Reviewing My Goals

I was chatting with my sister yesterday and asked if her trying out once a month grocery shopping has saved her any money and she said that she had saved about $300 last month. That is awesome! I have talked to a few other friends who are crushing their goal in 2019 and that really inspires me to keep reaching for my goals as well. Keep up the good work friends.

I wrote down 11 things back in December and thought I would share my list and evaluate where I am on them.

1. Continue with healthier eating. I had lost 20 pounds before Thanksgiving and my goal through Christmas and all that good eating that comes with those holidays was to not gain it back. I did just that and and stayed the same through January. I have lost 2 more pounds and hope to continue loosing. Thats still a win in my book. Lets see if there will be 10 less pounds of me in February.

2. Blog more recipes. I think we can say I have done that.

3. Garden, garden, garden and more garden. Thats exactly what I put. So we ordered 29 packets of seeds and have some seeds we saved ourselves from last year, we have the garden spot at my moms staked and are waiting for warmer weather for a neighbor of her to plow it up. Our garlic at home is doing great and we have lettuce. micro greens and mushrooms growing indoors. I think we are well o our way.


4. Cut grocery bill. I cut about $150 off juts by sticking to a budget and I still have $70 in my grocery envelope for deals too good to pass up.

5. Tea parties and picnics. There are two of my favorite things. I have had a friend over for lunch and some of my very own homemade dried rose petal tea with my very own honey. Picnics in January are not easy.

6. Visit more historical places. Havent visited anywhere this year so far but we will make up for lost time when it gets warmer out.

7. Business, business business. I made around $600 last year with my little business of teaching other how to make their own tinctures and selling some honey. I would like to double that this year. So this is one of those works in progress.

8. Make a quilt. I am a few blocks behind but I do have the materials. I will catch up on that soon and plan on having my lap quilt ready to use before the weather gets cold next year.

9. Visit more small eateries and buy more for small businesses. I purchased some yarn from a local shop and its the softest stuff I have ever worked with. I have a few other shops I want to order yarn from and have a little list of places for Mr Ladybug and I to have future dates at.

10. Donate my time and money to good causes. I have made a few inquiries about this and hope to have updates on this soon.

11. Make more things myself. We have some more cheese planned in the future. The colby was amazing! We have our kombuca brewing and I have my first batch of kefir done. I was going to fix rice bowls for dinner tonight and realized we have no homemade sour cream. We have not bought any in 2 months because homemade is so much better. I think we will make a batch tonight to have tomorrow with dinner.

Dont be discouraged if yo didnt even make any goals this year. For many years when I was a mom of three small children my goals were just to keep them all alive, not to leave them anywhere on accident  and still be able to talk in complete sentences. Just the other night at dinner we were talking with our two college kiddos about how for a while when they were small Mr Ladybug worked 60-80 hours a week. That was very tiring on us all. All the kids were asleep when he got home and he was out the door before they woke up then weekends were filled with soccer games. church activities and trying to get in a few minutes of rest before it was time to start all over again. We all have busy seasons in our lives and trying times in our lives. Our goals and our priorities change as we do. So dont beat yourself up if you dont have a list of goals. Just try to enjoy where you are at in life. Even when I look back on the hard times I can smile now and you will too.

First starters, budget blowing recipe, vintage kitchen gadget.

I didnt get my $15 extra from this weeks grocery budget because I got a really good deal on chuck roast and a pork roast and spent it on stockpiling some meat in the freezer. I brought the chuck roast home and grounded some into hamburger and about a pound of it I sliced thin for fajitas or rice bowls. Since only three of us eat beef I only package hamburger into three 4oz servings so we got 5 meals out of this roast that cost $11.75 which is why I have $2.35 on each package since I like to calculate how much our meals cost. I made hamburgers with homemade buns and homemade mac and cheese and we each ate for a dollar each.

I was about $5 under my budget up until Mr Ladybug decided it would be a great idea to try a new recipe we found from our favorite Youtube Channel Townsends. If you enjoy all things 18th century this is a great resource. This little adventure cost us $40. Its a good thing I find that man so cute or he would be in hot water. We had fun making it and it was delicious. We also found a great dry red wine for cooking.  I didnt even know Francis Coppola made wine. azqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqq                                                                                                                                   kiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiijuzghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhcv m

I have not lost my mind, I just wanted to give you a small taste of my life. I got up to get my bagel and came back to a tiny dog standing on my keyboard. I suppose its a good thing I find the little dog so cute as well.

So the wine is called Claret. from what I read its the same as a Bordeaux but do not quote me on that. I have yet to find a wine I enjoyed in food until this one so I am looking forward to using it in some other recipes as well.

The fun and annoying this about 18th century recipes is the lack of exact measurements. Luckily Townsends gives you are pretty decent estimate on the amounts. If you wish to try to stewed duck this is what you will need.

