As most of you know, I'm a couponer. I'm not one of those crazy couponers you see on TV, but I do clip to help our weekly budget. I used to spend $150+ PER WEEK on groceries. Since I started couponing, I have reduced my weekly budget to $50-$100 per week. That's for 6 dinners, lunches, and essentials (milk, eggs, cheese, etc)
My friend over at This Mom's Heart (thanks Katie!) taught a class last March on how to coupon and I've been able to implement my savings over the past year. I think I saved $3000+ last year on groceries thanks to the techniques that Katie taught me. And, I've been having people coming up to me asking me questions about how to do it. (I am, by no means, an expert! In fact, I still ask Katie questions!)
So, I've decided to keep track this year of exactly how much couponing saves me each month, and by the end of the year. I do my grocery shopping on Monday mornings, so watch for monthly updates the last Monday of each month!
January 2012:
Total (before savings): $816.28
Spent: $570.46 ($70 over budget - BUT this includes everything for our Super Bowl Party)
Savings: $245.82
Percentage: 30.11%
2012 YTD:
Total (before savings): $816.28
Spent: $570.46
Savings:245.82
Percentage:30.11%
Oh! And Travis and I *almost* made it the whole month without eating out! We had some fast food this weekend, and decided to go out for Mexican on Sunday after church. We only missed it by 2 days! Not too shabby! :-D
Happy Couponing!
Monday, January 30, 2012
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Rearranging 2012
My husband and I are both pack rats. We're not collect-everything-never-throw-anything-away-hoarding-pack-rats, but we both tend to keep things longer than we should. This is apparent to most of friends when they see the condition of our house. It never gets terribly dirty - just very cluttered.
So in anticipation for Baby Number 2 (Don't freak out, people! I'm not pregnant YET!), we've been wanting to move Penelope into the room next door (office) to her current room (nursery). Well, this isn't going to happen if the office is still a mess. And the office isn't going to get any better until we move all the stuff in there downstairs. And the basement has become a dumping ground and NOTHING will get done until we get that area finished. And so, we started in the basement.
We started in the garage. I had a bunch of boxes from before I got married that desperately needed to be gone through. I was able to take 2 boxes of collectibles, and 7 boxes of pre-marriage-Sarah-stuff down to 3 storage bins worth of stuff. Travis was able to do the same (ok, he didn't have 7 boxes, but still!). Combine that with reorganizing the Christmas and camping stuff and we significantly increased the amount of storage space in the garage.
Once the bulk of the junk was out of the garage, we started in the main room in the basement. We had A LOT of stuff to go through and have made HUGE improvements. We've thrown a lot of stuff away , and have donated a lot too (I've already dropped off 3 boxes and a couch to Goodwill). Here's what we started with:
After a couple of weeks of working a few hours (almost) every night after Penelope went to bed, I am happy to announce that the main room of the basement is complete! Tonight, we moved the rest of the stuff out (empty boxes, storage bins, trash bags, random things that are staying in the basement, etc), vacuumed, and shampooed the carpet. I must say, I'm very happy with our progress! We're hoping to get the basement finished by next week so we can then dive into the office!
Travis found a really neat home modeling app for the iPad that has allowed us to figure out exactly how we want to place everything. It takes a lot of the guesswork out of the rearranging process. Since this room is now complete, we can start moving things out of the downstairs bedroom and putting them where they need to go in this room. And then that'll free up space in the bedroom to be able to move stuff from the office down here, and so on and so on! Stay tuned for more updates!
So in anticipation for Baby Number 2 (Don't freak out, people! I'm not pregnant YET!), we've been wanting to move Penelope into the room next door (office) to her current room (nursery). Well, this isn't going to happen if the office is still a mess. And the office isn't going to get any better until we move all the stuff in there downstairs. And the basement has become a dumping ground and NOTHING will get done until we get that area finished. And so, we started in the basement.
