Provident Living-December

We have had a very cold and very snowy month… we are wearing sweaters and layers to keep warm at home.
We found a bag of steamed broccoli and steamed red potatoes stuck inside our screen door one night when we came home from one of many concerts.  My next door neighbor told me the next day when we saw each other that the food was from her, just as I thought.  She sometimes brings home extra food from work parties and gives it to us since it is too much for just her.  For lunch on Saturday I made a huge pot of potato broccoli soup and brought her a piping hot jar full of it along with some homemade French bread topped with apple butter and some pieces of holiday fudge, as well.  She seemed very happy and admitted to secretly wishing for more of my soup she remembered me bringing her when she wasn’t feeling well some time ago.  I was pretty sure this was NOT the same soup but it was delicious and used both ingredients she had given me and the rest was on hand in my pantry.
And by the word “pantry” which I use often, I am really referring to what I have on my shelves and in my food storage located in the basement rather than a traditional room off the kitchen.  I live in a very small 5 room home with 7 people.  I have an eat-in kitchen which is something like 8x15 in total with very little cupboard space.  The shelving we built with lumber and hardware a number of years ago saves us in so many ways.  It allows us to safely store “enough” for a large family who rarely dines out in a wet basement using the precious vertical space we have.  I have grown very accustomed to running downstairs multiple times a day to what is really, at this point, an extension of my kitchen.  My other reason for using the word “pantry” is that most people don’t completely understand the term “food storage” and when they do hear that term I get a lot of questions and usually they end up thinking we must be some sort of survivalist type family.  Food storage, itself, is a different topic and I’ll probably cover more on that next month.
After a looooong battle with the dishwasher, extended warranty and the repair company the store sends out to fix broken appliances, the store decided to refund our 3 year old dishwasher purchase price to us in FULL and alleviate themselves of further repair work.  They also offered to have installation of a new dishwasher paid for as well, though that won’t be necessary since ours is a portable dishwasher.  The check arrived in the mail a week later.
Discovering last minute that my 11 year old was in need of a “festive” shirt for his holiday concert I went out and bought a beautiful red and black plaid button down shirt and a white sweater vest with a red insignia on the upper left front of it.  Both look brand new, are brand name and I paid $4.50 for each item.  While it’s not garage sale priced, it is a fraction of the original price and it was convenient too.  After a quick wash, dry and press Tristan looked very handsome walking out the door that night in his black pants and black shoes.  A Santa hat on his head matched quite well and he did indeed look quite festive for the occasion.  While I was there I picked up a pair of pajamas, a sweater and another button down shirt with matching sweater vest from The Children’s Place that I paired together.  I only paid a few dollars and this boy is sprouting so quickly that he really has had very little to wear since the temperature dropped.  I figured I would not make him wait for Christmas buying this way and he really does need a few things NOW.  To be honest, I’ve never seen the boy so happy to receive clothing.
I made a number of gifts to give away.  I will do a post on these.  Some were kitchen made gifts and some were from my craft area.  All were thoughtful and took time and the reaction to the gift I did see get opened was a positive one.  I’d planned on more homemade gifts to go around but time got the better of me.  I have loads of ideas but I need to plan earlier and act on those plans early enough so those are my goals for next year.
My children took their own hard earned money, decided on a budget individually and they purchased or made gifts for family members.  My youngest had just $6 and he got thoughtful gifts for everyone when he was taken shopping with his Dad.  In fact I thought everyone was quite thoughtful with their gift giving.
Gift giving within our family was different this year as well.  I made the suggestion to my husband to use the old adage “Something you want, something you need, something to wear, something to read”… and a surprise from Santa Claus.  This year my husband thought it was a good idea.  It forced some creativity and more thought put into the gifts we got each other than in previous years.  Another plus; I thought it made gift giving easier because it seemed more organized.  I also stuck fairly close to my original budget but with a Santa gift I ended up going over by just a bit on each person.  We ended up finding some “unexpected” money to cover it though, so it worked out well.
I am currently trying to decide if I can successfully handle putting together a “Homemade Christmas” for next year.  It is something I have thought about for several years but my schedule combined with having little ones at home has made that difficult to actually do.  And I have received some resistance from my kids and husband suggesting this in the past.  So I am thinking, thinking, thinking… is it feasible?  My husband has some reservations about it so we may compromise and have Santa gifts that are not homemade.  I already know that our budget will still be tight next Christmas so there is the added advantage of keeping costs down even WITH the compromise.  Like I said, I have loads of ideas and need to harness the enthusiasm.
Finally, for the first year ever since having children we did NOT have professional portraits done of the kids or family.  It was a money saving choice… a choice we made.  Instead we had taken some pictures through the year that we thought could be “played with” and printed as 8x10’s with 5x7’s given to our parents.  We finally sat down, picked out pictures and cropped them and sent them in for printing.  We found a family package deal that gave us even more pictures in the package for less money than purchasing them without the package.  This worked out perfectly because my brothers and sisters and I had decided that instead of choosing names for a Christmas gift exchange this year, which not all of us were participating in, it would be more meaningful to exchange pictures between the families and help us feel closer which is the real reason for gift giving within the family.  The only cost is the print and the postage and some families are putting together family tree walls.  We all live pretty far apart and we don’t get to see each other often.  This helps the kids know who their cousins are.  We can mount the pics however we want to and then replace with an updated one whenever they come along.  I thought that was a pretty neat idea.  For us, our 8X10 prints take the place of 10x13 prints.  We ended up not being able to find 10X13 mats that would fit in our frames so we used a gift card and bought some nice 8x10 frames at 50% off after Christmas at the craft store.
That was my shorter than usual list for living providently this month.

Perfect Beans

Finally, I am done with my research on beans having started this over a month ago!  Thanksgiving and Christmas got the better of me over the past few weeks.  So here it is.

Beans!  High in fiber, low in fat.  Canned beans are one thing but dried beans seem quite another.  They are easy to store and good protein to include in a home food storage but then what?  What can I do with them?  How do I cook with them?  Dried beans are cheaper to buy than their canned counterpart making them affordable for me to pick up a bag here and there occasionally which I did to ensure I was following prophetic council.    Plus they keep longer, good for long term food storage which I viewed as a "just in case" type of thing.  Keeping longer gave me comfort because I didn't have to fix them NOW and I figured if there was nothing else to eat, I guessed I could stomach eating some beans... if I had to in order to stay alive.  I could never live with myself if I had to look my children in the eye and tell them I had nothing for them to eat when I could have... and should have done something about it.  But one day I looked at my food storage and realized I had so many barrels of beans I was scared.  I was scared of beans!!!  How can I rotate through a food storage that I am scared of and have no idea how to use?  How could I justify purchasing more of something I had no intention of eating soon when our grocery budget was tighter than ever and still tightening more?  Eating beans wasn't anything new... it was the fact that these beans were dry beans.  My mom had used dry beans in her meals which I may or may not have liked but I had started at ground zero in the cooking department and was learning my way through the kitchen.  My time had come to conquer the DRY BEANS!  Now I use them not just in soup recipes but I use them in many mexican recipes replacing the beef with them simply for the economy and health of them.  I even make bean burgers that give the old frozen vegi-burger in the freezer case of the local grocery a run for its money.  I've come a long way from ground zero.

