Friday was payday and while I paid all the bills I didn't record anything in my spreadsheet or on here, so today is my catch up day. I tried not to let things slide while I was really sick, but some of it did. Fortunately it was just the record keeping part and that is easy enough to catch up on.

$300.00 Beef and Pork from the farm
__90.00 Physical Therapy
_100.00 Turkey, Chicken, Duck Feed plus straw/hay/grit
_144.00 Water/sewer Old House (2 months)
__45.30 Life Insurance DH
__41.88 Life Insurance Me
__70.86 Car Insurance
__47.17 House Insurance Old House
_186.00 Storage
__41.16 ADT Security Old House
__30.64 Electricity Old House
__80.58 Lowes
__15.00 Prescription
_225.00 AMEX
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1417.59

I also spent $175.00 on a big Costco stock up of things like TP, paper towels, juice, vitamins, olive oil, and butter. Should be quite some time before we have to go back.

And I have $90 set aside for physical therapy on Thursday.

We went to the dreaded Wal-Mart yesterday to find a shockingly empty parking lot (only half full) and a badly understaffed and understocked store. There were no greeters and no shopping carts inside the store. I haven't been in there for over a year. I'd never seen it like that. We went to try to find some sweat pants for the kids. Of course all they had was swim suits, shorts, and tank tops. Wal-Mart used to carry sweats year round.

I did pick up some cheap plastic pots so I can repot my spider plant, poinsettia, lemon thyme and rosemary. I also got some glass plates to put under each pot to catch drips and dirt. I couldn't get potting soil though as the garden center was closed and locked. They didn't have anyone to staff it.

I bought some black towels for the rabbitry, new underwear, a Ball canning book, a new set of canning stuff (tongs, funnel, magnet, bubbler) and some totes for storage.

I'm afraid I snapped at a girl scout on the way out who had asked me on the way in to buy cookies, but I swear they are like little raptors pushing cookies in your face. I hate girl scout cookie season. Most of them are aggressive and rude. I was very tempted to tell her if she could pronounce all the ingredients on the box I might make a donation, but I sure as heck would not buy the box of poison she was peddling. I held my tongue and just gave a very sharp no after my earlier polite one.

I hate that they are allowed to camp out at store entrances. Drives me crazy. It's going to be like that all month everywhere I go. Even if you don't make eye-contact or are clearly making as wide a loop around them as possible and still get in the door, they come after you and get in your way. The adult supervising them just lets them do whatever they want. No manners are taught at all when it comes to selling. It's just all about pushing the sale and being in your face.

We never would have been allowed to behave like that when I was a girl scout.

I ended up buying some things after all that I hadn't planned on. I decided that I needed to get 2 new pairs of jeans. I have been wearing my jeans to do farm chores and they are becoming too shabby to wear off the property.

Then DS informed me he had outgrown all of his underwear but two, and DD informed me that she had outgrown all of her socks. I got DS 3 4 pks of underwear because they were cheaper that way and DD 2 6 pks. DD needed a cheap bottle of conditioner and both kids wanted a new brush because they didn't like the one I bought to replace the broken one. I do like it though. It is way better at getting out tangles. So DD wanted a round styling brush and DS just wanted one like the broken one. I also bought a hair dryer because ours shot out sparks and ceased to work.

Fortunately it was all at one store and I had over $13 in credits on my store card. I also ended up getting $5 credit for my next purchase. I was able to ignore any further suggestions from the kids, one of whom wanted yet another pair of PJ bottoms and the other wanted a new sweatshirt and a shirt. None of those things are needs, though.

Oh, and I did buy a set of headphones, but DD is paying me back out of her allowance. Total spent was $130, with DD owing me $20 of that back.

DD gave DS a haircut last night. Someone called him a young lady when he was out with his grandmother so he decided it was time. It wasn't that long, maybe 3 inches, but it was long enough that it was curling so it did give a little bit of a feminine style, but he was wearing boy clothes so not sure how he got mistaken for a girl. DD has gotten quite good with the clippers. I only had to trim up a bit around his ears. So that saved us $15. It's not quite a buzz cut, but no one will be mistaking him for a girl with it, that's for sure.

So my mom's handyman's wife does alterations and I got her to replace the zipper on my jacket. It cost $20. I thought it was a great deal, because it included the zipper, which was 27 inches long. And it's a better zipper than the original. My five-year-old jacket now has many more years of life left in it. I just need to be careful when I am holding the young rabbits. They are what chewed through the zipper in the first place. And then the tab fell off.

I could have gone through the rigamarole of shipping it back to Land's End and making them replace the jacket, but I kind of felt like a rabbit chewing through the zipper wasn't a failure on their part. Plus they would have just pulled the, "Well, it's not exactly the same as the newly designed squall jackets, so it doesn't count as something we will replace for free." I figured it would be more likely I'd be out the shipping for sending it back and then have to pay for them to send it back to me when they denied it, so was a better deal just to have it fixed.

She did a great job. I can't even tell it is an aftermarket change. $20 is a good deal for me, especially since that jacket now costs $139. It was like $75 or something when I first got it. There might have been a coupon involved.

I also sewed up a hole in my sweatpants seam.

My daughter needed a new bag for school. Her backpack basically fell apart on Friday. So we found one on clearance for $15, originally $30 at Kmart. They also had canning jars for $10, so I picked up a case of quart jars. I wanted to buy a couple of pairs of sweat pants, but they didn't have any women's. They had men's, teen's, boy's, and girl's, but all they had in women's was light weight knit pants. Yeah, cause that is what I want to wear on these 40 degree F mornings.

After that we walked over to the Good Will next door and purchased some of those bowls with handles that I think were originally used for those really big fancy coffees, but we use them as soup bowls or for really big cups of tea.

I looked at both places for a 12 quart stockpot because I would like a second one, but Good Will did not have more than an 8 quart stockpot and the only one they had at Kmart was an ugly, light blue, mottled ceramic one by Paula Deen. Right size, but not in my kitchen. I prefer stainless steel anyway. I may have to put it on my Christmas list for the in-laws.

I can muddle through with one for a while longer, it would just be nice to have two pots of stock going at once so I can pressure can the results all at once instead of in batches. I mean the big canner can do 14 quarts of stock at once, so I'd like to take advantage of that and save the time. Actually, come to think of it, I could do my second batch of stock in the smaller canner. It's got the capacity to cook 12 quarts of stock, even if it can only can 9.

I think I will have to order my sweats from a catalogue. And maybe some warmer PJ's while I'm at it. Do they make king size flannel sheets? I can never find them.

I ordered an electric razor off Amazon today. I haven't had one in over 3 years. I usually steal DH's, but he takes it to work with him, which means I don't have one while he is gone and I really hate using disposable ones. It doesn't bother me much during the fall, winter, and spring to have hairy legs, but now it's finally shorts weather, so I gave in and made the purchase. It was a $65 razor and with shipping it came to $82. Mostly because they didn't have a standard shipping option, only a two day shipping option. Oh, well, that was the one I wanted, one that was both rechargeable and usable with a power cord.

I also picked up a prescription today. It was $2.43. I am hoping to make it through the rest of the week with no spending. Well, I say week. I actually mean until payday on Friday when I will pay the bills and go grocery shopping. I shouldn't need anything between now and then. Still resisting the urge to pick up takeaway. The urge is always there, but I am getting back into the habit of cooking so it is getting easier to resist.

I bought some toiletry items on etsy today. I spent $70. I have bought from this particular shop owner before. Because of my allergies I have to be careful with what I put on my skin anymore. As does my son. The only scents used are from essential oils and no artifical colorings or chemicals are used in these products. Here is the breakdown of what I purchased:

$15.00 probiotic deoderant stick (Citrus)
__4.50 Gardener's lip butter in a tin
_10.50 Conditioning Herbal Detangler spray
__8.50 100% Natural Acne Bar Soap
_15.00 Natural Sun Stick
__6.50 Marshmallow Root Shampoo Bar Soap (for thick curly hair)

The rest was shipping. I swear by her acne bar. I've also used her chest rub (used like Vaporub) and one of her salves for dry skin. I have been very happy with everything and it has all worked well.

I am very curious to try the shampoo bar. I have a hard time finding good shampoo for my hair type and use a very expensive type by Paul Mitchell that has tea tree oil and eucalyptis. Almost all shampoo these days is formulated to make your hair be thicker, fuller, and have added moisture. It is extremely hard to find anything for oily hair that is incredibly full and thick and the last thing it needs is more volume. Everything seems to be for dry hair or color treated hair or damaged hair. There is very little for hair that is in good shape, just very unruly and makes plenty of it's own natural oil. So hopefully it will do the job I want it to do.

I also spent $107.34 at the grocery store today. I bought a lot of fresh fruit and vegetables. I've been kind of letting the diet slide lately and eating too many junky starches, so trying to head back towards eating Paleo again. I still need to make up my menu plan for the week, and stick closer to it this week. I'm never going to beat this sinus thing if I don't start eating right again. Of course all I want to do is eat chicken noodle soup. Well, maybe I'll make egg flower soup tomorrow for lunch. Pretty close to the same thing and I have homemade chicken broth in the freezer.

