Thrift store shopping

We all need to buy clothes for ourselves and our children. When money is tight (or even when it isn't) buying clothes because a kid grows is stressful. We have 4 kids, all of which were had prior to our crappy situation. Unfortunately, they don't quit growing just because it is stressful.

I have figured out that the Value Village across the street from my house has some amazing deals to be had. Thursdays they put a certain color tag at 50% off and on Monday that tag is $.99. It is a hit or miss on whether you can find what you are looking for but the deals are there to be had.

I didn't have much of a wardrobe when I moved back to the states, so when Christmas time came around and my mom asked what I wanted I told her clothes. Since she and I have very different taste in clothes it worked out better that she chose to give me a gift card (with the stipulation that it could only be spent on me). I spent several Monday mornings standing in line waiting for Value Village to open. I managed to spend that gift card and fill my closet quite fully. My mom would never have shopped at the thrift store but when I was able to tell her I got such and such brand skirt, dress, or shirt for only a dollar, she was amazed.

I have also been able to keep my kids clothed by watching the racks at Value Village. I have been able to find my teen the Levis jeans he likes for $4.99 or less. I was also able to find him various brands of basketball style shorts for summer for less than $3. Most of my daughter's footed pajamas came from there costing only $.99 -$1.50 each.

I like to shop at thrift stores because it is a thrill to find something that would have normally cost $60 and only pay $1. Even when we get back to a better place in life I will still shop at the thrift store.

Have a super fabulous wonderful day!

I Buy Cheap Vodka

I know, I know, I am poor and shouldn't be buying vodka.

It is bad for my health, I shouldn't be buying vodka.

I don't buy vodka to drink though. I buy it to make things with. I have been making our homemade vanilla extract for a few years now and am currently attempting to make mint extract. We cook and bake a lot at home and so we go through quite a bit of vanilla extract. It is expensive at the store and I had found blogs a while back that showed me how to make it for cheaper. It is simple. I split 10 vanilla beans in a liter of cheap vodka and let it sit for a few months and the end result is vanilla extract. You can choose to strain the solids out but I leave mine in while we are using the bottle. When we get about half way done with the current bottle we start a new one so it will be ready in time and we wont have to try to find a deal on it. You can also top up your current bottle with new vodka a couple times before your beans are spent.

We bought a live mint plant not too long ago to make some food with and when we were done I planted it outside. It hasn't been long but that plant has gotten quite big. We have been picking the leaves off to add to our water. It helps to get more water down if you don't like plain water. I had a bright idea when I realized I had to start a new bottle of vanilla this week that maybe I could use the leaves to make mint extract as well. I did a little looking around online and sure enough there were sites that said they put bruised mint leaves in vodka and let sit for a while and had mint extract. I got a bunch of mint leaves and bruised them. I put them into a canning jar and poured the cheap vodka over the top. They are up high in my cupboard to sit and mix for a while. I am excited to see if this turns out as well as the vanilla extract.

Making these extracts at home are an easy way to save money if you do a lot of home baking.

Have you ever made any extracts at home? Which ones? Did you like them?

Chocolate Chip Cookies

I am going to share my adapted recipe for chocolate chip cookies and how we store them so we don't eat too many cookies at one time. This saves us time, money, and from expanding waist lines. The original recipe comes from my pink Better Homes and Gardens cookbook.

 

 

Ingredients:

1/2 cup coconut oil

1/2 cup softened butter

1 cup packed brown sugar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1 cup whole wheat flour

12 ounces mini chocolate chips

 

1- In large bowl, beat coconut oil and butter together. Add sugars and baking soda and mix again. Beat in eggs and vanilla until well combined. Mix in all of the flour and then the chocolate chips. (I can do this whole process with my hand mixer but if you cannot you can finish up with a spoon or fork)

 

2- To bake you are going to preheat your oven to 375 degrees and drop by spoonfuls onto an ungreased cookie sheet about 2 inches apart. (I use a pampered chef small scoop to spoon mine out). Bake raw dough for about 8 minutes and frozen dough for just a minute or two more. They are done cooking when lightly browned.