We started in the garage. I had a bunch of boxes from before I got married that desperately needed to be gone through. I was able to take 2 boxes of collectibles, and 7 boxes of pre-marriage-Sarah-stuff down to 3 storage bins worth of stuff. Travis was able to do the same (ok, he didn't have 7 boxes, but still!). Combine that with reorganizing the Christmas and camping stuff and we significantly increased the amount of storage space in the garage.
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| Yay! Organization! |
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| So. Much. Stuff!! |
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| Smells like clean! (The bookshelf is staying there. We just need to go through the books) |
Sunday, January 1, 2012
Happy New Year!
2012
I can't believe its here already! According to the Mayans, we only have 354 days until the end of the world! :-)
2011 was filled with heartbreak, and with joy.
I watched my daughter turn 1 year old this year, and I also said goodbye to a very dear friend.
I got to see my aunt get married, and I said goodbye to a very special great-auntie.
I got to spend an amazing couple of weeks with family that I have missed dearly, and I spent New Years Eve sick at home.
All in all, I can't complain too much about the year. It was pretty good.
So what's in store for 2012? Well, I don't really like to make year long resolutions because I tend to break them pretty quick. What would I like to happen? I'd like to lose some weight. I'd like to have another baby. I'd like to be more committed to my job (I'm only required to work 10 hours a week, and usually don't even meet that.) I'd like to be more active and get more exercise. I'd like to blog more. I'm also going to be participating in a leadership program through my church, which I am very excited about! More about that later.
One thing that Travis and I have decided to do is to budget our money better. We're still getting used to the new pay schedule from his job, and its proving to be more difficult that we originally thought. So I found an idea online that we're going to try and implement.
We've decided that for the entire month of January, we're not going to eat out at all. Now, this doesn't include lunches. We each take a certain amount per month for meal money so that he can have lunch at work and I can have an occasional lunch with some friends. This amount has already been budgeted for. I'm talking about "Honey, I'm tired. Let's just order pizza." We do that way more than you think we would.
So its quite an endeavor, and it means I gotta get better about my meal planning, but I'm excited to try it. I'm curious to see how much money we have left at the end of the month, and I'm curious to see how much better we feel by the end of the month.
What are your resolutions? What would you like to happen this year?
I can't believe its here already! According to the Mayans, we only have 354 days until the end of the world! :-)
2011 was filled with heartbreak, and with joy.
I watched my daughter turn 1 year old this year, and I also said goodbye to a very dear friend.
I got to see my aunt get married, and I said goodbye to a very special great-auntie.
I got to spend an amazing couple of weeks with family that I have missed dearly, and I spent New Years Eve sick at home.
All in all, I can't complain too much about the year. It was pretty good.
So what's in store for 2012? Well, I don't really like to make year long resolutions because I tend to break them pretty quick. What would I like to happen? I'd like to lose some weight. I'd like to have another baby. I'd like to be more committed to my job (I'm only required to work 10 hours a week, and usually don't even meet that.) I'd like to be more active and get more exercise. I'd like to blog more. I'm also going to be participating in a leadership program through my church, which I am very excited about! More about that later.
One thing that Travis and I have decided to do is to budget our money better. We're still getting used to the new pay schedule from his job, and its proving to be more difficult that we originally thought. So I found an idea online that we're going to try and implement.
We've decided that for the entire month of January, we're not going to eat out at all. Now, this doesn't include lunches. We each take a certain amount per month for meal money so that he can have lunch at work and I can have an occasional lunch with some friends. This amount has already been budgeted for. I'm talking about "Honey, I'm tired. Let's just order pizza." We do that way more than you think we would.
So its quite an endeavor, and it means I gotta get better about my meal planning, but I'm excited to try it. I'm curious to see how much money we have left at the end of the month, and I'm curious to see how much better we feel by the end of the month.
What are your resolutions? What would you like to happen this year?
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Miracle Frooties
Travis and I like to think we're pretty adventurous when it comes to food. We will pretty much try anything once...twice if we like it. So when the opportunity to purchase some Miracle Frooties tablets arose, Travis jumped on it.
