Tag: cleaning and organizing

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Every Day

Top’s Grocery Haul This Week and Other Things


I shopped at Top’s this week. I purchased white cheddar popcorn( $2.99) at Hubby’s request. I was getting low on eggs so picked up the 18 count with a Super Coupon for $1.69.

The celery was also a Super Coupon and cost $ .88. The yogurt were on sale for $1.00 each.

But the best deal that I got was 4 of the craft beer French fries. If you purchased 4, they were $ .99 each. 

My total out of pocket was  $ 9.52. 

I have been busy around here doing regular chores and finishing up organizing the kitchen which is one of the biggest rooms in the house and held so much stuff. I pared a lot of it down. If it hadn’t been used in a year, it got donated. It is so much easier to cook  and find utensils, dishes, and pots and pans now that it has been simplified. 

Now I am preparing for my son and granddaughter to visit for a few days. We are very excited that they are coming especially Hubby. He has not seen our son since last November. We have not seen our granddaughter since she was here in July. 

We have been getting ready for winter. It is upon us and it is predicted to be very snowy this year.

My son helped Hubby put all the patio furniture away about 10 days ago. I am so glad because the winds have been awful.

Our landscape crew were here for the last time this year and everything has been weeded and trimmed. The pest control people were here and the spiders seem to be non existent. Yeah, because I hate spiders. The company who blows out the lines in our sprinkler system came and did that and shut it down till Spring. The last thing that needs to be done is winter fertilizer and that will be done by the company in the next couple of weeks. 

Hubby changed the filter on the furnace yesterday. With the heat on, we do that once a month. 

How did you guys do with Amazon Prime Days? Did you think the deals were worth it? I was very good and was able to pick up a Christmas gift for my grandson. I had a $10.00 credit that helped lower the cost.

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Every Day

This Week’s Grocery Haul and More

 

I only needed a few things this week. I realized that tomorrow is senior discount day at Top’s after I was on my way there. However, I needed one of the items that I picked up at Aldi’s for dinner tonight. Since I only needed 2 items at Top’s and found 2 more, I decided it was not worth the time nor few cents that I would save to make a second trip tomorrow. 

At Top’s I purchased 2 of the Bistro Favorites Ham that Hubby absolutely loves. I had 2 – $ .60/1 coupons that doubled. On my way to get the deli meat, I always check for the Crystal Light Peach. They have not had it in stock since March. Today they had a bunch so I picked up two. I recently found it at Walmart and purchased Hubby a case. I expect it to disappear quickly if we have another wave of this virus. My total at Top’s was $ 10.65. 

This is what I purchased at Aldi’s. I desperately needed the Romaine lettuce. I was out. 

My birthday is coming up so Hubby asked me what dessert I would want for that. My very favorite dessert is peanut butter pie. So he researched online and found a wonderful Keto peanut butter pie recipe that he is going to make me. The only ingredient that I needed was heavy whipping cream. The rest of the ingredients we have.

Every time I go I try to pick up the cranberry sauce, some 90 second rice, and the macadamia nuts for my stockpile. The macadamia nuts I am stockpiling in my freezer. The season is too short for them and I ran out this past year. 

The coffee was on sale and I can’t have enough coffee. My total for Aldi was $ 19.70.

So I am just spending $ 30.35 this week. I have been saving up grocery money the past few weeks for Thanksgiving sale shopping and some household items that I want. 

Hubby and I had a quiet weekend. There was lots of football on TV and our Buffalo Bills won their 4th straight game. I love this team and want them to do well. 

I spent Saturday working on another project. My largest pantry in the kitchen was a disaster. Every time I would come home from grocery shopping and I was tired, I would just throw everything in there. I would tell myself that I would sort it out later. Well, later never came.

I took 3 large bags of food out of there to go in my stockpile. I found duplicates of things I didn’t realize that I had so I kept buying them. This is what happens when things get out of control. It was so bad!

Just looking at the mess gave me major anxiety. I kept putting it off and putting it off. Saturday morning, I decided to get “a shovel” and dig it out. I took everything out and pulled those three bags of stuff to go in the big stockpile.

It is not totally completed. I had to order some things that I need to finish it up. But I will give you peeks and then when I am done, I will show you the finished product. 

This is a peek of my baking shelf and my breakfast shelf. I need more containers for some of these things. I may have some in the house or I may have to order them. I have to look in my storage. We have a lot of baking things because I am Keto and Hubby is not. 

