If you are a bargain-shopper or couponer, you'll definitely not want to miss this fun read over at The Bargain Jargon. I got quite the chuckle over it and I think you probably will, too!
Reader Tip: Make restaurant foods at home–for much less!
Pictured: Lynn's Panera-Style Broccoli Cheese Soup and No-Knead Bread
Lynn from Lynn's Kitchen Adventures wrote me with this great tip recently:
I am always amazed at the amount of money people spend eating out and how often they eat out. And I have to wonder if they have any idea how much they are really spending on all that restaurant food? If they would add up what they spend on lunches out, drive-thru dinners, and gourmet coffees, they would likely be surprised.
Eating at home is so much less expensive than eating out. You can make at least twice the food, usually more than that, for the same price. Many times when I have eaten out, I look at the food and think "what a waste of money this was!" I could have made a whole pan of lasagna and a loaf of bread for the same cost as my meal. If I eat out at a deli or sandwich place, I end up thinking how many sandwiches I could have made for the cost of the one that I just ate.
My family can easily spend $20 ordering pizza, but how many pizzas can I make at home for $20? Quite a few. Maybe I think this way because I love to cook. I love to create meals and try new recipes and I like the challenge of trying to recreate a restaurant meal or dish. Yes, cooking at home takes time, but there are many meals that you can make in 30 minutes or less.
One of my favorite places to eat at is Panera Bread. I love their soups and loaves of crusty artisan style bread. But I don’t love spending $5 or more a person to eat there. So, I make several versions of their soups at home. I have a broccoli cheese and also a potato soup that taste pretty close to Panera’s versions. In fact, I think I like my versions better!
I have also learned some of the tricks to making artisan-style bread at home. Martha Stewart’s website has a great recipe for no knead bread. I also love the book “Artisan Bread In Five Minutes A Day”. I still have a lot to learn about bread making, but I can now make a pretty good loaf of bread, and it does not cost me $3-$5 a loaf like it would at a bakery or restaurant.
With a little time in the kitchen, you can whip up some of your favorite restaurant meals at home–and save yourself a lot of money in the process!
Have you made any restaurant meals or recipes at home before? If so, I'd love to hear about it!
Guest Post: Homemade Pesto
Guest Post by Hannah and Abby from Safely Gathered In
Basil is one of those plants that grows really well in all types of situations. You can even grow it indoors in a small pot.
Once your basil leaves have sprouted, pick
off all the leaves that look decent. (This is a job your little ones can
help with. Especially if it's the end of the season and the plant is
just going to die anyway!)
And then it's time to make some Homemade Pesto!
Homemade Pesto
from Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook
1/4 cup olive oil or cooking oil
1/2 cup walnuts and/or pine nuts
2 cups firmly packed fresh basil leaves
1/2 cup grated Parmesan or Romano cheese
4 cloves garlic, peeled
1/4 tsp salt
black pepper
Rinse
your basil and pat dry gently. Don't wash the leaves until you're ready
to make pesto. They mold easily if you don't get all the water off.
Peel a couple of cloves of garlic. You don't need to chop them since it's all going in the food processor.
Stuff your tiny food processor full of basil.
Now
add the nuts. I've used pine nuts, walnuts, and almonds–toasted and
untoasted. You can pretty much use whatever you have available.
Add the oil.
Puree until smooth. Serve with crackers or pasta or just eat with a spoon.
Pick a container to store your pesto in.
Any tupperware or jar will do. To help the top from going brown, layer
a little olive oil over the top of the pesto before putting the lid on.
If
you aren't going to eat the Pesto right away, it will refrigerate for a few
weeks or freeze for at least eight months. I've had some in the freezer for much longer and it tasted just fine.
As with all food, the farther back in the freezer, the longer the food will last. If you'd like, you can freeze the pesto in ice cube trays and then, once frozen, remove these cubes to a freezer bag. Pop one of these pesto cubes into your hot cooked past for an easy, quick dinner!
Hannah and Abby share recipe ideas, food preservation
tutorials, and more information regarding food storage
at SafelyGatheredIn.blogspot.