1 duck                              $16
1 cup claret wine              $14
bone broth                        $2  I used chicken and I plan on making my own in the future
A bundle of sweet herbs   $6 two sprigs each basil, targon, mint and rosemary
3 cloves                             $0
2 shallots                            $1.50
3 TBS butter                      $0  I stockpiled butter during Christmas
1 cup water
salt and pepper to taste

put all ingredients in a stockpot and cook on open fire or wood stove 2-3 hours.

We did at least have some leftovers to get another meal out of and I will be using the same recipe this weekend to try with rabbit.

We had some pretty dirty bees wax from the hive where the girls decided to go rogue and make some crazy mess. If you dont get it cleaned out they start storing honey and when you start pulling frames you get an icky sticky mess plus you sometimes have to destroy larvae and thats future honey makers.  So Mr Ladybug melted the wax down, put some sawdust he had on his work bench in a paper egg carton and poured the hot wax over it. I  tore off one piece this morning and it started the fire perfectly. We plan on making these all year long as we get bees wax and sawdust. Momma if you are reading this I plan on making you some too.

I love kitchen gadgets but not like you think. My stand mixer is from the early 90's and my coffee pot is late 60's early 70's. It just about broke my heart when the one I had from the 50-60's era died on me. I was so excited yesterday when I had hamburgers to get to use my new tomato slicer that my friend gave me. Look how perfect they are!

 She gave me several things and I have lots of others and will be showing you their uses in future posts. So many of the things I have bought at garage sales have been things people used for decoration. I am a believer in if it doesnt have a purpose why bother keeping it plus it can be decorative and purposeful at the same time.

The Right Tools For The Job

Yay!!!!!! I made my grocery list. it didnt take that long once I actually sat down to do it. I have to do three stores today. I know for some of you this isnt really convenient but I live in a city where this isnt that big of a drive. Before really sticking to this budget thing I would do three stores each week but have changed it to once a month to keep impulse buying down. The majority of my groceries will come from Aldis, with Kroger coming in at a close second since they tend to have some pretty decent deals with coupons every few weeks. Walmart tends to be cheaper on cleaning supplies and I found some decent coupons on the Coupon.com app and was wanting to see how that works out.

A few years ago I wrote a little daily blip in facebook on wearing the full armor of God. I ladybugged it up by changing the breast plate of truth to a ladybug apron, my helmet was a straw hat I wear in the garden and you get the idea. I will have to try to dig that picture up for you if you missed it. I am a real hoot sometimes. Anyway this got me thinking about how I prepare myself for anything that I am about to do. Like if Mr Ladybug and I are going on a adventure that will take several hours is the car I take my heated blanket and snacks. We always have our water bottles and I try to remember tea bags and honey if he happens to stop to grab coffee somewhere I get just hot water. Sometimes we even take a thermos of coffee and I have one for tea.

This is what I need if I am going to be out running errands and shopping for the week. My water bottle and my hot tea. The little caffeine from the tea keeps me civil. The water to keep me from wanting to grab a drink while out. Its very tempting sometimes. My clipboard is a must for my list and to keep my coupons handy. My ink pen to  mark thing off so I dont forget anything and to jot down something if I get a phone call or see something I want to look into later. My diffuser necklace and bracelet. I love smells and associate alot of happy memories with them. Today I need good vibes and happy thoughts as I am around lots of other people out and about so citrus smells like grapefruit, lemon and orange will be in them. I also keep my phone handy to check in with Shopkicks and to see if there are any deals on that app or Ibotta. I normally write them down on my list to make shopping faster.

It may be silly but if you leave the house with a plan and stick to the plan things can run much smoother and faster. Sort of like cooking. Have you ever decided to make something and instead of getting all the ingredients out at once you just get things out one at a time and realize that you dont have something like enough eggs or baking powder?

I only need to be $15 under budget to have saved $100 of groceries this month. I am starting off with only $143 instead of my $150 since Mr Ladybug decided to order whole nutmeg off Amazon yesterday. What am I going to do with him?

Whatever you have to do today I hope you are well prepared and I hope you do it fabulously and with lots of glitter. Life is so much better with sparkles and we need more of that in our lives.

Getting Over that Hump

Happy Hump Day as some people refer to Wednesday. Not only are we halfway through the work week I am almost a whole month through sticking to my budget and for the most part I am pretty happy with the results. We are over in our clothing budget since Mr Ladybug needed some things for work and we bought college gear to support our favorite pep band member. It will all work out fine.

My little jar of Kombucha is brewing just fine in the cabinet and our second fermentation that we got to bring home from class we will enjoy this weekend. In the class the instructor had a book and after looking through it I had to have it. There is so much you can do with this stuff. I had no idea. I can not wait to get enough komucha going so that I can make some of these vinegars. facial creams and even try scoby jerky. I found it on Amazon for $17.85 but with the $10 I got reimbursed from a few of my apps it only cost me $7.85.

Last night we tried a new small batch brownie recipe. They were gooey and yummy but I still like my own recipe better. I will cut my down and try it later and post the recipe if it works.

it makes 4 brownies.

