February Menu Plans

 Since I am home again today I decided it was an excellent time to prepare my February dinner menus while having a second cup of coffee.
I am going to follow my previous plan of alternating slow cooker meals with quickly prepared meals on work nights. There are a few special occasions coming up in February, a birthday party for youngest son and his cousin, Valentine's Day (GF & I will go out to eat), my birthday (once again GF and I will go out to dinner) and a raffle that we attend each year. Also on Friday nights GF has been either cooking or taking me somewhere to eat since I do not get out of work until late. So the only Friday I needed to plan for was the last one of the month since my aftercare job has been cancelled for that evening due to a big school fundraiser. (another hit to the bank account..boo). Slow cooker meals are in bold. Meals using leftovers are in italics and meals prepared in under thirty minutes are underlined. I am also trying a couple of new to me recipes that I have indicated with an *.

Dry Rubbed Pork Roast*, mashed potatoes, green beans with walnuts

Pork Stir fry, steamed rice, egg rolls

Beef Brisket, egg noodles, broccoli with garlic and herbs

BBQ Beef sandwiches, oven fries, peas

Pumpkin Lentil soup, Hawaiian rolls

Chicken Marsala, parmesan risotto, salad

Roast Turkey breast, stovetop style stuffing with dried cranberries, Corn

Slow Cooker Swiss steak*, egg noodles, broccoli

Turkey burritos, yellow rice, green salad

Mom's One Pot Dinner* crescent rolls

Shrimp Orzo Skillet, salad

Spaghetti with meatballs , salad

Herb crusted eye of round, au gratin potatoes,  green beans

Honey glazed chicken, mashed potatoes, mixed veggies

Skillet Lasagna, salad, garlic toast

Corned beef with cabbage, potato pancakes, carrots

Balsamic glazed Salmon*, basmati rice, broccoli

Gail's Pork Adobo (giving this a try in the slow cooker), steamed rice, asian blend veggies

Horseradish encrusted tilapia, garlic potatoes, coleslaw

Chicken stew, whole wheat biscuits

Mom's Chicken paprikash, drop dumplings, green beans

Modenese Pork Chops* white and wild rice, corn

More Days off

  We have gotten yet another blast of arctic cold yesterday and today which means subzero temperatures and more time off from work. I'm not a fan of going out in the cold weather but I am a fan of getting paid and when we have these days that does not happen. So I am less than happy about the unexpected time off. On the upside I am saving money on gasoline, my house got a good clean and I didn't have to do it after an 11 hour workday, and I am all caught up on my dvr'd tv shows.  Yesterday was youngest son's birthday (also nice to have time to spend with him) and for his birthday dinner he requested the Broccoli-cheese soup I buy from BJ's Wholesale club

And instead of traditional birthday cake son asked for a Cheesecake factory frozen cheesecake. This I can also get from the wholesale club.

So despite the frigid temperatures I was off to the wholesale club to pick up these special items for my baby. I have to admit that his idea of soup and crescent rolls for dinner really hit the spot. And the cheesecake was wonderful.  I added a nice pot of lapsang souchong tea to my meal

Today's plan includes laundry. I have a couple of loads built up in the hamper that need doing. My refrigerator needs a good clean out as well and I want to wash down the walls in the upstairs hallway and down the staircase. Despite having hand rails and nagging from Mom people just kee putting their dirty hands on the wall itself.
I also am going to bake. A loaf of bread and a batch of shortbread cookies.
Tonight I am headed over to oldest son's house and I will take cheesecake leftovers for pregnant DIL with me. Oldest son is not a dessert fan. We are going to be going window shopping for a travel system for the upcoming baby. This will give me an idea of what to budget for this item that I want to get for them. Then son suggested we get our favorite Chinese carryout and eat at their house. I am on board with this plan.

My son the miracle worker!

  Believe it or not we have been without a fully functioning bathroom sink for about 2 years. It amazes me how long that time frame looks in print when it really didn't seem that long in actual time. Adult son renovated our old and tired bathroom while college age daughter and teen son and I were visiting family out of town two years ago. At that time we were having issues with the sink draining very slowly. Despite removing the pedestal sink from the room, replacing the drain pipes inside the sink and running a manual snake down the pipes inside the wall the drain continued to be so slow and eventually stopped draining entirely.
We moved tooth brushing operations to the kitchen sink and hand washing to the bath tub. On and off adult son has putzed around with the sink trying to get it to work. No luck. Son in law that used to work in plumbing tried and said he thought we'd have to tear out the kitchen ceiling to get to the section of pipe running from the sink. The ceiling already has issues from the bathroom renovation (replacing section of drain pipe from bathtub) and a leaking second story porch that adult son has since fixed. The holes remain and frankly I just didn't want more holes. Adult son has promised to totally remove and replace ceiling but there just hasn't been the time and the money all at the same time so far. Needing to get serious about this issue he has promised this ceiling will get replaced SOON.
In the meantime son had a few days off from work and according to him got bored. I wish he'd be bored more often. He has a buddy with an electric snake that he borrowed. He once again removed the pedestal sink from the bathroom to get to the pipes inside the wall and ran that snake. Funny thing happened, when the sink drained the water backed up in the bath tub. Hmmmm....Adult son then made use of the hole in the kitchen ceiling to remove a section of bath drain pipe and run that electric snake directly into that pipe and amazingly enough that seemed to do the trick. Both tub and sink now drain beautifully!!!!! According to son the problem was at the t-joint where both sets of drains came together.
Now that the sink was working once more son decided we needed to upgrade it a bit. It is the original 1929 bathroom sink that was put in when the house was built. The porcelain is in great shape for a sink so old ( few rust stains but overall not bad) but it had two separate faucets for hot and cold water. It also had a capped off center hole that we suspect once held a soap dispenser. Son took a trip to Home Depot, came home with a center faucet, a new drain cover  (the old drain cover was a simple rubber stopper), and two caps and got to work. The result:

