I have not posted in months. Life definitely has gotten in the way.

Our house in Oregon did not sell, but we luckily rented it to a local family who has two boys going to the college my daughter went to.

I have taken a trip back to North Carolina, and DH and I sat down and actually made some written goals.

One of those goals was to not waste so much time on the internet and keep my nose to the grindstone during work day, which I have been doing!

I have continued to read the blogs as much as I can and something that struck me was people talking about blackberries. Here in Northern California, I actually picked more today, but only about two cups. The apples are ripening… it’s Halloween.

I finally feel like I am really getting back to my frugal roots. We have been using up every bit of food we buy and I have at least 12 frozen lunches from leftovers. One of our written goals…

Another was to each get $100.00 allowance each month to spend on whatever we wanted. I bought garden stuff, seeds, lettuce and leeks and some Dr. Earth fertilizer. I still have around $40.00 left. Yesterday I considered asking DH if he wanted to go to a late afternoon movie, then I looked in the newspaper and saw absolutely nothing I was interested in. Good thing as DH could not get away from work.

We had a very tiny garden for the first time in like 20 years (I’m telling you my kids sucked the energy out of us)…



We had a butternut squash, crookneck squash, zucchini squash and assorted herbs. My lettuce and leeks are coming up nicely in Supersoil (the gardening store said it’s the best for starting seeds) and I will transplant them when we finally yank out the squash plants. We actually picked a zucchini over the weekend and the butternut still has a few squash on it growing. The yellow crook neck was pulled already. Some of the herbs are still growing too. I can’t wait for next year. On the flower front, I went over and took 12 cuttings from mom’s perennials and planted in little clay pots to put into the ground next spring. I also took seeds from my assorted annuals (purchased in a complete idiotic spur of the moment in a roll base from QVC like this
http://instantflowergarden.com/

I still have some roll to use next year, but dried all the little seeds and put in little plastic storage containers I found at the Dollar Store. I am also going to plan on planting tomatoes in 5 gallon black plastic containers. I saw someone at the garden store who did that this year and got lots of tomatoes (it’s a little cool here really for tomatoes). The South side of my house will be the perfect no wind, sunny area for them. I can’t wait for next year.

So after a summer, early fall of spending more than I would have liked, we have tightened up the belt, and it feels really good!