December 2023 Frugal Chatter

[SassyAshley]

I kind of feel like I did not get all of the things done but in reality I got the day-to-day stuff done but did not get any work done on the big projects.

I started my morning in the kitchen putting away some dry dishes and giving the counters a good scrub down. Then I made Spreadables and greated Mozzarella and Cheddar for the week.

Then I went out and shovelled the stairs and cleaned off both cars. I was only going to do the stairs but it was melting and I was afraid if it froze it would be a nightmare to get off.

Then I cleaned out the fridge, took everything out wiped it down. We did not have a lot of food waste, although a little disappointed my Ricotta I just opened went moldy. But the fridge needed a good wipe down and good reorganize things were just all over the place.

Took out garbage and recycling.

Dinner tonight was French Onion Pasta Bake and I made a Single Serve Brownie for us to split for dessert.

Tomorrow is going to be a baking day. I have eggs I need to use up and Mom' s friend gave her two medium size baggies of Blueberries and we already have a Costco bag of Blueberries in the basement.

Going to write a list of everything I want to make so I can go in with a plan and hopefully knock it out in an organized way that I can just rotating things in and out of the oven.

[SassyAshley]

Good Morning Everyone,
Up and getting my day started.

The PVR has been set for the week. Everyone is playing Christmas with Kranks this week, we actually watched it Friday night, I recorded it last week.

Laundry is going, normally I like to do laundry on a work-from-home day as it forces me to get and move around but being the week before inventory I am not sure how insane my week will be and Mom has a few appointments this week, so today is the day.

Dishwasher needs to be emptied and reloaded some of the dishes from last night did not fit plus there are some hand dishes to be done.

So far the plan for today is No-Knead Skillet Bread to have Soups this week, Blueberry Muffins, Apple Sauce Sour Cream Muffins, Crustless Blueberry Pie and for lunches Lemon Orzo Chicken Soup.

Also, need to figure out dinner for tonight. I think we have a piece of Roast Beef in the freezer, maybe I will pull this out and make a Shepard's Pie.

Happy Sunday Everyone.

[walkonby]

Nice to see you have a productive bright eyed and bushytailed start to your day @SassyAshley . I've been up but not very productive......yet.
Made a short grocery list of produce that we're out of and a few staples. Should just go myself for that as DH and I did plan to go " Christmas
Shopping " later today. He's always been a last minute guy when it comes to getting his gifts for us so this would be considered early shopping.
Still hoping to get a better price on a frozen Butterball than $1.98 a pound. That seems high to me? Going to enjoy using my accumulated AM to
get all the food for the 25th. Would be a nice bonus if Metro offered some extra incentive in sales in the next 2 weeks! I avoid using precious AM
on anything that Metro has at regular price.

The days are flying by now!!

[coupon girl]

Morning was up and showered at 6.40 a.m so did a load of laundry .

Off to london,ontario to see my older half brother age 77 with my younger brother and his wife plus my hubby decided to come so it will be nice .I decided to give my brother a xmas treat a mug with p.c dark mint chocolates had a 600 point offer-why not and a box of shortbread total spent 15.48.

I also have a small gift of chocolate for my younger brother and his wife a basket of various nice chocolates -toblerone,ghardelli and a few others plus 3 pairs of socks one for each member of his family.I love buying socks on sale thruout the year i am known for giving socks (only have a hard time for myself)As he has been so generous bring me flats of eggs from a family members farm on his wife's side.

On a side note since xmas is almost here i just reconnected with my dear brother after 10 years in april ,he had a heart attack last year age 60 so he is 2 and a half years younger than me .Never say never in life as you never know ,i have such peace now -no drama is in my life only my health problems which i am handling pretty well.

So happy here plus today i am giving him gas money as we all know it isnt cheap ,hope he take it or else i will pay for our lunch at tim hortons on the way there.

[SassyAshley]

Ok, I missed my deadline of having everything done by noon but I also deep down knew it may not have been a realistic goal.

I think if I was not filming 2 recipes I could have gotten it done because I could have multi-tasked more but hey it is what it is.

Last load of Laundry is in the dryer, dishwasher is emptied and reloaded, and most of the hand dishes are done except the dishes I am still using.

Blueberry Muffins, Skillet Bread are done, and my soup is simmering just waiting for Orzo to be cooked. Was planning a second batch of Muffins and a crustless Blueberry Pie, the Blueberry Pie will happen but not sure about the second batch of Muffins.

Still need to clean the bathroom as well.

[Skippy]

Morning was up and showered at 6.40 a.m so did a load of laundry .

Off to london,ontario to see my older half brother age 77 with my younger brother and his wife plus my hubby decided to come so it will be nice .I decided to give my brother a xmas treat a mug with p.c dark mint chocolates had a 600 point offer-why not and a box of shortbread total spent 15.48.

I also have a small gift of chocolate for my younger brother and his wife a basket of various nice chocolates -toblerone,ghardelli and a few others plus 3 pairs of socks one for each member of his family.I love buying socks on sale thruout the year i am known for giving socks (only have a hard time for myself)As he has been so generous bring me flats of eggs from a family members farm on his wife's side.

On a side note since xmas is almost here i just reconnected with my dear brother after 10 years in april ,he had a heart attack last year age 60 so he is 2 and a half years younger than me .Never say never in life as you never know ,i have such peace now -no drama is in my life only my health problems which i am handling pretty well.

So happy here plus today i am giving him gas money as we all know it isnt cheap ,hope he take it or else i will pay for our lunch at tim hortons on the way there.

