Tag: a little of this and a little of that

Categories
Every Day

A Little of This and a Little of That

I needed some food for Eloise so I planned on placing an order with Chewy. To my surprise when I went online to do that they had a deal where if you ordered $100. worth of products, you got a $30. gift card for your next order. I stocked up and the $30. gift card will get used when I need something more for her. I also used autoship so I got 10% off my order.

Hubby needed a new wallet. His was at least 15 years old and falling apart. We found him a new one that he absolutely loves for $15.99 marked down from $ 34.99. However, it is now marked down to $12.99 if anyone is in need. It is here https://www.walmart.com/ip/Aursear-Wallet-for-Men-Slim-Genuine-Leather-Mens-Wallet-RFID-Blocking-Credit-Card-Holder-with-Money-Clip/1189202732

We have been keeping all lights off in the daylight hours. I just turned the heat off because I am tired of the high utility bills. It is chilly in here but we have put sweatshirts on. We are trying to cook most of our dinners on the outside grill. Today I will use the washer to do a load of clothes in cold water with minimal detergent. They will get hung to dry. I have been washing the dishes in a dishpan in the sink to save on water. I am not using the dishwasher to see if that saves on the electric bill.

I made turkey club sandwiches for dinner last night. I cooked the entire package of bacon so that we have some to go with eggs for brunch today. We will have lasagna for dinner tonight. The small oven we will bake it in will help take the chill out of the house.

I did a bit of grocery shopping yesterday. At Aldi’s I bought 2 – l lb. packages of fresh strawberries for $ 1.69 a lb. I also purchased a package of brioche hot dog buns to go with some hot dogs that I already have in the freezer. They were $ 2.49. For the first time in a long time, I found some red stickers in the meat dept. They were breakfast sausages with $1.00 off stickers. So I got 2 packages for $ .98 each. I am always on the hunt for meat for our family Sunday breakfasts. All purchases were cheaper than Walmart, my other cheap store.

Then I went to Top’s. After I got rid of some old prescriptions that we were no longer using at the lock box in the pharmacy, I did a bit of shopping. I purchased a large onion at $.99 a lb. for a total of $ 1.28, a Free carton of Top’s ice cream with a coupon ($ 4.29) they sent me, used my raincheck to get another large package of BS chicken breasts for $ 1.99 a lb. for a total of $ 10.27( one package of the three I got this week is pictured above), 3 packages of Fresh Express Salad Kits for $ 3.00 each, 1.75 lbs. of tomatoes at $1.88 a lb. for a total of $ 3.29, 1 lb. of Ronzoni elbow macaroni for $ .99, and 9 cans of Mary Kitchen corned beef hash at $ 3.99 each minus $ .75/1 coupons that doubled to $ 1.50 each for a total of $22.41. My total for all came to $ 51.53. Then she took off my $5.00/50.00 coupon that Top’s sent me for a total of $ 46.53 and the $4.29 coupon for the ice cream for a total of $ 42.24. Hubby loves the corned beef hash so I stocked for him. The coupons were from prior cans that had them. The ones I got also had the coupons on them so I will be stocking more. I rarely buy the salad kits but these were a better price than I have seen in a long time. They will make dinners easy this week while I catch up all the work that didn’t get done while I was dealing with my sciatica.

I am off to pay some bills. Did any of you save a little bit of money this week? Please share with all of us.

Categories
Every Day

Spending As Little As Possible

Our Top’s had BS chicken breasts on sale this week. I had just inventoried the freezer last weekend with some help. Lots of beef and pork but very little chicken which surprised me. I guess we had been eating it up faster than I thought. So my intent was to look for chicken on sale. I did not expect that to happen anytime soon. However, our ad came for this past week last Sunday. There was a super coupon to get a 5-6 lb. package for $1.99 a lb. I don’t shop on weekends so I waited until Monday and they had been wiped out of the chicken on Sunday. So I got a raincheck. They told me they might get a truck in on Tuesday. I had an appointment that took me right past Top’s that day. So I stopped in to see if they had more chicken which they did. But they only had 3 packages so I snagged one. There was a limit of one. Yesterday, Hubby had to go out yesterday so we snagged another one of two that were there. Later in June, I will use the raincheck when things are better stocked. I had not been able to get chicken breasts for this price in years.

