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Every Day

Sunday and Monday Happenings

I had to purchase Hubby’s alcohol prep pads. He only had about 5 days left. Amazon carries the ones he uses. When I went to order them, they offered me a 30 day free trial of Prime. I took them up on their offer so that I didn’t have to get $35. worth of items and I got one day shipping. Hubby will enjoy Thursday night football on Prime for at least the next 4 Thursdays. And I will see if there are any movies I would like to watch. I have every intention of cancelling at 30 days.

We met my son, daughter in law, and West, at Duff’s yesterday for lunch in another town. We ate no breakfast so that we could enjoy Duff’s wings. Buffalo wings were invented out here at the Anchor Bar. So many tourists go there to try them. However, I and thousands of other people out here who do the yearly survey on who has the best wings, pick Duff’s. Their wings are amazing. Duff’s has won the survey for a number of years in a row. We had a few beers and soda for Hubby and West with out meal. Plus West wanted large fries and huge breast meat fried tenders. There was so much food that Hubby and I had enough for our dinner last night. I decided to pay for all of us. It was the largest lunch bill I have ever paid but considering that we got 7 meals out of and a great time, it was worth it. Since I did not pay out much grocery money this month, I just took it from that budget.

We all gathered at our home afterward so that my daughter in law could meet Eloise. She loved her and West got all of her toys out from under the furniture for us. Then we all played a 500 point game of Rummy. It was a fun afternoon.

I have been trying to run the dishwasher every three days instead of every two. Sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn’t. I am thinking all the time on how I can cut down on the number of dishes we use. For example, I ask myself if I can use a small plate instead of a large one. Can I mix all dry and wet ingredients in one bowl instead of two? Everything I am questioning. I want to get the electric bill down as low as I can this month.

Hubby had planned on cooking pork rib eye steaks on the grill for dinner. But since we had leftover wings last night, he will grill them tonight and I will make a tossed salad(trying to use up the romaine lettuce), and serve applesauce.

Our Buffalo Bills played the Baltimore Ravens in Baltimore last night and we got stomped. The Ravens are a big and rough team. I just prayed none of our players got hurt. One did though. Hopefully, he will recover quickly.

Hubby got up with Eloise this morning at 4:30AM. He let me sleep in for a change. I didn’t get up until 9:30AM. It felt good for a change. But I woke up not feeling well so I have taken it easy today. I have done some paperwork to get ready for our savings report tomorrow. Plus I paid our credit card bill that we got in the mail on Saturday.

I realize today that we have another CD expiring in the next 10 days so I will take care of renewing that tomorrow. The bank never sent me a notice about it. Ugh. I will take care of that when I call them.

I have lots of posts for this week starting with the savings one tomorrow. See you then. I hope you are having a great day!

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Every Day

A Savings Day

Before I talk about our savings today, I wanted to post a picture of our filet mignon and tossed salad dinner last night. I put ranch dressing on mine and Hubby had Italian. The filets were just seasoned with salt and pepper before Hubby grilled them. They were melt in your mouth good.

Our son who lives in the Adirondack’s in the eastern part of the state called Hubby yesterday afternoon for his birthday. We both enjoyed talking to him. It is rare that we get to see him because he works a full time job, owns a business, and is helping two different friends renovate their homes.

Today will be a savings day and I will list those as I do them during the day.

My son who lives just a little over an hour away called Hubby last night for his birthday. He told us that his family is going to the Buffalo Bills store downtown for when it opens on Sunday morning. So they will not be here for breakfast but will come later when they are done. Hubby invited them for lunch. They all eat Keto. So I made out a list of things that they will eat and was going to go to the store early this morning to get those things that I did not have. However when I was done with my list, I saw that I had a text message from him. He said his wife said we should go out for wings for lunch. So that is the plan sometime after they get done shopping. I imagine they will treat us. So I cancelled the grocery shopping trip which saves us on spending money for food and gasoline.

I did a very full load of laundry with just a couple of tablespoons of detergent. According to my appliance people that is all you need. I have been trying to get down to just one load a week to save on electricity. I have finally done it. I have an energy efficient Speed Queen washer and dryer. I use cold water to wash. Most things are hung to dry. I do dry sheets and towels in the dryer but for only 25 minutes and then hang them if they aren’t quite dry. I just replaced my dryer balls after almost 14 and a half years of use. I found a set of 6 at Walmart a month ago with a storage bag for $ 9.00. I do not use dryer sheets and haven’t for years.

