Category: Every Day

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Every Day

My To Do List, Etc.

It’s been a busy 10 days and I loved every minute of it. My daughter in law arrived on Friday and my granddaughter was so glad to see her. 

Yesterday my son and grandson and their dog, Nori, came out for breakfast. All of us had a nice morning of just being with each other. It’s always a treat for me to have family together.

My granddaughter and DIL left about 11:30am to make the long trek home. They made an adventure out of it by taking back roads and staying off the highways. It took them 7 hours to get home but they enjoyed every minute of it. If you have never taken a different route to where you are going, try it sometime. It is fun to travel from one side of a state to the other and just enjoy the scenery.

My son and grandson left to go home about 2:30pm. The house seemed very quiet after the hustle and bustle of the week.

Hubby and I ate leftovers for dinner. We had leftover spaghetti sauce with meatballs so I made Hubby a pasta bake smothered in mozzarella cheese. I ate leftover broccoli and chicken. I will freeze the rest of the cooked chicken for another day. The rest of the pasta bake will be scooped up into portion size dinners and frozen.

But today I have quite a to do list to catch up on:

Get groceries at Aldi’s and Top’s – they have some good sales that I am not passing up.

Return deposit bottles to Fast Cash.

Package and take an Amazon return to UPS.

Go to the library to return books and take out a couple more.

All of the errands will be run in an efficient way to save on gasoline.

When I get home, I need to:

– strip 3 beds and wash sheets and all of the towels from 2 bathrooms

– write a Thank You note to the person who held the reunion

– work on some future blog posts

– clean a bedroom


– cut up the veggies to make two salads

-just relax and watch a movie


Do you guys have a busy Monday? Leave a comment and share with us what is on your agenda.

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Every Day

Our Day Trips

Since everyone is sleeping but me, I decided to post quickly about how our week is going. I am up very early and have opened all of the windows because it is 7 degrees cooler outside than in. So I am just typing away here enjoying the cool breeze.

On Monday, we took my granddaughter to Niagara Falls. We went to the American side which isn’t far from where we live. As we were driving along the Niagara River, my granddaughter says to me ” My cellphone says I am in Canada and has gone blank.” I quickly figured out that the closest cell tower was most likely on the Canadian side. 

Fortunately, her camera worked so that she could get some great pics. From the American side, you can see those Falls and the Canadian ones. The closest is the American Falls and the Canadian Falls is on the right in the background. The two countries are very close together at this point. 

I also did some Amazon Prime shopping to get Hubby a new tablet and Alexa some Queen vinyls for her record player. 

Image result for mohan, the baby rhino at the buffalo zoo  

 
Yesterday, we took her to the Buffalo Zoo. She has always loved this zoo. We all got to see the new baby Rhino, Mohan, who is 1 month old. He was just presented to the public for the first time last Friday. Earlier in the Spring, her Mom took her to Washington, DC to see the sites and they went to the National Zoo. She was disappointed. She said the Buffalo Zoo is so much better. So she was very excited to go.

Last night we got Five Guys food for dinner because it was hot outside and without A/C, I was not up to cooking. We got hamburgers and fries. I resisted the fries. It wasn’t easy because they smelled so good.

Alexa and I are going to go get her an Orange Cream at Arby’s later today. She loves them. Other than that we are going to stick close to home since the A/C repair people are coming. Fingers crossed that they can quickly fix the A/C. This has been the hottest week all summer to have it not working. 

Enjoy the rest of your week.

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Every Day

A Great Shopping Adventure With My Granddaughter!

When we arrived home after the reunion, I had nothing thawed to cook for dinner or lunch. So my granddaughter and I went to Wendy’s first so that she could eat a hamburger and fries for lunch.

Then she and I went grocery shopping for the week to buy her favorites so that I knew she would eat. Yes, I spoil her rotten but that is what Grandma’s do. We overbought on lots of treats(many she wanted to try) but whatever she doesn’t eat this week, I am sure my grandson will. Plus Hubby will eat some of them.

The pictures show everything we purchased. Sorry that one of them is blurry and I hadn’t noticed that. I don’t want to take the time to itemize the prices but we did spend $ 168.65. So lest you think I never spend any money, this shows that is not the case.

She only wanted chicken and spaghetti and meatballs for dinner. So we will be eating lots of chicken dishes.
The broccoli was for both she and I. I can fill in anything else that isn’t junk from my stockpile.

I couldn’t believe that she has never had a Twinkie or a Swiss Roll, so we got those for her to try. Her Dad used to love Twinkie’s.