 

All three of the kids and I agreed it is really awesome to once again be able to brush our teeth and wash our hands at a bathroom sink. Its the little things in life.

Country Pork Stew

  Saturday was my twice a month cleaning day at the company my GF is a plant manager at,  so despite wicked weather and nasty roads it was off to work GF and I went. It sure was a nail biter of a ride and the snow just continued to fall through out the morning. We had a bit of a reprieve temperature wise with it being in the high teens (been a long time since I thought of those kinds of temperatures being relatively warm, lol) and on the ride home to GF's house we actually had some sunshine.  GF treated us to a lunch at Chipotle with some gift cards he got for Christmas then we made a quick run into the grocery store to pick up some minor things for dinner and Sunday breakfast. Minutes after we arrived home it began to snow again and continued until well after we'd called it a day.  All I have to say is the 2014 Farmer's Almanac has been spot on correct so far this winter. I am going to go out on a limb here and say I expect that its prediction of even more snow for February is going to be a good one. <sigh>
Thinking about dinner for the two of us (college age daughter and teen son opted to remain at home with adult brother) I dug around in GF's freezer and came up with a package of pork cubes. We'd picked up some potatoes and carrots as well as a can of diced tomatoes on our shopping trip so I turned to an old favorite recipe of mine for Country Pork Stew.
In a heavy dutch oven over medium heat I heated a bit of olive oil, added 2 teaspoons of minced garlic and the pork cubes to brown. Once I had a nice color on the pork I added the can of diced tomatoes, a large onion (peeled and cut into eighths) 4 potatoes (peeled and cubed), a half pound of baby carrots, 4 tablespoons of tapioca, 4 cups of beef stock, some freshly ground pepper, a teaspoon of sage, a teaspoon of thyme and a half teaspoon of rosemary. I popped on the lid, turned the temperature to low and let this simmer for 2 1/2 hours. A package of crescent rolls baked in the oven was the side dish.
For GF who is a major fan of pork this was the perfect winter dinner. Unfortunately my cell phone camera is acting squirrely and I was unable to get any pictures. :-(
Hot, filling, delicious.

Antarctica called....

and it wants its weather back. It seems as if Mother Nature is playing the same song over and over this year. Snow. Cold. Cold . Snow. Snow and Cold. Regardless of the weather the work week goes on. Temperatures have yet to get so cold and the snow so bad that another snow day would be called. For that my checkbook is grateful. I'll take that morning commute being three times as long as usual if it means getting paid. One issue we are having at home though in regards to the cold is that when temperatures hover around zero degrees in the early morning our furnace is struggling to get the house warmed up. We have a programmable thermostat similar to this one: . It is set for 68 degrees from 6 am until 8 am, then 60 degrees from 8 am until 2 pm, then 68 from 2 pm until 10 pm, then back down to 60 overnight.  Friday morning we awoke to zero degrees outdoors and  I noticed that after running for over an hour the main floor of the house was still only 63 degrees. A discussion with adult son J and looking at the subzero temperatures predicted for the upcoming week and we are going to try something new. Instead of fluctuating temperatures we are going to leave the thermostat at 68 degrees around the clock. We are hoping that this means the furnace will have to run less to maintain a constant temperature. The natural gas bill I received for heat (stove and hot water) mid January included the two days of polar vortex temperatures in early January. It was more than twice the amount of last year's bill for the same time frame (2013: $111.11....2014:$230.80). We have covered the main floor windows with window insulation, covered our French style patio doors with a sheet the is secured at the bottom with a heavy draft dodger and a throw rug pushed up on top of that (this door is always drafty). Our front door is insulated as is our side door. A shower curtain hangs at the top of the basement steps to prevent cold air from immediately hitting the furnace. We've taken all the measures that can be done to keep the main floor as warm as possible. Hopefully our new plan of a constant temperature while the weather is so severely cold will help the bill.

In the meantime we wander around wearing hoodies and snuggies like a cape and cover up with multiple throw blankets when sitting down.  And when we get really cold we all huddle in the bathroom where despite the furnace vent being completely closed it is perpetually sub tropical hot.

One Cottage Ham Two Hot Meals.