So now we are pretty stocked for the summer. Since meat is so expensive, we are weighing out 4 ounces for each of us when we eat it. That is all the protein anyone needs for dinner. Some days we have more if we use a bit of bacon, ham, or sausage for brunch. But not every day! Tonight we will each have 4 ounces of scallops and a tossed salad.

It’s hard to believe that it is Memorial Day weekend already. It has been so cold this spring that we feel like it is still winter. We had to turn our heat back on after only a few days with it off because it is so cold at night. It is still on and it is almost June. It is supposed to warm up this week. I hope so because we are sick of the cold and rain.

We got our electric and natural gas bill this past Thursday. I was in shock when we saw how much is was. It was for 33 days and was 455 KWH and 43.3 therms. For any of you who have noticed, I have been putting the wrong amount for therms on my prior bills. I was using the daily average instead of the monthly therms. Sorry! Last year’s bill for the same time period was only 30 days and was 412 KWH and 37.1 therms. So 3 more days than last year, 43 KWH more and 6.2 more therms. Last year’s bill was $70. less than this year’s. Our latest bill was $ 225.23. I expected this bill to be bigger but not this much bigger. I told Hubby the heat is going off soon no matter how cold it is. He can put on a blanket, sweatshirt or coat. Some of this bill was with the new smart meters and some from the old. I am hoping they get the daily usage up on our account soon. The meter has been in for a while. I stopped in last week at our utility company’s customer service center because I could not get ahold of them by phone to find out when it would be up on their site. The rep told me within the next 2 weeks. I want to be able to watch the usage so that I know what is using the most energy.

Update on my denture repair: It cost $276. and lasted less than 24 hours. So Hubby dropped it off to the dentist this week so it can be repaired again. I hope to get it back midweek next week. But I am leery that it will work this time. My sister is having the same issue. She thinks that they are not making them as good as they used to. Her first denture lasted 22 years. The new one has been repaired twice and she has not had it very long. I believe she may be right. Thank God I have a spare.

With the exception that our landscape service will be coming soon with a new tree for the front yard, I don’t see any major expenses until our September school tax bill. Hubby went down to the nursery to scope out a tree. We have decided on a red maple. So Hubby trusts our landscaper to pick out the largest one he can get that is nicely shaped. Ben gets a better price than we do. My son and Hubby cut down both dead trees last Sunday leaving enough stump for Ben to be able to pull them out with his truck. We have decided not to plant one in the side yard because it a wind tunnel through there and the tree won’t survive like the last one didn’t. So we will have Ben take both stumps out, plant the new one out front, take up the stone that encircled the one on the side, and either he or we will plant grass there.

As you can see by our chicken purchases, we are spending as little as possible. I believe we have enough meat and fish now to last until at least the September Labor Day sales. However if I see chicken again at $ 1.99 a lb. I will buy more. We have enough food that I will only have to shop for fresh dairy and produce. I will be making most of our own bread. The cheap bread in our stores is awful unless I can get Italian from the bakery at a good price at Walmart. And then it doesn’t last long unless I freeze it!

We were craving a take out pizza last night but instead I made a homemade one that was just as good.

I am feeling better so I hope to blog a few more times this week. I hope you all have a great Memorial Day weekend. It will be quiet here just the two of us. We will probably grill out a few times weather permitting.

How have you been saving money? Did you buy any great sales this week?

Categories
Every Day

Happy Mother’s Day Tomorrow

I hope you all have a fantastic day! We will be enjoying the day by cooking filet mignon on the grill. That is my favorite meal!

I wish I could be on here more often but my sciatica has been horrid the past month or so. It hurts to sit and stand. Advil is not working for me. So I have been doing a lot of reading lately laying down. I am trying to work through frugality books that I have read before. A special online friend and her husband are coming to visit again this summer. I am making a pile of the books as I read them to see if there are any she would like to take home with her before I donate them to our local library.

