Well, I blink and a week has gone by like it was only one day. 

I think I must be mostly in hibernation mode...asleep-awake. 

I had the last of the collards and ham for lunch one day. I don't think they're working this year.

 

I got some pie filling canned up. 

     Back in the Spring/Summer, when everything was coming ripe and I didn't have time to do everything, I knew I could bag some of the things and can it later, in the "off" season. So I froze blueberries, blackberries, and muscadine grapes. 

I decided this week to work on the blueberries.

    I'm thinking it might have been an easier job if I had sorted, cleaned, and de-stemmed them before freezing them. 

I didn't notice when I put the bags out to thaw that I grabbed a bag of blackberries (raspberries?), too. No problem, I just made a quart&pint of blackberry (raspberry?) pie filling too. 

Other than that, we laid some new peel 'n stick tiles and replaced the toilet upstairs. 

     John-the-husband worked on the living room ceiling...some of the drywall we had put up hadn't gotten screwed in all the way and had started sagging, plus there were about 6-inches at one edge that hadn't gotten any drywall put up yet, so we got that done. Plan is to put up wood on it next. 

    I worked on my painting the kitchen cabinets project. I divided the kitchen in "sections" to work on, so I didn't get overwhelmed or have too much messed up at one time.  The plan worked pretty good. I just need to install handles on three drawers to be finished with the second to the last section, then after that there's only the under-the-kitchen-sink cabinets left to go and I'll be completely finished. 

I didn't feel too good yesterday. I had a tummy ache earlier in the week after eating spaghetti and bread for supper, but was okay after that.
    Yesterday morning as I waking up in the morning, I thought I had a bad headache and that I coughed so hard it hurt my chest, like I had last year. (I'm reasonably sure I had the C0V1D last January, after we got back from a cruise. Never been so sick in my life.)  Anyway, when I woke/got on up, my head hurt a little but not bad, and I wasn't coughing any worse than usual, so I said well, guess I dreamed it.
     My upper back, upper arms and neck hurt, but they've been hurting since like around Thanksgiving so I didn't figure that was anything new.
     But then I was nauseous, and had to go to the potty, and was tired and just felt like ugghh. 

I didn't think it was C0V1D but it seems like every symptom, or no symptom, is C0V1D, so I went on and got tested and it was negative, like I thought. 

So it's probably just general Winter/Yuk season malaise, eating bad, and stress.

More Saving and Stocking Up

 I got on out to Kroger and shopped the deals I wanted before some yucky weather sets in today/tomorrow. Probably just rain/cold for us....but I've lived through enough "oops" forecasts that I wouldn't be surprised to wake up to a full-fledged blizzard or ice storm. As I always say, "Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst".
But even if it is just rain/cold, those are good days to stay in and be warm and dry and snug as bug in a rug at home, not out in the misery trying to save a buck.

Since I keep pretty well stocked up, I didn't *need* any of this right now. And these sales come around and around, so it wouldn't have been worth going out in bad weather for.
But I will need/use this stuff eventually, and nothing was going on this morning, the weather is overcast but dry, chilly but not frigid, so it was a good use of the time to go on and buy the things while I can get them for a lot less than having to pay full price if I end up needing something when it's not on sale.

Also, Lady-bird-pup-dog enjoyed the ride in the car.

 
So, what I got:

Jif PB is on sale for $1.49 as part of the "Buy 5, get $1.00 off" Mega sale. You don't have to buy 5 of the same item, just groups of 5 items included in the entire Mega sale.
I had loaded a digital coupon to my Kroger card for .75 off, so I only paid 74cents.
Great price for Jif, or PB in general. 

The Tampico juices were .49 Mega sale price, no coupons needed. 

Some Quaker and General Mills cereals were on sale for $1.79 Mega sale price. That's a great price for cereal considering normally they run upwards of $3, $4 a box.  If you have a coupon, even better.
I had a digital coupon for $1.00/2 boxes of Big G (General Mills), and a printable* coupon for .75 off Quaker, so I saved $1.75, or basically got one of the boxes for 4cents.
(*Be aware, not all stores accept printable coupons.) 

The butter was my main objective. Real butter is pretty expensive, $2.50 a box at WM, and up. Aldi sometimes has it for $1.79, but I don't like the taste of Aldi butter at all, so I generally stock up when it's on sale for $1.99 at Kroger.
Today I got it for $1.77 with digital coupon.
The butter wasn't part of the Mega sale, but the digital coupon was able to be used up to 5 times. 