  My slow cooker has become my best friend since starting a second job at my primary workplace. Those 11 hour days are killer and it is nice to come home to a hot meal. I picked up a cottage ham on my day off and my plan was to pop it in the slow cooker and do a New England 'boiled' dinner sort of idea with it.  Tuesday morning before leaving for work  I gathered my ingredients, the cottage ham, potatoes, carrots, and cabbage:

 

I popped them in to my slow cooker and added water and set it:

 

When I arrived home a hot dinner was all ready for me.

Planned overs went in to the refrigerator.

Then it was time to assemble part two of my dinner plan. In the cupboard I had a bag of 15 bean soup mix:

 I put the beans into some cold water and brought it to a boil allowing them to cook for about 10 minutes. I turned the heat off, covered the pot, and let it sit overnight.

Wednesday morning I drained the beans and rinsed them, placed them in my slow cooker, added some hot water and ham soup base  the seasoning packet from the soup mix and the leftovers (including the broth) from the New England style dinner

Some crescent rolls baked when I arrived home and a good hot filling dinner was once again on the table within minutes.  Given the weather conditions, snow and single digit cold, this was a blessing.

 

 

 

Monday Holiday

 One of the many benefits of working in a school are the official Monday holidays we get. Last Monday was MLK day so there was no school. Nice to have the long weekend.
My middle daughter K received an automatic starter for  her minivan and needed someone to follow her to the mechanics and then take her and her boys on some errands. Mom was the go-to person.

I needed to make my own stop at BJ's for a case of envelopes for work so that was our first stop after we dropped off K's van.  She needed to shop for a few items so we were off to the regular grocery store. While there I picked up a cottage ham and some chipped beef as well as some Chocolate-hazelnut tea  . $15 out the door.

K was in need of some items from Target and I was down to my last two MegaRed tablets so that was our next stop. $11.94 for the MegaReds.

The two hours the mechanic told me daughter that he van would take stretched out in to four. Since I'd given up my day to take her and the boys around she treated me to lunch at Chipotle. I do love that restaurant.
With time to kill K suggested we stroll around Big Lots and TJMaxx. I managed to make it out of Big Lots with no purchases in hand but couldn't help but pick up a new sweater (yes I know I said no more clothing purchases) for myself off the clearance rack for $15 and a box set of 8 drinking glasses for $7 similar to these: .  We seem to always be in need of drinking glasses at home and it was a good buy.

After taking K and the boys back to pick up her car I headed home. Once home I checked on my bank account balance (yes the banks were closed but I wanted to see if a direct debit for insurance had come through on Friday) and getting a nice surprise in the form of a deposit into my checking account from my bank. It was my cash back rewards from the previous year for using my check card. Nice!!
The remainder of the day was spent giving the house a good clean and making dinner. I went totally off my menu plans I sautéed some chicken tenders in garlic, garlic oil and smart balance, I then tossed in some broccoli florets, some freshly ground black pepper and some grated parmesan cheese and tossed the entire thing with some cooked penne pasta.

Getting back into the rythmn...

 It has been a hectic 10 days since returning to school following our snow days off. To top off the busy-ness of my 11 hour work days (government inspection coming up means a pile of paperwork to complete plus menus for next month to get done and lunch packets to be assembled on top of all the regular stuff) so of course I came down with a cold/flu virus last week that totally wiped me out and meant I missed a day at my aftercare job. Generally I get sick at the holidays but not this year. This year I waited until almost the worst possible time. <sigh>
Not a good thing after missing out on 2 days due to the weather. The bank account is taking a real hit here. Knowing that things were going to be super tight I went in to my twice weekly cleaning job despite feeling very much under the weather. I had some automatic bill deductions coming up and that money needed to be in the bank. Thank goodness I have this little 3rd job.
After a weekend of rest I felt more human. Good thing since this week I did two 'make and take' baking classes with some of the aftercare group. I get paid extra for these so a nice little check will be coming my way shortly. I also have so much fun with the kids when we do this. We did mini pizzas this time. I picked up already prepared balls of pizza dough , sauce, cheese, and pepperoni and each child got to make two mini pizzas all by themselves and take them home to bake. The participants aren't allowed to eat what they make while at aftercare and cold pizza really isn't that appetizing so this time they took their projects home and baked them. I got the biggest kick out of the little kindergartener who insisted on showing me her baked pizza that she'd brought for lunch the next day. Precious.
Feeling under the weather meant I was in no shape to shop or spend money (and since we had OTC meds stored up I didn't even have to spend money on releiving my symptoms).
No additional food shopping has been done either. Dinners have either been from the planned menus (we've had Mediterranean Lentil soup, eye of round, beef & noodle soup, honey glazed chicken, spaghetti & meatballs & country ribs) or last minute substitutions (baked mac & cheese in place of crockpot mac & cheese, a roasted pineapple rum glazed pork tenderloin in place of the stuffed tenderloin) or entirely new ideas from items already in the house (grilled lamb chops, baked pork chops) and one night we went to my oldest son's house for dinner! So far my eating out budget has stayed at $0.
There has also been no additional expenditures beyond what is necessary. Inother words I put gas in the SUV and that is all. The only driving has been to and from work, my one grocery shopping trip, and to son's and back (which is 4 miles round trip) and to GF's and home. In other words, the usual.
Today is a scheduled teacher inservice which means no work for me. And with Monday as a federal holiday it is a 4 day weekend. I have laundry going on and I finished my federal and state tax returns and are happy with the refund results. As always I will use a portion of the federal return to pay my property taxes. The remainder will go into the bank. We will need this money come this summer for living and travel expenses . House cleaning and then heading out to GF's for Saturday-Sunday is also on the schedule.