Super Savings Saturday: My hubby’s shopping trip
My wonderful husband volunteered to do the shopping for us again this week. And I happily took him up on his offer! It was kind of a last minute thing, so I just wrote a quick list for him and he went to Dillons. Here's what he got:
In addition, pictured are the other groceries we got this week–2 dozen eggs from my family's chickens (nothing beats farm-fresh eggs!), 4 loaves of bread and 4 boxes of stuffing that a friend picked up for me at Aldi which were reduced to $0.49 each! I think I'm seeing some French Toast in our near future! 🙂
All totaled for the groceries pictured we spent right around $42. I was really happy with that since in addition to what we already have in our cupboards, refrigerator, and freezer, we should have plenty of groceries to last us for this next week and I never even had to step foot out of the house to get any of them! And, at this point in my life, that's a pretty good bargain!
Someday soon, I hope to be back to more regular bargain-shopping and super sweet deals, but at this season of my life, I'm aiming to keep it simple and very manageable. And thanks to our stockpile of past past deals, so far we've been able to do that while sticking with our grocery budget–which I'm very happy about!
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Did you snag any great deals or bargains this week or save
money in other ways? If so, be sure to post about them on your blog and
leave your link below.
Note: Please remember that this weekly round-up is to share
deals you personally got and/or money you were able to save this week.
In order to keep this weekly round-up focused on helping and inspiring
others in their efforts to save money, links which have little-to-no
content other than promoting affiliate links, etc. will be deleted.
Also, to make it easy for everyone to navigate quickly through the
links, your link must link directly to your Super Savings Saturday
post.
Our $0.31 night of fun!
Did you get your $0.31 ice cream from Baskin Robbins tonight? We certainly did!
We've missed a lot of the other recent great food freebies and deals since I was too sick to make it out of the house. But the antibiotics are finally kicking into gear and I'm feeling much more energetic (I didn't know that was possible at 40 weeks pregnant, but compared to how sick I was last week, I feel great this week!) so we ventured out tonight to enjoy some very inexpensive and delicious ice cream.
Of course, apparently we weren't the only ones to have decided to hit up Baskin Robbins tonight. In fact, we had a hard time even finding a place to park–there were scores of people everywhere when we pulled up! The line was stretched quite far out the door but that didn't deter us. After all, patience is a virtue, right?
Waiting on the bench outside for Daddy to bring our ice cream. Kaitlynn wasn't too thrilled at having her picture taken!
And still waiting for Daddy to get to the front of the line! The girls were very patient and had a blast watching through the window as the long line of people gradually made it up to the ice cream counter.
Yours truly (aka The Very Pregnant and Swollen Mama!) with my two little precious girlies.
It was a fun and memorable evening–all for only $0.31 per person!
Worth Reading: Balancing Computer Time and Family Life
If you are a blogger or a work-at-home mom, or if you are considering becoming either of those things, may I strongly encourage you to head over to my other blog and read some of my thoughts on the importance of prioritization and balance when it comes to the computer and family life?
I rarely do interviews, but I recently agreed to do an interview on HomemakerBarbi.com on this very subject as it is something I am passionate about. I've struggled a lot with balance since my first days of blogging and working from home and I've learned a lot of hard lessons along the way.
As I said in the interview:
work-at-home mom out there to remember, it is this: anyone can be a
pretty good blogger or pretty good business owner, but there is only
person who is mommy to your children and wife to your husband. Don’t
let all the good things out there take precedence over the best things.
You only have one life to live–make it count!"
Go over here to read the three-part interview, I share some of my thoughts and tips for having your priorities in order when it comes to blogging and computer time and what measures I take to make sure my family and home and community are my first priorities.
Review: Feed Your Family for $12 a Day
I was recently browsing titles at the library when my eye landed on Rhonda Barfield's book, Feed Your Family for $12 a Day. As you can imagine, I quickly scooped it up and added it to my pile of books to check out.
Although the prices in this book were outdated and most of the recipes looked very uninteresting, bland, and even downright bordering on unsavory, there were numerous practical tips, hints, and ideas in this book making it every bit worth the read.
