January 27, 2012
This time of year I often get a lot of inquiries about how in the world does my family afford to go to Walt Disney World so often when they know I work on a shoestring budget. Everyone is in vacation planning mode and the “world’ beckons. So I’ve decided it’s time for a blog post on the ins and outs of vacation planning, not just for the “world” but for any vacation.
The main thing is to remember it IS a vacation, don’t over plan your trip. Allow for down time in your schedule. Many a vacation has been ruined because someone in the family is determined they must “do it all.” And that makes for cranky folks old and young alike. Remember, you can always go back and do what you missed this trip next trip.
I am a big believer in pre-planning trips. I feel that half the fun in the trip is the planning, just not going overboard about it. That being said I will admit one of our most favorite trips to WDW was a spur of the moment trip we planned on the fly on one Monday and we left that Thursday.
Another non-WDW trip was a penny hike trip we took to Mt. Rushmore. On that trip we literally flipped a penny each night to see which way we would go and to decide what we would do each day. So there is a lot to be said for not planning as well. It’s just a lot riskier.
But this blog is about planning and doing the WDW trip on a shoestring.
First pick your dates, but be a little flexible on those dates. Often a lot can be saved on the accommodations and transportation by moving your dates one way or another just a few days.
I know on many airlines if you fly out on Tuesday-Thursday the airfare is cheaper than if you fly the other days of the week. WDW resort rooms and campsites are also generally cheaper Monday-Thursday than on the weekend. So if you can be flexible, then by all means be so.
Gasoline and diesel are generally cheaper during the winter months than summer months as well.
WDW also has “off season” discounts on their resort rooms, so if you home school, year round school, or for other reasons can travel during the non-summer and peak season months to WDW I highly recommend it.
Here are the historical peak season dates. Of course, as with all things it all depends on what is going on in the world as to how busy the parks will be on these dates. These dates were supplied by The Mouse For Less website (a great planning tool location for certain) www.themouseforless.com
• Heaviest: Presidents' week in February
-Mid-March through Late April ("Spring Break"); Easter
-Memorial Day weekend
-June through mid-August
-Thanksgiving Day and weekend
-Christmas week through New Year's Day
• Moderate: After Presidents' week in February through early March
-Late April through early June (except Memorial Day weekend)
-The first part of Thanksgiving week
• Lightest: Mid-January until Presidents' week in February (expect attraction & pool closures & refurbishments)
-The week following Labor Day until Thanksgiving week
-The week following Thanksgiving until the week before Christmas
The Walt Disney World travel guides by Steve Birnbaum usually also have peak season dates listed in them. This information seldom changes much, so you could look at a library copy of it for free to get that information.
The Birnbaum books are great for info about the parks and are updated often. Older versions are good for general info, but will often be outdated for the current rides, shops, restaurants and meal prices. So if you are going to use them for your ultimate planning book spring for the issue for the year you are going. However, since they are put together a year ahead of time know that some of the info even in those most current issues may be out of date.
The best price planning info is the free DVDs and info you can get from WDW yourself. If you use mypoints (more on this later in the how to pay for it post) then by all means order it through there and get the points for doing so.
You can also get a lot of the prices from the following websites:
http://disneyworld.disney.go.com/
http://allears.net/index.html
The first is the official Disney website and the second is an unofficial one. I really like both sites. The Disney one gives you all the basic planning costs but the All Ears site gives you so much more. Right down to individual meal prices, no estimates, the actual cost.
All Ears also gives many helpful hints and lists current available discounts. A major plus when you are planning your trip on a shoestring. Two other sites that are great for helping you plan out your vacation are The Mouse for Less, which I previously mentioned and The Magic For Less. www.themagicforless.com
If you like discussion groups then I highly recommend themouseforless@yahoogroups.com I have learned much of what I know on vacationing on a shoestring from the folks on that list. The rest of my knowledge comes from my natural tightwad instincts. Be sure to check out all the files and links at the yahoogroups site. There is a wealth of information there.
A word of warning about the mouse for less group. It is a VERY active group and so if you don’t want to get 100 or more emails in a day I suggest you either read it from the web or go on digest for that particular group. It is well worth wading through all the emails to glean a lot of information from that group though.
Once you get all your research info together and you’ve chosen your time frame then it’s time to pick your resort, your tickets and whether or not a water park is in your future.
Picking the resort is strictly a thing of personal preference. Some folks prefer to stay off site because often at first glance the price is cheaper. There are numerous great hotels and condos for rent in the area and if that is your preference than you are on your own for the planning of that part, or check with the Magic for Less travel agency, more about these wonderful folks in a bit.
You see we have only stayed off site once in over 30 trips to the world and swore we’d never do it again. But that is OUR personal preference I know a lot of people who never stay on site and prefer it that way.
While our room off site was cheaper what it cost us in other ways was so much more expensive. Staying onsite comes with numerous perks. Here’s a list of some for you to consider when making this decision:
1. Once you arrive, if you are not leaving the resort area then you never need your car again until you leave. They transport you everywhere for free, even to their shopping complex called Downtown Disney. If you decide to leave the resort they do have a car rental spot onsite, where they will bring the car to your hotel room for you and you can rent the car for just the days you need it. Oh and by the way, it’s generally a cheaper rate if you rent it at the resort than at the airport due to airport usage taxes and such. Say for going to Universal Studios/Islands of Adventure or Sea World one day. More on these two another time.
2. If you are flying in they pick you up for free at the airport with the Magical Express, collect your luggage for you and deliver it to your room. When you leave they pick your luggage up at your resort and check it in for you at the airport. This leaves you free to go directly to the parks or wherever once you have checked in and to visit the parks on your last day if your tickets are all inclusive. A big plus. It also means you do not need a rental car to get to the resort, pay turnpike fees (which are hefty) or pay for an airport shuttle. Nor do you have the delay and hassle at the airport. While you make a quick potty run after you get off the plane a Cast Member from WDW is collecting your luggage for you. How great is that? The transport is a large comfortable bus that shows Disney commercials and such on tvs to start your Disney experience immediately.
3. Extra Magic Hours are a wonderful plus for resort guests. This is an extra 1-3 hours a day at a different park every day either in the morning before the park opens or after the park closes at night. Only resort guests are allowed in the parks during Extra Magic Hours so the lines are much shorter then. It’s a great way to get to ride the most popular rides without using a Fastpass or waiting in a long line. It’s also a great time to collect a Fastpass for a special ride later in the day.
4. If you are staying OFF site you must pay for parking at the parks that can add up quick on a multi-day trip. However, once you pay for teach day that is all you pay. The current rates are: Automobile, taxi, limo or motorcycle $14, camper, trailer or RV $15 and Bus or tractor trailer $18. There are ways to get discounts like owning an annual pass—we’ll get into this more later or being a member of AAA.
5. If staying off site you must also consider the driving time and gas each day both to and from the parks and possible turnpike fees. If you have little ones, or a person who simply needs to rest occasionally it is far easier to go back to your hotel room/campsite by staying onsite than off site.
6. Amenities, the resorts at WDW have a LOT of them. From swimming pools, to tennis courts, hot tubs and a petting zoo at the campground. And you don’t even have to be staying at the campground to enjoy the petting zoo, just take the free ground transportation over and while you are there consider the walking trails, or rent a bicycle or water craft for a fun afternoon. At night time the campground has free Disney movies and campfire sing-a-long or you can take a special nighttime canoe trip. Don’t forget to watch the Electric Water Parade on the bay while visiting the campground after dark as well, or maybe pay for a carriage ride. At the Animal Kingdom Lodge they have free use of night vision binoculars for you to watch the animals on the savannah after dark. That is always fun to do.
7. Each resort has a place to grab a bite to eat and you can purchase a refillable beverage cup that is good for your entire stay at your resort and it more than pays for itself during any trip. To date there are no refillable cups at the parks, except I know that for awhile the AK did have one that was for the day of purchase only. There is generally pizza delivery available to your room as well.
8. Disney character wake-up calls. If you are staying in the resort, alas not the campground, then you can be awakened each morning with a wake-up call by a Disney character. It’s part of the magic and many an adult likes it as much as the younger set.
9. Entertainment, many of the resorts have free entertainment going on at various times. One night at the Port ‘o Orleans, back when it was Dixie Landings, we stumbled into a live show at one of the clubs. It was a very good show. This was our one spur of the moment trip to WDW and everything was just perfect that trip. Just the two of us and all the pieces fell together just right.
10. Resort guests get first pick at dining reservations.
There are more pluses, but you get the idea.
Next you need to decide on package, or non-package deal. Again this is a personal decision. We seldom go with the packages because we generally take our own food with us for at least part of the meals and we most often purchase an annual pass. So the non-package generally works out cheaper for us. However, that being said, Disney has been running some pretty sweet deals this last couple of years that include free meals. I recently priced out a trip for the two of us to take a long weekend down and found out that the package that included length of stay tickets and meals was only $50 more than without meals. I would have had to pay far more than that for a la carte meals for five days for two! if we had decided to make that trip, it would have been well worth that $50 for the quick service meal plan, or even to pay the additional for the upper meal plans difference. So check your prices closely, sometimes the packages are much cheaper, depending on what you choose to include.
Tickets are another consideration. Our big trip for each year is generally 14 days and we go into the parks for 10 of those days. The other 4 days we go shopping, visit the water parks, go to another park (generally US/IOA) or simply crash and burn for a day. Our shorter trips are generally 4-5 days and we hit the parks all of those days. You can purchase plain tickets that are good for one park per day, Park Hopper Tickets or never expiring tickets. Each ticket has it’s pros and cons. That is a decision you will have to decide.
If purchasing tickets for just that particular trip we choose the Park Hopper, because we won’t stay in an overly crowded park. We have learned if one park is really crowded then another one is probably nearly empty. Certain parks on certain days are crowded, (see the Birnbaum books to determine the days). Or we will want to go to a park for a certain show on a certain day and maybe not want to spend the entire day in that park. But that is our preference, again you have to decide.
Generally we plan on going more than once in a year so we will purchase an annual pass. When I list how to get discounts and such I’ll go into all the pros of having the annual pass. It is the most expensive of the tickets at first glance, generally about $50 more per person than a 10 day pass, but it is good for 366 days from the day of FIRST USE! First use, not January 1 to January 1, not the day you buy it, but when you first enter a park using it for the first time. It also comes with some major discounts for lodging, food, shopping, special events and special products that you can’t get otherwise.
Once you’ve made all the decisions and decided whether or not you are going to other attractions in the area then you will need to figure out your budget and how to pay for it all. Don’t forget to add in meals, snacks and souvenirs at the parks. Plus you need to remember the “other” expenses like pet sitters at home, transportation there, if you are traveling by car are you stopping along the way? Will you visit attractions, where will you sleep each night. There are ways to cut all these costs (well maybe not the pet sitter) and a later post will go into this in detail. As well as a post on where to get the money to pay for it all.
