Layout:
Home > Archive: August, 2010

Archive for August, 2010

I used a coupon!

September 1st, 2010 at 12:12 am

Granddaughter was out of milk and she needs the Lactaid type. I actually remember I had cut a $1.00 coupon out of a magazine for Lactaid. I usually get Darigold because it is cheaper than Lactaid, but with the $1.00 coupon, Lactaid was cheaper than the non-name brand (in this case Lucerne since I went to Safeway).



So I bought that along with a $1.00 bag of spinach and $1.00 chopped up mushrooms for tonight's pork stir-fry dinner. Pork was given to us by the neighbors when they moved so San Diego.

I have about $20.00 left in cash for the week, but I only took out $100.00 instead of $200.00. I am still tweaking how much to take out since I am still using AMEX to buy gas at Costco (cheapest place to buy it).

What happened?????

August 30th, 2010 at 12:38 am

Did I read the P&G site incorrectly. I could have sworn the San Francisco Chronicle was going to have the Proctor and Gamble Super Saver in it this weekend. So I spent $3.00 to buy a Chronicle and no P&G saver.

It seems like printing coupons is expensive the way my printer goes through ink cartridges.

Part of me thinks I should just stay away from coupon sites because I just find myself getting frustrated reading about everyone else's great deals.

Inspired by Jefferey....

August 26th, 2010 at 04:19 pm

I am going to try couponing, but slowly. My local paper has Smartsource only. Most grocery stores do not have coupons having around (like I have seen when back East visiting my daughter), and no one ever doubles.

But what the heck. I go into CVS on Monday to try to take advantage of their ad for P&G products, get $10.00 back when spending $25.00. Well it so happened we were on our last toilet paper AND paper towel roll. I was just sick and I love Puffs! I am all set.

So I snatch up the Charmin and Bounty, go find the Puffs 3-pack I saw pictured in the ad. Darn Diet Pepsi is already gone (4/$10).

Long line at checkout. I leave, and guess what, no $10.00 off next purchase. My receipt says $22.98 met for extra bucks. Oh well, I have to get home. I will stop and get Pepsi and fulfill the rest for the $10.00 rebate later in the week.

Yesterday, back in town for glaucoma testing. Go to same CVS. Aaahh Diet Pepsi is in. Pick up 4 of them for DH (I occasionally drink Diet Coke, Pepsi yuck!), go find the single puffs boxes, pick up 3. Go to check out, the man in front of me is buying tennis balls that ring up the wrong price. Off the check and he go to check the price. I wait patiently (now that I don't have a job, it is way easier to stand in line without getting irritated).

My turn, the puffs do not ring up 99 cents. He checks the ad. I have the big boxes, it is for smaller boxes. How many places in the store does CVS have tissues? Apparently more than I thought. I go off to aisle 25 to find the right box (not by the pharmacy where I found the ones I had).

Back in line, everything rings up. I spend my last $23.00 cash for the week for groceries because of the diet pepsi and the Fiber 1 cereal I purchased. Long line in back of me. I was not going to separate out and pay with my separate envelopes of cash!

Which makes me think I should just lump my grocery/household spending into one cash category, then I would not have that delimma.

Onto Costco to fill up the truck (daughter and SIL are using my Camry while SIL is home on predeployment leave, since their cars are both in SC, where they actually live). Regular gas is $3.119999 a gallon at Costco (cheapest place to buy gas here). Why are gas prices in Humboldt County usually highest in the nation?

My advice for the Day

August 24th, 2010 at 02:00 am

If you have lots to do and are very motivated, do not drink a glass of wine with hummus and crackers at 5:00 p.m.

Suddenly all I feel like doing is drinking another glass of wine and doing nothing......

She is 2 today!

August 18th, 2010 at 09:28 pm

Two years ago I became a grandmother. One of the best days of my life!





I think I am being pretty restrained, here are her gifts. I finished the sweater last weekend in Tahoe.



She is spending the day in Disneyland with her daddy (who is deploying to Afghanistan soon) and my daughter, her mommy. Hopefully she is better today after being seen in the ER with an allergic reaction apparently to Japanese food. My daughter said 15 minutes after they gave her Benadryl and something else (probably a steroid), who face swelling went down considerably. She was having croupy sounding breathing too. Very scary. They missed their breakfast with Minnie and Mickey.