Thanks @coupongirl for sharing such an encouraging post especially the "never say never in life" part.Thankful that you were able to reconnect and hoping and praying for a great visit and safe journey!

[coupon girl]

Just got in from london,ontario just a bit foggy and mild rain we went with my younger brother and his wife (i gave him a bit of cash towards the gas).

We had a lovely visit from 1.30 til 5:45 p.m .My dear sister-in-law made us stew so yummy and my older brother made a wonderful carrot cake .


Thank you skippy i am glad my younger brother and i were able to connect and both grow old together after 10 years of not being in each others lives.

[harbie]

Another 4:10am morning. My body just seems to sense what time it is.

Yesterday was a VERY LONG 8 hours of move out. I was spent! Probably didn’t help that I’d done weight training the day before . I’m so glad Dh helped me .

An atmospheric River is headed to the south coast later today and tomorrow so I’m going to try to get out before it starts. I want to head to the lagoon to feed my duckies, especially “Limpy” . He’s a duck with a weird leg that he limps on and sometimes it stretches straight out. I have a special connection with him as we not only both have leg/foot issues but it’s also the same leg . Then it’s off to WM for a water filter.

A light workout is planned later but reeeeeally light.

[lilo0003]

We had our 1st Nova Scotia snowstorm and we don’t have a snowblower here yet so I got quite the workout today. It was a very heavy wet snow. We are going to look for a contractor to do the snow when we are away to keep the drive clear. I am transferring to a role here in NS so will be here more often than originally intended for the next 6 months. I am struggling with being away from my Ontario family and friends but love being so close to my N.S. family. The real test is next summer. We plan to be here for 4 months.

[SassyAshley]

Good Morning Everyone,
A bit of a change in plans today. I came home to Mom almost in tears last night she is having pain in her lower back which is not normal, she called the doc and got an appointment for 9:15 today. I am in a branch today but instead of going in first thing this morning, I will help Mom get out of the house and than go in. So just flipped my day, instead of working in the branch then working from home, I am doing my work-from-home stuff then will go into the office.

Yesterday did not go to plan which normally has me struggling/spinning but in a strange way, I had a really good day (outside of Mom's pain). I was only supposed to be in the branch for a few hours and than I was going to come home and work on some stuff I needed for today but instead I spent almost the whole day in the branch. Normally when that happens I would be spinning because I need it for today but I can home, got an email from my Boss we was working in the system and needed me out. So I made dinner and after dinner I logged in, got a few things done, not all the thing but oddly I was freaking out about this.

Although I did have to laugh, my car went in for service last week so I was driving SIL car, but yesterday I took Mom's car to work. Sure enough my Dad comes out to tell me my car will be back around 2 so I had to come home and switch cars and go back.

Last night I made Beef and Broccoli for dinner, in the morning I was scrolling through Instagram well I waited to connect to the work server and saw someone else making it and it became a craving.

Tonight's dinner, not sure but thinking maybe Mozzarella Chicken, we have some Cherry Tomatoed to use up.

Happy Tuesday Everyone.

[walkonby]

@SassyAshley hope your Mom gets some positive news about her back pain. ( or at the very least some pain meds to ease it )

[coupon girl]

Today went to mastermind that is closing by me a lot of things were 10-20% off ,so not as good as the grandparents day of 20% off everything .I didnt buy anything then went into dollar tree and got a few stocking stuffers.

Then into canadian tire ,gee their ornaments were so cute bought a silo for $2.40 and a doll outfit for the 18 inch dolls 15.97(cheaper than the our generation clothing) someone told me to check out canadain tire.

Then over to walmart bought a chicken on sale $7.10 and reduced undies for me george brand 8 for $8.00 plus a few other items ,then a mcdonalds coffee for hubby and a muffin for me.

[SassyAshley]

@walkonby , Thank you.

Update on Mom, they think it is a bladder infection but have given her warning signs to watch for incase it is a Kidney stone. She is asleep on the couch now and I am watching Christmas movies and working through Inventory Mysteries, tis the season.

Went into the branch, did some training, helped out a little bit and came home to work on various things I have not gotten to because again I am eye ball high in Inventory Mysteries.

I pulled out everything to make Mozzarella Chicken for dinner but got thinking, we have a lot of leftovers. In our house it is feast or famine when it comes to leftovers, this wee is feast. But looking at the rest of the week I started to questions if we would eat them all so instead of making something new for dinner we had leftovers. Mom has French Onions Pasta bake and I had Lemon Chicken Orzo Soup with Homemade Bread.

I gotta give props to Costco as part of their daily deals they had the polar fleece sheets we love on sale. We have had them for ages (5+ years) and the elastic is starting to go on the fitted sheet, so I decided to order us each a new set on Sunday Night, showed delivery on Friday, fine, sitting here this afternoon, knock on the door, the sheets are here.

Happy Tuesday Everyone.

[coupon girl]

Sassy -glad your mom is resting ,hope she is better soon.

I am off to bed as i am on fumes didnt sleep well last night was up early.

[lilo0003]

It was a leftovers for dinner night here as well. Tomorrow we are having dinner with my brother and then Thursday we fly home, we are 6 weeks to 2 months between visits so I use up all the perishable stuff and then send the eggs and milk to my brother to use up.
I dropped off the angel tree gifts this afternoon and the roads are clear so it was a very pretty drive in the area as the trees are still snow covered.
Sassy, hopefully the meds kick in for you mom quickly.