(I know, it's a lot of rules and things to figure out and keep straight, but I consider like a board game, a challenge. If my totals add up in the end, I win the game!) 

Carefree, Stayfree, Kotex and possibly other items I didn't pay attention to were $1.99 Mega sale price. I had a digital coupon, and also a printable coupon for $3.00/2 Kotex by U products, so I paid 49cents per box. !!!
I just nearly bought a box or two of these at WM yesterday to put in my stash closet, but they didn't have any Super size ones and they're the ones we needed. We have plenty of the Regular size ones.
    Even if I didn't have the coupons, $1.99 a box is great price for these as they're usually $3.00-plus a box.

The Carefree Breathe pad/liners also had a $1.50/1 digital coupon (and a printable coupon, although I only used the digital coupon this time) so they were also 49cents. We don't normally use these, but pads are always a good thing to keep in your stock pile for "you never know when you might need these" reasons. 

At .49, these kinds of things are especially good for buying to donate to church pantrys and/or women's shelters. Even at the $1.99 price it would be a good thing to buy to donate if you want to do some useful donating.
    You could just donate money...not trying to be judgy but...I find that when you give anyone money, be it an individual or organization, they don't always make the best use of it, don't try to get more for the money. They'll buy brand name, or not bother to shop a sale, or use a coupon. You could donate like a third* more product buying these at $1.99 then you'd end up giving them if you handed them $20 and let them buy it. (*Don't check my Math, I'm not really good at it, lol). 

Suave Body wash is .99 Mega sale price, I used a .75 digital coupon making it 24cents.
Tresemme Shampoo is $2.99 Mega sale price, and I used a $2.00 digital coupon making it 99cents.
    These are the kind of things I buy a little at a time, here and there, when the price is good, to stick into my stock pile. So when the next unforeseen event happens - weather, illness, unrest, etc - then I'm not having to worry about getting stuff I need. Like toilet paper.

Speaking of which, they had boxes of this cheap toilet paper for .69 a pkg. WM has a cheap 4-roll for .60 so it's a little cheaper, but I was here, and this was cheap enough to get a couple to put in the stock pile. 

Kleenex are on sale 4/$5, or $1.25 each. Includes from 65ct up to 144ct sizes. Depending on what you like/need, we're not extremely choosy so of course I got the most for the money, 144ct.
I only got these because I had a $1.00/4 digital coupon, which made there $1.00 a box, which is what I pay for tissues at Dollar Tree.
    We do use a lot of kleenex, all of us suffers allergies and sinus issues, so I pick up anywhere from 1 to 5 boxes at a time any time I go into DT whether I need them at the time or not, because I know I will need them eventually, and I want to make sure I have enough to tide us over for awhile in event of "supply interruptions". 

The cookies were mark-down priced for $1.00, and hot chocolate is a favorite around here, so they're a treat. 

My total savings was $45.11, or 61% of what it would cost paying regular price/not using coupons. 

Also, I saw on the register I could be saving 5% with a Kroger credit card. It more said something to the effect of ..."you could save 5%..net...or on certain products net..." I can't remember, but it sounded like there might be a catch, so I'm off to check it out and see if it'd be worth getting it.

Get 'em While the Gettin's good

 I used to cook meatloaf every so often because, I don't know, my Mom did, I guess. I wasn't a fan of meatloaf, or the recipe I was using then, which if I remember rightly involved ketchup and...No, I can't remember. 

I remember, I guess me and my sister were discussing how we cook meatloaf, and she used Worchestershire sauce, or maybe it was Soy?  Onions and peppers, which I didn't use because I didn't care for those, either. 

I don't remember what/where/when/how after that, but one day, like a light bulb flicking on over my head, I thought, 'I wonder if Manwich sauce would be good in meatloaf instead?'.
Answer: Yes. 

Well, any sloppy joe sauce.  Back then, a few times one or the other of the grocery stores would have something like a "Buy 5, get 50cents off", or $1.00 off, sale, and Manwich would be 50cents a can and I'd buy up about 10 or 12 cans. 

But then they didn't have the sale, and didn't have the sale. I ran out and have been paying 82cents a can for GV brand at WM.
So last week Publix had it BOGO (buy one get one....free), which made them half price, or 57cents a can.  Wasn't 50cents, but it's been a few years, so I guess, inflation. 57cents was better than 82cents.