I appreciated the author's understanding that not all of her ideas would work for every family. We're all in different seasons and situations so what method of cooking and grocery shopping works well for one family could be completely unpractical for another family. Feed Your Family for $12 a Day acknowledges this and offers a plethora of ideas which can be implemented to lower your grocery budget.
The book also addresses many common misconceptions regarding eating healthfully on a budget and walks the reader through a full year of ideas on how to make little changes to not only eat more healthfully but to greatly reduce your grocery bill in the process.
If you are just beginning to attempt to lower your grocery budget, Feed Your Family for $12 a Day would be a very helpful book to add to your reading list. And even if you're like me and have been shopping on a small budget for years, I'm quite certain you'd find inspiration and fresh ideas in these pages as well. At least I know I certainly did!
Have you read any helpful books on frugality or money recently? If so, tell us about them! I'm always looking for new book ideas to add to my reading list!
The Emotional Benefits of Becoming Debt-Free
This was such an excellent article by Simple Mom on "The Emotional Benefits of Becoming Debt-Free". Here's a little snippet:
solves everything. Economic setbacks still happen. Layoffs still
happen. And unexpected money pits still happen. But being debt-free means those things don’t hit you like a mack truck – they’re an annoyance.
They don’t have to change our entire lifestyle – they can further
confirm our conviction that living without debt means having more
options, having more peace.
And while we may never be rich, we can be wealthy in those areas
where we want to be wealthy – in relationships, in experiences, and in
supporting causes that matter for eternity. I’ll take that over depending on Master Card, any day.
It takes work and effort to stay out of debt. Believe me, I know.
It takes sacrifice, it takes commitment, it takes self-discipline. It means you have to forgo some things others might think you're entitled to, you have to stop worrying what the Jones family thinks, and you probably will come across as rather weird to a number of people.
But it is every bit worth it to be free from the bondage of payments. To not have to worry so much if you are hit with unexpected things like job loss (we've been there twice in the last few years), or a big medical bill (we've had that, too, more than once in the last few years), or an accident which totals your one reliable vehicle (yep, we had that happen to us last year, too!).
We've hit a lot of financial rough spots in the six years my husband and I have been married and life has thrown us a number of unexpected curve balls. But that's life, isn't it? No one is free from crisis or difficulty in some form or another.
There were many times along the way when pulling out a credit card to pay for an unexpected bill or taking out a loan to pay for a bigger expense would have been really easy to do. There have been times when we've both faltered and wanted to throw in the towel. But by the grace of God, we've stayed true to our commitment to stay out of debt–even when we didn't know how those ends were going to meet at the end of the month.
And you know what? Committing to stay out of debt from day one of our marriage has been one of the best decisions we've ever made. After years of scrimping and sacrifice, we're reaping the benefits now of being able to live significantly below our means because we don't have any payments. We're not only able to take care of the needs of our own family, save for our childrens' future, our retirement, and our first paid-for home, but we're also able to give abundantly to our church, to missions, to causes we believe in, and to those who are needy.
To us, that is what it's all about–"living like no one else, so we can live and give like no one else".
Enough said. Go read the article by Simple Mom here.
Dolly Parton Imagination Library: Free book each month for children 5 and under
Dolly Parton Imagination Library: Free book each month for children 5 and under
I have mentioned this before but I wanted to mention it again since some of you asked about reading programs for younger children yesterday. The Dolly Parton Imagination Library is a program available in many areas which offers a free book each month to children 5 and under.
It is not available in our area so I have no personal experience with it, but I have heard from many different readers that the books they send are good quality and that it's definitely worth your while to sign up if your area offers this program.
Check to see if this program is available in your area and read more details here.
Thanks for reminding me to post about this, Kimberly!
Super Savings Saturday: A “splurge shopping trip” and the menu for this week
Super Savings Saturday: A “splurge shopping trip” and the menu for this week
Well, the head cold I came down with last week morphed into an awful sinus infection/head cold this week and I ended up being very sick all week long. (Did anyone notice that I didn't post anything of substance this week aside from deals? That was because my brain was too shot to even consider forming a substantive post!)