I have heard many rumors about beans through the years and wondered about them.  In spite of having delved in to use beans in our meals for several years figuring out certain tricks along the way I still had some of the same questions.  How could I help answer other people's questions they were asking me about cooking with beans such as how can you prevent them from giving you gastrointestinal distress?  If I salt them won't they be tough?  But if I don't salt them will they have any flavor?  What about the time involved in cooking with beans?  These are some valid questions with some good news answers.  I recently read an article in the December/January 2014 issue of Cooks Country that cleared up any questions I still had about beans.  Putting this new information to the test combined with years of personal experience I am confident in coming up with a creamy, flavorful bean every time now.

Time vs. Money or the old adage "time IS money, money is time".

So quickly you should know that while beans are a cheap source of protein, dried beans are ridiculously cheap by comparison.  That said, the location you purchase from and the packaging size can further influence the price you pay for those beans.  And it doesn't hurt to keep a few CANS of beans on the shelf, either, for those days when even the best laid plans fall short.  The price of a couple cans of beans on my shelf to provide a quick meal for 7 is NOTHING compared to the $35 + price tag on an unplanned trip through the McDonald's drive through.

Time, of course, is a resource just like money.  The good news with using dried beans is that it doesn't have to take a lot of time.  I am referring to "hands on" time.  You DO need to plan ahead to use beans but the time it takes to prepare the beans is mostly hands off plus the only equipment needed is a basic Dutch Oven (fancy name for pot with lid).  And I'm all for any simplicity I can get in my little kitchen.

Here are some simple Core Techniques in utilizing dried beans in your diet.

1.)  SOAK or BRINE BEANS:  While soaking beans overnight may be standard procedure that everyone knows about there is a LOT of confusion about brining them.  Adding salt to your soaking beans not only seasons the beans but actually softens their skins as the sodium ions in the salt replace calcium and magnesium ions as the beans sit in the salty solution.  Sodium ions weaken pectin which is the glue that holds the cells together and gives the cell walls of the bean strength.  With the break down of the cell wall more water can then penetrate the bean making for a softer bean.  Note that lentils do not need soaking.
Bottom line; Soak beans for 8-24 hours in brine solution of 3 Tbsp. salt and 4 quarts of water for every pound of most beans in most recipes.  Use immediately.  *** Unused brined beans may be rinsed and kept refrigerated for up to four days or may be frozen for several weeks.  Think of this as "fast food" for upcoming meals.  FAQ:  What if I don't have time to soak the beans overnight?  If you don't have any left over brined beans in the fridge or freezer then use a quick soak by bringing the beans, salt and water to a boil.  Then turn off the heat and cover with lid letting them sit for one hour.  Drain and rinse your beans after the one hour mark and proceed with your recipe.  Still not fast enough?  Simmer beans in 3 quarts of water with one Tbsp. baking soda for 20 minutes before draining, rinsing and proceeding with recipe.  Remember though, an overnight brine will always produce the creamiest beans.

2.) SORT/RINSE BEANS: Bags of dried beans sometimes contain small stones and other debris called ditritus so pick through your beans as you rinse them in a colander with cold water.  Really get in there with your hand and mix them around as you run them under the water.  If you are really being overly thoughtful (or nervous) you can even spread the beans out on a towel or white plate to make sure that anything that should not be in the beans is spotted and discarded.  I usually find that what doesn't belong is obvious.
Bottom line; Rinse those beans keeping eyes open for detritus.  Eliminate the jokes and intestinal discomfort.  Rinsing beans after soaking and cooking helps remove some of the broken down chains of carbohydrates which can otherwise cause gas and other digestive troubles. 

3.)  BEWARE of ACID:  Contrary to popular myth, salting beans has NOTHING to do with tough beans but acidity does affect the bean.  If the cooking liquid the beans are in is too acidic then beans will not soften no matter how many hours they spend bubbling on the stove top.  A low pH (higher acid) actually has the opposite effect of brining and will strengthen the pectin in beans, making them tougher; a very low pH actually prevents them from cooking.  It took a LOT of acid to cause a problem during testing.  A primary acidic food we tend to cook with beans is... TOMATOES!  In my own kitchen I have produced very creamy beans when brined with salt and rather tough ones when I added tomatoes too early to my non-brined beans that were boiling.  Be safe!  Add tomatoes to your recipe only when beans are nearly tender.  If beans remain unsoftened despite all these measures then your beans were just too old (more than 10 years) or your water is too hard.

Store beans in a cool, dry place.  I like to keep my dried beans as long term storage in plastic buckets with gamma seal lids that can be purchased at places like Home Depot but can be purchased in bulk (least expensively per lid) online.  When I run low on beans upstairs in my kitchen I simply refill my canning jar from the buckets and they look somewhat chic sitting on my exposed shelves in the kitchen.  Canning jars, also frequently called Mason jars, are the most economical way to store goods in glass.  Highly functional, yet very attractive to display, they will keep moisture, bugs, and rodents from ruining your goods.  LOVE canning jars!

My favorite beans to store are Great Northern, Black, Kidney and Pinto Beans.  Pinto Beans can be purchased in bulk at Sam's Club.

There are hundreds of ways to take advantage of using dried beans in your diet.  Now you are prepared for success the next time your recipe calls for beans.

November's Provident Living

This was my list for November.  When I make this list of things I do each month I feel like all those little things that I take time for or have learned to take care of in a self sufficient manner add up and make a difference in our budget and in our quality of life.  I love learning new ways to do useful things.  As I look at my lists from each month I realize how much I have to be grateful for, I see little miracles in my life and I feel more gratitude in my heart for the plain and simple gifts otherwise so easily taken for granted.

 

I mended a winter coat that my oldest child had worn.  The padding and lining were both ripped and after my repairs and a good cleaning it looks as good as new.  Already for the next child to wear and it has started getting cold... especially as she leaves the house at 5:30 a.m.

I made a triple batch of laundry detergent and a double batch of dishwasher detergent.