My college kiddos both have long days today. The boy had to be there at 8 and he will be home at 5 to eat dinner then back at school for pep band until 9:30. The girl has to be there at 9:30am and will be there until 9:30pm where both will come home together. So of course this momma worries they will starve to death. The boy eats breakfast before he goes and only needed a lunch but she needs a whole days worth of meals. Yes, i know that there is food on campus but it would cost $20-25 for the day. Thats almost what it costs to feed one of us for a whole week. No thank you!  In the pic below we have yogurt with blueberries and granola, cream cheese pinwheels with pretzels and a cheese spread plus apples and spaghetti for dinner. Lets not forget the homemade mocha ice coffee. Those things are like $2.50 out of a machine. Highway robbery!

She does have access to a microwave and fridge.

I still have not made the grocery menu or shopping list and I plan on going tomorrow at 9am so thats still on the agenda. After keeping the fire in the stove going constantly I need to clean out the ashes. I am still undecided on a fire today but with it looking so dreary, I probably will start one. I need to feed all the outdoor animals earlier and avoid getting soaked in the rain. I also having a friend come to visit thats exciting stuff. Hope you have a great Wednesday too.

Good Tuesday Morning!

Its a little barky at my house this morning. Last night two sheriffs knocked on our door looking for someone. not anyone in my house, and the dogs are still upset about it this morning. Every noise they hear is someone at our front door. Its going to be along day with these monsters. To make things even more fun for the dogs today there is a crew of men next door at the house that caught fire and few months ago. They have knocked out all the windows to replace and are running a generator to power their tools and there is lots of hammering going on.

Last night I was craving cupcakes and I found a recipe that made 4. They turned out perfect! I am really liking this small batch baking kick. Here is the link to find the recipe. For the icing she says to use 15 g of butter thats about 2 teaspoons.

https://www.thekiwicountrygirl.com/small-batch-chocolate-cupcakes/

I have no idea where my cupcake pictures are. So you will just have to take my word that I made them.

On todays agenda is to work on next weeks menu. I have to find a meatless Monday recipe that the boys in the house wont realize is meatless. I need to get the dogs beds washed and mop the floors. I also have firewood to bring in and outdoor pets to feed. Dont be jealous my life isnt quite as glamorous as it sounds.

On the menu today is veggie noodle soup and to appease the carnivores I will make chicken salad sandwiches too which means I will also need to add making bread to my list of things to do today. The college kiddos will be home for lunch today so it will be veggie and turkey wraps for lunch with apple slices and pretzels.

Happy Cold Monday!

Mr Ladybug moved a couple of feeders to the front window and now when I am blogging this is my view. We are so enjoying having these red breasted nuthatches visit out feeders. They love peanuts. They love them so much that Mr Ladybug was holding the feeder in his hand and they landed on it. We are definitely going to try to get a picture of that when its not freeze your face off temps outside.

In its first grow the oyster mushroom log produced about 10 oz of mushrooms. We let the log rest and have now started spraying it again to get another round. They are so tasty. We had some a week ago in fajitas and I put them on steaks last night. I have just enough to make a quiche with the remaining ones. We will definitely look into growing more of these through out the year.

I try lots of recipes off the internet and it makes me crazy at the amount of ones that just dont taste good, like the peanut butter cookies from last week. Yesterday I came across a cheesy scalloped potato recipe and he was using seasoning mixes that I could not find anywhere. Then when I looked through his pictures he definitely had paprika top of his potatoes but nowhere in the recipe did he state to put paprika on the top to help get the brown color. So if you dont like the way people do things you should do them yourself. So here is my recipe and you should have to struggle to find the ingredients or be missing any ingrdeients.

Mrs Ladybugs Semi Cheesy Scalloped Potatoes

2 pounds of peeled and thinly sliced potatoes
3TBS butter
3TBS seasoned flour, all purpose will do but seasoned gives it a bit more flavor
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp onion powder
1 cup of vegetable broth, chicken broth works too but I have a vegetarian in the house
2 cups milk
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1/2 cup parmesan cheese
paprika


Preheat oven to 400 degress. Melt butter in a sauce pan over med hi heat. Once melted add flour, garlic and onion powder. Mix well until everything is mixed in with the butter, Add broth and stir until there are no lumps. Add milk and parmesan cheese. Stir well and continue stirring until cheese is all melted. Once its melted it should be thickening up so remove from heat.

 Layer half the potatoes in casserole dish. Top with half the cheddar cheese and half the sauce.

Add remaining potatoes, sauce and top with cheese.Sprinkle top with paprika.

 Cover and bake 30 minutes. Remove cover and bake 20-30 minutes more making sure potatoes are cooked.

Did you get outside last night to see the Blood Moond Lunar Eclipse? I did and it was so beautiful. I didnt think my fingers or toes would ever thaw but it was definitely worth it. Even standing and sliding on the ice with my twisted ankle thats bothering me this morning was worth it.

Where are the degrees?

