In The Refiner's Fire

Homemade vanilla ice cream from last summer! YUM! We looked into all the things for our summer 2020 vacation this past week - no concrete plans yet, but I have been thinking about summer!  Homemade ice cream is always on the menu at least once.  Yum!  We have an old hand-crank ice cream maker that my parents used for many, many years.  They upgraded to an electric model several years ago; now we get to crank! It is always an adventure and the ice cream turns out wonderful. We have a busy week this week with two music concerts. Trying to schedule dinner around music concerts and play rehearsals is quite a challenge.  It should work out just fine; it just takes some extra planning! Here is the menu for this week: Sunday, January 26:      Breakfast: Peanut Butter Toast      Lunch: Out with a gift card      Snack: Jam Thumbprint Cookies      Dinner: Breakfast for Dinner: Eggs, Bacon and Hashed ...

Today's shopping happened in two pieces - one right after I dropped the children off for rehearsal and one after I brought them home.  In between, I came home to drop off the groceries I purchased, ate lunch and ended up falling asleep on the sofa with my book.  Opps!   Either way, it was a frugal shop today.  John is out of town with work for a couple of days, so I let the children choose what they wanted for dinner both nights and we have a few things in the grocery shop that are not part of our typical shopping.  I am okay with that - we had the cash and did not need a lot of everything else.  So here is what we purchased today: Store #1: I rarely shop at this store for groceries since their prices are rarely better on things that we purchase.  I do know their prices on eggs can be better and sometimes their milk can be too. I checked prices as I had several tail-ends of gift cards rattling around in my purse.  This week their price...

Cleaning out this week I found the above box - it was from a leather purse my Mother purchased for my Aunt after a summer of working at Yellowstone National Park back in 1957!  I have no idea how the box ended up in my house (some of my Aunt's things did come to my house a couple years ago, so maybe....) but it was a fun find.  The purse cost $5.95 in 1957, which would be approximately $55 in today's money.  My Aunt was starting her first "real" job that fall after graduating Nursing School and my Mother wanted her to have a nice purse to use.  Guess what? The purse was still in the box - completely untouched!  My daughter now has a lovely purse to use!  And the box was recycled, as it was starting to disintegrate.  A completely unexpected but interesting find. Honestly, I feel like I did not do much this week.  I got some important paperwork done and did a lot of writing.  I also had what felt like the beginnings of a head cold this wee...

Grilled Cheese on Homemade Bread, Carrot Sticks, and Apple Slices - a fairly simple lunch. Nothing like typing 2019 in the header!  Seriously, I do well for about 2 weeks in remembering what year we are in and then my brain just goes on autopilot.  Sheesh.   We will get there...eventually. We are starting the week cold and then heading into warmer winter weather - still winter weather but on the warm end.  I am okay with both of those; it is January in Minnesota, after all.  I need to do a full inventory of the freezers.  Our upstairs freezer (the one with our refrigerator) is in dire need of cleaning out as we have been sticking all the odds and ends from meals in there over the last month or so.  It is truly a mess. That will have to go on the goals list for the week! In the meantime, here is what we are eating this week: Sunday, January 19:      Breakfast: Toast with Peanut Butter and Strawberry Smoothies   ...

I stopped at the grocery store Friday on my way home from working out.  There were a few deals this week and we were out of onions, potatoes, cornmeal, tea, coffee and laundry soap.  Our son put away all the groceries as I brought them in from the car so I did not get a photo again this week. Our shop this week included chips, soda, and candy as our children's contributions for a party later this week.  We could sign up and bring an item of pay $10 for each of our children.  I spent roughly $8 for the four items our children will bring.  Here is what we bought this week: 1 bottle A&W Root Beer $1.99 1 bottle Dr. Pepper  $1.99 2 containers Peanuts 2/$5 10 oz. Coffee $5.99 2 packages Tea $2.99 each minus $1 coupon 10 ct. 12-inch Flour Tortillas $2.50 1 package Yellow Cornmeal $2.29 3 14 oz. cans Black Beans $0.59/each Laundry Soap $2.99 1 container mixed lettuce $2.99 5 lb. Red Potatoes $4.99 6 lb. Clementine's $6.99 3 lb. Red Onions $3....

Our Lefse-making stations.  I could eat Lefse all the time! I'm writing this and watching the snow fall outside.  It is falling almost sideways, as the wind is quite sharp right now.  John is on his way home from work  and I was able to work from home today, so we should all be home before the storm is too bad out there.  The children had today off for end-of-term and have spent the day watching movies and playing games. I worked out this morning, picked up some groceries and have been working on things for work since then.  I enjoy having a quiet day at home to work and I appreciate having a hot mug of tea and a bouquet of flowers to enjoy while doing it. Later today, I will plan out some baking for tomorrow.  I'm thinking granola, bread and maybe some more Lefse. We will see! Here are some things we did this week that we felt are frugal: * We made all meals at home and brown-bagged if we were not home.  We made  chicken soup, ...

