Outside my window … Cold and snowy. Can you believe it? It’s not unheard of for late April in Western New York, but it sure is annoying. I’m thinking … About lesson plans and laundry. I’m going to get back to “looping” our lessons, like Sarah does over at one of my favorite homeschooling blogs. I did this a bit in the beginning of the year when I was struggling with morning sickness, then got away from it when we got back to a season in life where I could schedule things. Now we’re in the throws of newborn life, and I know that looping will help us stay on “track” without leaving me feeling pressured and overwhelmed. As for the laundry …. well. Yeah. I am thankful … That we live near most of our family. Sure, there are times when we want to run for the hills. But for the most part, we are surrounded with support. We may not always see eye to eye on things (I think we mostly don’t, actually), and we might just totally drive each other nuts, but I’d still rather be with all of them than away from them. I can’t imagine living in an area where we have no support system. Would we survive it? Yes. But I’m glad that (for now) God hasn’t called us to that. In the school room … We are LOVING (loving, loving, loving) The Green Ember by S.D. Smith. Yowzers. If you’re in a read-aloud lull and looking for something that kids and adults can enjoy, I can’t recommend this book enough. Seriously! It’s a story with depth, moral significance, and […]
Frugal Fridays #22
I missed last week’s Frugal Fridays because I fell sick with food poisoning on Wednesday … it was horrible! I’ll spare you the details, but it took until Monday until I was able to really eat again. Add to that 3 out of 5 kids getting sick (thankfully not the baby!), and we had a rough week. We’re all healthy now though. Hopefully it stays that way for a while! Successes/Blessings: Last Friday I took the children to Eucharistic Adoration which our awesome priest holds on the 3rd Friday of each month. On the way home we pass by my grandparents’ house and I try to stop by when we can and when they are feeling well enough to be invaded by a van full of little kids! This time Grandpa offered to cook lunch for the kids, and sent me home with a 21 pound turkey. I asked him why he bought a 21 lbs turkey since it’s just the 2 of them, and he told me that he saw a great deal and couldn’t pass it up. I guess the frugal apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Actually, I knew that already. I also inherited the gardening bug from Grandpa, and the couponing and canning comes from Grandma. I cooked a ham for dinner that was purchased last month when they were on sale at Aldi’s. We’ll get at least 3 meals out of this one ham. I got back to monthly meal planning and shopping this month, and came in $10 under my $400 monthly budget. I made seed starting tape for my carrot seeds using materials I already […]
A Baptism!
I just wanted to share some pictures from when we had our littlest one baptized on Divine Mercy Sunday (the Sunday after Easter Sunday). He was baptized along with his cousin, our newest God Child, who was born about 2 weeks after him! It was a very special day for our family, and yet another reminder of God’s amazing grace in our lives. FacebookPinterestE-mail
Frugal Fridays #21
Successes and Blessings: I cooked a turkey that I purchased on sale in November. This was for an early Easter dinner last Saturday with my mom and sister. We used the leftover turkey for 2 lunches. I ordered a blender/food processor set for free from my husband’s work’s rewards site. We had some really nice weather this week in the 50’s and 60’s, so we were able to turn off the heat/pellet stove and open up the windows. The sunshine and fresh air was very much enjoyed! Our filing cabinet was destroyed in one of our moves, so we haven’t had a system for organizing or important paperwork for quite some time. We had a large wooden credenza style cabinet, but I was using that for cloth diaper storage. I found alternative storage for the diapers so that the cabinet could be used for its intended purpose…and therefore we do not need to spend any extra money on a filing cabinet! We received a few meals from our homeschool group this week. This is the last week that we’ll be receiving meals, and then it’s back to the grind. I’m reading two eBooks right now that I got for free. I saw a post that The Prudent Homemaker had on her Facebook page a while back for a free download of The Green Ember that I’m reading aloud to the kids (we are LOVING this story!!), and I’m reading through He is My All: Living in the Truth of God’s Love for Me that was also listed for free at the time I got it. My main sources for finding free Kindle books are One Hundred Dollars […]
Frugal Fridays #20
Spring is slowly gracing us with its presence, although we’re still getting the occasional snow flurry. I’m getting the gardening itch, although I’m not sure I have the energy yet to accomplish half of what I’d like to…or what I’m pinning on Pinterest. We’re still receiving meals from our homeschool group three days a week, which I am eternally grateful for. I feel like I could probably manage getting back to cooking dinners at this point, but not having to do it every night is helping me recover from the cesarean a lot faster. I am so thankful for a community that is so eager to help. I know many mamas are on their own after having a baby. If you know a mom who is very pregnant, just had a baby, dealing with sickness, or just generally stressed out…offer to bring her a meal. Dinnertime can be the hardest part of the day for a busy mom, and something as simple as not having to do the cooking for a night can make a world of difference. Successes/Blessings: I mentioned last week that we were hunting down deals for my husband who was in desperate need of clothes. His wardrobe consisted of exactly 1 pair of jeans, 2 polo shirts (1 of which had a stain), and various t-shirts (most of which had a stain). He has a couple of pairs of shorts, too. We typically shop at thrift stores for our clothes, but since he is tall and lean, he struggles to find his size. We were able to hunt down some great deals and got him a pair of jeans, a […]
Frugal Fridays #19
We are slowly getting back to “normal” around here after the birth of our newest little love. We have been amazingly blessed with a church and homeschool community that has been providing us meals since we came home from the hospital. I’ve only needed to cook one meal since we got home, and it was a freezer meal that was already prepped, so I don’t even really count that. I’ve also been physically recovering well. As I expected, it’s been a slower recovery than after a natural birth since I had to have an emergency c-section, but overall I’m feeling really well. Each day wake up feeling infinitely blessed that Henry and I are both here and healthy. Successes/Blessings from the last few weeks (mostly blessings because I haven’t been feeling up to doing much!): I was given a bag of clothes and several pairs of shoes from a friend of mine who was cleaning out her closet. I printed off a free grammar workbook for my oldest son. McGraw-Hill Treasures Workbooks. We placed our order for 1/4 steer and 1/2 pig. They’ll be ready in June. My husband was able to purchase a used vehicle after searching for a few months. The man selling it was willing to negotiate because his wife was not pleased with having it sitting in their driveway. Because of this, we were able to negotiate quite a bit off of his original asking price. I picked up some Easter candy on sale at the Family Dollar. We purchased birthday gifts for my oldest son’s 8th birthday and some non-candy Easter goodies using an Amazon gift card. Breastfeeding […]
Baby!
