My husband gave our two older boys’ haircuts. We gladly accepted a gift of a package of turkey bacon and a package of beef from our neighbor. She said she hadn’t liked the turkey bacon (we don’t mind it at all!) and had bought too many packages of the beef and didn’t think she could…
September 2016 Garden Harvest After a month of no shopping, I’m planning to continue to live mostly from our pantry, freezers, and garden, with a few purchases. Our income is still rather limited. In 2012 and 2013, we had a budget of $100 a month for food and $65 a month for non-food items. Our…
Thank you, everyone, for your kind and encouraging comments and emails last week. I really enjoyed them! Here’s what we did to save money last week: My husband cut my hair for me. It took all of 3 minutes–less time than it would have taken me to gather my purse and keys and get…
I picked red noodle beans, butternut squash, Armenian cucumbers, grapes, Swiss chard, and a few tomatoes from the garden. I cut oregano and basil from the garden to dry. My drying process is simple: I rinse the herbs and lay them to dry on a cooling rack. Our climate is very dry and the bit…
My daughter brought home some leftover greenery and two roses for me from a floral arranging class she took because she knew I would like it. She also brought home an arrangement that we enjoyed on the table all week. She learned how to make a simple arrangement and a boutonniere. The woman who taught said…
Winter was wanting to make herself some 1940’s style overalls. I ordered this printable pattern for her. She made the first pair out of some dropcloth that I had (that painter’s cloth you buy from the hardware store to put down while painting) and made the second from some denim that my sister-in-law gave…
I made a triple batch of laundry soap. I reconfirmed that we don’t need to buy any school supplies this year (except printer paper, and I’m good for a while). I thought I might need one thing, but my son informed me that we had 4 or 5 of them in the drawer. I collected…
Last fall, my eldest and I were invited to someone’s house to check out the clothing she was giving away. Her mother said she had told her daughter to narrow down her clothing and wondered if we would like her hand-me-downs. This young woman is always impeccably dressed and we went over there a…
My freezers are packed full of frozen fruit from both our garden and from deals I found earlier this year. There’s some meat in there, somewhere behind all the peaches, blackberries, figs, strawberries, and blueberries. There’s lemon juice from our lemon trees too. The garden has started producing Armenian cucumbers. I’m hoping for enough…
I picked five baskets of figs from my Mission fig tree. I canned rosemary fig jam. I used the water from rinsing figs to water potted garden plants. I also collected water from the air conditioner drip and used it to water potted plants. I picked tomatoes from the garden. I also cut rosemary, garlic chives,…
I love a loose-fitting cotton nightgown for summer. Winter wanted a summer nightgown, and so she set forth to make one using a pillow case we had. It was a hand-me-down from my mother (the sheets had worn out) and was rather long, being a king-sized pillow case. It wasn’t a vintage-embroidered pillowcase, but she…
I’ve been seeking new ways to save money all month, as our finances are particularly tight at the current time with a lower income, increasing expenses, and an emergency trip to the hospital earlier this month. I have found that if I look closely, there’s always another way or two to save money in addition…