Both kids seem better today. Tobias woke up feeling pretty good, even ate a little something and was not running a fever so he decided to go to school with the injunction to call me to come get him if he started feeling poorly. Rose seems 100% now, so that is nice.

It's a gorgeous day here today. It's only 42 but the sun is out and its very clear. Both google weather and msn weather say it was supposed to snow. It did yesterday but it was too wet and did not stick except on the shoulders of the foothills. And there are no clouds in the sky, just a very pretty shade of winter blue. I thought about hanging laundry out, but I wasn't sure if it would dry with it being this cold and no wind. It tends to dry faster in the house unless its at least 55 degrees outside.

I spent a little money today at the gas station. Got a large pepperoni pizza and a bag of chips. So totally not a necessary purchase, but I'm still in a very anti-cooking mood right now. I think a couple more good nights of sleeping will help with that immensely.

I wrote 2 pages last night. That puts me to 108, I think. I'll have to go back and check. 14 more pages to go and I am 1/3 of the way to my goal.

I've been working my way through the commentaries of the second season of the new Doctor Who while doing my PTR emails. Lots of interesting info and it gives me something to listen to while I do the mind-numbing pointing and clicking. Last night I was able to cash out $5 with a new one and $3 with an old one. So I should see that show up in my paypal account on Friday at the latest. I'm very close to cashing out on another $5 one and another $3 one. I still have never heard back from ReadRevenue about that lost payment 1/13/07. It's probably a lost cause. I did send them another email about it last night.

I paid my car insurance online today, 3 months @ $185.50. $5 of which was because I split it in two payments instead of paying it in full in December.

DH ordered a pair of size 16W shoes online and spent $40 plus shipping. He put it on the credit card so we will add that amount to our regular payment. DH has a very hard time finding shoes that fit his foot and neither one of us can stand the service at the local Foot Locker. Which is really too bad. The local Lady Foot Locker has excellent service and the guys need to take a lesson from them. And I've told management so after the last time.

Okay, I think that covers all the spending for today.

Today is leftover day in my quest for good food management. Well, its leftover day for the children, anyway. I don't have any leftovers but they sure did. So Rose cleaned out the last of the macaroni and a slice of pizza and Tobias cleaned out the half can of chili, a serving of green beans, and 2 breadsticks for lunch today. With us being sick with the flu we've had some convenience foods this week. Most of it canned or frozen.

I miss my good wholesome homemade fare, but this is the first day I felt like cooking in the last week or so. But first I was getting the other stuff cleared out of the fridge. Tonight's dinner will be homemade again. Beef ribs, baked potatoes, salad, and broccoli/cauliflower. Yummy.

I'm torn about dinner tonight. I know I could just make something simple like spaghetti and meatballs, something that I don't have to babysit if I put the meatballs in the micro. But I am still so tired and even that sounds like a huge production.

I have to go buy milk anyway so I'm trying to talk myself down from getting a pizza while I'm out. It's only $6 for a large pepperoni, but then again, its $6 that really does not need to be spent. The problem with being sick is that my resistance to spending money goes way down. There is just so much ease, or at least there is a perceived ease to getting take out.

If I didn't need milk, I wouldn't even drive down to the store as it requires more effort than I really feel like putting out there. Oh, I'm alert enough, its not like it would be dangerous for me to drive the 1.2 miles to get there, but I'm just really lethargic. Haven't done my treadmill since last Wednesday.

I do have a doctor's appointment for tomorrow. I'm kind of glad I couldn't get in today, so I could get some more sleep while the kids were at school.

As promised, my gluten-free meatloaf, which also happens to be low-carb or high protein for those who eat that way.

1.5 lbs harmburger
1 bunch of green onions, chopped, both green and white parts
3 heaping tbsp garlic, minced
4 large eggs
1/2 cup freshly shredded parmesan cheese
1/2 cup cheddar cheese

Mix green onion, garlic and hamburger (torn into chunks). Mix in eggs and cheeses. Mix with hands for best consistency. Oil an oven safe dish lightly (helps with clean up later on). Put meatloaf in oven safe dish. Cook at 375 for an hour. Let stand about 10 min to allow the grease that rises to the top to reabsorb. If you blot it up the meatloaf will end up dry. This can also be made in a muffin tin for individual sized meatloaves, but will dry out quicker so check on it after 45 min. It can also be fried into patties but is kind of fall aparty that way.

Garlic is very essential to the flavor of this recipe, if left out it will be quite bland.

I so did not want to make a big production over dinner tonight. I had a huge case of the lazies. So I made salmon patties. I don't use bread crumbs or crackers like many people do, I use parmesan. Everything was on hand in the pantry or fridge So here's my recipe.

3 6 ounce cans of pink salmon
3 scallions, chopped, both white and green parts
2 jumbo eggs
3 tsp minced garlic (from the jar)
1/2 cup parmesan cheese (not from the green can, freshly grated)

Mix it all up, form it into patties, fry in olive oil over medium heat (turning once) until done. Simple, easy, took all of 5 minutes, if that, to prepare and not much more than that to cook. Add a can of green beans and you have a meal. Well, we have a meal, we eat big at lunch, light at dinner. But I suppose you could add a roll and a fruit if you wanted or some other sides.