What I didn’t tell you yesterday is that when Hubby turned on the A/C when we got home, it would not turn on. Even the fan isn’t working. We are hoping it is the thermostat. We called our A/C people for service Monday morning and they are swamped. So they can’t come until Wednesday afternoon. So we will be doing as much cooking outside as possible and with the air fryer and microwave. We don’t want to heat up the house. We open the windows at night and cool it down.

I hope you all have a great week! 

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Every Day

We Had The Best Weekend

Last Friday we started our journey to a family reunion. We left in the AM to drive to our Hilton Hotel in Eastern NY. That was a 5 hour drive. 

We drove non-stop with plenty of iced water, iced tea, and snacks in the car that we brought with us. I gassed the car up using $.20 off per gallon before we left.

After checking in the hotel, we left to drive to see our DIL and granddaughter and go out to dinner. My son was working.  We went to the Silver Spoon in Ravena. It is a cute diner that has just delicious food. They were able to accommodate my diet and that I appreciated. 

After spending some time with them, we returned to our hotel to get a good night’s sleep because we knew we had a long day on Saturday.

On Saturday, we made coffee in the room and had a snack that we brought from home for breakfast. We knew we would be eating lunch and dinner at the reunion.

Then we hopped back in the car to drive the almost 3 hours to the reunion in South Salem, NY. We are so glad that we decided to attend. Many of our generation have died but more of us are still here. We loved seeing each other again. It was like we had never been apart.  Many of the next two generations were also there and had a great day swimming in the lake, playing horseshoes and badminton and, going out in the canoe. We just loved catching up with each other and watching the young ones enjoy themselves. We also got to see a brother and sister and her husband who we don’t see as often as we like because of distance from each other.  

Lunch was a number of huge subs, fruit, salad, and greens and a myriad of salads. I was able to eat greens with some cheddar cheese on it and some strawberries. I always carry avocados from home whenever I travel. So I had 1/2 an avocado broken up on the greens which served as a dressing. Water was my drink of the day.

Dinner was hamburgers, chicken kabobs, greens and more salads. The kabobs and greens tasted terrific.

All day long there were cookies, cakes, cheesecake, etc. At 3PM, everyone minus me had their choice of a variety of ice cream. 

I have learned how to eat properly no matter where I go and that there are always things I can eat. When I weighed myself this morning, I had lost 2 more lbs. over the weekend.

Shortly after dinner, we left to drive the 3 hours back to the hotel. 

The next morning we left about 7AM to go to our son’s home and have breakfast. We picked up our granddaughter to bring her back with us for a week. So that was about 5 hours for our trip back home.

It was a lot of driving 3 days in a row and Hubby did it all. 

So with the exception of a short post tomorrow, I will be spending all of my precious time having fun with my granddaughter this week. After tomorrow I will be back posting again on next Monday. You guys have a great week!

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Every Day

The Rule of 72

I have always assumed that everyone knows the Rule of 72 when it comes to investing or saving your money. But having spoken with a number of people recently, I have found that my assumption is wrong. So many of them had never heard of it. So for those that don’t know or are new to saving and investing, I will explain it here.

The Rule of 72 is pretty simple to calculate. It says that if you want to know how many years it will take you to double your money at a given interest rate, you just divide the interest rate into 72.

Here is an example. If I earn an average annual 6% in the stock market, it would take me 12 years to double my money. If I earn 10% it would take me 7.2 years. 

If I only put my money into a savings account and the interest rate is 1.45%, it would take me 49.65 years to double my money. This shows you pretty quickly that investing in a savings account isn’t going to build wealth rapidly. But if you want a safe investment, savings accounts are fine.

When you invest in the stock market, it is risky for a couple of reasons. You can lose a lot of money if the market tanks like a lot of people did in the mortgage meltdown. They lost because they got nervous and pulled their money out at a big loss. So they ended up not being in when the market went back up. Your money invested in the market is not FDIC insured. 

Your savings account is FDIC insured up to $250,000. per depositor per bank. If you have a joint account with your Hubby, you are insured up to $500,000. on that account.

So each person or family has to decide if they want risk or not. Risk builds wealth quickly. Not taking risk takes many years to build wealth. Do what you are comfortable with.


Anyhow this is how to calculate how long it will take to double your money using the Rule of 72.


I hope you all have a fun and safe weekend!

