December Frugal's...last one for 2015!!

Here we go...
Dec.01
--Glad to pay my $10.00 per month for TOPS meetings....weigh in, great meeting, good friends and weight lost
what more can you ask for from $10.00 a month. And, I eat better and cheaper since I have lost 25lbs.
10 lbs to go...lol...that means I could save even more money by eating even less and better!
--lunch was leftover soup from the freezer and supper was leftovers from the night before....no waste here is my goal!
Dec.02
--$ Sale at the No Frills Store...limit of 6 items from the flyer...stocked up on several items we use all the time and saved a lot.
--Took all the accumulated cardboard boxes out to the backyard and flatten then on the weeds will make gardening easier next year.
That's it for now 2 a day is the goal.

Like most of us here, there are so many little things we do every day that have become habits that we don't think of, try to
post them this month so we can all know what we are all doing.....it could help someone else remember an old habit!

Congratulations on that 25 pounds, Danna! Food waste continues to be an area where we really need to improve.

There was a 10% off your $50 or more purchase coupon in the grocery sale stores flyer that was good only on December 1st. There are only a few items we buy at that grocery store because we can buy everything else for less at other stores. But I postponed a few purchases so that I could buy them that day, found a coupon that matched up to a decent deal on pasta, and stocked up on a few items, which allowed me to reach the $50 minimum. In fact, I came in at $51 and change -- so enough to qualify for the 10% off, but didn't over do it by buying stuff we didn't need. Now I've got what I need to make a fancy pasta dish (essentially a glorified version of macaroni and cheese with shallots, gourmet mushrooms, and smoked mozzarella). I only make this dish once or twice a year because it is definitely heart-attack inducing. But now I have an excuse to make it!

Still using up loose tea from my tea stash. Still not a fan of black tea, but I'm drinking my way through it. A local tea shop is having a special this weekend that a friend and I are going to go to so that we can stock up on our favorites -- various green teas being mine. So I'll still have a stash of black tea to contend with at some point in the future, but at least the stash will be smaller!

Decided at the last minute to do a project in my beekeeping class about pollination and planting bee-friendly plants. So we're going to make seed bombs today. Turns out I have everything I need on hand: clay kitty litter, potting soil, and seeds. I could get reimbursed for expenses if I had actually bought anything, but it's a bit of a hassle and I didn't really have time to go to the store anyway. The biggest challenge was seeds. I'm using a combination of random packages of sunflower seeds, marigold seeds, and different herbs. The seeds are all pretty old so who knows if anything will actually grow, but it will be a fun experimental project for my students, it declutters a few things from the house, and it is essentially free. Works for me!

December so far is shaping up to be a far more frugal month than November.

- Tonight we'll finish the turkey soup made from the Thanksgiving carcass and veggies we already had in the house. The other meal this week is a cinnamon-orange beef stew made with beef that was discounted because it was on its last sale date.
- DW signed up for a plan at work which will pay her $25 a month to carry her cell phone with her during work hours. She's already doing that (for the new granddaughter, not necessarily for work), so it was kind of a no-brainer. She was talking about upgrading her phone before this opportunity; now we can do it without dinging the budget quite as much. I'm pretty sure that sometime this month we're going to move to Consumer Cellular for cell-phone service; doing so lets us share a plan which will knock $10 off our monthly cell-phone bills.
- I got a frequent-buyer reward from my hardware store -- $10 off if I purchase $10 or more. I had to make a run there anyway, so I'll pocket $10 of what I would have bought anyway.
- Used our pet-store reward-program money for the quarter and a coupon for dog food. The dog definitely is not frugal, but it helps to save money where we can.

Much better start than last month!

Returned two pairs of knitting needles and a ball of hemp realizing that I already have enough needles and I can make my knitted produce shopping bag out of junk yarn I have hanging around the house. The hemp was very cool, but I can afford to be less cool.

Mailed my grandson a great corduroy shirt purchased for 2.30 at Goodwill, 3 dollars to mail--gosh mailing has doubled in price over the last year, I think.

Dropped off three large bags of stuff at the Goodwill and did not let myself enter the Goodwill.

