I live, write, and garden in the PNW with my husband of 27 years, disabled daughter, college-aged son, and my 84-year-old mother. We have paid off $250,000.00 worth of debt (if you include the interest) in the last fifteen years and as of 6/12/2020 are 100% DEBT FREE!!!!Well, there's no school today as we got a bunch more snow dumped on us. It's not anything like in other parts of the country, I think there's only about eight inches total, but there's a lot of black ice under it and the plows are having a hard time. Plus it's very cold and they are using a little common sense this time about closing schools that the majority of kids in the district walk up to a mile to get to. I am glad I bought milk last night.
I think I will bake today. I usually bake on Thursdays but with the kids home it will give them something to do. I've got the ingredients for pumpkin bread and can have my daughter make cookies since the stock in the freezer is almost gone. Then of course the dinner rolls and buns. I won't need to make any more bisquits as I did that on Sunday and there are enough for the week.
Today will be an enforced no spend day, though I had no plans to spend any money anyway. There's plenty of time for pancakes and eggs and fruit for breakfast and the kids have been bugging me about fast food type food so I'll probably make cheeseburgers with fresh buns and fries for lunch. I got a great deal on ten pounds of frozen organic french fries a while back and we are slowly working our way through them.
Dinner will be leftovers as we have two pieces of chicken, a couple of salmon patties, and two servings of pot roast left still to eat. I just need to add veg and starch. I'm watching letovers very closely this week to prevent food waste. We have a tendency to throw out so much food because it gets shoved to the back of the fridge and forgotten about. In an effort to cut back on the grocery budget, we will do best at managing waste first so we don't have to go buy more of something right away.
I spent a lot of time yesterday reading on ways to save money on food. Most of it was the same old/same old but I found some interesting articles that were actually helpful. I was at Kitchen Parade and found this series of articles:
I also spent some time at Get Rich Slowly which did have some nice tips, though a lot of them were things I had heard before. I did come away with some new information though, so it was worth the read.
My food budget is the easiest to cut as it has the most fat in it. I just really have to be on the ball about it and not be lazy. Laziness is the number one killer of the food budget in this house. If we are not lazy this month, I think I can squeeze out $200 for savings or extra debt payoff.
I put some books on hold at the library. Mostly cookbooks on healthy eating or making restaurant style (Chinese, Japanese, Mexican) food at home from scratch. Hopefully they won't take too long, though one of them had 2 requests before mine, the rest I was the first requester for.
January 12th, 2011 at 04:00 pm 1294848000
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January 12th, 2011 at 04:18 pm 1294849119
They are yummy! I pressed chopped pecans on top before baking too if your family likes nuts. Have a wonderful day!
PS: Checked out your link and she has Weight Watchers recipes! I am joining today.
January 12th, 2011 at 06:30 pm 1294857011