One of my peonies last summer. Lovely! It feels as though last week was very lazy for me.  I only accomplish about half of the things I had hoped to accomplish.  I did rest, read, exercise, and just enjoy myself.  That is what I really needed, I believe.  My body has been very tired and had some both physical and mental healing to do. I think it was a good week, even if I did not get everything I really hoped to accomplish finished. Here are the actual goals I set for last for the first full week of 2020, January 5-11, with updates: 1.  Finish at least one baby gift (I have 3 to finish).  I got the top and bottom tied (with the battling between!) and I have pinned the edge for a self-binding on one baby quilt. 2.  Read 50 pages for work.  I read 26 pages for work.   3.  Write 1500 words for work.  I wrote 2600 for work this week - lots of writing with the semester starting! 4.  Spend 30 minutes 3 days working...

Crab legs and coleslaw for John's Birthday earlier this month.   We are all back into our routines this week.  I take great comfort in routines and I am so grateful to be back into a regular routine.  John and I are trying to eat down our freezers and pantry this month (and hopefully into February too), so our menu may become more interesting as the month continues on. Every year for John's Birthday, we buy crab legs. He considers this a birthday gift and they are typically on sale for the new year and so we can purchase them for a fairly reasonable (for here) price.  This year, my parents purchased them as John's birthday gift.  We look forward to this each year and the children are now quite adept at cracking crab legs and retrieving the meat.  Here is what we are eating this week: Sunday, January 12:     Breakfast:  Mango Smoothies and Toast     Lunch: Leftover Jambalaya     Snack: Popcorn   ...

No photo today - we stopped and picked up groceries between running elsewhere and I hurriedly put away the groceries when we arrived home. We spent $25.78 on groceries this week. We have tightened our belt a bit this month for groceries.  We have full freezers, cupboards and a full refrigerator, so even with a smaller grocery budget we will eat well!  This week we only bought a couple of things that were either needed or are part of re-stocking a couple of holes in our pantry.  Today we stopped at one store and purchased: 1 large container of fresh spinach  $2.50 2 12 oz. cans beans  $0.89 ea 2 20 oz. cans crushed pineapple  $1.49 each 5 6 oz. cups yogurt  5/$3 2 10 oz. packages of shredded cheese $2.24 each 1 box whole wheat crackers $1.99 2 boxes Kraft Macaroni & Cheese $0.79 each 1 gallon 1% milk $4.19 1 container baking powder $2.19 1 lb. pasta $0.99 Come back Monday to see what we are eating this week. What did you buy this ...

One of the quilt tops for the baby quilts I am making currently. We are slowly working our way back into a typical routine at our house.  The children are back at school, John is fully back at work, and I had this week off before heading back into things next week.  It was lovely having a week to just relax and work on some things I have been wanting to work and slowly get myself back into a routine. John and I sat down and reviewed the 2019 budget and put together the 2020 budget.  I knew we were going to need to tighten the budget to get through the plans we have for 2020, but I do not think either of us realized how tight things were going to be.  And it is all right - we have everything we need and much of what we want and only really need to purchase gas for the cars and a few groceries this month.  Going forward, we will not have to add much to that, so we should be good. So, tightening the frugal belt and here we go in 2020! Here are the things w...

One of the flower bouquets picked from my garden this summer. This is the time of year that seems like such a fresh start and where so many set new goals - goals for the calendar year 2020.  For the past several years I've set myself an impressive list of goals I hoped to achieve.  This past year, I did succeed in achieving most of them and making progress on all of them - I was very pleased with myself. It was also a year where my parents collectively had six surgeries, I had two and was diagnosed with another (hopefully temporary) medical condition that is wreaking havoc on my body.  Our children started high school, participating in many things and working very hard on homework.  They have also started looking at summer jobs - something they can hold for several years.  John started the church year with a whole less of old business popping up through the woodwork, so to speak, at church - we are definitely over the honeymoon period and working in the ...

Krumkaka from December 2019. Is anyone else having to double-check that they are writing 2020 for the date?   I am having a particularly hard time this year for some reason.  Eventually my brain will get there! We stopped at Sam's Club (wholesale warehouse) this weekend and purchased toilet paper, sanitary napkins, canned tomatoes, canned corn, canned tomato sauce, canned chicken, milk, dates and some flowers.  They have some of the best prices around for these items and we needed everything except the dates and flowers.  Each week we set aside $10 for a combination of our CSA and bulk purchases. We spent just under $100 from this savings for these purchases. Buddy and I then stopped at our local grocery store and purchased the following, spending $29.48: 1 bag Tortilla Chips $1.79 1 package Black Olives $3.69 1 12 oz. Can Kidney Beans $1.29 (I feel dumb making this purchase, as I completely forgot to purchase canned beans during a sale a couple of ...

Two Swedish Tea Rings - one uncut and one cut - for church coffee hour. The year ended with a bang (metaphorically speaking) and a whimper.  It was both busy and lazy, which I appreciated.  My parents were able to come for the holiday (they return home tomorrow) and I am so grateful that they were healthy enough to fly to visit us.  We served for coffee hour for the Children's Program at church and attended Christmas Eve services.  We got together with some family and friends.  It was lovely! Here are some things we did that count as frugal over the last several weeks: * We baked three types of cookies, a tea ring, and a potato lefse.  We only had to purchase a bag of dates for this baking and used the regular grocery budget to do this. * We also baked salmon, two types of soup, and made scalloped potatoes with ham.  For Christmas Eve dinner we made Swedish meatballs, mashed potatoes, corn, and a fruit salad.  For Christmas Day we made a...