I had hoped to go to KMart for their Double Coupon Event and I'd also hoped to hit Walgreens, Dillons, and Aldi for another two-week shopping trip. But instead, I didn't even make it out of the house all week except for an appointment at the birth center. In fact, I didn't make it out of bed much most days.
However, even though I was too miserable to cook this week, we still managed to avoid getting carryout all but once. We used a few meals from the freezer, my sister cooked us dinner one night, and some friends brought us dinner another night. I can't even begin to describe how thankful I am to not only have our freezer full of good food, but also to live in a community of such helpful family and friends! We're truly blessed.
Since I'm still not well enough to be out and about, my husband kindly offered to do a shopping run for us tonight. I know he would have willingly gone to multiple stores, but he's been so helpful to me this week while I wasn't feeling well, that I decided to just keep it simple and make up a quick list for him for Dillons.
I wanted to get the cheese (on sale for $1.28), the Frosted Mini Wheats ($0.60/box after coupons), the Pillsbury brownie mix ($0.50/box after coupons), and we needed milk and juice and a few other things, but that was about it. So I told him to not worry about getting the best bargains and to just take $50, buy what was on the short list, and then spend anything leftover on whatever else he wanted to.
Here's what he bought:
You want to know what he spent the extra money on? Treats for me and the girls for after the baby is born (including my all-time favorite Milano cookies!!). I tell you, I love that guy! He is constantly spoiling me!
And the total? He spent $47!
(And in case you are wondering, we still have a lot of fruit and veggies in the refrigerator and freezer so I didn't have him buy any of those. Since I can't eat fruit and many vegetables right now due to my heartburn, we seem to go through them much more slowly. I can't wait until I can have a nice big fruit smoothie and fruit salad once this baby arrives!)
I am so thankful to be on the mend now and I look forward to getting to possibly get out to do a little bargain shopping before the baby comes. Though I'll willingly take having a baby over bargain shopping any day! If we don't have a baby before the end of this week (which I'm really not planning on, since I'm guessing I'll go late), I plan to do a big two-week shopping trip on Friday.
By the way, in case you wonder what we're eating this week, here's our planned menu for the week. I'm keeping things super simple right now, as you'll be able to tell:
BREAKFASTS
Cereal or pancakes (from the freezer) and juice
If I have enough energy, I'm also hoping to make homemade cinnamon rolls one day since I've been craving those!
LUNCHES
Leftovers or sandwiches with veggies or fruit
I have some spinach I need to use up so I might also concoct a spinach and rice casserole one day.
DINNERS
–Hamburger/onions/peas/corn/potatoes sauteed in the skillet served with homemade bread and salad
–Breakfast Pizza (I'm going to make my own biscuit dough and use leftover Easter ham from the freezer.) and fruit
–Macaroni and Cheese, homemade bread, green beans, oranges
–Chicken Salsa Pizza, peas, fruit
–Meatloaf, twice baked potatoes, sweet potatoes, green beans, grapefruit
–Ham and Cheese Stromboli (again, using up leftover Easter ham), fruit
–Turkey Sausage, sweet potatoes, muffins, fruit
SNACKS
Granola Bars
Muffins
Fruit
Yogurt
Popcorn
And that's that!
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Did you snag any great deals or bargains this week or save
money in other ways? If so, be sure to post about them on your blog and
leave your link below.
Note: Please remember that this weekly round-up is to share
deals you personally got and/or money you were able to save this week.
In order to keep this weekly round-up focused on helping and inspiring
others in their efforts to save money, links which have little-to-no
content other than promoting affiliate links, etc. will be deleted.
Also, to make it easy for everyone to navigate quickly through the
links, your link must link directly to your Super Savings Saturday
post.
Tired of Missing Deals?Join Our Hot Deals List!
Click here to sign upTown Hall for Hope Recap: Change Begins With Me
Wow! If you missed the Town Hall for Hope tonight, you really missed out!