But first, now that I have scared you with all this “planning” part I’d like to suggest a way around a lot of this first step. While I’ve never used their service and have no connection what so ever to the folks there I have heard nothing but rave reviews about The Magic For Less Travel Agency. These are the folks that help with the yahoogroups I mentioned earlier and they work VERY hard to make certain you get the best possible vacation at the lowest possible price. Even after you have booked with them, they keep looking for better deals for you and make certain you get the BEST possible price. If you are from the Dave Ramsey list then you know Jeannette is with The Magic For Less and she’d be more than happy to help you with your vacation planning. She can be reached at:
JConaLarock@themagicforless.com or follow her on facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/themagicforless
I suggest you shoot her an email and allow her to run some comparisons for you.
In a later post I’ll go more into what has to be paid when, refund policies and much more.
Next post: So now you’ve planned it how are you going to pay for it?
Jan who can’t wait to go again in OK
Friday, January 27, 2012
MOVING ON TO WEEK #2 OF THE YEAR
January 27, 2012
Some have asked about the recipe program I use. I am currently using Master Cook v9. I truthfully do not know all the ins and outs of it. I would love to do all the planning and such in that program rather than in all the various programs I am currently using. I’m thinking of upgrading to v11 so I can get some support and learn how to do it all in one program. Until I have saved enough blow money to do that I’ll keep on the way I am doing it in Word, Excel and Master Cook, which is of course causing some redundancy.
So if you ask for an export of a recipe directly from MC I need to let you know this is one of the features that I can’t get to seem to work right, but I will work my way around that for you.
Anyway, on to the menus for week 2:
BREAKFAST OPPORTUNITIES: WEEK 2
Biscuits (leftover from week #1 Sunday’s dinner) with:
Leftover gravy (see dinner menu)
Sausage patties from the freezer or canned
Bacon, pre-cooked from fridge or canned
Eggs, fried or scrambled, from our chickens
Jelly/Jam/Honey/Molasses
Hot Cereals:
Rice, leftover from dinner’s week #1
Oatmeal packets, homemade
Farina, from food storage
Multigrain packets, homemade
Cold Cereal:
Raisin Bran, purchased with coupon
Rice Chex, store brand
Fruit:
Grapefruit, from bulk purchase
Mango, dried from food storage
Beverages:
Orange Juice, from frozen concentrate
Hot tea
Milk
Hot cocoa, from Master Mix
WEEK 2: LUNCH OPPORTUNITIES
Sandwiches:
Roast beef, from leftover smoked roast of week #1 dinners
PB&J
Toasted Cheese
BBQ Beef, from leftover bbq beef dinner in week #1
Salad ingredients:
Jarred spring mix
Tuna, from food storage
Roast Beef, from smoked beef from week #1
Pickled eggs, from food storage
Carrots
Onion
Salad dressings available:
Ranch, homemade
Italian, homemade
French, homemade
Soups:
Potato, after Tuesday
Chicken Noodle, after Thursday
Gumbo, after Saturday
Fruit:
Grapefruit
Banana
Fruit cups, bulk purchase
WEEK 2: DINNER MENU
Monday 1/16/2012
Chicken Pot Pie, homemade
Tea
Multi-grain dinner rolls, homemade
Gingerbread with whipped cream, made from Master Mix
Tuesday 1/17/2012
Potato soup, homemade
Crackers, bulk purchase
Milk
Gingerbread with whipped cream, leftover
Wednesday 1/18/2012
Sweet ‘n sour Pork, made from home canned pork loin or Master Mix
Egg Rolls, frozen, leftovers from previous week’s purchase
Chicken Fried Rice, use leftover rice and chicken from Monday’s meal
Steamed Rice, cook a jumbo batch
Tea
Peach Crumble, from food storage items
Thursday 1/19/2012
Chicken Noodle Soup-homemade
Peach Crumble, leftover
Tea
Crackers
Friday 1/20/2012
Roast beef Hash, from leftover roast that had been previously canned
Dinner Rolls, homemade
Tea
Brownies, from Master Mix
Corn, bulk purchased can
Saturday 1/21/2012
Gumbo, Zatarain’s Mix bought on sale, and frozen smoked sausage from food storage
Crackers, food storage, bulk purchase
Leftover desserts
Milk
Sunday 1/22/2012
Waffles, plain and fruited, from Master Mix
Milk
WEEK 2: SNACKS AVAILABLE
Salty:
Southern Trail Mix, leftover from the holidays
Chips leftover from week #1
Cheezits leftover from week #1
Sweet:
Gingerbread, after Monday
Peach Crumble, after Tuesday
Brownies, after Friday
Fruit:
Assorted dried fruits, home dried and bulk purchased
Grapefruit
Banana
Vegetables:
Carrot sticks
This week’s addition to food storage was the canning of the excess meat from the 10# of chicken leg quarters that I got for $.69 per pound. I canned the deboned meat as cooked, rather than raw pack. Again following the USDA guidelines. I then made chicken broth by boiling the bones with carrots, celery, onions, garlic, poultry seasoning and parsley. This in turn was canned for future meals.
I’m often asked for the Buttermilk Pancake and Waffle Mix recipe so I will include that one today.
BUTTERMILK PANCAKE AND WAFFLE MASTER MIX
Yield: 10 1/2 cups
2 cups buttermilk, dried
8 cups flour, all-purpose
1/2 cup sugar
8 teaspoons baking powder
4 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons salt.
1. Whisk all the ingredients together in a large bowl.
2. Store in an airtight container in a cool dry place.
BUTTERMILK WAFFLES
Servings: 4
Preparation Time: 10 minutes
Start to finish: 30 minutes
Notes: Make a double or more batch and cool on a rack. Layer them in a refrigerator container with wax paper, or cereal bags in the container. Store in refrigerator or freezer. Heat as needed.
Serving Ideas: Serve with butter, a variety of syrups, bacon, ham or sausage.
Categories: Breakfast Foods
1. Preheat waffle baker.
2. In a large bowl, combine all ingredients except egg whites until just blended.
3. In medium bowl beat egg whites until stiff.
4. fold into mixture. Bake per baker instructions.
6. Variations:
Nut or Berry Waffles
7. Add 1/2 c chopped nuts, or dried chopped fruit to batter.
8. Meat add ins
9. add 1/2 c diced ham, bacon, sausage etc to batter.
BUTTERMILK PANCAKES
Servings: 10
1 whole egg, beaten
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 cup water
1 1/2 cups Buttermilk Pancake and Waffle Master Mix
1. In medium bowl whisk egg and oil together and then whisk in water.
2. Stir in mix. Add fruit, nuts, cooked meats if desired. Add extra water if thinner batter if desired.
3. Let set for 5 minutes.
4. Preheat a griddle , that is lightly oiled.
5. Pour 1/3 c batter on the griddle and cook each side until browned on each side, (the edges will be slightly dry and bubbles will form) Use a spatula to turn them over.
6. Repeat with remaining batter.
7. VARIATIONS:
8. Stir in 1/4-1/2 c chopped fruit, nuts, or browned breakfast meats.
So there is week 2 for your viewing pleasure.
Jan who knows doing the Master Mixes at first take a lot of ingredients, but the payoff in the long term is great in OK
Some have asked about the recipe program I use. I am currently using Master Cook v9. I truthfully do not know all the ins and outs of it. I would love to do all the planning and such in that program rather than in all the various programs I am currently using. I’m thinking of upgrading to v11 so I can get some support and learn how to do it all in one program. Until I have saved enough blow money to do that I’ll keep on the way I am doing it in Word, Excel and Master Cook, which is of course causing some redundancy.
So if you ask for an export of a recipe directly from MC I need to let you know this is one of the features that I can’t get to seem to work right, but I will work my way around that for you.
Anyway, on to the menus for week 2:
BREAKFAST OPPORTUNITIES: WEEK 2
Biscuits (leftover from week #1 Sunday’s dinner) with:
Leftover gravy (see dinner menu)
Sausage patties from the freezer or canned
Bacon, pre-cooked from fridge or canned
Eggs, fried or scrambled, from our chickens
Jelly/Jam/Honey/Molasses
Hot Cereals:
Rice, leftover from dinner’s week #1
Oatmeal packets, homemade
Farina, from food storage
Multigrain packets, homemade
Cold Cereal:
Raisin Bran, purchased with coupon
Rice Chex, store brand
Fruit:
Grapefruit, from bulk purchase
Mango, dried from food storage
Beverages:
Orange Juice, from frozen concentrate
Hot tea
Milk
Hot cocoa, from Master Mix
WEEK 2: LUNCH OPPORTUNITIES
Sandwiches:
Roast beef, from leftover smoked roast of week #1 dinners
PB&J
Toasted Cheese
BBQ Beef, from leftover bbq beef dinner in week #1
Salad ingredients:
Jarred spring mix
Tuna, from food storage
Roast Beef, from smoked beef from week #1
Pickled eggs, from food storage
Carrots
Onion
Salad dressings available:
Ranch, homemade
Italian, homemade
French, homemade
Soups:
Potato, after Tuesday
Chicken Noodle, after Thursday
Gumbo, after Saturday
Fruit:
Grapefruit
Banana
Fruit cups, bulk purchase
WEEK 2: DINNER MENU
Monday 1/16/2012
Chicken Pot Pie, homemade
Tea
Multi-grain dinner rolls, homemade
Gingerbread with whipped cream, made from Master Mix
Tuesday 1/17/2012
Potato soup, homemade
Crackers, bulk purchase
Milk
Gingerbread with whipped cream, leftover
Wednesday 1/18/2012
Sweet ‘n sour Pork, made from home canned pork loin or Master Mix
Egg Rolls, frozen, leftovers from previous week’s purchase
Chicken Fried Rice, use leftover rice and chicken from Monday’s meal
Steamed Rice, cook a jumbo batch
Tea
Peach Crumble, from food storage items
Thursday 1/19/2012
Chicken Noodle Soup-homemade
Peach Crumble, leftover
Tea
Crackers
Friday 1/20/2012
Roast beef Hash, from leftover roast that had been previously canned
Dinner Rolls, homemade
Tea
Brownies, from Master Mix
Corn, bulk purchased can
Saturday 1/21/2012
Gumbo, Zatarain’s Mix bought on sale, and frozen smoked sausage from food storage
Crackers, food storage, bulk purchase
Leftover desserts
Milk
Sunday 1/22/2012
Waffles, plain and fruited, from Master Mix
Milk
WEEK 2: SNACKS AVAILABLE
Salty:
Southern Trail Mix, leftover from the holidays
Chips leftover from week #1
Cheezits leftover from week #1
Sweet:
Gingerbread, after Monday
Peach Crumble, after Tuesday
Brownies, after Friday
Fruit:
Assorted dried fruits, home dried and bulk purchased
Grapefruit
Banana
Vegetables:
Carrot sticks
This week’s addition to food storage was the canning of the excess meat from the 10# of chicken leg quarters that I got for $.69 per pound. I canned the deboned meat as cooked, rather than raw pack. Again following the USDA guidelines. I then made chicken broth by boiling the bones with carrots, celery, onions, garlic, poultry seasoning and parsley. This in turn was canned for future meals.
