Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Stuff I've Sold (September)

I have set a goal to sell $500 worth of stuff from around our home!

In August I sold $74.06!

This month I didn't sell quite as much but I still sold a few items:

*Scrapbook Paper [50 sheets 12x12 and stickers] $12.00
*Miscellaneous Scrapbook Items $3.00
*11 pages 8.5 x 11 cardstock $1.50
*Women of the Bible book $4.31

Total Sold: $20.81

Remaining to reach goal: $405.13

We'll see how it goes!!

(I sold the scrapbook items through Craigslist and the book on half.com!)

Monday, September 29, 2008

Menu Plan Monday



Here is my menu for the week:

*Fried Ham, Corn, and Biscuits
*Chicken Noodle Soup
*BBQ Sandwiches with Baked Beans
*Lemon Pepper Fish with Corn and Bread
*Cheeseburger Soup

Nothing fancy just good food!! And I am so glad fall is here and I can make soup!!

If you want a recipe just leave a comment and I will get back to you through your blog or if you don't have a blog and leave your e-mail I won't publish the comment and send the recipe to your e-mail!

Have a blessed Monday!

Saturday, September 27, 2008

Episode 2:Wardrobe Basics (..I absolutely love!)



In this show I am discussing wardrobe basics!

To see show notes visit www.lifefrugalandsimple.com.

Friday, September 26, 2008

The Small Ways God Works

This morning I looked at my meal plan list on my fridge and I thought that God so often works and shows himself in the small things. Last Sunday I had planned 9 meals and here we are on Thursday and we have only had 2 of the meals!! Isn't that amazing? Monday we were invited to dinner at the Simmerman's, Tuesday I cooked, Wednesday I made chili which was lunch for John David yesterday and dinner last night. We so often make it through a week and only 2 or 3 meals have been cooked and we often think "wow, what did we eat, I only crossed 3 meals off the list?" God just blesses us in so many ways and he shows himself to us by blessing us in so many little ways. Without God we could not make it on a $160 a month food budget and have excess groceries and money in the budget each month! GOD IS SO GOOD!

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

...Make Cards of Course!

Once I finished my wedding album the natural and logical thing to do was to make wedding cards with the extra stickers! I absolutely love giving homemade cards but usually make them for specific occasions. After I was finished scrapbooking today I started making cards and finished with 22! Of course they didn't really cost me anything since I had all of the stickers and card stock already and even had extra envelopes from stationary.

Here are my creations:


My first wedding card that says "LOVE"


Another wedding card that says "I DO"

I made 7 wedding cards and then starting making all different cards!


These are two of my favorites! I will write "Thanks" or "Happy Birthday" or "It's a Girl" on these depending on who I am giving them to! I made 4 of these!


All of the cards!

I have:
7 wedding cards
5 blank cards
3 Christmas cards
4 sportsman cards
2 thank you cards
1 congrats card

So now I am ready to start sending cards!! And the best part, $0 out of pocket expense for me and de-cluttering my home in the process!

My Wedding Scrapbook is finished....finally!!

Well, 2 years, 3 months, and 27 days later I finally have finished our wedding scrapbook! I am so excited to be finished! I started it shortly after we were married and would work on it during Christmas and Summer break but had never completed it...until now!!

I pulled the book and pictures out yesterday determined to complete it but almost didn't even start because I had no yellow paper! Instead I found my scraps (with very little yellow) and one 12x12 sheet of black paper and I truly "scrap" booked 22 pages!! Since I didn't have much paper I put lots of pictures on each page, I am very happy with each page that I did and amazed that I was able to complete 22 pages with so little! Here are a few of the pages!


The page on the left was already completed (all the "wasted" paper) but the page on the right was the first one I completed!




One of my favorites, the grandparents page. We were blessed that all of our grandparents were at our wedding!


Another favorite...the tractor page! We left on John David's tractor!!


I really like this page, these are my favorite dating pictures. They were used on the table where our guest registry was and I found the yesterday when I was cleaning out pictures, since they were already mounted on the yellow paper I knew they would make a great page!


