Thursday, January 31, 2013

Millie is back at the shelter................

please let me explain why before judging me.........

We took her to our vet last night to get a check up like you would do with any animal.  We were concerned about her back end as she didn't sit on her bum, she squatted.  Plus if we went to pick her up she would yelp like we had really hurt her, which of course we hadn't.

Anyhow our vet looked her over and she has cataracts, a heart murmur, something wrong with her hips and/or spine and the enamel was missing from some of her teeth.  We would have had to pay for more extensive testing to see exactly what's what; we declined.

Now for someone who has had an animal for a while and this gradually happens you expect that as part of growing old.  However to have all this happen from the get go is a whole new kettle of fish, and one which we didn't expect to happen or were prepared for.

After what we went through with Molly, I was not emotionally ready to deal with all this medical worry again.  Nor are we financially able to deal with it.  So we made the heartbreaking choice to take her back to the shelter.

I am drained with this experience as I was and am felling guilty about taking her back, but I knew we had no choice.  I don't expect anyone's sympathy but thought you had to know what we had done.

Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Thank you for all your good wishes regarding Millie..

we seem to have got through the first 24 hours relatively unscathed.  She did pee in the house on Monday night once, but since then (touching wood) we have not had any accidents.  Molly used to pee on command, just need to get Millie to understand that!!!  Went into town and she is so good in the car  I am so impressed.  Called in at some friends house and she was pretty good there as well.  I was just terrified that she may pee in the house, but she didn't.

She has really made herself at home and has decided the couch is hers:

She can be quite vocal and barked/howled up a storm at the two horses in the paddock......
The only person who is really suffering is myself.  I have been stressing so much about her not being house trained I have ended up with a severe headache.  So I need to relax and everything will fall into place.  Also my apologies for not visiting everyone's blog, I am so tired with this headache my eyes just can't focus properly.

Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Would you like to say hello to the newest member of our household....


Millie

We brought Millie home on Monday night, so sorry about the quality of the photos.  Millie is around 4 1/2 (we were told 6) and is a beagle. She was originally brought into the shelter last August.  One of the volunteers took her home, but her dog didn't take to Millie and so she was brought back to the shelter.

They were telling us at the shelter that beagles are often at the shelter especially in hunting season, as hunters bring the dogs up to hunt and then dump them which is just awful.

I will post more photos as the days go by in the daylight.  She is a smaller version of Molly; hopefully minus the allergies.

Monday, January 28, 2013

Grocery shopping.........

I went grocery shopping on Friday, and thought I'd share with you some of the deals with you.

My first stop was Bulk Barn.  They had a $3 off coupon when you spent $10.  I have been wanting a tea ball for a while and at $2.99 that's the cheapest I have seen one yet.  Also bought some of their loose leaf tea and it was good.  I bought the black mixed berry Rhodiola and really enjoyed it.  So after the $3 coupon I paid $9.55 for what's in the photo.

I then popped into Zehrs.  Must admit I got a few good deals there.  The bread was 25 cents a loaf after coupons.  The box of PG Tips tea was free with a free product coupon.  The small tin of Tetley tea was 25 cents.  The box of Presidents Choice tea was $3.50 for 216 bags.  All in all I spent $53.24 and used $16.69 in coupons and $4.40 in 50% sticker savings.

Finally I popped into Sobeys as they had the "good" milk on for $3.99 a 4 litre bag.  They have a February 22nd expiry date on them.  The buns were day olds and I got the bag for $1.99, so spent $9.97 there.
All in all I spent $72.76 on Friday and I spent another $7.15 on Wednesday when I bought a bag of milk and 2 dozen eggs.  So my totals for this week was $79.91 spent and $25.06 in savings.

If you can check back in with me on Tuesday as I will have something very good to share with you!!!






Sunday, January 27, 2013

How to clean the house..........

I saw this over on Sue's blog here, and couldn't resist...........enjoy your Sunday...............cleaning of course!!!!