Hopefully the pain will go away soon. I have been doing exercises to try to get that to happen. You all know how active I am, so I am hating this! I seriously thought about ending my blog. But if you will be patient, I will continue it when I can and be back to normal soon. Prayers if you are a praying person. I would really appreciate those.

But we have been as frugal as we can right now. I am working on a # of problems. It looks like Mint Mobile is not billing us correctly and QVC put someone else’s charge on our bill. So hopefully I will have that all straightened out this coming week. The one time I went out two weeks ago, I lost my credit card. No one had used it. But I cancelled it and they say it will take 2 weeks for another to arrive. Fortunately, I have another one to use. I did not realize that I had lost it until I went to pay $ 402. for my dental cleaning and X rays at the dentist. That was a week later. I gave the dentist my denture to repair. I had a tooth pop out of it a while ago. But I have a spare, so I waited for my appointment to bring it in to him. The repair will cost $276. when I go to pick it up. UGH!

The other bad thing that affected us this week is Rite Aid is going out of business. So we have been switching every prescription to a new pharmacy. Second time we have had to do this in just a few months. What a pain!

Hubby and I went to our appointment to see the town assessor two weeks ago to dispute the $33,000. raise in our assessment for our home. They had raised us tentatively from $ 470,000. to $503, 000. The assessor agreed with us and they are leaving our assessment at $470,000. We have a letter to show that. We had to sign it and get it back to them. I did that the same day it came in the mail. Of course, we made a copy of it. Also we have qualified finally for a reduction of our assessment because we are old for the school taxes. We have been paying full school taxes since we moved here. So our assessment for school taxes only will be $ 383,900. Needless to say until we get the tax bills I won’t know what we will actually save. But I am happy about all of this!

We have barely had any sales on decent meat in my grocery or warehouse stores. Especially on beef and chicken. So we are working on eating the chicken in our freezers. However last week, Niagara Produce had cowboy steaks on sale for $13.49 a lb. Not a great price but since we have been doing very little shopping, we had money saved up from our grocery budget. I bought 6 for $ 168.00. That will give us some beef to grill along with the filet mignons and strip steaks that we already had. This should give us plenty of beef for the summer. However, I am always looking for those sales.

During the Walmart + benefit week, I was able to fill up our car at $.50 off a gallon. I was also able to get a Free Express order and not pay the extra $10.00 for it. I also used the scan and go and spent $15. on stock up items to get $5.00 Cash back.

We were able to save $4,000. for the month of April. We are slowly getting to our goal. We spent landscaping money to the tune of $1700. which was an extra expense.

That is about it for now. What have you done frugally the past 2 weeks?

Categories
Every Day

A Little of This and a Little of That

The below post I wrote one week ago. I thought I had published it. But I must have forgot. Sorry about that.

It has been another busy week. We had 4 appointments this week and we have 4 next week. They take a chunk out of our time especially when they are scheduled midday. They will be easing up after that because Hubby is cutting back his PT to once a week. He will do the second one at home. He ordered the little bit of equipment that he needs. Fortunately, it cost under $35. We have a heating pad and ice bag which he has been using at night before bed. We joke about the ice bag. It is almost 58 years old. I purchased it when we got married. I suppose we could buy a new one but this one works perfectly fine.

In between all of the going out, I have been spring cleaning our home. Hubby has always cleaned and polished all of our hardwood floors and we have a lot of them. He can no longer do them so I have added this chore to my list. I did all of them this week and they turned out beautiful. I was very proud of myself. It hurts my back a bit but I am in better shape than Hubby right now.

I have also been getting my downstairs pantry into better shape. Over the past few months it has become messy when I don’t have time to put away the grocery hauls. It is starting to look much better now.

I have been trying to find time to clean and organize the downstairs freezer. But every time I schedule time to do it, something comes up.

I am hoping to get the SUV washed and clean the inside. I may take it to the carwash this week which will save me some time. Then when I get home, I will vacuum and wash the inside and do all the windows. Now that we finally have some nice weather coming, it should stay cleaner longer. It has been so cold and crappy here. We still have our heat on. I got a huge electric and gas bill for the past month. It was for $ 281.58. It is 66 right now as I write this but raining. It is supposed to clear up this afternoon and then be cloudy tomorrow and 52. Then 53 to 62 the rest of the week. That is much better than it has been. Maybe if the nights get warmer, we can turn off our heat soon.