Last night I threw two chicken legs in the crockpot with half an onion, chopped, 5 tbsp of minced garlic, 6 stalks of celery with leaves, 1 tsp freshly ground black pepper and 1 tbsp of freshly ground kosher sea salt and filled it to the top with water. I set it on high for 4 hours and then on low for 12 hours, then it set to warm.

Then I drained it through a collander, set aside the chicken, dumped the veggies, put the broth back into the crockpot, added a large diced carrot, 2 stalks of diced celery and 1/3 of a bag of egg noodles I found in the cupboard. Set the timer for an hour, than picked the chicken off the bones and shredded it and put it back in the soup. Voila, chicken noodle soup with very little effort and no constant watching that the pot doesn't boil over.

Of course, salt may need to be added to taste on the finished product. My kids didn't think it needed it, but I did, so I just added it to my bowl.

Very cheaply made and I have 2 meals worth of leftovers. Yummy.

Today I made a loaf of bread and a batch of hamburger and hot dog buns. I'm getting better at the buns, though next time I will double the time of the second dough rise. My hot dog and hamburger buns are flatter than I'd like.

Still the kids like the way they taste and will eat them up, so a little flatness isn't causing complaints.

I am also going to throw the makings of turkey soup in the crockpot tonight, just fill it up with turkey necks, an onion, a carrot, some celery leaves and inner stalks, garlic, salt, pepper and water and let it go all night. Then tomorrow strain it, pick all the meat off the bones to add back to the broth, add fresh carrots and celery and homemade whole wheat egg noodles, and have it ready for the kids when they come home from school for dinner, served with warm homemade bread. Yummy and cheap.

I am really glad I bought a pasta maker in my formerly less than frugal life. I didn't use it much then, but I sure use it a lot now.

No more fruit flies! We managed to kill the buggers off without using bug bombs. It took a week, but with fly strips, scrubbing down the kitchen, putting all food in sealed containers or Ziploc baggies, and DH vacuuming up stray ones, our kitchen is now fruit fly free. Try saying that 5 times fast.

We decided not to chance anything tonight by cooking in the kitchen so we grabbed fast food. Not healthy either physically or financially, but that's the choice we made. We just did fast food drive thru after going to the chiropractor and making our milk run to town, then back to the school just in time for Rose's basketball practice.

I made bread last night in the bread machine and I shouldn't have to make any now until Sunday. Tomorrow we shall cook again. It's spaghetti and meatballs night, with salad and fruit (either apples, blueberries, cherries or pineapple as that is what we have on hand). I need to make up a new week's worth of menues as I misplaced the other ones I'd done. Oh, to be organized.

We did do some cleaning in the laundry room, the bit that still hadn't been done yet. There's a little bit left but its almost done, will probably be done before we go to bed tonight. Which will be really nice. Hopefully tomorrow we can work on taking down the Christmas tree or at least getting the ornaments and lights off. I want it done before DH leaves for Alaska on Sunday. I want my living room back before he goes and the tree itself is to heavy for me to haul out to the shed for storage (its fake).

One of these days I will be organized! And I believe that slightly more than I believe my neighbor will ever pay me back the $11.55 he owes me. Anyone have a bridge for sale?

DH just went down to the gas station and filled one of our gas cans for $12.50 so we have it on hand for the generator. We have already had one brief power failure today and winds are expected to be nastier tonight, plus there is a very good chance of heavy snow if the temperatures plummet. Nothing like the 2 feet we got last time, but several inches.

I hope it doesn't hit us, but at least we have a back-up energy and heat supply. That generator may not turn out to be just an expensive piece of porch equipment after all. Though I am still feeling the pinch of buying the thing!

Rose's basketball practice was upped to 3 hours tonight. I hope the power does not go out at the school, though there are emergency lights I don't know if there are any in the gymnasium. I don't like these 3 hour practices. Especially on nights they assign math homework.

Dinner tonight is my lower carb version of Chile Verde.

Ingredients:

1/4 lb sugar-free bacon, crumbled
1 lb boneless pork roast, cubed
1.5 cups chopped scallions
1 T minced garlic
4 oz green chile peppers, diced (fresh or canned)
1.5 T jalapeno peppers, diced (fresh or canned
2 cups water
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper

In large skillet, fry bacon crispy. Set aside. Start browning pork in bacon fat. Add bacon crumbled. When pork is browned, add scallions and garlic.* Saute until tender. Add remaining ingredients and stir. Simmer for 30 min. Turn up heat to medium for 15 min to thicken. If you want to add some thickener like corn starch or flour you can, but I don't.

*Optional: if desired, julienne chop a green bell pepper and add with scallions and garlic to stretch meal further. Serves 4 without bell pepper, 6 with.