Saturday, January 26, 2013

Do you have a trifle bowl and a couple more questions

I do and got it out on Thursday as I had some strawberries that needed using up.  So I decided to make a trifle.
The only time I like hundreds and thousands, aka sprinkles is on a trifle and I LOVE them on top of the cream:
This trifle consisted of a bottom layer of strawberry jello/jelly with 1 lb fresh strawberries sliced in it.  A layer of custard, of course made with Bird's Custard Powder and a layer of whipping cream.

I have a couple more questions that I need answers too so I figured I would ask you guys.

First a food question.  I have a bottle of Zesty Italian Dressing and it needs using up.  Any suggestions on what I can do with it as I have no idea?

Also for those of you who have a wood burning stove or a fireplace, what do you do with all the ashes?  We use our fire 24/7 for six months of the year so have a lot of ashes.  Other than just dumping them around the property what else can you do with them?

Now finally I saw this over on Little Home in the Country's blog.  Really interesting and I agree we need more people like this to do these things.


Friday, January 25, 2013

Home of the Week

Busy day on Thursday as I cleaned out the fridge and freezer in the kitchen.

Before:



After:

This is what I had the throw out:
Made an inventory of what was in the freezer and sorted out what was in the fridge.  So a good job, jobbed!

Now this photo is for my own amusement.  For the first time in flipping ages, this was what was on our kitchen table............nothing other than the table runner and fruit bowl.  It's a very rare occasion when that is all that's sitting there, as if in doubt put it on the kitchen table until it gets put away.

This week's "Home of the Week," is not totally unpleasant, it's just not really my cup of tea.  I don't know that area at all but $2.4 million seems very pricey to me?  Also I don't like the look of the house from the outside.  From the front photo you're not sure what the other houses are like in the street, but the last photo confirms it's a modern house plopped into a road of traditional houses, I don't like that at all.  In it's favour the light coming into the house is lovely making it light and airy, but I do think I'll pass on this one.

I'm not really sure what to say about the "Condo of the Week?"  For $2 million, I would have thought there would have been a better view?  The building's amenities seem great but the condo itself left me wanting something more?I do love the floors and the kitchen, but the whole place lacked personality and warmth I think?  What do you think?

We have had some flipping cold weather, so thought this was appropriate!

Thursday, January 24, 2013

Our little Princess

The other day there was a larger than normal envelope in the mail box addressed to me from someone I  didn't think I knew.  Anyway when I opened it in was this gorgeous hand smocked baby bonnet for our little Princess. 

Marlyn was kind enough to send it to us for Our little Princess.  You can catch up with her over at her blog here.  She also welcomed another grand daughter to her family this past Sunday.

Look at the detail here, this will become an heirloom.

On Wednesday I had to go into the city, so of course I called in to see the baby.  She is now back up to 6lb 2oz.  She looks as though she is filling out a bit in the face.  She is a love though, and is a good baby.  She loves to be swaddled though and sleeps better when she's all wrapped up.
I couldn't rotate this photo, sorry.........

At the moment we are going through a very, very cold snap.  So to keep warm I have been making soup.  I made Green Bean, Ham and Potato Soup at the beginning of the week.  I didn't have a recipe I just made it up.


1 onion, chopped
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup flour
2 cups chicken stock
salt & pepper
1 cup cooked ham, chopped
2 cups frozen green beans, or fresh if you have them
2 large potatoes, diced
1 - 2 cups milk

Soften the onion in the butter for a couple of minutes.  Stir in the flour and cook for a minute.  Gradually stir in the stock, mixing thoroughly.  Add diced potatoes and simmer for 10 minutes.  Add in the green beans, and ham and continue cooking for another 10 minutes.  Mix in the milk, use enough to make the soup consistency you like.  We personally prefer a thicker soup.  Season to taste.  This should feed 4 to 6 people.

I also made Easy Cream of Cauliflower Soup


Ingredients:
2 tablespoons butter 1/2 cup chopped onion 3 cups coarsely chopped fresh cauliflower 1 - 10 ounce can condensed chicken broth (or vegetable broth) 1/4 cup all purpose flour 2 1/2 cups milk 1 1/2 cups shredded Cheddar cheese salt and pepper buttered croutons chopped parsley

Directions:
Melt butter in large saucepan. Sauté onion until tender. Stir in cauliflower and condensed chicken broth. Bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat and simmer 12 to 15 minutes or until the cauliflower is tender.