This week we got a $10. rebate check in the mail along with a Pillsbury coupon good for any product up to $8.00. We also got a notice from Rite Aid to join their class action suit because my info was hacked. So got that taken care of today. So many companies are not keeping your info safe.

Hubby made a big pot of his homemade chili this week. We ate it for 3 nights and then had some on hot dogs one night. Last night we picked up 2 fish fry dinners from Chiavettas since it was Good Friday. They come with French fries. They were so good and we have leftovers for tonight.

Did any of you watch the Matlock Finale this week? It was so exciting and such an ending. I am happiest that it has been renewed for another season.

My son had a really busy week so he is staying home and resting this weekend. We will miss him and West but will see them next weekend. So I think I will continue to spring clean my home. I can work in a couple of bathrooms today and the laundry room tomorrow.

Now this is the current week. I cooked a turkey breast this week. We had turkey dinners two nights in a row. Then I put the rest in the freezer in 2 person portions to use in the future.

I have been working so hard this week that Hubby decided we should treat ourselves and go out to dinner on Thursday night. We have a new brewery in a close by city called the Big Ditch. It is a beautifully renovated space. The food and beer were excellent. Service was outstanding. We will have to take your Hubby there Chris when you visit again. I think he would like it.

We ended up with 4 appointments this week and our only free day got booked by our landscape crew to do the spring cleanup and mulching. They will be back to take 2 trees out that died. They got a blight. They will replace the one out front and just seed where the other one is. It never did well on that side of the house because of the wind tunnel that goes through there anyhow.

This week I picked up some shelf stable milk at Dollar Tree. I also picked up a few items at Aldi’s one of which was a carrot cake that Hubby and I love and it was marked down by $2.00. That was about it for shopping.

We got our tentative assessment for our property. They raised us again this year by $33,000. That brings us almost to the assessment that they tried to raise us to the last time that we fought it. So we have an appointment to fight it again next week. Housing has not been selling in our neighborhood. The house partially behind us has been on the market for over 2 years. Getting the builder to have the lawn mowed is another problem we have. When it gets higher, I will contact the town about it. I dealt with the sales rep last year and she was nasty. So I will report them this year. It is a code violation. A neighbor put their house on the market for three months and took it off because it didn’t sell. I believe they are not selling because interest rates are too high. Anyhow Hubby is working on the grievance so that we have a strong case.

Well that is it for right now. I have another post that I have been working on to help you. It is 1/2 done. I will try to get it on here within a couple of days.

What have you gals and guys been up to?

Categories
Every Day

My Project That I Am Working On

I am trying to get more organized in my freezers again. It seems that I have been so busy over the past few months that things have just gotten thrown in them wherever they fit instead of being really organized with a good plan.

So this past week in between appointments and other things, I have been tackling my two freezer drawers in my refrigerator. First thing I did was make a plan. I decided that all frozen vegetables and fruits, potato items like French Fries, quick prepared meal items(any purchased from the market or homemade leftovers), breakfast meats, ( bacon, sausage, ham, Steakums), ice cream, homemade preserves, and the meat I would be using in the next two weeks for dinner would go in these drawers. That will save me from running downstairs so often and opening the chest freezer.

The jars are the preserves and leftover homemade soups. Things that we can grab quickly for brunch.

We always keep a bag of frozen potpies because they are my guilty pleasure, some tortellini which I use in soup, avocados to go with my bacon and eggs once in a while.

I just went to B’J’s on Thursday. Hubby had his physical therapy that day. So I dropped him off and went to the warehouse club to pick up one item. B’J’s was only 2 and 1/2 blocks away. I had a free coupon for a 56 oz. Ling Lings Potstickers that was expiring this coming Tuesday. It was free because we have no tax on food here. By going with him I didn’t have to spend any more for gasoline doing a second trip.

You will see in these drawers that I have two plastic bags with white things in them. Sorry about the pictures but I am still having trouble with my phone. The white things are the potstickers. I repackaged them so that we could get 4 meals out of them and be able to fit them in these freezer drawers. I have a bulletin board on my refrigerator where I put directions from packages so I have them when needed.