If you've spent any time at all on this blog, you know good and well that I'm a big fan of Dave Ramsey. I've listened to him countless times on the radio, watched some of his television show on Hulu, read his books, gone through Financial Peace University twice, attended two of his live events, and even met him in person (okay, so it was all of about thirty seconds at a book signing, but I have shaken his hand and had my picture taken with him and his wife!).
So, I was expecting tonight to be good. But it far exceeded my imaginations. In fact, Dave's message of hope and personal responsibility was an out-of-the-park home run!
I could write twenty different lengthy blog posts on things he shared tonight, and maybe you'll see some of those over the next few weeks and months. The biggest takeaway from tonight for me was the reminder that change begins with me.
It's easy to want to blame others for our failures and mistakes, but we need to own up to our own actions and take personal responsibility for them. We need to stop expecting hand-outs or expecting the government to be the solution. Change begins with me.
I read a book earlier this week called Do Hard Things and one of the quotes from that book really stuck out to me: "What each of us will become later in life largely depends on what we become now."
What are you doing now to be where you want to be next year or in five years or in twenty-five years? Don't just wait around for a lightning bolt to strike you and change your life. Start setting goals, start taking steps, and start seeing results. Change begins with you.
Stop participating in this recession by letting the fear-mongering talking heads bring you down. Get up and get busy living your life, pursuing your goals, and making a difference in your future and in the lives of those around you.
And remember, that the greatest hope and change you can ever have is found in Jesus Christ.
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If you missed tonight's broadcast, you can read Passionate Homemaker's live-blogged post here. Also, be sure to check out the Three Things You Can Do to Choose to Commit to Hope.
Reminder: Tonight is the Town Hall for Hope!
When just about every media outlet and
talking head out there would have you think our world is coming to an
end, Dave Ramsey is here to sound a message of hope–something we could all use a good dose of right now.
Tonight (April 23, 2009) at 8 PM EDT, Dave Ramsey will be hosting a free nationwide Town Hall for Hope:
Town Hall for Hope is your opportunity to sit
down with people in your community for a nationwide town hall
meeting led by Dave Ramsey. Thousands of venues across the
country will host the event, broadcasting Dave's live
presentation. In the opening half hour, Dave will offer straight
talk about the economy, recession, foreclosures and more.
He'll carefully explain where we've come from, where we are now,
and what we should be doing with our money during this time.
Then, Dave will spend an hour answering your questions
live!
Go here to see what venues in your area are hosting this event.
Will you be attending? I hope so!
I am so disappointed because my head cold (yes, the same one I had most of last week!) has gotten worse instead of better this week and morphed into the most awful sinus infection I've ever had, so I'm not going to be able to go tonight unless I have some miraculous recovery in the next few hours. However, my hubby is going and I'm hopeful he'll be able to take it all in so he can come home and tell me all about it!
I've been searching high and low to find a webcast of it, but so far I've been unsuccessful. Anyone know if there is going to be a live webcast available online for this event?
Anyone have an incredible homemade macaroni and cheese recipe?
Anyone have an incredible homemade macaroni and cheese recipe?
I was making my menu for this next week and was suddenly hit with the urge to make homemade macaroni and cheese this coming week. Not only is cheese is so inexpensive right now, but I'm pretty sure homemade macaroni and cheese constitutes a "quick, easy, and frugal meal".
There's only one problem: I have yet to come across a winner recipe for homemade macaroni and cheese. I've tried a number of them and they either turned out soggy or dry or not cheesy enough or something or other.
But I'm not convinced its impossible to make yummy homemade macaroni and cheese. In fact, a few times in my life I've tasted some that was exceptional but I was never able to get a hold of those recipes.
So help me out here with my pregnant cravings, will you? Do you have a blue-ribbon homemade macaroni and cheese recipe? I'd love to get my hands on it and try it out. Post the link to the recipe in the comments section or email it to me. I'd be immensely grateful! And I promise that when I find a really good recipe, I'll be sure to share it here.
Super Savings Saturday (and what are your quick, easy, and frugal meal ideas?)
Super Savings Saturday (and what are your quick, easy, and frugal meal ideas?)