Smoothly combine flour and milk. Add the mixture to the saucepan. Cook and stir over medium heat until mixture boils and thickens.

Remove from heat. Add cheese and stir until melted. Add salt and pepper to taste. Ladle into soup bowls. Sprinkle with buttered croutons and parsley.

(I blitzed my soup to make it smooth)


Buttered Croutons: 1 1/2 cups bread cubes 2 tablespoons melted butter
Preheat oven to 350ºF.
Toss bread cubes in melted butter. Bake for 7 to 8 minutes or until golden brown.
Serves 4. 


I have to say I did prefer my Green Bean and Ham soup over the Cauliflower, but both are worth making.

Wednesday, January 23, 2013

This week's challenges..........

Financial: Whatever your budget is for the week, cut it. Can you cut it down 10%, 25%, maybe even in half for the week? Figure out a realistic cut, then put the extra towards debt or a savings goal!

Not sure if I can do this as the money I take out weekly is stretched to the limit.  I'll try my best though; what with putting money away for the 52 week challenge, the sealed pot challenge, money in my other pot, my birthday pot and my Christmas pot, there's not a lot left over.

 Decluttering: It's time to organize our food stash! Your pantry, cupboards you keep food in, fridge, freezer, etc... take inventory of what you have, organize it, toss any old, expired foods, make a menu plan using up any items that are nearing their "best before" day, donate foods you won't eat, etc... Don't forget to snap before & after photos!! If you've already done this over the month, well, you're off the hook!! ;)

This is a job that I have wanted to do for a while, so should be easy to do.

Freezing flipping cold around here.   Still hibernating.  Do have to leave the house though today, will have photos to show you tomorrow........

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Many things annoy me, but paying Bank fees really tick me off.

We are with the TD Bank and have been ever since we came to Canada.  I keep threatening to move all our stuff, but basically I am just too damn lazy to do it and can't be bothered with all the hassle.

One thing though that drives me crazy are the bloody bank fees.  It's around $15 a month if you go over a set amount of transactions which I always do.  So one way of getting around that is that you have to have a minimum balance of $3,500 in your chequing account to defer those fees.    Although it annoys the heck out of me, I know I cannot make over $15 in interest a month in a savings account with that money, so moved money into our chequing account so I don't pay the service charges.

$3,500 is an odd number to me, so I have $4,000 in there and just "forget" about it.  When I balance my cheque book it's minus the $4,000 as it doesn't exist in my cheque book.  I also make sure I have nothing less than $100 in our chequing account.  If it falls down to $100 in my mind we have no money.

We have only ever been overdrawn once and it was a cheque we had made out to the Government for our citizenship application, and back in the day, when the banks weren't open all hours I figured it wouldn't be processed for an extra day, but it was.  Luckily we had money in our savings account and they moved the money over from there for us but they charged us a fee for doing it.

By "forgetting/pretending" that $4,000 doesn't exist and mentally telling myself that we CANNOT go down below that $100 balance in the chequing account we should never ever have service charges.

Do you have a trick that you use so you don't have service charges?

I have discovered some new to me authors and when I order the books from the library you won't be hearing nothing from me as I'll have my nose in a book.

I have read four of Maggie Sefton's books so far and they are good.  Here is a link to her site.  I have been reading the Kelly Flynn series, which is set around a knitting store.  The books feature both knitting patterns and recipes.

I can't wait to order books by the author Laura Childs.  Here is a link to her site.  I'll be honest I am not sure which series to start with. The Tea Shop Mysteries seem to be calling my name?  Plus they are set in Charleston, South Carolina which is a place I love.

Monica Ferris books also look like my type of book.  Check out her site here.

Last but not least Earlene Fowler books have a quilting theme about them.  Here is a link to her site.


Monday, January 21, 2013

Catching up with a couple of things.