 

 

We love fresh warm home baked cookies at our house but I find that a single recipe makes too many cookies for us to eat. I personally don't need that much temptation laying around. What I do is mix up the whole recipe above and then I put 12 on a small cookie sheet and bake right away. The rest of the dough gets put on a cookie sheet lined with waxed paper like this picture above. I then slide the cookie sheet with all the dough balls into the top of my freezer. After about an hour or two I can remove the cookies sheet and put the dough balls into a freezer bag to use for later.

 

 

This is my bag that I store our dough balls in for later use. I have the simple baking instructions on the outside so nobody has to dig the cookbook off the shelf. This bag is then kept in the freezer until we need a few cookies. We take out our few and put them on the cookie sheet while the oven is preheating and then bake them. I find it takes only 1-2 minutes longer to bake from frozen than it does the fresh dough.

 

This simple recipe saves us time when we would like to have a treat but nothing readily available. It saves money because home making cookies are much cheaper and serve a lot more than ready to bake or already baked store bought cookies. The idea of storing the premade dough in the freezer til ready to use saves me many, many calories as well. I don't eat raw dough due to raw eggs so that isn't a problem for me. :)

 

Have you ever frozen cookie dough for later use? What other kinds of cookies have you done this for?

Vitacost.com - Raw Honey, Pasta, and Tea

If you are new to Vitacost and sign up through a referral link you will get a $10 off $10+ purchase coupon code in your email. I found a way to get a great deal on a few items.

Here is how one deal can work out today:
1 - Sign up for Vitacost as a new member using a referral link
2 - Check your email for your coupon code
3 - Add items to cart (any close to $10 will work but this is one with things I would like to get)
          YS Eco Bee Farms Raw Honey -- 22 oz normally over $7 on sale for $5.91
          Annie's Homegrown Gluten Free Rice Pasta and Cheddar -- 6 oz on sale for $2.19
          St. Dalfour Organic Vanilla Tea -- 25 Tea Bags on sale for $2.12
          Any 2 Free Samples

The above works out to $10.22 total.
4 - Add the coupon code for your $10 off during the check out.
5 - Shipping is a flat $4.99 unless you spend over $49 which then it is free.
6 - Your total on the above order is $5.21  (less than just the raw honey would cost at the sale price)

Have you ordered from Vitacost.com before? I do regularly and love it. I love the fact that the shipping cost is the same to my APO address as it is for any US address. I also like that I can get things from there that I cannot find locally.

Cancelling Cable TV

One thing The Man and I do not agree on is how much tv should be watched in the house. I hate the tv on except for in small doses, I would much rather listen to the radio. He, on the other hand, thinks that the tv should be on 24/7. It is kinda funny to me as he turns off every light in the house when he sees them on but he leaves that darn tv running if we are home and awake. I believe that the tv makes my kids more crazy. I swear the days I do not turn the tv on they behave much better than the days I do. I don't believe that depriving them of tv is ok either though.

I finally convinced The Man that almost $100 a month of cable tv was ridiculous when we have a fabulous movie collection and that none of us really need that much tv time anyway. I had also told him that we would get Netflix which is less than $10 a month if he really couldn't deal with no cable. He reluctantly agreed and called to have the cable tv shut off. The company tried to keep him but he told them no and scheduled to have it turned off. We had it scheduled to be shut of after our paid bill time was up. It was due to be shut off in about a week.

GUESS WHAT? Today they called and offered him 6 months cable tv free of charge. I am really torn on this idea. Of course he accepted it, and I probably would have too since the biggest reason I wanted the cable gone was the cost of it. I guess they didn't like the idea we were cancelling and are trying to rope us back in. I am still going to make sure that it is cancelled before that 6 months is up as I do not have any desire to pay $100 a month for tv ever again when there are so many other cheaper options.

Do you think their offer is a good deal or a pain in the rump?

Badger Sunscreen Deal

This weekend only iHerb.com has Badger sunscreen on sale for $3.00 for a single unit. This is a great natural sunscreen and a great price.

If you have never ordered from iHerb.com before you can use my referral code JIJ590 in the coupon area when you checkout to save $5.00 on your first order.

You can also add a free sample to your order here.

