Frugal Friday File 2023, (on Sunday) August 13...

Again I couldn't get this posted on Friday.  It was kind of a busy week.

1.  Rudy had a vet visit on Tuesday.  At seven years old, he is now considered a senior dog.  He doesn't act like one, though he is getting a little gray around his face.  Vet visits are not cheap, but keeping a healthy dog healthy is frugal.

2.  I hemmed two pair of slacks for Caitlyn before she left for college.  Always happy to do something that can make her happy...especially when its free!  :)

3.  This week I had to be in the neighboring town for a doctor appointment, so while I was there I went to Hobby Lobby to look for pieces of felt.  I was thrilled to see that they had them and that they were only 34¢ each.  I bought 4 colors/sheets, and that is all I purchased.  With tax it came to $1.47.  That is definitely the cheapest I have ever gotten out of that store!  

4.  I made a needle case out of the felt to complete a mini sewing kit for Caitlyn to take with her to college.  (I've mentioned her moving to college twice in this post, and it puts a lump in my throat.  They moved her today [Sunday]).

5.  Finished one library book.  Will pick up another when I go pick grocery order tomorrow.

On the menu this last week:

Saturday:  grazed the fridge

Sunday:  Sunday family supper @ Kasey & Beau's

Monday:  Spanish Rice

Tuesday:  subscription meal (frozen from a previous order)

Wednesday:  subscription meal (frozen from a previous order)

Thursday:  Mexican Cornbread

Friday:  takeout pizza

Frugal Friday File 2023, August 4...

 

Why can I not seem to get this posted on Friday...sigh.

1.  Reserved library books.

2.  Spent a lot of time at my craft desk making cards.  Not necessarily a frugal hobby per se, but since the supplies have been purchased, it is only responsible to actually use them and mail them to people.  ;)

3.  The extreme heat events we've been having made an appearance on this month's electric bill, but not by as much as I feared.

4.  The pump on our water well went out, and required professional replacement.  Chaching - $3,000.  Frugal living meant that we had the funds available to write that check.

5.  Paid off all vacation spending with savings that had been earmarked for vacation.

On the menu this week:

Saturday:  late lunch on the road, skipped supper

Sunday:  Sunday family supper with Kasey & Beau

Monday:  Tuna Salad, fresh tomato, crackers

Tuesday:  omelette, watermelon salad

Wednesday:  Quiche

Thursday:  Takeout baked potatoes w/ bbq brisket

Friday:  Fried Rice

The one where we returned from vacation...

 

Watermelon Salad served with Omelette

We've been out of town for a couple of weeks.  We got home this past Saturday. I didn't want to announce to the internet that we would be gone beforehand, so I'm just mentioning it now.

Since we have had our fill of non-home cooking for awhile, and thus took the hit to our wallet, I'm back to cooking, and trying to shop the pantry and freezer rather than the supermarket.  Yesterday I made tuna salad and served it with fresh tomato slices and crackers.  Now that is a cool summer supper!  (I have to add here that several days of our trip we were fed great home cooking by our hostess, and I came home with a new recipe.)

Today we were out of bread and needed milk, so Carey went to the store for those, and I asked him to pick up a watermelon.  For the first 64 years of my life I hated watermelon!  Every few years I would try a bite, because it looks so good, but never could manage more than that bite...until last year.  It is odd how palates change over the years...many, many years.  :)

This afternoon I cut up the melon to have it ready-to-eat in the fridge.  I thought I could make a salad with some of it, so I looked at recipes on the Web, and then adapted them to ingredients I had on hand.  I ended up using watermelon, red onion, cucumber, hominy, and added a dressing with white wine vinegar, honey, olive oil, and Tajin seasoning which has chile and lime flavors.  I strained the watermelon, so it wouldn't be too much liquid, and waited till the omelette was done to toss everything together.

Preparing the omelette gave me a headstart on tomorrow's dinner, as I sauteed extra onion and bell peppers so that I would have some for the quiche I have planned for tomorrow.  You may think that is a lot of eggs to be eating this week.  Well, the friendly POA non-sanctioned chicken wrangler has been getting a bounty of butt nuggets from the hens lately and sent us home with a dozen and a half to add to what were already in our fridge.

On another note, while we were gone, we decided to leave Rudy inside all day giving him the run of the house due to the extreme heats we've been having.  The kids came by several times a day to let him out and feed him and play a little.  Bless him, he didn't get into any boredom mischief!  That was a nice surprise.

Oddly, though we were the ones doing a lot of eating out, he was the one gaining weight.  I walked in to a visibly chunkier dog, and his collar was too tight!  I think he was given more generous servings in our absence!  Well, that and hanging out in the A/C all day instead of his accustomed extended backyard exercise time chasing squirrels and deer. 

It's great to be home again.

Frugal Friday File 2023, July 14...

1.  Did really well cooking at home all week.

2.  Jared's birthday was this week.  Even cooked his favorite meal at home, and made his favorite freezer pie.  Thankfully he loves the quick & easy freezer pie, so no baking involved.  When it is over 100º F having the oven on is crazy, and standing over a hot stove making a favorite meal is a true act of love.

3.  I re-used a gift bag for his present, and I made his birthday card.  The gift had been ordered far in advance, and delivered with another purchase, so no extra gasoline spent.

4.  While I was cleaning off the kitchen countertops, I found a bottle of shower gel.  Weird, right?  It had been there for awhile...like...a long while.  I think it was part of a gift basket, as it wasn't one of our usual brands.  Still, we were needing some, so I'm happy to use it up before buying more.

