This week in groceries

Keeping track of how much I spent, and on what. Would your grocery bill be higher? Do you buy things that are only for you? Do you end up eating healthier? What was I thinking when I bought that? You be the judge. Here is a pic of the booty.

From Aldi:
Milk (Skim) $2.70/Gal.
Iceburg Lettuce $0.89/head
Shred CoJack Cheese $2.99/12oz.
Bananas ($0.44/Lb?) $0.96
Turkey Lunchmeat $3.49/16oz.
Apple Juice $1.69/64oz.
Russet Potatoes $1.99/10Lbs.
Pineapple Chunks (Canned) $0.89/?oz.
TOTAL
$15.60

This week in groceries

Since home-ec is a subject that is close to my heart these days, I thought I would do a post about my grocery budget. I have been trying to do Once-A-Month-Cooking (OAMC). For those that haven't heard, this is a system of cooking that involves one very intensive all-day-long cooking marathon. You cook a whole month's worth of meals in one day, and don't have to cook (much) again for a whole month. While this may sound like a mountain of work, it is actually a much more efficient way to cook. You chop all your vegetables, once. There are more, but it's less time than dragging out your cutting board or food chopper every night for supper. You can cook all your meats at once, (all your hamburger or all your chicken for instance). Not only do you save energy by not having to heat up your oven or stovetop multiple times, it's also less mess to clean up, since you only use one or two pans for several meals at once. OAMC encompasses all the positive aspects of homemade cooking as well. You can tailor your menu to include or exclude anything you want. This means you can make your meals as healthy as you want or need them to be. There are many many reasons why this system can work well, if you need more convincing than my meager arguing skills can wrangle up, do a Google search for OAMC. There are many many blogs and sites dedicated to this subject. This post will just scratch the surface of one aspect: planning/shopping.

My budget for groceries has been... adversely affected recently. Let's just say J's income is variable. Since it is our only income right now, we have to be vigilant about what groceries get spent on. Yes, that is, which groceries can be afforded at the moment.  :[  So here I am posting for all the world to see: did I spend well? Did I get a deal? (Don't tell me if I didn't.) Could I have done better? Probably. I am not a mega coupon diva. I've seen TV shows where those gals go shopping and get hundreds of dollars worth of stuff for cents on the dollar. I'm told those same gals spent MONTHS planning such a trip, and that it isn't something you can do every time. Even so, I would LOVE to be learn to pull off such a trip every so often. Maybe in a later post. Meanwhile, back at the "ranch"...

So, yesterday's shopping saga: I had spent several hours pouring over grocery fliers from the Sunday paper and online. I had come up with a list of spectacular deals. J and I narrowed it down to things we could really use. Then I was off, towing along #2 and #3 (he hadn't gotten out of the house in a while due to our sub-zero wind chills, I thought it would be good for him). I didn't have a paper flyer for Fareway, since they decided not to put it in my local Sunday Gazette. So, no price-matching cause they need the ad to do that. I think. I'm pretty sure. I wasn't going to waste my time finding out the hard way anyhow. So I went to Hyvee Drugstore first, because they are only a couple blocks from our house. They had an AWESOME coupon booklet in the Gazette. Then I was going to go to a store that we call the shrine of evil (hint: you Always walk out having spent more than you planned). But, on the way there we came up to Theison's, and they also had an awesome coupon book in the Sunday paper. So we stopped in and got the awesome stuff (and free popcorn which made #3 immensely happy) and headed to Fareway to pick up the flyer I *was* going to price match. Only once we got there I just went and got the stuff. It's hard to price match stuff from their meat counter anyway. Then a quick side detour to Goodwill to check out their inventory: I'm shopping for a bread maker for my sister and a "new" dresser for my daughter. Struck out. At least it was quick. On to Aldi which is practically next door. If you don't have one of these in your neck of the woods, you should get one! They are a discount grocery, emphasis on the discount. They only carry select items, though they have a very wide selection IMO. It's all the little details that make it stand out. Maybe a separate post on that sometime. By this time everyone was in a rotten mood. We argued about who had to strap the baby in every time, baby had a meltdown just after checkout, and it was still subzero outside. But we got 'er done, by gummy. I was so grateful not to have to put away all the groceries that I didn't snap a pic of them. Oh well. Here's the official breakdown anyway.

