Purging again

Bad blogger strikes again. I’ve been meaning to get on here and post but . . . well, you know . . . things got busy. Not a good excuse I know. But, really, life was busy. I’ve gotten couple groceries and didn’t take pictures and blog about it. I got a few free samples, three kinds of coffee, the new Tide Swash which I’m anxious to try, and something else that I can’t remember what it was.


It’s happening again. The purging bug has bitten and I’m going through things and getting rid of stuff. I even forced encouraged my eldest munchkin to go through things and get rid of all the junk treasures like pieces of paper and old Happy Meal Toys. If he didn’t know what movie it was from, the toy was gone. I’m such a mean mama. I even made him cry when I made him go through his rocks and sticks and only keep what would fit in a small canning jar. He eventually got into the groove and between the two of us we filled a kitchen trash bag. I’m even starting on a second bag!! Isn’t it exciting???

I hope I’ll eventually be decluttered and have a place for everything and everything in its place.

It’s definitely a process.

Now, off the computer and back to my purging!

Grocery Challenge

First off, I have a question. Does it really have to count toward my challenge if my dear sweet hubby tells me to go buy a couple of spiral sliced hams at Aldi’s because they’re marked down to $1.29/lb. Yes, we’ll love eating them, and yes, that’s a pretty good price, but I really needed to spend at least some of that $24.20 plus tax on some baking supplies for Christmas cookies and candies that I’m making over the next couple of weeks for gifts. The stuff I needed to get only cost me around $14, but my total was $38.73.


Okay, I just need to resign myself that I’m not going to keep in my challenge budget this week. I guess I can justify the baking supplies as gifts instead of groceries if it makes me feel better.

Menu Plan Monday

I didn't exactly follow my menu plan last week that well, we ended up with more leftover nights than planned because we had so many leftovers and this week might be the same.

Monday: Leftovers
Tuesday: Sitter night - Pizza
Wednesday: pancakes
Thursday: chicken nuggets & french fries
Friday: scrapbook night - leftovers
Weekend: plans are still in the works, so I'm holding off on planning meals yet.

Whats on your  menu plan for this week?

Freebie in the mail

I got a freebie in the mail today.

I haven't had a chance to read all the recipes yet.  I dont' usually use mixes for things like muffins, pizza crust and cornbread, but I hope to find some recipes I can try.

A house full of packrats

My son is a packrat . . . wait, both my sons . . . okay, let me just say it this way, every male human in my house is a packrat. I have a few packratish tendencies but I’m doing quite well getting over that, thank you very much. But my son, oh my goodness, the kid has two boxes on the bookshelf in the room that the munchkins used to share that haven’t been moved to his new room, since his new room is still painted all girly since we bought this house. (did you like that run-on sentence) He had valentine stickers in there, why does he need valentine stickers? He might be able to use them on valentine cards this year.


Gasp . . . NO!

I’m trying to purge and get rid of things, not save everything “just in case”.

What am I going to do? How can I teach my kids that they don’t need to keep all that stuff that’s not needed?

Maybe I need to convince my hubby to get rid of some old things, cuz you know, Daddy’s are SO cool and if Daddy is doing it, maybe the munchkins will too.

Okay, so how do I convince hubby to start purging?

Free Christmas music

If you haven't been already, make sure and go here and download some free christmas MP3s during Amazon's 25 Days of Free deal. Also check out a free Big Daddy Weave song as well as tons more here including Barlowgirl, Jars of Clay and Casting Crowns.

ssssccccccrrreeeeeeeeee

Did you hear that? That is the sound of me stretching.


I’m a city girl that married a farm boy. I grew up with chicken that came as frozen chicken breasts, not a whole chicken with all the bones and icky stuff. When I organized the freezer I came across a small chicken that neighbors gave us from their freezer when they moved.

Guess what I did with it!!! I cooked it, and you’ll never believe this one, I picked the meat off the icky bones so I can freeze it and have it ready next time I want to make chicken & dumplings or something like that.

Can you believe it? I still don’t think I can. I’d take a picture of the bones to prove it, but it still kind of grosses me out and I don’t want to see it when I look through my blog.

So pretty . . .

Seriously, doesn’t it look so pretty when it’s organized? I sure think so. I wish I would’ve thought to take a before picture, but maybe I can give you an idea, stuffed full, except for some empty spots on the bottom. (How smart is that?) Things stuffed in wherever they would fit.


Now the after . . .

See, I told you it was pretty. Okay, so pretty might not be the best way to describe it. How about organized and functional? Does that work? I even made a chart to tell where what types of meat was in what area on the bottom. Now we have to see if my dear hubby keeps it that way when he gets in there to get meat out to grill. There is over 100lbs of deer in this baby, a few bags of frozen blueberries, lots of bags of frozen mulberries, some shredded zucchini, a couple loaves of chocolate zucchini bread, and the last bit of pork and two turkeys along with a few assorted other frozen stuff.

Now, on to the freezer section of the basement fridge. There is a tub full of strawberry, mulberry and peach freezer jam, along with all the quick foods that I send with hubby to fix himself while he’s working out of town, or to use for those days that you just need an easy quick meal.

I personally think it looks kind pretty as well.

But maybe that’s just me.

Okay, I’m seeing a trend here, I keep going over my goal of $30 a week, I’m even going over my “I’ll give myself some leeway as I start off” goal of $40 a week. But I got a ton of groceries for great deals I think. I will enjoy when hubby is not working out of town, then I won’t be buying as many convenience foods to send with him for the week. That should help the budget tremendously.


Here is the breakdown: before coupons $86.62, I wish Schnucks told me how much I saved from their normal price because I got a lot of things on 10 for $10 sale that was super cheap. After coupons I spent $46.07.

Some highlights were”

• 4 bags of chocolate chips free

• 4 bags of chocolate chips for $0.50 each

• 5 free bags of chex mix

• 3 free Green Giant Steamers

• 2 Green Giant Steamers for $0.20 each

• Creamers for $0.79 each.

• The equivalent of 2 free bags of wheat flour when I bought 2 jars of yeast.

Not too bad. I almost didn’t have room on the counter to put all my stuff!

My weekly total is $64.53, so way over my goal. I’ll have to see how I end up at the end of the month and see if I can shave some off in the next couple of weeks