This page was already completed but I had to share because I just like it so much!

John David and I just looked through the scrapbook together, I am so glad it is finished so we can remember our wedding day and our children will be able to look through the pages and see details of our wedding!

Monday, September 22, 2008

Chicken Caesar Salad


Delicious Chicken Caesar Salad

Last week we had Chicken Caesar Salad twice for dinner. The salad was just as good as many that we have had in restaurants. The key in a good Casear Salad is the dressing and Kraft Classic Caesar is amazing!


Chicken Breast fried in Olive Oil

This is a really simple meal. I purchased a head of lettuce and cut it up. I divided it evenly so we could have two salads on two nights out of it.

To prepare the dinner I fried one chicken breast in olive oil. While the chicken was frying I coated the lettuce with 1/3 cup dressing and grated fresh parmesan cheese. Once the chicken was done I sliced it and topped the salad with it and sprinkled on parmesan! Delicious and frugal!

The cost (for 2 meals)
*1 head of lettuce $1.29
*2 pounds chicken @ $1.99/pound $3.98
*Kraft Classic Caesar (FREE with coupon) (Kroger did have these on sale a few weeks ago for about $1.60 though)
*Parmesean Cheese (maybe $.25)

Total: $5.52

$1.38 per salad

(I would guess if I purchased the dressing around $1.60 that 2/3 cup would cost approximately $.50, which would bring the total up to $6.02, still not bad for two meals for two people!)

Menu Plan Monday



Here are my meals for this week. When I meal plan I don't assign meals to certain days, I tried but it didn't work for me! Instead, I just make a list of meals and then each day I pick what we want to eat and lay out the meat that morning! I know it may sound very unorganized to some but it has worked for over 2 years for me!

Here is my menu:

*Fried Steak with Cornbread and Green Beans
*Chili and Cornbread
*Spaghetti with Bread
*Roast and Potatoes
*Homemade Scalloped Potatoes
*Hamburger Gravy

Here is the recipe for Hamburger Gravy:

1 pound hamburger
1/2 quart milk
1 small onion, chopped
1/8 cup all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon onion salt
salt & pepper to taste

Cook hamburger. Remove from heat and sprinkle with flour over cooked hamburger. Stir evenly until coated. Place skillet over medium heat, add 1/2 of milk and stir until gravy begins to thicken. Add remaining milk until gravy comes to a boil. Season with salt, pepper, and onion salt. Serve over mashed potatoes.

*This is a family favorite that my mom made when I was growing up and now I make it and love it!!

*Visit my website Life Frugal and Simple to watch Episode 1 of my New Podcast Two Quck and Frugal Meals where I cook two simple meals for under $4!

Saturday, September 20, 2008

Episode 1: Two Quick and Frugal Meals



In this episode I cook 2 different meals that both cost under $4! I walk through the steps of preparing both of these meals and share the cost per meal!

Friday, September 19, 2008

The Highlights of the Past Few Days

I have not been spending much time on my blog this week because it has been a pretty busy week. I have had work this week (I work on an hourly basis for Tennessee Farmers Cooperative in Communications). The work has kept me busy and I haven't had an abundance of free time to blog. 

In the free time that I do have I have been coming up with content, preparing "scripts" and props and filming for my show Life:Frugal and Simple. Episode 1 will be up tomorrow! (I have filmed a CVS ECB Tutorial and a Life:Frugal and Simple Introduction thus far.) Episode 1 is titled "Two Quick and Frugal Meals," I cook two meals that both cost under $4 each! 

We stopped back by Kroger after church Wednesday and I purchased a few more cans of Campbell's Select Soup. They are on sale this week for $1.69 and some of the old label cans (they have re-designed the label) have $1.00 off coupons which make them $.69 total. (These are also part of the buy $15 worth of Campbell's, General Mills, Pillsbury, etc. and get $3 of your order, that would take and extra $.20 off, making them $.49.) I only purchased 3 more but $.69 is still great for a quick and easy lunch or good soup for a soup and sandwich dinner!

I also went to CVS and found some great deals....be sure to check back later for that!!