I caulked all the spots that needed it on our window frames and sills. We are trying to get ready for winter. Hubby has been cutting the lawn down really low and mowing up the leaves as they come down. He has also been trimming the bushes and cutting some of the plants down. This is keeping him really busy and saves us on hiring our landscaper to clean up for the winter.

We still have no heat on. That is amazing for the end of September. I hope we can go a few more weeks without it by wearing sweatshirts and long pants. I have gotten our draft stoppers for the outside doors from our storage area so that they are ready to use.

Dinner tonight will be the leftover honey bourbon chicken, which Hubby loved, roasted potatoes, and brussel sprouts from Thursday dinner. I like to cook two meals at once. When we eat these, all leftovers in our fridge will be used up.

I love coffee as I am sure many of you do. I never buy coffee at a McDonald’s, Dunkin Donuts, Tim Horton’s or Starbucks. I always make it at home. If I want it while I am out running errands, I bring my travel mug with coffee in it. However I drink 4-5 cups a day. As you all know, coffee has gotten so high in price, especially the last two weeks in which it took a huge increase of $3.00- $5.00 for a large can. So I am cutting back to 2 cups a day. If I need something else hot, I will have tea. I have lots of tea bags. Plus I can use my teabags to make two cups of tea.

When we got Eloise, we needed to buy litter. It was so expensive that I was shocked. We seem to be going through it quickly. If you have a kitten or cat, can you tell me where you buy it the cheapest and what you buy? Also how high do you fill the litter box with clean litter when you change it? I scoop her litter box twice a day. She also really likes to cover things up and manages to get litter all over the floor when she is doing that. Do the covered boxes work better than the flat ones? Thanks to anyone who responds and helps me out. I am headed in there now to clean and wash her box. Then I will vacuum and sanitize the floor.

Popeye’s contacted me with an apology and a $15.00 coupon for my next order. I’ll take it. When things go wrong on your order, it pays to let them know.

Did you do a little something to save or not spend today?

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Every Day

Back To The 1960’s And 1970’s

When I was growing up, I had a very happy life. My mother left my father when I was 3 just before my sister was born. We had no money and my grandparents took us in. My mother got a good job, her college B.A. in accounting, and I lived with my grandparents until I married.

My grandfather didn’t make much money as a shirt cutter. But he owned his home( his father was a builder), a 2 story home with two flats. Relatives always lived downstairs. Most of the money my mom made was handed over to my grandmother for rent, food, and daycare. My mom was allowed to keep enough for transportation(2 buses each way) to get to her job, food for her lunches, money so that we could all go to the lake for the summer, high school tuition( everyone in the family had graduated from this private school because it was tradition), and just a bit of spending money. My sister and I wore hand me downs from my older cousin. I got my first bike when I was 12. It was a hand me down from that same cousin. I never felt poor but I knew money was tight for the things they wanted for themselves and us. My grandmother could make a penny stretch on food like no one else that I have ever known. Every meal was portion controlled. Rarely were there snacks or soda.

This way of life got me very interested in financial things in junior high and high school. I used to take library books out of the library that today would be considered frugality books. I learned about finances in college while I studied for my accounting degree. It was the first time I ever heard about a checking account. I just soaked up everything I could learn. The two biggest things I learned was to never spend more money than you earn and to use credit the proper way. It was okay to get a mortgage for your first home but to furnish it with credit cards was a bad idea.

When I married my Hubby, he came from a different background. He lived in a very nice suburban neighborhood that was considered one of the best places to live. But as I found out over the first years of our marriage, they weren’t rich either. They did pay their home off quickly so they owned it. That was a lessen that Hubby and I loved. We paid ours off early and the last two, we paid cash.