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Every Day

Saving With The Small Pressure Cooker

I love pressure cooking. I have two, a large one and this tiny one.
Remember the smaller the appliance, the less electricity it takes to operate.  I believe I paid $19.99 for this and I have more than gotten my money’s worth.

I use this over and over again especially to cook rice.  Hubby loves rice and I hate the mess it makes when I cook it on the stove. I usually end up with a spill all over my burner.

Besides rice it makes just enough macaroni and cheese for two to three. I no longer eat pasta or rice but it is perfect for 2-3 servings when we have the grandchildren.

It is also perfect to make those rice mixes or even Kraft macaroni and cheese which I do sometimes for West. Many days I have made soup in it. It is just enough for us.

It takes so little energy over what it costs to use a burner on my stove. I  measured it with my KWH meter and it is just a few cents to operate. I only use my larger pressure cooker when I am cooking a larger piece of meat, making a stew, a pot roast, or when we have company.

So if you want to save money on electricity, think about the size of the appliance that you are using. Use the smallest one that will cook what you want efficiently.  And remember in the heat(summer or longer where you live), use it outside on your patio, porch, or garage.

Do you use any small appliances to save on energy costs? Please share with us in comments so that others can learn from you. 

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Every Day

Frugal Things This Past Week

These are the things we have done frugally this past week:

– We watched fireworks from our home. Neighbors at different ends of our street put on quite a show with lots of big stuff. We didn’t have to drive and use gasoline to go anywhere. 

– We cooked at home from scratch every night.

– I got another free $5.00 Amazon gift card. I used that gift card to defray the cost of 3 ounces of organic stevia.

– Even though we paid for mulch through the landscape company a few weeks ago, Hubby had to go and buy 5 bags to replace what got dug up with the tree. This will give us extra as needed. He purchased it on sale for a total of $10. at Home Depot.

– I went to the YMCA and exercised 3 days last week. I have also been doing a lot of walking.

– I purchased some more boneless chicken breasts at Aldi’s for $ 1.49 a lb.

– I purchased salmon fillets for a sale price of $10.99 a lb. at Top’s. I love salmon and this is a good price here.

– We were rebated $19.68 in credit card reward points. 

– We celebrated our 52nd wedding anniversary with a home cooked meal. 

– We do not exchange gifts on our anniversary. But I did give Hubby a card and made a carrot cake for him.

– I collected warmup water from our shower and used it to water our hanging baskets.

– I read my library books in 2 and 1/2 days and  returned them. Cheap entertainment!

– We have been using up free toiletries that have been just hanging around here.

– We continue to cut our electric and natural gas bill as much as we can. 


– Scanned the grocery receipts into Fetch for rebate points.

– Returned Hubby’s soda bottles and cans for $ 1.25. 

– DIY: We had some squeaky hinges on some of our doors. Hubby oiled them all. Now when I get up at 4 in the morning, I won’t wake Hubby up.


Feel free to leave a comment and share what you did frugally this past week. 

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Every Day

What We Ate and Grocery Shopping

I only grocery shopped one time this week. This is what we purchased.

Chicken breasts were again $ 1.49 a lb. at Aldi’s. I purchased one large package. Then I cut the breasts into smaller portions lengthwise and used the food saver to package and freeze them. I also purchased 3 avocados for $.79 each and 2 heavy whipping cream to use in our coffee for $ 1.55 each. My Aldi’s total was $11.77.

At Top’s, I purchased 4 packages of Parmesan Crisps for snacks and to put on salads for $ 2.50 each. Salmon was on sale for $10.99 a lb and that will give me 5 meals. Hubby asked for the 100% apple juice boxes. So I picked up 1 package of 8 for $2.39. Lastly, I purchased 2 G. Hughes sugar free ketchup for $2.99 each. My Top’s total was $40.57.


As you all know, we eat from our pantry and freezer stockpile while replenishing our produce when needed. So here are the meals we ate this past week.

One night we had taco salads and one night we had Chef’s salads with chicken pieces on it. We also had pork chops and steamed spinach another night.

Then I had salmon and oriental veggies and Hubby had leftover pork made into fried rice.

One night we had lemon garlic chicken and asparagus. Last night I made our anniversary dinner. Hubby cooked porterhouse steaks on the grill. I made riced cauliflower for me and I baked potatoes in the air fryer for Hubby. I baked him 3 potatoes. That way he has two leftover for other meals this week. We have leftover steak to go with 2 breakfasts this week.