I’m often asked for the Buttermilk Pancake and Waffle Mix recipe so I will include that one today.
BUTTERMILK PANCAKE AND WAFFLE MASTER MIX
Yield: 10 1/2 cups
2 cups buttermilk, dried
8 cups flour, all-purpose
1/2 cup sugar
8 teaspoons baking powder
4 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons salt.
1. Whisk all the ingredients together in a large bowl.
2. Store in an airtight container in a cool dry place.
BUTTERMILK WAFFLES
Servings: 4
Preparation Time: 10 minutes
Start to finish: 30 minutes
Notes: Make a double or more batch and cool on a rack. Layer them in a refrigerator container with wax paper, or cereal bags in the container. Store in refrigerator or freezer. Heat as needed.
Serving Ideas: Serve with butter, a variety of syrups, bacon, ham or sausage.
Categories: Breakfast Foods
1. Preheat waffle baker.
2. In a large bowl, combine all ingredients except egg whites until just blended.
3. In medium bowl beat egg whites until stiff.
4. fold into mixture. Bake per baker instructions.
6. Variations:
Nut or Berry Waffles
7. Add 1/2 c chopped nuts, or dried chopped fruit to batter.
8. Meat add ins
9. add 1/2 c diced ham, bacon, sausage etc to batter.
BUTTERMILK PANCAKES
Servings: 10
1 whole egg, beaten
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 cup water
1 1/2 cups Buttermilk Pancake and Waffle Master Mix
1. In medium bowl whisk egg and oil together and then whisk in water.
2. Stir in mix. Add fruit, nuts, cooked meats if desired. Add extra water if thinner batter if desired.
3. Let set for 5 minutes.
4. Preheat a griddle , that is lightly oiled.
5. Pour 1/3 c batter on the griddle and cook each side until browned on each side, (the edges will be slightly dry and bubbles will form) Use a spatula to turn them over.
6. Repeat with remaining batter.
7. VARIATIONS:
8. Stir in 1/4-1/2 c chopped fruit, nuts, or browned breakfast meats.
So there is week 2 for your viewing pleasure.
Jan who knows doing the Master Mixes at first take a lot of ingredients, but the payoff in the long term is great in OK
LET THE GAMES BEGIN!
January 27, 2012
So are you ready for the challenge of planning your menus for one year? As promised I will try and post my weekly menus for breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks along with some recipes.
Because there are so many recipes that will be involved each week and my time and space are limited I won’t be posting all the recipes for each week. Once a recipe is posted when I use that recipe again later in the year I’ll post the link where it was previously listed. I’ll also go back and add a comment to a previous post if I should add the recipe at a later date.
At all times you can use the search feature at the left (hidden between the photos) and search my blog to see if I forgot to add a link. Hey, I’m human you know.
If you should ever see a meal/snack item mentioned you’d like the recipe for, that isn’t already on the blog, please feel free to contact me.
So on to week one. You will notice that breakfast, lunch and snacks are opportunities, not a set meal. This is because of our varied schedules and tastes in the household. Only dinner is at a set time, 5:30 pm, in this house and has a set menu for certain days (with some flexibility added in)
WEEK 1: BREAKFAST OPPORTUNITIES
French Toast, made from leftover Texas Toast bread from the week before. Used up the remainder of the loaf and cooked it all at once, then refrigerated/froze for a quick grab up meal.
Serve with butter, syrup, jelly, molasses, fruit or other favorite toppings
Hot Cereals available:
Oatmeal, various flavors from homemade packets
Farina
Multi-grain, from homemade packets
Cold Cereals available:
Raisin Bran
Store brand Grape-nuts
Fruit available:
Dried cherries, bulk pack from Sam’s
Grapefruit, fresh bulk purchase
Strawberries, frozen after Wednesday
Beverages:
Grape juice from frozen concentrate
Milk
Water
Hot Tea
Cocoa, master mix
WEEK 1- LUNCH OPPORTUNITIES
SANDWICH MATERIALS AVAILABLE:
PB&J
Toasted cheese
Bologna
SALAD MATERIALS AVAILABLE:
Jarred Spring Mix—vacuumed sealed to keep it fresher
Pickled eggs—homemade
Cheddar cheese—bulk purchase from Sam’s Club
Carrots
Onion
Celery, dried –reconstituted
Frankfurters
SALAD DRESSINGS AVAILABLE:
Ranch, homemade
Italian, homemade
SOUPS AVAILABE:
Tomato—bulk purchase
Beef—homemade and canned
Pinto bean and ham soup after Sunday
FRUIT:
Fruit cups, bulk purchase from Sam’s
Grapefruit
Strawberries—after Wednesday
DINNER MENUS 1/7-1/15/2012
Saturday 1/7/2012
Master Mix meatballs, recipe below
Mashed potatoes, make a double batch to use leftovers later in the week.
Bread machine bread, make a large loaf to use leftover later in the week
Black eyed peas, home canned from dried
Carrot cake, from a mix purchased on sale with a coupon
Tea
Sunday 1/8/2012
Pinto beans and ham, from dried beans and canned Christmas ham
Jalapeno cornbread, uses 1 of the few packages of frozen ground beef
Carrot cake, leftover
Milk
Monday 1/9/2012
Ghengis Grill for Jan’s birthday—a special meal for me! Although my birthday was the 6th ds couldn’t join us until Monday due to his work schedule.
Tuesday 1/10/2012
Smoked roast, leftover from the week before
Corn on the cob, frozen
French Fries, frozen
Black eyed peas, leftover
Garlic bread, made with Sunday’s leftover bread
Carrot Cake, leftover
tea
Wednesday 1/11/2012
Sweet and Sour meatballs, recipe below
Egg rolls, frozen purchased on sale
Fried rice, ham, made with leftover rice from the previous week and Christmas ham that has been canned.
Steamed rice, make a big batch for use in future meals
Tea
Almond cookies with strawberries, homemade cookies and frozen or freeze dried strawberries
Thursday 1/12/2012
BBQ smoked sausage, made with homemade bbq sauce (from last summer) and smoked sausage purchased in bulk and frozen 2 weeks ago. Recipe: http://cjpattersonontheranch.blogspot.com/2009/08/home-again-home-again-jiggity-jig.html
Cole slaw, make double batch for later in the week
Macaroni and cheese, purchased on sale
Pepsi
Lemon Bars, from Master Mixes
Friday, 1/13/2012
Bean burritos, refried beans made from pinto beans earlier in the week.
Mexican rice, use leftover rice from earlier in the week
Guacamole, homemade
Sopapillas, master mix
Tea
Saturday 1/14/2012
BBQ beef sandwiches , use leftover smoked roast and homemade bbq sauce recipe link listed above
Cole slaw, leftover from earlier in the week
Potato salad, made with leftover mashed potatoes
Chocolate chip cookies, from homemade slice and bake cookies
Pepsi
Sunday 1/15/2012
Biscuits, master mix
Gravy, master mix
Fruit cups-bulk purchase
Milk
Juice
SNACKS AVAILABLE FOR WEEK 1
Please limit your snacking
SALTY:
Chips, limited-bulk purchase
Cheezits-bulk purchase
Southern Trail Mix-bulk purchase, leftover from holidays
SWEET:
Carrot Cake
Almond Shortbread cookies after Wednesday
Lemon Bars after Thursday
Chocolate chip cookies after Saturday
FRUIT:
Grapefruit—bulk purchase
Fruit Cups—bulk purchase
Strawberries, frozen after Wednesday
VEGETABLES:
Carrots
So now that you can see what our family basically ate on week #1 of the year of menu planning now how about a recipe or two? The main dinner menu item is the Many Way Meatballs. This is one of our favorite meat Master Mixes. The meatballs can be used so many ways for a variety of meals. They freeze and can wonderfully. Making them a handy “convenience food” for those nights you simply can’t stick to a menu or you need something FAST!
Many Way Meatballs
Servings: 80
4 pounds ground beef
2 whole eggs, slightly beaten
1 cup bread crumbs, dried
1/2 cup onion, finely chopped
1 tablespoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
2 cups milk
1/4 cup parsley flakes
1. Mix all together well. Form into 1 1/2 inch meatballs. I use a small ice cream/cookie scoop for this. I recommend spraying the scoop with cooking spray before scooping.
2. Place on foil lined and sprayed cookie sheet with sides.
3. Bake at 375 F for 25-30 minutes or until done.
4. Cool and package in one quart containers for freezing or canning. Don’t forget to label and date.
On the night I make these my family likes the meatballs just plain, hot from the oven. In fact I have to watch the guys close or they just might eat far more than they should.
They make their second appearance later in the week as Sweet ‘n Sour Meatballs
Sweet ‘n Sour Meatballs
Servings: 6
Notes: You can vary the veggies to your family's likes. Consider things like snow peas, water chestnuts and other vegetables.
Serving Ideas: Serve over steamed rice and with all the usual sides for an Asian meal.
Categories: Ground Beef
1 tablespoon Vegetable oil
10 ounces Pineapple chunks, drained and juice reserved
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1 tablespoon soy sauce
3 tablespoons vinegar
6 tablespoons water
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
1 container Many Way Meatball Mix, about 20 meatballs
1 large green bell pepper
1 whole carrot, sliced
1/2 medium onion, sliced
1. In a large skillet, combine oil and reserved pineapple juice that has had water added to it to equal 1 cup liquid.
2. In a small bowl combine cornstarch and brown sugar. Then stir in soy sauce, vinegar and water. Stir this into the pineapple juice mixture in the skillet. Cook over medium heat until thick, stirring constantly, Approximately 5-7 minutesl
2. Add pineapple chunks and remaining ingredients. Mix well. Simmer 20 minutes or until heated through. Stir frequently and add a small amount of water or pineapple juice if needed.
Leftovers from this weeks worth of meal that would then go to food storage would be the remaining meatballs either frozen or canned (add water to the canning jar and then process pints at 15# pressure for 75 minutes or quarts for 90 minutes—please follow all USDA guidelines while canning).
The leftover steamed rice can be dried to make your own “minute rice.” Or refrigerated or frozen to be used in the future for a variety stir fried rice dishes, Mexican Rice, or to be reheated for breakfast and eaten with sugar, milk and butter.
So there you have it week #1 for 2012, and for 2013 because as I have mentioned previously. I am keeping the files I have created for these menus to use in the future. Complete with the full grocery list, so this time next year it will be a matter of point and click.
Jan who hopes this is helpful to someone in OK
So are you ready for the challenge of planning your menus for one year? As promised I will try and post my weekly menus for breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks along with some recipes.
Because there are so many recipes that will be involved each week and my time and space are limited I won’t be posting all the recipes for each week. Once a recipe is posted when I use that recipe again later in the year I’ll post the link where it was previously listed. I’ll also go back and add a comment to a previous post if I should add the recipe at a later date.