Had a bit of a shopping spree. Only it was at Goodwill so it didn't cost very much. DD got 3 lightweight sweaters, a cute turquoise empire waisted spring shirt, and a 3/4 length lambskin jacket. I got two 8 x 10 tarps, 5 wide mouth pint jars with rings and lids, and DH got a thing to help his laptop fan work more efficiently. Hey, it's a big shopping spree for us! We spent $53.72.

I need the tarps for the rabbit shed to hang on the walls behind the cages to protect the walls against sprayed urine. Yesterday I picked up two rabbit cages at a feed store near the ranch we get our meat at. We were on the way back from our ranch trip and there has been a shipping delay on the cages we ordered and we can't really wait much longer to take the kits from the mother rabbit. I just need to pick up a couple of feeders tomrorow and we can start taking the babies away.

When we are at the feed store they inquired about our rabbits and I left contact info, because they are interested in buying them to sell as pets. Of course I told them we are just getting started, so it wouldn't be for a while. Someone is going to call me.

I just find it interesting that through no effort on my part whatsoever we have people that want to buy our rabbits for pets or for food. I guess they are right when they say word of mouth is often enough. Of course, this first batch is for us, but we should have a new batch of kits in about 4 weeks.

There are some pedigree NZ Whites on offer in the next county so if the cages come in time, I may see if I can get a couple more adult does. Then I can really get into production.

It snowed here yesterday morning. I don't even know. It was just a light dusting, 1/2 inch or so, certainly not a blizzard, but hello, it's the middle of April. This is so not on.

I think I will pay property tax tomorrow. The courthouse is next to the library and I have a book on hold to pick up so might as well combine trips, even though tax isn't due until month's end. Not much point in waiting. I just want it done because the last two years I waited until the last minute and then had to pay it online, along with the online charge for doing so.

I've not been as chatty over here. That's mostly because I've been talking about the farm stuff over on the other blog, trying to mostly keep this one on the financial front. If you want to catch up with that stuff you can visit me there at

http://whendidthisbecomeafarm.wordpress.com/

Supposedly the house will be done by the first week of May. I'm still not holding my breath. It would be nice. That's an excellent time to put it on the market. And it'll be move in ready. But they've been pushing the date out and out and out since this began, so who really knows? I just want to be done with it.

I got another $5 Amazon gift card from Swagbucks. I haven't been very focused on it this month. My account balance is now $120.

DH's mother gave us a camera so now I don't have to worry about saving up for a camera. Which is nice.

Oh, and I found a dime in the parking lot today. It went to the coin jar.

It sure doesn't seem like there's much to report in on now that I'm not trying to pay off a bunch of credit cards. The mortgage and the van loan are things that happen once a month.

I did go to Costco today and got my AMEX rewards coupon check cashed. I will go to the CU tomorrow and make a deposit of that and the coin jar money.

I also bought cheese, toilet paper, and a case of oranges while there. I spent $41.61. I didn't think about olive oil which I am getting low on, but I have half a bottle so I think I'm okay for another month. If not, I'll shlep myself over there.

I did price the S&W organic tomato sauce in the #10 cans. It is $2.59 for 101 ounces, so 2 cans would be 202 and $5.18. They have stopped carrying S&W tomato sauce there and have switched to their own store brand. Because of DS's allergies we have to be very careful on brands and ingredients. But if we were to buy their brand it would cost $6.99 for 12 15 ounce cans for a total of 180 ounces. So obviously the #10 can is a better deal. I hope they are not phasing it out completely and I will still be able to get the big cans for a while.

I did put up some sauce last summer, but the kids will only eat it mixed with store sauce. Next year I won't bother putting up sauce, it's not worth the labor if they won't eat it. I'll just put up diced tomatoes. It's just not cost effective, either, to do sauce. Anyway, I will be making a trip back to Costco at some point to buy several of the larger cans and then every time I open a can I am going to put what is left of it into quart or pint containers and freeze the rest. It is much more economical and I don't have to worry about the allergy issue.

I have thought of just recanning it, as well, since I've seen where people have successfully recanned the large containers of ketchup and mustard. Should be safe, though I might want to add a bit of lemon juice to each jar if I do that.

Speaking of mustard, I am getting low so I will be making a new batch soon. I am going to add some cayenne this time. I want it to have a bit of a kick. It was good last time, but a little mild for my liking and since I am the only one who eats it, I can tinker until I get it to where I like it.

Well, I suppose that's about it. Oh, I got 2 $5 gift cards from Swagbucks today. That puts my Amazon gift card amount at $100. I should have enough to cash out again tonight or tomorrow.

Today we did some major shopping. Mostly it was too replace things that are past re-mending (i.e. things that have already been mended once, often more than once).

We ended up spending $325.05 and supposedly saved $63.55 due to clearance and sale prices. DH got 3 pairs of jeans. He told quite a hilarious story of ripping out his jeans right before getting to the airport and having to mend them with duct tape because there were no sewing kits available. At least you can pass through airport x-ray machines with a duct-taped crotch. Good to know.

DS got a pair of Wellies, 2 sizes up, yikes, a pair of flip flops for vacation and summer and a new pair of tennis shoes. He also got several pairs of underwear. He's growing like a weed. He'll probably be as tall as me by the end of this year.

I got three shirts, slightly nicer than t-shirts, but not super dressy. I was happy to find one in kelly green. It is a hard color to find so when I saw it I jumped on it. There is a rather violent perdominance of neon colors in the stores right now. Painfully neon bright.

DD got a pair of flip flops, 2 pairs of sweats and a t-shirt.

Then for the household I got 6 new washcloths. I used to have 20 white ones, but my mother keeps stealing them. Just because she got the twenty pack of white ones from Wal-Mart once upon a time, she thinks all of the white ones are hers. Well, 4 turquiose, one hot pink and one bright yellow, should stop confusing her on that score.

I also bought a new sheet set for the king bed. The turquoise sheet finally gave up the ghost after a couple of sewing repairs. I plan to make linen napkins out of the side that isn't all ripped up. The replacements are a sort of bluish green sea foam color. Sheets are expensive. I got the moderately priced ones, but I still thought they were expensive for not all that much fabric.

The kids got headphones and batteries and DH got some body wash. We should not need to make any such purchases again for quite some time.

I added $3 to the coin jar today and sent $854 to the Vacation Fund. The puts it at $1119.65.

Most, but not all, of the debt repayment hit our credit report. We have a monitoring service through Experian due to theft years ago. I'm paranoid enough about it, to keep tabs on at least one of our reports. So it is lagging one month behind on the mortgage, but it was lagging 3 months behind as I think the credit union only reports it quarterly, and it is one payment behind on both the AMEX and the BoA, but it will catch up. Meanwhile our credit score went up to 790.

Now I'm all antsy for February 8th to get here and I can start paying the Chase card off. It's kind of contagious, that push to get further and further out of debt. Paying Chase off probably won't have much of an effect on our credit score. It's the car loan that is likely keeping it from going over 800. Still, we are positioning ourselves well to buy a new house.

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We went down to the sustainable, free-ranging, organic (and grass fed in the case of the beef, no soy or GMO's in the case of the chickens) farm today and I spent $297.78 of my $300 monthly meat budget. We came back with 4 chuck roasts, 8 pork chops, 2 beef stir-fry, 2 bacon, 2 whole chickens, 10 ground beef, and 2 ground pork. We still have a couple of packs of bacon and some hamburger from our last trip, so this should meet our protein needs nicely for the month. And of course there are our free eggs from the backyard chickens.

I really hope to be able to order a half a steer this year. We will see how it goes. I also wouldn't mind a whole pig, but the ranch doesn't do that so we'd have to find another source. They do a $300 box of pork though. I'm not really sure if it's worth getting though, because we pretty much only eat bacon, ground pork, and pork chops when it comes to pork. Very occasionally I will make pulled pork for burritos from a roast, but not often.

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On the way back from the farm there was a gas station that had gas for $3.17 a gallon if you had cash, so DH and I ransacked his wallet and my purse and scraped together $31 (including the last couple bucks of the meat budget money) for gas, since the absolute cheapest it is in our county is $3.25. So the tank sits at 3/4 full now. Well worth it since we were driving by it anyway.

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We went to Costco after we got home and I used my rebate coupon. We stocked up on some toiletries, garbage bags, canned pineapple, butter, and oranges. Charmin had a $2 off coupon, so that was nice. We stopped at another store for Organic milk, green onions and bananas.

I feel like I put myself through the wringer today, though. On the bright side my knee isn't hurting. On the not so bright side everything else is. I'm sure it will be better in the morning, though. It usually is.

I forgot about making buns for the cheeseburgers today, so I ended up throwing together a quick stir-fry. I cut up 4 boneless skinless chicken thighs that I ransacked the chest freezer for and put them in a marinade of 1 cup low sodium gluten free soy sauce, 2 T of honey, 1/2 T of ginger, and a 1/2 T of garlic powder. While that was soaking DD and I cut up 3 carrots, 3 stalks of celery, 1 cauliflower, green beans, and 1/2 a yellow onion. I did more of a combination of stir-fry and steam-fry as I don't like to stir constantly. It made enough for us to have it for dinner, for lunch tomorrow, and maybe still have some leftover. Doesn't it look yummy?