Bonus Days

  I received a text message from my principal last night that we would be closed Monday and Tuesday due to the extreme weather anticipated in my area. I intend to use my time wisely. I'd already decided that I was going to head the 25 miles home early from GF's house because it had started to rain and one thing I am not fond of is driving in freezing rain.
After running a couple of errands in the early afternoon (cat litter for me @ $11 for 30 lbs. & dog food for GF, then a quick run for a small bag of shredded carrots for my school cafeteria salads to tide me over until the food delivery came) GF and I had an early dinner of herb crusted eye of round, rice, brown gravy, and candied carrots. After cleaning up the kitchen GF rode along with me to the gas station. He is such a sweetie he offered to go and pump the gas for me. What a guy! And since I'd just gassed up on Saturday morning I only had to put $20 in to fill up for the week.
Then I took GF home, packed up my car, and headed off. It was odd to return home by 6 pm on a Sunday. Adult son was watching the football game so I decided to get right to work and get some Christmas decorations all put away and be ahead of the game before going back to work. I had the kitchen all stowed away and the dishwasher humming with cups and teapots that got flooded in their storage container when I received the news about no school until Wednesday. Here is my teapot collection once again on the shelves of the hutch they 'live' on (during the holidays I have a collection of Christmas teapots that go there, now stowed away until next year).

I figured I might as well keep on going until 9 pm when I knew I'd want to sit down and watch a favorite program of mine (Alaska The Last Frontier..check it out). I got all of my dining room and living room decorations put away and the bins down cellar and a second load of teapots (I have an extensive collection) in the dishwasher by 9. A nice hour in front of the tv and then another snuggled up in bed with a book and it was lights out.
I was up early this morning and settled in at the computer with a cup of coffee to social network and figure out my plan for the day.
1. I am going to undecorate the tree so sons can haul it to the tree lawn for trash collection. I already have the bin for the decorations next to the tree.
2. Laundry. I want to wash my Christmas fabrics (including tree skirt before packing it away) as well as do a load of dark clothes.
3. Baking. I am going to make a loaf of bread as a housewarming gift for my daughter M who just moved into a new place last week.  I am also going to bake a batch of snickerdoodles and pack some of those up for her as well.
4. Soup. Although I declared Tuesday as soup nights so I could use my slow cooker I decided since I have two bonus days I will make soup today on the stove. I think I'm going to take a small container of soup to daughter as well as a container of soup and some cookies to my pregnant DIL. The soup bones are roasting in the oven.

I promised M that I would come by and see her new place all set up (I helped her move on New Year's Eve so I've seen it filled with boxes, lol) and I am hoping the weather will be co-operative.
And speaking of the weather so far so good, the temps are much colder, in the teens right now but dropping and the worse is yet to come. And we did have last night's rain freeze and some slight snow fall on top of that. And it is snowing lightly now.
5. Cleaning. Now that the Christmas decorations indoors are put away for another year I am going to dust, swiffer, vacuum, & mop hardwood floors in the dining and living rooms, then clean counters and cabinets doors and mop the kitchen floor. Then finish up by giving the upstairs hallway and the bathroom a good clean as well.
And today is going to be the first of my $0 expenditure days for the week.

Adjustments to menus and a new goal for myself

I am determined to stick to my frugal food budget this month. While out grocery shopping yesterday I was unable to find a cottage  ham at any of the stores that I went to. I am unwilling to spend any more money this month on groceries and extremely unwilling to spend the inflated prices at the regular chain grocery store where I know I can find this item. I am going to do a bit of digging around in the deep freezer but I think I may have a beef brisket or short ribs still in there in the back, and I know for certain we have cheddar brats and kielbasa. Once I have determined what we actually have on hand I will make a new menu plan to replace the New England style dinner idea. It is definitely time for an inventory of this space in any case.
GF and I now have plans to go out to dinner with friends (parents of youngest son's girlfriend) this coming Friday night so I do have a little leeway on the menu plans there.  And although creamed chipped beef is a very frugal meal I'd have to go in to the high priced store to get this item and my goal is to avoid any and all food shopping for the remainder of the month so I will substitute something else (thinking sweet & spicy kielbasa with buttered noodles and salad ) for this meal too.
I have a Panini sandwich on the menus as well and Aldi did not have the ciabatta rolls I have been able to buy there this time. I did however find a good simple Ciabatta roll recipe online and will give it a go making these from scratch myself. There was no swiss cheese at Aldi yesterday for these planned Panini however I do have slices of mozzarella and cheddar and will just use one of these instead.
 After reading a few blogs and looking at my checkbook balance, one other goal I am setting myself this month are $0 spending days. I intend to set myself 5 days out of 7 as $0 spending. With going back to work this shouldn't be too difficult to do. Working an 11 hour day means very little time to spend money. I will gas up the SUV on Sundays for the next week, starting today. Another upside to the long workdays means most of my driving is only to and from work. The only extra driving I was doing was to pick up college age daughter from her campus and bring her to work the aftercare program with me at my school. College age daughter now has another ride into the job  since her gentleman friend is now on the staff with us. He will collect her from her college campus and bring her in to school with him. I am extremely thankful he is able to do this.
  Weekends are my downfall but I have already had my monthly haircut, will not purchase clothing or books this month ( I have a nice stack of books still unread to enjoy plus I intend to dip into some old favorites such as the Tightwad Gazette in the next couple of months), and have already stocked up on food and almost all of the household items we need. We still need cat litter and Duraflame logs. These will be bought today with the cash left in my wallet.
I will earn some cash next weekend with my cleaning job but I want to be able to stick this in my savings account.
Things I will still need to buy this month include two birthday gifts (youngest son and nephew) and a baby shower gift for oldest son's best friends impending arrival. We also need to replace the set of blinds on our side door. Our black lab-boxer loves to jump up on this door and look out the window and he has really done a job on these blinds. I will temporarily 'fix' the broken bracket on the bottom with some duct tape and a new set of blinds will be purchased later on in the month.
I am certain that I will be able to meet this new goal as well as sticking to not purchasing any more food the rest of January.