This is the rack on my door which holds our sides that aren’t canned or frozen and some beans and other things in canning jars that we use.


These are our two dinner shelves along with some extra products to restock with and some paper towels.

I had two rolling racks for our cans. I hated them from the day we purchased them back in AZ. I only keep a few of each canned goods that we use a lot in our kitchen so things had to be stocked on those racks behind each other. I could not see what I had. So I bit the bullet and purchased a tiered can rack which is on it’s way here.

Not only am I doing our Fall cleaning but I am reorganizing everything so that we can find things easier. We are both getting older and I don’t want to have to hire help. Hubby has lots of help to do things in the yard. But I am still able to fully function around the house. As I age, I want to make sure that I can still do that. Hence lots of time spent getting things weeded out and made easier for the both of us. So this is why I have so many days lately not blogging. This all needs to be done and can not be put off. So please bear with me.

Are you getting any good deals this week? Or are you organizing or Fall cleaning too?

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Every Day

Frugal Things March 31

These are the things frugal and not that we did today:

– With the guidelines to stay home another month because of the coronavirus, I figure the grocery stores will get stripped again this weekend. So I decided to place a large pickup order. Because the Instacart people walked out in various places, I was not able to place a pickup or delivery order at my local chain grocery store. That just leaves us with Super Walmart pickup. I had not been able to get a slot for a Walmart pickup for the last 2 and 1/2 weeks. So I tried a few times yesterday and was finally able to get one. This morning I picked up an order of things like fresh produce, dairy, a boneless ham, some bread products for Hubby, and some other things. No one seems to have flour and I am very low. I would rather bake bread but was happy to be able to get some bread. I think we now have enough for the month of April. If I forgot something, my neighbor will pick it up for me. I don’t mind them getting a little something when I need it but I don’t want them to have to shop for a large order for me especially when stores have limits. 


– I unbagged everything in the garage, wiped the items down with disinfectant, and brought them into the house to sit on our game table for a few days before I put them away. Only exception was the frozen items that needed to go in the freezer. Then I disinfected the car(steering wheel and signals, gear shifter, door handles, etc) and disinfected the doorknob that I used to come in the house and threw the box that I had the pickup guy put everything in into the recyclable bin. My hands were washed really well a number of times and the counters in the kitchen were sprayed and I let them dry. I will do the same to the table when I move the items into pantries. I know how infectious this disease is and I am very, very careful. 
  
– Hubby wanted deli meats and Walmart had none available except the ones you have sliced at the deli. I did not want to get those for many reasons. So I bought a boneless ham that we sliced on our meat slicer. Some was put in the fridge and the rest in packages in the freezer to use a package at a time. It isn’t the variety that he would have liked but he does love ham. 

– I spring cleaned a guest bedroom today. I even did the windows on the inside. I was happy to get all of the dust off the ceiling fan.

– Hubby and I had dentist appointments scheduled for the beginning of April which weren’t going to happen. The office manager called and rescheduled us for mid May. Let’s hope that we will be able to do that. Our dental plan was for just one year and is up in June so we need to get this done. Time will tell.

– When I was spring cleaning I found the above. Do you remember the Slob Sisters? I think I got this back in the 80’s. It’s a cleaning and organizing system. It’s very old school! I think I will listen to the tapes starting tomorrow while I am on the treadmill. I am not sure that we even own a VCR anymore. Then I will either sell it or give it away. 

– Meals today were our choice of coffee cake, eggs, and/or bacon for breakfast. We ate no lunch. Hubby will be grilling filet mignons in the air fryer oven. I bought a whole filet at the end of the summer for either $ 5.99 or $6.99 a lb. We sliced it up so that we would have a number of meals. If you have never done a nice steak in the air fryer, you are missing out. They are delicious. Hubby will have a salad with his and I will have brussel sprouts left from dinner last night.

– I got my exercise on the bike for 30 minutes.

– The sun is finally coming out after a few days of rain. I am hoping it stays out for a few days. It’s so much nicer spring cleaning with the sun shining. 


– Hubby watched some “Manifest” shows. He also loves the show ” Home Town” which he has been binge watching. I think he is enjoying the scenery of the city of Laurel, Mississippi. That is where his father was born. 


After I got done cleaning, I took a much needed nap.