I think this plan is going to work well for us. Time will tell. If it doesn’t, I will tweak it.

It took me a long time to do this with the short period of time I had because I had to go through my chest freezer to pull out the things that I wanted upstairs. Then I had to bring things from upstairs downstairs to make room for all of the things. Now my downstairs freezer needs major attention so I will work on that this week in between two medical appointments for me. That is going to take a lot of the rest of my time.

My son and West came for breakfast this morning. Afterwards I planned on going to our town’s electronics recycling with the frame that died the other day. My son said he would take it to his college’s recycling. That saved me a trip. I made eggs, bacon, and French toast for breakfast today. Everyone was happy!

We have been eating chicken for the past few days. We should finish it tonight.

I think I have a sinus infection and possible ear infection. I doubt that I will be able to get an appointment quickly with my doctor. So I may make a trip to urgent care in the morning.

That’s it for now.

Categories
Every Day

A Little Of This And A Little of That

I ran most of the rest of the errands for the week. I went to Home Depot to drop off another ION battery at their recycle bins. I missed it when I brought the other ones up.

Then I went to Top’s to get our groceries this week. Their ad was not very good. But I did pick up needed celery for $.99 and 1 lb. of Oscar Mayer Center Cut Bacon for $5.99 with a Super Coupon. I will be going to B.J.’s tomorrow combining the shop with an appointment. I have a Free coupon for a large bag of Ling Ling’s Potsticker’s that is expiring on March 30th. It will be no cost to me because we have no tax on food in my state.

We got our Electric and Natural Gas Bill for the past month. It was $270.84. I used 84 more kwh of electricity than the same period last year and 10 more therms. The bill for the same period last year was $208.81 so this one is much higher but $ 41.00 less than last month so at least we are headed in the right direction. Hopefully, it will warm up soon but we are in a bitter cold spell and it is snowing right now.

I am hoping that one of my sons has a chainsaw. We no longer do. We have 2 trees that need to come down. They aren’t that big so I think it is okay for us to take them down without hitting the house. I hate to pay a tree service to do it. They are so expensive. We had two trees that were close to our home taken down last year and it cost a fortune.

We have been trying to use up leftovers the past week or so. We have had 2 turkey BLT’s using up turkey that we thawed, bacon for brunch meals of eggs and bacon that was leftover, tomatoes that needed to be used up and the same for romaine lettuce. Other meals have been rib eye pork chops with fried apples and crispy crowns(emptied a bag), stir fry with chicken and sesame sauce on rice. Tonight will be grilled filet mignon, baked potatoes( I will bake extra for potato salad), and brussel sprouts.

I have done 2 loads of laundry in cold water and hung one and dried the other of sheets in the dryer.

We had a weird thing happen to us yesterday. I heard a noise in Hubby’s office. Every few seconds I would hear it. Eloise followed me because she heard it to. We couldn’t find anything but it sounded like it was in the wall behind one of our ladder bookcases. I am thinking mouse but we have never had one. Eloise was interested but not that interested which surprised me. I got Hubby but I didn’t know if he would hear it because he has lost hearing in one ear and most in the other. He could just barely hear it but couldn’t see anything either. It was above my pantry. I was getting worried that we might have a mouse down there. But we have never had one. As I was about to leave the office to go down and check, I saw our electronic picture frame(on the shelf of the bookcase) turn on and the screen become black with a red line across it. I told Hubby and he quickly unplugged it. We listened and the noise was gone. We haven’t heard it since. We got this electronic frame when Alexa was born that holds lots of pictures which recycle in it when you turn it on. It was almost 18 years old so I guess it bit the dust. So we have thrown it out. But I am glad it wasn’t a mouse! And I am happy we have those pictures on other devices.

I have been working on our food storage a few hours this week and I continue to do so. I will be showing you what I am doing on Friday. I don’t think I will have time tomorrow.

So what have you been doing? Saving any money?

Categories
Every Day

Cutting Costs on Groceries, Etc.

We are now making our own yogurt. I had to buy one container to use as a starter. But with each successive batch, I save some to make the next batch.