My own recipe for gluten-free meatloaf muffins: mix 1lb. ground beef, 3/4cup oatmeal, 1 egg, 3/4 can sloppy joe sauce (save the rest to spoon on the tops of the meatloaf muffins). Spoon into muffin tin and spoon rest of sloppy joe sauce onto the tops. Bake at 425* about 1/2 an hour. 

This week Ingles grocery has some of my favorite breakfast items on sale. 

The Store brand pancake syrup is BOGO for 99cents each.
I pay like $1.38 for WMs brand, so this is a deal for me. We use a good bit of syrup.

They have Quaker Oats 18oz container BOGO for like $1.99 each, but then I saw they have the larger 42oz containers of the store brand oats BOGO for $1.64 each. Much better deal for the money. 

The Quaker instant oatmeal is BOGO for 1.99 each. I feel like they have these on sale 2/$3, or $1.50 each sometimes, but for all I know that sale may be extinct forever and maybe this will be the new best price, so I went ahead and picked up a couple of boxes. If they go on sale 2/$3 I'll buy somemore. 

I could get store brand instant oatmeal as cheap or cheaper, but none of the store brands carry Raisins & Spice, which is the only instant oatmeal I like. They only have like raisins, dates & walnuts or some such. Yuk. 

They also have some Kellogg's cereals BOGO for $1.99 each, but I think I'm currently stocked up pretty good on those particular cereals, and also Kroger generally has the typical Kelloggs cereals cheaper on sale, $1.79.
This week Kroger has General Mills and Quaker Capt Crunch cereals for $1.79 wyb (when you buy) 5, and there's coupons for 75cents off a box of Quaker, and 50cents off 2 boxes of General Mills, so that makes them a little cheaper. I may pick up a couple of boxes there, just because they're a little cheaper. 

Mostly I'm aiming to get to Kroger to buy 5 boxes of store brand butter at $1.77 a box. Usually I stock up when they're on sale for $1.99 a box, so $1.77 is even better.
I might would buy more than 5, but it's a digital coupon loaded to my shopper card deal, not the 'Get $1 off wyb 5 items' sale, so 5 is the limit for the price. 

~ * ~

For things I stock up on, not on sale, I usually get from Dollar Tree or WM because the prices are cheaper. I had to go to WM to pick up a prescription for my son who's sick with a sinus infection, and I had Colas and canned vegetable beef soup on my shopping list. Also burger buns, but they were out.
While I was there I picked up some 'just to have extras' things.

I can't remember everything, but I stock GV pizza crust mix at 52cents each, canned pasta, ie spaghettio's w/meatballs, ravioli, burger macaroni I forget the name of at 60cents a can. National Cup tea bags $1.00 a box. GV pork n beans 33cents a can. Raman soup hot-n-spicy bowls, I think they were 37cents each.
I forget what else.

I bought one package of toilet paper to put in my closet, and a box each of wet cat and dog food. I'm not out of cat and dog food, but if I have a box open, I like to have a closed box as back up. Or bag. I also keep an extra bag of dry cat and dog food, and chicken feed and scratch grains. 

~ * ~

Last night I was on the WM website (looking at electric blankets) and saw an ad that says you can get 5% cash back on your purchases at WM dot com, including pickup and delivery, with a WM credit card. And also you can get 5% cash back for the first 12 months in store using WM Pay. 

I'm not one to have a lot of credit cards, generally we have one we use at a time that will have 0% interest for 12 or 18 or 21 months.  (That's another story for another time.)
But I do have a Target card that gives me 5% off my purchases the very rare times I shop there, my Amazon card gives me 5% cash back on purchases at Amazon, and we have a Murphy USA card to save 5cents a gallon on gas there.
I shop more at WM than anywhere (I'm ashamed to admit) so of course I should be saving 5% on my purchases. Be dumb not to. 

I'll just have to get in a better habit of using pickup more. I've used it a couple of times, but I'm not really a schedule and appointment kind of person. I like to decide on the spot to go to the store.

Little House Album

My first little glitter 'putz' house.

2nd one, log cabin. I used the wrong glitter and it didn't look good.

3rd project, Churches, made for gifting.

Tiny putz vintage camper.

Added a hanger and made it an ornament

Fire Station

First four putz creations displayed.