I went grocery shopping on Friday and spent exactly $73.00, not often that happens, an exact dollar amount.  Had $11.89 in coupons savings.  Went to No Frills and stocked up on their 15 bottle packs of water for 88 cents, plus they had an in store special on Folgers ground coffee for $5.88 for the 900 gram container, plus I had $1 off coupons.

This week we had to clean out a closet as part of the decluttering challenge.  I cleaned out the spare bedroom closet last week.  I may try and get something else cleaned out today if I have chance.

For the financial challenge we had to donate some money.  I decided to "give" in the form of a $5 Tim Hortons gift card to a mentally challenged individual that I know goes into a Tim Hortons location all the time.  I left the card with the manager who promised to pass it onto this guy.  The card will pay for three cups of coffee for him.

I must admit I found that part of the challenge hard as I haven't been anywhere where I could do something like this, this week.  Plus it's been a tight week this week, so didn't have too much in the way of extra money.  I would have loved to see his face though when they give him the card.

We're in for some bitter cold weather in the minus 20's so it's time for soups and stews.  Made broccoli soup using this recipe and am looking for a good green bean and ham soup recipe as I pulled out some ham from the freezer.

Thought this was amusing....

For those of you who are not Canadian,  its a total white out, and we still think Spring is coming....

Sunday, January 20, 2013

Hibernating today

Blowing a gale force with snow squalls coming in from the lake........



Sun is peeking through but it's flipping cold still.  I'll be back tomorrow!!

Saturday, January 19, 2013

Olive and Rhubarb............

Heading to see dd and son-in-law today, as we haven't seen them since Christmas, so thought I'd share the latest photos of their "children" Olive and Rhubarb.

This is Olive asleep on her dad's leg. 


And here is Rhubarb:

Enjoy your Saturday!

Friday, January 18, 2013

Home of the week and other things

My reaction to this weeks "Home of the Week," was I'll pass.  Just not my cup of tea at all.........

Where to start with this weeks $3.5 million "Condo of the Week."  I am actually speechless; I will be very interested in your reactions to it!!  Look at photo six to see the monogrammed valance?  Also the mirrored tub/bath????  You can even buy the place furnished...........WHY???  

I am taking part in the 52 week challenge as mentioned here.  Figured out what we are going to do with the money saved at the end of the year.  We need a new desktop computer and printer, so fingers crossed we manage to complete the challenge as that money should cover that.  Now we need to figure out how to make our computer last until then.  We have had it a long time and it's a slow as molasses!!

It has turned cold again and we have had snow.  Got the oil tank filled this past week, we had used half a tank of oil between the middle of November through the middle of January, so it cost us just over $462.00.  The oil went up by 5 cents a litre since the middle of November.  Can't seem to win.  However we got our property tax statement in and at least that didn't go up, so that is a blessing.

Oh and Cindy has her post up with all the Ontario Bloggers that participated here: http://justnorthofwiarton.blogspot.ca/2013/01/ontario-bloggers-day.html

A very blah post today, goes with the weather.....


Thursday, January 17, 2013

Ontario Bloggers...........

Cindy is hosting an Ontario Bloggers Day over at her blog.  You can find out more here.  Although we all love reading blogs from all over the world, it's neat to read about people in your own neck of the woods.

We live in a rural area midway between two towns.  Alliston is a thriving town a 10 minute drive to the East of where we live.  The main industry there is the Honda plant and because of that the town is growing by leaps and bounds.  Alliston's "claim to fame," is that Frederick Banting was born in Alliston.
Frederick Banting was a medical scientist, doctor, painter and Nobel prize winner noted as one of the main discoverers of Insulin.  You can read more about him here

If we go 10 minutes west of our house we arrive at our other local town Shelburne.  Shelburne is an up and coming town and seems to have a lot of plans for the future.

Shelburne hosts the Canadian Open Old Time Fiddle Championship each year.  However to my mind they host an even bigger event, the Great Canadian Worm Charming Festival and Championship.  Now just in case you haven't heard of this........I have no idea why not though??????  Here is a link they even have their own song.

Now for those of you who have 9 minutes to waste, you can watch this you tube video about the Worm Charming Festival.




