Frugal Friday! Week of October 21-27, 2018

Hi Everyone!

How was your week last week???  Mine was extra extra busy!  Our daughter was invited to be a substitute violist with the local high school orchestra.  To start with, they do not have enough violists in their orchestra, only having three high school students and one retired gentleman who plays with them. Then, the situation was that their lead violist--one of the high school students--was going to be away on a mission trip helping out with the recent hurricane victims in Florida.  This in itself would be alright--but the problem was that the orchestra had a performance this past weekend at a church close by in Georgia.  So my daughter was asked if there was any way that she could fill in for the missing student, and play with the orchestra even though she is not a student at that school.  She was happy for the opportunity to both help out, as well as the opportunity to play with an orchestra, so she said "Yes!"  Then we arranged our homeschool schedule so that she could go and join them for two practices last week, so she would have had at least a LITTLE experience playing the songs that they were going to be performing--though one of the music pieces was still handed to her that morning at the church they were playing at.  Good time for improving your sight-reading skills! :)  The high school actually had four practices last week, but we have our own schedule and my daughter had previous commitments during two of the high school practice times.  But God blessed, and when the orchestra played at the church, I thought they sounded very very nice, and I could tell the church members were very happy to have this music addition to their church program that day.  My daughter greatly enjoyed doing it, and I was SO thankful that I had already purchased her a full length black dress at a local thrift shop for .75 cents, as this was exactly what she needed to wear to match what the high school orchestra players were going to be wearing.  Sure, her dress was a slightly different style, but overall a full length black dress is a full length black dress!  Besides that--she was a volunteer!  The high school teacher was so thankful for the extra viola player that he said he would take her wearing anything!  We teased her that she could wear a bright pink dress, and then would REALLY stand out amongst all the orchestra players wearing black!  Being a teenager herself, however, she did not see my husband's and my humor in this pink dress suggestion, and declared that she would much rather blend in with everyone else! ;)

This invitation for her to play has given me a heads up that it would probably not be a bad idea to add in a few other black clothes to her wardrobe, as black is a traditional color for musicians to wear when preforming.  It is not a color that my daughter chooses to wear for her every day clothes, but I think I will keep my eyes open for a few more clothing pieces, especially since she is a hard size to find.  I would like to get her a black cardigan that she could wear over her short sleeve black dress.  I saw one girl in the orchestra who was wearing a soft cardigan over her orchestra dress, and I thought this was a smart idea, especially for winter time coming up.  Then I would also like to find her a pair of nice black dress pants, as well as a silky type of black blouse.  Then with those things, I think she could "fit in" with most music attires of groups that she may be invited to play with.  If I keep my eyes open ahead of time, I have a better chance of finding items at a good price.  She has already been approached by a second music teacher at a different school in this area, and asked if she can help out with music on two different dates this Christmas season, so her name is getting "out there" in the pool of names of student players in this area, and it seems that EVERYONE is short on viola players!

Besides being prepared ahead of time with my daughter's black dress, other things I did this past week to save my family money included ordering some food in bulk through a food co-op for some items that I like to purchase in bulk.  Things that I like to order this way include my rolled oats--I order them in 50 lb. bags, and the price is around $30 some dollars.  I also order my quick oats this way.  You do not need to order 50 pounds--they sell lots of things in smaller packages, like one or five pound bags.  But the larger containers do tend to cost a bit less when you divide it out to price per pound of food.  And we use a LOT of oats, since I make all our own granola, and I also use it for regular oatmeal, for my oatmeal bread, etc.  And since I have a basement for bulk food storage, it works for me!  I simply store my bulk oats in several buckets with lids that I purchased from Walmart, and I have never had any problems with the food going bad.  I also order things like shelf stable silken tofu, steel cut oats, 7 grain cereal, bulgar wheat, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds, nutritional yeast, etc.  And this time, I ordered a large box of dried dates for the first time.  My nuts and seeds I do store in my extra freezer, as they will go bad after a while if you are not using them up fast enough.  Since I have an extra freezer, I just store them in the freezer.  The co-op I am ordering with makes stopes all over the U.S.  If you have never tried ordering through Azure Standard, you might enjoy looking at their web site and seeing if they have any drops in your location.  If they do, and you want to try them out, I would love it if you would use my referral link!  It won't cost you anything extra at all, but if a new customer makes a $100 order and uses my referral link, Azure will give me a credit of $25!  Here is the link to the web site:

Azure Standard

And you will need to type in my Share code, which is: SusanMenzmer1.  If you order using my share code--thank you!  I appreciate it greatly!