Its 15 degrees outside as I type this. I dont know how you feel but thats just not enough degrees for me. Unfortunately I will have to head out to feed my chickens, rabbits and pigeons. Mr Ladybug will fill up the bird feeders and we will bring in enough wood to keep us warm through tomorrow. We keep our house at 65 which is a little cool for some people but if you wear nice warm house slippers and not be dressed in summer attire its not a bad temp at all. So our furnace is not kicking on an its actually 72 in the living room according to Mr Ladybugs fancy thermometer he got for Christmas. Yes I think the wood stove was worth the investment.

Yesterday we went to kombucha class and it was so much fun, We learned alot and got our very own scoby to bring home to start fermenting ourselves. We also go to bring home a blackberry ginger that we created ourselves. It should be ready in a few days to try. I also ordered a book that the instructor had in class with tons of things to do with your kombucha. Expect to see lots more things on this tasty drink.

 After class we stopped for a quick lunch out and then home by 1pm. Mr Ladybug had to run to work real quick this morning but I dont plan on leaving the house until maybe like Thursday on grocery day. Nothing keeps your budget on track like not going anywhere to spend money.

New years weekend I made this little glass dry erase board. I thought it would be cute to hand on the wall and draw something for each holiday that pops up. Unfortunately I can not draw so I use coloring pages that I find.  To make one yourself just take a picture frame, remove the back and glue the glass to the frame. Make sure to use dry erase markers and just wash it off with a paper towel and a little water or rubbing alcohol.

I finally remembered to get a pic of the pancakes made with the mix from a few days ago. The boy has eaten then 4 times so I am guess they are good.

Our seeds came in!!!  If I had seen the mailman deliver them I would have hugged him. I can not wait to get them in the ground but its going to have to get lots warmer outside. We are sitting around relaxing the cold Sunday. I am going through cookbooks I got from the library and may start a Cozy Mystery that I picked up.

Rewarding your hard work.

All work and no play not only sticks but is pretty boring. On my get healthy journey I normally buy myself a new outfit and try to keep the cost at around $20. Yes I can get pants, shirt and a cute pair of flats for $20 if I try hard enough. Same goes with sticking to your budget. There should be more of a reward than seeing your bank account go up. Unless that is reward enough for you. The way you choose to reward your hard work is up to you. When Mr Ladybug and I were first married we did not have any savings. In fact if we paid all our bills and had $50 left over for the month we usually celebrated and went out to eat. Now if we had only $50 left at the end of the month we would be totally freaking out and trying to sell our organs on craislist or something. Mainly because we learned that emergencies happen like a broken appliance and if you have to purchase one with on credit it can take a long time to pay it off. A week after we bought our home back in 1995 the fridge quit working. We did not have the money to replace it and bought one on credit at Montgomery Wards. I dont want to even think about how much that purchase really cost us. The fridge did last us 22 years. When it finally quit on us I had a friend who knew someone selling one for $50 and we bought that. We intend on updating the kitchen in a few years when we have no kids in college and will purchase a new one then.

So I got those coupons from Kroger the other day and Kroger was the last of my stop yesterday. I needed to get the boys favorite almond milk, and grab my free M&Ms. I love having fresh flowers in a vase and they usually last me over a week. I decided instead of getting more cereal that I would get myself some flowers. Whenever I sit at the table it makes me smile and I love all the colors. Sorry I didnt have my curtains open in the picture some sort of utility truck was in front of my house and I didnt think it added to the photo. The flowers were only $5 so I still use $2 towards the almond milk.

I have $85 in my grocery envelope. I am going to definitely come in $100 under my original projected grocery budget which was $650. I will still keep that in my envelope since I plan on starting to purchase and can some meat to make quick and easy dinners this summer when the temps start rising and I want a hot meal in record time.

I said we were going to have spaghetti last night but I decided that chef salads were a better choice to use up some salad fixing from last week so they didnt get composted and some lunch meats we had left over too. Tonight I dont have to cook at all since we are going over to a friends house for dinner. There will be few hostess gift ideas on the blog later.

This cookie is on a salad plate so even though its big its not that big.

The chocolate chip cookie was such a hit the other night that I thought that I would make a peanut butter one last night. It looks good but you will not see any recipe for it until I tweak it a bit. Dont you just hate that when something isnt what you are expecting? Maybe I set my expectations too high. Maybe the blog I got the recipe from didnt grow up with my moms peanut butter cookies and didnt know what a good one tasted like. I remember I love it when she let us make the fork marks in top of them.

I have about $20 left in our entertainment budget for the weekend. I purchased a year digital subscription of our local paper for Mr Ladybug and am giving the kiddos $10 to order pizza for dinner tonight. With the forecast calling for some icky weather Saturday evening into Sunday and then its going to be super cold I dont see us wanting to venture out too far from home after our Kombucha class tomorrow anyway plus we have a few gift cards that are already paid for from previous weeks.

Enjoy your Friday. I am off to get a few things done around the house and then a quick trip to the library and to help my oldest daughter get two of my grand dogs to the vet for their yearly shots.

