Frugal "Friday" - The Last Week of November 2018

Amazing Christmas Lights from December 2017.

All of my Christmas light (or twinkle lights or fairy lights...) are sitting in a giant storage box in my living room right now waiting to be put up on the outside of the house.  The weather has not been cooperating, so I'm tempted to buy two short strings of battery and timer-operated lights to put on our evergreen wreath and evergreen pot and call it good!  I'm still hoping.  Our display is nothing as exciting as what is shown in the photo above, but I still enjoy putting them out and I think they add a pop of color and cheer to the winter nights.  I do have two outdoor strings that would work in place of buying battery operated ones so I may do that instead. I may even have a timer hiding somewhere in the storage room! I need to dig a bit more and see. 

This past week was a good week and a very busy week and it felt SO long.  We had several extra events and did quite a few things.  The children had Friday off school for end of term and we declared a pajama day for them - movies, popcorn, and hot chocolate in their pajamas along with making some homemade Christmas Tree ornaments for their teachers.  I had a couple of things that I need to attend to, so I was in and out of the house throughout the day.  The items I needed to attend to were attended to and I was able to cross several things off my to-do list as well.  John was at work all day but was able to come home early for him and we enjoyed one final movie together in the evening.  Since all were movies we already owned or purchased from the library, it was a fun and frugal way to end a busy week!

Here are the frugal accomplishments this week:

* Made all needed meals at home, in spite of having a non-working oven.  Our Crock-Pot sure got a workout this week!

* Attended one fundraiser (our children were serving) for one meal and then John and I each enjoyed one free meal at work as well.

* The children made ornaments using items we had on hand.

* I worked on two Christmas gifts this week. (I am hoping to post some photos and descriptions once all the gifts are finished).

* We renewed our library materials online, saving us the gas to travel to the library.

* John brought home a jar of "trail mix" (peanuts, candy corn and coffee M&M's) from a congregant at the nursing home.  I took it to work for snacks this week since he does not like either candy corn or coffee M&M's. 

* I did some much-needed deep cleaning this week - washing curtains, walls, interior window sashes and casings, cleaning and rearranging storage shelves in the laundry and storage rooms, and a bunch more.  It cost nothing but time, a little detergent and water - which I already owned.  I am grateful that it is completed and now I can move on to other things!  Using the those areas is so much more enjoyable now.

* Our son grew another inch this week - he grows in fits and starts rather than smoothly, which is physically painful for him and rather frustrating for the rest of us (he eats a lot more than normal and falls asleep very easily during these times).  I let down the hems on his school pants again and, with his assistance, cleaned out several items that no longer fit in his closet.  We will donate those. I also made a list of a few things he needs to purchase.  We are going to have him borrow from his Dad (John) until his growth slows down a bit, since they are now the same size. 

* I cleaned out two boxes and several things that we haphazardly piled in the storage room.  This improved the function of the storage room greatly! The two boxes contained some random papers, the majority of which were definitely not needed.  We put the needed papers in a folder in the filing cabinet for keeping and recycled the rest.

* We pulled out the Christmas decorations, culled a few things (which will be either thrown away or donated) and put out the Advent calendar, the Advent wreath and the Nativity sets.  We will slowly decorate through the month of December, with the tree going up on the 3rd Sunday in Advent and being decorated on the 4th Sunday.  We may decorate early, as both my parents and my in-laws will be here on the Thursday and Friday before that for the children's Christmas concert, but close enough.  By Christmas Eve everything is decorated and we will enjoy the decorations until Epiphany, January 6.  I have a couple of new ideas to try this year, and I was pleased that I may only need to buy one small item to have them come to fruition.  I may even be able to implement these ideas without purchasing anything!  I'll post photos if it all turns out as I hope.

What did you do this week that was frugal?