Can serve by itself or with 100% whole wheat tortillas, veggie wraps, etc. Added cheese or sour cream also optional.

Recipe responds well to doubling, tripling or quadrupling for the freezer.

The evening saw a lot accomplished. We found the floor in Tobias' room and unburied the dresser and put all his clothes away in it. That helped a lot. So now he has a perfect dresser and a perfect desk with his computer on it, which was perfect to begin with. One thing he does keep neat is his computer area. Just like his sister. These are old computers by the way, leftovers. They don't have much on them besides Word and Works and games.

I swear I did not buy 75% of the junk in his room. Grandparents. Enough said.

Dinner was an old stand-by: Tex-Mex Chicken and Rice. And I cheated, too as I had leftover chicken and leftover rice. So I just warmed up the chicken and rice, dumped in two jars of salsa, stirred it, reheated it and stirred it again. Presto, chango, dinner. Cheap, fast, easy.

DH and I are going to try to finish T's room tomorrow while he is at school. Who knows how succesful we'll be? At least his closet was still completely clean and organized from the last time I did it. Of course, that was because he couldn't get into it because of all the stuff in front of the door, but I'll take what I can get.

Rose's basketball games went pretty well today--for Rose. Our team lost both games but Rose made the most baskets of any of her teammates in the first game and was one of only 3 people to make any baskets on her team on the second game.

The first game was against our own school's other team and they have most of the 6th graders and the 5th graders they do have are the most advanced players. They didn't divide it up well, not mixing the experienced kids with the less so ones. Of the 10 kids on Rose's team, only half have played before. And this is the team they practice and scrimmage with, so we knew going in we wouldn't beat them. I just told Rose to do her best and she did.

The second game went pretty well considering that 5 out of 10 of their players were half a head to 8 inches taller than Rose who is the tallest girl on her team. There's not too much you can do when people outreach you by that
much, so I'm proud my daughter did so well against them.

I do wish they would have separate 5th and 6th grade teams and not combine
them together. They have enough kids to do it and its hard when you are
overmatched because of height, even though you play well.

I just wish that the girl who used to bully Rose would get her act together. She used to be such a good player and now she's just acting like a ditz and has made maybe one basket in 3 games when she used to be a top scorer. She doesn't pay any attention to what's going on around her, I don't know why she is even out there if she isn't going to give it her best. Well, she doesn't bully Rose anymore. Kind of hard to when Rose has flown right past her in skills this year. It's a good thing Rose isn't the vindictive sort or she'd have good reason to bully back now. Or at least tease.

Anyway, I still feel really good about Rose, knowing she is getting better and better all the time and trying hard.

We got smart and packed lunches today for the kids, since the games were from 12 to 2 and they just get so hungry. If we hadn't packed food, they would have wanted to go down the road to the Casino and get sub sandwiches at their market store that has a Port of Subs in it. Wanted to prevent the "can we eat outs" from happening.

After that we went into my mother's house to do laundry and Mom took over so we could go do the rest of our grocery shopping. We are trying for a weekend shop that means we won't shop again for the month except to buy eggs and milk. That is the best way I can think of right now to keep to the grocery budget of $200 a month.

Then Mom decided to take the kids overnight so we came home without them. I made whole wheat hamburger buns tonight as we are planning on making cheeseburgers for lunch tomorrow. I've got a few ideas to try next time to see if they might work better. We put them in a 9 X 13 glass pan and next time I think we'll try using a cookie sheet instead. The pan works great for rolls but less great for buns. I think I'll see about finding a different whole wheat bun recipe that's a little different, too.

It's late now so I will post our spending journal for today tomorrow.

This is my 5th Entry for today but it is payday so it is to be expected that I can't silence my keyboard for any decent stretch of time once I sit down to it.

It is a very interesting experience tracking daily spending. DH is totally on board with it and is even reminding me when I forget which is very helpful because I want to do this.

We had a very good day out and about while the kids were in school. It is nice to have some time just to be a couple, even if it is doing mundane things like paying bills and grocery shopping. Being able to have an uninterupted conversation in the car is pretty cool, too.

Dinner tonight was cooked out of the freezer and pantry, none of the new stuff. I am trying to stick to a menu plan so things will stay on track. So dinner was oven baked chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans and milk for everyone else, and just a piece of chicken and some green beans for me. My stomach is still unsure of itself, though I am feeling miles and away better than yesterday.

I really wanted to buy some bananas today but the last time we did it brought in fruit flies with them so until they have all died off we aren't buying fruit unless it goes in the fridge. It is so frustrating, I've got a few pest strips hanging but they just don't want to land on them.

A few more days and they should be all dead, there is no more available food for them. We are being extra careful that if we do leave dishes in the sink because the dishwasher is full, that we rinse everything off. Last thing I need is a resurgence of the the things because someone left a ketchup blob on a plate.

I've got plenty of apples and oranges, which of course is why I want bananas. Sigh. Oh, well, I will live and if this is the only thing in my life that is upsetting than I think I am very happy to live with that!