Grocery and Errand Day

Do you always feel like ordering out when you grocery shop. I almost always do and when I once a month shopped I normally would. Now I always plan for dinner to be something I had made already. I made spaghetti 2 weeks ago and froze extra sauce and meat. All I have to do now is thaw, reheat and boil water for the pasta. Thats not too hard.

This morning I am off to the feed store for the rabbits and chickens, a quick stop at Walmart for something that I can not remember right now and really hope I wrote on my list, swing by my friends house to take her to Aldis with me, a stop at the library for Mr Ladybugs book and to see if they have any movies and last but not least pick up the boys prescription. I plan to be home before noon. Not sure if I will make it but I will definitely try.

I promised you pancake mix and by golly you are getting pancake mix. Unfortunately I have no pictures of the made pancakes. I am a terrible pancake flipper I can flip a sunny side egg like a pro but my pancakes look like they have been through a shredder sometimes. Maybe its because I actually really dont like pancakes but Mr Ladybug and the Boybug love them and I love my boys. So almost 5 mornings a week I make pancakes. Anyway the whole time I am fixing them I keep thinking "make these picture worthy" and I did but then I just handed them over to the boy and those things were gobbled up before I could get the pic. So here is your recipe.

Pancake Mix

4 cups all purpose flour
3 TBS baking powder
2 tsp baking soda
3 TBS sugar
1 1/3 cup powdered milk
4 TBS shortening
4 tsp egg replacer like Ener G.

Place all ingredients in food processor and pulse until mixed well. Store in airtight container.


To make 8 pancakes use 1 cup of mix and 1/2 - 2/3 cup of water. If you dont want to use the egg replacement you can just add a 1 egg to 1 cup of mix. I was wanting something that I didnt have to add anything to. I got the egg replacement on sale and it was much cheaper than powdered eggs.

Almost there

Wednesdays are so weird, The week is starting to wear you down but you are still so close to the weekend. Maybe I am really the one who is so weird.

Last night I used the bread sticks recipe I shared a few days ago to make much smaller bread sticks and to see how they would do as rolls or buns. I think it was a success. My family gobbled them all up! In the picture below on the side of the baked rolls you see a thin lone bread stick. Thats because it was the only one left to photograph. 

Tomorrow is grocery day and I think I have my list done, Its been a very long process this week getting it finished. Not sure why I kept dragging my feet its not like eating is a new concept for us. I intend to be below budget which is good since I need to buy maple syrup. That is a big budget buster but definitely worth the cost. We have actually bought tree taps this year to try to make our own maple syrup. That should be interesting and hopefully not dangerous.

I am making pancake mix today. I normally buy it at Aldis for $1.50 a box and it lasts the boy 2 weeks which is not a huge cost but all the ingredients are something you normally have on hand so it makes sense to make it yourself. If it passes the boys taste test I will share the recipe tomorrow.

Today I am going to do something that I love to do that some of you may find odd, rearrange furniture. I absolutely love to do it.  I will be in the living room with a nice fire going, listening to either an audio book or jazz and trying to not trip over my rowdy dogs. 

A Single Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

You read the title correctly. This recipe that I found will make one 7 inch cookie. I really have no idea why this intrigues me. Maybe it was my love of my easy bake over as a child. Whatever it is, single serving desserts are my new Pinterest and internet search. Expect lots of them in the future.

Here is the link

https://www.cookingclassy.com/recipe-one-chocolate-chip-cookie/

I followed it perfectly and it turned out great. I used a Pampered Chef Ice Cream Sandwich Maker as my mold but you could easily do it by hand.

Seed catalogs are all in. Before Christmas we purchased at $50 Botanical Interests gift card for $35 from their website. I got online to order a seed catalog from them and received a post card with 20% off your order in the month of January plus free shipping if you spent $50.  We finally put out order together over the weekend and our grand total came to $69 but after the gift card and 20% off we ended up paying $39 for all our seeds.  Right now our seed total is $46 since we bought the three pack of lettuce seeds a few weeks back. Dare I hope to keep our seed total under $50? Not very likely. When we see seeds or plants we are like kids in a candy store, we want them all.

I found this little quote online but no author. I hope it inspires you as it did me today,

Keep your circle positive.
Speak good words.
Think good thoughts.
Do good deeds.

Coupons

Happy Monday to everyone. Mondays are my get things back in order from the weekend and prepare for the week ahead day. I almost always have to run to the grocery or pharmacy for something too. This morning I had to run out to grab more apples. The people in my house are eating them like crazy but if I bought 2 bags at the store they would stop eating them for sure. You can imagine my happy face while at the store this morning and these coupons popped out.

I do use coupons but I am not an extreme couponer. I just get the digital ones through a few store apps, the ones that come in the mail and a few that someone may give me that they dont use. I maybe spend an hour a week looking at ads, coupons and making my lists of things I need.  I may save $5-$10 in coupons and another $20 in grabbing sale items for that week. I think the saving for that hour of planning are well worth it.