Also Campfrugal asked for the recipe and here it is:

PEANUT BUTTER BLOSSOMS

1 3/4 c. flour
1/2 c. sugar
1/2 c. peanutbutter (smooth)
1/2 c. brown sugar, packed
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 c. shortening
2 tbsp. milk
1 tsp. vanilla
1 pkg. Hershey Kisses

Mix all ingredients together except for Kisses. Drop by spoonful, shape into ball, roll in sugar.
Bake at 375 degrees 10 to 12 minutes on ungreased cookie sheet. Remove from oven. Press Kiss on cookie and let cool.

I generally double the recipe and use dark chocolate kisses. I don't roll in sugar, and I usually put back into the oven to let the kisses melt a little bit. I also use butter instead of shortening.

Happy August 18th!

Busy, Busy, Busy.....

August 18th, 2010 at 04:12 am

First of all, I am so proud to say we did not eat out during our entire Tahoe visit. We did buy deli sandwiches in Reno while bridal dress shopping with MD. On the drive home, we stopped in Redding, CA to pick up some serving dishes we loaned for the family wedding, and I got deli meat, cheese and mayo along with some Costco rolls out of the ice chest and made sandwiches.

DH must be getting kind of used to me being a housewife, because he told me "I want 2" as he passed through the kitchen with another load of serving dishes, hauling them to the truck.

Monday was a mad work around the house day, unpacking, laundry, cleaning the house.

Today I cooked and helped DH prepare for his annual bow hunting trip. I baked peanut blossoms, made macaroni salad for the first time, garlic butter, shucked corn and prepared fresh asparagus for roasting.

Then I cleaned the kitchen up after he left. Whew this housewife stuff is tiring!

My disability check arrived on time, our rent check arrived late, but had the late fee added, so I deposited those yesterday.

Need to pay rental house payment tomorrow along with our gigantic AMEX bill. I had physical therapy this morning too. It has been a busy couple of days.

Hello from South Lake Tahoe

August 14th, 2010 at 06:57 pm

Using daughters iPad. Missed Friday the 13th wedding. Unlucky migraine with accompanying severe nausea hit that morning so I missed husband's nephew's wedding. I felt bad as my SIL needed my help, but DH took over my duties in addition to his own barbecuing duties.

We have 3 uncooked tri-tips to take home. That was our contribution to the small family wedding. We also rented a house and have been eating here instead of restaurants.

Wedding was on the lake, and we are heading over to help clean up and DH and future SIL are thinking about a gondola ride up Heavenly.

Dh leaves for his annual bow hunting trip next week and daughter and granddaughter are heading down to pick up Marine SIL in San Diego. So I will be home alone for a few days.

My plan is to get a fall garden in, finish a baby quilt for oldest daughter's friend and sew buttons on granddaughter 's sweater I finished this morning.

Have a relaxing weekend everyone.

For the first time in my adult life......

August 11th, 2010 at 12:26 am

I am unemployed. It's official, I just e-mailed my resignation after talking to my boss (my former employer is several states away). I just reviewed my blog entries and I have not even mentioned taking 3 weeks off work for medical leave. Since my comp injury 1 year ago, I have never taken time off work to try to get better. I finally decided to just take it even if the doctor did not give me total disability (I have been on partial disability for several months). Well my shoulders are much better, but my wrists are worse, so I am keeping this short!

My right hand has a nice little lump of a ganglion cyst and my left hand is numb when I wake up in the morning.

So after discussing with DH, we decided to bite the bullet for a while and let me try to recover or figure out some type of work other than medical transcription.

Now I really have to get frugal!

Tonight is barbecued chicken pizza and I hung out a load of laundry to dry. I went to physical therapy and now need to get packed for our trip to Tahoe tomorrow for a family wedding. The rented house is already paid for and I have menus planned for the entire family. Need to pack up the food I am taking and make a list of what to buy.

Wow is my life going to change. Any advice anyone?

Calling Mrs. Frugalista!!

August 9th, 2010 at 04:35 pm

Well you have probably given up on me, but here is my pizza dough recipe in case you still need it. It is from my Oster bread machine cookbook:


Jim's Pizza Crust

Water 7 to 8 oz.
Salt 1/2 tsp
Olive oil or vegetable oil 2 Tbsp
All purpose flour 3 cups
Active dry yeast 1.5 tsp

Combine all ingredients into bread pan, select dough setting. Start. When signal displays done, blah, blah blah. Pull dough out of maching.