Vizsla asked for my bread recipe so I thought I'd post it here.

1 and 1/2 cups + 2 tbsp water
3 and 3/4 cups whole wheat flour
2 tbsp dry milk powder
1 tsp salt
2 tbsp canola oil
2 tbsp honey (or cane sugar)
1 tbsp molasses
3 tsp active dry yeast

If your wheat flour does not have gluten in it you can add 1 and 1/2 tbsp of gluten as well. If you are grinding your own it will have it. There is no harm to the recipe in leaving it out.

Add ingredients in order indicated by your bread machine and use the whole wheat setting.

I don't have oven directions for it, but you could probably find them online for something comparable. This is for a 1 and a 1/2 pound loaf of bread.

This is a very filling bread, so when making sandwiches for the kids with it, we only make half sandwiches and they are full.

Today I:

Baked a loaf of whole wheat bread.

Made homemade tacos for dinner using a bunch of individual spices instead of from a mix. Healthier and with no fillers.

Cut up a 2 and a half pound pot roast into chunks to make chili tomorrow. If I had bought the pre-cut beef it would have cost twice as much for just under half the amount.

There will be enough chili leftover to package a family size meal for the freezer.

Today is shaping up nicely, well its almost over, but no money was spent. I will be using gas to go to basketball practice, the 2 mile round trip twice. A whopping 4 miles worth of gas.

The French Dip restaurant desire passed and I never made my chili today. The windstorm kept me up late last night. I took down the Christmas lights that are on the opposite side of my bedroom wall today so the clunking wouldn't keep jerking me awake tonight, like it did last night. I also turned off all the timers so the rest of the lights no longer come on. As tired as I was, I didn't think a major kitchen production was in order. Maybe tomorrow.

DH comes home tomorrow, maybe I'll make the chili then. It's a big recipe and there ought to be leftovers for the freezer.

I checked my regular savings accounts today. I made a total of 50 cents interest between the three of them. I am so glad I have ING.

Ever since reading a blog an hour or two ago that the person made French Dips for dinner, I have had a mad full on craving to go get a French Dip tomorrow from this wonderful restaurant down by the border crossing. They make what is probably the best French Dip in the state and I can't get the thought out of my head.

I don't have the cash on hand to buy one. I don't have the money in my checking account to buy one. I do have a credit on one of my credit cards for overpayment, but I don't want to use it. I'm trying to talk myself out of this, because it would be wasteful and I promised myself no eating out. Plus the French bread is white flour.

I hope I get over this by morning. I wish I even had the money to go get some London Broil and do it up myself. I can easily make whole wheat flour French bread in the bread machine. But no shopping until Friday. I'm not wasting the money right now.

My plan for tomorrow was to make some homemade no bean chili anyway. Which I have been wanting to make all week, but is a bit labor intensive. I guess if I get it started right after the kids leave for school the smells will permeate the house and overrun the French Dip thoughts. That sounds like a plan.

I also want to make up some hamburger buns. Basically use the bread machine to do the dough and after the first rise, divide the dough into six balls instead of 12 like I would for rolls, let them rise and bake them in the oven.

Ooh, now chili with crusty fresh hamburger bun type rolls, yes, that will wipe out the French Dip craving at its source.

In my quest towards better food management I aiming towards 5% waste as opposed to about 30%. I have been keeping better track this month than ever before. Today was leftovers for dinner, sort of.

There was enough spaghetti left over for Rose, but no hamburger. Tobias had a plate from the other day that has both spaghetti and hamburger on it (I guess his growth spurt is over). So I made fresh hamburger for Rose to have on her spaghetti, but made the entire package.

Then I had leftover hamburger, so I made 7 ounces of rice for me, as I know that is how much I can eat and have nothing left over. There was enough leftover sauce that I added it and the hamburger to the rice and that was my dinner along with green beans, a tangerine, and the last piece of bread from the batch I made last night, smeared with garlic butter.

Number of leftovers currently in my fridge: 0. Yay, me. It didn't even feel like I was eating leftovers. Okay, well, technically I wasn't except the sauce, but the kids were and didn't feel like they were eating leftovers.

So day one of the new year and food management is currently under control.

I finally got everything cleared out around the bread machine so I measured out all the ingredients and it is busily working away on the dough and we shall have fresh bread tomorrow. This is going to be pretty good, I think. Since we only buy the organic 100% whole wheat bread, which comes to 2/$5.00 at the bread outlet store, and we buy five to six loaves a month, plus the same kind of hamburger or hot dog buns, we should save a lot of money doing it this way.

The organic ingredients came to $10.00 and should be good for about 40 loaves of bread or homemade buns, (I'll track it to be sure) which would come to $125 from the outlet store for that same number of loaves or buns. Homemade comes out to 25 cents per loaf or batch of buns.

So instead of spending $15 to $20 a month on bread products, I will be spending $6 to $8. And the kids will eat the crust off homemade bread as well as the heels. No problem.