I mentioned the other day that I bought 8 boxes of cereal since they were around $1.10 a box. Unless they are that price again in the coming weeks I will not buy cereal. I also have managed to stockpile 20 cans of Chunky and Progresso soups since both have been on sale the past month for .99 a can. Yes I could make a big pot of soup cheaper in most cases but its one of those convenience things and I dont have to use the freezer space to freeze 20 bags of single serve soup. Mr Ladybug and I were out most of the day on Saturday with the exception of running home for lunch. We couldnt decide on a quick place to grab a bite and soup and sandwich at home cost about $3 for both of us to eat.

I found the extra money for the animal feed easy enough in the budget. I just have to change some numbers around. We are looking at less that $90 for gas for the month so I can use some of the extra towards the food. I also had some other categories over budgeted and will have a new budget made out for February.  Using cash and seeing the actual money go out of your hands helps alot. I can easily see the savings going up. Setting money aside for specific things really helps you see where things go. I made a car maintenance budget of around $130 a month. Our car is new and still has a factory warranty but the kids car does not and even though the boy and hubby can change the oil it still costs something. Plus putting money aside for any little repairs that may come up and for tires make things easier.

I hope to have a few new recipes for you tomorrow with the theme of single serving desserts. I found a chocolate chip cookie recipe for the kiddos and a skinning apple pie for Mr Ladybug and I.

End of the week summary

I was under the grocery budget again this week by $45 but Mr Ladybug and I decided to take a class on making kombucha and it cost $20. Since to continue making it will require items from the grocery store I used the extra this week to pay for it. I also bought 3 bags of popping corn which will last for the year and 8 boxes of cereal which will last a while as well. I found some marinara sauce for 49 cents so I bought 4 jars even though I didnt need it and a trip to Trader Joes with my friend had me buying the dried ravioli which was not on the list but will make for easy future meals. I am still under $60 this month so far and expect to continue to come in under the remaining weeks of January.

I needed to get gas in my car yesterday and the kids car was half full, I am an optimist, so the boy and I went together to fill up both and that cost $33 which gives our fuel total for the month so far as $58. We probably have one more fill up towards the end of the month and will come in way under what I have budgeted which is good since I will need to move some over to the pets budget.

We needed to buy college game day shirts and hats since our boy is in the pep band and we will be going to a basketball game this weekend. That came out of the clothing budget and even if we were over budget there we dont care because we are so happy to be band parents again. We really miss high school band with our kids.

We have a few dining out options all already paid for with gift card deals I found so thats exciting. Plus we have our bird photography class weather permitting and we will be eating our mushrooms from our mushroom log this weekend as well. Its a wild and crazy weekend on the Urban Farm.

Last night I was asleep before 8:30. I told Mr Ladybug I was tired and I just was out. I woke up around 4:50am thought about getting up and showering and fell back to sleep until the alarm went off at 5:50. That was crazy but very wonderful to sleep that long. Listen to your body. I am infamous for trying to get a million things done before I go to bed and worrying about the things that still need to be done. Sometimes you just need the rest and please take it.

 I am headed out to bake bread with a friend this morning. Enjoy your Friday and I hope you have at least fun thing planned for your weekend.

Bread Stick recipe and a little this and that

You remember the other day I made chocolate syrup just so I wouldnt have to spend money out of my budget to  buy it and it turned out amazing, The same thing happened  when I decided to have spaghetti but didnt want to buy bread sticks. These were the easiest I have ever tried and they were a huge hit. I am going to mess around with this recipe and see how it would work for rolls and maybe even cinnamon rolls.


The Easiest Breadsticks you can make


1 cup warm water
3 Tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 oil
3 cups all purpose flour
3 teaspoons wheat gluten
2 1/2 teaspoons yeast

 Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Place water, yeast and sugar into bowl and let sit for 10 minutes until yeast is foamy. Put in the rest of the ingredients and mix and kneed well until dough is not sticky 5-10 minutes  Roll out onto floured surface into 12X10 square and cut into 1 inch strips. Twist strips and place on baking sheet. Let rise for about an hour and bake for 10-15 minutes. Brush with butter and sprinkle with garlic and parmesan cheese if desired.


Today is grocery store day and I am headed out soon with a buddy. Lets hope all the chatting doesnt lead to buying things I dont need. I have realized that keeping my purchases separate like pet food, groceries, toiletries and cleaning products when purchasing them has kept costs down. This may not be the case for you and if you are trying to budget but you do it differently it doesnt mean you are doing it wrong. I better head out so I am not running late. I will keep you posted on any great deals and my budget totals tomorrow,

Budget Woes

We are in the 9th day of the year and I have already found my first issue with the budget. Remember a few days ago I was talking about how I didnt realize how much we spent on dining out in a month and I also was not really sure what we spent on gas for our cars or our clothing. Well I obviously didnt know how much we spent on feeding our many pets. I had never bought all the pet food all at once before. If you are not a pet owner or are an animal hater you may want to skip this post.