Pat dough into a 12 x 15 inch jelly roll pan or greased 12 inch round pizza pan. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Spread pizza sauce over dough. Sprinkle toppings over sauce. Bake 15-20 minutes or until crust is golden brown.

Back in the days before we had bread machines we used a pizza recipe from the Betty Crocker Breads recipe "book" that we bought after first married almost 32 years ago (first printing 1977), which is where the sauce comes from too:

Pizza
1 package active dry yeast
1 cup warm water (105 to 115 degrees)
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp salt
3 tablespoons salad oil
3 to 3.5 cups all purpose flour
2 tablespoons salad oil

Prepare sauce (recipe to follow). Dissolve yeast in warm water in large mixing bowl. Stir in sugar, salt, 3 tablespoons of oil and 2 cups of the flour. Beat until smooth. Stir in enough remaining flour to make dough easy to handle.

Turn dough onto lightly floured surface, knead until smooth, about 5 minutes. Place in greased bowl; turn greased side up. Cover; let rise in warm place 45 minutes. (Dough is ready if an indentation remains when touched).

Heat over to 400 degrees. Grease 2 jelly roll pans with 2 tablespoons of oil. Punch dough down, divide in half. Roll each half into a rectangle 16 x 11 inches. Place rectangle in each pan.

Spread 1/2 cup sauce over each pizza. Cover with toppings. Sprinkle cheese over top. Bake 25 minutes.

Pizza Sauce
1 can (6 ounces) tomato paste
1/2 cup water
1 tsp salt
1 tsp oregano
1/2 tsp garlic or onion powder
1/8 tsp pepper.

Mix all ingredients. Let stand 1 hour.

Now I find it interesting that I used the Oster recipe to make 1 pizza where as the Betty Crocker recipe says it makes 2. I must like thicker pizza crust.

The last pizza I made and the one I am making tomorrow is a barbecued chicken pizza. I used Sweet Baby Ray's regular barbecue sauce instead of regular tomato sauce. I used 2 chicken breasts just sauteed in some oil with salt and pepper (tonight DH is barbecuing chicken breasts along with tonight's pork for tomorrow's pizza. I used red bell pepper and onions that I sauteed before putting on the pizza and mozarella and cheddar cheese. Chopped cilantro on top of the cheese. Yum! I hope you find this useful.

Mother of the Bride..... again.....

August 4th, 2010 at 01:54 pm

DH and I were running errands on Saturday, both starving and decided to go ahead and be cheap and have hot dogs and soda at Costco instead of spending more money.... Good thing too! Middle daughter's boyfriend called and said he was at our house! What? They live 6.5 hours away in Reno, Nevada. He needs to talk to us. I freak, call oldest daughter and ask if MD's BF if in trouble? No she says.... now you must wonder what is wrong with me. You see he was just here a week before for a friend's funeral and he was turning 30 in a few days. MD and BF have lived together on and off for 9 years! Well his brother and nephew were down from Washington State. We told him we would meet him at Starbucks. By the time we got there, we pretty much knew what it must be. Yes, he asked if he could marry our daughter. DH said yes before he even finished asking.

Sunday BF and his mother came to our house for breakfast before he took off for home. My stomach was in knots all day. What if she said no?? She called at 6:30 p.m. very excited. She said yes.

For some reason I thought this would be a calm wedding situation since they have been together for so long and are 29 and 30, will both be 30 by the time of the wedding, but NOOOOOO!!!! MD and YD were on the phone giggling and crying and she wants to go dress shopping next week with her sisters and I. Luckily we already were planning to go to Tahoe for a wedding on Friday the 13th, so we are leaving a day early so we can all go dress shopping together. She already is searching for venues, trying to figure out the guest list. This is day 2 of engagement!

YD's wedding was planned and executed in 13 days since SIL was deploying for Iraq. We had 13 days of craziness and then had a lovely wedding. In this case, I think we are having 10 months of craziness (tentative date 06/11/11).

Luckily I have our contribution saved (same as the cost of YD's wedding), and am thinking I should put the same amount aside for OD just in case. I'm sure MD's wedding will cost twice as much as YD's. Luckily we are locked in to the cheaper amount! Ha Ha. MD was happy as she said it was more than she was expecting from us anyway.

YD has one of her photos on a billboard at Camp LeJuene, NC, as the welcome home for a battalion from Afghanistan. She had taken the picture previously of a couple and the wife submitted it in a contest and they won! We are very proud of her.