So when we married, it was the 1960’s. Hubby owned a car with a car payment and was paying off a small student loan. I did not work the first 6-8 months of our marriage. We found an attic apartment for $ 80. a month including heat and electric. We had a cheap phone bill because Hubby worked for the telephone company. I brought not $1.00 to our marriage because I worked long hours to go to college and every penny paid my way through those 2 years. Those years before I worked, I read every thing I could find in newspapers and books on finance and frugality.. My mother in law gave me a few cookbooks from the WWII era and I made almost every recipe from them. I had exactly $25. a month grocery money. We had no more in the budget because we had to pay all the bills and we were saving for two things that were very important to us: For Hubby to get his B.A. degree in Engineering and to save for a house. Living in that hot apartment made us want to get out of it quickly. So we squeezed every penny we could and made that grocery budget work. We saved money religiously every month for our two goals. I got a job at the telephone company too but not where Hubby worked. I bussed it. I had no driver’s license. Hubby went to school nights and we saved my income and what was what left in his for a down payment for a new home.

We purchased our newly constructed home in the suburbs 1 year and 10 months after we married. We had saved enough money so that we could purchase with cash a bed, a refrigerator, a sofa, and 6 unfinished chairs to use with the used table that Hubby’s mother gave us. I had used green stamps( does anyone remember them?) to get a card table and 4 chairs so we would have a place to sit in the kitchen and eat. His mother also gave us an old dresser. Hubby purchased a door that had been damaged and made and stained 2 end tables out of it to go on either end of the sofa. They were so sturdy that we used them for 32 years. We sold them when we moved to Arizona. I wish I still had them.

We furnished the house as we saved cash to do so. We never ran out and used credit. I worked and got a ride with the man next door who actually was my boss back and forth to work.

I quit my job due to a miscarriage just before Hubby was hit by a car while walking from the parking lot near his work. He had serious damage done to his knee and was in the hospital for weeks and home recovering for weeks. He had switched jobs and hadn’t worked long enough to get full pay for long so we lived on 1/2 pay for a long time. We made it through without borrowing a dime from anyone. But it was a big wake up call. We had some money saved besides money for furniture. But we used almost all of it up while Hubby was out of work.

That wake up call was our journey towards financial independence. We set up an annual budget that paid us first every paycheck. That has been a line item in our budget to this day. We never wanted to wonder again how we were going to make ends meet! We had always been frugal but we turned it way up after that. We still had money set aside for entertainment and things to make life enjoyable every month. We have never felt like we were giving anything up.

Fast forward one year and my first son was born. Fast forward 2 more years and my 2nd son was born. Now we had 4 people in our family so we had to up the grocery budget. It went up to $80. per month. But it included all food, OTC meds, cleaning products, all soap products, cat food, and and personal care products. I only purchased Pampers to use when we went out somewhere. I washed diapers and hung them to dry for years. That saved us a fortune. Up until just before my first son was born, I went to the laundromat every week. But we had saved and set aside money for a washer and dryer. It was our first scratch and dent appliances and with babies I was so grateful for them.

As our money grew, we found places to invest it so that we could make more money. We continued to save every month and it just kept growing. The best part was all of the passive income we made every month.

Yes, we had emergencies come up but we always had the money to pay for them and we still do.

This is getting long and I need to prep our chicken parmesan that we are having for dinner, so I will continue to write more tomorrow. This is a blog post that I decided I was going to do way back when I started blogging in 2007. Now is the time!

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Every Day

How We Save In The Kitchen

There are many ways to save in the kitchen. One of them I am sure you know like not wasting food. We never throw out food. It is too expensive to feed our garbage can. Eat your leftovers at another meal or three. It is not going to kill you to eat the same food 2-3 nights in a row.

I go through my fridge, especially the produce drawers, every other day or so. It only takes a few minutes. Any produce that is getting old is used up that night or the next or it is frozen. Peppers I will slice and freeze for fajitas. Carrots I will slice or make carrot spears and freeze. The sliced ones go into soups and stews. The carrot spears get sauteed in butter and used as a side. Onions get sliced or diced and used in casseroles or omelets. I have frozen tomatoes many times and used them in casseroles, soups, gumbo, or in spaghetti sauce. I just freeze them whole in a food saver bag. Celery does not freeze well. That I will use to make a side and stuff it with cream cheese and diced olive. My Hubby loves this. My mom used to make it every holiday.

I put my leftovers together on a certain shelf so that we always know where they are. Right now, I have French toast and sausage that Hubby will reheat for a brunch. There is also a small container of corned beef hash that will get used within a day or two.