We are the proud pet parents of 4 dogs Atlas the German Shepherd, Balder the Beagle, Thor the Chihuahua and Loki the ?. Loki was added to the mix a back in October he was supposed to be a mini pin. We were pretty sure he was a mix and knew he wasnt going to be a big dog so we didnt care. More on him in a later post he looks like a tiny Rottweiler and hes a hoot. Then we have Socks the cat, Roxie the Ferret, and Athena and Aphrodite the guinea pigs. I really love my piggies and they really love me. Then we have the livestock which are racing pigeons, the chickens I will list their names at a later post with their pics and the rabbits. I forgot the thousands of bees but your flowers feed them so not worries there.

So the dogs, cat, ferret and piggies were how I was shopping for yesterday. I had their food budget and the outdoor animals food lumped together at $150 a month, I normally buy animal food whenever one of them is out and grab it with the groceries which is actually a huge mistake when you start budgeting. I have even started separating toiletries and cleaning when grocery shopping to keep them all straight. I was also guilty of running to grab dog food and grabbing something else that caught my eye instead of sticking to a plan. So no more impulse buying, When really starting out or all over budgeting you almost have to do this to really see what you are buying and where. This is really where using cash comes in handy too. I dont use cash for all my purchases but if you are new to this budget things I highly recommend it.

I sat down and compared prices online for Walmart, Petsmart and Amazon. I was really surprised Petsmart was my cheapest option and if you order online and pick up in store you save an extra 5%. I will be taking advantage of that savings next month I needed to go in store to compare size and prices. My first stop was to Kroger where I purchased and only purchased a $150 Petsmart gift card. For that I scored 300 fuel points or 30 cents off per gallon of gas. We always take both cars to fill up together so that would be at least $6 savings. I grabbed food, bedding and a new water bottle at Petsmart and the total came to $167. Yikes I did purchase a $10 water bottle for the piggies since I am having leaking issues with theirs. So technically we are looking at $157 and if I ordered online would have saved that extra 5% It would have come out at $150.  The issue with the budget is I still have $50 I need for the outside animals feed. Its not like we dont have the money I just have to take from either savings which I dont want to do or from other categories which I have some over estimated. I only hope I dont run into more of these issues but if I do I will get them ironed out and stick to my budget.

One of the things I hear alot as to why people dont budget or plan or coupon is that they just dont have all the time for it or its not worth all the work. Seriously it took me 10 minutes to compare my prices online and 5 minutes to run into Kroger and grab a card to save an extra $16 a month.  Thats almost $200 a year and could be more with higher fuel point earning and when things are on sale. There are also deals on apps that pay you back sometimes. We are saving over $50 a month from keeping up with our dining out costs. Once I add in coupons and meal planning you are looking at lots of little savings that really add up.

Most of the stores have a new ad that comes our on Wednesdays so today I will look through them stock up on things that we need or will need and that are on sale. Last week I was able to grab the kids favorite poptarts for $1 off per box just because there was some sort of game code that had expired on the box. I bought 6 boxes.

I hope your budgeting is running smoother than mine and if it isnt just reevaluate it. Every day is a new day to start over and it will get easier.

Chocolate Syrup Recipe

Yesterday before the girl left for class I told her I was going to make brownies and she immediately said that we also needed ice cream which I did not have. I told her I didnt want to go out and get ice cream because I knew that she would also want chocolate syrup and I have been basking in the knowledge of having that extra $45 left from last week grocery trip.  That girl is really cute shes also graduating from college this year and I know that moving out will not be to far away and she wont be living at home to bake brownies for forever and then I find myself to start tearing up. We needed more apples anyway since she and the boy managed to eat the 3lbs of apples I bought last Thursday. I had reserved a movie at Redbox for .27 so I asked the boy if he would mind stopping at Kroger to get apples, ice cream and my movie on their way home from class. He was fine with that so I gave him an envelope with $20, the list of two things and my debit card to get the movie. They return home with my movie, the apples and TWO things of ice cream. I asked why two and they said because they were on sale 2 for $5. I guess thats not terrible. The girl pulled out a bag she was carrying with caramel sauce which I pointed out was not on my list and she told me that she knew that and that her brother would not use the money I gave them since I didnt put it on the list and made her buy it with her own money. I seriously love that boy! Its really easy when you are trying to stick with a budget when everyone is on board.

I knew that they would want chocolate syrup and since I didnt want to add more to my shopping trip I had made syrup before but didnt have my recipe. I looked around on line and found some but nothing really sounded awesome. I was talking to my sister and we came up with out own recipe and there will never be store bought syrup again.

Mrs Ladybugs Chocolate Syrup

1 1/2 cups sugar
1 cup cocoa powder
1 cup boiling water
a pinch of salt
1 tsp vanilla
1-3 tsps instant coffee granules or use one cup of stout boiling coffee instead of the water.


