Savings and Goals Journal #6

Last week’s Savings and Goals post didn’t happen, so this week will be a summary of the last two weeks. It’s been a busy couple of weeks, but things are leveling out now.

The garden is almost all planted. I still need to plant a few more squash seeds in the little garden behind our house. I started some plants from seed but I think I’d like a few more. It will take a while, but we will save money when the majority of the food on our plate comes from our garden!

Our savings these last weeks weren’t huge. With lots of things going on that are requiring our attention, we are doing our best to stick to our budget.

In the Kitchen

We stuck to our meal plan and actually had some leftovers stretch for an extra day. I love it when I can move a meal to the next week. It means I’ve saved money and those extra leftovers gave me an extra no-cooking day!

Last week’s meal plan:

• Monday: Grilled pork chops and veggies, corn on the cob, cake
• Tuesday: Leftovers
• Wednesday: Broccoli-beef stir-fry, brown rice
• Thursday: Breakfast for dinner: Biscuits, gravy, eggs, fruit
• Friday: Lemon-pepper chicken breasts, mixed vegetables, cilantro-lime rice
• Saturday: Leftovers
• Sunday: Teriyaki burgers, salad

This week’s meal plan:

• Monday: Tostadas
• Tuesday: Chicken stir-fry, rice
• Wednesday: Ham and beans, cornbread
• Thursday: Leftovers
• Friday: Pizza casserole (this is a new recipe I’m trying), salad
• Saturday: Leftovers
• Sunday: Pancakes, eggs, sausage, fruit

My daughter made some banana muffins using some bananas that were too ripe. We are working on stocking the freezer with some homemade snack foods to cut down on the amount of prepackaged things that come into the house.

We got a good deal on chicken breasts. My daughter made a marinade and my husband grilled a bunch of it. We put it in the freezer in meal-sized portions and some smaller portions to add to salads.

We also bought hamburger and portioned out patties for about four meals and put them in the freezer. The rest of it I cooked up and bagged in portions. In one of my cooking books, it says that about 2 1/2 cups of cooked ground beef is equal to a pound. My daughter and I figured we would be able to stretch it much further as ground beef crumbles instead of patties. Meat is just getting more and more expensive.

We made a batch of homemade spreadable butter. I also made a batch of homemade granola.

I inventoried my canning supplies and found that I have plenty of jars. That is a good thing because jars may be difficult to find. I was able to buy lids, so I am set for canning when the tomatoes and green beans start coming in.

In the Garden

Grampy decided that we would go ahead and make the PVC drip irrigation system for the whole small garden this year. So that took a bit of time and an investment of money for the supplies to make it. But, it waters so well that I am happy we went ahead and made the investment. It will water right where the plants are and hopefully will help minimize the weeds I fight with every year. Normally we water using ditches and they often run over and make a mess and the weeds go crazy.

We water the gardens with irrigation water, so the cost of water is a set fee for the year. But we still don’t like to waste it. We also hope having the water right at each plant will help them grow better. We will be able to adapt the watering system for use in our raised beds whenever we get them built.

We used every piece of cattle panel and every t-post we could find around the property to build our trellises for our tomato plants in the large garden area. I much prefer growing my indeterminate (vining) tomato plants this way as opposed to using the cages. I use the cages for my Roma tomatoes. In total between the two gardens, we have 51 tomato plants.

We also used t-posts and some old field fencing to make trellises for our green beans. This is our first year growing pole beans. Usually we grow bush green beans. We are trying pole beans this year because bending over to pick all those green beans makes our backs hurt!

In our larger garden area, my dad has one of those white cargo trailers that we use for storage of garden tools and things. It saves a lot of time having tools and such up there since the garden is all the way across the property. It’s only two acres, but still a distance to tote things.

While I had the water going on the tomato and chile plants, I took on the task of tidying and organizing the storage. Lots of the things stored in there belong to my dad and his wife, so I couldn’t do anything with those except wonder why they are keeping them. I found enough of the green stretchy plant tie to tie up tomato plants this year so I won’t have to buy any.

Home and Family

Our oldest daughter was in an auto accident involving a deer. We are thankful that she is fine, but her car was totaled. So we’ve been busy dealing with insurance and now are on the hunt for a car for her.

So far our auto insurance company has been great to work with. And, with a little flexibility from everyone, we have been able to get her to and from work without too much trouble.

Kids’ Stuff

One morning this week, the grandbabies were extra-fussy while my daughter was cleaning the kitchen after breakfast. I was working out in the yard and heard them from outside. So I came in and the grandbabies and I moved all the furniture in the living room and cleaned beneath it and found all of the missing parts of their toys: puzzle pieces, the shapes for the shape sorter, an alphabet learning “tablet.” Just lots of things that had disappeared under the furniture. So we sorted it all and got everything together and it was like they had new toys! I’m beginning to wonder if they stuff things beneath the furniture on purpose!

It often takes much more time to do a task with the little people “helping,” but I think it is so important to have them be involved in helping tend the home. I remember when my daughters were little, when it was time to mop the kitchen, they would “help” me take the chairs into the living room. Then we would put a blanket over the chairs to make a fort. They would be busy playing in their fort, and I could get the floor mopped. While the floor dried, we would read books in the fort. Then when the floor was all dry, they helped move the chairs back.

Conquering the Clutter

I have begun to attack our clutter with a vengeance! We made two runs to the waste transfer station. The stuff was a combination of boxes and clutter/junk from projects and an old couch from my daughter’s RV remodel and our old barbecue. We were able to recycle any metal items and the cardboard. They do charge a small fee to take things there, but it is closer to our house than the landfill and a lot cleaner. When we first moved here and were remodeling our little house, my husband got a hole in his truck tire twice from going to the landfill. He won’t go there anymore.

I’ve also begun to fill the back of my husband’s truck with items to take to the thrift store now that it is open and accepting donations. And I have a two sacks of books to trade at our local used bookstore.

All of this cleaning out isn’t exactly saving me money, but I truly feel that by having things organized and tidy I will save time and money in the long run. I won’t waste time looking for things and I won’t have to go buy things because I will know what I have and where it is. It is very freeing to let go of things that I no longer use and I’m trying hard to get over the “just-in-case” mindset. If I haven’t used it since I moved here eleven years ago, chances are I never will!