HYVEE (Drugstore)
Eggs $1.99/1 Doz - $1.00 coupon = $0.99
Milk (Skim) $3.19/Gal - $0.42 coupon = $2.77
Ground Beef (80% Lean) $3.79/Lb. - $1.80/Lb. coupon = $1.99
Hyvee Nacho Chips $1.88/13.5oz.
V05 Shampoo $0.68/15oz. x 3 = $2.04
V05 Conditioner $0.68/15oz.
HYVEE TOTAL (w/out tax)$10.35

THEISEN'S
Ice Melt $5.79/20Lb - $1.50 = $4.29
Washing Soda $3.49/55oz. - $0.50 = $2.99
Hawkeye Magnet (J's Bday) $1.88
THEISEN'S TOTAL (w/out tax)
$9.16
* Also got a raincheck for Fels Naptha Soap and Borax (for making dry laundry detergent).

FAREWAY
Fastco Tater Tots $2.00/32oz.
Fastco Crinkle Fries $2.00/32oz.
Fastco Shred Cheese $1.50/8oz. x 2 = $3.00
Pork Steak $1.49/Lb. x 2.92Lbs. = $4.35
Cabbage $0.39/head
FAREWAY TOTAL
$11.74

ALDI
Fresh Whole Pineapple $1.99 ea.
Navel Oranges $1.99/4 Lbs.
Mac N Cheese $0.45 x 2 = $0.90
ALDI TOTAL
$4.88

GRAND TOTAL $36.13

Not too shabby. Let's see if we can make it till next week!

Blog Vacation

So... Now that I am able to get back into the swing of things (somewhat)... my iMac died. *sob* Some of the data got backed up, but accessing it right now is problematic. And then my server had a hardware failure, from which it has yet to recover. All in all, this blog is barely limping along. Since that server also hosted most of my pics, this blog is in sad, sad shape. My editing tools were all on the iMac too, so it may be a bit before things get back in order. In the meantime, I hope to be sharing some new things soon.

Tea Party

My daughter is way into tea parties. Last April my mother, aunt and cousins staged a "grown up" tea party. There were biscuits, real flavored tea, good china, Easter party favors, desserts, and all the guests dressed up. Ever since then, she has been asking me for another one. Since summer is just about the busiest time of year for everyone, it hasn't happened yet. Settling for second best, we have been having "tea party" lunches. I took some pictures of our 'al fresco tea party'. We pitched a tent in the yard and set up a laundry bin with a tablecloth. A blanket sufficed for carpet in the tent. Mom claimed dibs on a small pillow to sit on. The menu was 'fruit plate' - cut up fruit and veggies, some chips, crackers, cheese, dip and sandwiches to round it out. 'Tea' was some grape juice drank from fancy cups with matching glass trays handed down from my grandma. Very nice! But too hot to hang out for very long. The light inside the tent was very yellow (for obvious reasons). I did the best I could with the photos, but they're still pretty yellowish. Oh well.

And here some photos from April's tea party. Happy birthday Aunt Elaine! Her birthday was the day after. There are exactly the right number of candles on the cake, but we won't say how many. ;)

Paisley Pattern

Check out what I've been messing around with. Paisleys! I saw a really cool font that wasn't quite as complicated as this pattern, but it did have paisley cutouts in all the letters. Really quite neat looking. So that'll be the next step to see if I can transform this lovely pattern into an actual font that can be typed, scaled, etc. I have some fonts that I've made before, but they were all vector art in Adobe Illustrator. You know - make a copy of each letter and position it just so... again and again until you've spelled something out. Uhg. There MUST be a better way, I just haven't gone out there to find out how. Anyway, here are some lovely paisleys to brighten up your humpday.

Unoriginal Monday

Despite the negative feelings I have about 'puffed up' content on many of the blogs I visit, I am here today to share something worthy. Worthy of what, I leave up to you. Thus the title of this post, because there isn't going to be anything I did myself in this post. Well, other than possibly view it before you did.

Jim's Pancakes Totally awesome (bees are my FAVORITE!) One of his works was featured in a magazine ... I think AARP. Nope, I am not that old yet, but my mom is. We totally drooled over the whole site. I watched the videos too. Pretty clever, he uses those ketchup bottle things and a lot of ... creative coloring agents. Stale turmeric? BLECH!! I'll just stick with food coloring, thanks.

Penguin Pancakes

I totally copied these guys over at Kitchen Fun With My 3 Sons. LOVE it! Check out the whole rest of her blog, it's pretty awesome. This was really fun and easy to make. Here is my version.

Here are the parts in progress. Made the body and head with a bigger blob on bottom, and smaller blob on top. I used pancake mix divided, part with a little cocoa added. I ran out of the lighter colored batter, so this one has all choc. parts. They are supposed to be oval shaped for the wings. Not perfect, they still taste great. I think they look fine as 'organic' shapes too.

Here is the finished penguin.

I had a lot of fun making these. The beak and feet are made of orange sections, and the eyes are whipped cream and mini M&M's. Yummy! The kids were not too hungry, so I cooked up the rest of the batter. We will be having penguins the rest of the week, yay!