I took my van back to where we'd gotten the new transmission put in because I was hearing a knocking in my steering column whenever I turned.  They discovered a loose bolt they had missed which they tightened and everything is fine.  For my trouble they gave me a card for a free lube and oil change the next time we need one which is a $50 value.  They also gave me an opportunity to write an online review for them so I did.  I brought in a copy the next time we were going past their service department and they mailed me a $10 gift card to my favorite store, Target!

Homemade granola bars were quite the hit.  Everyone loved to get one on those "early days" we have twice a week when everyone has to run out the door.  I liked them because they were easy to cut and held together well.

French style vegetarian soup was an easy, warming and delicious soup that was made out of next to nothing and nearly filled my "cauldron".  It used all pantry ingredients and even called for some old bread so I pulled the heels out of the fridge.  I gave it little thought other than making sure my beans were soaking the night before.







Lemon Bundt Cake with lemon glaze, also made completely from pantry ingredients, included a homemade all purpose cake mix but no actual lemons.  It was perfectly lemony and delicious and very inexpensive to make.

Doing crafts with my pre-schooler was a lot of fun using pumpkin seeds from our jack-o-lantern to outline our pumpkin craft and then paint orange.  This craft taught concepts in size as well as patterns and worked on fine motor skills with scissors, glue and paint.  We also used the seeds to glue and trace his name.

We began working on homemade Christmas presents for cousins and siblings which utilize our huge crayon bucket collection.  All those broken crayons will find renewed life by making crayon melts.

Free entertainment... my husband got four complimentary tickets to the Musical "Peter Pan" that he has been working for months on.  We got a fifth complimentary ticket for school staff and since a couple of my children are in the production it was one more ticket than I needed.  So after some thinking I invited a friend of my girls that I thought would really enjoy and appreciate seeing this performance and who would also be good sitting with my other three children.

Speaking of the annual musical, it is like a second job for a quarter of the year for my husband and earns us some cash which will be paid in four installments between now and June.  The person playing Tinker Bell in the live orchestra fell through as did the person playing harp and so my husband was hired to play in the pit for performances as well.  He will earn some unexpected money for rehearsal time outside of his regular hours as well as get paid per performance as a hired professional.  This will allow us to restock some of our emptying pantry shelves, replenish our emergency fund and give us some Christmas money to work with.


 Homemade Italian dressing is a favorite on spinach and homegrown tomatoes which are still ripening on my windowsill.  I usually have the dry ingredients in pint jars on the shelf ready to be mixed with their wet ingredients for a quick fix on busy nights or so my older children can easily prepare the salad dressing themselves.  Home canned peaches and applesauce have begun to supplement the fruit in our diet. 

 I made a White Bean Alfredo which will fool anyone into thinking they are eating chicken.  It is so good and filling.  I think the secret is in the garlic!  The recipe utilizes white beans and powdered milk in my food storage.  I often cook with powdered milk because while we prefer not to have to drink it I do not notice a difference at all when I cook with it.  Using it in this way enables me to rotate milk in my long term storage and reduce my cost of cooking this dish since bulk powdered milk is probably the least expensive way to buy milk.




Remember those little spookies we picked at the pumpkin patch last month?  I was able to freeze 14 cups of puree from them.  After gracing our front porch for most of the harvest season we brought them in when the outdoor temperature began reaching the freezing point at night and we roasted them.  I measured the puree into clean reuseable lunch meat containers which work just like "gladware".  A few years ago there was a pumpkin shortage in this region and not a can of pumpkin was to be found in any store around here for months and months.  I was grateful to have a few frozen containers of puree but have since made sure to freeze as much pumpkin as I can.  I use pumpkin for muffins, pancakes, soup and of course, pie!

 The reason I include the Pumpkin Whoopie Pies here is because I used fresh pumpkin puree to make these... the cookie part was so soft and they were a wonderful autumn treat.  They are a real contender with the traditional chocolate and cream version that I loved growing up.  The other ingredients in this treat were purchased in bulk.  The cream cheese is something I stock up on when I can buy it at .90 per pound.  Unopened, cream cheese lasts for months in the fridge.  Check the expiration date and stock up on as much as you have room for and think you'll use in that time.

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies

Some of my shopping bargains this month included Halloween napkins for .30 a package.  At home I always use cloth napkins but I do use paper napkins in lunch boxes.  I got four cookie cutters in various Halloween shapes on the clearance table as well as a Halloween door hanging decoration for just $1.50 instead of its usual $5.  It's very cute with a Halloween cat and everyone who knows me knows I won't let anything with a cat go to waste!!!  On a more practical note I avoided the after sales on Halloween candy but stocked up on canned goods.  Many vegetables were just .49 per can when you bought them in multiples of 10.   I was able to add 78 cans of food to my pantry shelf to help replenish my dwindling supply.  Some cans will be given at food drives to help feed others this holiday season also.  Baking supplies go on sale this month so this is the time to stock up on those items.  Sugar went on sale for $1.19 for 4 pounds with a limit of two so my husband and I each went through the line and then we went back the next day on the way home from somewhere.  Butter was $1.59 per pound.  Spices, baker's chocolate, canned pumpkin, soups and canned milks were on sale too as well as pasta. I also purchased 10 pounds of bacon using a rain check.  They were on sale but if purchased in multiples of 5 (up to 10) then they were just 1.99 with the rain check.  Since bacon rarely goes on sale for the price I am willing to pay I did purchase all 10 allowed.  I found large bags of Snicker's minis, normally $10.00 for $1.10.  I bought two bags and may use them for Christmas or perhaps to pass out to the children in my class at church.  Dollar deals included cream cheese and Cool Whip.

TURKEY!!!  Of course this is the month to buy turkey.  The store with the best sale on turkey around here had a purchase limit of one so my husband and I each went through the line separately.  Large turkeys over 16 pounds received $17 off with a $20 purchase.  I advised my husband to look for a smaller turkey in that range because the deal would give us more money off per pound.  Our turkeys ended up  costing about .50 cents per pound.  

 

I had a little fun experimenting with my camera here.  The kids got super excited about making a volcano one Saturday morning when it was time to make bathroom cleaner.  Bathroom cleaner is super easy to make with some basic items that you may already have in your home.  It is super fun and quite entertaining to make.  Just be sure to use a big enough bowl to mix it up in.  Then it will settle and fit into a bottle for use.  It cleans quite nicely and smells really good.



Marinated Garden Tomatoes for Pasta



  The end of my garden tomatoes had ripened on the window sill and this was a delicious way to use them.  I chopped them up and marinated them for pasta sauce one evening after a very busy day.  I was able to get some other household chores done while it marinated and the water boiled for pasta.  I decided that this vegetarian dish may be my new favorite pasta.  It is completely easy, made out of next to nothing and tastes just like this pasta I loved that Down East discontinued several years ago.   Check out the recipe under "Tomatoes" on this blog.

