Frugal Happenings Week 1 of June

Sunday:

 -- My husband had a shirt with slightly fraying cuffs....just enough to not be office worthy... but the rest of the shirt was in excellent shape. I carefully folded a very narrow edge under and hand stitched it down.  The shirt will be good for another season of wear.

 -- We packed snacks for an outing and incorporated leftovers into our meals.

 -- I washed and hung my daughter's beddind to dry.

 -- While not frugal up front, we have decided to invest in a solar oven.  I'm hoping to not only have it for emergency cooking, but to also learn to use it during the summer weeks to help decrease the household temperatures further and in turn decrease the electric bill.

 -- I peeled and cut up a watermelon rind to try my hand at making watermelon rind preserves.  I had all the supplies on hand.

-- I checked out 2 cookbooks, 1 research (history) book, and 2 novels from the library.  My husband checked out two books on CD to listen to during his commute.  My daughter checked out a book about cats that peaked her interest.

Monday:

-- I washed and hung two quilts to dry.  (This included our picnic blanket, which we had used twice over the weekend.)

--  I made 5 jars of watermelon rind preserves.

-- I ordered some books for a research project.  After an exhaustive search, nowhere locally had these books for me to beg or borrow.  Through careful shopping I found 8 of the books I needed and spent a total of $55.35.  Finding them all used and with free shipping helped keep my costs down.

Tuesday:

-- I cooked a double batch of blueberry pancakes.  Cooking once and eating twice is a wonderful way to cut down on heating the house up, save time, and allow for economy of scale.

-- Because blueberries and strawberries were on sale I picked up some to make jams.  These will go into our food storage.  The blueberries were on sale and couponed for $1 off each package.

Wednesday:

-- Bought produce at the Farmer's Market...spent $10 for quite a good amount.

-- ordered an outdoor chair and utilized 10% off coupon.  Our summer (fold up and take to events chairs) were totally worn out an falling apart.

-- pulled together a meal for guests from our food supplies

-- tried a store brand version of one of our favorite coffees and actually prefer it

-- utilized the delay feature on the washer and had a load of clothes waiting when I got up...hung them to dry

--  My mama brought me a jar of home canned green beans.

Thursday:

-- We ended up doing a Sam's Club run.  However, I did pick up some items for our long term storage that were on sale, too.)

-- Friday and Saturday were a blur.  Even though my costs were higher for meals, we were feeding extra people. The meals had to be quick and convenience foods aren't cheap.  However, they are still less than eating out.