I also made a batch of cinnamon ice cream tonight and I have some French bread going in the bread machine.

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I went to the store today and I ended up spending $127.53. I just didn't have the energy to go to Kmart and the grocery store so I bought the toiletries at the grocery store. I got a couple of things not on my list and forgot the peanut butter which we are totally out of.

I meant to spend about $100, but I went through the bakery. *sighs* I should know better, but I swear the box of cinnamon rolls just jumped into my cart when I wasn't looking. I also bought two boxes of psuedophedrine from the pharmacy and 1 box of Dayquil because my supply was woefully low and I feel a sinusy thing coming on. And then I remembered I needed batteries. But I won't need to buy anything else before payday on Friday and I have $70 left.

They were having a good sale on whole fish, but the fish counter reeked. I could smell it from 10 feet away. I have noticed that a lot at the small Haggen since the remodel. I know that they've instituted some cost saving measures to pay for the totally unnecessary remodel, like not restocking the salad bar or letting the hot food in the deli run out when it runs out, carrying less selection in some areas and way too much in others, raising prices, and pushing their own store brand far more than they ever used to, but the fish counter should not smell like that. I draw a line there. Clearly they are holding on to fish that previously would have been out the door before it stank. So no more buying fish or seafood from there. That makes 2 grocery stores I will not buy fish from.

Haggen has always been my favorite grocery store, but I will either have to go to the big one 5 miles out of my way or just stick to Trader Joe's and the Food Co-op (which carries fresh fish) from now on. It's a shame, too. I've been shopping at that store since I was 4 years old and they were just that store, not a small chain of stores. That's almost 39 years now. I have never been disappointed in them until the last year, but now I am.

I had planned to go today, but I decided to take another look through my freezers first. I am glad I did. I had thought I was out of hamburger, but I found six packages of it on the wrong shelf behind some frozen veggies.

I had thought I needed chicken, but I found 2 whole chickens. Unfortunately the chickens are frozen together so thawing in the micro is not really an option. The package is too big. I'll have to thaw it in the fridge roast it, and then divide it into portions for the freezer. I also found 2 pork chops, 1 pound of ground pork, 1 pound of ground lamb, 6 steaks and five packs of bacon.

After that I cleaned out the fridge and found a head of purple cabbage and kohlrabi in the back. These are both good keepers and were perfectly good. I have a cucumber that I will need to eat tomorrow. If I put it off much longer it'll be chicken feed, not people food. And of course I have broccoli. I am halfway through my lettuce, celery, and carrots, and I have plenty of potatoes and onions, so really, there's nothing I need to buy except dairy and fruit.

So how do I make use of that great coupon of $10 off a $50 purchase good through Monday? Well, $22 of it will be milk. And I will buy some flour and some tuna and some oranges. That should put me to the $50 point and then I won't need to set foot in the grocery store for another week, although I still need to go to Kmart for the toiletries.

I am going to make homemade sausage with the ground pork and ground lamb for breakfasts next week and make a couple of meatloaves for lunches. And the steaks will definitely make it into a couple of dinners.

I sent $100 (my January allowance) to my friend who is in desperate need right now. That'll leave me with about $100 for the week in checking after I do the shopping. I should be just fine with that. No more bills are due before next payday.

I sent for another $5 gift card from Swagbucks for Amazon. The last one hasn't come yet, should show up this weekend.

I added $5.64 to the coin jar.

I finished knitting DS's scarf. Yellow is his favorite color and it is a hard one to find at a store. It was hard enough finding bright yellow yarn. This one is a single thickness.



This is one I made previously and I did fringe on that one. DS didn't want fringe on his as he thought it was too girly. It's a deep rust or copper color and a double thickness as well.



Now I'm working on one for DD, but the pattern on the yarn wrapper does not actually match the yarn, which is supposed to be purple for so many rows and then black for one row and then purple again. It says fourteen per row but it really needs twenty and it does make a difference so I am going to have to unravel it and start over. This annoys me, but oh, well. Life goes on.

On Christmas DH's FIL forgot to put the turkey neck into the roaster (or maybe didn't because it was still frozen). Last night I put it in the crockpot with some water and DS and I split it for lunch. I can't believe the amount of meat on a turkey neck, I always forget. And it is so tender and flavorful. Anyway, to the juices left in the crockpot I added all of the turkey carcass bones that I'd frozen along with all of the peels I've been saving for the last few months (onions, carrots, garlic) and some celery leaves, salt and pepper and filled it to the top with water, so it is cooking down for a total of 20 hours.

Tomorrow I will make soup with half the stock and freeze the rest. I wish I had some fresh parsley for it, but I'll add some parsley flakes to the finished stock. I am defiitely planting parsley next year. Right now I'm looking at potatoes, celery, carrots, and an onion for it. I don't think we'll be adding noodles this time, just lots of potatoes. I might even thicken it to make stew. This will be the last of the turkey, so we will have used every part. The chickens got the organs. I am very happy to have had a zero waste turkey this year, considering how much it cost.

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We made a simple ice cream recipe in my new hard ice cream maker. It's definitely harder than soft serve, but still not as hard as hard ice cream from the store, but that might have been because we didn't do a custard base, we just did a simple one of 1 pint cream, 1 pint half and half, 1 cup of sugar and 2 tsp of pure vanilla extract. It will freeze all the way up overnight though and I'll see how the end result is. I haven't tasted it, but everyone else did and pronounced it good but light on the vanilla.

Their website has all kind of recipes for it, regular ice cream, sorbets, sherbets, and sauces. I'll experiment with recipes until I find ones that freeze harder. There was a note with the recipe for Champagne sorbet that said that the alcohol will make it thaw quicker, so I am wondering if maybe that was part of the issue, since pure vanilla extract is basically vodka and a vanilla bean.

I probably won't eat too much of it since I'm trying to stay away from sugar more and not become diabetec, but there was one sorbet that used strawberries and 2 tbsp honey that might not be too bad. I won't even have to wait until summer since I have strawberries from the last season in the freezer. (I usually won't buy fruit out of season because of the cost).

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Got a bill from the podiatrist, $114, for DS's toenail thing. That's for two visits and he spent a half hour with us both times. Since my podiatrist is way out of network the insurance didn't cover it. Still, he's the best and my family has an established relationship with him. Plus $57 per visit? I mean, who still does that? No one. Most doctor's charge $90 or more around here. Anyway, I mailed that off.

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DH took the kids to Kmart today. DS got two more pairs of sweatpants and one more pair of PJ's. DD got one more pair of PJ's. They should both be set now for the rest of the winter. Stuff was marked down even more than the other day. DH ended up spending $48.87. I forgot to give him the saving's card again. Oh, well. I need to start keeping it in the checkbook, I think.

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DH also picked up a prescription for himself, $2.50 and toiletries and cleaning and laundry supplies for $61.34. The latter stuff is all unscented, coloring free, natural stuff because of DS's chemical sensitivites and allergies so a bit more expensive, but we shouldn't have to buy it again for quite some time.

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DD has volunteered to cut DS's and DH's hair tomorrow. We have a clipper so it's not like you can go wrong much with that and she's getting to be as good at it as I am. I just don't want to do it right now with a swollen knee.

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I still haven't watched the Doctor Who Christmas special. I guess I am not quite the fangirl I once was in the Eccleston and Tennant years. I still hope to watch it tomorrow, though. I haven't watched anything since before Christmas. Who has time for TV right now?

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I received a $5 Amazon giftcard from Swagbucks and cashed out for another one yesterday. I think that about covers it.

It is a weird feeling to have an empty bill box and to have paid all of the bills to the end of the year already. I know it's been like this for the last couple of months, but I'm still not used to it. I really like it though. Instead of being paycheck to paycheck we are half a month ahead and that is wonderful. I can't wait for that to be a month ahead. And then 2 months and then 3 months, etc., as we build the Emergency Fund back up.

So the last of the bills and some miscellaneous shopping were paid out of today's payday. The breakdown is as follows:

$90.00 Physical Therapy
$41.75 Various cold medicines to replenish stock
$70.56 Internet
$44.87 Phone line Old House (for security system to work)
159.65 Propane bill Old House (was already in savings)
144.00 Water/sewer (was already in savings)
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550.83

I put $2500 into short term savings. That will cover all bills between January 1 and January 11th.

I will have two more physical therapy appointments this year so I have that money set aside.

I took out $215 in cash, but $15 went to DD for her allowance. DS doesn't get an allowance again until January (he got an advance). So that $200 should last us until the end of the year for toiletries and meals out. I have $1300 left of this paycheck, but we still need to buy presents for a couple people. Whatever is left will be sent to the credit card.

Next week's paycheck will be the 2 day paycheck and that isn't earmarked for anything yet. I will need to pay the $505 for my crown whenever they send me the bill so I'll probably set that aside out of it.

I deposited my coin jar money to the Emergency Fund and have hit my goal of $1500 in there by the end of December.

1457.42 Beginning EF
+_66.38 Coin Jar Money deposited
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1523.80 Ending EF

Christmas bonuses should be mailed out today and they usually get here pretty fast since there are so many flights a day between Anchorage and Seattle and then between Seattle and here. It might even be here as soon as tomorrow (last year it came the day after the Christmas party, which is today), but I'm figuring probably Monday or Tuesday.