 

 

We rented two DVDs from Red Box for free with two different coupon codes they mailed to us... a nice at home date night.  We also borrowed the movie The Lorax from the library for one Friday night which the whole family watched.

 

We filled out an on-line survey to get 50 points added to our Shoppers Club card which is half the points needed to get a discount on their gas pump.

My husband and I went out for dinner at a favorite little local restaurant for our date night out.  We were leaving at closing time on Friday night and they are closed for weekends.  So they came and asked us if we'd like to have some free bagels.  Of course we were delighted.  Then they said they were just going to throw out the unsold bags and we could take as many as we wanted to so we picked out ten half-dozen bags leaving the workers some to take if they wanted and thanked them.  Our children were delighted on Saturday morning and bagel sandwiches went out in lunch boxes on Monday.  We still have plenty more stored in the freezer for the coming weeks.

I stopped at the craft store to help my 11 year old pick up some crafting supplies for a science project in his enrichment class.  We found Crayola modeling clay being sold at a discount and it would give him more control over the project than Styrofoam balls.  It would take away the need for purchasing a paint color we were out of as well.  I also had a list of supplies to purchase for making some Christmas gifts and found a 50% off sale on my exact list items.  This enabled me to make gifts for two children at the price of just $5.  I already had leftover supplies at home for the rest of the project from several years ago.

November was a busy one.

 

 

 

Down East Marinated Pasta Sauce

I had quite a number of garden tomatoes which had ripened on my window sill over the past weeks and needed to be used up soon.  I came up with this recipe which turns out to be nearly identical to a discontinued pasta that disappeared off store shelves years ago almost as soon as I had found it.  Thinking how much I paid for that little box compared with the cost to prepare this recipe which feeds my whole family as a main dish amazes me.   I didn’t know better!  Anyway, this dish is healthy, nearly addicting and a great way to use tomatoes particularly during tomato season.  The whole family may appreciate a plate of this; heavy on the noodles for the children and loaded up with marinated tomato goodness for those with a more mature sense of taste.  Most importantly, this dish is easy and inexpensive to make particularly if you grow a garden.  Purchase pasta when it goes on sale for .90 per pound or better yet stock up at .49 per pound.  All other ingredients can be bought in bulk at places like Sam’s Club for a savings.
 
The Recipe:  Down East Marinated Pasta Sauce
6 large ripened tomatoes
1 1/2 TBSP dried basil
1 heaping tsp. minced garlic or two minced cloves
1/2 c. olive oil
1 tsp. salt
1 pound angel hair
generous sprinkle of black pepper
1 c. shredded mozzarella
*Cut tomatoes up and place in medium size bowl.  Add basil, garlic, olive oil and salt and lightly stir.  Let stand at room temperature for one hour.
*Cook pasta according to directions.  Drain and transfer to a serving bowl or pasta platter. 
*Pour marinated tomatoes over top of pasta.  Sprinkle generously with black pepper and top with mozzarella.  Serve immediately and enjoy.
***  Suggest serving with a tossed green salad, homemade Italian Dressing and a loaf of warm French bread.  Leftovers???  Warm it up and take it with you in a thermos for a quick and delicious packed lunch.

French Style Vegetarian Soup

I love this soup and soup is one of the most inexpensive and filling meals you can make.  Soup has the potential to be one of the healthiest meals to put on your table as well and this recipe is really the best of both worlds.  I tried it when I had more limited ingredients than usual and came up with this great combination of blended spices and vegetables for a large pot of warm and comforting soup.  Perfect for autumn but good anytime.  It yields about 12 generous servings and it will stretch farther if you have young children that don't eat as much... or who might be a little picky!  Serve with biscuits or a loaf of homemade French bread.

French Style Vegetarian Soup

Preparation:  ***Soak 1 generous cup of dried navy beans overnight***

 

 

*2 cups diced potatoes

*2 cups diced onion (substituting minced dried onion for all or part works too)

*2 cups diced carrots (buy in 5 lb. bags at Sam's Club at .25 per pound)

*1 Tbsp. Salt

*2 cups cut green beans (fresh, canned or frozen)

*10 oz. peas (frozen is best, or canned)

*1 cup soaked and rinsed navy beans  (You can use a 16 oz. can of navy beans if you must but dried   beans purchased in bulk is one of the cheapest forms of protein and will keep your costs down.)

*1/2 cup of pasta (broken spaghetti or even a cheese ravioli works well if you happen to have some)

*1 or more slices of stale bread  (a great way to use up those bread heels always in the fridge)

*Pepper to taste

*4 cloves garlic or 1 tsp. garlic powder

*4 sundried tomato slices or freeze dried tomato chunks or 4+ Tbsp. tomato paste

*1 1/2 Tbsp. basil

*1/2 c. grated Parmesan cheese

*1/2 c. olive oil

 

Fill large pot with 3 quarts of water and add the 1Tbsp. of salt.  Simmer potatoes, onions and carrots in salted water for 45 minutes.  At the same time bring beans to a boil in unsalted water and let simmer for 45 min. to an hour.  Then add beans to the vegetable stock.  (Salted water makes beans tough.  Can be refrigerated at this point but reheat to boiling to continue). 

 

Add green beans, peas and spaghetti.  Crumble in bread.  Season with pepper.  Simmer 15 minutes. 

 

If using dried tomato product, rehydrate with a cup of boiling broth at this point.  Blend garlic, basil and Parmesan with tomato using a blender.  An immersion blender is the best and easiest to use.  Add olive oil a little at a time and blend.  If you have not added a cup of hot broth to your tomato mixture already, do so now and blend. 

 

Pour this tomato blend into the pot of soup and stir thoroughly. 

 

Enjoy!

 

 



October's Provident Living

My average daily meal cost per person went down to an average of $2.25 this month but this enabled us to utilize a few dollars of our grocery money to help pay for our family to attend "Halloween Nights" which is a whole lot of "hardly haunted" fun for "free" once you are in the door with admission.  Without anything else included this is the cheapest way for our family to take a hay ride alone.  (And there is a LOT of other stuff to do there).  We saved $14 on admission by turning in resident coupons we had sent for and saved for this event.

Purchasing bargains and choices I made this month:  I bought iceberg lettuce for .89 instead of organic spinach that I usually buy.  I stocked up on toothpaste when it went on sale for $1.  I purchased apples at the store for .54 per pound to refill my empty fresh fruit drawer.  I got a rain check for bacon at $1.99 per pound if you buy 5 packages.  I bought 10 pound bags of potatoes for $2.49.  I bought citric acid (for dishwasher detergent) on clearance at nearly $1 off per container.  I turned in a rewards card and a kitty litter coupon to buy cat litter (also on sale) for only $4.  I redeemed coupons and a partially used gift card to Old Navy and walked out with a sweatshirt ($4 on clearance), a long sleeved shirt and a pair of sweatpants for my growing 11 year old boy and a blouse for me all for $3 and change.  The clothing for my son will be a gift for Christmas.