At all times you can use the search feature at the left (hidden between the photos) and search my blog to see if I forgot to add a link. Hey, I’m human you know.
If you should ever see a meal/snack item mentioned you’d like the recipe for, that isn’t already on the blog, please feel free to contact me.
So on to week one. You will notice that breakfast, lunch and snacks are opportunities, not a set meal. This is because of our varied schedules and tastes in the household. Only dinner is at a set time, 5:30 pm, in this house and has a set menu for certain days (with some flexibility added in)
WEEK 1: BREAKFAST OPPORTUNITIES
French Toast, made from leftover Texas Toast bread from the week before. Used up the remainder of the loaf and cooked it all at once, then refrigerated/froze for a quick grab up meal.
Serve with butter, syrup, jelly, molasses, fruit or other favorite toppings
Hot Cereals available:
Oatmeal, various flavors from homemade packets
Farina
Multi-grain, from homemade packets
Cold Cereals available:
Raisin Bran
Store brand Grape-nuts
Fruit available:
Dried cherries, bulk pack from Sam’s
Grapefruit, fresh bulk purchase
Strawberries, frozen after Wednesday
Beverages:
Grape juice from frozen concentrate
Milk
Water
Hot Tea
Cocoa, master mix
WEEK 1- LUNCH OPPORTUNITIES
SANDWICH MATERIALS AVAILABLE:
PB&J
Toasted cheese
Bologna
SALAD MATERIALS AVAILABLE:
Jarred Spring Mix—vacuumed sealed to keep it fresher
Pickled eggs—homemade
Cheddar cheese—bulk purchase from Sam’s Club
Carrots
Onion
Celery, dried –reconstituted
Frankfurters
SALAD DRESSINGS AVAILABLE:
Ranch, homemade
Italian, homemade
SOUPS AVAILABE:
Tomato—bulk purchase
Beef—homemade and canned
Pinto bean and ham soup after Sunday
FRUIT:
Fruit cups, bulk purchase from Sam’s
Grapefruit
Strawberries—after Wednesday
DINNER MENUS 1/7-1/15/2012
Saturday 1/7/2012
Master Mix meatballs, recipe below
Mashed potatoes, make a double batch to use leftovers later in the week.
Bread machine bread, make a large loaf to use leftover later in the week
Black eyed peas, home canned from dried
Carrot cake, from a mix purchased on sale with a coupon
Tea
Sunday 1/8/2012
Pinto beans and ham, from dried beans and canned Christmas ham
Jalapeno cornbread, uses 1 of the few packages of frozen ground beef
Carrot cake, leftover
Milk
Monday 1/9/2012
Ghengis Grill for Jan’s birthday—a special meal for me! Although my birthday was the 6th ds couldn’t join us until Monday due to his work schedule.
Tuesday 1/10/2012
Smoked roast, leftover from the week before
Corn on the cob, frozen
French Fries, frozen
Black eyed peas, leftover
Garlic bread, made with Sunday’s leftover bread
Carrot Cake, leftover
tea
Wednesday 1/11/2012
Sweet and Sour meatballs, recipe below
Egg rolls, frozen purchased on sale
Fried rice, ham, made with leftover rice from the previous week and Christmas ham that has been canned.
Steamed rice, make a big batch for use in future meals
Tea
Almond cookies with strawberries, homemade cookies and frozen or freeze dried strawberries
Thursday 1/12/2012
BBQ smoked sausage, made with homemade bbq sauce (from last summer) and smoked sausage purchased in bulk and frozen 2 weeks ago. Recipe: http://cjpattersonontheranch.blogspot.com/2009/08/home-again-home-again-jiggity-jig.html
Cole slaw, make double batch for later in the week
Macaroni and cheese, purchased on sale
Pepsi
Lemon Bars, from Master Mixes
Friday, 1/13/2012
Bean burritos, refried beans made from pinto beans earlier in the week.
Mexican rice, use leftover rice from earlier in the week
Guacamole, homemade
Sopapillas, master mix
Tea
Saturday 1/14/2012
BBQ beef sandwiches , use leftover smoked roast and homemade bbq sauce recipe link listed above
Cole slaw, leftover from earlier in the week
Potato salad, made with leftover mashed potatoes
Chocolate chip cookies, from homemade slice and bake cookies
Pepsi
Sunday 1/15/2012
Biscuits, master mix
Gravy, master mix
Fruit cups-bulk purchase
Milk
Juice
SNACKS AVAILABLE FOR WEEK 1
Please limit your snacking
SALTY:
Chips, limited-bulk purchase
Cheezits-bulk purchase
Southern Trail Mix-bulk purchase, leftover from holidays
SWEET:
Carrot Cake
Almond Shortbread cookies after Wednesday
Lemon Bars after Thursday
Chocolate chip cookies after Saturday
FRUIT:
Grapefruit—bulk purchase
Fruit Cups—bulk purchase
Strawberries, frozen after Wednesday
VEGETABLES:
Carrots
So now that you can see what our family basically ate on week #1 of the year of menu planning now how about a recipe or two? The main dinner menu item is the Many Way Meatballs. This is one of our favorite meat Master Mixes. The meatballs can be used so many ways for a variety of meals. They freeze and can wonderfully. Making them a handy “convenience food” for those nights you simply can’t stick to a menu or you need something FAST!
Many Way Meatballs
Servings: 80
4 pounds ground beef
2 whole eggs, slightly beaten
1 cup bread crumbs, dried
1/2 cup onion, finely chopped
1 tablespoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
2 cups milk
1/4 cup parsley flakes
1. Mix all together well. Form into 1 1/2 inch meatballs. I use a small ice cream/cookie scoop for this. I recommend spraying the scoop with cooking spray before scooping.
2. Place on foil lined and sprayed cookie sheet with sides.
3. Bake at 375 F for 25-30 minutes or until done.
4. Cool and package in one quart containers for freezing or canning. Don’t forget to label and date.
On the night I make these my family likes the meatballs just plain, hot from the oven. In fact I have to watch the guys close or they just might eat far more than they should.
They make their second appearance later in the week as Sweet ‘n Sour Meatballs
Sweet ‘n Sour Meatballs
Servings: 6
Notes: You can vary the veggies to your family's likes. Consider things like snow peas, water chestnuts and other vegetables.
Serving Ideas: Serve over steamed rice and with all the usual sides for an Asian meal.
Categories: Ground Beef
1 tablespoon Vegetable oil
10 ounces Pineapple chunks, drained and juice reserved
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1 tablespoon soy sauce
3 tablespoons vinegar
6 tablespoons water
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
1 container Many Way Meatball Mix, about 20 meatballs
1 large green bell pepper
1 whole carrot, sliced
1/2 medium onion, sliced
1. In a large skillet, combine oil and reserved pineapple juice that has had water added to it to equal 1 cup liquid.
2. In a small bowl combine cornstarch and brown sugar. Then stir in soy sauce, vinegar and water. Stir this into the pineapple juice mixture in the skillet. Cook over medium heat until thick, stirring constantly, Approximately 5-7 minutesl
2. Add pineapple chunks and remaining ingredients. Mix well. Simmer 20 minutes or until heated through. Stir frequently and add a small amount of water or pineapple juice if needed.
Leftovers from this weeks worth of meal that would then go to food storage would be the remaining meatballs either frozen or canned (add water to the canning jar and then process pints at 15# pressure for 75 minutes or quarts for 90 minutes—please follow all USDA guidelines while canning).
The leftover steamed rice can be dried to make your own “minute rice.” Or refrigerated or frozen to be used in the future for a variety stir fried rice dishes, Mexican Rice, or to be reheated for breakfast and eaten with sugar, milk and butter.
So there you have it week #1 for 2012, and for 2013 because as I have mentioned previously. I am keeping the files I have created for these menus to use in the future. Complete with the full grocery list, so this time next year it will be a matter of point and click.
Jan who hopes this is helpful to someone in OK
Thursday, January 26, 2012
A YEAR’S WORTH OF MENUS
January 26, 2012
Some folks think I’m certifiably crazy. I announced at the first of the year I was going to do a year’s worth of menus all three meals a day and in doing so I would save hundreds if not thousands of dollars out of our grocery budget doing so. The idea grew out of my success with going without a freezer in December.
Learning to plan my menu without depending on a free standing freezer has made it where I can see the big picture of the value of long term menu planning not only for money savings, but for nutrition and food storage.
I’ve been doing it since the first of the year and it is really working out nicely for us. It has pretty well done away with the annoying nightly “What’s for dinner” discussion. A huge plus.
I’ve mentioned on various yahoogroups I’m on that I am doing this and there have naturally been a lot of questions about how to do it. I’ve also been asked to post my year’s worth of menus. After much thinking I’ve decided rather than clog those lists up to post the journey through the year here, along with the how to’s and recipes to do it.
So this first post is about the “HOW TO”, “HOW IT WILL SAVE YOU MONEY” and. “HOW ABOUT WHEN LIFE HAPPENS?”
HOW TO
I have to admit that when I first decided to do a year’s worth of weekly menus for three meals a day, plus snacks I thought it was a huge mountain to try to climb. Then I remembered the old joke “How do you eat an elephant?” The answer of course is “One bite at a time.” So that’s the way I moved forward.
I started with planning my dinner menu for the first week of the year. I did this because then I could schedule leftovers for breakfasts and lunches for the same week.
I also decided with our grocery budget I could only afford to purchase one meat a week. That was a scary realization. As the regular readers of my blog and list posts know we are on the Dave Ramsey Financial Freedom plan and that means we have a zero dollar based budget with a set in stone amount for groceries each week.
Unfortunately we’d got away from our established $100 a week for our family of three over the last few months of the year and in November I spent over $1,000 rather than the scheduled $400. This was a serious lack of control on my part. A mistake that slowed our gazelle way down on its race to avoid the debt cheetahs.
So with the beginning of the new year I was determined to stay at or below that $100. This meant one bulk meat purchase a week, and a lot of planning to keep variety in our meals, especially as grocery prices are escalating.
The idea was a follow up on my previous post of living without a freezer. Buy one meat, use it for 2-3 meals during the week and then can the rest for future menus. This would build up my food storage, while feeding us well on a small budget.
We eat a LOT of ground beef, so I determined that doing a ground beef menu every other week would be the best pattern for us, at least in the beginning. That first week we started with ground beef and our favorite Many Way Meatballs Master Mix.
I put the menu together for dinners first. Then in my Master Cook program I entered the recipes for EVERYTHING we’d need to eat that menu for the week. This gave me the exact measurements I’d need of each ingredient.
I then constructed my grocery list, including the exact measurements needed, from those menus. From that grocery list I then put the same measurements in a spread sheet to be totaled to show how much I will need for the entire year for each ingredient. This is important for the “How It will save you money” segment.