We eat what is in our home already. The biggest reason is so that things do not go to waste. The next reason is that some of the prices over the last couple of days are starting to come down especially on eggs. They are now down $4.00 for a 60 count since the last time I purchased that box. By keeping my price book, I can tell when something has been reduced. I think they will continue moving in that direction so I will be buying nothing that is already on our shelves or in our freezers. That food was a whole lot cheaper than the prices now so while prices fall I will use up that food.

We continue to make more and more bread items. We are now making our own pizza dough every 2 weeks.

I buy fresh potatoes so that I can make baked potatoes, mashed potatoes, wedges, French fries, fried potatoes, hash browns and potato pancakes. I can get the fresh for about $ .40 a lb. That is a lot cheaper than canned or frozen.

We make our own puddings and jellos from the boxed. Buying the ready made is so much more expensive. I stockpiled about 100 of each over the last 4 years at $.68 each. They are now $ .98 each and up.

We buy generic(store brands) when we can. They are much cheaper. But they have to have very few ingredients when I do that.

I always shop with a list. That prevents me from impulse buying.

Hubby is hooked on diet cola again. I am trying to get him to drink more iced tea. We do buy pomegranate juice that we each drink about 1/2 cup a day for our health.

I am now buying chunks of cheese and grating my own. We have decided that we don’t want the cellulose in our food.

Ninety eight percent of the time I only buy on sale items. I will buy a lot when there is a a good deal. That way I rarely have to pay full price for anything.

I use Fetch to scan my receipts to earn gift cards which I use to defray the cost of groceries.

Well that is enough for now about groceries.

The picture above is of my brunch yesterday. I had my pomegranate juice with 2 eggs over easy and a piece of salmon. One of the reasons we watch our pennies is so that we can afford to buy salmon occasionally. This had been in my freezer for a couple of months. I bought it on sale for $7.99 a lb. which is a great price for my area. It was such a treat. Yes, I pan fried it in butter. I like the crunch.

We have been eating reuben sandwiches the last couple of nights using up the corned beef that I cooked for St. Patrick’s Day. Hubby makes them using the indoor grill in our home. I think we will probably have them again tonight. The rest of the corned beef I will freeze for other meals.

Hubby and I have watched our shows that we DVR for entertainment this week. We have also taken advantage of the warm weather and sunshine by sitting outside.

Hubby has been trimming the bushes. Our landscape guy will be coming the beginning of April to do the real Spring cleanup and mulch all of our gardens. Unfortunately we have lost 1 tree and are about to lose 3 others in our yard. Our pear tree which was so beautiful is dead due to a blight in this area. The same blight is killing 3 spruce trees that are about 20 ft. tall. We are trying to figure out what we want to do to replace them or have them cut down. Trees are so expensive. We are getting older every day and probably won’t be around to see them grow. So most likely we will have them removed and take the stones up that encircle those areas and plant grass.

It was our turn to read the electric and gas meters so I read them yesterday and submitted them to the company. We used 120 ccf’s of natural gas which is about what we used for the same period last year. Our electric usage was 490 kwh which is about normal for us. I expect our bill will be huge. I will let you know when we get it. I never realized until President Trump mentioned that New York state has the highest energy prices in the nation and that is why he is working with our Governor to bring the pipeline in. He says it will lower our costs. I hope so because right now it is so expensive.

I perused the new ads for next week and I don’t see any good deals that I can use. So I will probably not grocery shop.

That is it for today.

Categories
Every Day

Cutting Costs

One of the most important things that we do to cut costs is to use our time wisely. We all only have a finite amount of time to live our lives so we must use it well. Hubby and I are not ones to play online games. I realize that some people use it as a means of entertainment but I could easily see how that could take up immense amounts of time that you could use to cut costs, cook from scratch, track your budget so that you can really see what you are wasting your money on, and track grocery prices, etc.

I did Solitaire for a while because I felt it kept my mind sharp. But I finally realized that I could do that by writing my blog and reading. I love to read but don’t do it as much as I would like to. So I will be adding time for that into my schedule each week.

So getting up in the morning and immediately wasting hours of time online is not in my wheelhouse. I do check my e-mail and facebook messages during the day but very little time is spent doing that. My computer is turned off most of the day unless I am writing a blog post.