We have 1/2 of a bag of the tiny potatoes that should get used soon. So I will cut them in half and put them in a skillet, cover them with a little water and bring them to a boil. Then I cook them on medium for 10 minutes and drain them. Next I add a bit of oil to the same skillet, heat it and then put the potatoes back in cut side down and saute them until they are roasted and brown. We love these. We will have them with chicken tonight and if there are leftovers we will eat them with our eggs the next brunch.

But there are other ways to save in the kitchen one of which I have told you. I use lemon Koolaid to clean my dishwasher. I never buy the expensive special cleaners. I am still using the bag of them that I purchased years ago when they were $.10 each.

I clean my garbage disposal with baking soda and vinegar. First I put about 3/4 cup of the soda in and then put vinegar in. It will foam way up into your sink. Then just let it sit for a few minutes and then run the disposal. It cleans it and gets rid of any funky smells. I have a black plug that keeps things from falling into the disposal like utensils. I put that in the top rack of the dishwasher whenever I run it.

I never use the self cleaning cycle on my oven anymore. If I cook a pizza or something at 400 degrees or more, I will wipe it out when it has cooled down a bit. If there is something I can’t get off, I put a small bowl of ammonia on one of the racks and let it sit overnight with the door closed. In the morning, everything wipes out. The self cleaning cycle takes a lot of energy that I prefer to save.

Also I use Scrub Mommies in my sink to do pots and pans and dishes that I do not put in the dishwasher. That sponge goes into the top rack of my dishwasher when it needs to.

When I am washing the dishes or pans in the sink, I fill the 2 sinks about a 1/4 of the way. One has soap added for cleaning and the other has water only for rinsing. Don’t let your water run down the drain while you do that. You can waste gallons of water. I try to do that all of the time. I am not perfect so I get distracted sometimes just like everyone.

When I am done with the sinks, I spray them with an all purpose cleaner and rinse and then wipe them dry with the dish towel that I used that day. I change my 2 dish towels every day. I have one color of towels for dishes and a different color one to dry our hands. That way we don’t get them mixed up.

We use our 11 in 1 countertop stove for almost everything. We also use our instant pot, crock pot, and microwave for meals that we don’t put in that oven. We do grill outside now a lot and plan on using that right through the winter unless we are buried in snow.

Catch your water in the kitchen in a big pot or bowl while you are waiting for it to warm up. You can use that water to clean with, water plants, or to boil pasta, etc. Don’t just let it run down the drain. When you do use your stove top, cover your pots and pans. Things will cook faster.

We use a small hand vacuum that is always charging in my kitchen to clean up any crumbs on the counter or that fall on the floor every night to keep things clean. It saves us from lugging the larger vacuum so often. Once a week it gets a full vacuum to clean the floor. This keeps it clean enough that Hubby only has to clean and polish it once a month.

We have 2 ceiling lights in the kitchen. We also have a hanging 3 bulb light over the sink area and recessed lighting in the ceilings over all the counters. We only turn on the lights where we need them for the task we are doing. When it is daylight, we rarely turn them on unless it is dark and stormy outside. All of the bulbs are LED’S.

I know where everything is in my refrigerator so that I can quickly get whatever I need and close the door. We don’t want to let all that cold air into the room.

I keep my two pantries in my kitchen stocked with what I usually use so that I don’t have to run to other areas of the house to retrieve things. I put my meat that I will use for the next two weeks in my refrigerator freezer so that it is handy. It also prevents me from having to open the chest freezer as often. We also have small lights in our pantries so that I can see what we have. They are also LED’S.

Lastly, we use our garbage disposal for food scraps off our plates with the exception of potato skins, any kind of bone, fruit rinds, and egg shells. These things will ruin your disposal. All other waste goes in our kitchen 30 gallon container. I push those items down so they compact. This way we do not have to use as many plastic garbage bags which are very expensive. I used to use the brand names but I switched a while ago to the Great Value 30 gallon ones. They look and are as thick as the brand name ones.

I think that is about it for saving in the kitchen. If you have other ways that you save in the kitchen, please share them with all of us via the comments.

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Every Day

Cost Cutting on Friday

I took all of the chicken that was left off of our first chicken and did the same with the whole second chicken. I made homemade chicken soup for dinner and it will probably last for 3-4 meals.