Miracle Frooties are a tablet made from a berry grown in West Africa. The berries contain a glycoprotein which binds to the tastebuds on your tongue, causing sour and bitter things to taste sweet. The effect is temporary, lasting up to 2 hours, and once it wears off, everything tastes as before. They have no side effects and are completely harmless. Because of this bizarre switch of flavors, some people host "flavor tripping parties", in which the host supplies sour and bitter foods for guests to taste after eating a tablet.
They came in the mail today and we decided that we were going to give them a try. After we put Penelope to bed, we prepared our arsenal of flavors from what we have around the kitchen.
We decided since these are 10x that we would split a tablet. The directions say to place the tablet on your tongue and very slowly move it around until the tablet is dissolved.
After the tablet dissolved, we prepared ourselves for the taste test. Here's the verdicts:
Vodka - Tasted like water that burns the back of your throat
Sour cream - Tasted like yogurt
Lemon Juice - Ever been to Chick-Fil-A, and they didn't add enough water to the lemonade to
dilute it down? That's what this tasted like.
Starbucks Hot Cocoa Powder - Super sweet, super rich chocolate
Cottage cheese - This didn't taste any different to me. Travis said he noticed a slightly sweet taste
Soy Sauce - Sweet, but still tasted like soy sauce and still salty
French's Spicy Brown Mustard - This was the biggest surprise. It tasted like honey mustard!
Distilled Vinegar - Tasted sweet until you swallowed
Red Wine Vinegar - Tasted like sweet red wine vinegar until you swallowed
Martell Very Fine Cognac - All you taste is the aftertaste, and you don't taste the alcohol
(apparently we don't like cognac, who knew?)
Crown Royal - No flavor, and very little burn
Hendrix Gin - The cucumber and rose flavors that Hendrix is famous for was brought to foreground
and you could really taste the unique flavors. There was also no bite to the gin
Mini Chocolate Chips - No difference
Crispex cereal - No difference to me. Travis noticed a sweeter flavor
Cherry Craisins - The cranberry tang was gone, but they still didn't taste good
Golden Raisins - Tasted like...well, raisins
Frank's Red Hot - Tasted like a spicy banana pepper. I thought it was actually really good!
Sriracha Sauce (Asian Pepper sauce) - The sour flavor in the sauce was gone and all you tasted
was the chili
Balsamic Vinegar - Tasted like a sweet vinaigrette dressing
Spanish olives - Tasted less tangy but still like olives
Laughing Cow Garlic and Herb Cheese - The garlic flavor in this was a lot sweeter
Laughing Cow French Onion Cheese - This tasted the same to me, but was slightly sweet to
Travis
Ketchup - Tasted really gross, like someone added WAAAAY too much sugar to ketchup
Grapefruit La Croix - La Croix is a sparkling water that is lightly flavored, and the berries made it
taste like regular sweetened soda
All in all, it was a very fun experience! Next time I go to the grocery store, we're gonna get some more stuff we can try (Granny smith apples, lemons, etc). Who knows? One day we may host our own "Flavor Tripping" party! :-)
Miracle Frooties are a tablet made from a berry grown in West Africa. The berries contain a glycoprotein which binds to the tastebuds on your tongue, causing sour and bitter things to taste sweet. The effect is temporary, lasting up to 2 hours, and once it wears off, everything tastes as before. They have no side effects and are completely harmless. Because of this bizarre switch of flavors, some people host "flavor tripping parties", in which the host supplies sour and bitter foods for guests to taste after eating a tablet.
They came in the mail today and we decided that we were going to give them a try. After we put Penelope to bed, we prepared our arsenal of flavors from what we have around the kitchen.
We decided since these are 10x that we would split a tablet. The directions say to place the tablet on your tongue and very slowly move it around until the tablet is dissolved.
 |
| Tablet-ness! |
After the tablet dissolved, we prepared ourselves for the taste test. Here's the verdicts:
Vodka - Tasted like water that burns the back of your throat
Sour cream - Tasted like yogurt
Lemon Juice - Ever been to Chick-Fil-A, and they didn't add enough water to the lemonade to
dilute it down? That's what this tasted like.