I tend to track my leftovers pretty well. That habit is getting well-established. But trying to keep menu plans going, well, it works for a week or two and then I let it go. But during the weeks it works, it works really well. I want it to work all the time. Not working leads to meals out and way too much money spent.

I think what I need is six weeks of weekly menues that I can put into rotation. I also need to make enough at meals to provide for leftovers for other meals. Like tacos one night and taco salads for lunch the next day, spaghetti and meatballs followed by meatball sandwiches. Macaroni followed by macaroni pie, that sort of thing.

I want to have in place a working system by the time February starts. In the beginning menues should draw on what I have on hand in the pantry and the freezer. I have a lot of sauces that I picked up for cheap at Sunshine Liquidators, our local overstock and scratch and dent place. And they are all free of allergens or additives that we are allergic to or can't eat. So I need to figure out how to use them. A lot of them have recipes on the back of the bottle so I can play around with those and make sure they are financially feasible recipes.

I'd also like to do some OAMC, well maybe some shorter sessions that can bank some freezer meals for the nights were I am exhausted or sick. Just to make life easier and us not so prone to go out. That going out to eat is really what kills the budget. That and school hot lunches. Have to get those things under control.

I've been thinking a lot lately about things I can do to stay the course, or improve it. Some may call them goals or resolutions or steps and put them along with the new year, but I don't. Because I don't really like anything that starts with the new year or in any way smacks of a promise to do something better or different in the coming year, because take a wild guess what happens when I do do that? Anyone? Yeah, I don't do them.

So these are just things that I'd like to learn to do so that things go better for me as I go.

I'd like to keep my grocery budget to $200 a month, or rather $200 every 4 weeks. We have four people in this house. DH, who can usually eat a horse and drink a cow in one week's time. But he is only home 12 days out of every 28, and he is fed by work when he is up there. Me, and I eat maybe 2200 calories a day but I exercise vigorously five days a week and on my off days tend to only eat 1800 calories. My daughter, who has 1.5 hour basketball practice 3 nights a week and 2 1 hour long games on Saturdays, who tends to eat 2000 calories on work out days and 1400 on non-workout days. And my son, who is currently going through a growth spurt and eating about 1200 to 1400 calories a day depending on physical activity.

I think we should easily be able to stay within this amount if we completely stop buying convenience foods and eating out. I am wanting to eliminate all not from scratch foods anyway, as they have so many unhealthy ingredients. This should leave us with about $100 for meat protein, $30 for dairy and $70 for 100% whole wheat bread items, fresh fruits and vegetables each period.

We eat a lot of protein due to postprandial hyperinsulinemia (all of us have it except the youngest one and we feed him the same as us as he is showing signs of it, just hasn't been tested) and we don't like vegetarian meat substitues or beans of the non-string or green variety. Cutting back on protein is not an option for us to save money.

I think $100 a month should be adequate. We can usually get 10 pounds of hamburger @ $1.48 per pound, 10 pounds of chicken hindquarters @ $0.39 to $0.59 per pound, whole chickens at $0.59 per pound, beef roasts @ $2.49 per pound, tuna fish $0.99 (label must read tuna, water or tuna, olive oil, salt is okay--no autolyzed vegetable broth or any other additives), turkey legs or necks for $.0.69 per pound. We get 4 18 packs of organic omega-3 eggs a month at $2.19 per pack. If there is a good sale I will buy salmon or other seafood like shrimp or crab, but that is rare. All meat must be free of added ingredients, like a "10% solution added to enchance flavors," non-genetically modified, wild caught and not farmed in the case of seafood, no growth hormones, and free range. We prefer grass-fed and kosher, but sometimes there is a limit to what we can expect from our local grocery stores and most organic meat is out of our price range.

The most expensive thing is the sliced sandwich meats from Applegate Farms that have no additives, preservatives or in the case of ham has not been cured. The kids take that for lunches. Once it is opened it must be used within 4 days. I really need to divide these packages up and freeze the excess because the kids won't go through a whole one in a week's time. And also the organic milk is very pricey, too. DH drinks regular milk but the rest of us drink organic. DH can go through one gallon in 2 to 3 days by himself while we go through 1 in about 5 days. I can get coupons from Organic Valley dairy and I use my reward coupons from Fred Meyer as well.

I also need to start making my own bread products again. I have the bread machine, the ingredients and the recipes, but I never quite get around to it. I need to get around to it. Bread is pretty much my last convenience product but since we buy organic bread and 100% whole wheat bread, it is pricey. I can do this. I just have to want to.

This is all doable. It just needs to be done-able. Okay, making up words now. But I think my point is clear here. Just do it. I'll very grudgingly let this be categorized under goals, but I consider it more of a plan.

I reckon I'm going to have a lot of these no spend days over the next few weeks, and will really have to keep a sharp eye on the spending. That's okay, though. I don't want to be lax with it. Tomorrow should be no spend, also. It helps when you don't leave the house?