I am trying not to be anxious about it. It's just that we are so close. Even if it is 5% of income like last year instead of the rumored 10% of income it will still wipe out the BoA card with a little leftover for the AMEX and then the AMEX will be wiped out by the extra paycheck in January. Our tax return would then wipe out the 0% Chase card with plenty leftover since we'll be getting quite a lot back due to maxing the HSA and spending it all this year on medical. And if it's the 10% then boy howdy it's all gone before the year is up.

I just want it done and gone. It's been so many years. I want that weight lifted off my shoulders forever.

I really don't like these shorter days. Getting up in the dark to take DD to school is not my favorite thing to do. Some kids have to walk to school in the dark and of course being the sensible and responsible teenagers that they are wear all dark colors and cross in the middle of the street. Ditto riding their bikes without head or tail lights. Or helmets.

I can't decide whether it's a death wish or the invincible gene. Either way, I don't want to end up with splattered teenager all over my car. It's dirty enough as it is. (Sorry, morbid humor. I'm just kidding in case anyone took that seriously). I get so tense because I am always afraid a kid is going to dart out in front of me. It's happened enough times as it is.

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DS is still in a lot of pain. I went to the store today to get more medical tape, neosporin and some epsom salts for him to soak his feet in. Then after the soak we have to pour a bit of hydrogen peroxide on his toes, then dry them, then put neosporin on the wounds, then put guaze around them and tape it in place. The one toe looks better than it did yesterday. The swelling has gone down. The other looks worse. Anyway, I spent $12.43 on the medical supplies.

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It seems like my cushion is being wittled away. Instead of an extra $400 to send to the credit card, I'll have closer to $300. Oh, well. Life goes in it's own direction, which is not necessarily the direction you want it to go in.

I'm just trying to hold out and not order a pizza. I think I am going to bump up pizza night to tomorrow. Homemade of course. I need to get past the desire to order one takeout. Mine always taste better.

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We got the invite to DH's Christmas Party for work in the mail. December 14th. Not that we can go even, it's in Anchorage, but that means the bonus checks will be given out to those who go and mailed out to those who don't. Which means we should have it in about 3 weeks time. I so hope it is the rumored amount, which is twice what last year's was. I know I can do a lot with it either way, but to be able to pay it all off at once...well, I can't help anticipating it.

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I am on my third day of no caffeine. I was throwing my diet out the window and up to about four cans a day of Pepsi Throwback. It was bad for me and it was getting to be an expensive habit. So here's hoping I can keep it out of the house. I am really tired, but I know that will pass in another couple of days. Already my stomach is feeling better and my heartburn is gone. I don't know what gets into me. I try to keep our food pretty natural and ethical and then I just kind of throw it out the window on one item. Human nature, I guess. Pepsi Throwback is actually in the 100 mile food shed, there's a bottling factory one county over, but that is not a good excuse!

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DD's MP3 player broke and she about had a nervous breakdown. She's somewhat OCD (not as bad as DS) and listening to her music about a half an hour before bedtime is part of her calming routine. I helped her figure out one of the free internet radio things that you can put in one artist and then it plays other artists in that vein. She was a little worried about it running all night and I told her it was fine as long as it wasn't loud enough to disturb the rest of us.

I also told her we could buy a new one on Friday, that I'd advance her the allowance to do so. She's had her current one for several years and taken very good care of it, but it just won't turn on. Fortunately, she had all her music backed up on her computer, so the loss isn't total.

It's been such a long day. I'm glad that it's over. I'm looking forward to payday on Friday. I want to see that debt total go down. One more nail in the coffin of the Evil Empire.

I'm really starting to think that public school is ruining my life. I swear my DD brings home every single germ that passes through those not so hallowed halls. 2 days of not keeping anything down and then today I slept from one a.m. to 3:30 p.m. and I actually feel like I could sleep another ten hours. I haven't eaten today, but I have had something to drink and so far so good. I might try some soup in a bit.

DH took DS with him to the ranch. We ended up deciding to get a turkey after all. It's a bit expensive, but we have the money right now and they still had one available. It would be nice to know exactly how my turkey lived out her life. Slaughter was yesterday, but we don't know if that means it will be thawed or frozen. If it hasn't been frozen I think we will go ahead and cook it tomorrow and make that our Thanksgiving. Otherwise we will wait until the day. Since DH goes back up to the slope on Monday it would be nice to do it a little early and include him.

I do know that whatever we do I'm going to make sure to strip the bones within a couple of days and package up any meat for the freezer that we won't be using right away. I can do quart sized baggies and then that way when I make two quart soups I will have enough meat to just dump in. I will also, of course, make the stock with the carcass.

I will also make up some TV dinners of turkey, potatoes with gravy and stuffing. I have several divided dishes. I also plan to make that casserole that Frugal Foodie posted the other day. And then probably turkey cacciatore, turkey fried rice, and turkey enchiladas (to freeze) as well.

I just find having a plan of what to do with all the leftovers cuts my waste down so much. And with an expensive organic, sustainably raised heritage turkey, I don't want to waste any of it. It'd be like throwing away money.

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Speaking of money, I recieved a check from ACOP for $14.05. I also qualified for a product study from them that will start November 26th. It'll be $8. I just need to keep a food diary for every member of the household for 4 days and then enter it online. I've done it before a couple years back. It took me about an hour altogether.

I also spent $16.89 of my allowance to get four pairs of super thick slipper socks to wear around the house. That leaves me with $55.81 that I have no idea what to do with. I guess I can set it aside in an envelope I found from last summer that had my name on it and had a few dollars of my last allowance in it. I guess I had never spent it and then we stopped taking allowances for the grown ups while we were paying the $2500 of DS's medical.

I might go buy a couple of sweaters. I don't have very many and two of them have gotten pretty threadbare. As in I have to wear a shirt of the same color underneath them. Since I've had these two sweaters at least since DD was a baby (I'm wearing one in our family photo when she was just a few months old) they've definitely done their duty and can be retired. I think there is enough material on the one that is not worn that I could sew it into a gift bag for Christmas.

Other spending this week was to get DD 3 warm sweaters, 10 pairs of underwear, and a pair of slippers. The floors get really cold in this house. DH took DS shopping for pajama pants and a new belt to hold up his jeans, but ended up only getting the belt because DS decided to have a meltdown 10 minutes before the store closed and there was no time left to try them on. Hopefully they can try again tomorrow. DS was just a pickle all day yesterday, but it has been a long time since he has had a full on meltdown in public. So far that added up to $140.

DD needs a haircut, too, so that will be $15. Hopefully that will be it for a while. I am hoping to get through the next two weeks only buying milk, peanut butter, crackers, oranges, lettuce, celery, carrots, onions and cabbage. We have plenty of meat in the freezer and plenty of flour and sugar for making bread and rolls and cookies. There is plenty of broccoli still growing. Any money that is left in the grocery budget will be sent to the credit card.

DH and I went to Costco last night. I had not figured out what I wanted to do with my allowance, but I figured it out when we got there. They had a digital crockpot, with a timer for up to 20 hours. The cheap crockpot I got for Christmas last year is already malfunctioning, so I wanted to get a good one at some point.

Some point converged with the present last night. They had the $40 stainless steel one on for an instant rebate of $10 off and then additional mail in rebate of $5 off, so when all is said and sifted, I got a good quality crockpot for $25 plus tax. This will make cooking easier again. I won't have to worry about the crockpot burning.

Still not sure what I will do with the rest of my allowance, probably just set it aside.

We didn't buy too much else there. A case of toilet paper, some prosciutto, and a case of oranges.

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Last night we defrosted and inventoried the mini chest freezer. There is quite a bit of food in there, mostly protein. I still have to inventory the other two fridge freezers, but I pretty much know what is in the main one and can more or less see at a glance what is in the secondary one.

In beef I have 4 packs of stew meat, 1 flank steak, 4 chuck steaks, 3 ribeyes, 2 pounds of hamburger, 4 premade hamburger patties with cheese and bacon mixed in, 1 filet mignon, 2 strip steaks, 1 New York steak, 2 mini-steaks, and 2 packages of prepared Korean beef ribs.

In chicken I have 1 pack of stir-fry chicken, 4 family size bags of thighs and legs, 6 packages of boneless, skinless chicken thighs, and 1 and 1/2 packages of chicken wings.

In pork I have 6 packs of Kirkland low sodium bacon, 1 pack of Trader Joe's uncured bacon, a package of Canadian bacon, and 2 porkchops.

In fish I have 3 12 ounce packages of wild caught salmon.

There are two bags of egg fried rice (one Chinese, one Japanese) from TJ's, a penne pasta meal in a bag from TJ's, a pound of organic broccoli/cauliflower, some cheese, 3 quarts of Italian prunes (home grown), 1 quart of raspberries (home grown), and 1 pint of strawberries. Most of the fruit is in a different freezer.

Starting with next week's meal plan I will be trying to get this meat used up. Pretty much none of it is organic and is left from earlier this year before we started our journey to sustainable, organic eating. I think we can get it finished off in the next couple of months.