I then repeated these steps with the breakfast and lunch menus. I now had a complete grocery list for the week and it was time to “shop”. I started with my food storage. I checked every single item, not trusting my memory for anything. I verified that I had the required amounts for the week on hand. If not then it went on the “to buy” list.
Once the “to buy” list was built I checked the sales ads and my price book to find where it would be best to purchase those items AND anything that was a true loss leader that I would need for future menus that I could afford in my weekly budget. (more on this later.)
Next stop was my coupon box. Where I pulled the coupons I needed for those purchases.
Armed with the list and my coupons I did all my grocery shopping for the week, my ONLY visit to the grocery store for the week.
Once home things were prepped and stored properly. It was nice to know I had everything I needed on hand for well planned out meals for a week.
HOW IT WILL SAVE YOU MONEY
First of all if you have a menu plan you KNOW what is for dinner and there is no rushing out for fast foods. You can cook far better burgers and pizza at home for less than half the price and with pre-planning you can actually get the meal faster than loading the family up, driving to the restaurant, waiting for them to cook it, listening to other people’s kids screaming and then driving home. Oh and you aren’t tempted to stop and shop somewhere along the way. This can add up to huge savings right there.
By hitting the grocery store only once a week you save fuel, time and money. Yes money because you aren’t tempted to do impulse buying if you aren’t in the store.
Because the meal plan is there for the entire week you can also “bulk cook” a lot and save money and time. Because if you need browned ground beef for three meals, or for canning, you can brown it in one pan all at once. It will take the same amount of energy to do it all at once as it would to do a single meal of it. So you save by not having to heat the stove up for that browning the rest of the time.
You also only have to clean up once, thus you save on water, energy to heat the water, wear and tear on your dishwasher, dish soap, and your time. And we all need more time.
With creating your annual grocery list you can clearly see how many of non-perishable foods you need for the year. So if there is a great sale on that item and your food budget has room in it, grab your coupons and stock up at the lower price, so your overall grocery expenditure for the year goes down and your food storage goes up.
A friend gave a good example of this with a purchase she recently made. She serves Hamburger Helper one day a month to her family of nine. She recently found a loss leader sale that when combined with her coupons made it $.49 a box. This is versus the normal $1.50 to $2.00 per box. She verified the “best if used by date” and then picked up enough boxes for the year. This made her savings huge.
At this point there is usually someone that says “but I don’t have room for food storage.” Having lived in a one room efficiency apartment for a long period of time I can tell you there is ALWAYS storage room, you just need to know where to find it. I’ll do another post later on about where to find the room to store and tips on making sure nothing gets forgotten.
A side note on nutrition. I have found that by writing down a complete daily menu for a week at a time it has allowed me to incorporate more fruits and vegetables into our daily diet. This is a very good thing.
Let’s be truthful, when you eat out a lot, be it fast food or a sit down restaurant or you slap something together at the last minute you tend to eat less than healthy. By taking the few extra steps at first to plan your meals you will find that good for you foods will filter more and more into your diet.
This can lead to future savings on medical and clothing bills.
The same friend who purchased the Hamburger Helper decided it was best for her to do a month’s worth of menu plans for her family and then multiply that times 12 to get her annual menu. This works well for her. We like trying different foods too much to be this limited, but for many families this is the best way for them to plan their menus.
She then followed the steps to figure her grocery lists and when consulting her price book for the best sale prices (which generally rotate about every six weeks) she discovered that by doing the annual grocery list and shopping accordingly she would save 75% on her annual grocery bill based on current grocery prices. That folks is a HUGE savings. What could you do with that 75% savings? How many debts could you pay off? She’s using the savings to pay her house off early. Who wouldn’t want to own their home?
HOW ABOUT WHEN LIFE HAPPENS?
One of the most popular questions is “Do you allow for diverting from the menu plan?” The answer is a resounding YES!
Life happens, Suzy has a school play, it’s Joey’s birthday, Mama is sick, Great Aunt Ethel dies, Dad is going out of town on business for a week, the garden produced a million more zucchini this week than planned on or the loss leader of the week is a great buy for a meat that is not on that week’s menu. These and many other things happen, including your hubby just flat does NOT want turkey this week.
In fact I’m not dead on schedule with my menus right now because I sometimes re-arrange the meals to fit what is going on in our life on any given day. The menu is a guide not a dictate. All meals from the menu eventually get eaten, they just might be done in a different order or on a different week. But they all get used as close to the schedule as possible to help keep the domino action of the pre-planning going.
An example: On a recent week we had a ground beef week scheduled and the next week was scheduled to be whole chicken. Only my husband, who really doesn’t care for chicken, was going to be gone for a week for work on the ground beef week. My son and I love chicken, so I moved the chicken forward a week and we’ll have two ground beef weeks in a row. It took moving leftovers around a bit, and doing a little extra canning to keep meats fresh from the previous week, but it worked out well. We stayed on budget and all were happy with their meals.
Speaking of leftovers, this is another way you can save big. There is currently a series of commercials running where it shows the people throwing away half of the foods they purchase because the leftovers go bad, or the meat isn’t stored properly.
With the menu planning you incorporate the leftovers into your meal plan each week, or you can/dry/freeze them for future meals. By cutting that 50% waste from your grocery budget you save big time. Unfortunately little Suzy won’t have science experiments in your fridge for the annual science fair as a result. But then is food mold REALLY that good of a science fair project?
So that is the plan. Posts on the implementing of it, including recipes, storage tips and much more will follow.
Jan who thinks this is going to be a challenge for her family but can really see the long term benefits in OK
Some folks think I’m certifiably crazy. I announced at the first of the year I was going to do a year’s worth of menus all three meals a day and in doing so I would save hundreds if not thousands of dollars out of our grocery budget doing so. The idea grew out of my success with going without a freezer in December.
Learning to plan my menu without depending on a free standing freezer has made it where I can see the big picture of the value of long term menu planning not only for money savings, but for nutrition and food storage.
I’ve been doing it since the first of the year and it is really working out nicely for us. It has pretty well done away with the annoying nightly “What’s for dinner” discussion. A huge plus.
I’ve mentioned on various yahoogroups I’m on that I am doing this and there have naturally been a lot of questions about how to do it. I’ve also been asked to post my year’s worth of menus. After much thinking I’ve decided rather than clog those lists up to post the journey through the year here, along with the how to’s and recipes to do it.
So this first post is about the “HOW TO”, “HOW IT WILL SAVE YOU MONEY” and. “HOW ABOUT WHEN LIFE HAPPENS?”
HOW TO
I have to admit that when I first decided to do a year’s worth of weekly menus for three meals a day, plus snacks I thought it was a huge mountain to try to climb. Then I remembered the old joke “How do you eat an elephant?” The answer of course is “One bite at a time.” So that’s the way I moved forward.
I started with planning my dinner menu for the first week of the year. I did this because then I could schedule leftovers for breakfasts and lunches for the same week.
I also decided with our grocery budget I could only afford to purchase one meat a week. That was a scary realization. As the regular readers of my blog and list posts know we are on the Dave Ramsey Financial Freedom plan and that means we have a zero dollar based budget with a set in stone amount for groceries each week.
Unfortunately we’d got away from our established $100 a week for our family of three over the last few months of the year and in November I spent over $1,000 rather than the scheduled $400. This was a serious lack of control on my part. A mistake that slowed our gazelle way down on its race to avoid the debt cheetahs.
So with the beginning of the new year I was determined to stay at or below that $100. This meant one bulk meat purchase a week, and a lot of planning to keep variety in our meals, especially as grocery prices are escalating.
The idea was a follow up on my previous post of living without a freezer. Buy one meat, use it for 2-3 meals during the week and then can the rest for future menus. This would build up my food storage, while feeding us well on a small budget.
We eat a LOT of ground beef, so I determined that doing a ground beef menu every other week would be the best pattern for us, at least in the beginning. That first week we started with ground beef and our favorite Many Way Meatballs Master Mix.
I put the menu together for dinners first. Then in my Master Cook program I entered the recipes for EVERYTHING we’d need to eat that menu for the week. This gave me the exact measurements I’d need of each ingredient.
I then constructed my grocery list, including the exact measurements needed, from those menus. From that grocery list I then put the same measurements in a spread sheet to be totaled to show how much I will need for the entire year for each ingredient. This is important for the “How It will save you money” segment.
I then repeated these steps with the breakfast and lunch menus. I now had a complete grocery list for the week and it was time to “shop”. I started with my food storage. I checked every single item, not trusting my memory for anything. I verified that I had the required amounts for the week on hand. If not then it went on the “to buy” list.
Once the “to buy” list was built I checked the sales ads and my price book to find where it would be best to purchase those items AND anything that was a true loss leader that I would need for future menus that I could afford in my weekly budget. (more on this later.)
Next stop was my coupon box. Where I pulled the coupons I needed for those purchases.
Armed with the list and my coupons I did all my grocery shopping for the week, my ONLY visit to the grocery store for the week.
Once home things were prepped and stored properly. It was nice to know I had everything I needed on hand for well planned out meals for a week.
HOW IT WILL SAVE YOU MONEY
First of all if you have a menu plan you KNOW what is for dinner and there is no rushing out for fast foods. You can cook far better burgers and pizza at home for less than half the price and with pre-planning you can actually get the meal faster than loading the family up, driving to the restaurant, waiting for them to cook it, listening to other people’s kids screaming and then driving home. Oh and you aren’t tempted to stop and shop somewhere along the way. This can add up to huge savings right there.
By hitting the grocery store only once a week you save fuel, time and money. Yes money because you aren’t tempted to do impulse buying if you aren’t in the store.
Because the meal plan is there for the entire week you can also “bulk cook” a lot and save money and time. Because if you need browned ground beef for three meals, or for canning, you can brown it in one pan all at once. It will take the same amount of energy to do it all at once as it would to do a single meal of it. So you save by not having to heat the stove up for that browning the rest of the time.
You also only have to clean up once, thus you save on water, energy to heat the water, wear and tear on your dishwasher, dish soap, and your time. And we all need more time.
With creating your annual grocery list you can clearly see how many of non-perishable foods you need for the year. So if there is a great sale on that item and your food budget has room in it, grab your coupons and stock up at the lower price, so your overall grocery expenditure for the year goes down and your food storage goes up.
A friend gave a good example of this with a purchase she recently made. She serves Hamburger Helper one day a month to her family of nine. She recently found a loss leader sale that when combined with her coupons made it $.49 a box. This is versus the normal $1.50 to $2.00 per box. She verified the “best if used by date” and then picked up enough boxes for the year. This made her savings huge.
At this point there is usually someone that says “but I don’t have room for food storage.” Having lived in a one room efficiency apartment for a long period of time I can tell you there is ALWAYS storage room, you just need to know where to find it. I’ll do another post later on about where to find the room to store and tips on making sure nothing gets forgotten.
A side note on nutrition. I have found that by writing down a complete daily menu for a week at a time it has allowed me to incorporate more fruits and vegetables into our daily diet. This is a very good thing.