Making a change

  In between the grocery shopping trips I ran one more very important errand yesterday. GF and I met my adult son at a local cell phone store to change my service provider. My contract with my former provider was up at the end of December. I paid my final bill and was ready to move on. Adult son has had a family plan with college age daughter and youngest son and was willing to add me to his account. It is a slightly different set up than what I had. Before I had unlimited talk and text and only 200 mgb of data for a whopping $116 a month. Now I have shared minutes from 7 am to 7 pm Mon-Fri BUT unlimited mobile to mobile (any provider) all the time, unlimited minutes nights and weekends (7 pm-7am Monday-Friday, 7pm Fri-7am Mon), unlimited text & picture text, and unlimited data. Sweet. A new Iphone 4S was free. And they bought my old Iphone for $50 store credit (used to get half off on a cool little speaker thing so I can listen to radio via my phone). AND most importantly  I will be saving a cool $58 each month over my old cell phone plan. Happy, happy, happy.

January Grocery Shopping

  The weather was finally co-operative today allowing me to get out and about and take care of a few errands.
I had an 8 a.m. appointment for a haircut and that was my first order of business. My usual 'girl' is on maternity leave (new baby boy congrats to her!) and another 'girl' from the salon took care of me. I came away quite pleased. Same cut, not too short.
Since I was up and out and the sun was shining I went directly to do the grocery shopping.
My first stop was GFS. I had to pick up some salad fixins for school on Monday, food delivery doesn't happen until Tuesday and I have several salads already pre-ordered. I also needed frozen veggies for home. I spent $23.85 and brought home 1 2 1/2 lb . bag of peas, 2 2 lb. bags broccoli florets, 1 3 lb. bag sweet corn, 1 2 lb. bag cut green beans, 1 2 lb. bag Brussels sprouts. I also purchased a new reusable thermal bag to replace the one that got destroyed in our recent flood.

My next stop was BJ's Wholesale Club. I was looking for a cottage ham but struck out there on that. I spent $37.65 on food and $21.38 on nonfood household items (paper towels, a sympathy card, and a magazine). Food wise I brought home 1 gallon of 1% organic milk,  1 48 oz box cheezit crackers, 1 case fruit greek yogurt, 8 lbs. ruby red grapefruits, and 5 lbs. sweet onions.  No sooner did I load up my SUV and drive away did I remember the flour, sugar, mouthwash, and hard salami I'd intended to purchase. GF needed to get some meat and milk for his house so a second trip to BJ's was made later in the afternoon. On that trip I spent $9.71 on a 2 pack of Crest pro-health mouthwash and another $13.97 on flour, sugar, and hard salami.

My final morning stop was at Aldi. I spent $18.32 on taxable items that included cranberry-pomegranate juice cocktail and ruby red grapefruit juice cocktail, trash bags, and tissues as well as two re-useable shopping bags to again replace ones that got ruined in the flooding.
Food-wise I spent $107.71 and brought home 6 slim jims (treats for the kids), 1 boneless leg of lamb roast (a special purchase item that I will tuck away in the freezer), a package of mild Italian sausage, 2 jars of sweet pickles (a treat for GF who loves them). 2 cans mandarin oranges, 1 100% apple juice, 1 100% cherry juice, 2 bottles steak sauce, 1 bottle ranch dressing, 1 3 pack garlic, 1 bottle spicy brown mustard, 1 bottle honey mustard, 1 jar nacho cheese, 1 cabbage, 2 lbs. carrots, 1 lb. organic baby carrots, 1 bunch celery, 1 bunch bananas, 1 bag granny smith apples, 1 bag lemons, 1 bag navel oranges, 1 pomegranate, 4 multi colored peppers, 1 English cucumber, 1 carton Guava-Mango juice, 1 bag spring greens, 1 bag romaine lettuce, 1 bag spinach, 1 pint mushrooms, 2 coffee creamer (one for home, one for GF's house) 1 hazelnut coffee creamer (for GF's house), 1 quart light cottage cheese, 1 pint low fat sour cream, 1 bag shredded cheddar cheese, 1 package string cheese, 2 packs chocolate pudding cups, 2 packages mixed fruit cups, 1 dozen eggs, 2 bags dried cherries, 1 pint organic cherry tomatoes, 2 bags chips, 1 bag tortilla chips, 2 bags veggie straws, 1 box saltines, and 1 bag oyster crackers.