I forgot to tell you yesterday that on one of my Top’s shops this past week, they did not give me the 200 gas points I earned. So when I went on Thursday I went to customer service with my receipt and they gave me the additional $.20 off per gallon. That brought me up to $ .40 off per gallon and after shopping that day I was up to $ .50 a a gallon. So I will be getting gas soon. Watch your receipts closely. They make mistakes sometimes. $.20 off per gallon is valuable today.

One load of laundry was done using cold water and about 3 tbsp. of laundry detergent. I never follow the directions on the detergent bottle or box. A repairman told me years ago to use only 2-3 tbsp. He said you do not need more than that because the agitation does most of the cleaning. I hung that load to dry.

I cleaned a bedroom today. I didn’t get the windows done so that will be on my agenda tomorrow.

Breakfast this morning was bacon and eggs again. I ate the scrambled egg that was leftover the other day. Waste not, want not! I also sent an e-mail to Top’s customer service letting them know that the quality of their bacon is tasteless and it is like chewing rubber. Their bacon has always been delicious. I don’t know what has happened to it. I will not be buying it again.

I also contacted Walmart. I have never gotten my Florastor order. They kept saying it was delayed. I really needed it as quickly as they told me it would be here. I am only taking 1/2 a dose of what I should be taking trying to make it last. They told me it is lost(probably stolen). Well, why should I have to contact you? Shouldn’t you have let me know me know and refunded my money? They issued the refund for $ 53.77 which will take 10 days. UGH. Now I am back to square one and will have to see where else I can find it.

My arthritis has been bad especially when it rains and we have had a lot of that. I tried Advil, Tylenol, and aspirin and nothing worked. My son suggested I try Aleve. He has some medical background and said many people say they get relief from it. I did and it works. I am hoping it continues to work.

I used my credit card reward points to get $100. cashback in the form of a credit on my next credit card bill.

I hope you all had a good cost cutting day.

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Every Day

Cutting Costs and My Why

All the years of our marriage, Hubby and I have had some lofty goals. We have met them all including buying 4 brand new homes, putting our sons through private schools and college, 2 in ground swimming pools, moving cross country twice, and giving away many thousands of dollars to family and charities, etc.

We have one last goal before we die! It is to give a certain amount of money to four family members upon our deaths. I am not going to tell you how much that totals up to because we want to keep that private. We have been saving many years for this goal. What I will tell you is the amount we still need to reach that goal is $ 113,028. Yes it is a lot of money. But we want to speed the savings up so we are going to extreme cost cut. Another reason I am doing these cost cutting posts is to help a family member. Plus if I only help one of you, I have done my job here.

I am aware that we all want to talk about what we save. It is really more about what we spend. Every dollar that we fritter away is a dollar that can’t be saved and invested for any goal that I or you want to reach. By fritter away, I mean waste. You all know the frivolous things I am talking about. We have talked about them many times.

I don’t know how fast we will reach this goal but I am hoping it will be under 3 years. I will let you know at the end of each month how much money has been saved toward this last $ 113,028. from our different streams of income. I will be very mindful that every dollar we spend will not be there to lower the amount we need.

So lets get started on the cost cutting with some of the things that we have done so far this week.

Hubby has decided to cut a birch tree that has grown larger than we thought it would so it needs some serious trimming. It is near our house and when the wind blows here the branches whack the roof. We had a tree company come out last summer to get an estimate. He told us he would it do it for $350. when he had another job in the area. That was the last time we heard from him. Whatever Hubby can’t reach, we will ask one of our sons to do when they visit. This way we won’t spend that $ 350. or most likely more because prices are always going up.

You read my small grocery haul post yesterday where I am trying to keep what we spend on groceries very low. I do this by purchasing only sale items, using coupons, and taking advantage of senior discount day 6% off. I also take advantage of deals for extra gasoline points if we can use that food. Gasoline is very expensive here in NY mainly because of all the taxes on it. So I like the Top’s and B.J.’s deals to get cheap gasoline. I always check prices before I fill up and if our cash station has the better price than those stores after the points and deals, I fill up there. Right now I am trying to wait until my tank is very low so that I can fill up and get the full benefit of those points or deals.

That free rotisserie chicken, that I purchased on Tuesday, will make 2 or 3 meals of sliced chicken and a big pot of chicken soup which will give us 3 more meals. I will be making my own broth in the crock pot instead of spending $ 1.37 for 32 ounces. I can get twice that from the chicken carcass. skin, and water. That will save me $2.74.