Dinner tonight was out of the freezer, turkey necks, which the kids love and broccoli and cauliflower, which the kids also love. I ate other food that I had on hand as I didn't feel like thawing out two packages of turkey necks. This was a pretty cheap meal as I got the necks the week after Thanksgiving when they were selling for 29 cents a pound.

My goal for the next two weeks is no eating out at all. Not even cheapy fast food places. Everything home-cooked and from the current stores in the freezer, fridge, and pantry.

I found out last night at the grocery store that they didn't have gallons of Organic Valley milk because it was affected by the big power failure down Seattle way. Bummer. Not sure when they will get it into the stores. That will be the only grocery spending I will do until the 5th, but only if they get production back up and running.

I am mass producing lasagnas today, it is a long and exhausting process making these babies from scratch, but I'd rather do several in a day than one at a time anyway, since it pretty much involves getting every pot and pan in the house dirty, not to mention the food processor and the salad shooter, a couple cutting boards and a chef's knife.

But it is coming along and it is sauce time so the house is about to smell very, very good. In the midst of thawing and cooking hamburger, boiling whole wheat noodles, shredding cheese, chopping onions and garlic, digging around in the cupboard to find the big bulk containers of basil, oregano, thyme, rosemary, marjoram, sea salt and green, white, and black peppercorns, draining diced tomatoes, making sure there is enough butter to grease all the pans with (hey, this is not low-fat lasagna, after all, even if I am using leanest hamburger and skim mozzarella), I also had to make peanutbutter cookies for Santa Claus.

I did make the peanutbutter cookies a little healthier by using extra virgin olive oil instead of vegetable oil, whole wheat flour instead of white flour, and an omega-3 organic egg. At least they are higher in protein than most cookies. I had one with my balanced dinner and they taste much better than regular peanutbutter cookies so I'm happy. I probably won't eat anymore of them, though.

Well, my break is over. DH has processed more onions for the second batch of sauce. He is crying. Literally, from the onions, so I best go help him out.

By the way my blood pressure is down to 120/80 and I am feeling a lot better today.

Today is a no spend day. I got a call this morning reminding me of a follow-up physical therapy appointment for tomorrow, so I decided to try to do my shopping before the 1:15 appointment instead of maing an extra trip to town. I have to go in again on Friday so if I don't get it all done before the appointment, that is okay.

I put up some more Christmas lights today and did some basic housekeeping chores. I've been thinking a lot about goals for next year, but until I know what DH's raise is going to be, which I won't know unitl January, I'm kind of unable to plan well. I don't like that. Still there is no help for it.

The most frugal thing I did today was cook a potroast and chicken at the same time in the oven. I have enough meat for the rest of the week and will just have to add veggies and potatoes each day. I have enough leftover veggies and potatoes from today that I won't have to make any tomorrow. And plenty of chicken gravy. I will save the beef drippings to make beef gravy later this week.

I think I'll go ahead and cook up all the chicken sausage tonight so that I can just reheat it in the microwave for breakfasts through the week. I like the whole reheat and eat thing. It makes my life much easier and I tend to waste less food that way.

I've almost got the freezer completely cleaned out. Garbage went out this morning so I have an empty can again. I have one full shelf of stuff to throw out still and one partial shelf where everything is frozen to it. I'll probably have to turn the freezer off and pull it out in the morning. I need to turn it off to get all the ice out anyway, then wash it down and unplug it.

I think I can switch with Mom as soon as DH comes home and we will have the smaller one that is actually ours and she can have her old pain in the butt bigger one with a door that doesn't latch right ancient ugly freezer back.

I'm not sure if I will use the one I am getting back from her or not. The half size chest freezer and the one in our fridge seems to be doing the job fine now that we are not buying processed foods. TV dinners, 3 kinds of ice cream, frozen pizza and other easy boxed fast food takes up a lot more room then meat, chicken, fish, vegetables and fruit. But I might be able to sell it. Or maybe we will keep it outside by the shed and use it for over flow or if we get a quarter of a beef or something. I'm not sure yet.

I wonder if our electric bill will go down once we get rid of the one freezer and don't plug in another? Well, this won't be the month to tell with the Christmas lights and all.

We are going to visit MIL and FIL today. I am packing along a beef potroast, potatoes, and broccoli and cauliflower to make for dinner so that I won't be tempted to go through the drive-thru and spend money later on. The last thing we need right now is to be putting that poison into our systems, what with everyone sniffly and all. I remember reading a factoid once that said something like for every teaspoon of sugar (or maybe tbsp) in your food, it reduces your immune systems ability to fight by 16% or something like that. So eating right during cold season is crucial.

So with this advance planning we should be able to make this a no spend day.

But I'm not going to. I'm posting on here for accountability. Instead I will make whole wheat spaghetti with homemade sauce and garlic cheese meatballs and have that with a nice green leaf and purple cabbage salad and some of the berries I bought yesterday at Costco. It will taste better than eating out, it will be better for me, it will cost less and I won't waste gas going to a restaurant.