5.   I received another refund check from Medicare for chiropractic care paid out of pocket.  This one was for $13.  I had JUST deposited the previous checks, and another trip to the bank for such a small check seemed ludicrous.  But I did have another appointment this morning, so I stopped by bank while I was out.

On the menu this week:

Saturday:  late lunch, so ate watermelon for supper again

Sunday:  Spanish Rice

Monday:  Subscription meal

Tuesday:  Chicken Curry

Wednesday:  Taco Salad

Thursday:  Chicken Fried Steak w/ Mashed Potatoes, gravy & veg

Friday:  Beef Stroganoff

Kitchen reorganization continues...

A few days ago I said I would try to live with this cupboard for awhile.  However, I decided to move the canned goods to the pantry.  I liked having them near the stove (as they have been for the last few years), because it was nice to have frequently used ingredients close at hand when cooking.  But I will get used to the change.

Once I moved them to the pantry, I realized it made room for the cooking oils to move from the lazy Susan on the counter to the newly spacious cabinet.  

Above photo is the pantry Friday afternoon.  I forgot, as usual, to take a photo before I started.  I didn't even sit down after getting home from work.  I started straight in emptying everything from the pantry (except for the jars on the top shelf), and wiping down and sweeping it out to be ready to start reloading on Saturday.

I ordered the hanging shelf for the door last week.  I put it together (easy) and hung it first thing Saturday morning.  It said to wait 24 hours before filling baskets, as it has sticky pads to help secure it to the door that I guess needed some curing before putting any strain on them.  Really I think they just keep the shelves from swinging outward when the door is opened or closed.  Since I wasn't planning on having heavy items on the door, I gave it about 8 hours, while I began reorganizing the pantry interior shelves.

One white bin on the floor is for soiled kitchen towels and fabric napkins awaiting laundering.  The other bin is to contain bags of potatoes.  Everything else is pretty much where it was before, just better contained and labeled to try to prevent 'us' from just jamming things in willy nilly.

The door shelves have powdered milk, drink powders, seasoning packets, different sizes of ziplock bags, cloth napkins, peanut butter and jams (the heaviest things on door), and crackers.  Oh, I also have a cylinder bag clipped to the shelf unit on the right that holds plastic grocery bags that we reuse for small wastebasket liners.

Carey was visiting with his mom this weekend, so it was a good time to have the kitchen torn apart and then put back together.  There is still lots to do, but these are the ones that turned things upside down for awhile.  Now Carey can make his coffee in the morning without having a mess to work around.

Frugal Friday File, July 7...

 

1.  I worked Thursday & Friday at my previous office.  I will also work on Monday.  Just filling in for my replacement who had a pre-scheduled vacation before she was hired.   These three days of work will be a welcome paycheck.

2.  After going through the stack of printed recipes on my counter and putting them in my recipe binder, I found one for Hot Alaska Salmon Melts which is an open-faced sandwich recipe that my sister told me to try.  It had shifted to the bottom of the pile, so I was happy to find it.  AND I got to use up a can of salmon from the pantry instead of buying some.

3.  I received another (smaller) refund for part of my chiropractic care paid out of pocket.

4.  Carey finally let me check out a library e-book for his Kindle.  I had to check it out because the man doesn't have a library card.  (I could not live without mine!)  He prefers to buy used books donated to the library that they then sell in their "book nook",  which he reads and then donates back to the library.  There's not always a lot of selection that interests him.  Anyway, this is a step in the right direction.  Maybe he will have a library card someday.

5.  My sweet little Catiebug is moving into an apartment with three roommates next month to start college.  I told her to come raid my kitchen for duplicates that they may need, so they don't have to buy every little thing.  She just left here with my mother's set of stainless steel cookware (that stuff is pretty timeless, and it was just lounging in a guest room closet) that includes a large saucepan, a small saucepan, a large skillet, a small skillet, a dutch oven, and lids for all (but I do need to order a spare set of knobs and handles as those will probably break at some point), a non-stick skillet, a set of Rachael Ray casseroles (which look great, but I hated using, so if she didn't take them they were going to Goodwill), a set of air-tight canisters, a 9" x 13" cake pan, a muffin pan, a large cookie sheet, a mixing bowl, a liquid 4 cup measuring cup, a set of dry measuring cups, a set of measuring spoons, a can opener, wooden spoons, a large metal spoon, a pizza cutter, a large spatula, a small spatula, two of my favorite paring knives (I have about a dozen, they are the BEST, brand is Victorinox, very affordable), dish towels, hot pads, an oven mitt, and a vase.  I may have forgotten some; I only remember this much because she just got through packing the car up.  :)  This stuff is all out of my way as I am trying to get my kitchen in order.  YAY!  And I don't have to drive this stuff to Goodwill.  :)

On the menu this week:

Saturday:   takeout baked potatoes with bbq brisket

Sunday:  Sunday Supper at Kasey & Beau's

Monday:  takeout sandwiches

Tuesday:  Hot Alaska Salmon Melts w/ coleslaw

Wednesday:  leftovers

Thursday:  subscription meal

Friday:  watermelon

Kitchen reorganization, Part 3...

Eight years ago I wrote a blog post about assembling this recipe binder.  Sometime later, as I printed out and tried new recipes, I got into the bad habit of laying them in a particular place on the counter.  I always meant to go back and put them in the binder, but you know what they say about good intentions.  

I have now filed all of the quite-large stack into the binder's page protectors.  I am really happy to have this done.  As I was putting the printed recipes into the binder, I discarded ones I had tried and not loved or ones that I had never tried and didn't think I probably ever would in the future.  And as of now I can't print out new recipes (my printer is out of service), so I should be able to keep this under control (and off of my counter) now.