This was my week off from shopping since I'm currently doing the shopping-every-other-week experiment so I spent no money on groceries. And do you know how nice it was to have plenty of food on hand and not have to worry about shopping? I haven't felt well most of this week (a bad head cold combined with being 38 weeks pregnant has left me fairly exhausted most days) so I was so thankful we were just able to stay home and eat from our stockpile.
Before I came down with my head cold, I did have a chance to have a Baking Day (you can read about that here, in case you missed it). I'm so glad I did that because not only did we finish filling up our freezer with snacks and meals for after the baby comes, but it also meant we had some quick and easy snacks on hand for the girls and Jesse to eat while I haven't been feeling well. Also, having chicken cooked up meant I could easily whip up a simple casserole or pizza this week without a lot of effort so we didn't fall back on carryout–something which I find easy to do when I'm not feeling well and haven't prepared some things for the freezer.
One thing I've really been finding recently is that having frozen veggies, muffins and rolls, and cooked chicken and ground beef in the freezer, along with some fresh fruit in the refrigerator, and a number of staples in the cupboards guarantees I'm able to put together a very simple and healthful dinner in minutes, all for a fraction of what we'd pay for picking up something at a restaurant.
Two of our favorite quick and easy meals:
Chicken Broccoli Rice Casserole–I cook and freeze up rice ahead of time and use cooked and chopped chicken from the freezer and then add in frozen broccoli, shredded cheese, cream soup, salt and pepper, and maybe butter and an egg or two. Using pre-cooked rice and chicken from the freezer, I can put this together in five minutes or so and then bake it for 350 degrees for 30 to 45 minutes. While it's baking, I add some rolls or muffins from the freezer, some green beans, and some fruit and you have dinner in less than 20 minutes of preparation time!
Homemade Chicken Salsa Pizza–I use frozen homemade pizza dough and cooked and chopped chicken from the freezer. I just set it out around lunch time and then 30 minutes before dinner roll out the pizza dough, spread on some salsa or barbecue sauce, and then sprinkle on the cooked and chopped chicken, and generously sprinkle with shredded cheese and bake it (more detailed directions here). While the pizza is baking, add some fruit salad and some veggies and dinner is done in less than 30 minutes.
By not shopping this week and by having a plan for simple dinners to fall back on instead of carryout, we saved quite a bit of money this week. And it's these little things can really add up over time to make for Super Savings!
By the way, do you have any quick, easy, and frugal meal ideas your family falls back on during busy weeks or when you are feeling exhausted or sick? I'd love to hear them!
———————————
Did you snag any great deals or bargains this week or save
money in other ways? If so, be sure to post about them on your blog and
leave your link below.
Note: Please remember that this weekly round-up is to share
deals you personally got and/or money you were able to save this week.
In order to keep this weekly round-up focused on helping and inspiring
others in their efforts to save money, links which have little-to-no
content other than promoting affiliate links, etc. will be deleted.
Also, to make it easy for everyone to navigate quickly through the
links, your link must link directly to your Super Savings Saturday
post.
Baking Day Wrap-Up
Finally, everything off the Baking Day list is done! And I have decided our After-the-Baby Freezer Stash is officially complete since our basement freezer is stuffed with the makings of 25 meals plus rolls, muffins, and banana bread! (You can see the full list of everything we made complete with recipe links here.)
It will be so nice to not have to worry about cooking or baking or shopping for at least a month or so after the baby is born. I’m definitely hoping this will not only save us time and money, but will make the transition from two little ones to three little ones go more smoothly. Now if only I could find a way to do a month’s worth of laundry ahead of time, we’d be all set! 🙂
Here were the results of the baking we did yesterday and this morning:
3 dozen Banana Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins
1 1/2 dozen Whole Wheat French Bread Rolls
3 dinner’s worth of Calzone dough
1 dozen Super Power Muffins
3 bags cooked and chopped chicken
2 loaves Banana Bread
Did you have a chance to do any baking this week? If so, post about it
on your blog and leave your link below to your direct blog post. I’d
love it especially if you could share pictures and recipes so I can get
more ideas for my next Baking Day projects! And I’m guessing many
others would be inspired as well.