We welcomed our newest addition in the wee hours of the morning on March 5th. Henry Peter was born by emergency c-section after being rushed to the hospital by ambulance due to a placental abruption…something very different than my typical medication-free natural births! I had told Zac several times during my pregnancy that I just had a feeling that *something* was going to be different about this delivery. I had no idea just how different, though. My miracle. All 8 lbs 10 oz of him. FacebookPinterestE-mail
Frugal Fridays #18
Life has been pretty simple and slow-paced and will continue in that fashion until this little baby decides to arrive. I’ll also probably skip my Frugal Fridays post the week that he’s born. Successes/Blessings: I knit a couple of birthday gifts for my younger sister who has a birthday in May. I used yarn that was given to me a couple of years ago and a free pattern from Ravelry.com. I finally got around to drawing up our garden plan. I’m taking some ideas from some “Victory Garden” plans that I’ve seen on Pinterest this year and I’m excited to see how well succession planting works for us! I’m taking advantage of the Club Pick-Up feature through Sam’s Club for the first time this week. I’m way too pregnant to be going on large shopping trips right now, so I love being able to place my order and have my husband pick it up on his way home from work. I ordered two fruit trees from Stark Bro’s. I ordered a Sweetheart Apricot (which has a second crop of almond-like kernels inside the pit) and a Reliance Peach tree- both dwarf size trees. I also ordered 3 fig trees a few months ago that should be shipping in the next few weeks, and we have 2 apple trees on our property already. My plan is to add at least 2 fruit trees to our property each year. I’m going to try growing the dwarf trees in large 10-15 gallon grow bags. We’ll see how that goes…. My husband had a customer who works for a local grocery store give him a bunch of […]
Frugal Fridays #17
Successes/Blessings: I earned two $5 Amazon gift cards through Swagbucks (referral link). I’ll be saving them to use for birthday/Christmas gifts. I have started my weeks of prodromal labor (typical for me…happens with every pregnancy). The other night I was having contractions (not braxton hicks…but real deal contractions) from about 8:00pm until 4:00am, and then everything just died out. So I’ve been exhausted and frustrated. My mother inlaw kept 3 of my older kids overnight the night before last so that I could rest, and when she dropped them off yesterday, she brought a tray of her Spanish rice and chicken (a family favorite). It was so nice to not have to worry about cooking dinner! I’ve traded a few more books on paperbackswap.com and used the credits for books needed for homeschool. I used the rewards points system that my husband’s work offers to order 2 books as well. Through his program, I discovered the Picture Book Biography series and have ordered 3 of them so far. We’re really enjoying them! I normally don’t like most children’s biographies, but these were well done and not at all boring to read aloud. We filed our taxes this year with TurboTax, and that came with an offer to put a certain amount toward an Amazon gift card, and receive a 10% bonus on that amount. We opted to do that and figured out how much we’d like to spend on birthdays and Christmas for the kids this year, plus a little extra to cover some of the cost of birthday gifts for our 12 nieces and nephews, and put that much on an Amazon gift card from […]
Frugal Fridays #16
A pregnancy update for those interested: I’ll be 37 weeks on Monday. Being stuck inside due to extreme winter weather has resulted in me gaining about 12 lbs more than I have in previous pregnancies (4 in the last 2 weeks)…and I still have 3 weeks to go. My midwife informed me today that I can’t go into labor early because she has to go out of town to help her daughter who broke her shoulder and needs help taking care of the kiddos. I won’t begrudge a grandma helping out her daughter and grandkids. And I don’t typically go into labor early anyway. Although the last one did come 9 days early…that’s abnormal for me. I’m having a hospital birth, so in the event that I *do* go into labor early, there will be an on-call OB available. I’ve never delivered with an OB, though. I’m hoping to hold out for my midwife. She’s delivered my last 2 babies and has been amazing. Also hoping that we don’t get too much more snow, because that might make things interesting if I go into labor and can’t get out of the driveway. My last labor was only about 2 hours long…so, yeah. I’ll be going for my pre-labor haircut and pedicure on Monday. Anyone who knows me would probably be surprised to hear me say such a thing. And it really isn’t a very frugal thing of me to do. 😉 I typically get my hair trimmed before labor because it’ll likely be a while before I can get out of the house alone to get it done once baby is born. And the […]