Let’s be truthful, when you eat out a lot, be it fast food or a sit down restaurant or you slap something together at the last minute you tend to eat less than healthy. By taking the few extra steps at first to plan your meals you will find that good for you foods will filter more and more into your diet.
This can lead to future savings on medical and clothing bills.
The same friend who purchased the Hamburger Helper decided it was best for her to do a month’s worth of menu plans for her family and then multiply that times 12 to get her annual menu. This works well for her. We like trying different foods too much to be this limited, but for many families this is the best way for them to plan their menus.
She then followed the steps to figure her grocery lists and when consulting her price book for the best sale prices (which generally rotate about every six weeks) she discovered that by doing the annual grocery list and shopping accordingly she would save 75% on her annual grocery bill based on current grocery prices. That folks is a HUGE savings. What could you do with that 75% savings? How many debts could you pay off? She’s using the savings to pay her house off early. Who wouldn’t want to own their home?
HOW ABOUT WHEN LIFE HAPPENS?
One of the most popular questions is “Do you allow for diverting from the menu plan?” The answer is a resounding YES!
Life happens, Suzy has a school play, it’s Joey’s birthday, Mama is sick, Great Aunt Ethel dies, Dad is going out of town on business for a week, the garden produced a million more zucchini this week than planned on or the loss leader of the week is a great buy for a meat that is not on that week’s menu. These and many other things happen, including your hubby just flat does NOT want turkey this week.
In fact I’m not dead on schedule with my menus right now because I sometimes re-arrange the meals to fit what is going on in our life on any given day. The menu is a guide not a dictate. All meals from the menu eventually get eaten, they just might be done in a different order or on a different week. But they all get used as close to the schedule as possible to help keep the domino action of the pre-planning going.
An example: On a recent week we had a ground beef week scheduled and the next week was scheduled to be whole chicken. Only my husband, who really doesn’t care for chicken, was going to be gone for a week for work on the ground beef week. My son and I love chicken, so I moved the chicken forward a week and we’ll have two ground beef weeks in a row. It took moving leftovers around a bit, and doing a little extra canning to keep meats fresh from the previous week, but it worked out well. We stayed on budget and all were happy with their meals.
Speaking of leftovers, this is another way you can save big. There is currently a series of commercials running where it shows the people throwing away half of the foods they purchase because the leftovers go bad, or the meat isn’t stored properly.
With the menu planning you incorporate the leftovers into your meal plan each week, or you can/dry/freeze them for future meals. By cutting that 50% waste from your grocery budget you save big time. Unfortunately little Suzy won’t have science experiments in your fridge for the annual science fair as a result. But then is food mold REALLY that good of a science fair project?
So that is the plan. Posts on the implementing of it, including recipes, storage tips and much more will follow.
Jan who thinks this is going to be a challenge for her family but can really see the long term benefits in OK
Monday, December 5, 2011
LIVING WITHOUT A FREEZER
December 5, 2011
I’m not sure why, but our freezers go out on a pretty regular basis. I don’t have trouble with any other appliances dying quickly, but it seems like every 18 months or so our freezer dies. It just did so again, we lost pretty much everything in it.
This time it was the last straw. The proverbial camel’s back was broken. I refuse to replace it. WHAT? You say. A person like me who is definitely into food storage refusing to purchase another free standing freezer? Unheard of, but that’s my decision.
Seriously I did the math and what little we saved on buying and freezing in bulk we lost in having to replace a freezer every time we turned around, dry ice costs to keep the foods safe until the new freezer was delivered and oh the work that went into maintaining that freezer.
So for the first time in my entire life, literally, I am without a free standing freezer. It’s definitely going to make a difference in how things are dealt with around here.
I’ve developed a game plan that hopefully will work out well for us and in the long run save us a lot in money and lost food all the way around.
I’ve gone back to shopping once a week, for just the foods I am going to need for the PLANNED MENU for the week. I’ve returned to couponing. However, I am still very big on food storage. Just not frozen food storage any more. So here’s how the first week went.
Last Sunday I sat down with the sale ads for the local groceries and discovered no one had any meats on as loss leaders. So I chose my main meat for the week to be a roast, knowing that I can often pick those up on Monday mornings at a discount at our local Wal-Mart.
I then made my dinner menus for the week. Here is week #1’s menu:
DINNER MENU PLAN 11/28-12/4/2011
MONDAY 11/28/11
Baked fish fillets (Gorton’s or Mrs. Paul’s)--coupon
Baked potato—from food storage
Green beans—from food storage
Leftover pies or cake for dessert
Tea
Crescent rolls—coupon and sale combo
TUESDAY 11/29/11
Roast with vegetables-large discounted chuck roast
Homemade bread
Leftover pies or cake for dessert
Tea
WEDNESDAY 11/30/11
Grilled Montreal Seasoning chicken breasts—food storage from fridge freezer
Chicken Rice a Roni—food storage
Asparagus—dried from food storage
Homemade Dinner Rolls
Homemade Brownies
Tea
THURSDAY 12/1/11
Stew made with leftover roast and vegetables
Cornbread( leftover from making stuffing for Thanksgiving) or crackers—food storage
Cookies—from fridge freezer
Milk or tea
FRIDAY 12/2/11
Pinto bean soup—food storage
Cornbread--leftover
Fried potatoes—food storage
Tea
Leftover desserts
SATURDAY 12/3/11
Beef and Bean Burritos using leftover beans and roast
Mexican rice with corn in it
Homemade Sopapillas
SUNDAY 12/4/11
Potato Soup or leftovers
Crackers—food storage
Homemade Gingerbread
Milk or tea
As you can see I purchased very little on that Monday morning trip. It’s a basic menu and what happened with the leftovers is what changes the system.
I started out the week, like most everyone in the nation with leftover turkey. This was deboned by Sean then sandwiches and turkey salad were eaten by all family members early in the week for lunches.
Then the leftover turkey went a few different directions. Some was pressure canned in turkey broth made from double boiling the carcass for future sandwiches, salads and casseroles. Some was dried for jerky treats for the dogs, some was fed to the cats, except Lizzie B. who doesn’t like turkey. The rest was made into a week’s worth of dog food for our three 50# dogs mixed with rice, vegetables and turkey broth.
As you can see we ate three dinners off that one $19 roast. What you don’t see on that menu is the lunches the next week made with the ground up leftover roast made into sandwich spread for Gary’s lunches.
Nor do you see that the vegetable beef soup/stew made such a large amount I canned up several jars of it in lunch size servings for the food storage.
The pinto bean soup was a LARGE pan full. The leftovers were divided up. Three cups went into making the refried beans for Saturday night’s dinner, which had leftovers that will go into bean burritos for lunches for next week. Two cups were placed in the refrigerator for Beef and Beans that are on next week’s menu using ground beef as the main meat for the week. The remaining beans were canned for food storage.
There was still room in the canner, so I dug packages of frankfurters out of the small refrigerator freezer (thus freeing up room) and made homemade Beans and Franks, which I canned for Gary’s lunches as well.
Two things came out of the refrigerator freezer and only one thing went in this week. That one thing was a single fish fillet patty that went in because we only needed three and the packages contained two each. My goal is to get away from using the two and ½ (camper) freezers for anything other than freezing items that cannot be safely canned or frozen, such as eggs.
While I used several things out of food storage I also added beef soup, canned beans, canned beans and franks and canned cooked turkey to the food storage. A total of 2 pints and 25 ½ pints of food went into the food storage.
On my grocery list now are replacements for the non-freezer food storage items I used. I will purchase two for every one I used to build the food storage system up. Because I’ve been doing that pattern for awhile I can afford to wait for those items to become loss leaders, have a good coupon, or grow in the 2012 garden.
I plan on running the canner and/or dehydrator 1-2 times a week to can/dry up leftovers. I will also run it full each time by canning things like dried beans, beans and franks and other “convenience” foods for those days I don’t have time to do a major cooking job. Or by drying things like rice, or dog treats to fill the dehydrator to max.
This next week, unless tomorrow’s ad has a great loss leader meat product, will be a ground beef week, I’ll purchase a 10# chub at Sam’s club, because it’s cheaper that way and then do similar to this week. Planning my leftovers for future meals or for canning or drying for food storage. Since we won’t eat anywhere near 10# of ground beef in one week I’ll also make up taco filler and can that as well as plain browned ground beef for the food storage.
It’s a system that I think will eventually get my food storage to a decent level and reduce food loss to a bare minimum.
Jan who thinks that living without a freezer is going to be just fine in OK
I’m not sure why, but our freezers go out on a pretty regular basis. I don’t have trouble with any other appliances dying quickly, but it seems like every 18 months or so our freezer dies. It just did so again, we lost pretty much everything in it.
This time it was the last straw. The proverbial camel’s back was broken. I refuse to replace it. WHAT? You say. A person like me who is definitely into food storage refusing to purchase another free standing freezer? Unheard of, but that’s my decision.
Seriously I did the math and what little we saved on buying and freezing in bulk we lost in having to replace a freezer every time we turned around, dry ice costs to keep the foods safe until the new freezer was delivered and oh the work that went into maintaining that freezer.
So for the first time in my entire life, literally, I am without a free standing freezer. It’s definitely going to make a difference in how things are dealt with around here.
I’ve developed a game plan that hopefully will work out well for us and in the long run save us a lot in money and lost food all the way around.
I’ve gone back to shopping once a week, for just the foods I am going to need for the PLANNED MENU for the week. I’ve returned to couponing. However, I am still very big on food storage. Just not frozen food storage any more. So here’s how the first week went.
Last Sunday I sat down with the sale ads for the local groceries and discovered no one had any meats on as loss leaders. So I chose my main meat for the week to be a roast, knowing that I can often pick those up on Monday mornings at a discount at our local Wal-Mart.
I then made my dinner menus for the week. Here is week #1’s menu:
DINNER MENU PLAN 11/28-12/4/2011
MONDAY 11/28/11
Baked fish fillets (Gorton’s or Mrs. Paul’s)--coupon
Baked potato—from food storage
Green beans—from food storage
Leftover pies or cake for dessert
Tea
Crescent rolls—coupon and sale combo
TUESDAY 11/29/11
Roast with vegetables-large discounted chuck roast
Homemade bread
Leftover pies or cake for dessert
Tea
WEDNESDAY 11/30/11
Grilled Montreal Seasoning chicken breasts—food storage from fridge freezer
Chicken Rice a Roni—food storage
Asparagus—dried from food storage
Homemade Dinner Rolls
Homemade Brownies
Tea
THURSDAY 12/1/11
Stew made with leftover roast and vegetables
Cornbread( leftover from making stuffing for Thanksgiving) or crackers—food storage
Cookies—from fridge freezer
Milk or tea
FRIDAY 12/2/11
Pinto bean soup—food storage
Cornbread--leftover
Fried potatoes—food storage
Tea
Leftover desserts
SATURDAY 12/3/11
Beef and Bean Burritos using leftover beans and roast
Mexican rice with corn in it
Homemade Sopapillas
SUNDAY 12/4/11
Potato Soup or leftovers
Crackers—food storage
Homemade Gingerbread
Milk or tea
As you can see I purchased very little on that Monday morning trip. It’s a basic menu and what happened with the leftovers is what changes the system.