We have cut our morning coffee costs. Hubby very rarely has a cup of coffee in the morning. I used to drink 3-4 cups a day. I only drink one with my brunch now. Today I had that cup with my scrambled eggs and SteakUms. Hubby had a toasted cinnamon raisin English muffin that was in the freezer.

The only deals that got me to grocery shop the end of the week were 2 dozen medium eggs for $ 3.49 each at Top’s. And a few things I needed at BJ’s. I got 2 very large boxes of raisins for $10.49 each, one large bag of Skinny Pop( my guilty pleasure) for $ 6.79, and a 8.23 lb. corned beef for $5.49 a lb. for a total of $ 45.18. My total for all groceries this week was $ 79.93. The corned beef was the best price I could find in my area. Most of them were $ 8.09 to $8.69 a lb. Since it was so big, I cut it in half and we will have it for St. Patrick’s Day and I froze the other half for some meals late in 2025.

My shopping was combined with my two doctor appointments this week so as to not waste gasoline.

I have an envelope that I put receipts in so that I can enter them into Fetch every week to save for Walmart gift cards. I did enter them this week. It only takes a few minutes and it is so worth it.

We got our quarterly water and sewer bill midweek. It was for $ 58.03 and included a $ 3.+ sewer rate hike. We used the minimum amount of water. For those who don’t know, I take Navy showers which does not take much water at all. I use the dishwasher about twice a week but wash many dishes by hand like pots and pans, wooden utensils, wine glasses, and the lids to glass containers, etc. I use a dishpan with soapy water and a pan to rinse.

When I boil water for pasta, etc., I use the same water to water plants or flush a toilet. No water goes to waste in this house. We do get a large water bill when we use our sprinkler system to water our lawn about 4 months a year.

On Ash Wednesday, we had coconut shrimp with mango sauce for dinner. On Thursday, I made 2 meals of spaghetti and meatballs. I made garlic bread from a $1.00 loaf of Italian bread to go with it. On Friday, I went to Chiavetta’s and picked up fish fries and French fries. I was hungry so I ate all of my fish. Hubby has some fish left for dinner tonight. We have plenty of French fries leftover. Those items will get heated up in the air fryer. I am going to put some chili on top of my FF’s. Tomorrow night we will finish up the spaghetti and meatballs with more garlic bread. That should finish all the leftovers in the fridge. Waste not want not!

The only other spending we did was to get some Burts Bees Waterless Cat Shampoo for Eloise and some new underwear for me. Mine was 4 years old so it was time for some new. I never put underwear in the dryer so it lasts me a very long time. That was all under $35. I also spent $13.00 for a car wash. Of course the next day, it rained while I was out at the doctor’s so it is a bit dirty again. If it gets a little warmer in the next couple of weeks I will wash it in our driveway.

This afternoon I used my Instant Pot to hard boil a dozen eggs for next week’s brunches, snacks, and salads. I also used some shelf stable milk to make some SF pudding for the week.

In between errands and doctor’s appointments, I have been doing some spring cleaning. My windows are so dirty that I can’t wait until I can wash them.

Well I am off to hang my laundry. I will TTYL.

What have you done to cut costs lately?

Categories
Every Day

A Little Of This And A Little Of That

It has been a very busy week of appointments and errands. Our week started off with my son and West coming for breakfast on Sunday. I cooked a lb. of bacon, a lb. of sausage, and scrambled eggs(about a dozen and a half), and made French toast which took 4 more eggs. These eggs are getting expensive. I think I will start thawing the eggs in my freezer for our next big breakfast. It is still cheaper for me to cook than take everyone out to our Greek restaurant for breakfast. Then we spent a few hours playing rummy which this Grandma loves!

We ate all of our meals from our stockpile. We finished the turkey making a big pot of soup. We had a filet mignon, baked potato, and broccoli for dinner last night. Tonight we are splurging and getting take out fish fries from Chiavetta’s. We have not had them since last Lent( they started selling them again in November) so this will be a real treat. This weekend I will put a chuck roast in the crockpot and make a stew with plenty of carrots, onions, and potatoes. That will last us 3-4 days.