That is it for today. What did you do today which was frugal or not? Please feel free to tell us in the comments.

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Every Day

Grocery Shopping Haul

This is the only grocery shopping I did this week which I did at Aldi’s. I am shopping there more and more. Their prices are so good compared to my local grocery stores and Walmart. But the best part is that if I buy on sale, we can get grass fed meat for a lot cheaper than anywhere else. We have found their grass fed organic meat to be delicious!

I really never wanted to spend so much money on grass fed meat. But I have found that by cutting the junk food out of our diet, I am able to buy grass fed a lot more often. Junk food was costing us a fortune and it has no nutritional value. We are spending no more on groceries than we were before we started buying grass fed meat. 

To keep Hubby happy on this diet, I buy these Parmesan Crisps for snacks for him. They are 100% Parmesan cheese. 

This week I have continued cleaning and organizing. Most everything on our main living floor is in pretty good shape because I keep on top of it. 

So this week, I donated some items out of our gift closet that I knew we would never use. Then I reorganized and cleaned it. 

But the biggest organization I did was under the sink. It was a mess. Every time one of us used a cleaner, we stuck it under there. UGH! So I pulled everything out and only put back what we would actually use in the kitchen. It cleaned up very nicely. The white wastebasket is our recycle can. When it is full, we take it to the recycle bin in the garage. I keep a few glass jars behind it for grease disposal. The stackable bins hold dishwasher tablets in one and sponges and magic erasers in the other. The other container holds Comet(which I clean the sink with) stainless steel cleaner for my appliances, cleaner for the gas range, steel wool pads and a toothbrush for cleaning in cracks and crevices. 

I have no need to have dish liquid, hand soap, or all purpose cleaner under there because I keep them on a tray next to the sink. Extras are always in my basement storage.

I wish you all a wonderful weekend.      

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Every Day

What I Have Been Up To

For the past couple of weeks, I have been cleaning and organizing the basement which is 2112 ft. just like the house. It has a full basement under all of it. It turned into a major project. I had great ambitions of getting it done in two or three days. Sure Precious, you are not as young as you used to be! I finally finished it yesterday. 98% of it I did by myself!  

Besides dealing with the mess, I also had to vacuum the concrete floor which was a total disaster because our pest service had sprayed down there in October and killed all of the bugs. They don’t spray the pantry because I will not let them.

The only thing I did not do was clean up the top of Hubby’s workbench. He will do that so that he can find his tools when he needs them. I have no idea his organizational system. 

Nor did I touch Hubby’s dresser project which he is in the middle of but hasn’t touched in a while. The white piece of furniture which has a glass top is going out with the garbage this week. We have not used it since our home in Arizona. If someone wants it, they can take it from near the road. Many pieces of furniture have disappeared the night before the garbage man comes. So it would not be unusual. 

After everything was clean except the pantry, I emptied most of the pantry into another section of the basement which is above. That took a long time.

Then I cleaned the entire floor in the pantry so that Hubby has pretty much a clean slate to put down the carpet tiles. Those couple of shelving units will be easy to move when he gets to that area. He actually went to Home Depot today to get some crack filler and other things he needs. It was nice that I was able to get $ 100. worth of Home Depot gift cards for $80. on a Top’s deal last year. 

The hardest thing we have to do is move the freezer which is pretty full. So we are figuring out how to do that so Hubby can lay the carpet tiles under it. Then we can move it back. We may have to ask a neighbor to help us do that.

This was the first area I tackled. 

And this was the last which is the area that our furnace, humidifier, dehumidifier, water softener and sump is in. 

Besides working on all of this, I had dentists appointments to keep, errands to run, the normal every day things, and I did not want to stop exercising one hour a day. That was very important to me!

I have convinced Hubby to hire a local contractor to do the sheet rocking. I feel it is just to much for him. So I have called and left a message for him to call me back. Hopefully we will hear from him when spring break is over. 

Over the weekend, I cooked bison burgers for us because they were easy while I finished the basement. We used to buy bison all of the time when we lived in Arizona. I finally found it at Aldi. Not knowing how good it would be, I only purchased one package. It was so tender and delicious that you can bet when it goes on sale again, I will purchase it and stock the freezer.

Yesterday, I cooked up a big batch of chicken. So tonight, Hubby and I will have salads with chicken on it.

So have any of you been working on organizing your home recently?