We skipped lunch all week and ate late breakfasts so that we could intermittent fast. Breakfasts were always eggs over easy or scrambled with our choice of Canadian bacon, regular bacon, or chicken breakfast sausage. Many breakfasts I had 1/2 an avocado with them.


So what did you cook this past week? Did you get any great deals while grocery shopping? Please share in comments so that we can learn from each other.
 

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Every Day

Till Debt Do Us Part

How many of you knew that there is a Canadian show called “Till Debt Do Us Part”?  I didn’t. Since we are debt free, including no mortgage, I was never looking for shows like this. I stumbled upon it on Saturday on You Tube. So I did some binge watching of a number of shows.


Of course it is a lot of entertainment but if you have never budgeted your money, it might be helpful in that area. 

The premise is that a woman named, Gail, who has a background in finance makes house calls to people who are seriously in debt and need someone’s help to set up a plan to get rid of that debt. 

She shows the couples how much over their income they are spending each month and how much debt they will be in in 5 years if they don’t fix it. 

She also sets up a budget for them so that they can be out of debt in a few years.

Now I am skeptical about how many of these couples actually follow their plan after the three weeks of the show is gone. Especially of those who I am sure will never change their ways. There were some couples I watched who I hope made it to their debt free date. However, there were some who thought it was all a big joke and I am sure were just after the “up to $5000.00” that she would give them if they did what she told them and had good attitudes. Hopefully, Gail made sure that the money was put on their debt and didn’t leave it up to the couples to do it.

I am sure there are many couples like them who are just really bad with their money. Either they have never been taught how to budget with their money or they believe they “deserve” to buy whatever they want whether they can pay for it or not. The latter I don’t have any sympathy for. They are the ones who end up having their cars repossessed, losing their homes, and ruining their credit. 

If you have debt, please take a look at some of the videos that I will link. It may open your eyes. I can’t link them all but I will give you links to some of the ones that I thought were interesting: 

Debt On A Tight Rope

Slaying The Debt Dragon

Time To Pay The Piper

Cash Poor House Proud

Ground By Debt

Gail Force of Winds

You can find a lot more here or by searching for each Season in the search bar:

A Lot More 

I hope these motivate some of you to budget your money and tackle your debt. You can not have true freedom and less stress unless you do something about it.

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Every Day

Saving While Cleaning

Cleaning is something that will cost you a fortune over your lifetime. There are tons of cleaning products in the stores that lure you into spending your money over and over again.

Here are some ways that I save on the cost of cleaning products.

– Buy your Magic Erasers as generics at Dollar Tree or in bulk on Amazon. Cut them in half. You usually don’t need a whole one to do the job.

– Use microfiber cloths instead of paper towels. My window ones do a great job. I use these cloths for just about every cleaning job.

– I like the Method all purpose cleaners so I stock when I see a great price. I find these cleaners do 90% of the cleaning jobs around my home. Or you can make your own with vinegar and orange peels.

– Don’t use store bought Swiffers- dry or wet. I use an old fashioned dry mop and a reusable mop with washable pads.

– I use reusable dusting wands that I can hand wash and hang to dry. 

– Don’t use Lysol Wipes that you have to buy over and over again. Make your own with some paper towels and vinegar. Or use a microfiber cloth like I do. They do a great job in sinks and tubs. I only use Lysol wipes in the car. I keep a container of them in case of a messy car job on the road or a spill. 

-Make your own daily shower cleaner. I use vinegar, rubbing alcohol and water. Just use google to find one.

– We use our own steam cleaner a few times a year to keep the shower clean. It does a great job on grout. 

– Don’t pay to have your carpets cleaned. We have purchased two shampooers over the years and we clean our own.

– Use a packet of citrus Kool Aid like lemonade to clean the inside of your dishwasher. It costs pennies compared to the products they sell to do it.

– I use vinegar in my dishwasher instead of Jet Dry.

– Good old cheap Pine Sol mixed in a bucket does a great job on floors.

– Cut steel wool pads in half for whatever job you need them for. Half a pad will usually do the job.

– Clean your kitchen sink with baking soda and a microfiber cloth. Clean the garbage disposal with baking soda and vinegar. Make sure to mix it in a container in the sink because it will fizz up. Pour it down the garbage disposal and let it sit a bit. In between deep cleanings I throw my lemon slices from my lemon water in it and grind them up.

– Throw a cheap Equate denture tablet in the toilet and let it fizz. Then use a reusable toilet brush to clean it. 

These are just some of the ways I save. I am sure there are plenty more. Feel free to share in comments the way you save on cleaning. We can all learn from each other.