It warmed up today to 26 degrees F, still below freezing but a lot more bearable and easier to keep the house warm at a lower temperature. Tomorrow it is supposed to be 32 degrees. It is also supposed to snow. Guess how happy I am to hear that? I just got dug out, for goodness sake.

It has been 8 days since my kids last went to school. Crazy. At this rate we'll be making up snow days until July. Which will give me a lot of time to work in my garden without the constant "Mom can I's" that I always get the minute I walk outside the front door.

I got a call from the library's automated system this morning to tell me each of my kids have an overdue item. The library isn't even open because of the storm! Like it would matter if I could turn it in they wouldn't be able to check it through. Stupid computers.

The school website hasn't yet posted whether there will be school tomorrow or not, but I am doubtful. The roads are still pretty icy and since 95 percent of our school district is bused, and because it is still so cold out for kids to be waiting for the bus, I somehow don't think it will happen. Yet, I hold out hope.

I did make the kids clean up the living room today. They have been camped in it for a few days and I was just sick of the mess. Now I'm on here mostly avoiding doing another load of dishes and finishing cleaning out the freezer now that I have an empty trash can again. Or almost empty. Paper plates are starting to look very appealing right now. Seems like these kids do nothing but eat when they are home.

At least today is a no spend day. I see a lot of those in my future, but hope I can at least get to town on Friday to pay the mortgage. I suppose I could do it over the phone since my CU that gets the paychecks direct deposited holds the mortgage, but I'd also like to deposit all that rolled coin and the survey check I have burning a hole in my purse. And maybe dump the kids with my mom for a couple of hours so I can just recharge my batteries. I need some me time, seriously badly.

I also need to go to Costco to get toilet paper, lettuce, meat and Omega 3 organic eggs. I'm on my last carton of eggs though it has 14 in it (out of 18). We usually go through 4 a day when DH isn't home, so that puts us out on Saturday, or not enough for everyone to have them on Sunday. I also need to get some more of those nitrate/nitrite free, sulfite/sulfate free, sugar free sausages. And some organic milk. I really don't care for this other stuff, although the kids like it.

I am trying to keep my chin up right now but I feel very whiney. At least tomorrow is the $10 deposit to savings, so my savings will go up.

Edited to add:

And they just posted school closures for tomorrow on the school's website. Darn it!

Or maybe cooking during the storm.

2nd entry today.

There is a foot of snow outside and no sign of it stopping anytime soon. The kids are having a blast, though I do keep making them come inside to get warm.

So far this morning I have turkey noodle soup cooking, finished making the TexMex Turkey and Rice and decided to make some Turkey Cacciatore while I was at it. I will have some nice freezer meals for the chest freezer.

I'm going to have to dread the storm and bring in some firewood, which means I'll have to kick Rose out of my snow boots. She's not going to like that, but I'll do it the next time she comes in to get warm. I have to set up the drying racks, they've managed to soak their scarves and their coats are going to need time in front of the fire as well.

They haven't plowed our road yet, though I'm sure the highway is in good shape. It usually is if you can get to it. I'm glad I have nowhere to go. This will really help with my no eating out for 2 weeks goal. It'll help a lot with no spend days, too!

I do hope the school buses can get through tomorrow. It's going to be a long day otherwise.

It's snowing hard and fast here tonight. That doesn't always mean anything here on how deep it will get. We've been known to get 3 feet overnight or 2 inches. Usually somewhere in between. We had about a half inch when I got up this morning and an inch by 2 p.m. and then it stopped. Started up again a half an hour ago and its already added an inch.

I decided to go in and pick up my kids instead of having my mother bring them home. I really needed to go grocery shopping. I went to Fred Meyer so I could also pick up waterproof gloves for the kids and look at the boots. They had a good price on the boots so I got Tobias a new pair. His old ones are too small, they were too small by the end of last winter. Rose can wear mine until I get a chance to take her to try things on. Her feet are shaped in such a way that I can't just pick her size and they'll fit. I found good gloves for them, too.

I stocked up on apples, oranges, and bananas. They had braeburns on sale for 88 cents a pound. I wanted the more expensive honeycrisp but couldn't justify the $1.99/lb price and braeburns are good. Organic bananas were 79 cents a pound while the regular ones were 99 cents, weird. The oranges were a little more than I like to pay but I didn't want to go to another grocer and I knew they were still cheaper than at the organic foods store.

I bought some root vegetables, parsnips, turnips, rutabagas, carrots, sweet potatos and will be roasting them probably tomorrow. I have only had sweet potatoes once before but I think its going to be fine. Have some acorn squash I can add to it.

I picked up the organic deli meat without nitrates/nitrites and sulfates/sulfites for school lunches and some organic 100% whole wheat bread and same type of hamburger buns and organic non-fat milk. They had bagged broccoli/cauliflower cut up for $1.25 for a one pound bag that they were clearancing, I got two. Looked at the chicken but the stuff they had on special was from Cincinatti and I prefer to get my chicken locally. Usually they have local stuff on sale but I think they are still trying to move a lot of holiday stuff out.