Some evenings at my house get a little complicated with scheduling but with a little planning they don't have to be expensive.  I made a picnic dinner to bring in to my husband's classroom for our family to eat on a concert night.  I had some deli ham in the freezer that I purchased on a great sale for $1 per pound and stuffed a few slices into pita halves (which were purchased on sale and with a coupon) along with some shredded cheddar (a bulk purchase), iceberg lettuce and some tomato slices from my garden.  I brought a bag of chips my neighbor had given us from a leftover work event; a real treat!  I packed a mason jar of pickle slices, a bag of the last of our fresh apples we picked in August, a pan of brownies, milk with enough plastic cups to go around and some cloth napkins.  Into the cooler they went with some ice packs since the meal would be sitting in the car for nearly 2 hours before we would eat it.  It was a great meal that we really enjoyed sitting around the classroom table together eating.  Why did I go to this effort?  We live 7 1/2 miles and 10 miles from our children's schools and do not have access to bus transportation.  I had two children at the elementary school (on the way to my older kid's school) who needed to be picked up at 4:00 after school and 5:00 after running club.  My younger children always play at the playground for that hour on days like this one.  At the other school one daughter had a rehearsal until 5:30 and another until 6:00.  My husband had a meeting until 5:15 in the school building as well.  Call time for both girls in the concert was 6:30 with the concert starting at 7 p.m.  Obviously going home was not an option for everyone and our gas budget has been especially tight since getting a newer car that has a V-6 instead of a V-4 engine so the fewer trips we make the better.  A trip to McDonalds costs our family around $35.  Yikes!  I used to be able to plan for an occasional trip out for dinner but our grocery budget has dwindled too much for that at this point.  So eating "out" this way produces a real savings!  While taking into consideration that I had spent a little prep time making the brownies with my pre-schooler (how fun) and aside from the pickles I spent time preparing several months ago and time I've spent nursing the tomatoes since I planted the seeds, it took me 30 minutes before leaving the house to toss this meal together and get it packed.   Looking at it from that standpoint comparing its cost to that of going out to a restaurant to eat it was like "earning" or saving over $1 per minute of my time plus we saved on gas money.  Pretty awesome!  And everyone got to play games or musical instruments making our "wait" for the concert zip by.  And we even had some pickles and brownies to share with a friend. 

I accepted some pasta salad and leftover Birthday cake from my next door neighbor's weekend party.  She lives alone and gave us what she couldn't eat up by herself.  I made chicken one night for dinner from the drumsticks that this same neighbor brought to me a while back.  They had been in the freezer. 


Our annual trip to the pumpkin patch

Each member of our family got to pick a "little spooky" to grace our front porch for the autumn when we made our annual trip to the pumpkin patch and corn maze.  Later these pumpkins will be roasted to restock our freezer becoming pies and muffins throughout the coming year.

I made yogurt from my last yogurt starter.

This is a simple process that perhaps I will go into at some future point.

My clothesline is still in use as much as possible.  We have nearly exclusively used the sun to dry our laundry outdoors for over six months now at a savings of $40 + per month... partially that expensive because our old dryer had become so inefficient that it either ran forever or we had to turn it on three times to dry one load of laundry.  But now that we are getting into the rainier, cloudier part of the year (we even had snow yesterday!!!) my husband and I have moved our old dryer out to the garage (trying to figure out what to do with it) and we moved my sister's extra dryer, which she and her husband kindly lent to us, down to our basement.  It has really helped me to keep up with laundry during wet stretches of weather. 

We utilized the extended warranty on our 5 1/2 year old, 65,000 mile Toyota Sienna when it needed a new transmission!!!  That would have cost us almost $4,000 plus they gave us a lender van to use for the week which would have cost us anther $300.  I'd say that the $1,600 we paid for the warranty was worth it, this time, although I know people who advise against extended warranties.  We also utilized it a few months ago when the automatic door decided to quit working.  That was a $1,500 job.  All covered... Phew!





My oldest daughter attended homecoming wearing a borrowed Formal from one of my friend's older daughters. 




I mended a cute black blouse that was handed down to my 14 year old.  It needed only a single button to secure the inside of it which I got out of my button box.  I was careful when sewing the button on not to go through the outside layer so the stitches I made don't show through to the front of the blouse.  I also mended a grey skirt for my 6 year old that was also handed to us.

I made cheese crackers for the first time.  I have learned that the trick to making really good crispy crackers is to roll the dough very thin.









My husband loved the smell of these as they were baking in the oven one evening.

The verdict???

  My 11 year old said he liked them even better than it's boxed counterpart at the grocery store.

My 4 year old LOVED them as well and had two helpings with his lunch.

Two of my girls skipped eating this in their lunch.  My boys thought they were crazy.



My first grader's snack week I made: Popcorn, 8 dozen mini muffins, granola bars and a sheet of sugar cookies made "festive" with crystalized sugar left over from a birthday party that I dyed orange.  AFTER they were baked I cut the cookies out into Halloween cats and bats with some cutters I picked up in a package last year on clearance for .25.  The teacher paid me a huge compliment on my cooking toward the end of the week when I showed up for parent-teacher conferences.  She stated that it was a novelty to most of the children to have food that was NOT processed and they really, really liked it.

My son and I went "out" to eat lunch... on a picnic blanket overlooking a pond filled with ducks and geese on an amazing crisp autumn day with the most perfect bright blue sky.  This was followed by a "crunchy leaf" hike through the woods.

I was able to purchase a few books I'd been wanting to get my younger children for Christmas.  I looked and found them at Half Price Books using a 20% teacher's coupon.

I sold movies we no longer wanted to Half Price Books.

We attended pre-school story time and crafts at our Public Library. 

I brought dinner to a friend who desperately needed it; homemade tomato soup with bow ties from home canned tomatoes, rosemary focaccia bread, home canned apple sauce and three loaves of half white/half wheat bread for her family to make sandwiches with during an especially stressful (expensive) week.

I got a flu shot!  It made me sick... AGAIN!  And this belongs here because I jump through hoops like this so they deposit money, in this case $50, into a Benefit Bank and it can be used next year to help defray medical costs like co-pays or medicine that my children (or I) will inevitably be in need of.  This "game" was put into place at the same time that our copayments skyrocketed and our monthly premiums soared as well.  So anything that helps keep grocery money where it belongs... I'm into it!

