Frugal accomplishments for February 2014

Red Velvet Cupcakes from my baking book:
The Everything Gluten-Free Baking Cookbook

February's been a pretty good month so far. We've had our challenges, but overall I've enjoyed a lot of things that happened this month. My Dad is back in the hospital and that has been tough, because he was very sick when he went and his recovery has been very slow, but hopefully he is now on the mend.

We've been able to stick with our budget this month, going "cash only" for gas, groceries, and everyday necessities has been the best way to curb my overspending habits. It's definitely an inconvenience at times, but it's also brought about joys that I did not anticipate!

I've always been a quiet person by nature. Extremely introverted and I prefer doing things by myself or with my husband. But being cash only I've had to come out of my shell a bit. When you're looking for a bargain you often have to talk to people! You have to get out of the car. You have to shop in person, not online. Sometimes this is frustrating, but I've also met a lot of really awesome folks and I've learned to smile more. I've learned there is a HUGE difference between needs & wants.

A few frugal accomplishments this month have included: 

• A frugal Valentine's Day: Because the day was going to be low key financially, Michael and I found really creative ways to have fun and show our love. We made homemade cards, send small emails all day, I made Cheryl's homemade chocolates (for Michael, but I think I ended up eating them! LOL), I also made homemade gluten-free  red velvet cupcakes for a friend and we had a few leftover to celebrate the day. We spent dinner with no screens and just talked and really enjoyed our day. It was a wonderful Valentine's Day!

• Frugal traveling: With my Dad sick in the hospital we wanted to find frugal ways to visit him over the past few weeks. Thankfully I have some really great friends and we were able to stay with friends on our first visit. A week or so after our first visit Dad was transferred to UVA Medical Center in Charlottesville, VA so  I spent some time researching affordable places we could stay in Charlottesville. We found a truly wonderful resource called Alexander House Inn & Hostel. The facility has both a dorm-type facility (the hostel) where you share the large room for sleeping + a small kitchen area  + a shared bathroom, along with an inn that has several private rooms that you can rent for very reasonable prices. We rented a private room, hubs wasn't quite ready for the more frugal "dorm" option! lol (Not that I can really blame him...) You do share a bathroom with the rest of the inn visitors + all open spaces such as the kitchen area, dining area, and living room area. I LOVED how eco-friendly the inn was and how they encouraged recyclying, composting, and even harvesting rainwater for growing plants. It was an extremely relaxing place to be and was a welcome retreat after visiting with my Dad at the hospital. We met some other people visiting at Alexander House as well, but I never felt uncomfortable, and really enjoyed our private room. And surprisingly enough, it didn't seem strange to share a bathroom with people we didn't know. We never ran into a time when we needed it and it was occupied, so it worked out fine. (Oh admit it, you really wondered about that! lol! Especially if you have celiac disease or gluten sensitivity, bathroom readiness is important! lol) Cute neighborhood as well and very close to the hospital. We also enjoyed the kitchen area and being able to make our own gluten-free meals in the inn. We took all of our food with us. This was incredibly helpful in saving money over the course of our trip.

• Frugal shopping: Bought 3 books at a used bookstore, will probably sell them on eBay after I'm through reading them. Bought bulk toiletry items from amazon. We won't have to restock on toilet paper or paper towels for months. (Hoping to also cut down on the amount of paper towels we use, would love to stop buying them completely one day.) 

• Frugal clothing: Patched my favorite pair of jeans in the hopes of getting another year's use out of them! The patches aren't even that noticeable! 

• Frugal reading: Downloaded an app from my local library to read ebooks. I read one book, but started having issues with the app even after removing it from my phone and reloading it. Will have to let the library know I had issues with it because I would love to use this resource on a regular basis! 