I made a second afternoon stop at Target for nonfood household items. I was all out of hair gel and used the last of the deodorant I had at GF's house so I replaced those items, I also picked up dish soap (none at Aldi..no Dollar Tree near GF's house), carpet deodorizer, hydrogen peroxide (52¢), and a box of Estroven (6 months after my hot flashes stop they've started up with a vengeance yet again, <sigh>). Total cost out the door $ 26.94

In summary I spent a total of $183.18 (nicely under the $200 limit I set myself) for food and $ 76.35 over the limit of $50 I set myself.
I also remembered as soon as I got everything stowed away that I wanted to do pictures this month of my purchases. Oh well, maybe next time.

And the snow just keeps coming down

  Woke up and looked out the window this morning and it looks exactly the same as it did out there last night. The radio is reporting spin outs and roads closed and blocked all over the area. And the bitter cold has arrived with temperatures at just about 8 am being in the slightly over single digits. Brrr. Trying to look at this from a positive point of view I am warm, safe, do not need to venture out anywhere, my  kids are all warm and safe and we all have plenty of food. And yesterday got off to a good start with a $0 day! Paycheck and death benefits are due to be deposited today into my checking account so I have already balanced the accounts in anticipation for this cash inflow. Later on this afternoon I will pay daughter's college tuition balance, mortgage, car payment, electric bill (amusingly since my email I am now getting regular readings & the bill is actually $8 less than last month), cell phone & internet bill. Homeowners insurance is automatically deducted  as is Direct TV and my ancestry.com account. I will just go ahead and put these deductions into my check register. Auto insurance will be deducted after the next payday (even if there are no snow days it will only be a 4 day pay) and the gas bill should roll in around then as well. Based on last month's use-age for heat plus 10% I am holding back enough to cover this from this pay period. This will leave me from this payday the $200 I have budgeted for groceries, the $50 I've budgeted for household, and enough for gas and anything unexpected for the next two weeks. Hopefully I can transfer money into my savings after the next pay period. I am also anticipating my cash back rewards deposit mid month from my bank to ease us through. I'm hoping we won't but thinking it is possible we will have a 'snow' day on Tuesday because of the expect temperatures plunging below zero. With the number of kids walking and waiting at bus stops it is entirely possible school will be called off. A hit to the budget but I'm thinking ahead and hanging on to any extra money now.
Dinner is going to be spaghetti with meatballs, I already have a package of ground beef from GF's freezer defrosting on the counter and he is well stocked with everything I need to make this for dinner.  No salad stuff in the house but we do have garlic toast in the freezer. The weathermen are saying the snow will taper off later on today but frankly I am wondering if it is worth the tricky negotiation that is GF's driveway  for some lettuce and tomatoes. Maybe we will call the sauce our veggie and be done with it.
Laundry is under way with a load in the dryer and another in the washer. I had just enough bread flour left in GF's pantry to make a loaf of bread and the dough is rising on the counter!

I am starting to get a little cabin fever from being inside so once the snow stops I plan on shoveling GF's driveway for him and taking the dog for a walk!

Snowed In!

I think the saying is Man proposes but God disposes isn't it? Well I had all kinds of plans for today involving driving home the 25 miles to my own home from GF's house. I was going with adult son to change phone providers, I was going to clean my house and catch up laundry and spend quality time with the dogs. Mother Nature had other ideas, I woke up this morning to softly but steadily falling snow that began sometime during the night. The driveway already had an inch of white stuff on it when we checked it out. I had already planned to wait until morning rush hour was over before beginning my drive and decided that would be the smart thing to do. Surely the snow would taper off enough for ODOT to get out there and get the highways cleared and salted.
Or not. GF phoned me when he made it in to work and said the trip in was pretty sketchy and I should wait a good three hours before even thinking of leaving. That was ok with me, I made coffee and curled up with the computer and then a book.
Three hours later there was no let up in the snowfall and GF's city still hadn't made it down his street with a plow. GF phoned and said he'd been listening to road reports on the radio at work and his advice was to stay put but of course it was up to me. I texted with adult son about conditions at home since they can vary greatly from here. Son's advice was the same as GF's advice.
So here I am all snowed in. I took a few snapshots of GF's yard this afternoon in between watching BBC's Sherlock on Amazon Prime videos online.
Here is part of GF's deck, check out the amount of snow on the fountain:

 

This next shot was done through the screen part of the sliders in his great room looking out over the patio area with the hot tub:

 

And this last picture is the view from his front door. I love the view because his house is perched on a hill and the back yard abuts a protected wild life area. But that same hill means a monster of a driveway  to get up and down.