All dress-up occasions for the month of October featured articles from the dress-up bin in the attic.  This allowed for dancing and make-believe at home and for whatever costume suited your fancy on the way out the door to a seasonal "Event."  We took advantage of "HallZOOeen" one Saturday getting trick or treat stations and a free magic show that was AWESOME at the zoo while seeing the animals, free with annual membership.  We also attended a Jack O Lantern walk at a nearby park after dark which was free and really neat.

I have a rule in my house that we don’t turn on the furnace until November.  Sometimes that’s really hard but we did it!  We have a little house with lots of bodies and so it doesn’t have too much trouble staying warm enough but we do pull out the flannel at night!  We did clean out the filters and give the furnace a test run just to make sure it will be ready for the inevitable.  It sure was great to have a month off from heating or cooling the house.

And finally, just before our first hard freeze (and two days before our first "snow" as it turns out), my daughter and I went out for one last "green" harvest.

These vegies all came from plants I grew from seeds this past spring.  My spring was BUSY and so I didn't get them planted in the ground as early as I should have.  Once the plants took off I was really sorry that I hadn't gotten them in the ground earlier.  It was hard for the kids to pick the small peppers and tomatoes because for months we've been leaving them on their plants so they could grow bigger or ripen.  But big or little, ripe or not we picked them.  The cherry tomatoes will ripen on the sunny kitchen window sill and the big tomatoes will become fried green tomatoes that will serve us for several dinners.  The peppers will be chopped up and frozen for future pots of chili or pizza toppings.  It is all still nutritious, filling and delicious.  I guess the vines will go into the compost in the coming weeks as I get to all the leaves and other autumn yard work.

Provident Living- September

Since January 1st of this year, my “shaved down” grocery budget has been significantly reduced and the belt tightening has certainly been felt.  Where we used to have a little to buy chips or an extra bag of rice or an extra can of tomatoes is no more.  If I was careful we could go to McDonalds once during the month or buy a $5 pizza on a busy Friday Night.  That has proved impossible since the second cut of the year.  The loss is $100 per month which end result is what I consider to be a challenge to be met and conquered, engaging my mind in creatively searching and thinking in order to feed my family for $2.72 per person per day.  I am understanding the correlation between money, resources, priorities and goals better than ever before.  Unfortunately the cuts are going to continue for the next couple of years before things even out and hopefully finally get better.  It is not that my husband is making less.  We’ve been blessed with a very steady, reliable income for 19 years and he’s actually making more!  It’s just that more and more continues to be pulled from his pay check to cover medical insurance and the suffering State Teacher Retirement System.  The cost of living keeps going up too.  We are now living within $200 per year of some level of poverty that I do not clearly understand but  I know that it is a percentage of income in relation to the poverty level and that would give our kids a reduced lunch price if they bought it at school.  We did not used to be that close… and we did not used to make this much.  Once upon a time I dreamed that if we ever made this much money we would be rich but things change.  The other night as I was setting out dinner on our deck table, the place we choose to eat at whenever weather permits because of the elbow room it allows us, I was thinking about our budget and finances and decided that I should really be more worried and even depressed perhaps.  And yet I felt the exact opposite.  I am learning so much as I rise to the challenges placed before me PLUS I had in my hands a fragrant, savory deep dish brimming with a shepherd’s pie, homemade rolls, a bowl of fresh spinach with the garden promising me some tomatoes soon and some jars of simple salad dressings.  These delectable smelling items would nourish my family as we joined around the Sunday dinner table to share our meal and our days lessons.  The late afternoon sun was shining with pleasant temperatures and gentle breezes.  Birds were chirping, butterflies were fluttering past out in our yard and most importantly I felt that we had once again been blessed with “enough”.  It was a near perfect evening.  No need for depression.  “Enough” was all I needed anyway.  I will never think of budgeting the same way again.  Knowledge is power and that’s the truth.

So here are some ways that I’ve worked to make ends meet, living frugally or as I prefer to state, we live “providently”.  Many of these things are from the kitchen aspect of my job because eating is sort of important but as we we near gift giving season and another round of cuts to our paycheck in January as well as a new contract with new terms to sign I hope to have some more ideas coming soon as well.

Haley got a JOB!  She is now saving for her mission and college at a much more rapid rate than before.  She’s worked several weekends and realized she’s saved over $100 from it already.  As a result of this job she is now released from our family’s “allowance” system.  This is just in time to utilize the money that would have gone to Haley to pay for Kaitlyn’s monthly classroom fee for the year.  There’s always somewhere for the money to go… thankfully we had somewhere other than the grocery budget to pull from.  On a side note I caught one of those rare glimpses you get in parenting a child that I MIGHT just be succeeding.  Haley returned from her first day on the job and actually thanked me for teaching her how to clean and how to work.  She was glad I’d given her chores to do.  Yes, I heard that right.  Woooo!  After all the years of groaning and eye rolling I’LL TAKE IT!!!  Haley seems to be proud of having gotten herself a job… many kids at school have given her a bit of a hard time over her job but she is happy that she’s getting experience, is earning her own money and has something to add to her resume.  She seems to be balancing this job with school, seminary and volunteering at the library quite well, so far.  Busy girl!  And getting a job is an education in and of itself.

I decorated for Autumn around the house using items I already have.  Spooky helped.  I prefer to use fall colors with apples, leaves, pumpkins and pinecones that will make the house festive for September through November rather than skeletons and other creepy things that are really only good for Halloween. 

We signed up for “Free Fridays” at our local grocery store and had “coupons” downloaded onto our shopper’s club card for free merchandise each week.  A free two liter of 7-up, a free bag of cheetos, a free 1 dozen eggs, Hillshire Farm Tuscan herbed chicken, Orville Redenbacher popcorn and free breakfast trail mix was ours to pick up each week as we stopped in to pick up our milk.  We also used a coupon to get a free 20 oz. soda.

Paid just $1.50/lb for Spare Ribs buying it on sale in bulk on the date of expiration.  Bought hamburger at $1.70/lb combining its bulk sale price with a coupon.

Bought shampoo and conditioner for .79 each and butter for $1.99/lb. which is a slightly better price than buying it in bulk at Sam’s Club.

We went to Coney Island with free parking and admission on Labor Day for the annual AFL-CIO picnic.  The picnic, put on by Cincinnati Federation of Teachers was free but we paid a nominal fee for ride bracelets which we had budgeted for.  That is the way to go to an amusement park for us.

We are drinking less milk (but still the recommended amount) and more water.

We bought toothpaste for $1.00 when it went on sale.  We also brought home a bag of free toothpaste samples from the dentist.