Starbucks Hot Cocoa Powder - Super sweet, super rich chocolate
Cottage cheese - This didn't taste any different to me. Travis said he noticed a slightly sweet taste
Soy Sauce - Sweet, but still tasted like soy sauce and still salty
French's Spicy Brown Mustard - This was the biggest surprise. It tasted like honey mustard!
Distilled Vinegar - Tasted sweet until you swallowed
Red Wine Vinegar - Tasted like sweet red wine vinegar until you swallowed
Martell Very Fine Cognac - All you taste is the aftertaste, and you don't taste the alcohol
(apparently we don't like cognac, who knew?)
Crown Royal - No flavor, and very little burn
Hendrix Gin - The cucumber and rose flavors that Hendrix is famous for was brought to foreground
and you could really taste the unique flavors. There was also no bite to the gin
Mini Chocolate Chips - No difference
Crispex cereal - No difference to me. Travis noticed a sweeter flavor
Cherry Craisins - The cranberry tang was gone, but they still didn't taste good
Golden Raisins - Tasted like...well, raisins
Frank's Red Hot - Tasted like a spicy banana pepper. I thought it was actually really good!
Sriracha Sauce (Asian Pepper sauce) - The sour flavor in the sauce was gone and all you tasted
was the chili
Balsamic Vinegar - Tasted like a sweet vinaigrette dressing
Spanish olives - Tasted less tangy but still like olives
Laughing Cow Garlic and Herb Cheese - The garlic flavor in this was a lot sweeter
Laughing Cow French Onion Cheese - This tasted the same to me, but was slightly sweet to
Travis
Ketchup - Tasted really gross, like someone added WAAAAY too much sugar to ketchup
Grapefruit La Croix - La Croix is a sparkling water that is lightly flavored, and the berries made it
taste like regular sweetened soda
All in all, it was a very fun experience! Next time I go to the grocery store, we're gonna get some more stuff we can try (Granny smith apples, lemons, etc). Who knows? One day we may host our own "Flavor Tripping" party! :-)
Bake Fest 2011
Merry After-Christmas! Was it a good one? Did you enjoy spending time with friends and family? Was the food awesome? Was Santa good to you?
For me, the answer is just yes. To everything. We had a great Christmas. It felt just like being in NH with my extended family. The fact that we replicated that feeling tells me it was an awesome Christmas. And of course, Santa was EXCEPTIONALLY good to Penelope. :-)
Perhaps one of the staple activities around the holidays is the baking of yummies. This year, I baked more than I ever have before. I enjoyed it, but it was quite stressful. So here it is! The breakdown of Bake Fest 2011.
1 batch of gingerbread men for Thanksgiving bake sale at the church
1 batch of gingerbread men for Christmas bake sale at the church
2 batches of gingerbread men for Candace and Fezziwhig Party
1 batch of gingerbread men to send to family
1 figgy pudding (yes, like from the Christmas carol)
1 baklava for the band
1 chocolate cake for Christmas Trifle
Each batch of gingerbread men makes approximately 4.25 dozen cookies. Weird number? It's because the number of cookies depends on the cookie cutter I use. The gingerbread men make 4 dozen, the ninjabead men make 4.5 dozen, so it evens out to approximately 4.25 dozen.
For me, the answer is just yes. To everything. We had a great Christmas. It felt just like being in NH with my extended family. The fact that we replicated that feeling tells me it was an awesome Christmas. And of course, Santa was EXCEPTIONALLY good to Penelope. :-)
Perhaps one of the staple activities around the holidays is the baking of yummies. This year, I baked more than I ever have before. I enjoyed it, but it was quite stressful. So here it is! The breakdown of Bake Fest 2011.