Sunday, September 14, 2008

Life: Frugal and Simple Introduction



This is my first official episode of Life: Frugal and Simple. This is an introduction to the show!

Saturday, September 13, 2008

My Meal Plan for this Week

Each week I meal plan which makes my grocery shopping and my cooking much easier. I don't assign certain meals to certain days, instead I just plan out 7-10 meals for the week and into the next week. I usually plan meals for things I have already and then if I am missing an ingredient or two it goes on the grocery list.

This weeks meals:

*Spaghetti and Bread
*Chicken Caesar Salad x 2
*Red Beans & Rice
*BBQ Pork Chops with Pintos & Cornbread
*Fried Steak with Corn & Rolls
*Lasagna with Bread
*Taco Soup
*Enchiladas

And after this meal plan, this is what my grocery list looked like:

*Spaghetti Sauce
*Lettuce
*Smoked Sausage
*Crescent Rolls
*Ranch Dressing Mix
*Enchilada Sauce
*Tortillas
*Taco Seasoning

Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Wardrobe Basics

Last week I cleaned out my closet! Typically I go through and pull out the things I no longer like. This time I took a different approach, I pulled everything out and put back only the things I love. The things I put back first were the basic wardrobe pieces.

Here is the list of essentials for me:

Bottoms

Dress:
1. Black, Brown, and Tan Pants
2. Black and Brown Knee Length Pencil Skirt
3. Black and Brown Capris

Casual:
1. 2-Pair Khakis
2. 2-Pair Jeans
3. Khaki and Denim Skirt

Tops

Dress:
1. White, Black and Brown Long Sleeve Button-Up
2. White Short Sleeve Button-Up

Casual:
1. White and Black Short Sleeve Tee
2. White and Black Long Sleeve Tee
3. White, Black and Brown Cardigan

Other
1. Black Dress
2. Black and Brown Wool Coat
3. Black Jacket (matches black skirt & pants)
4. Rain Jacket

So these are my basics. I wear at least one of these everyday. I add to this list Spring/Summer Skirts & Dresses and Fall/Winter Skirts & Sweaters as well as solid and printed tops.

Sunday, September 7, 2008

Saturday, September 6, 2008

Life: Frugal and Simple

Today I have started out on a new venture....video podcasting. This is something John David and I have talked about for a while now, in fact last summer we almost bought a domain and we were going to start a video podcast about rural living but for one reason or another we didn't.

I decided that I wanted to video blog occasionally so today we filmed a video blog and after editing the video we decided that we were going to start a video podcast. The name of my show is Life: Frugal and Simple. I think this title sums me up and what I strive for: living frugally and living simply.

You can visit the new site www.lifefrugalandsimple.com and watch a tutorial on CVS's Extra Care Bucks program & see the great deals I got today at CVS!

Stuff I've Sold

I have been de-cluttering and selling unwanted items!

I have made a goal for myself to sell $500 worth of stuff from our home (not including John David's electronic toys!) I am going to try to do this within a year. From August 1 to July 31, 2009 we will see how much I can get rid of and how much I can make!!

So far I've sold:

*3-textbooks for $55.57
*Scrapbook idea book for $2.99
*50 sheets of scrapbook paper plus themed scrapbook paper for $15.50

Total sold: $74.06

Remaining to reach goal: $425.94

I still have a long way to go but I have 11 months!!

Friday, September 5, 2008

Yard Sale Finds!

Okay, so I know a yard sale is not the place to go when you are in the midst of de-cluttering your home but we went to one today! It was a large sale close to Farm Credit so we went this afternoon. I decided that I was not going to buy any clothes, shoes, etc. but just look in case I found something that I have been looking for...and I did!!

I found an apothecary jar! I think these are so pretty and useful! It was only $1!!



John David found a quart size mason jar glass (with the handle) for $.25. We use mason jars for our glasses, jelly jars are juice cups, pint size wide mouths are our everyday glasses and a quart size widemouth is John David's tea glass! So now he has another big tea glass...this one with a handle! He also bought 2 ethernet cables for $.25 each. Our total damage was $1.75! Not bad at all!!