Another way I saved money last week was by stocking up on small half size notebook paper when I found it for a good price.  I like doing my Bible Study notes in those small, half size binders.  They are just a good size for me, and the half size makes it close to the same size as my Bible, and it just fits together well for when I am carrying both to church, storing on my book shelf, etc.  Anyway, of course, with the half size binders, you need to use the half size binder paper.  I "can" simply cut my computer printer paper in half and three hole it to fit, and I do this sometimes, but mostly I am keeping hand written notes and I REALLY like having the faint lines on my paper all printed out for me, and so I like to buy the packages of filler paper to fit the binder.  Well, I guess the half size binders are not so popular as they used to be, because I have had an increasingly hard time in finding the paper packs to fit them.  I used to be able to get the paper at our college book store, but they no longer carry that size.  Then I used to be able to find them at Walmart, but my Walmart stopped carrying them as well.  So now I am pretty much forced to purchase them from an office supply store like Office Depot or Staples, and the Staples price is $4.00 for each pack and the Office Depot price is even more!  And I have not found a good price on Amazon either.  Anyway, so I pretty much give in and simply try to get some every now and then when I have a coupon for Staples, to help take a bit off of the price.  I use around one pack of paper each month, at the rate that I take notes on my Bible studies, so I have decided that my Bible studies are worth it to me.  BUT--I happened to be passing a shelf section in my Walmart last week and they had some extra things out for holiday season, and I could not believe it but they had the packs of half size binder paper!  I figured they would probably not be any cheaper than the paper was at Staples, and I am not out currently as the last time I had a Staples coupon I stocked up a little bit, but I thought just in case I would go and price check one of the Walmart paper packets.  Well, I was very surprised when it rang up at $1.88!!!!  The price scanner also indicated that it was a "holiday pack."  Well, I did not see anything holiday-ish about this paper pack, but that DID tell me that it probably isn't going to be carried all the time, but is just there for now.  So you know what they say--"Make hay while the sun shines!"  Yes--I went back to the shelf and bought every single package of the half size binder paper that they had!  Which was only 12 packages, so I viewed it as a good investment in my next year's worth of Bible study notes!  At that price, it saved me a little more than half the cost I would have had to pay if purchasing from an office supply store.  And the paper isn't going to spoil while it waits for me to get around to using it!

I shared last time about making my own home baked French Fries, and several readers commented that they would enjoy more details on how I make them, so this is for those interested! :)  It is super easy!

Step 1:  Wash and scrub your baking potatoes good.  Leaving the skin on keeps the fiber in, as most of the fiber in a potato is located in the skin.  Cut out if there are any bad spots or eyes growing, then cut your potato in half length-wise and then slice into large French fry lengths.  These are like the large wedge fries you find at theme parks, not the skinny fries from fast food places.

Step 2:  Lay your French Fries out in a single layer on a baking sheet.  You will need to either spray your baking sheet with some type of non-stick cooking spray, or use a non-stick mat under them.  I have a non-stick mat, so that is what I use.

Step 3:  Give a very light spray with non-stick cooking spray, and then immediately sprinkle with a little salt.  Don't go overboard on the salt--too much is not good for you, but even adding some salt on the surface of these will still be much less salt than what is on the commercially made fries!  You can also sprinkle with other spices as well.  Sometimes I sprinkle with a little cumin, or with some garam masala, which is an Indian spice blend.  Really, your imagination is the limit here!

Step 4:  Bake in a preheated oven at 400 degrees F, for around 20-30 minutes, until the French Fries are starting to brown on top.

Step 5:  Flip your French Fries, and continue to bake another 20 minutes or so.

Step 6:  Pile in a large pile on your plate, and devour with a little yummy catsup while they are still hot!

I hope you like this recipe for baked French Fries as much as we do!  They are so much healthier than the fries that take a bath in oil and grease, but besides that they are just plain yummy!

Do you have any home made recipes that you make instead of purchasing a food at a fast food restaurant?   Share something you did or made to help save money for your family this week--I would love to hear what you have to share!

~Susan

Frugal Friday! Week of October 14-20, 2018

Happy Friday Everyone!

How has your week been? Last weekend my hubby had a long weekend as it was Fall Break at the college that he works at. So we planned a short little vacation, up to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park—“my” park! I love going there, even though our family is not exactly hard core hikers or anything—well, our daughter would happily be a hard core hiker, but her parents are more the easy hike kind of people! 😉 Anyway, so last week I spent a lot of time prepping food to take with us. When we go, we like to “camp” in a tiny tiny cabin that is owned by a very sweet couple. Their place is more a small RV camping place, but they have just three tiny cabins, which works perfectly for us. The cabins have a small kitchen area, which works for both saving money on eating out, AND it helps me stay out of the ER as I have to be very careful of what I eat, having an intolerance to oils and fats that are added into so many foods these days!