Attempt at recreating a "Shiny Brite" Nativity. Figures too small.

Displayed in my china cabinet with stick-on battery lights for illumination.

Halloween house

Gingerbread houses, made for gifting.

Gingerbread house

I trimmed these out, but can't find a picture of them finished.

Beach scene

Tiny village houses.

Haunted house.

(*Also made a red barn I gifted to my cousin...need to find picture.)

Cardboard Campers

 Today I worked on making some little glitter putz cardboard campers.

 

 

 Pattern:  https://retrorenovation.com/2015/12/03/diy-putz-house-12-a-mini-vintage-travel-trailer-free-downloadable-pattern/

 

I started making little cardboard glitter putz houses about 6 years ago, made a few here and there and pretty much lost interest. 

 

Turned out my sister loved the little houses, and asked for new ones for Christmas, and I'd end up finding myself, in December, stressing and struggling to get a house or houses made. 

Including this Christmas, despite the year-long quarantine, when I should have had time to create a Continents worth of little houses. 

To be honest, I wasn't even going to make one at all this year. (This just past Christmas.) But then one day we were chatting and she said if I needed a gift idea for her, she wanted a little Halloween house. So then I felt like I needed to make her one. 

 

I managed to get one made, in the nick of time. I usually make myself, my Mom and my Aunt houses at the same time, but couldn't do that this time. I did good to get this one done in time.

 

When she said she wanted a Halloween house, I wasn't sure exactly what she was wanting. My usual creations are sparkly, glittery, colorful, snowy....I didn't know if she wanted that, but in Halloween colors, or what? 

For whatever reason I decided on this one (pictured above), and she loved it. Actually squee'd when she opened the box. 

So, I decided to try to do better this year, starting early, giving myself plenty of time to make a few putz creations for Christmas. 

While looking for ideas/patterns for the Haunted house, I had ran across the little retro camper and decided I would like to make it next. 

I originally set a goal for completing them in January, but after spending a day cutting out the pattern and getting one piece of one camper cut out, then spending three days doing other stuff, I thought I better extend my deadline to...maybe Spring. 

I actually made a lot more progress than I was expecting. Somehow managed to get all the pieces cut out, and even started primer-painting them.
Being done by the end of January may be a reasonable goal afterall, good Lord willin'.

Frugal New Year

 I used share on my fb when I'd go shopping and what I got and how much I saved and such.
     It seemed like no one was really interested in learning to save any money, so I pretty much gave up.

This year, things changed.
    Between young relatives just starting out trying to save for a home, and the scare of the virus/quarantine, I've had questions about saving money on groceries and stocking up for emergencies. 

    Although, I think most of them have already forgotten the need to stock up in case of emergencies. Just about a month or so ago several of them were complaining about not being able to get toilet paper again. I wanted to scream at them, "Did you learn nothing?! Why haven't you been stocking your cabinet with toilet paper over the past few months?!". 

    Anyway, I'm not the deal shopper I was a few years ago. I just got burnt out, I think. So I quit getting coupons, quit religiously following the deal sites trying to get every deal possible. Went back to regular grocery shopping at WM. 

    But there were a couple of money saving tactics that wasn't complicated or requiring much effort - stocking up on sale items (that you use), and buying mark-down products. 

    With today being New Year's day, last week I wanted to get some collard greens for our traditional NYD dinner of collards, black eyed peas, and cornbread.

Before I headed out to the grocery store to buy some, I checked the ads for my local grocery stores online.
I found that one of the stores, Ingles, had them on sale for 2/$4, or $2 a bunch.
I saw they also had several other things on sale for prices good for stocking up on. 

I was busy canning most of the day, so it was later in the evening when I got to the grocery store, and it seemed practically the whole produce dept. was marked down. Potatoes, squash, corn, cranberries, oranges, grapefruit, apples...so much was marked down. 

Granted, the produce is nearing it's end date, not the freshest but not bad at all, you just have to eat or do something with it fairly soon.
I grabbed a little tray of seedless red and green grapes for snacking, 99cents.
Found two 3-pound bags of onions for $1.49 each, or 50cents a pound. I had been waiting on an onion sale so I could make/can some french onion soup.
I was waiting to find bell peppers on sale for 50cents each to make/can chili...found a 3-pack for 99cents. Even better. 