A couple other good deals that I was able to get in on:
BeeCeuticals Organics, Hand Salve, Orange & Honey, 2 oz - $0.90

St. Dalfour, Organic, Vanilla Tea, 25 Tea Bags, 1.75 oz - Buy the tea get a tea cup for free - $3.99
other flavors available but I LOVED this flavor

Shipping to the lower 48 states is free if your order is over $20 and weighs under 10 lbs.

After you sign up and place an order you can also sign up for the rewards and get your own code to pass out to others. For your first order I would be grateful if you would use my code JIJ590 which helps me out and also gives you a discount.

How I Save Money When Shopping

When I started being a stay at home mom our income was cut by over a third. I had lived poor before we got married so I knew we wouldn't starve and we wouldn't be homeless because we moved on to the military base. Other than that I was scared. I never thought about being a stay at home mom. I was a hair stylist and I was quite social. I was a good hair stylist and made decent money. Staying home the social aspect has been much harder for me to deal with than the money issue. I have found ways to save money and get free products and while they may not be much that little bit seems to help a lot.

I use coupons when I can. We live overseas due to the military but we still have an American commissary. We can use coupons. They do not double coupons but they will accept coupons up to 6 months past the expiration date. My mom sends us her coupon inserts by using them as filling in boxes that she sends. I am also able to print coupons online and sometimes sign up for coupons from companies on Facebook. I was able to save a lot more money when we were in the states using stores that doubled coupons but saving money is saving money and I will always use a coupon if it is available.

I love thrift stores, yard sales, and online yard sale sites too. I wish I had understood thrift stores more when I was single and poor but I love to go to them now. When we lived in Tucson I used to go to Savers every Monday because it was $1 day, everything of a specific color tag was $1. Here I haven't seen thrift store sales but I can still buy like new/ gently used items for a fraction of the cost. There is also a local online yard sale site that you can look for used items for sale. I have managed to score great deals by using these. Regular yard sale season is rapidly approaching as well. There are a few here and there and if I could get up and ready earlier on the weekends I would probably find a few more.

BzzAgent.com is a word of mouth site. You can sign up and take surveys about yourself and then at times you are invited to join BzzCampaigns. I have done a few where they have sent me a product to try out and review. I like this because I am able to try a product for free or deeply discounted. All they ask is that you spread the word about the product and share a review. I love this because I can put an honest review out there. I am currently waiting on my DrScholl's for her insoles to try out. I don't wear heels that often but I would love to see if this actually makes them more comfortable.

Swagbucks.com is a search engine that rewards you with points for using it. You can also take surveys or polls and watch their Swagbucks TV to help earn extra points. You can print coupons and earn point for redeeming them. For even more points you can get referrals and earn points for your friends earning points. I earn about 1 $5 gift card per month. It isn't a lot but it is free for doing something I would be doing any way. My referral link is at the beginning of this paragraph.

Mypoints.com is another site that you can earn points toward gift cards. I manage to earn about 1 $25 gift card per year. They also have a referral program. I do not have a bunch of referrals so these are realistic opportunities for anybody. Printable coupons from this site will earn points as well as shopping online through this site. I receive emails from them with click to earn points as well.

I save money by checking online for deals and pricing when we need clothes, shoes, or personal effects. If I find the price I am looking for I will buy online. When shopping online I also check sites like ShopAtHome.com or Ebates.com to see if they have any online coupons or cash back. A lot of sites are included on these sites.

Most of these suggestions have to deal with savings when shopping. I will share some more ideas on savings around our house at a later time. Do you have suggestions for saving when buying clothes, groceries, or household items?

Rhubarb Cinnamon Jam

We have been trying to experiment with new foods because I did not come from a home where there was a ton of variety. My parents were great and they fed us well but they both worked and so we had a lot of plain meals such as spagetti, hot dogs and french fries, or chicken with rice and a vegetable (generally corn). Since I am a stay at home mom I have a little more time to attempt a garden and cook more variety of food from scratch. I also enjoy being able to make some things from scratch because it is not only cheaper but we also avoid a lot of preservatives in the homemade version.