Mix sugar, cocoa and salt in a sauce pan. Add boiling water and stir well leaving no powder behind. Place on burner and heat on med/high heat until boiling and stir the whole time. Once boiling remove from heat and add vanilla and coffee granules making sure all gets mixed in well. Let cool, put in container and refrigerate. This should last for about a month in fridge.


You can use it to top ice cream, dip for fruit or cookies, to make chocolate milk or eat straight out of the jar with a spoon on those really rough days.

I actually know what day it is.

It can be hard getting into new routines and keeping to a budget or any other goals you have made this year. If you have made some goals but havent started dont worry you have a whole year. If you have already messed up thats okay to. I believe in you and you should believe in you too!

Today is Monday. You have no idea how happy I am to know that. My college kiddos have been off for three weeks. my husband has been off for holidays and has worked a few Saturdays and I have not know which way is up. I love them dearly and have actually enjoyed all the extra time we have spent together but I need a good routine to function properly.

You can tell its just hoping to eat one of my babies!

Yesterday I got a few mediocre hawk photos but this time the hawk was in the sky and not in my pigeon loft or chicken coop. Hopefully in the coming weeks my pictures will be a little less mediocre and more fabulous since Mr Ladybug found us a free class on Winter Bird photography at our local Wild Birds Unlimited this Saturday. We are also thinking of joining a photography club to learn so new tricks. You are never to old to learn something new.

The budget is going on week 2 and things are looking great! I have my extra $45 for groceries, We didnt need to put fuel in either cars this week, I used $8 of the clothing budget, spent $12 total from the Christmas fund and $3 from the birthday/special holiday fund on some cute valentines things for my family. FYI Valentines Day is one of my favorite holidays and if you are interested in swapping Valentines Day cards with me let me know. I will be sending out a notice on social media for any friends interested.

I figured that yesterday we harvested 1 cup of greens for our breakfast and dinner meals. Not too bad for January. The lettuce is coming along nicely and its about time to plant some more sprouts since I will be using most of the ones we have going this week in our meals. We have the lettuce on a grow mat but everything else is just under a grow light. Yesterday I planted two small containers of radish sprouts. One I placed under a normal lamp and the other in my kitchen window to see if you could grow them without a grow light for those who may not want to purchase one.

Lettuce

Mirco greens, They grow an inch a day. I am going to harvest the radish in the back and get more planted today. 

Look at the mushrooms. My daughter asked what if we eat them and die. I said we will die happy because we grew mushrooms.

I actually had a longer post today but the cat walked across the keyboard and its all gone. Oh well that my cue to get off here and get busy with other things.

This is last nights dinner. I was so proud of the cost of this. I found  sirloin for $2.99/lb so we had steak, potatoes and salad for around $5 total for 4 people. 

Never miss breakfast.

Yesterday we got to sleep in and just take the morning slow and boy did we. We decided to use the gift card to the new place we hadnt been to for lunch and decided to skip breakfast. Our normal mexican place serves lunch at 11 so around 10 I checked the new places website and it didnt open until Noon. I think by noon we all were very hangry. We leave the house at 11:50 and find out that the garage was flooded since we have gotten so much rain lately. We get to the new mexican place and it wasnt opened and there was no one inside. We even tried to call and no one answered.  So we went to our normal place and were able to eat by 1.

We got back and started pulling things out of the garage to get it cleaned up. Luckily this is only the second time in 25 years that it has flooded but that other time taught us to put things that can soak up water off the ground so it was mostly just pushing the water out.

While Mr Ladybug was using the shop vac I went around to the back to feed the chickens. pigeons and rabbits. I thought it was very odd that the chickens were inside their coop and not in the run and then all of a sudden our cat who actually normally hangs out in the back part of the yard to run off other birds and squirrels pounced on the screened windows of the pigeon coop and they freaked out. I scolded him and opened the door to the coop only to have all the pigeons come racing out all freaked out and thats when I saw a hawk on the loft. I closed the door and started yelling for Mr Ladybug. We get the hawk out of the loft safely, especially since it illegal to kill them, but now I am missing 10 pigeons one of which he ate in the loft.

I have been wanting to get a pic of a hawk but getting one in my loft was not what I had in mind!

Sooo just to add icing on the already messed up cake for the day the post I started working on for making sour cream will be postponed since the cream did not sour. We have made it so many times without any problems.

Maybe I will post the finished correctly sour cream later this week.

So maybe all the crazy didnt happen because I didnt eat breakfast but I decided not to risk it this morning and made sure we ate a good one. So far so good.

I really love Sundays I usually go over the dinner menu I made earlier in the week and plan out what we will eat what day according to when everyone will be home. Tues and Thursdays the boy has band practice until 6 so I like to have something that stays warm in the oven. The girl hasnt given me her schedule yet but last semester I tried to get her dinner to her by a certain time in the afternoon so she could reheat it before she tutored. Then I have to figure out who needs packed lunches and make bread and bake. Mr Ladybug and I were watching something on tv last night and there were eating cookies and coffee. Both of us were wanting a cookie so bad so I am off to make oatmeal raisin cookies for tonight.