I started out the week, like most everyone in the nation with leftover turkey. This was deboned by Sean then sandwiches and turkey salad were eaten by all family members early in the week for lunches.
Then the leftover turkey went a few different directions. Some was pressure canned in turkey broth made from double boiling the carcass for future sandwiches, salads and casseroles. Some was dried for jerky treats for the dogs, some was fed to the cats, except Lizzie B. who doesn’t like turkey. The rest was made into a week’s worth of dog food for our three 50# dogs mixed with rice, vegetables and turkey broth.
As you can see we ate three dinners off that one $19 roast. What you don’t see on that menu is the lunches the next week made with the ground up leftover roast made into sandwich spread for Gary’s lunches.
Nor do you see that the vegetable beef soup/stew made such a large amount I canned up several jars of it in lunch size servings for the food storage.
The pinto bean soup was a LARGE pan full. The leftovers were divided up. Three cups went into making the refried beans for Saturday night’s dinner, which had leftovers that will go into bean burritos for lunches for next week. Two cups were placed in the refrigerator for Beef and Beans that are on next week’s menu using ground beef as the main meat for the week. The remaining beans were canned for food storage.
There was still room in the canner, so I dug packages of frankfurters out of the small refrigerator freezer (thus freeing up room) and made homemade Beans and Franks, which I canned for Gary’s lunches as well.
Two things came out of the refrigerator freezer and only one thing went in this week. That one thing was a single fish fillet patty that went in because we only needed three and the packages contained two each. My goal is to get away from using the two and ½ (camper) freezers for anything other than freezing items that cannot be safely canned or frozen, such as eggs.
While I used several things out of food storage I also added beef soup, canned beans, canned beans and franks and canned cooked turkey to the food storage. A total of 2 pints and 25 ½ pints of food went into the food storage.
On my grocery list now are replacements for the non-freezer food storage items I used. I will purchase two for every one I used to build the food storage system up. Because I’ve been doing that pattern for awhile I can afford to wait for those items to become loss leaders, have a good coupon, or grow in the 2012 garden.
I plan on running the canner and/or dehydrator 1-2 times a week to can/dry up leftovers. I will also run it full each time by canning things like dried beans, beans and franks and other “convenience” foods for those days I don’t have time to do a major cooking job. Or by drying things like rice, or dog treats to fill the dehydrator to max.
This next week, unless tomorrow’s ad has a great loss leader meat product, will be a ground beef week, I’ll purchase a 10# chub at Sam’s club, because it’s cheaper that way and then do similar to this week. Planning my leftovers for future meals or for canning or drying for food storage. Since we won’t eat anywhere near 10# of ground beef in one week I’ll also make up taco filler and can that as well as plain browned ground beef for the food storage.
It’s a system that I think will eventually get my food storage to a decent level and reduce food loss to a bare minimum.
Jan who thinks that living without a freezer is going to be just fine in OK
Sunday, November 27, 2011
A WINTER MORNING WAKE UP CALL
November 27,2011
As I rolled over in my warm bed trying to figure out what had wakened me I listened to the sounds outside my window. The cold late November air was pierced again with a sound I’ve became use to over the years.
“Aaaaaa” like rapid machine gun fire, something had the guinea fowl’s in an uproar, but it didn’t concern me. Anyone that has ever raised guinea fowl knows that all the guineas in the world share one brain cell and it is never your birds day to have it. Something as simple as a leaf blowing in the wind can set them in a tizzy.
As I rolled over and tried to go back to sleep the guineas continued sounding their alarm cry and soon Piper Peacock joined the chorus “Onk heee, Onk Hee” as the rooster crowed and the geese joined in honking their intruder alarm. The cacophony of startled bird cries was soon joined by Sir Oliver Inkwell sitting on the bedroom window sill meowing loudly.
Okay, so now the critters have my attention. Freeing myself from the bed covers I fumble for my eye glasses on the night stand and go to the window to see if I can see what is going on.
For several seconds I stood watching the birds to get a clue as to where the intruder was. The birds had the big cedar tree outside our bedroom window encircled. They definitely had something trapped under there, occasionally I could see rapid movement fleeing from one side to another under the skirts of the large tree’s ground touching branches.
Whatever it was it was fast, but moving as if possibly injured. Cat maybe? No I only saw two legs. Guinea after guinea would charge under the huge cedar at whatever it was and then dart back out as the quickly moving shadow would alternately run at the guineas and flee from them.
Piper Peacock paced nervously around the tree honking her dismay at the whole procedure. Piper doesn’t care for any changes in her world what so ever (well except for maybe wanting a male added to the flock). She honked and voiced her opinion loudly. The geese stood back watching the whole display cheering the guineas on honking their approval as each guinea charged under the tree. Repeat Rooster stood on the back porch railing crowing, but offering no real help as tiny Turk the Turken hid under the back deck.
I continued to watch as I reached for the clothing I had laid out the night before. Just then the shadow charged after another guinea foray and stepped out of the shadows of the tree.
A small young brown hawk ran limping from the tree to over by the house. The guineas soon cornered it near the compressor as it flapped its wings and charged back at them.
He was fully puffed out his speckled feathers standing on end and looking quite stressed. He made an effort to fly away from his tormentors, but hit the fence of the garden and landed in the flock of geese that had been watching the whole spectacle. The geese separated and looked at the small bird like “yeah right, You’re a chicken hawk, but we’re not chickens.” They didn’t even bother to run off because the bird was so small and obviously injured.
I turned and told Gary what was going on. He was quickly dressed and out the door. To see what needed to be done. While hawks aren’t welcome around here, we don’t want any animal suffering. The guineas were determined they were going to pay this young hawk back for every keet other hawks had ever carried off.
I kept an eye on the hawk from the window until I saw Gary going toward it. Then headed out to help him.
When I arrived in the side yard Gary was watching the sky. He said that the hawk had recovered from bouncing off the garden fence and in a panic when it saw him had gathered enough strength it had swooped skyward and flew off over the trees to the west of the house.
He said the flight was labored and it seemed to be dangling one foot a bit, but it had gone far enough the guineas couldn’t get to it and it had landed in a tree that he was pointing at. The tree was several acres away from our location, so we did not try to follow.
Of course the guineas strutted around for several minutes after that telling the world how they had beaten the mean old hawk, as the much wiser geese just looked at them indulgently.
Little Turk, who is the smallest of our free ranging birds finally came out from under the porch and snuggled up with Repeat as if to say “My hero.” Apparently the inexperienced young hawk had tried to get her not realizing he would not fit through the lattice of the porch like she would and had crashed into it injuring himself.
We surmised this by the hawk feathers near where Turk had been hiding. Earlier this week Turk had been running around with two chicks, they of course had disappeared. We figured this hawk is probably how they disappeared and he came back thinking he was a good enough hunter to get Momma bird too. Boy was he wrong.
I doubt that particular hawk will ever be back as long as the guinea crew is on duty.
Jan who is up for the day and ready to decorate for Christmas in OK
As I rolled over in my warm bed trying to figure out what had wakened me I listened to the sounds outside my window. The cold late November air was pierced again with a sound I’ve became use to over the years.
“Aaaaaa” like rapid machine gun fire, something had the guinea fowl’s in an uproar, but it didn’t concern me. Anyone that has ever raised guinea fowl knows that all the guineas in the world share one brain cell and it is never your birds day to have it. Something as simple as a leaf blowing in the wind can set them in a tizzy.
As I rolled over and tried to go back to sleep the guineas continued sounding their alarm cry and soon Piper Peacock joined the chorus “Onk heee, Onk Hee” as the rooster crowed and the geese joined in honking their intruder alarm. The cacophony of startled bird cries was soon joined by Sir Oliver Inkwell sitting on the bedroom window sill meowing loudly.
Okay, so now the critters have my attention. Freeing myself from the bed covers I fumble for my eye glasses on the night stand and go to the window to see if I can see what is going on.
For several seconds I stood watching the birds to get a clue as to where the intruder was. The birds had the big cedar tree outside our bedroom window encircled. They definitely had something trapped under there, occasionally I could see rapid movement fleeing from one side to another under the skirts of the large tree’s ground touching branches.
Whatever it was it was fast, but moving as if possibly injured. Cat maybe? No I only saw two legs. Guinea after guinea would charge under the huge cedar at whatever it was and then dart back out as the quickly moving shadow would alternately run at the guineas and flee from them.
Piper Peacock paced nervously around the tree honking her dismay at the whole procedure. Piper doesn’t care for any changes in her world what so ever (well except for maybe wanting a male added to the flock). She honked and voiced her opinion loudly. The geese stood back watching the whole display cheering the guineas on honking their approval as each guinea charged under the tree. Repeat Rooster stood on the back porch railing crowing, but offering no real help as tiny Turk the Turken hid under the back deck.
I continued to watch as I reached for the clothing I had laid out the night before. Just then the shadow charged after another guinea foray and stepped out of the shadows of the tree.
A small young brown hawk ran limping from the tree to over by the house. The guineas soon cornered it near the compressor as it flapped its wings and charged back at them.
He was fully puffed out his speckled feathers standing on end and looking quite stressed. He made an effort to fly away from his tormentors, but hit the fence of the garden and landed in the flock of geese that had been watching the whole spectacle. The geese separated and looked at the small bird like “yeah right, You’re a chicken hawk, but we’re not chickens.” They didn’t even bother to run off because the bird was so small and obviously injured.
I turned and told Gary what was going on. He was quickly dressed and out the door. To see what needed to be done. While hawks aren’t welcome around here, we don’t want any animal suffering. The guineas were determined they were going to pay this young hawk back for every keet other hawks had ever carried off.
I kept an eye on the hawk from the window until I saw Gary going toward it. Then headed out to help him.
When I arrived in the side yard Gary was watching the sky. He said that the hawk had recovered from bouncing off the garden fence and in a panic when it saw him had gathered enough strength it had swooped skyward and flew off over the trees to the west of the house.
He said the flight was labored and it seemed to be dangling one foot a bit, but it had gone far enough the guineas couldn’t get to it and it had landed in a tree that he was pointing at. The tree was several acres away from our location, so we did not try to follow.
Of course the guineas strutted around for several minutes after that telling the world how they had beaten the mean old hawk, as the much wiser geese just looked at them indulgently.
Little Turk, who is the smallest of our free ranging birds finally came out from under the porch and snuggled up with Repeat as if to say “My hero.” Apparently the inexperienced young hawk had tried to get her not realizing he would not fit through the lattice of the porch like she would and had crashed into it injuring himself.