My $2.00 *bunch* of collards turned out to be what I would have considered three bunches, but it was three -stalks?- in a rubberband called a bunch. That's getting my money's worth. 

I didn't note the original prices but I saved probably $6.00 or so on produce. 

They also had all their Luck's beans on sale for 50cents a can, regular $1.00 a can. Dried beans are cheaper, but not everyone has time to cook beans, or has jars and a pressure canner to can them for heating and eating, so 50cents is a good price for stocking up on canned beans.
I mostly got these for my emergency-food-stock. 

Saved $10.00. 

They also had 2-ltr soda and Tonic water for 50cents each. 

I'll be honest, I drink aaaaa loooooot of coke (cola). I know I shouldn't, but I do. I usually pay 57cents a 2-ltr for Sam's colas at WM, so it wasn't a huge savings, but pennies add up to dollars eventually. 

I only bought one cola here because I wasn't sure I'd like it...I didn't hate it, but didn't love it enough to go back and buy more before the sale ended. Otherwise I picked up a few 7-Ups and ginger ales. 

The tonic water is 77cents at WM, so I saved a little over $1.50 on these. 

Some cereals were BOGO (buy one get one free) which made them $1.98 a box. Not the best price, but under $2.00 a box is my buy price, so I got a few boxes while I was there.
I can usually get cereal for $1.49 or $1.79 without coupons at Kroger during a sale, but they haven't been on sale lately (watch, they'll go on sale this week, lol) and, too, I have to drive to another town to a Kroger, so unless I'm going somewhere anyway, or it's an especially good sale, it costs more to drive to Kroger than I would save if I went just for a few boxes of cereal.

I saved about $6.00 on cereal. 

(Don't know why my picture is upside down, sorry!)

This wasn't really a savings, but I paid over $3.00 for a box of those peppermint candy sticks for my Aunt for Christmas, so I grabbed another box while they are half off. 

I had seen the Coconut bon bons before Christmas, but passed because of the price, which I don't recall exactly what it was, but I'm positive 64cents is much less than half off regular price. I love coconut bon bons, so I got all three bags they had left. 

The gummy and jelly bean religious candy marked down to $1.74 each I got for John-the-husband to snack on while working. 

The bread was $1.00. It's 88cents at WM, but I didn't want to go to WM, and I figure I saved enough on the other stuff that I could spend 12 extra cents on bread. 

My receipt says that altogether I saved $28.93.
Had I bought all this stuff at regular price it would have cost me nearly $30.00 more. I don't know about others, but 30 bucks is a good chunk of change to me. Three and half times and it adds up to $100.00. 

Happy New Year, 2021

 Wow, how in the world can it be two whole years since I last posted?
       You just blink, and half your life is gone by. 

      I knew I hadn't posted in awhile (but not two whole years!), but didn't think too much about it. Seems like I felt like blogging was going "out of style", most were going the social media route, fb pages and groups and such. Bloggers I followed slowed or stopped posting...My posts weren't getting many/any readers, so...I just didn't take the time to do any posting. 

But then just recently it dawned on me that I have visited/read/used a good many blog posts over the past couple of years, even right up to yesterday, in fact.

     The ones yesterday in particular were titled something like, "How to cook collards and ham in my Instant Pot". One post among many that I've gotten information and education and ideas from. A few days ago I was reading posts about putting wood slats on my ceiling. A couple of weeks ago it was posts on making the little cardboard (glitter/putz) houses. I read posts about how to can this or that, survival prepping, repair projects, decorating, crafting, and more. 

 
As I was reading through, gosh, probably a dozen or so blog posts about cooking collards in my Instant Pot, I thought, "Thank goodness these posts are here."
(Me realizing just how many blog posts I've been reading over the past years) "Why did I think blogs were going away?"
    My neglected blog(s) crossed my mind, but then I thought, 'meh, my posts are just blah, blah, blah. Nothing helpful or useful to anyone.' 

But then I thought about other posts I had read that people wrote about their lives and doings and this and that, and I enjoyed reading many of those, too. I don't know, sometimes it's like visiting friends (except without the having to be social part). 

Long story short (haha) I want to try to start blog posting again.
     I'm not calling it my New Year's resolution, because we already know how that goes (hint: it doesn't), but I plan to make the time to do some posting again. About whatever. No theme, because I'm...the opposite of structured...I don't know the word for that. Random, maybe. All over the place. Very ADHD.