ANYWAY, so we had a little budget vacation, and it was wonderful! Things that we did to save money included:

*Being repeat customers at our rental cabin, the owners give us a small discount. This saved us $25!

*Brought all our own food from home. I had prepped most of it ahead of time, so while at the cabin I really felt like I also had a break from regular duties.

*Came home from camping trip with leftover spaghetti. Added broccoli and leftover sauce, and it was enough for one more meal, which was both economical as well as helpful since I didn’t have any meals prepared and waiting at home!

*Brought leftover bananas home from trip, and put in freezer for smoothies since they were getting a bit on the spotted side of things.

*Made home made baked French fries one day for our lunch.  Yup--that is all we ate for the entire meal.  A huge plate of hot and crunchy, yummy French fries!  Since they are baked, I do not feel guilty at all when we do this!  Let me know if any of you are interested in how I make these, and I can share more on them another time if there is interest.

*Found a book at a Free Little Library that will be perfect for a family member. Tucked it away to add to other Christmas presents.

*Returned to our closest thrift store, to look once again for more winter clothes for our daughter. This was the same store where we found the hand made wool skirt last week. I could not believe my eyes when I found on the rack a second hand made, wool skirt, made from the same pattern as the skirt we bought last week! Obviously the same person made both skirts, but this second skirt was not out on the rack last week when we bought the first one! My daughter and I were both thrilled! I wish I could let the person who made and later donated these skirts know how much we appreciate them, and that their hard work in making them is very much being appreciated and is a blessing to our family! I have used up my gift certificates that my daughter and I both received for our birthdays since we volunteer there, but I didn’t complain at all that the skirt cost me $3.25. I cannot purchase the fabric for that price, let alone the pattern, thread, zipper, etc.!

Here is one happy teen daughter, modeling her "new" skirt that fits her PERFECTLY.

Here is a close up of the skirt, where you can see the very neatly done pleats on the side.  One thing we joke about is my daughter tells me that when she grows up, she wants to "be a size."  This is because she can sometimes fit in the largest children's sizes, and sometimes fit into the smallest women's sizes, but other times we cannot find ANYTHING in the stores at all to fit her!  So there is no blanket "size" that we can go to the store and pick and know that it will fit her.  So here comes along these two hand made skirts, that fit her perfectly--but of course, with them being hand made there is no size tag in the skirts at all.  So my daughter says she is STILL "not a size!" Perhaps not, but at least she now is blessed with two beautiful skirts to wear this fall and winter!

Well that was our Week! How has your week been, and what did you find to save this week?

Frugal Friday! Week of October 7 - 13, 2018

Good Morning!

I had several of you ask me for my home made granola bar recipe, so I finally took a moment to type it up for you.

As I mentioned last week, it is not frugal in the way of dollars, as the nuts and seeds that are in it are not inexpensive to purchase.  But if you are like me, and have to be very careful about what you eat, it can still be a frugal recipe over purchasing the high end granola bars!  And, of course, if having things at home ready to pack your own lunch encourages you to do so instead of purchasing your meal out, well, that can be money saving as well!  So following is the recipe I used, with the few tweeks I made:

Granola Bars

1 1/2 c. mashed ripe banana (about 3 large)
1 tsp. vanilla
2 c. rolled oats
1/2 c. dried cranberries
1/2 c. walnuts, chopped
1/2 c. sunflower seeds
1/2 c. pepita seeds (these are hulled pumpkin seeds--I found my package at Aldi's!)
1/2 c. chopped almonds
1/4 c. flax seed, ground
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. salt

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Lightly spray a large baking dish (9x13) with baking spray, and line with a piece of parchment paper with some hanging over the edges, so the bars are easier to remove.

2. In a large bowl, mash the banana until smooth.  Measure to make sure you have 1 1/2 c.  If you have extra mashed banana, freeze it and use it later in a smoothie.

3. Stir in the vanilla.

4. Place the oats into a food processor (or blender on lowest speed) and pulse until the oats are coarsely chopped but still have texture. Stir the chopped oats into the banana mixture.

5.  Stir the dried fruit, walnuts, sunflower and peptic seeds, almonds, flax seed, cinnamon, and salt into the banana-oat mixture until thoroughly combined.  The dough will be very heavy and a bit wet.