We surmised this by the hawk feathers near where Turk had been hiding. Earlier this week Turk had been running around with two chicks, they of course had disappeared. We figured this hawk is probably how they disappeared and he came back thinking he was a good enough hunter to get Momma bird too. Boy was he wrong.
I doubt that particular hawk will ever be back as long as the guinea crew is on duty.
Jan who is up for the day and ready to decorate for Christmas in OK
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
WHERE DO I BEGIN?
October 5, 2011
Once I finally decided I do this last week I started searching for information on modern couponing. The very first thing I did was set up an email address that would be used strictly for couponing, rebates, freebies and sweepstakes(yes I do sweepstakes too, and when I was doing them on a regular basis I won a lot of small prizes). Very little personal information was listed on this email and the subsequent facebook and other websites I signed up for.
I’ll write another time about the freebie lists and doing sweepstakes, for right now couponing and rebates are my main theme.
My reasoning for this was that this project had the potential to create a lot of junk mail. I did not want my personal email account to be flooded with such junk mail. But then I tend to have separate emails for all my different activities (genealogy, mystery shopping, chat groups, bill payment etc). I find keeping the different activities in separate emails with sub folders in each email address for automatic filtering makes my email reading a LOT easier. I can do a bulk delete on themes I’m not interested in very quickly that way. Gmail is great for creating various email accounts.
Once that email account was set up I started to do my research for help in getting into modern couponing.
First I went to the ever trusty yahoogroups looking for a “how to” group. For the first time yahoo failed me. Oh there were lots of groups, with 1-5 members and little to no activity. I joined one, posted my intro as requested and was never even acknowledged.
Next stop facebook. JACKPOT, the very first one I found was Couponingtodisney.com . Boy did this one strike a cord with me. After all part of my need to coupon is to get back to Walt Disney World as soon as possible. I signed up for this group and found their website to contain everything I needed to know to get started couponing.
Another great site I found was coupondivas.com . They too had a lot of great info. Between these two I found so much info I stopped my search right there and started studying all the steps to be a successful extreme couponer.
Before I had a chance to study both sites as much as I should it was time to purchase a Sunday paper and an All You magazine, which I did. I read later I should have purchased the paper in multiples of two and on my first trip saw why they said to. But last Sunday I only purchased one. It was a jackpot of a coupon mother lode. Between that single paper and the one magazine I acquired over $300 worth of coupons. I know from my past experiences that it won’t always be so, but for me it was the perfect Sunday to buy my first paper.
I spent much of Sunday on the sofa reading the newspaper and magazine so they could be cut up. The paper then went down for my “no-no” kitty who misses the litter box all too often, but always hits the paper or feed sack if we have a clean one down by the box. From what I saw in news content for the paper that was a very appropriate use for it.
The magazine, once butchered, went into the recycling sack. By the way this magazine was also an excellent source of how to information, complete with recommended websites and a $1 coupon for a truly how to magazine by them that I plan to pick up as soon as I locate a copy.
Then I filed the coupons I had cut from the two to familiarize myself with what ones I had.
Once that was done I started on reading the various sale ads and trying to decipher what would be my best purchases for my $100 budget allowance for the week.
I slowly made out a list of what I thought would be my best buys for the week, but I wasn’t pleased with how little I was going to save at first. Remember my long term goal is to have a decent, but not extreme, food storage system, paid for with as little money as possible and to be debt free in as short of time as possible. I am very impatient about those goals, I’m not getting any younger.
Back to the web and more studying. The girls on both of the afore mentioned websites had match ups listed and explained how certain stores allowed a stacking of coupons of sorts. This lead me to internet coupons, which I consider to be my most likely source since I cannot subscribe to just the Sunday paper in my area and I have no desire to have newspapers stacking up daily in my corner. That just might be too tempting to Amy Jo, the no-no kitty.
So next I went to my mypoints account to print coupons. This is a bonus place to print internet coupons. If you aren’t familiar with mypoints it basically is an online company that you get points for clicking on ads, doing internet searches, answering surveys, doing purchases on line, and printing and using internet coupons to get points to redeem for gift cards.
My personal favorite gift card is a $50 Wal-Mart gift card, which we in turn use to get $.03 off per gallon (sometimes up to $.05 off) to purchase fuel for my truck. Mypoints is free to use, if you would like more info please leave me a message and I’ll send you a referral (you really don’t need one to join, but I get bonus points if I refer you). I like saving $50 out of my fuel budget!
Back on facebook I have started “liking” various companies, restaurants, and product webpages of places we normally visit or items we normally use. These will often net you money off or free item coupons. Again I use the coupon only email address for all of this.
Not all the stores I was considering using had inserts in the Sunday paper. So using my mypoints tool bar I google searched for the webpages of the various stores I was considering for shopping. This helps get me toward my goal of x amount of searches per month for more points. The number of searches required for the varied amounts of bonus points vary from month to month.
I discovered some of the online ads had where you could click a box and create a grocery list of the items you wanted, then click “print” and a nice neat list prints out for you for that store. Talk about convenient. Wal-Mart was one such store, just make sure you have plenty of ink in your printer when you do it. I later got to a store and discovered I had ran out of ink in the middle of my list. LOL! I had to grab a sales ad at the store and wing it as a result.
As I read each sale ad online I also looked up that store’s coupon policy and printed a copy for my files. This can be an important step for everyone. I once had a store refuse my, really good one time one use only for an item I went there specifically to purchase with that internet coupon. I found out via their website the store was suppose to honor it. So now I will have the corporate policy with me in case there is ever another discussion.
I also found out that the 3 shoe boxes of “no expiration date” coupons I own may or may not be honored at various stores—ones with bar codes, no problem, ones with no bar code it is up to the individual store.
With all this basic research completed I felt I was ready to go on my maiden shopping trip.
Jan who says “next entry please” in OK
Once I finally decided I do this last week I started searching for information on modern couponing. The very first thing I did was set up an email address that would be used strictly for couponing, rebates, freebies and sweepstakes(yes I do sweepstakes too, and when I was doing them on a regular basis I won a lot of small prizes). Very little personal information was listed on this email and the subsequent facebook and other websites I signed up for.
I’ll write another time about the freebie lists and doing sweepstakes, for right now couponing and rebates are my main theme.
My reasoning for this was that this project had the potential to create a lot of junk mail. I did not want my personal email account to be flooded with such junk mail. But then I tend to have separate emails for all my different activities (genealogy, mystery shopping, chat groups, bill payment etc). I find keeping the different activities in separate emails with sub folders in each email address for automatic filtering makes my email reading a LOT easier. I can do a bulk delete on themes I’m not interested in very quickly that way. Gmail is great for creating various email accounts.
Once that email account was set up I started to do my research for help in getting into modern couponing.
First I went to the ever trusty yahoogroups looking for a “how to” group. For the first time yahoo failed me. Oh there were lots of groups, with 1-5 members and little to no activity. I joined one, posted my intro as requested and was never even acknowledged.
Next stop facebook. JACKPOT, the very first one I found was Couponingtodisney.com . Boy did this one strike a cord with me. After all part of my need to coupon is to get back to Walt Disney World as soon as possible. I signed up for this group and found their website to contain everything I needed to know to get started couponing.
Another great site I found was coupondivas.com . They too had a lot of great info. Between these two I found so much info I stopped my search right there and started studying all the steps to be a successful extreme couponer.
Before I had a chance to study both sites as much as I should it was time to purchase a Sunday paper and an All You magazine, which I did. I read later I should have purchased the paper in multiples of two and on my first trip saw why they said to. But last Sunday I only purchased one. It was a jackpot of a coupon mother lode. Between that single paper and the one magazine I acquired over $300 worth of coupons. I know from my past experiences that it won’t always be so, but for me it was the perfect Sunday to buy my first paper.
I spent much of Sunday on the sofa reading the newspaper and magazine so they could be cut up. The paper then went down for my “no-no” kitty who misses the litter box all too often, but always hits the paper or feed sack if we have a clean one down by the box. From what I saw in news content for the paper that was a very appropriate use for it.
The magazine, once butchered, went into the recycling sack. By the way this magazine was also an excellent source of how to information, complete with recommended websites and a $1 coupon for a truly how to magazine by them that I plan to pick up as soon as I locate a copy.
Then I filed the coupons I had cut from the two to familiarize myself with what ones I had.
Once that was done I started on reading the various sale ads and trying to decipher what would be my best purchases for my $100 budget allowance for the week.
I slowly made out a list of what I thought would be my best buys for the week, but I wasn’t pleased with how little I was going to save at first. Remember my long term goal is to have a decent, but not extreme, food storage system, paid for with as little money as possible and to be debt free in as short of time as possible. I am very impatient about those goals, I’m not getting any younger.
Back to the web and more studying. The girls on both of the afore mentioned websites had match ups listed and explained how certain stores allowed a stacking of coupons of sorts. This lead me to internet coupons, which I consider to be my most likely source since I cannot subscribe to just the Sunday paper in my area and I have no desire to have newspapers stacking up daily in my corner. That just might be too tempting to Amy Jo, the no-no kitty.
So next I went to my mypoints account to print coupons. This is a bonus place to print internet coupons. If you aren’t familiar with mypoints it basically is an online company that you get points for clicking on ads, doing internet searches, answering surveys, doing purchases on line, and printing and using internet coupons to get points to redeem for gift cards.
My personal favorite gift card is a $50 Wal-Mart gift card, which we in turn use to get $.03 off per gallon (sometimes up to $.05 off) to purchase fuel for my truck. Mypoints is free to use, if you would like more info please leave me a message and I’ll send you a referral (you really don’t need one to join, but I get bonus points if I refer you). I like saving $50 out of my fuel budget!
Back on facebook I have started “liking” various companies, restaurants, and product webpages of places we normally visit or items we normally use. These will often net you money off or free item coupons. Again I use the coupon only email address for all of this.
Not all the stores I was considering using had inserts in the Sunday paper. So using my mypoints tool bar I google searched for the webpages of the various stores I was considering for shopping. This helps get me toward my goal of x amount of searches per month for more points. The number of searches required for the varied amounts of bonus points vary from month to month.
I discovered some of the online ads had where you could click a box and create a grocery list of the items you wanted, then click “print” and a nice neat list prints out for you for that store. Talk about convenient. Wal-Mart was one such store, just make sure you have plenty of ink in your printer when you do it. I later got to a store and discovered I had ran out of ink in the middle of my list. LOL! I had to grab a sales ad at the store and wing it as a result.
As I read each sale ad online I also looked up that store’s coupon policy and printed a copy for my files. This can be an important step for everyone. I once had a store refuse my, really good one time one use only for an item I went there specifically to purchase with that internet coupon. I found out via their website the store was suppose to honor it. So now I will have the corporate policy with me in case there is ever another discussion.
I also found out that the 3 shoe boxes of “no expiration date” coupons I own may or may not be honored at various stores—ones with bar codes, no problem, ones with no bar code it is up to the individual store.
With all this basic research completed I felt I was ready to go on my maiden shopping trip.
Jan who says “next entry please” in OK
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