This past week I found a recipe on the blog One Hundred Dollars A Month for making Rhubarb Cinnamon Jam. Rhubarb seems to be in season here at the moment since it is at every store and the markets for a reasonable cost. Rhubarb is one of those foods that I did not have as a child so thought I would try this recipe. It turned out amazing! Even my middle boy who is super picky and wont eat much variety liked it. He said it smelled like apple pie while I was making it. I think he is right. The Man thought it was good too. I like these homemade jams because they can be different flavors than what you can buy in the store and they are cheaper for a bit of effort.

My cost breakdown goes something like this:
rhubarb - 2.30
water- free
pectin - 1.89
butter - .05?
sugar - 2.28
lemon juice - .10?
cinnamon - .05?
For a total of  $6.67 for 7.5 - 8 oz jars. Less than $1 per jar of homemade yummy jam that does not contain HFCS. This is worth my time to let my family have something that I prepared especially for them.

Please take a few minutes to look around the blog One Hundred Dollars A Month. Mavis has great ideas on how to eat healthy foods on a very slim budget. She has ideas I would have never thought of. I really enjoy visiting her blog.

The Recipe:
Rhubarb-Cinnamon Jam (adapted from Sure Jell recipe)

4-1/2 cups prepared fruit (about 2-1/2 lb. fully ripe rhubarb…about 5 lg stalks, 6 c chopped)
1 cup water
1 box SURE.JELL Fruit Pectin
1/2 tsp. butter or margarine
6-1/2 cups sugar, measured into separate bowl
1 T lemon juice
1 t ground cinnamon
*red food coloring (optional…see note at bottom)(I did not use)

BRING boiling-water canner, half full with water, to simmer. Wash jars and screw bands in hot soapy water; rinse with warm water. Pour boiling water over flat lids in saucepan off the heat. Let stand in hot water until ready to use. Drain jars well before filling.

CHOP rhubarb in medium dice. Place rhubarb and water in 4-qt. saucepan. Bring to boil on high heat. Reduce heat to medium; simmer 2 min. or until rhubarb is tender. Measure exactly 4-1/2 cups prepared rhubarb into 6- or 8-qt. saucepot.

STIR pectin into prepared rhubarb in saucepot. Add butter to reduce foaming. Bring to full rolling boil (a boil that doesn’t stop bubbling when stirred) on high heat, stirring constantly. Stir in sugar & cinnamon. Return to full rolling boil, stirring constantly. Boil exactly 1 min., stirring constantly. Remove from heat. Skim off any foam with metal spoon.

LADLE immediately into prepared jars, filling to within 1/8 inch of tops. Wipe jar rims and threads. Cover with two-piece lids. Screw bands tightly. Place jars on elevated rack in canner. Lower rack into canner. (Water must cover jars by 1 to 2 inches. Add boiling water if necessary.) Cover; bring water to gentle boil. Process 10 min. Remove jars and place upright on a towel to cool completely. After jars cool, check seals by pressing middles of lids with finger. (If lid springs back, lid is not sealed and refrigeration is necessary.)

*Add a few drops of red food coloring after you remove jam from heat and skim off any foam with metal spoon.

makes 5 12 oz jars or 7.5 8 oz jars

Snow And Ice Cream

We woke up to snow today. I know this isn't very exciting for a lot of people but for us this is amazing. We lived in Tucson, Arizona for 10 years prior to moving here and there was almost no snow there. The first year there was some snow a couple of times and we enjoyed it, but last year I think we might have gotten a light dusting of flakes about 2 times. The first thing the kids wanted to do was go outside and play. I told them we had to have breakfast first. While I was mixing up ingredients for waffles and homemade syrup, I had The Man go out and collect some clean snow before the dog or kids could contaminate it all. We turned it into snow ice cream. This was the first time any of us had experienced this and yes, I was a bad mom and let the kids have some snow ice cream while their breakfast was cooking. I figure that we do not feed them like that regularly so it is OK to have a super special treat sometimes. Over the course of the day we ended up making three flavors. It is much cheaper than the $5 half gallons at the store and we already had all the ingredients on hand.