6.  Spoon the mixture into the prepared dish.  With lightly wet hands, smooth out until even and uniform.  Press down on the dough until compacted.

7.  Bake for 22-26 minutes, until firm and lightly golden along the edges.

8.  Place the dish on a cooling rack for 10 minutes, then carefully slide a knife to loosen the ends and gently lift out.  Place the slab on a cooling rack until completely cool.

9.  Once cool, slice into bars.  I used a pizza slicer and it easily cut through the dried fruit and nuts.  Wrap leftovers individually in wax paper and tape closed.  Store in a large freezer gallon bag in the freezer.

I hope this recipe helps some of you out who cannot eat the processed, commercially made granola bars! Or those who simply want to eat more healthy, and avoid all the added sugars and such that are of necessity put into the shelf stable products.

So on to this week--my daughter and I went shopping at a local thrift store, looking for clothes for her.  She is at that difficult to find size--just barely out of the children's sizes, yet not quite big enough to consistently fit in the ladies sizes!  We managed to find a pair of jeans for her that were a ladies size 2, for around $3.00 I believe. They MOSTLY fit--the waist is a tiny bit big, but she has a belt so can take care of it that way.  Then, on a second trip a day or so later, we found a lovely hand made wool skirt for $3.25. It is a plaid skirt, and I am amazed at how well the plaid is lined up at the sides, as well as the neatness of the pleats, etc.  I have a little clothing sewing experience on simple garments, and this skirt was very well made!  The picture does not do it justice--it is just adorable on my daughter, but since I did not get a picture of her in the skirt, this pic will have to do! 

It is not really crooked as this pic makes it look--it was hanging on the hanger all crazy!  But it will at least give you an idea of what it looks like.  It matches her white sweater, her gray sweater, her black sweater, and looks pretty good with a dark blue sweater, all of which she already had.  Now we just need the weather to turn cold enough that she is needing to wear wool and sweaters and such!  And both the jeans as well as this wool skirt were purchased with the last bit of my $10 gift certificate that the thrift store gave me for my birthday, since I am one of their volunteers!  I would volunteer for them anyway, but I sure have appreciated their giving me a birthday gift certificate!!!

What did you do this week to save money???

Leave your answer in the comments. :)

~Susan

Frugal Friday! Week of September 30-October 6, 2018

Happy October Everyone!

Is it feeling like Fall where you are?  It is not at all around here, but I am trying to remind myself that this winter it will indeed turn cold, and so I should be enjoying this 86 degree weather. . . and I am trying.  I just would like it to cool down enough to have the windows open regular.  I would like not using the air conditioner, and not using the heater--those are my kind of temps!  I even saw from NOAA weather that we really WERE about 10 degrees hotter than the average September temperatures, so no wonder I was thinking it should be cooling down.  We even broke a record for the last September high set in 1925!

But on to this week!  At first, I thought I didn't do anything to save money this week.  But I sat and thought for a little bit, and realized that I did, even though it wasn't saving money by finding all these great deals in the store.

*Since I loved the shirts I got from Duluth Trading Company so much, I went ahead and ordered two more.  They were on sale a little bit, but still not at all what I would call cheap or money saving.  HOWEVER--I was .01 cent away from hitting their amount to receive free shipping, and I decided to call and talk with a customer service representative.  I explained my situation, and they immediately offered to give me free shipping anyway.  Not being afraid to ask ended up saving me $11.99 in shipping charges!  I wouldn't have been upset if they had not been able to do this for me, but I figured it was fine to ask, and if they could they would and if they couldn't then it was just not something they were allowed to do. I am glad I asked!

*I accepted two bags of nutritional yeast flakes--yummy!  Perhaps you have never heard of nutritional yeast flakes--I hadn't until I got married, and my husband used it on his popcorn.  I thought he was a bit strange, but chalked it up to him being from California and me from Michigan! But once I tried it, I LOVED nutritional yeast!  I mainly use it on popcorn, but it can also be used to make a rather cheesy flavored kind of sauce to use in different things, and since I can no longer eat dairy of any kind, that makes it pretty useful for me!  Anyway, my dear friend that I go over and help each week as she is disabled, she has signed up for the auto refill sort of thing from Amazon, and is receiving her nutritional yeast faster than she can eat it so she offered me two bags, which I gladly accepted. It makes my friend feel good to be able to bless me with some gifts now and then, as a "thank you" for my helping her.  She knows I am MORE than happy to help her out, because I know she truly needs the help--but at the same time, it is always nice to receive a little thank you of appreciation as well.  So this will bless my family, and it makes my friend feel good to be able to gift me something for my helping her.