Once we buy our new chest freezer, the mini one is going to be used strictly for chicken. It is big enough to hold thirty whole chickens. When we buy our beef it will go in the new freezer, possibly with a half a pig. We'll see how the money flows at that point.

I am so happy it is November. No more $500 payments to the doctor for DS's treatment. We will have one more $300 payment for glasses this month and then we'll be done with big medical for a while, I hope. Although we still need to save some as come January we will have the $2500 deductible again. Hopefully this coming year it will not be met so quickly. I will have to have two molars fixed, but I am hoping to use part of DH's Christmas bonus to do that.

I did send the extra $230 to AMEX along with my regular payment. Here's how it all broke down this week.

$730.00 AMEX
_100.00 Chase (no interest)
_300.00 for Mom's utilities
__92.97 to the Freezer Fund
___7.03 to the Emergency Fund
__32.97 Electric at the Old House
__25.00 to the Holding Tank for Garbage
__72.00 to the Holding Tank for Water/Sewer old house
__39.53 DH Life Insurance
__32.70 Me Life Insurance
__59.89 Car Insurance
__45.63 House Insurance for old house
__41.16 Security system for old house
_153.00 Storage
__17.00 HoA Dues for old house
_100.00 Property Tax for old house (Holding Tank)
_500.00 to Mortgage for old house
_100.00 to Holding Tank for propane (old house)
_100.00 to MacBook Fund
__28.20 Dental (DH)
__15.69 Medical (DD)
_100.00 DH's monthly allowance
__15.00 DD's weekly allowance
__10.00 DS's weekly allowance
_267.32 on groceries (did a major staples stock up, plus OTC meds)
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$3075.09

I will also be making the car payment out of this payday, just waiting for the bill to get here. I took $100 in cash out for miscellaneous needs. And I will be depositing $46 from the coin jar on Monday, which puts my Freezer Fund at $1000 even. And the MacBook Fund is now at $300. I had $7.03 left after fully funding the Freezer Fund so that went to the Emergency Fund, which now sits at $1008.36.

I did my big shopping tonight. It's been a while since I've needed to go to Costco for anything other than gas. Even so, I did pretty well, I think. I spent $118.40 ($3.72 of which was tax). I got 4 cases of tomato sauce, 1 case of chili, 1 case of cream of mushroom soup (for DH, I won't touch it with a ten foot pole), cheese, organic pizza snacks, toilet paper, and quart and gallon size freezer bags.

The reason I bought tomato sauce is that the kiddos don't like the home canned straight, but they'll eat it one can home canned mixed with one can store bought. I think next time I can tomato sauce I should make it spaghetti sauce with sugar and seasonings in it. It's just too tomatoey for them. Since I only canned enough for about half the year, these 48 cans should do me for the year.

I also bought a few convenience items, DH's soup, some chili and the pizza snacks. As much as I'd like to be 100% from scratch all of the time, there are days when I just get too sick and I just want to be able to open a can or have the kids open their own can of something. Until I start canning my own homemade soup that is something I have determined to live with.

After grocery shopping we got gas there, but I can't find what I did with the receipt. I'm pretty sure it was $70 or so since the tank was empty and gas was at $3.92 per gallon. When it shows up on my AMEX I'll report the amount. If I remember.

Afterwards we went to Haggen and I got popcorn, beef hot dogs (for DH), tortillas, bread (still a little too sick to be baking my own), milk, orange juice, onions, yogurt, nasal spray, and cauliflower. Oh, and 3 12 packs of Pepsi Throwback (for DH). I spent $77.63 there.

Again, a couple of convenience items and the very unnecessary soda, unless you consider marital harmony worth that $11 for 36 cans and I do. DH is 90% on board with the organic, sustainable eating, but there are a few things I don't see him (or me) completely eliminating. Progress, not perfection.

Also spent $8.01 for 2 prescriptions today. We shouldn't have to spend anymore money for a week now, except perhaps for milk. That'll be nice. Tomorrow I should be up for cooking again. The worst of the cold seems to have passed.

We are back from our short vacation to Tacoma. It was incredibly hot while we were there, in the low 90's each day. It was close to that here at home, but we really took a doozy of a time to go.

Still it was very nice to get away from home for a bit and to relax in a pool each night. The zoo was very nice, much better than Woodland Park Zoo. I have some lovely pictures some of which I will post when I am not so exhausted, but here is one.



I didn't actually ride one of the camels as my knee was acting up fiercely by the time we got to the camels (about 2 hours in)and I didn't think I could climb up the stairs to get on, but the kids and DH both did.

We stayed on budget for vacation which was something I was a little worried about. I took an extra $100 just in case, but I came back home with it.

There was a really great diner across from our hotel. We have lucked out quite a bit in finding excellent diners when we've been on vacation. We tend to shy away from the big chain restaurants most of the time if we can help it. This place, Elmer's, reminded me of the place in Port Angeles called Joshua's that we ate at several times on our summer trip last year. Elmer's is a very small chain, local to the PNW, but feels very homey and the food was incredibly good and locally sourced.

The kids got their school wardrobes (well, I guess for DS it was just getting clothes because he's outgrown everything since he's homeschooling this year) taken care of as well. Although DD still needs a pair of gym shoes for PE and a pair of everyday tennis shoes. And both kids need socks. DS's jeans will need to be altered as they are far too long, but we found ones that fit him well otherwise, which we couldn't even come close to doing last year. He's grown a lot in the last year.

I really hate the years between boyhood and teenage boyhood for finding clothes. If you are not a super skinny tall beanpole there is nothing for you in trousers between the XL 20 boys and the size 32 mens waist with a 29 inch inseam. That's 5 missing sizes. DS lived in sweat pants last year, but he hated it. There are tons of tween clothes for girls and you can at least make do with skirts for a few years if you have to. The choices for boys are extremely limited. A business taking advantage of that clothing gap would clean up. I am not the only mother of a boy I've heard complaining of this.

Still, with homeschooling he can get through the fall, winter, and spring on two good pairs of jeans and the hated sweat pants. He wears shorts in the house all the time anyway.

It's been a very busy weekend for me, hence me being quieter than usual here. My daughter and I went down to Burlington yesterday and I picked up some more glass Pyrex dishes with the BPA free lids. I'm really wanting to phase out my plastic usage as much as I possibly can. We also went to another kitchen store and I picked up another Hamilton Beach professional loaf pan. I had bought one last time we were down there and loved it so much that I wanted to get another one the next time we went, so I did. These pans are incredibly good. I don't have to grease them at all. The bread just slides right out, no sticking.

We spent a lot of time at the Cascade Mall looking for a neon green t-shirt for my daughter. Nothing. I did find two nightgowns though to replace some pretty worn and holey summer nightgowns that I have had for probably over ten years. I got a lovely green one and a pretty red one in the same style and they were on sale. I so rarely shop for myself that it pleases me greatly when I can get something useful that will last for several years when it is on sale.

I also got a new pair of slip-on sandals. Surprisingly, they are by Nike. I haven't worn anything by Nike since 7nth grade when the ball of my foot became too wide to wear anything they made. It was a little weird for me to pay that much for a pair of shoes, but they were so well-cushioned and comfortable that I decided it was worth the splurge. I have been looking for a good pair of these for ages.

I used to have ones made by Van's but my son lost them when he was goofing around wearing my shoes and I haven't been happy with anything I've tried on since. I know that I will be able to wear them for years. I really love them, except I wish they did not have the silver swoosh on the tops. Otherwise they are solid black. I am not really a brand person when it comes to clothing, my favorite brand of jeans is WalMart leggings, so I find the swoosh very ostentatious. But I will put up with it for the comfort.

Anyway, that is how I spent my monthly allowance this time. 2 nightgowns, 1 pair of sandals, and some Pyrex. Woo hoo. I am so practical. But all of these things make me happy so that is okay.

We never did find DD a neon shirt there, but we found one today locally at a place called Instinct, which is new to our mall. They had a shirt and a pair of shorts in exactly the color she wanted and they were on sale, too. Woo hoo. I love that.

I also bought DS his first pair of brand name shoes that were not soccer cleats. It was far more than I have ever spent on a pair of shoes for him, but nothing fits him. We tried five different shoe stores. Surprisingly, he ended up with Nikes. He has issues with how shoes grip his ankles and the way he can spread his toes in the toe box and he actually found three pairs of Nikes that fit. And he has enough room in them to grow so he should be able to wear them for a good chunk of the 7nth grade.

DS has never been brand conscious and has happily worn plain (but brightly colored) sweat pants, Kmart swishies, and Goodwill, handed down, and garage sale t-shirts and polos for years. If it had been a thing of "I want Nikes and only Nikes," I would have snapped him right out of that, or made him save up his allowance and aluminum can money for it, but they truly were the only things that fit. We weather proofed them as soon as we got home as I want them to last and remain nice for as long as possible.

I don't know if I mentioned or not, but I did put up some wire fencing (from the old house) around the garden, since Queen was digging stuff up. I also put down straw around the plants to help hide that pretty brown dirt that the silly chicken likes to dig up. I need to buy some chicken wire to keep her out of there, as the fencing isn't enough and she can sort of slip between it.. I will use zip ties to attach it to the wire fencing.