Hubby made a Caesar salad with his chicken and used up the last of the lettuce last night. I just ate a chicken sandwich. It was nice to not have to do any cooking.

We turned our A/C off about 10 days ago because the weather got cooler. We had to turn it back on mid morning yesterday. It was so hot and muggy here. I made sure all day that the shades were drawn on the sunny windows. But 10 days less of A/C on our next electric bill should make a difference.

Hubby has the sprinkler system on a timer three days a week. I usually get up before it comes on so I check and if it rained during the night or is supposed to rain that day, I turn it off. Our water rates have gone up this year so I do everything I can to not waste water.

I got a haircut at Great Clips before I shopped at Top’s yesterday. I had a $2.00 off coupon and had my stylist punch my card. You buy 7 haircuts and you get your 8th haircut free. I have 2 punches right now.

Fast Cash Bottle Redemption is in the same plaza so I took 3 bags of bottles back to get $ 2.55 in deposit money. Our deposit here is $ .05 per bottle or can. But it looks like NY wants to raise the deposit to $.10 a bottle and expand the deposit to other beverages including wine, spirits, and hard cider. It is in the legislature and I expect it will pass.

I used to buy big packs of water bottles to stock up for an emergency. I have quit paying for that. I now just wash out any plastic bottles when they are empty and fill them from the sink. I rotate through them to keep the water fresh.

Another thing that I have been doing is replacing my jars of spaghetti sauce with McCormick’s Spaghetti Sauce mix. It is cheaper and takes up less space. When my jars are gone, I will only use this or make my own homemade.

Are any of you saving for a goal right now?

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Every Day

What We Did To Cut Costs The Past 10 days

The flowers in the picture are for Mother’s Day from my son who lives in the eastern part of NY. They are just beautiful with so many roses and lilies. Seven lilies had yet to open when they came. Today they are all open. I have been enjoying them while we eat our meals.

I use a car wash that gives a free wash after you collect 5 coupons for other washes. I had 5 so I went up and got the SUV washed. That saved us $12.00 and they also gave me a coupon for the free wash. When I got home I cleaned the inside of the car and vacuumed it out. It is amazing how many stones were on the mats.

While I was out, I went to Fast Cash and redeemed $ 3. 50 worth of bottles.

Hubby never cut my hair because he had an achilles problem and can’t stand for too long. Since my hair was so bad, I found a $ 12.99 coupon for Great Clips and had it cut. The stylist did a great job so I will continue going to her when I need to. I got a $ 2.00 off my next cut coupon.

We got a refund check from the hospital for my last CT scan for almost $29.52. I wasn’t sure why and was about to call them. Then I remembered that they made me pay my co-pay up front. That is unusual because between Medicare and my health plan, you never know what they will pay. So it was a refund of that over payment.

Top’s had NY premium strip steaks on sale again for $10.99 a lb. I picked up 3 more packages of 4 each. We really love these.

This past week, Hubby grilled steaks, and fried haddock. I made chicken fajitas and red beans and rice. We ate all the leftovers the other nights. No take out or restaurant meals for us.

We always have leftover steak from dinner so Hubby sliced it up and cooked it with butter and garlic. He made eggs to go with it for a late breakfast.

The landscapers came a week ago Friday and weeded all of our gardens, put a new garden in by the shed, and mulched all the gardens. Then they transplanted two bushes from the garden that has our spruce trees in it to the new gardens near the shed. The garden with the 3 spruce trees was planted over 14 years ago and they have kind of taken over. So the smaller things needed to be moved. The garden that was done last year needed a couple of more bushes. Hubby knew exactly what he wanted but the landscaper said he would have to have the nursery order them because they don’t carry them. Hubby said no he would order them and plant them. They came last week and he has done that. That saved us quite a bit of money.

We also had two bushes in the garden out front that had gotten big and scraggly over the years. So the landscaper removed them and replaced them with smaller bushes that are similar.

Two loads of laundry were done: one load of clothes which I hung and one load of winter blankets that I washed, dried, and stored for the winter.

Because I am doing so much scratch cooking, I am using my dishwasher more often unless I use paper plates. So it has been run every other day.