*I accepted a free scarf when it was offered to me.  My same friend orders most of her clothes from Amazon, because she is disabled and it is very difficult for her to get out and go clothes shopping.  Sometimes, something that she ordered ends up being a different color than it looked to her on her computer, so I help her package it back up and drop it off at the post office for her.  Well, she had ordered a scarf which ended up being a lighter color than she had expected.  She showed it to me and asked if I liked it, and I truthfully told her I thought it was beautiful, so she immediately gifted it to me.  I wore it the very next day!  It is lovely, and I will happily be reminded of my sweet friend every time I wear it.

*I attended a meeting at our church, where they showed a video on the Bible lands.  I loved seeing pictures of places where Jesus grew up!  This video was from a series the church is showing.  They purchased the set, and have permission to show it in a public setting.  By going to the church to watch it, "I" don't have to buy the set, so it is free entertainment as well as free education for me!

 *I made home made "granola bars."  I have tried home made granola bars several times before, but have never had much luck with them holding together well.  And now, my eating is even more difficult because I was pre-diabetic a few years ago, and knew I did not want to continue down the diabetic road, so changed the way I was eating and no longer use almost any refined sugar at all.  Just a tiny tiny bit, mostly in a tablespoon or so that goes into my bread making.  But overall, have cut WAY back on what I used to eat of it.  Well, I found a recipe that used mainly bananas to sweeten, and no refined sugar so I thought I would try it.

 After baking it as one block, the recipe said to cool completely and then to use a pizza cutter to cut it into blocks.  I was amazed at how well they held together when I did cut them apart!  Yea!

Then I wrapped them individually in wax paper and taped them closed. To keep them longer term, I placed all of these individual packages inside a gallon zip freezer bag, and placed them in the freezer. This way I can take out just the number that we need for a lunch.  I actually do not think this is an inexpensive recipe, so it is not saving money in the traditional way, as they are filled with nuts and seeds and dried fruit in addition to the banana, and those are not inexpensive ingredients by any means!  So I almost did not list this activity as a money saving one, but finally decided that since it fits along the lines of how I need to eat these days, it is still probably money saving if you compared it to purchasing a super healthy type of premade granola bar.  It is just not going to look like saving money if you are comparing it to the regular granola bars that have refined sugar, oil, and other ingredients like that in them.  So compared to their "type," I am still going to say they are money saving.  And if you think about how when I feed my body correctly, I have reversed my pre-diabeties and get to avoid doctor visits, and all the medications and such that go along with diabetes, well, it is all part of staying as healthy as I can.

*I packed lunches from home for a lunch time health talk at my husband's work.  Remember those granola bars I just talked about?  Well they came in handy this week when my husband's work had a health talk that they call a "Lunch N Learn."  They have these every now and then, and employees are encouraged to bring their lunches and listen to the speaker.  Since I am covered by my husband's health insurance, I get to come if I want to as well.  After all, keeping me healthy also helps save his employer money in health care costs.  I really enjoy all of the Lunch N Learns that I have been able to attend.  This one was on being physically active, and the speaker was one of the P.E. teachers at my husband's college.  She talked about the difference between exercise, training, and movement.  It was very interesting and I learned some new things.  Many of the people attending just buy a lunch at the cafe or at the food bar in the Wellness Center where the meetings take place.  But I brought lunches for myself, my daughter, and my husband, and we all met at the meeting room and ate lunch together.

*I turned in receipts for a reimbursement.  How easy it is to let things get forgotten whenever there is something we are going to get a reimbursement for!  And whenever we do that--surprise, surprise--we don't get the reimbursement!  I had a lot of receipts for homeschool expenses that my husband's employer would actually reimburse us for, so I made sure to actually get the turned in and the reimbursement came this week.  Yes, I did have to actually spend the money in order to get the reimbursement, but that is just fine with me.  We are blessed beyond measure to have this benefit, and it means my daughter has a better education because of it!  Turning in these receipts ended in our being reimbursed for $758.  I would say that was worth organizing my receipts and filling out the proper form!

Well, that's it for me for this week!  Leave a comment below and tell me one (or more) thing that you did to save money for your family this week--I would love to hear!  And if anyone wants my home made granola bar recipe--knowing that the ingredients are not the cheapest--let me know and I will try and get it on here.  But if you don't ask, I am going to assume there is not any interest. 

Have a great week!  

~Susan