I haven’t been able to buy liquid hand soap for most of the year just by virtue of the fact that we still have some form of soap for hand cleaning and although it continues to be on my shopping list it ends up getting crossed off when the budget is out of room.  I did have quite the supply of liquid soap refill in my long term storage; however, it finally dwindled.  Then I remembered that I had a bag full of fancy soaps, the tiny kind with fancy shapes and scents which my MIL had sent over in a box of stuff she didn’t want several years back.  It was still sitting in a box with some other things to be gone through.  Now we have soap that makes our hands smell like roses and English lavender which is even better and most bars last several weeks instead of the pump we used to empty twice a week in the bathroom alone.  We also continued to use soap, shampoo and conditioner from our hotel stay during the summer.  I also got two liquid soap pumps for free which I am using one of in my kitchen since I was missing liquid hand soap in there. 

We got three free movie rental deals from Redbox.  One was a family friendly movie we all watched together.  The other two were fabulous movies that Rick and I watched for some free “at home dates” since our date budget has significantly dwindled this year too.  “Parental Guidance” with Billy Crystal and Bette Midler was fantastic.  “Safe Haven” was the other movie and we loved it.

I got out my sewing machine and mended four sets of cotton sheets we use during the warm months.  They all had very neat right angle rips in their fitted sheets and I was able to use a special darning stitch for a nearly unnoticeable repair.  The sheets varied in age from four to eight years old and I need them to last a bit longer. 

My seedlings from the spring began to give harvest finally with so many green peppers that my plants were nearly falling over and the kids were coming in with 8 at a time to drop into the vegetable drawer.  These peppers were fantastic in vegetable soup and most especially on pizza.  We harvested some tomatoes from our tomato jungle for snacks and salads as well putting many on the window sill to finish ripening in the sun.  The plants, grown from tiny seeds, were taller than Nathan!  And look at our carrots!  Nathan loved going out to check on the carrots.  He loved digging them up and pulling them out even more. 


We ate rice instead of potatoes.


Our family was able to go apple picking, a beloved family tradition, arriving at the farm an hour away went it opened at 8 a.m. so Haley could still participate and get to work on time.  The apples were ripening 3-4 weeks early here with the weather we’ve had and so for the first time I picked apples on the last day of August.  We paid $25 a full bushel and picked four bushels in just 45 minutes.  Now I can see some people thinking that $100 is too much to pay for apples.  But if you think of the fact that we got nearly 200 pounds of apples for .50 per pound (which is the most I’ve ever paid for u-pick) it is still a bargain when you pay anywhere from .99 to 2.99 per pound at the grocery store, depending on the season and variety.  Those same apples would have cost me anywhere from $200 to $600 which makes my farm picked apples, at worst, still quite a savings.  We filled shelves and baskets with the freshest apples that will feed our family fresh apples for any number of snacks and meals for a month.  The rest of the Cortlands,  Jonathans and McIntosh apples were dehydrated into fruit snacks or made into slices, sauces, butters and cooking juices and even my youngest children participated in the production process.  We used the peels and cores to get the most sauce possible and in just 5 days of part time work on the project I filled about 7 cases of jars with food.  The money spent was carefully carved out of a portion of our regular grocery budget and is a significant part of our fruit supply for the coming year.  Not a bad price after all.  And the small amount of waste that we did have from the apples went out to the compost for a future garden.

I made caramel apples at home with fresh picked apples and caramels I’d purchased for just $1 several months ago when they were on sale.  I also drizzle chocolate on each one because it looks fun and fancy and tastes even better!  I purchase chocolate chips in bulk and I don’t use many for this.


I consistently cut my grocery bill at the checkout by 30% to 50% by buying only advertised specials and in some cases combining the special price with another offers. 

Using my meat purchasing “rules” I was able to buy 26 pounds of meat for $27.99… more than enough for my family for a whole month.

I did not purchase breakfast cereal.  We did have oatmeal a few times along with homemade granola, muffins and eggs.

I made yogurt for a whole month saving a plain starter from each batch to make the next bowl of yogurt from scratch again as needed.  I made a simple but very tasty granola to go with the yogurt. 

Saltine crackers from scratch!  I’ll have to perfect them but they weren’t bad for my first try.  I made a cheese spread… 1 lb. of cheese for about $1 spread on homemade crackers and topped with a garden fresh cherry tomato made a delicious snack.


Second try on the crackers was MUCH better.  Necessity being the mother of invention with my milk money gone and my little one sick and in need of very plain crackers to go with his gingerale and broth, I rolled the cracker dough paper thin and sprinkled regular salt from a shaker… they tasted just like the store bought version of Saltines but were much fresher.  Yum!  Ironically these crackers crisp up when you leave them out which makes me wonder what kind of preservatives are in the boxed version on the store shelves.  I did store them in a plastic cereal container once they were crisp because we do tend to have quite a bit of humidity here.  It cost me pennies to make about 200 crackers.
I made my own french fried onions for a Sunday dinner pork chop casserole instead of buying dried french fried onions.  The ingredients cost pennies and the end result tasted terrific.  Outstanding, even.
I made a chicken and rice soup mix that tastes like Mrs. Grass and prepares with the same ease.  It has 4 dry ingredients that are so easy to throw into a Mason jar for a quick and delicious hot lunch to take out the door or for sick little tummies that are in need of gentle nourishment.  For the ease and the cost of this mix I may never buy chicken noodle soup in a can ever again.  I also made tomato basil soup from last year’s home canned tomatoes and tossed some pasta into it.  This is a delicious and easy recipe that efficiently gets my kids to eat tomatoes as a vegetable and doesn’t contain high fructose corn syrup that its canned counterpart does.


Continued to water the garden solely from the back water barrel all month.  It was a dry month and the plants needed some water.  I’m thinking of getting a second water barrel eventually for the other side of the house.

Upon pricing bulk tomatoes I didn’t stumble upon any that made it worth it for me to can any.  I’ll keep hoping that I come upon some in the next month but they were all either too expensive for canning tomatoes or else too far away.  I did decide to purchase a #10 can of diced tomatoes which was under $3.  It was enough to multiply my spaghetti sauce recipe 7 times.  Yes the pot of sauce was HUGE but I have a pot for that!  I spice the sauce for next to nothing and used half the meat that the recipe calls for to give protein and flavor in the sauce.  The extra sauce is portioned into freezer bags and altogether should feed my family about 7-8 meals.

I served my sauce over pasta I bought for .90 per pound (second best price all year).  I purchased 11 more pounds of pasta… it has a shelf life of 10 years if stored properly, which it is.