Cashed check received for selling textbook and used it to buy pig ears and dog biscuits for the ever-chewing canines.

on Weds DD has 1 hr break during her 5 hr driver's ed class. So my dad and I take her to grab a bite. I went to pay and my discover was rejected twice, odd because I have a whopping $300 balance. Before I could get another card out, my dad paid and will not take the cash. So that was a $38 unintended frugal. It was parm night, various parm-ed dishes for $8.95. I got chicken parm, took one look at the huge chicken breasts and boxed them up. Boxed up half the pasta and ate the rest, including soup and salad. Got home, friends were taking down my mom's bed because a hospital bed is coming today. They each had a chicken breast and leftover bread. And I still have 1/2 the pasta. $8.95 for four "meals", not bad. Plus, DD gave her grandpa over 1/2 her calzone.

It would be nicer to have her home for a meal but the high school is sort of in an isolated area and the restaurant we go to is the only one around. We'd never make it home and back.

It is almost the end of the semester, but I'm definitely feeling a bit overwhelmed and stressed at this point, which has resulted in my buying more lunches at school instead of bringing lunch from home. Today I managed to pull something together at the last minute. I grabbed the last kefir smoothie from the fridge and quickly made a little container of trail mix. I used up the last little bit of store-bought trail mix that was mostly just sunflower seeds. Then I added the last few dark chocolate chips from the bag in the pantry. Threw in a small handful of dried sour cherries and that was that. It wasn't the greatest trail mix combo in the world, but it cleared out a few things from the pantry shelves and prevented me from buying lunch at school. I also grabbed the bag of wild rice chips that had only one handful remaining. Feels so good to clear things out of the pantry and it feels great to scrounge up a nearly free lunch. As an early dinner, I made some cheese quesadillas with some corn tortillas that were likely to start growing mold any day (so glad I got to those in time!). And I added in the last of the roasted veggies that were leftover from Thanksgiving. A nice creative meal.

The seed bomb making project was a hit. So happy I didn't rush out to buy anything for the project as some of my students weren't in class today. I had plenty of supplies for the students who were there and we ended up with about 4 dozen seed bombs. The beekeeping club is going to make more tomorrow, too. Hooray for free arts and crafts!

Aside from that there's not much to report. We've been keeping the thermostat set to 58 degrees in the house. Fortunately, it hasn't been all that cold yet, even overnight. I'm sure we'll bump the temperature up a few degrees as winter progresses, but it feels good to be able to put that off for a few more days or weeks.

Couldn't believe pork roasts were $0.99 per pound. Talked to the butcher and was informed no antibiotics, hormones or added injections. He said pork has been going down in price. Bought 2 roasts ... froze one and made shredded bbq pork today with the other one. Same thing with beef roast... $2.78 per pound. Butcher said he cannot remember the last time it was so inexpensive??? Plan on cutting one up for beef barley soup... yum!

Dec 03
--no spend...no gas
--leftovers for supper and large amount on sirloin steak bought on sale not very tender
in the crockpot with BBq sauce made myself (steak bought on sale months ago) ready for the
next couple of nights.
--more cardboard boxes from the grocery store broke down and put out in the yard to kill weeds for next year.

Lunch and dinner provided at work yesterday. Not the healthiest of eating, but I tried to make good choices for the most part. Met two long-time friends in New Hampshire today for a craft fair fundraiser that was happening at the humane society where one of my friend's works. I rarely carry cash and didn't think to stop to get any before going to the craft fair. As a result, I didn't buy anything while there, but had a nice time walking around, catching up with my friends, and then petting the cats who were awaiting adoption. Afterwards, stopped to buy gas and got a hot chocolate at Dunkin' Donuts, a truly rare experience, but I had a coupon for a 99 cent medium hot chocolate and a DD card that I had loaded with $10 months ago and had never used. So I spent a whopping $1.08 for a treat.

Making homemade pizza for dinner with sauce from tomatoes we grew in the container garden this summer. Bought the mozzarella as part of my discounted grocery shopping trip earlier this week. Topping it with slices of fresh avocado that was also purchased during aforementioned grocery shopping trip. Cheap, but delicious eats!