Have you done anything to save a bit of money?

I want to wish all of you Mothers on here a wonderful day tomorrow. We will be staying home and Hubby will most likely grill filet mignon and I will put some baking potatoes in the small oven and cook some broccoli. This is my very favorite meal.

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Every Day

Things We Have Done To Save Money This Past Week

Ninety percent of our meals were made at home this week including homemade chicken soup, taco bowls, and turkey sandwiches.

Leftovers were eaten other days. Waste not, want not!

For entertainment, Hubby and I watched the NCIS, FBI, CSI, and Equalizer shows that Hubby had saved on the DVR.

Hubby planted the daffodil plant that my son and daughter in law had given us for Easter. We were thrilled to see that there were 3 bulbs in that pot.

We are still going through our home and getting rid of things that we no longer want by donating them. Hubby took all of our old electronics: computers, cellphone and tablets to the electronics pick up at our town hall this morning. This did not save us money but it is saving us space and clutter.

I inventoried our canning jars not only for the seasonal things this year but for more meat. We have been using up the meat that was canned in 2021 and 2022. So I need to put up a lot more beef and chicken. I do have enough jars, rings, and new lids.

We have been making lots of pudding for snacks this week. I also have celery and carrot sticks that we eat with homemade veggie dip.

If you have a thrift store close to your location, run in there when you are doing other errands and see what they have. You never know what you may find. I rarely find clothes but often I find cheap books and greeting cards. It only takes me an extra 5 minutes when I am out.

We got our electric and natural gas bill for the past month. It would have been $ 193.09 for 31 days but we got the NYS Energy Credit on this bill which New York is giving to everyone. So our bill after the credit for $24.23 was $168.06. We are now having very cold weather for this time of year. It has been in the 20’s at night so I expect this next bill will be higher.

We have been doing the usual: one to two loads of laundry a week using cold water and hanging most to dry. We have been cooking either on the range top or in the countertop 11 in one oven. The dishwasher is run once to twice a week.

Hubby will be giving me a haircut today. It has been a year and a half since I have gone to the hairdresser and I am enjoying saving the $ 140. I was spending going every 5-6 weeks.

What have you done to save money this week?