I still need to get the broccoli and dill into the ground. Waiting on Mom to dig up those irises still.

I made 2 loaves of bread today instead of one. DH comes home on Wednesday so I figured there wasn't much point in making only one loaf. He eats a lot of bread so I make more when I know he will be around. I have decided to use one cup of whole wheat flour in my recipe. It takes 4.5 cups of flour. It makes the bread a little heartier without sacrificing the lightness of it.

I make a very easy dinner tomorrow night using some of the bread. But that belongs in my meal planning post.

DH and I drove down to Burlington today. Our main purpose was to go the ranch and get sustainable, pasture-raised organic beef, pork, and chicken. And that was accomplished nicely. I set aside $300 and I actually came back with $30.56, so spent $269.44. I could have bought a bit more, but I thought this would fill our available freezer space nicely and it certainly seems like a month's worth of meat (if not more). The leftover $30.56 will go to our freezer fund.

Surprisingly, as expensive as this meat is, I think our grocery bill is actually going down. This meat is much more filling because our bodies recognize it as being more nutritionally sound, so we are eating much smaller portions of it at meal time, probably by half. And it tastes so much better and is much more satisfying. Flavor can be so key. I also love, love, love the fact that there is so much less packaging. It is wonderful not to have all those polystyrene meat trays to throw out all the time. I noticed it took longer to fill the garbage bin this month.

I ended up with 3 whole chickens (between 3 and 4 pounds each), 6 packages of bacon (about 8 pounds), one package of sweet breakfast sausage links (1.5 pounds), 8 pork chops, 4 beef chuck roasts (2.5 pounds each), and 8 pounds of hamburger. I forgot to ask them about a ham, doggone it!

We do still have some meat left from last month's purchase as well. 2 packs of hamburger, an entire flank steak (about the size of a good London Broil), 1 New York strip steak and 4 ribeyes (they did not get made this week after all because LIFE HAPPENED). Plus we didn't end up ever making the duck, it's still in the freezer. I just got really sick the one day and went down for about 24 hours and then was fine again. Oh, yes, and while rearranging the freezer I found some Cornish game hens, as well, so those need to get made.

I asked them about Thanksgiving turkeys and they do have them. They start accepting orders in July so I will need to remember that so I can get my order in. They range in size from 12 pounds to 22 pounds, so basically you order a small, a medium or a large and get something in that range. We will order a small, which is the 12 to 15 pound range.

I also asked them about the pork family boxes and we can order one of those soon if we decide we like the pork. We already know we like the bacon and the polish sausage. We got the pork chops to try. I also asked them if they make anything similar to a hot dog and they usually do come summer time so I will ask again the next time we go down.

A pork family box costs $300 and contains 35 pounds of meat. That works out to over $8 a pound though. Yes, it's organic and pasture-raised and sustainable, and that is super hard to find, but about the only thing I usually pay that much for is wild caught Pacific salmon and usually I can get that for $5.99 a pound if I buy the whole fish. They don't sell a whole pig, unfortunately, the box is the best you can get. I may just stick with individually buying their bacon and sausage and the occasional pork chops and not bother with the other things. We'll just see how good those chops are, first.

I'm pretty much set for meat this month, but I will need to go to the Food Co-op to pick up some more turkey hot dogs so I can make DS up a big batch of corn dogs at the Food Co-op, some roast beef, ham, and turkey slices from the deli for school lunches, and some duck eggs if they have them as they are so good for baking.

I also will need to buy flour soon. While we were in Burlington we found the organic flour mill where you can buy the 25 or 50 pound bags of flour or you can buy the 25 or 50 pound bags of wheat berries. I do eventually want to get my own little flour grinder, but that's way down the road after the beef purchase. Unfortunately the flour mill is not open to the public on Saturdays (or maybe at all on the weekend), which is the only time the farm store is open, so we can't make just one trip to get what we want.

I am about to open a five pound bag of their flour that I got at the store so I will see how long it lasts us and then calculate what our flour needs will be. It might be worth it to get 100 pounds when we go and store them in the new chest freezer when we get it. I wish I could find it sold locally in the 25 pound bag. I am going to ask at the Food Co-op, since I know they let you buy cases of stuff at discount if you are a member. So maybe they have the big bags available in the back or something. If it will save us a trip it might be worthwhile.

I think we are going to switch back to the Organic Valley Milk but in the cartons, not the plastic jugs, unless we can find the other organic milk in glass bottles. The type in glass bottles that we are drinking now is not homogenized and I really just can't handle the cream separating. We've tried shaking it to death but sometimes there are still lumps, and it's just texturally weird and visually unappealing. If it was just me I'd cope, but everyone wants us to at least have homogenized milk. I will buy the other for making yogurt though if my first experiment with making it tomorrow goes well.

While we were down in Burlington we stopped by the Corningware Outlet Store and bought an 18-piece set of Pyrex storage containers at a good discount. These are glass containers with BPA-free plastic lids. We got 20% off. They also had some lids you could buy individually for some containers we already had at home that came without lids. They were $1.49 each and if we'd ordered them direct from Pyrex they'd have been 3X that much with shipping. I also picked up a new set of measuring cups and spoons (the sort that have six different sizes on each). I'm not sure what we did with the receipt, but we spent around $54 there.

We also got gas today, $66.90.

And I think that's it. Tomorrow should be a restful day. DH is taking the kids to his mother's after lunch. I will be making yogurt and baking bread, but that is all that is on my agenda. I will probably finish reading a book and do some writing and maybe even watch the other half of the movie I started on Wednesday. And take an uninterupted bath. Ah, bliss!

I went back to Goodwill today to buy canning jars. They were 20 cents a piece and I ended up with twelve really good quart size jars and three really pretty pint size jars. Last time I went I got 12, a mix of both. And I have a dozen new ones that I got a while back in an unopened box at a garage sale. I have both Ball and Kerr jars. I don't think it makes much difference as long as it is one of those two brands. So I think I am set for a while. New, this many jars would have cost me a fortune. I was lucky I got there when I did. After I picked out the jars I wanted a lady came through behind me and cleaned out the rest.

I also popped over to Kmart to buy lids and rings. Some, but not many, of the Goodwill bottles had rings (2 were rusty and had to be thrown out), but of course you don't know if the lids were used or not and since I mostly want to can with these, I need good lids.

I filled up the entire dish washer with all of my jars and rings and gave them a heavy duty wash. Tomorrow I hope to make grape jelly using this recipe I found at Owl Haven:

http://www.owlhaven.net/2009/08/25/video-how-to-make-grape-j.... I can never find grape jelly without junk in it in the store. I can find literally every other kind of jelly known to man that is just fruit spread, or is just fruit, sugar, and pectin, but for grapes it's just impossible. With this recipe I can use pure organic grape juice and end up with exactly what I want in my jelly.

I am also going to attempt to make homemade yogurt following this method I found at The Frugal Girl: http://www.thefrugalgirl.com/2009/10/how-to-make-homemade-yo.... I don't know if I will do that tomorrow or not, but I'd like to do it this week. I was actually looking into yogurt makers, but you still have to do all of the work involved with the process before putting it in there and then it just keeps it at the right temp. But this method uses stuff I already have, a cooler and hot water at 120 degrees. So why pay $25 to $50 for a machine that basically keeps the water warm and then beeps at you when it's done? And makes tiny little six ounce jars. I mean, one of the points of making your own yogurt is to have some fairly good sized jars of it to spoon out of and not to have a ton of little bottles to constantly wash out.

When I make it I am going to just do a half batch. I want to make sure my family will eat it, so using a half gallon instead of a whole gallon of milk makes more sense at the moment. If they don't particularly care for it I can use it up in fruit smoothies or try freezing it. It should be an interesting experience.

Mom gave me a space to use that gets a lot of heavy sun so I am going to pick up some more tomato plants. I really want to can tomatoes and tomato puree (for making sauce) this summer. Canned organic tomatoes are one of our biggest expenses and I want to see if I can cut that down by canning. Also with glass jars I can be assured of no BPA in the can liners.

I might even try my hand at canning some beef. There used to be a little old lady at the church I went to as a kid who canned beef and it was the tastiest stuff. I'd love to do that because sometimes it would be nice to just open a jar and heat and serve pot roast that way. On days when I am just far too tired to cook or something.

I am also thinking about canning green beans. I've not really liked green beans in canning jars in the past, but I think this might be because the beans were too mature, so if I pick them young it might make a difference. Also I may just attempt to freeze young green beans as they are great for stir-fry.

This June I will be going out to get a bunch of organic strawbrerries for freezing and jelly and then of course I will pick our own raspberries in July for jam, and our own blueberries in August for making blueberry jelly and frozen blueberries (we are still eating some from last summer!), and if we get enough blackberries, maybe I'll do jam for those, too. The brambles were pretty small last year, but they are over a bigger area this year, so I might have enough. Mom is also hoping her grapevines are old enough now to produce grapes. I'd love to have some frozen ones on hand, though I'd prefer not to make jelly from grapes, though we could juice them and make the jelly from the juice.