We live in an area known as "The Hills of the Headwaters."  It is a gorgeous area with a lot of natural beauty.  Both dh and I wish we had moved to this area sooner, as everyone is so friendly and we love the house we live in, despite it causing numerous headaches over these past four years!!!    

On Wednesday I went to see our Little Princess and would you believe I forgot my bloody camera?????  What the heck.  Anyway she is still as perfect as ever, despite her being asleep the whole time I was there.  Oh and she was gassy, and by the straining on her face before I handed her back to her mother, I would say that wasn't only a wet diaper that needed changing!! The joys of being a Nana, you get the good bits and don't have to deal with the nasty bits......not that I would have minded changing her diaper.

Wednesday, January 16, 2013

While having my breakfast in a morning,

I sit at my computer desk and do certain things. 

1. Go onto Swagbucks and do the daily poll and NOSO, then do a search until I win Swaggbucks; all that takes five minutes at the most, generally only a couple. (I have set myself a goal of having 2000 Swagbucks in my account by the end of the month)

2. Check for any comments on Blogger, read and publish them.

3. Go onto Daily Mail Uk to see what's happening both celebrity and news wise.

4. Check email account and try and answer at least one email, and respond/look at other people's blogs.

All this takes at least an hour, some mornings less, some mornings more depending on how much time I have to spare.  I enjoy this time, I sometimes will write a blgo post or start one for the next day (like this one) as I feel more creative in a morning for some reason.

Do you have a routine in a morning?

Now for some unknown reason on Tuesday I had a spurt of energy and made good use of it.  Do you remember the steamer I bought, here is a link to that post.  Well I gave our bathrooms a good clean, which included steam cleaning the shower and both toilets, around the taps.  I also steam cleaned all the floors in the house, plus did some general tidying up.  By lunch time my back was complaining about it all, so I sat down to read a book for a bit.  I am really glad though that I purchased that steamer.  I use it once a week too wash the kitchen floor and no chemical is used.



Week 3 Decluttering & Budget Challenges!!
Time for new challenges!!! Are you ready?!
 
Decluttering Challenge: Choose a closet, any closet, and clean it out!! Pick 2 closets if you're feeling really energetic & determined!! Take before & after photos so you can awe & inspire everyone else participating in my challenges as well! ;) lol!
 
I actually cleaned out our spare bedroom closet on Monday, so that will count, but I will clean out something else as well, not sure what yet. 
 
Financial Challenge: Give. Find a way in your budget to "give" financially somehow... It doesn't have to be grand, you don't have to go hungry. I just want you to go that 'extra mile' for someone else. Buy a coffee for the person in line behind you at the coffee shop, hand a $5.00 bill to a homeless person on the way to work, throw a little extra into the collection plate at church, toss your change into the charity box in front of the register at the grocery store, etc... simply give.
 
This sounds simple enough, a random act of kindness always feels good.

Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Going no where fast...........

Monday morning was like that for me.  Spent a bit of time on the phone sorting a few things out, including calling Lipton about a problem I am having with their Pyramid teas.  I have fallen in love with their Blackberry Vanilla Infusion tea.  However when I pull the string from the bag it can create a hole in the bag, which means the leaves escape into my cup.  So I called to see if I was doing something wrong.  Turns out I am not, and they are sending me a coupon to replace the box. ( I am not sure if you can see the hole in the bag in the photo?)

I adore this tea and may buy myself a tea ball next time I am out so if I tear the bag again I can put the tea inside of the ball.  The string is heat pressed onto the bag, so it's not glued on as I thought.

I called Pattons the yarn people the other week as a ball of yarn had a hole in it and they were saying they had a problem with that batch.  Anyhow here is what I received in the mail from them:

I am going to give them a call to say thank you for their generosity.  Wasn't that good of them to send two balls of yarn?  In the right of the photo you can see some coupons I got in the mail also including a $1 and a $2 Campbells coupon  which is handy.  I called about some soup of theirs that looked like dirty dishwater and didn't smell much better either.   They said it was a blending problem and kindly sent me the coupons, which was nice of them.

Cindy is hosting an Ontario Bloggers Day here.   If you blog and are in Ontario, go and sign up at the link, I think it's happening this Thursday (17th).  Its one way of promoting one another's blogs and we all get to "meet" new and wonderful people via blogland.