The decluttering continues!

I have stayed busy today getting rid of stuff! I am so excited! Early this morning I tackled my closet. I decided instead of going through and picking things I don't want any longer that it would be more effective to go through and pick the items that I really love. So after about an hour and a half and some tough decisions this is what my closet looks like!


The bottoms & dresses!



The tops!



The closet!

Now this is an improvement over what it was definitely. It still is a lot of clothes though (but my spring, summer, fall, and winter clothes are ALL in there) and I still have some other items that were weeded out earlier that I probably won't get rid of so I may be adding a few more items (not everything though!!) I know I am weak to add clothes back that didn't make the cut, but seriously this is half of what was in there.

After lunch I tackled the scrapbook box again and this is everything that I have pulled out of there in the past two days (plus a couple books I am trying to sell!)



Some of this is already listed on Craigslist, the books on half.com, I am going to try to sell some more of it, and give away some of the scrapbook "scraps"!

Thursday, September 4, 2008

I'm in the decluttering mode again!

Well I have been in the decluttering mode today since we are moving (more than likely) before the end of the year (John David's been training almost 3 1/2 months and if we were to stay in Columbia we would purchase a home). So I am getting a head start on getting things out of the house before moving day arrives (whenever that may be!)

So this is what I did today:

1. Clothing assessment (Since fall is coming I wanted to know what kind of fall/winter clothes I have.) After this assessment I realized that I have more than enough clothes to get me through the fall & winter so no clothing shopping for me! In fact after carefully going through everything I really need to be getting rid of more clothes...another day for that though!

2. Cleaned out scrapbook items Since I have not been scrapbooking much in over a year I decided that it was silly to have a ton of paper & stickers & other items just sitting so I went through and found several items to sell on craigslist (hopefully!) I listed 50 12x 12 sheets of paper,stickers, and a group of miscellaneous paper, stickers, and letters. I already had an inquiry about the 50 sheets of paper so hopefully I can get some of this sold!

3. Listed a shirt on Craigslist I have been meaning to do this for weeks! I tried to sell one of John David's Twenty X shirts on eBay unsuccessfully so I listed it today finally!

4. Went through books We finally sold ALL of our textbooks through half.com but today I went through the bookshelves to see if there was anything else and found 3 books! Two of them I have listed on half.com and the other, a copy of the 1975 Baptist Hymnal (I have 2), I am trying to figure out what to do with.

I am still in the decluttering mode so no telling what else I may decide is going (the night is still young!)

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Lunch with my hubby!

Today John David and I went to the Square Market Cafe here in Columbia for lunch! It was nice to spend time with him on a lunch date! I ordered half of a Club Panini and a cup of Chicken con Queso Soup and he had half a Reuben and a cup of Chicken con Queso soup! The food was delicious and the company was great!!!

Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Ironing and Starching

I just finished ironing and starching John David's work shirts, pants, and jeans. I used to hate to iron but now I enjoy it because it is a way of expressing my love to him! So after ironing 7 shirts, 4 pair of khakis, 2 pair of jeans, and 2 pair of my pants I am caught up...for the moment. (I am really learning that a woman's work is never done!!)

Relaxing Weekend!

This weekend was a relaxing weekend! Friday afternoon John David parents and sister came to visit and spent the night with us. We had a lovely Saturday morning breakfast at Cracker Barrel with them and they left around 1. We relaxed that afternoon and at 6:00 we went to church to watch a play which we really enjoyed.

Sunday morning we went to church. Again I had five 3-year-olds in my class! Five is a very manageable number! I had a good morning with the kids, none of them cried and they all listened to the lesson!! Sunday afternoon we went to the Burns' for lunch. When we got home John David took a nap and I prepared a dish for our Small Group Picnic which was at 5!

Since we were busy (much busier than we are most weekends!) this weekend we decided to take it easy Monday! We slept in really late (I am not telling how late!) and just enjoyed being together.

Now it is Tuesday morning and I am doing laundry, cleaning bathrooms, and all of those things I neglected over the weekend!
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