Clothes drying weather has continued… I’ve been drying clothes on the back yard clothesline my husband made for almost 6 months now and our bill continues to be significantly lower than before.  The building materials and rope purchased have more than paid for themselves and it is refreshing to hang laundry with the squirrels and birds first thing in the morning.  My kitties come and wind themselves around my ankles and take dust baths at my feet as I hang laundry.  My kids come outside and talk to me or swing on the swing.  It is lulling to watch laundry fluttering in the breezes.  My neighbor and I had a good laugh when she stuck her head out the window as I was hanging laundry one Saturday.  She told me she’d just watched a movie from 1999 where one of the characters was hanging her laundry onto a reeled line just like my set-up and it made her think of me.  I jokingly said “it’s SO last century” isn’t it?”

We decided to turn the computer off every evening before bed to save on the electric bill.

All of our bread, hamburger buns and rolls were made in our kitchen.  Side note here; Many people think they “don’t have time” and I’ve been told this time and time again.  The bread costs me about .25 to make and I can tell you that multi-tasking is the name of the game.  You don’t need to watch your bread rising.  It simply takes a few minutes of your time  and attention on three occasions over the period of 2 1/2 to 3 hours… I even rise bread while I’m out of the house picking up kids or bake it while we eat dinner, read, fold laundry, talk on the phone or I take a shower so that it is ready for the next day’s lunches.   I buy 25 pound bags of flour at Sam’s Club for $7 and change.  Yeast is purchased in bulk there as well as salt.  And that’s all bread is made out of other than water.  And bread from scratch tastes (and smells) GREAT!


Poptarts!  It’s been years since we’ve eaten pop tarts and while your waist line might object to eating homemade pop tarts every day, every so often it would be worth it to have a home made pop tart.  They are phenomenal and taste SO much better than the ones pumped with preservatives wrapped in foil and shelved in a cardboard box for your purchase.  They were easy, too!  The filling in my pop tarts was home canned Strawberry Marmalade I made from the berries we picked on the farm 3 1/2 months ago.  The only expensive ingredient was the butter in the warm flakey pastry.  These little goodies were pretty large in size, I thought.  Next time I think I will make the Pop Tarts half the size buy simply folding the pastry in half instead of trying to roll and cut all over again to match the size for the second layer.   We each had one and I froze the rest which are ready in the oven in just 5 minutes… a quick, fun breakfast.

I made “Bean”-burgers out of dried black beans, bread crumbs I saved in the freezer from the “heels” and some onions and spices.  They were phenomenal.  Move over Morningstar Vegi-burgers… these were so good.  I made steak fries to go with it along with homemade hamburger buns.  I made “pink sauce” to go with the fries and slathered my burger with it as well.  These burgers were simple and quick to make.  Beans are a cheap source of protein but canned beans are the most expensive way to purchase them so I always use dry.  Around here I cannot find black beans in bulk but can buy them for about $1.25 per pound.  Earlier this year I was able to purchase the black beans in Columbus in a huge 25 pound bag for about half that price per pound.  Beans are a wonderful food if prepared properly and you can really reduce your food expenses by eating meals featuring this food.  And less fat too!

We were given a large bag of clothes for free from a young mom at church.  She had lots of shirts, sweaters, dresses and jeans, some with the tags still on, that fit my 14 year old daughter.  Lindsay is thrilled.  My neighbor brought over 2 1/2 bags of chips, a bag of hot dog buns and a bottle of pickle relish for us leftover from a cookout she hosted at work.  I readily agreed to water her side yard that she just paid to have fertilized while she’s on vacation in return.

Last month we got a “new” to us car which is great on one hand.  On the other hand, the gas mileage per gallon is nothing less than awful!  It’s city miles per gallon are the same as the van’s city miles and that’s almost all we drive.  Along with a slight increase in auto insurance there just isn’t any extra money for gas too.  So we had to do some thinking.  Trips to the store must be made directly on the way home from somewhere or Rick did ride his bike once.  Haley is paying a small gas fee for a ride to and from work… less than a bus would cost but fair.  We do not collect this from her if we were going out near that direction anyway.  Tristan and Lindsay go to school early one day a week and so Rick drops them both off on the way to work.  That saves a trip.  The older girls and Rick have waited for each other during rehearsals or meetings after school while doing homework or music practice that saves an extra trip.  On the day before pay day last week we had just enough gas to get home but not home plus another trip down town.  Nathan and I planned on spending most of the day at the Museum Center.  We adjusted our schedule just a little so we stayed a little longer than planned and then swung by SCPA to pick up Haley while Rick graded papers, etc. as he waited for Lindsay.  Then I picked up the Fairview kids after that and instead of idling the engine we turned it off and rolled down the windows to wait for them.  Me staying down town and Rick waiting for Lindsay saved two trips down town and I got home with 3 miles to spare as did Rick, until pay day the next morning.  Rick has also left a few minutes early on a few days and picked up the Fairview kids at their dismissal time on his way home which has also saved us gas money.    Some things cannot be pared down however. Once we had a child in high school the combination of seminary and yet another school start time created driving that adds up to nearly 500 additional miles per month.  That is more than double what it had been.  But seminary is important and education goes without saying.  Working together we created a budget and I think praying over it is the only thing making it work.



Finally I made a gift to send with my youngest daughter to a birthday party she was invited to.  I found instructions on line for FREE to make a wallet purse.  I was out of interfacing but found some large patches of coordinating fabrics with interfacing already ironed onto them from a stash my Aunt had given me last year.  I was so happy to find that when I cut off the rounded edges the measurements were exactly what was called for in making the wallet.  I was pretty thrilled because I really had no time to go out to the store and anything I spend on a gift would need to come out of my grocery money which is already thinly stretched.  I used a zipper I already had purchased years ago when they were on clearance at a store closing sale, the end of a red spool of thread, buttons from my button box and an unused red rubber hair band from my daughter’s stash.  I did go out and purchase some coordinating ribbon to make a strap because I couldn’t find anything on hand that went well but used a coupon so I got it for .50 and I have leftover ribbon for a future project.  For the birthday party gift I stuffed the purse with packages of cute sticky notes, travel size Kleenex, a fancy purple pen, a chapstick purchased on sale a few months ago, a mini mad libs left over from a birthday party we’d given and a $1 bill.  Besides the dollar these were all things I had on hand already and so was no cost to me now.  What a fun thing to receive a purse stuffed with cute but useable items.  My daughters all love the wallet purse so much that I may end up making several of those for Christmas.  While at the craft store I also purchased a bulk package of barrettes to make fancy felt barrettes for gifts in the future… they were only $1.50 instead of several dollars more than that for the same package in the grocery store.

I made a gift bag for this purse using a plain brown paper bag, a hole punch and a matching piece of ribbon to the purse.  I used a fancy sticker I had leftover from a Christmas project several years ago that matched the ribbon but didn’t really have anything to do with Christmas and this gave the bag a completed look.  I found this exact product in a catalog a week later; 12 bags for $12… a real bargain, huh?