Two days ago I ran a lot of errands. I had to go to the Post Office with mail, to Home Depot to dispose of three Ion Recyclable batteries that were no longer charging, fill the car up with gasoline using my $.30 off a gallon, to Top’s for on sale cat litter and a half gallon of Half and Half, and to the liquor store. After that I was beat.

Yesterday, I went to Niagara Produce and purchased a chuck roast to put in the freezer. It was only $4.99 a lb. They also had a huge package of chicken tenders on sale for $2.49. That is the cheapest price I have seen in a long time. I am very low on chicken. Today after I run some more errands, I will pressure can all of it to put on my shelf.

I went back to Top’s yesterday on a 3 day sale to get an almost 9 lb. turkey breast for $ 1.29 a lb. Since I haven’t been able to find much chicken, I will substitute the turkey instead.

That was all I purchased this week so I did not spend a lot of money. After I call my eye doctor for an appointment when their office opens this morning, I will finish the errands that I didn’t finish the other day. I couldn’t get the car washed because it was raining. I will try again today. It is so dirty that it needs a good bath. I tried to bring some bottles back to Fast Cash but they weren’t open yet so I will try again today.

Other than all of these things, we have been cleaning, doing laundry, and watching our shows that we DVR so that we can watch them without commercials. Hubby also installed a new kitchen sink caddy to hold my brush, sponges, and dishcloth. My other one broke. He was having a very difficult time getting the sticky off the adhesive part that held the old one to the sink so that he could install the new one. So I gave him Goo Gone and that took care of it. I remembered that I used to use that many years ago.

Also I finally got the Federal and State taxes done and filed. I am glad to have that out of the way.

Did any of you guys save money or find some good deals this week?

I will we back this weekend with another post. I didn’t forget to tell you about the utility bill. That is coming.

Categories
Every Day

We Had Our Christmas Celebration And West’s Birthday Celebration Yesterday

My youngest son and his family were away for two weeks over Christmas traveling in the Southwest. Then either West was sick or we were or they had football games since they are season ticket holders. We had not seen them since December 7th.

Fortunately my son from Eastern NY came out the day after Christmas and we celebrated with him. It was a wonderful visit and we were so happy to see him.

So we had our Christmas and West’s birthday celebrations yesterday. Rather than anyone cook, we went out to breakfast at our favorite Greek restaurant which we all love. The food and service was fantastic.

Then we came home here and opened money gifts, gift certificates, and emptied our stockings. West was happy with all of his candy, snacks, and money. The rest of us all had Keto snacks, liquor sample bottles(gin and vodka), and scratch off tickets. We had 4 small winners.

After relaxing for a bit, we played rummy which we love and we are very competitive. It was a lot of fun!

Last night Hubby breaded two ribeye pork chops with Italian panko and cooked them in the air fryer portion of my small oven. They were delicious. I made mashed potatoes and we had applesauce as a side.

I checked our budget numbers on Feb. 1st for January and we saved $3160. for the month. I was really happy with that since we paid a large property tax bill.

I have a busy week. I have a bill to pay today and I may start my Federal and State Income taxes. Depends on what else I have to do today like fold a load of laundry, change our sheets, and wash them.

Brunch today will be leftover dinner from last night. We only ate half of our pork chops and there are mashed potatoes and applesauce leftover. Hubby has requested spaghetti for dinner. We have not had that in a long time. I will throw in some ground beef. I always have some cooked up in portions in the freezer. I have a loaf of Italian bread in the freezer that I will pull out to defrost so that I can make garlic bread.

I am also going to hard boil a dozen eggs in my Instant Pot. They will go in salads, get eaten as snacks, and Hubby likes to make egg salad. Perhaps I will make some muffins and SF pudding.

We got a notice from our electric and gas company that they will be changing our meters to smart meters soon. That was about 6 weeks ago. We have not seen them. I am hoping they do it soon because these meters will help us keep better track of what we are using daily.

Tomorrow is our monthly Senior Citizen Discount Day at Top’s so I will be grocery shopping to get the additional 6% off on the sale items that we can use.

What are my readers up to today?