And twelve hours after first looking outside today the snow is still coming down.

 

 

New Year's Day Dinner

It has been my family's tradition (carried down from my German relatives) to eat pork and sauerkraut for good luck and prosperity in the coming year on New Year's Day. I do not remember a single January 1st of my entire life when this meal wasn't on the table. (Mom also used to eat pickled herring right after midnight, also for luck. I don't do the pickled herring thing. I actually like pickled herring, just haven't eaten it since I was in my teens. ) According to Mom the pork was for prosperity and the cabbage for luck.
In any case I just cannot imagine this day without this meal. This year I decided to do some country style spare ribs instead of the usual pork roast. GF picked up a nice package of these on our last shopping trip to BJs for his house. I pulled these out of the freezer and the bag of 'fresh' sauerkraut we'd also purchased there from the refrigerator.
I layered the pork over the kraut, seasoned the ribs with a bit of black pepper, sage, and rosemary. GF and I are both on a campaign to lower our respective blood pressures (not dangerous just higher than we'd like them to be) so I skipped the salt. I figured the sauerkraut was going to add a nice acidic touch to the dish so salt was unnecessary. It was ready for the oven!

I turned the oven to 350 and put the pan in for 45 minutes uncovered to allow the ribs to brown. After this time I covered the pan with foil and left the ribs to finish cooking for another hour and a half.

I had a bit of a surprise when I went to prep the potatoes, the bag that we'd bought for GF's house somehow ended up at my house and we only had three small potatoes left. A quick look in GF's pantry cupboard and I unearthed a bag of egg noodles. So buttered and peppered egg noodles it would be.  A can of corn (GF requested this in place of the planned on carrots) rounded out the meal.
GF's plate looked mighty tasty if not very colorful.

A trip to Lowes

 After a beautiful walk with the dog in the softly falling snow GF and I set out to run a couple of errands. We determined that Lowe's would be our first stop. I was in search for five gallon buckets with lids as a new storage system for bread flour, AP flour, and sugar at home. GF wanted mini paint bucket liners and a couple of new faceplates for his house. Our next stop was going to be Target and our final stop was to be OfficeMax for GF to purchase desk calendars for work.
Lowe's had five gallon buckets for $2.87 a piece or 'food grade' buckets for $4.87 a piece. Lids, the same ones for both, were $1.97 each. Since I plan on lining the buckets with large clear plastic bags saved from work and not intending to keep the dry goods for an extended length of time (just want to keep them free from damp and bugs in the summertime) I settled on the regular buckets. I bought three to start (may get more of these for storing bags of dried beans & pastas) at a cost of $4.84 each for both bucket and lid.  I also noticed a cat litter pan on the clearance shelf of the pet supplies aisle and asked customer service to scan for a price. It was $4.04. Sold. And we've been having an issue with my pug Mr Guido chewing on furniture. I grabbed a bottle of bitter spray to prevent chewing for another $2.18.
Total cost out the door : $21.84 with tax.
We skipped our next stop at Target. I'd purchased the litter box and had begun to feel pretty exhausted (that late night rearing its ugly head). GF ran into OfficeMax while I waited in the car. I'm sure we can borrow some litter from a neighbor to tide us over until I get to the store tomorrow.
An hour's nap put me right again after we got back to GF's house.

2014 Goals

  I have never been one to make New Year's resolutions. I prefer to review what I've been doing and make some adjustments and changes when necessary.  I have three simple goals for this year.
The first goal is purely financial. 2014 is going to bring one major financial change for us. Youngest son will be graduating in June and the death benefits we have been receiving for him will come to an end.  I knew this was coming which is one reason I eagerly took the second job working aftercare at school when it became available last August. However having all my eggs in one basket means no paycheck during the long summer months. My plan is to of course save enough money to get us through this time period in the next few months. Beginning in February every spare penny will go towards this goal. At the same time I plan on looking for a summer seasonal job in addition to the twice monthly cleaning gig I already have.
Belt tightening in the form of changing cell phone providers (going tomorrow with adult son to get on the family plan he and college age daughter and youngest son have together will save me $65 a month..significant savings), cutting way back on the areas where we have been lax in watching the budget (clothing, eating out, book purchases), and continuing to keep a tight rein on utilities and grocery expenses will go on.
 My second goal is physical. Despite having a job that is physically demanding I don't feel I'm getting enough of the right kind of exercise. I don't want to spend money on a health club membership I will never use so I am going to walk more. I have a couple of indoor walking tapes I will pull out and dust off and get outside as much as possible. I'm hoping GF will join me in this goal. Both of us have blood pressures that are higher than we'd like, I think increased cardio exercise will be beneficial to us both.
My third goal is spiritual. I need to feed my inner self. To this end I am going to devote an additional 30 minutes each day to reading my Bible and spending some time in prayer and reflection. Somewhere I have a woman's daily devotional book that I will dig out and start to use.
Simple and hopefully do-able goals I can meet.