Monday, January 14, 2013

Another visit with our little Princess....

We went to see our little Princess on Sunday as they were kept in hospital an extra day; something to do with bacteria (?) but nothing serious. 
Couldn't get her to open her eyes for the camera, but they are dark.  She has the laid back temperament of her dad and is going to be tall like her mothers side.

She's feeding well and sleeping well, so that is also good.

I don't know where the last few days have gone too, as I knew on Tuesday that "R" was going in to have the baby on Thursday; then she got pushed back to Friday as the hospital was so busy; so the last few days have revolved around waiting to meet our little Princess.

The hospital was that busy on Friday night that they had to make six women go to other hospitals to have their babies.  Things have changed a lot since we had our children.  We had to sign in and out of the ward.  Also they don't call it a Maternity Ward, they call it Post-Partum.  I had to ask someone as we couldn't find the Maternity Ward on the listing. 

When I had our kids we kept them on a strict four hour feeding, that doesn't seem to be the case nowadays.  Also they kick you out of hospital after 24 hours unless there is a problem.  I was in hospital for seven days with our son, granted he had jaundice but if I remember rightly five days was the norm for your first baby.  Even when I had dd I was in 48 hours and that was a straight forward delivery.

One thing that I did think was neat in the room "R" is in there was a sofa that turned into a bed, so that "M" has been sleeping there are well.  I thought that it was lovely that both mum and dad get to bond with baby all at the same time.  There wasn't that option when our kids were born.

Do you think things have changed a lot since you have had children?

Sunday, January 13, 2013

Our little Princess

Our little Princess , who weighs 6lb 1 oz and is around 21.7 inches long. 

You can't really see much of her.  She has a lovely head of dark downy hair and super long finger nails.  No idea who she looks like, maybe me...LOL  She more or less slept while we were there.  I called in at Bonnie Togs, never been in that store before and picked up a few pink things for her, plus her first dolly:
Mother doing well, though very tired and sore, as she went from 0cm dilated to 10 cm dilated in an hour and a half and surprised everyone, so no one was ready for the birth.  Suffice to say she had to have stitches poor girl.

I will get more photos next time I see her as she will be dressed in clothes next time, not all swaddled up in that sheet.

Saturday, January 12, 2013

Grocery Shopping and other things.......

*** AT 2.06AM THIS MORNING "R" & "M" HAD A BABY GIRL.  PHOTOS AND MORE DETAILS WILL BE POSTED ON SUNDAY...........I AM A NANA!!!!!!***

For those of you in Ontario (not sure about the rest of Canada) there is a great deal at Sobey's this week.  When you buy a certain amount of Proctor and Gamble products you get $5 off; plus you can use coupons as well.

My first transaction; (I split mine up as I wasn't sure how it was all going to work) was spend $15 before taxes on certain personal use items (toiletries).  My total before taxes came to $17.96.  They then took the $5 off and in this weeks local paper was the Proctor and Gamble coupon insert, so I used $6 worth of coupons from there.  So all in all after taxes I spent $8.78 on everything in the photo.

The next transaction was for cleaning items and you had to spend $20 before taxes to get the $5 off.  I bought three of the Swiffer clothes as I use them all the time and two bottles of washing up liquid. Prior to taxes that would have cost $22.35, minus the $5 plus I had $6.50 in coupons, my total came to $13.11 with taxes.  The cabbage was $1.69 and the red onions were $2.99.


I also popped into Zehrs and picked up what's in the photo and that cost $28.09.

The day before I also was in Zehrs and picked up a family sized chicken Cesar salad, a package of garlic toast, a package of deli meat, a carton of yogurt and a package of Kellogg's All Bran.  I had FPC for the yogurt and cereal, so they cost nothing and the rest was reduced, so all in all that trip cost me $8.05.

So, so far this month I have spent $75.21 on my grocery shopping, with $45.16 in savings.

I was lucky enough to win this quilted pillow cover from Debby.  Isn't it lovely?  She is a very talented sewer and quilter.

