May 2023 Frugal Chat

[walkonby]

woo hoo! The guys are up and the gazebo roof panels are being slotted into place, the chairs and cushions are on the upper deck and Gordon Lightfoot is playing courtesy of Alexa.
Now THAT'S a Saturday afternoon to cheer at! Oh me?? I have a batch of THESE in the oven atm. Gotta give the guys something after all their hard work!

[harbie]

Looks delicious @walkonby but the knife skills gave me the heebie geebies .

2 banana/ chocolate chip/ pecan(can’t stand walnuts) breads are cooking as we speak. It smells soooooooooo good. I just want to inhale it all but they are going to be sliced and into the freezer for our upcoming road trip.

Working on a meal plan for our trip and also a grocery shop for when we arrive at our destination. We will do a grocery pick up order and then I can cook at our place. I still plan to bring some stuff pre made to help a bit with prep. Hopefully there will be some good sale that week.

[SassyAshley]

Had Dinner with Bro and his Fiancee, ordered Chinese, it was good. A nice treat, cannot remember the last time we ordered Chinese, it has gotten so expensive.

I am not attending dinner tomorrow for Step-Mom as I was supposed to be heading out of town for work but my trip got delayed.

My plan for tomorrow is to prep for the week, I really want to focus on my eating. Since I have been going into branches more my old eating habits are creeping in, skipping meals, more caffeine, less fruits and veggies.

I bought myself these cute Bento Boxes that have 3 layers so I can pack Breakfast, Lunch and Snacks, I got the 3-pack so I can pack ahead and they are slim so if I am travelling I can fit two in my lunch bag. All of our branches have fridges I can keep food in well I am there.

Going to try and do about an hour of work before bed. Since they have given me a new project for work, I am turning it into a Bullet Journal. I have found, I either have to be next-level organized or I am scattered and get lost in the process, plus colouring in the little squares is so relaxing for me, it is like crossing things off a to-do list.

[walkonby]

@harbie your loaves sound so yummy! Great road trip snack! I'm more of a pecan person than walnut BUT in these I put dried cranberries, raisins, both walnuts and pecans, scraped out the last couple of tblsp of Nutella from a jar and emptied a 1/8 cup of apple jelly from another jar, cinnamon, brown sugar Splenda and LOVE!

Never mind dangerous knife procedures, I used my handy turning tool to peel, core and slice the apples in one operation. True confession...I ate the crappy small piece that had stuck to the tin foil on the pan and broke apart. Parchment paper covered almost the entire pan but I stuck a small piece of the foil on the end to cover it all, that was a mistake!

[coupon girl]

Today was edging the front flower bed ,doing 2 loads of laundry .Then we went to visit hubbys brother and his wife ,nice visit .She gave me a plant for my front garden ,so nice to share.

On sunday we are going to sons for a nice bbq late lunch he said .I told him i would bring a lemon pie.
Daughter is busy and doesnt have sebastian this weekend but he ex took her and sebastian for brunch today -it is sebastians gift to her lol.
Next weekend we will go visit daughter and sebastian .

[SassyAshley]

Good Morning Everyone,

Happy Mother's Day to all the Moms.

Ugh, I slept in again, I know, I know my body needs it but it just makes me feel like I am behind all day.

I need to focus and just knock it out.

I have tons of ideas and options for breakfast, but I am lacking lunch ideas. I do not know why but I always find lunch so hard. Generally I gravitate towards leftovers but when they aren't any leftovers that is when I tend to skip meals. I think I need to get back into the habit of making a meal on Sunday that I use for lunches. The only thing is, I have no idea what I want to make.

Happy Sunday

[coupon girl]

Happy mother's day to all the moms out there.

Last night i purchased shorts for hubby and socks (maybe a pair will feel comfy on me) from the gap they allowed 3 codes to work online codes are extra10,friend and addit.I think this is an error on their part as i have never used 3 codes before.So i saved 60% off with 6 % raketan yesterday .I am tired of washing my hubby's shorts as he only has a few pair.

[cath007]

Happy mother day's to all the moms out there

[Frugalbigmama]

Happy Mother's Day! Beautiful sunny day!

I gave my mom her gift on Monday when I went down to take her to Costco. I will take her out for dinner one night this week.
(Would rather have a less busy night and my sister invited us all for dinner- They are ordering dinner in. So my mom will not have to cook tonight

Dropped DS off at work and stopped at Walmart and Independant. Bought a few things. Stopped at bank to deposit a cheque and now home to take it easy Was a late night last night so enjoying the day and sunshine is the only plan.

[SassyAshley]

Today has been a day, it feels like everything I have done is taking forever to get done. I got done what I wanted to get done but it took all day.