My first grocery list of 2014

   I have my first grocery list of the year all ready for the shopping trip I plan to do on Friday. I don't go back to work until the 6th so I have some time to get us all stocked up for the month. With getting two very tiny paychecks in January I need to be extremely conservative about my shopping this month. I originally thought I'd be able to get everything I need for under $175 but am thinking I can stretch this to $200.  I plan on visiting GFS (I need to pick up salad items for work on Monday too), BJ's, and Aldi. I may need to make a small run into the regular grocery store for the chipped beef I want. Aldi used to carry this item but sadly discontinued it leaving me no other option than the regular store. Happily this sells for under a dollar per package so it is still a frugal option. Mostly we need fresh produce. We are out of onions, garlic, fresh fruit (I'm thinking bananas, apples, oranges, grapefruit, lemons), salad produce (lettuce, cukes, tomatoes, red bell peppers, broccoli slaw), celery, cabbage, and carrots.  I need to restock coffee creamer, juices (received a mini fridge for Christmas so looking forward to stocking this up), frozen veggies (beans, corn, broccoli, Brussels sprouts), milk, eggs, Italian sausage, a cottage ham, chipped beef, ciabatta rolls, AP flour, sugar, hard salami, frozen OJ, cottage cheese, sour cream, Swiss slices, dried beans for soup, and snack foods for the kids . 
The deep freezer is nicely stocked up with some frozen fruits, poultry, meat, and seafood. The pantry shelves are full of canned and bottled goods. We have a ton of rice and pastas. And my stock of bread making items is in good shape as well. The fridge has a good supply of cheeses and butter and smart balance. Condiments, spices, coffee, teas, hot chocolate, baking goods (except for ap flour and sugar) are looking fine as well. My stock of dried beans is very low, I do have two bags of lentils, another bag of a 'pumpkin-lentil' soup blend but other than that none at all. I am planning on restocking these items in February.
Non-food-wise we can use some dish soap, mouthwash, hydrogen peroxide, carpet deordorizer, kitchen cleaner, tissues, and paper towels.  I have budgeted $50 for these items.  I also want to pick up a box of Duraflame logs for the fireplace so I have set aside $25 for this item as well as amother $15 for three 5 gallon food safe buckets with lids as a new storage system for flours (AP & bread) and sugar. I've checked out prices and both Home Depot and Lowe's have these items for a low amount.
In the recent basement flooding we lost our cat litter and the litter box was so disgusting (truly both adult son and I had to step outside in the snow because we were gagging so badly from the smell and the mess) adult son and I managed to get the entire thing into a contractor bag for disposable. I will need to replace the box and the litter. A trip to Petco for this is on board. Adult son said he would swing by there today and I can just reimburse him. I told him a basic litter box was all that was needed and scoopable litter please. Speaking of litter, anyone with cats ever tried the litter from Aldi?
I told adult son to try to keep this expense under $30.
Looking forward to the challenge of staying within these budgeted amounts.

Welcoming 2014

  Happy New Year!! We had an awesome time saying goodbye to 2013 and welcoming in 2014 at the Horseshoe Casino and most importantly we stayed within our budgeted amounts and came home with money in our pockets. The dinner buffet is absolutely fabulous and GF's brother and sister-in-law had enough rewards points built up that we got a free dinner! (GF and I both received coupons in the mail for a free dinner ($25 value) for Friday January 3rd. We are considering another evening out, perhaps dinner, a short time with the 2¢ slots (maybe $20 each) to get the parking comp-ed, and then home. We've been meaning to get together with friends (actually the parents of youngest son's lady friend) and this might just be the answer. )  I chose to try small helpings of several salads: Waldorf, an arugula shrimp salad that had a fabulous dressing, smoked salmon, and the Horseshoe salad which is ditalini with celery, walnuts, and dried cranberries in a light oil and vinegar based dressing. Then I moved on to a small helping of mashed potatoes, a slice of prime rib, two small lamb chops with a mint julep sauce, a piece of roast turkey, and half a dozen of the largest shrimp I have ever seen. Dessert ended up being two tiny samples of a delicious raspberry mousse, a mini almond cupcake, and pistachio gelato. Having had nothing to eat all day prior to this I had minimal guilt.
GF and I stuck to the 2 penny and 1 penny slots and I actually played for over an hour on one machine with my original $20, up to $84 at one point before gradually cashing out at 34¢. I didn't expect and certainly didn't  plan on bringing money home with me. Just playing the machines is fun for both GF and I.  $1 flutes of champagne and free party hats and noisemakers and we celebrated in the New Year. The one drawback is finding out I am not as young as I used to be and the 3 a.m. bedtime isn't as easily done as it once was.
We are in the midst of getting more snow that began sometime before midnight (the Horseshoe is located in an historic building in Cleveland that used to house a department store, one actually seen in A Christmas Story..Higbee's...and the original windows are all still there and GF and spent some time enjoying the view of Public Square and the party going on there about 10:30 and noticed the snow then) so today's plan of going to the matinee may be put on hold until the weekend. It may be a comfy clothes kind of day.
I have a large package of country style ribs that I will put in a roasting pan on a bed of sauerkraut for dinner, mashed potatoes and carrots to accompany this. Looking forward to having a nice slow start today.