After FM I went to Terra Organica, the organic foods store and picked up a couple packages of organic 100% whole wheat tortillas, 2 packages of organic multi-grain pancake mix, and some free range organic chicken broth.

Then I went and got my kids and Mom sent me home with a couple of uncooked sweet potatoes that sister had left behind and the rest of the 100% whole wheat rolls from Thanksgiving.

I'll need to go meat shopping I think sometime next week. I really need to see what I have in my half size chest freezer, which I think is just turkey legs and necks (no thank you anytime soon), a 4 pack package of bacon (and not the good kind, I mean it tastes good, but its full on nasties) and 4 pounds of hamburger. I think there might be some steaks and a whole chicken in the freezer that is in my fridge. Maybe I should concentrate on getting that used up first and then worry about meat shopping later on.

When we got home the kids played in the snow for a half an hour and then I made them dinner, turkey and cheese quesadillas and leftover potatoes and gravy. I'm going to throw the turkey carcass in the crockpot tonight with water, salt, celery, carrot, onion, garlic and dried parsley if I can find it. I usually use fresh parsley when making stock but didn't think about it when I was shopping and don't have any now. Then I'll make turkey noodle soup tomorrow with the result. I'll make whole wheat egg noodles with my pasta maker or see if I can't find where the whole wheat spaghetti noodles got to. I'll freeze part of this.

I think I'll make up TexMex turkey and rice tomorrow, also. I have a really easy recipe. Cook rice, dump leftover shredded turkey on top, cover with two jars of medium salsa (organic, preferrably), stir, heat, stir again. Voila. Sometimes I'll throw in extra diced tomatoes, drained if I have a can. I prefer to use brown rice but it works with white minute rice, too,and is faster. Usually I make it with leftover chicken but since I have all the leftover turkey, that's where it goes. I'll freeze up some of these in meal sized portions, too.

Just checked the google weather report for my little town and its supposed to snow all day tomorrow. Really, really glad I got groceries today.

I am feeling better again. I got quite a lot of extra sleep while the kids were at my mother's and I am hopeful I am on the upswing, but I did feel a bit dizzy today while shopping and I still have a cough. If the roads are not too bad I will try to see the doctor though on Tuesday. I want to make sure I don't have bronchitis or the start of walking pneumnonia. He's usually slammed the first day back after a long holiday so I don't even want to try for Monday.

I finished reading the book Odyssey by Jack McDevitt. Hard sci-fi/excellent. Watched the movie Someone Like You. Funny, sad and sweet romance and Hugh Jackman is always good whether he's a romantic lead as in this or Wolverine from X-Men. And pretty to look at. LOL

Today was a no spend day. That's easy when nothing is open!

My thanksgiving went well. I got to sleep in and not cook anything. For some reason when I got to Mom's they didn't want me coughing all over the food, so I guess that is one thing this never-ending cold has got going for it.

I came home with a ton of leftovers and without my children, who are going to stay until Saturday and then my mother will actually drive them home, which almost never happens.

I made up all of my divided microwave dishes into TV dinners and froze them. I had ten in all and still had leftovers. Mom also sent home the carcass with me and I threw that in the freezer. I'll make stock when I'm feeling better. I'll end up with an awful lot of food, none of which I paid for.

I tried cranberry something or other, jelly maybe? for the first time and sweet potatoes for the first time. My sister made them. The one I like. The other sister didn't show. She's not much on family, even her own. Usually my nice sister doesn't come to Mom's for Thanksgiving, they do their own thing, but they moved this year and I think they were all missing us, plus her kitchen is tiny now. I liked the sweet potatoes, though I think she put too much brown sugar in them and the cranberry stuff was too sweet, I don't really care for the flavor of cranberries in juice so I wasn't surprised that I didn't really like that stuff. But I'm glad I tried it.

It was a nice visit, but I am glad to be back home. I think I will sleep for the next 24 hours or so and see if I can't beat this thing. After I get caught up on the blogs, of course.

I have the turkey stock simmering on the stove and it is filling the house with a wonderful aroma. I also have turkey legs roasting in the oven and we will be having mashed potatoes and gravy and green beans with it for dinner tonight. I am making enough so that I don't have to cook tomorrow for dinner. I still feel yucky.

We went out for lunch today. I honestly could not face the idea of cooking earlier so I took the kids through drive-thru and spent $9.39 to feed the 3 of us. Had to drive 20 miles to get to the nearest drive-thru also. Not great. It did however give me the quarter I needed to roll a roll of quarters up, so that with the roll of pennies will be $10.50 deposited tomorrow into the savings account for the extra credit card payment.

Tomorrow I have to try to remember to call the phone company and drop our long distance service. It is only $3.33 a month, which is $39.96 a year, but we don't use it so it is wasted money. I always use my Costco calling card when I do call long distance, so there is really no point at all in having it. I wonder if that'll reduce the taxes and surcharges any at all? Probably just a few cents if it does.

Laundry room still isn't done. I am studiously ignoring it right now. Maybe tomorrow.