I Have Sinned...

 Hello Readers!

It’s time for a confession. Today, I made a purchase online. It’s been a great, Frugal February; I’ve been very good at getting my shopping done in the store and spending my money on things I generally thought were necessities. However, I have been scrapbooking lately and thought I had everything I needed to work on my youngest son’s album. However, when I started to sit down with his pictures and the album I was using, I quickly realized that most scrapbook paper I have was rather “girly”. Some of it was masculine, I do have some cool steampunk themed paper… but really that’s not a good look for a young boy. So, I started looking online for some paper kits. Just so I could see what was out there… and well, I found a sale. A WONDERFUL warehouse sale… the kits I had been dreaming of were half off, and then there was a 20% discount on the final order total… and free shipping if I spent more than $50. So, I did it… I purchased 14 kits and spent around $80. The kits were almost $6 each and very lovely… so I bought them... I caved… and now I’m confessing. My husband says it’s okay because I haven’t shopped online all month, and the added bonus is that I did not order from Amazon, but I did order directly from the manufacturer’s website itself.

In other news, I have decided to modify our family’s diet a bit. I have decided to eliminate snacking and instead purchase more organic/natural foods with the intention of meal planning and rounding out our meals better.  This decision, I’m sure, will not reduce the food costs in the house. But! Hopefully, it’ll help provide better nutrition for my family. I’m also planning on increasing the amount of fish we are consuming, as well as increasing the number of green vegetables.

The last time I went shopping, my food budget was only slightly more than I normally spend on a weekly basis. It seems like time will tell whether this is a beneficial change. I’ll tell you what, though, I was cooking organic ground beef, browning it in the pan, and it smelled so much better than the regular beef. I’m not sure what the difference was, but it also cooked up a lot nicer. Could be in my head, but hey, I’ll take it.

Well, that is it for now, readers! Have a Fabulous rest of your day!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Good morning,

Today is Valentine’s Day! It’s been a great morning so far. We exchanged small gifts/cards this morning and it has been a great way to brighten up the week and add in a bit of excitement to the everydayness of everyday. We don’t normally do anything for Valentine’s Day, but this year I decided that we would have a bit of fun. We drew names across the household and agreed to a $5 gift exchange. I made some small decorations for the mantle and made smaller snail themed valentines for the kids which included homemade mini chocolate giftboxes for them as well. I got my dh some coffee pods for his Valentine’s Day present with a lovely homemade card. He in return got me more craft supplies with a lovely handwritten letter.

Later tonight we will make some dinner to finish off our Valentine’s Day. I planned on making some pasta with meatballs, salad, and some garlic toast. We will see how it all turns out. It might be a little challenging especially because we all managed to catch covid.

Overall, sickness hasn’t been that bad, mainly just general tiredness, soreness, with a little congestion thrown in. The kids don’t seem to be terribly sick either… just tired and sore. Hopefully everything will clear up in the next few days and everyone will be feeling as good as new.  

2nd February Post

 Hello Readers,

Welcome back to my blog, hope y’all are having a fantastic Friyay! Things have been going well here in my world.

Frugal February has been in full swing here. So far so good, only a few, not so frugal moves have been made. I’ve been very good though and have not ordered one thing online. It has been tempting to do so at times, but I have limited myself to only doing research online on items I have been thinking about purchasing. I also do a little price comparison online as well. I did learn that it is more expensive to purchase parmesan cheese in bulk from Sam's Club, and the basic shredded Walmart parmesan appears to be the best value at only 2.22 per 6oz package.

The not-so-frugal moves I have made have been fast food purchases. Since paying a bit more attention to where I am spending money, I have noticed that my tendency to stop for the quick bite of food has increased. All be it was because I had a few eye appointments in the mornings which led to the occasional treat from McDonald’s... I am glad it was from McDonald’s though and not from Dunkin Donuts, which I will admit was an “almost” during the beginning of the month. The temptation was high for sure with that one… luckily, we chose Mcdonald's Sausage McMuffins instead of the fatty donuts, which I might add are very much disappointing these days... I remember going into the Dunkin as a child and smelling the greasy donutty air from them frying donuts first thing in the morning with the smell of basic drip coffee thrown in. Nowadays they are made in a factory and don’t even taste the same… cold, stale, and sad donuts for sure. McDonald’s processed sandwiches are at least nice and warm and not so stale…

Speaking of McDonald’s… Did you know it is cheaper to purchase the basic Sausage McMuffin at the store than through the app? I always feel a little bad because I have got a bigger family and well, when I go, the order is almost for a dozen of those bad boys. Those poor employees got to whip those up on the spot… It would be great to be able to order ahead of time to give them a little more time to prepare them along with all the other breakfast orders, of which I’m sure they are busy with already.

Well, I suppose that is enough rambling on for now. I’m off to finish a lovely cup of coffee and to prepare some lunch! Thank you for stopping by to read my musings and I hope you all have a fantastic rest of your day! 😊

1st Frugal February Post

 Good Evening Peeps!

It is officially “Frugal February!” That means we are embarking on a new, fabulous month and attempting to save some cash. My goals for the month are to avoid shopping online and eating meals based on what we have on hand. We have also agreed to go frugal on date nights…. It should be fun and add a little excitement around here.

It was my shopping day, and I was able to keep my weekly shopping to just under $150. I needed to pick up plenty of milk and fruit for snacks... plus a little ground beef for dinner. I probably spent too much on some frivolous crafting items… but they will help make some projects more fun.