1 batch of gingerbread men for Thanksgiving bake sale at the church
1 batch of gingerbread men for Christmas bake sale at the church
2 batches of gingerbread men for Candace and Fezziwhig Party
1 batch of gingerbread men to send to family
1 figgy pudding (yes, like from the Christmas carol)
1 baklava for the band
1 chocolate cake for Christmas Trifle
Each batch of gingerbread men makes approximately 4.25 dozen cookies. Weird number? It's because the number of cookies depends on the cookie cutter I use. The gingerbread men make 4 dozen, the ninjabead men make 4.5 dozen, so it evens out to approximately 4.25 dozen.
 |
So 5 batches of cookies = 21.25 dozen = 255 cookies! That's A LOT of cookies! I also made a traditional figgy pudding, a baklava for the band, and a chocolate cake for a Christmas trifle I make every year for Christmas. Needless to say, I'm done baking for awhile!
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| Figgy pudding ready for the oven! |
All in all, Bake Fest 2011 was awesome! I had a lot of fun baking, and loved decorating all those cookies. Although I have to admit, after awhile, they all sorta started looking the same (YOU try decorating 255 gingerbread men differently!!) :-) My new Kitchenaid mixer definitely helped!
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| Merry Christmas to me!! |
So now that Bake Fest 2011 is over, what's next? Well, just a little thing I like to call "The Great Kitchen Clean-up 2011" :-)
What did you bake for Christmas this year?
Thursday, December 22, 2011
It's been awhile...
Just wanted to let you know that I'm still around. I have been baking LIKE CRAZY! So much so, that I've dubbed the past month "Bake Fest 2011." I also recently received and award from a friend! So excited about that! I will definitely get back on after the holidays and do a legitimate post! I promise! But for now...
Merry Christmas!!
Merry Christmas!!
Saturday, December 3, 2011
One of my favorite sites
In case you haven't figured this out, I love to cook, and I'm always looking for new recipes to try. There are a couple of goto sites I use on a pretty regular basis (allrecipes.com, my recipes.com, etc), but there is one that I always look at first. It's Gina's Skinny Recipes. Gina takes non-WW friendly meals, and turns them into healthy yumminess. Now, I'm no longer doing WW, but it doesn't change the fact that the recipes are awesome and taste super yummy!
Some of our favorites are:
Asian Turkey Meatballs with Line Sesame Dipping Sauce
- So yummy, and easy too! And the dipping sauce is to die for!
Chicken Quesadillas
- The sweet and spicy avocado mango salsa makes this recipe amazing!
Spinach Lasagna Rolls
- Another staple in our house and SO easy to prepare...and Penelope likes them!
Low Fat Chewy Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies
- Seriously, the best oatmeal cookie I have ever had! They don't even last 2 days in my house!
And these are just our favorites! There are so many more that I regularly make! And she is so nice. Have a question? Post a comment and she'll answer it, most of the time within a few days! It's like having your own cooking teacher! :-)
We made the Filetto di Pomodoro for dinner tonight. While we didn't like it as a spaghetti sauce, I bet it'll taste super yummy in other recipes that call for tomato sauce (like Spinach Lasagna rolls!). And it can be frozen for 6 months! Woot!
If you like to cook, and love lower-fat options for a lot of recipes, you definitely need to check out Gina's Skinny Recipes!
Some of our favorites are:
Asian Turkey Meatballs with Line Sesame Dipping Sauce
- So yummy, and easy too! And the dipping sauce is to die for!
Chicken Quesadillas
- The sweet and spicy avocado mango salsa makes this recipe amazing!
Spinach Lasagna Rolls
- Another staple in our house and SO easy to prepare...and Penelope likes them!
Low Fat Chewy Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies
- Seriously, the best oatmeal cookie I have ever had! They don't even last 2 days in my house!
And these are just our favorites! There are so many more that I regularly make! And she is so nice. Have a question? Post a comment and she'll answer it, most of the time within a few days! It's like having your own cooking teacher! :-)
We made the Filetto di Pomodoro for dinner tonight. While we didn't like it as a spaghetti sauce, I bet it'll taste super yummy in other recipes that call for tomato sauce (like Spinach Lasagna rolls!). And it can be frozen for 6 months! Woot!
If you like to cook, and love lower-fat options for a lot of recipes, you definitely need to check out Gina's Skinny Recipes!
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