I am also considering making pickles. I've been wanting to grow cucumbers anyhow. At the very least I can make the ones you don't pressure can, but just keep in the fridge up to a month. I won't even get into how much junk is in commercial pickles. Yellow #5 is enough to turn me right away from them. If I want yellow pickles I can use tumeric, but I don't see the point in my pickles not being greenish white like the actual food it comes from.

I might not have enough jars for all I want to do! But then my mother has several jars herself and she seldom does much more than make freezer jam anymore. And she has the canner so I don't have to buy one, though they had those at Goodwill, too.

I haven't been feeling great the last couple of days. Not sick, really, just...yucky. Today I didn't stick to my meal plan. I cooked, it's just that the idea of doing a complicated new recipe did not appeal. Plus, I realized I was out of soy sauce, so I couldn't really make the marinade. I ended up just doing bacon cheese burgers, corn on the cob, and nectarines. It worked well. We picked up soy sauce so we can make the Tropical Chicken Stir-fry tomorrow and bump the ribeye meal to next week. They are frozen so it's not that big a deal. Plus DS is doing a make up tae kwon do class tomorrow for when he was so sick, which means a stir-fry will just be easier than the other.

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I found this interesting booklet on meal planning:

http://nchstd.documents.s3.amazonaws.com/More%20Month%20than.... It's kind of a crash course for people who don't really know what they are doing. It wasn't exactly news to me, but I think it would be very helpful for someone who hasn't tried meal planning before and wants to dive in. It does require time though. I think this is more for families with a stay at home parent (and not of very young children, but at least preschool age and up, because some of it would just be hard to do with a toddler clinging to your leg or wearing a baby) or maybe one parent who is only working part time. I'd find it hard if I was working full time. Not that it's not doable, but it's probably not practicle in that situation. Also didn't really care for the breakfasts, because I don't like oatmeal (unless it's in cookies or bread or granola or Joe's O's), but it's not hard to plan breakfasts. And I liked the shopping lists. It's a good teaching tool really.

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I added $6.98 cents to the coin jar. I picked up a prescription for $25. We filled up the gas tank on the van, $57.16. We did a major stock up run to Costco so I shouldn't have to go there for a couple of months, and picked up six LED lightbulbs there, batteries, toilet paper, and of course groceries.

I got really annoyed at a lady there. She was trying to squeeze between me and the shelves instead of going around DH and I. There was not room to do this and she was practically shoving her cart into me. I was probably less than gracious about it because I was having a bad pain day in my leg which always makes me walk slower. I walked even slower at that point. I get cranky when I hurt. She huffed loudly and finally just went around us. I wanted to tell her off, but I bit my tongue. People are rude enough at Costco without me adding to it.

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Spent $10 on two foam swords for the kids. I probably played with one of them more than was seemly for an adult, but it was fun to whack something today. Very stress relieving. This was actually an expense for school.

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Here, have a photo of the half grown chickens roosting in the coop. I will try to get a photo of the ducks up soon.



Oh, and here's a photo of the damage my mother "didn't" do to our older car. The suction cup dent remover does not work to pull it out, either. It cost $5.

So far today I have paid $700 to BoA VISA, $600 to AMEX, and $265.86 to Costco. We bought two new high pressure, low flow toilets for the old house, plus selected organic groceries there (and some raw sheep's cheese imported from France that they were sampling, so good, and we usually get some kind of expensive cheese when we go there). The toilets were $79.99 each plus sales tax of 8.9%. They are one piece models where the tank is part of the toilet unit, so very easy to install. We also bought gas while we were there, filling the tank for $59.56.

I figured out the budget for this week and next week's pay, and then figured out that since the car payment isn't due until 5/19 and we get paid on 5/18, I could actually skip making a car payment out of next week's check and make it on the 18th in person instead. I could then take the $800 (payment + additional principal that I always make) and put it on the BoA VISA instead. It's cutting it close, but I do still have enough money in the EF to cover the car payment if needed.

That should still have us on track to have the VISA paid off by the end of May or at the very latest the middle of June. I wasn't expecting to have to buy a new bed for DS this month, but sometimes things happen. Maybe we won't have to use the full $1000 I've set aside to have the whole house professionally cleaned. We are going to email about setting up an estimate. Then we can make an appointment to have it done. Then the only thing left to do will be to change out the toilets, get an estimate on fixing the window, and then scheduling an appointment to actually fix the window.

And then we will have to make a decision on replacing all of the interior doors and frames, or letting the house go As IS/Where IS without fixing those things. I don't think we are going to paint. I might get an estimate to see if it is worth it, but...I don't really want to put that much more money into it. I just want it clean, on the market, and not have to worry about it anymore. At least the roof is sound. We are twelve years into a thirty year roof warranty come July, and it was an excellent roof we put on.

The lawn will have to be mowed this weekend though. And probably at least every weekend from this point on, at least in the front where it shows from the road.. *sighs* It won't be too bad. We'll need the gas mower this first time, but after that I can use the push mower. And I can save the back yard for DH when he's home and he can use the gas mower for that.

I have some other bills to pay and set money aside for but I'll probably do that tomorrow. I did make a deposit to the Safety Net of $122.30.

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I forgot to post this before I left, so we took the kids clothing and bathing suit shopping after school, a planned expense, and got spring wardrobes for them (shorts and t-shirts for DS, Capri pants and t-shirts for dear daughter. They each got a bathing suit and I got one, too, though I am annoyed about it. The one I really wanted and liked the colors in various shades of green and blue of the most showed way, way, way too much cleavage even for me, and I'm pretty comfortable with that sort of thing, but dang, I would have had to pin this to feel comfortable in public. It fit so well, too, otherwise. It was an older ladies swimsuit, too. Why do they think we want to show off that much over age 40? It's like the toddler booty shorts. I mean, why? It'd be one thing if I was buying a bikini, but this was a swimdress style suit.

The one I ended up buying was various shades of pink (one of them hot pink, which I do like, but most pastels, which I don't) and brown. I am not really a pink person, but due to things that often tend to be out of my control, I have far too much pink in my wardrobe already. Usually because I just want to be clothed and the only thing left in the styles I like and my size by the time I get to shopping is the pink ones.

But it fits perfectly and supports perfectly. The skirt is a little too long for my preference, but hopefully it won't get in my way when I do the crawl stroke. I used to have one that was so long my hands would tangle in it when I swam laps. This one isn't billowy though at all. So I bought it. One nice surprise is I was able to buy it a size smaller than my other swimsuit. (I like to have two because I swim almost every day mid-spring through mid-fall, and the older one invariably falls apart from all the chlorine mid-season.

I mean, if I wanted to spend over $100 for a suit, I would order one online and get the colors I really wanted, but I don't, and a $33 suit with proper support and coverage, even if it isn't the greatest colors, is fine with me. And DH likes it regardless and says it looks good. It's just my dislike of pink, not reality. Sometimes we have to make compromises in life. This isn't a big one.

We also picked up some school supplies to replace what was worn out or used up, and some OTC medications to replace the stock used up when ill. The last thing I want to do when I am sick is go shopping for medications, so I really like to have enough on hand to treat 3 of us if we go down at the same time (DH is seldom sick).

We went to two stores and spent $73 at one (after $8 off from our loyalty card and were given a $5 gift card because we qualified for having spent over $50). At the other, where we did the bulk of our shopping we spent $265.56 (almost the exact amount we spent at Costco, interesting).

I was so tired by the time we were done, I decided to get takeout pizza instead of making some. *sighs* Willpower, thy name is not LuckyRobin. So that was $27.18. And after a quick run to the store tonight for milk and crackers I am not going to spend any money (except to write out bills) for the rest of the weekend. I hope.

Friday we went shopping at Costco. I picked up a few items for my mother while we were there. It cost $67.11 and she paid me back today. I kept the $65 in my purse, but added the $2.11 to the coin jar.

We spent a good $230 at Costco ourselves, mostly because I did not want to go back there again any time soon. I may be walking almost normally now, but after a trip there I was limping and had to ice for several hours afterwards. It is just too big a place to try to manuever through when you are disabled.

So I doublestocked on some stuff, toilet paper, Ziploc bags, medicines, etc. Most of the cost was that, though I did get a big bag of precut broccoli, some hamburger patties, pancake mix, a case of oranges (after opening the box and checking every single orange for mold), and some chicken thighs as they were .99/lb. Since they come prepackaged in family sized servings, I prefer to buy them at Costco if the cost is low enough, so I don't have to do any extra work. It had been running $1.59 for the last year or so, so it had been cheaper for me to buy it elsewhere in bulk at .98/lb and package it myself.

I wish I had realized we were nearly out of brown sugar though or I would have bought some there. I have about a half cup left after making the marinade today. Now I'll need to wait for a sale and it's not really baking season so I may have to pay a higher price. We use it too much to go too long without it. I should root around and make sure I don't have any in the cupboards. I had quite the stockpile at one time.

DH had to run DS's viola down to the school as he forgot it today and then he is to swing over to the one CU and get the amount of last year's interest for our taxes. He needs to get those done this week so we can get them sent in before he leaves on Monday.