I made both Banana and Blueberry Muffins because I have Bananas that needed to be used and I did not want to freeze them (I just found 5 bags of Bananas in the freezer I did not realize I had so I do not want to add any more). Plus I had blueberries that needed to be used up. So I made two batches and Mom individually wrapped them so whatever we do not eat in the next couple of days can go in the freezer.

One of my new fav breakfasts for office days is a muffin and some yogurt with fruit so now I can just pull a muffin from the freezer to take.

I chopped Romaine for the week. Maybe it is just me but I have been shopping at Giant Tiger more, I admit I am not a fan of Giant Tiger but I think it is our location. It was very disorganized, the staff were not very helpful and felt dirty, but I have been giving them another chance lately as they did some renovations and looks like things have changed. But I have noticed when I buy produce there it does not last very long. Even though I check it before I buy it, it seems to turn rather quickly and I lost quite a bit of my Romaine.

Made Raspberry Overnight Oats for Breakfasts and Veggie Fried Rice and Dumplings for lunches.

Went out and tidied up the backyard a little bit because they are pressure washing our house tomorrow. Noticed our neighbour's exterior faucet is running and flooding one corner of my backyard so we sent them an email.

Clean out the fridge and took out the garbage. We had quite a bit of food waste this week but it is my own fault. I have been doing the bare minimum when it comes to prep. Mix that in with my bad eating habits this past week quite a few things needed to go. I emptied the fridge and wiped it out and now we have a clean start.

Kept dinner pretty simple tonight, pulled homemade meatballs from the freezer, and thank you No Frills, 2 weeks in a row I had an offer for Classico Sauce for $1.99, limit 4, I used a jar of Roasted Portobello (our fav) and made Pasta and Meatballs with Garlic Bread and Ceasar Salad.

I got about an hour of work done last night but have quite a few things I still need to get done so going to work on those now. I was hoping to have the house stuff done around noon so I could spend the afternoon catching up on work and relaxing but that did not happen. I finished just in time to make dinner. I really really need to get back into my routines.

[lilo0003]

Another busy day. I was able to do a bit of gardening and so I am almost ready to plant the vegetables next weekend. The boys each bought me a hanging pot of flowers that that has added some colour. I am really trying not to go overboard but I always do. I love the look of flower pots all over the deck. So this year some of the pots have the herbs and hot peppers.
DH and I had brunch at my FILs retirement home which was lovely and then DS 1 made dinner, now I am finally relaxing after a long walk with DH.

[Frugalbigmama]

Morning! Sunshine again! Now I just expect it every day!!

All the work emails going around planning upcoming vacation time...it seem to fly by so quickly.
I finally booked tons of time off the next few months and still have lots of time left for the fall for a trip or 2!

Have a pretty quiet work day at the moment. Will get some things done today and out for a walk or 2!

Enjoy the day!

[harbie]

Good morning everyone. Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend.

It’s been HOT here. The temp in town yesterday reached 35 in the car for a bit! I’m not complaining….much .

Finished my garden for now. I added a tomato plant and lots of green onions, more radishes and peas. I think that will be enough for now until the radishes are done.

DH took me to New Balance and I tried on a pair I’ve been eyeing for a while. They are really nice but I need to adjust to the feel. It’s completely different from my usual 1080V shoes.

These are the new ones I tried.



But I’m thinking of my usual running shoes in a colour similar to this


Im also looking at a vibrant orange . I told the sales lady I need the most obnoxious colour they come in so I have to wait until October and February for the releases of those colours .

Grabbed a few groceries:
green onions
russet potatoes
iceberg
soy curls
silk creamer
bbq sauce
bananas
avocado
All was on sale except the avocados, bananas and creamer (but used a coupon) but still spent WAY TOO MUCH in my opinion. $87 . Sad thing is the prices were the same at other stores except the bbq sauce. Scary going grocery shopping nowadays.

Off for my yoga and hopefully run and if not I’ll do my strength training then Dh and I are going to buy bike helmets for our upcoming trip. We decided to rent bikes this time so we can take our time deciding on what bikes we want, get $$$ put aside for them, get the hitch installed and the carrier.

Need to get ready for a jam packed work week while prepping for our trip. I’m gonna need lots of caffeine

[HermanH]

Looks like walking on a banana peel or lime.

[Frugalbigmama]

What a beautiful day outside!! Had to get the summer tires ready for the swap later today. So swept the garage and tossed some more junk in the garbage can.

Found a perfect spot for DS's 2 golf bags. (he kept old set for friends to use and they get used all the time so don't mind storing them).

Having a garage sale in a few weeks so getting ready for that. Will be so nice once all that crap is out of the garage!