I haven't posted on my book review blog in a while.  Not because I haven't been reading books, but mainly because I have been lazy!!  Plus the books I have been reading are my own which I purchased from Bookcloseouts.  Anyhow I decided to post a couple of reviews of books I really liked here.

Friday, January 11, 2013

Got a couple of things completed for this weeks challenges

I got the two drawers cleaned out like I wanted to:

Bill/junk drawer before:
After:
Then I have a "junk drawer" that I use exclusively.

Before:

After:
I have also made a start on the trying to bring more money in the house.  I put an ad on Kijiji to try and sell these lights:
I have advertised them as Fairy Lights that are ideal to use at a wedding.  I know they are Christmas lights, but as they are white and as they can be used both indoor and outdoor I figured I would give it a try and get $15.00 for all three boxes. Will say I was surprised at the response and I have sold them tentatively; I am  meeting up with a lady next Wednesday who wants them and is willing to pay the $15  and have another couple of people lined up if she falls through.

Another thing I am taking part in is Cindy's 52 Week Challenge.

 
 
It's pretty self explanatory, but one tip I have is to print out the form and cross off each week when you put it in your jar/pot.  I am trying to get ahead of the game as I have a feeling when it gets to $30+ a week it will be harder to come up with the money.  I am on week nine.  I love this idea and thinking I will have saved up $1,378.00 by the end of the year excites me. 

If you click on the link above the form you will find more details over at Cindy's.

I am still keeping up with the sealed pot challenge as well, just need to remind dh to put money in there!!!


Thursday, January 10, 2013

Couple of things I did to save money this week.

My liquid soap in the powder room was half empty so I filled it up with water and shook it all up.  Granted the soap is a bit watery but it works just the same.

Did some baking yesterday.  Did it when the hydro was on the medium rate and put some potatoes into bake while baking other things and used up some things in my fridge and pantry.

Called Bell AGAIN, as their fees are going up by $6 a month {SIGH}  After talking with dh we decided to cancel his Sports Net World channel that we pay $18 or there abouts a month for.  After being on the phone for half an hour, the very helpful guy had miraculously been able to reducur fees by $18 a month.  So not only does dh able to keep his Sports Channel, but our bill will come in at around $121 a month, as I am paying $30 for the phone and $76.50 for the TV each month.

Also must say this guy was very, very helpful and even agreed with me when he tried to sell me Internet services that I was wise to stick with our current provider as their stick can get very expensive.  We currently pay just under $170 every three months for our high speed Internet and that includes the 13% taxes.

I saved electricity on shredding all the paperwork from the bill drawer that I cleaned out yesterday by burning it on the fire.  It also saved my back and head by not having to lean over the shredder and listen to it droaning on while I shredded a years worth of paid bills!!!

Now none of this seems like a lot buy everything does add up over a while......

Wednesday, January 9, 2013

My latest "treasure,"

I picked up my latest silent auction win on Sunday.  What do you think it is, it is made by Fenton?  I'll tell you the answer at the end of the post:





Carla's challenge for us this week is:

Finance: Can you bring some extra money into your household this week somehow? Here are a few ideas:
  • Pick up extra hours at work
  • Sell items around the house you no longer need or use
  • Offer a service or talent
  • Come in "under" budget and add that to your weekly savings
Decluttering: Junk Drawer. We all have one, don't pretend you don't, cause I won't believe you. ;) lol! Declutter your junk drawer and post before & after photos!!

Of the two things the decluttering will be easy as I need to sort out the drawer where all the paid bills are and had been planning on doing that anyway.

The finance one will be a little more difficult.  However I was thinking of putting some Christmas Tree LED lights that we no longer use on Kijiji and advertise them as fairy lights perfect for a wedding?

So what is my vase/bowl?  It's actually a candle holder, a 6" Fenton Hobnail Milk Glass Candle Holder like this one  I paid $15 for it which seems to be the going rate.  I don't have any bids in for the next couple of weeks.

Hotel Stay - Dinner

As part of our hotel stay the kids had booked us dinner, breakfast and afternoon tea. Here is what we ate at dinner.  Everything was spot on...