Vanilla Snow Ice Cream

Ingredients:

• 1 cup of milk
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/2 cups sugar
• CLEAN Snow

Preparation:

Go outside and get 4 - 5 cups of fresh, clean snow. Don't pack the snow! Bring it in the house and set it in the freezer until you need it. Mix together the milk, vanilla, and the sugar. Stir this mixture until the sugar is dissolved. Slowly add the snow to your mixture, stirring constantly, until it is as thick as ice cream! Eat up!

Our other versions were Mint Chocolate Chip and Chocolate. For the Mint Chocolate Chip we exchanged mint extract for the vanilla, added a couple drops of green food color, and added a few mini chocolate chips. For the Chocolate we omitted the vanilla and replaced it with 1 Tablespoon of cocoa powder. This was fun and who knows when we will have snow again. Have you ever had ice cream made from snow? Do you have some different variations?



Glasses Online

*this is the pair of glasses I ordered from Coastal



Today I had my first eye exam since high school. Yes that was a long time ago since I am going to turn 32 in February. I walked in thinking it was going to be an easy exam. It took me almost 2 hours to go through all sorts of tests and now I have to go back for a peripheral vision test and a scan of my head. I did walk out with a prescription for glasses. They are supposed to help me see things up close better. I priced glasses at the on base optical shop and it would cost me $300 for the pair of glasses that I liked. They charge separately for frames and lenses. It is a lot of money. If I end up buying them I will have to buy them out of our tax return as I don't usually have that much free money to spend. I did some research online and there are several online places to buy glasses. I decided to try out a could of them. I ordered a free pair from Coastal.com, a free pair from Firmoo.com, and a $6.95 pair from Zennioptical.com. I am a bit nervous trying online places especially ones who send free glasses with just the cost of shipping. These places include the cost of basic lenses in the cost of their frames. You would pay a extra for coatings or better lenses. I figured since my first prescription isn't very high I would be able to get away with the basic lenses.

Have you ever ordered glasses online? Did you like them?

If you order a pair from this link at Coastal I can get some referral credit to help fund a future pair. I would be so thankful if you would check it out or recommend this post to your friends to check out the links. The free glasses opportunities are for new customers only.

Cheap Christmas Stocking

I realized when we pulled out our Christmas stuff yesterday that H does not have a stocking yet. I should have known this but it totally slipped my mind. I was too busy trying to get through birthdays and buy Christmas gifts. I figured maybe I would try to make one for her instead of going out and buying an overpriced, cheaply made, stocking that I would not like. I used one of our other stockings and cut around it with a roller cutter. The pink and red part is a wool sweater that I paid $1.50 at a yard sale a while ago to make a diaper cover that I had not gotten around to yet. I used the middle of the sweater so I still have the arms of the sweater to use to make pants that can be used as a diaper cover. The white part is the hem of a skirt that I had picked up for free. I loved the fabric of the skirt but it was way too small. I love this stocking and am going to keep my eye out for some more wool sweaters to do this with as well. I would love for all of my kids to have a special stocking that I made for them.

Have you made your own stocking or some other Christmas craft? Please link in the comments so I can check out your homemade goodies too.

Thanksgiving Cranberries

I am so glad that The Man loves to cook and bake and will help me out in my endeavours in the kitchen. I bought 3 containers of cranberries to make cranberry sauce because I do not eat the canned stuff anymore since it has HFCS in it. We started making jellied cranberry sauce and ended up with 3 half pints. We canned it in the half pint jars because we are the only ones who will eat it. The kids like to turn their nose up at it. They surely do not know what they are missing. The man took some of the pulp and mixed it with some sugar and put it in the left over pie crust to make a tart type thing. We shared this as a snack after we were done cooking. It turned out good. I had too many cranberries left over so some got turned into cranberry nut bread and some got turned into a cranberry sauce type syrup and made into cranberry cream cheese. We still have a little bit of the pulp leftover and we are going to use that to make cranberry scones tomorrow to have with tea. I cannot believe that 3 containers of cranberries can stretch so far but to me that is amazing and I love the fact that we are going to be able to use all of them with no waste. How is that for thrifty?

Pie is out of the oven and it is after midnight - I think I am past ready for bed now. I hope everybody had a wonderful Thanksgiving.