Speaking of projects, I recently made a meal planner (shared in a previous post), which began a new adventure in the scrappaper world. I started watching how to make certain documents in MS Word, but that led me to watch a video on making journals from composition books. It looked like a lot of fun, and since then, I have been playing a bit more with my paper stash... I’ve made a couple of new journals from composition notebooks. The first was a full-sized one that I built from a dollar Walmart composition book, and the second one was made from a mini composition book that came in a pack of three… and I gotta say, I’m in love. It is a very satisfying short project that makes these little books come to life and is lots of fun. 

Have you been working on any projects? Please share in the comment section below, and have a fabulous evening!

Meal Planning Wednesday

Good Evening Readers,

Today, Wednesday, is my day to go through the pantry and freezers/fridges. I go through, sort, and plan what to do with the food I have on hand and find out what I need to purchase more of. There is a lot of food that we have available, mostly that which I have acquired from impulse purchases and meal plans that have not been followed as well as perhaps they should have, on top of keeping the pantry stocked properly.

My pantry collection isn’t as bad as the freezer collection, though; in the freezers, I have lots of random things... like empanada wraps, premade pie filling, frozen yogurts, miscellaneous fruit that I “saved,” leftover meats from dinners I made. One time I purchased 8lbs of strawberries from Samsclub, and cut them up and froze them because they were a good price and in season. And well, many months later, we still haven’t touched them.

My goal, especially with Frugal February coming up, is to start using them up, one frozen thing at a time. Tonight, I am making pasta… I found some hamburger patties I “saved” from dinner, who knows how long ago (FYI, just so no one freaks out on the age of them, it hasn’t been more than a few months since they were cooked and put in the freezer), so they are ending up in the pasta. I heated them up in the sauce while it was cooking and chopped them up while the dish was still being prepared. I jokingly told my kids we weren’t having meatballs with the pasta, but rather meat “squares”.  They were completely ok with having the meat “squares”; it even made it a bit more fun.

Because today was the day I prepared my shopping lists, I have had budgeting a bit more on my mind. I ventured into the world of YouTube to see how people make those awesome planners. I found a tutorial on using MS Word to create a meal-planning list. I decided to follow along with it… and as usual, I’m not very good at following directions, but I learned a bit and was able to really customize my Shopping Planner/List Document. This time, I was able to include areas to incorporate pricing to go along with my planner. Which, I think, will make it easier to plan out shopping trips and stay on target with my budgeted amount for the necessities.

I have uploaded a copy in case any readers might be interested in such a thing and would like to download a copy of your very own for personal use. As always, I will close with that, and I hope you all have a Fabulous day! 😊

Projects....

Hello Readers,

How has your day been today? I hope it's been a good and productive day for y'all.

My day has been good and somewhat busy, I was able to do some computer work which was good. I love sitting down and focusing on a project, especially when it is a bit "art" related. I’ve always had a knack for being able to take something I see and copy it or break it down and rebuild it to some degree. I have always found it a bit amusing because while I can break down and build up things, I cannot, for the life of me, copy instructions without altering the original author's intent.

Once, I tried making a skirt from a pattern... it was a really “easy” one, too. It was meant for the beginner, and I messed it all up. This is after years of experience and having made several dozen other skirts from scratch. Same thing with cooking. My husband and I could take the same recipe for pineapple upside-down cake and “follow” the instructions… mine have always failed. But my husband, his would look like it came out of a magazine. Not saying I’m a bad cook… I have made “many” experimental dishes and had them come out as a huge success. I have made many birthday cakes around here, and although the decorating sometimes might need a little something, the cakes usually come perfectly well. I can easily whip up a batch of puff pastry dough without issue... if I don’t follow a recipe.

In other news, I’ve been watching a few YouTube videos on scrapbooking. I’ve seen a few on Junk journals, and those look like fun. I do like playing around with watercolors and have had a bit of a stash growing. I was thinking that using them as part of a junk journal might be a bit interesting.

I’ve also seen a video on making coffee-stained paper. Looked like a fun, messy project. You basically just take some plain ole printer or copy paper and paint it with coffee (you could also use tea).  You put it out to dry, and you’re left with some antique-looking paper… I’d imagine if you used the right flavor of coffee, it’d smell interesting, too. Although when I was watching the videos, I was thinking you might be able to stain your papers using food coloring just as well, perhaps without the coffee smell.

Well, that’s that for tonight, folks. As always, have a fabulous rest of your day! 😊

What's Your Favorite.....????

 Hello Readers,

How are you this Saturday Morning? I am doing well! I have caught a cold that’s been running around the house. Dh caught it from the kids, and now I have it… It is mainly a head cold, but it drains you from your energy, leaves you with a sore body, and fills your head with goobers. Luckily though, it is the weekend, and my dh doesn’t mind me resting a bit in bed. He has even brought me coffee, tea, and some oatmeal. He is the best! 😊

For today’s topic I’d like to kind of keep it simple. What is your favorite all time breakfast? I do love a lovely waffle with ice cream and warmed strawberries on it… but I couldn’t eat it every day… its far too rich. So, I can’t say that is my favorite. “My favorite” is something that I define as something that’s tried, true, and gets the job done. I’d have to say my “favorite” breakfast is a simple humble bowl of oatmeal with some cinnamon, nuts, and berries thrown in, maybe with a reasonable (or unreasonable) helping of honey. It’s very satisfying, hits the spot flavor wise, and it is easy to make and clean up after… It takes nothing but a bowl, spoon, and a measuring device, maybe…unless you’ve learned how to “eyeball” it by having made it enough times.

So let me know, in the comment section below (isn’t it great that last section rhymes?), what is your favorite breakfast… and in closing as always, I hope you have a fabulous rest of your day! 😊