Categories
Every Day

What We Have Done To Save Money The Past Couple Of Weeks

  • Made almost all of our meals from scratch using food we already had in our home.
  • Made lemon bars, carrots and celery sticks to dip in homemade onion or veggie dips, banana muffins, jello and pudding for snacks. We no longer buy junk food. I don’t know what the corporations have done to it but it does not taste the same as a few years ago and it is very expensive.
  • I have been doing only two loads of wash a week done in cold water with 2 tbsp. of detergent for each load and hanging most of it to dry.
  • Instead of changing our tablecloth in the breakfast room every day, I have been using place mats on the cloth. They keep the tablecloth cleaner and I just throw the mats in with the regular wash.
  • I am washing our windows a few at a time using homemade cleaner. Hubby will be doing the outsides soon as this rainy weather breaks using the pressure washer. They have not been done in a couple of years because of all the building of homes behind us. Those are now done so I feel it is safe to wash them now and we won’t get blowing dirt to make them dirty again. I thought about hiring a company to do them but did not want to pay the $850. they wanted to do them.
  • We have not heard from our landscaper about a spring clean up of our property so Hubby has done it himself a little at a time. Hubby will contact the landscaper for mulch to be put down and a new garden put in around the shed in May. We did pay in full getting a discount for fertilization of our lawn this season. They usually start the end of April so they should be coming soon.
  • New York State is providing funding to our electric and gas company to give a one time credit of $ 9.52 on our electric bill and $ 15.66 on our natural gas bill as an effort to address energy affordability due to inflation. It is in the state budget which has not been passed yet, so who knows when that will show up. It will show up sometime down the road under the miscellaneous section where all the fees and surcharges are. It’s not much but as I always say, every little bit helps.
  • We put a metal rack out with our garbage last week and the garbage company did not take it. So I put it back out last night hoping they would take it today. Within an hour of me putting it out last night, a man took it. I am happy that it is gone and I didn’t have to use my gasoline to donate it.
  • I have only used my big oven once recently. Otherwise we use the countertop 11 in one oven for everything.
  • I continue to take navy showers which saves on our water bill.
  • Our son and DIL gave us a daffodil plant for Easter. Hubby will be planting it in our garden soon.
  • Our lawn got so long that Hubby has been mowing it for two weeks now. It looks great really early this year. I believe it is because we had a warm winter and lots of rain the past couple of weeks. Our flowering trees are all in bloom which always makes me happy. Our cherry tree is blooming and setting cherries. We should have lots of cherries this year earlier than normal.
  • We have been using up all of our produce and eating all of our leftovers so as to not waste anything. Food is way too expensive to throw out. We have been eating beef stew, made using homemade beef broth, for the past two nights. We will eat it again tonight and then it should be gone. All made from scratch using a sirloin tip roast that I got on sale many months ago for $ 4.99 a lb. I cut it up into stew beef. I refuse to pay $7- $8. for stew meat. I added fresh potatoes, carrots, onions, and celery and then made gravy towards the end of it cooking.
  • Be aware that the post office is talking about raising the price of a first class stamp again to $ .73 on July 14th after just raising it to $.68 earlier this year. I am so glad that I bought a 100 count roll of forever stamps at $ .66 before the last increase.
  • Some of our winter coats can be washed at home and I will do that. But a couple have to be dry cleaned. So I am keeping my eye out for a discount coupon.
  • My chives are in full bloom so we have been using them on baked potatoes with sour cream.
  • It seems like gasoline is rising almost every day due to the mess in the middle east. So I filled up our gas tank today getting $ .20 off per gallon with my Top’s gas points. After the points I paid $ 3.20 per gallon.
  • Hubby got 4 new all season tires put on our car yesterday. We had to buy new ones due to the fact that our car is 11 years old. The snow tires we bought at the beginning of the winter will be stored on the ceiling in the garage. The tires were $1,000. We have odd sized tires that have to be preordered. The rubber that tires are made from has really gone up. But these tires should now last until we no longer have the car. We paid cash with money we had saved for this purpose.
  • I picked up my prescriptions at my Rite Aid pharmacy for the very last time. They are closing my store in a week or so. Hubby and I have to decide who we are going to use now. We still have 2 Rite Aids in our area but I hate the customer service at one of the stores. The other is much farther away from me. We are considering two other chains and two grocery store pharmacies.

What have you been doing to save a bit of money lately?

Categories
Every Day

My Plans Today

I hope you all had a great holiday. For those of you with kids home on spring break, enjoy them. They grow up too fast.

While I am sipping on my coffee this morning which I needed desperately after waking up at 4:30am, I am planning out my week. I am going nowhere today so that I can do a number of things around here.

My chest freezer needs to be defrosted. So after my breakfast of eggs over easy and a slice of turkey with a slice of cheese melted on it, I will tackle it. I need to set up some ice chests to put the food in while it is out of the freezer. Then I will set up a table next to it for the overflow. I get the freezer defrosted so quickly that it never has a chance to thaw.

I use my blow dryer and a plastic scraper to melt the ice off. I put the big chunks in a bucket to empty when I am done. When all the ice is out, I dry the freezer really well using some old bath towels. I do all of this when it is unplugged. When I am done, I always remember to turn the freezer back on. Then I put all of the food back: oldest on top. I am hoping I have no freezer burn. I usually don’t. I will take inventory while I am returning each item to the freezer.

While I am doing this, I will pull out all of the frozen bananas. They are everywhere in every freezer. I plan on making some muffins later today using all of them. I will keep some out for breakfasts and snacks this week and freeze the rest for future meals.

We had a wonderful Easter dinner of leg of lamb with a great sauce that I have been making for years, roasted potatoes, broccoli, mashed cauliflower, corn on the cob, and olives for my son who loves them. We topped it all off with Keto peanut butter ice cream for those who wanted it and Tillamook waffle cone ice cream for those who didn’t.

My son and his wife gave me a beautiful plant of mini daffodils. Daffodils are one of my favorite flowers. Hubby has already researched how to plant them in our yard the end of May. They also offered to bring wine for dinner. They brought two bottles: one sweet and one dry. Only the dry got opened. So we have part of that bottle and the other bottle left. I am not crazy about dry wine but will finish it up in my recipes.

Dinner tonight will be all the leftovers from dinner last night. I think we will have enough for another night after that.

What are your plans for today? Feel free to share.