The closing date on DH's grandparents' house was moved from January 30th to February 20th. Even though the people had put in an offer and had the inspection done, they then had to have the bank approve and do it's own inspection, which is taking a while. They were preapproved before the offer and figured that was enough, hence the earlier closing date. First time homebuyers.

Hopefully it will actually close on the 20th. I don't know how long it will be from that point until DH gets his share of the inheritance. Not too long, I hope. No one has contested the will and it was divided fairly with 5% going to each of four grandchildren, and 40% going to each of two children. The family is more or less amicable.

I got the book I put on hold from the library today, The Feast Nearby by Robin Mather that someone here on the blogs had gotten not too long ago. I am really looking forward to reading it. The author lived on $40 a week for food after her husband divorced her and she lost her job. That's about $160 a week for a family of four if I extrapolated it out. We spend about $150 a week for the four of us, so it's pretty close and I thought maybe I could find some actual useful ideas in this one. So far I'm liking it, but haven't got too far yet.

All right, I've procrastinated my bills long enough. Time to grab the bull by the horns.

I haven't sat down and done all the bills yet. Physical therapy really wiped me out today and then I had to go to Walgreens and two different grocery stores, so I mailed off the one bill due on the 31st (just going to elsewhere in the county so will get there in plenty of time). That was the $100 for half year dues for the HoA of our old house's development.

I did have enough coins in the coin jar to roll both nickels and pennies, and I had another $1 in my purse, so with that I ended up depositing $35.50 into the Safety Net portion of the Emergency Fund.

$708.63 Beginning Safety Net Amount
+_35.50 Amount of Deposit
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$744.13 Ending Safety Net Amount

That brings the total EF to $3895.78, which means I only need to transfer $104.22 to ING to hit $4000 and not the few dollars more I thought it would be. I will figure out the ING money tomorrow as I have to put some other amounts in from what needs to go into the holding tank.

I also paid out the kids allowances today. DS got $7 and DD got $36 (I was a bit behind on hers and had to fill her envelope for 3 weeks worth of allowance). I also gave her $10 as she is spending the day at the mall tomorrow with her friends and will need to buy something to eat. She likes to go to one of the stir-fry places where they actually have real food, but they are a bit more expensive than the rest of the food court.

I also bought an extra large specialty pizza tonight for $28.17. I was in the mood for a bit of a splurge. And I spent $2.16 on a prescription. And $169 and some odd cents on groceries and OTC meds as well, refilling my cold medicine stockpile for DS (the dye free stuff he needs to have because of his allergies). I think that's it for today.

I spent $17.70 at Fred Meyer today. DS got his pillow and DD got her box of hair dye. Had a coupon for the hair dye. Then we stopped at Trader Joe's and got their nitrate/nitrite free pastrami, black forest ham, and roasted turkey for school lunches. The regular roast beef looked weird (kind of shiny and scaled) so we got the pastrami instead. I still have plenty of tortillas and baby spinach for wraps which is what they like in their lunches these days.

We also got a bag of peppermint taffy (no artificial ingredients or food dyes). All of the other kids have been bringing in Christmas candy and DS wanted something he could have that he's not allergic to so he doesn't feel so left out. This fit the bill. I spent a total of $15.56 there.

Has anyone else noticed that often cashier's fail to give you your total at the end of checking your groceries these days? It happened at both FM and TJ's today and I have noticed this more and more of late. Only one of these had a easily viewable screen for me to see the total on. The girl finishes checking and then starts wiping her stuff down without ever telling me the total. I don't like that type of customer service. Maybe they are so used to people just swiping their cards, but what about those of us who still use cash or write checks? It's not as bad as the checkers that talk to each other over your head and never greet you, but close.

I should be able to stay out of the stores until Friday now. That is the plan anyway, though I might have to buy bread. Or just download the manual for the bread machine Mom gave me and make some.

I made broccoli and beef stir-fry for dinner. It was the last of the bagged kits. I'll be making them from scratch from now on, but I am going to make my own kits, because it's really the prep work that takes the time. If I pre-do all the prep work then I will still be able to have dinner on the table in 15 minutes, which is quicker than driving to pick up a pizza or burgers and much, much healthier. I've got some time tonight so I will make up some of my own kits. I will let you know how that goes.

I'm glad I have all day to rest because we have been running since 10 a.m. Friday when I picked up my daughter from school and the two of us went down to VM for another surgical followup appointent. I have been given a clean bill of health for that and have been told it was my final followup. He said I've healed so well he can hardly see the scar, so that was wonderful news.

Driving wasn't too bad. We arrived in Seattle close to noon. I paid for valet hospital parking $10, because it is only $2 more and it is very much worth that $2 to me to not try and park the mini-van in those narrow little slots and then have to navigate traffic on foot back to the hospital. Plus there is no elevator in the parking garage and I still have such difficulty on stairs. I didn't want to set myself up for a painful knee for the rest of the weekend.

We ate lunch in the hospital cafeteria. This weekend has been long planned for and the money set aside so even though we ate out this weekend, I don't consider it part of the no eating out thing I'm doing, even if technically it is. Anyway, we spent $23.22 on lunch. I had the pot roast special which was roast beef, baby red potatoes and my choice of broccoli or mixed vegetables. I chose mixed veg. I also got an orange and a drink. My daughter ended up with a mega slice of pizza, a bag of chips, a chinese bean thing (not sure exactly what it was) and a soda. They've raised the prices since the last time we ate there.

It was one by the time we were done eating and we decided to go up early, even though my appointment wasn't until two. Sometimes they will take you early. They did, after ten minutes and I was out of there by two. It took a little bit to get our van and then we hit the road. Traffic wasn't too bad and we were in Marysville by three thirty, where we stopped at Fashion Bug.

DD got 2 pairs of jeans, a hoody, and 4 camisoles and I got 3 sets of long sleeved pajamas with full length bottoms and one long-sleeved thermal shirt. I remembered to bring my coupon. It cost $275.83. A bit pricier than I had hoped for, but still 100 times cheapter than the same clothes if we'd got them at Lane Bryant.

After that we went to our hotel and checked in. Hotel cost $124.05 after taxes. It was a nice enough hotel, but the walls were pretty thin and you could hear everything that went on in the hallway. We won't stay there again because of that.

DD and I walked over to Arby's which was just next door for dinner and I spent $17.96 on dinner. Prices have gone up since the last time I ate at an Arby's or else it's just far more expensive there than at home.

For breakfast we ate at an IHOP around 11:30 for $26.32 and that included a 20% tip. We got the breakfast sampler and split it and added a couple more sides to round it out for the two of us.

We stopped somewhere along the way at a Haggen to buy some cold medicine. I can't find the receipt but it was under $20 for some ibuprofen, cough drops, and cold medicine.

Then we went to Burlington and went to the outlet mall and got new tennis shoes for DD, $53.54. A boy's size 12. She's going to end up with feet like her father's I'm afraid. Then we went to The Avenue and DD got three tops and a bracelet for $36.42.

Then it was time to eat so we went to The Outback. We ended up spending $62.43 with the tip. We brought back half an order of lambchops, mixed veg and a bowl of baked potato soup for DS, who stayed with grandma during this time. He was very happy to see it. He loves the food from there, but we go so rarely because of the location and the expense.

So it was a very spendy weekend, but we didn't go over the set budget. DD and I really enjoyed the time together alone and we got some much needed items. I think the long pajamas are working, too. Last night I only needed to have the heater on 70 instead of 76 in my room despite the fact that it was well below freezing.

Today I have to go to Freddy's. DS needs a new pillow and I need to pick up milk and a few other items, so this way we only need to go to one store. I plan to keep it under $60 and then a quick stop at TJ's for the lunch meat DS needs and then no more spending until Friday.

And I am most definitely back on the no eating out challenge until the end of the year.

I added $9.56 to the coin jar today.

I did a bit of clothing shopping. It's been a very long time since I've bought much in the way of clothing, but since losing the 45 pounds almost everything is too big. I have also been very cold lately to the point that jacking up the heat doesn't help and neither does three blankets on the bed.

So I got a couple of turtlenecks to wear under my nightgown. I also got three chenille sweaters, two zip front and one pullover, and I got two new pairs of jeans in the smaller size. That gives me four pairs of jeans (I had two in my closet from a long time ago). I think this should keep me until spring.

If the turtlenecks don't keep me warm I may end up getting an electric blanket. I don't particularly like using those because I always take water to bed with me and I have a tendency to spill and I'm always worried I am going to shock myself or something. It's getting so that the only time I feel warm is in the car with the heat jacked up or in the shower.

DH bought a new pillow and we got some medicines and a new pair of tweezers and (very bad) four bottles of soda. They were cheap, at least.

I transferred the money from ING to my checking account today for first of the month bills. Of the money I had set aside I still have $648.08 left. I will probably put $200 in the emergency fund and then if I don't need the rest between now and the 16th, I will put what is left into the January/HSA money.

We got paperwork in the mail in case we want to put DH's bonus into his 401K. We don't, it's earmarked for debt repayment, but if they sent him that, it means he is definitely getting one. And also I wouldn't think they'd send out 401K paperwork unless it was a substantial amount to put in there. Two to three more weeks to go to find out just how much it is going to be. I hate living in suspense. But it is at least good news that there will be one.