• Frugal Beauty & Hygiene Products: This month I started something I've wanted to do for a long time. As much as I enjoy using coupons to buy shampoo/conditioner/toothpaste/deodorant, etc... I've always wanted to learn how to make my own and go the "no (sham)poo" route with my hair. So I've made different homemade "lotions & potions" for shampoo, conditioner, and deoderant. I've been doing this about 3 weeks with fairly good results. It definitely takes some experimenting to find the right recipes that will work for your own personal body and hair, so I've learned a lot along the way. I'll share more of these homemade beauty product recipes once I feel confident they have been successful for me. 

• Frugal gluten-free bread: I found this recipe for gluten-free sourdough bread online and have been experimenting with it for several weeks. I've made 3 batches of bread with really good results. However this week something happened with my starter. It began to smell rather vinegary and not very sourdough-y, so I tossed it just in case it came in contact with some sort of bad bacteria or something. I am starting a new batch this weekend and I hope by next week I'll be able to make gluten-free sourdough again. The best thing about this bread is that if you can make it successfully, you don't need store-bought yeast (the wild yeast rises the bread), eggs, or milk. The bread is naturally vegan, frugal to make, and really delicious! 

• Frugal probiotics: A few years ago I tried making kombucha on a regular basis. Yeah, I'm kinda hippy dippy like that, and I do believe in the power of probiotics and their role in gut health. However, I just couldn't keep up with kombucha. It's kind of an involved process where you have to brew tea, let it cool to the right temperature, use the right types of sugar and tea and allow the tea to ferment for a week or so and then store it properly... and it's kind of like taking care of a baby... and this is probably a good reason I don't have kids! lol (Cats thankfully are pretty self-sufficient and are more than happy to tell me when they are hungry!) So enter water kefir. I liked the idea of water kefir and was willing to try it. I liked that it wasn't milk/dairy based and it sounded relatively easy to care for. You simply "feed" 1/4 cup of kefir grains about 3 tablespoons of brown sugar. Add enough water to fill your jar (I use a quart jar) and allow the kefir grains to ferment for 24-48 hours. (The longer you ferment, the less sweet the finished product will be.) Strain out the kefir grains and voila, you have water kefir. It's kind of like a slighly deflated soda and you can add different flavors such as lemon juice or lime juice or even fresh fruits and allow it to ferment longer to infuse the flavor of the fruits. A personal favorite combination for me is lime juice and ginger. This link will give you easy-to-follow, yet very detailed instructions on how to make water kefir. I bought my grains from amazon (since you really can seemingly buy EVERYTHING on amazon these days.) I've been fermenting the grains for about 3 weeks now and my grains have multiplied beautifully and are producing a very nice tasting water kefir. It sounds kind of strange, but it's a great way to get probiotics at a fraction of the cost of pills. Have you ever tried water kefir? I'll write a more detailed post about it later. 

What have your frugal accomplishments been this month? 

**These posts are inspired by my friend Carrie's monthly frugal accomplishments on her blog, "With all that I've been given" Please check out her wonderful blog and leave her some comment love! **

Frugal Tips: Homemade Dish Soap

So why in the world would you need to make homemade dish soap when you get a bottle at just about any grocery store for less than a dollar (especially if you're buying the really cheap stuff!) Well, I guess if you were stocked up you wouldn't really need too, but this is really fun to make, SUPER easy, and still probably costs less than the cheapest dish soap you can buy. I don't make it often, but we're in the "counting pennies" stage of January and it's a snow day and I'm not willing to go out to the Dollar General just to buy dish soap because I'm out. That's a wasted trip of gas in my opinion!

AND... hubs was so interested in what I was doing he stopped to come over to see how it worked. I told him it was science and he was in. Don't ask me about the actual science. I have no idea, I just know it cleans dishes when I'm out of Mrs. Meyers or Dawn and that's good enough to me. And I actually have all the ingredients on hand (because I've been known to make lots of other homemade household cleaning items) so it's a win win in our house.

Washing soda is SLOWLY becoming easier to find (I get mine from a local ACE hardware store, but you can also buy it from amazon (because what CAN'T you get from amazon these days?), and it's really key in this recipe. It's what gives the dish soap thickness over a day or so to make it act and feel like the dish soap you're used to buying from the grocery store. Make sure not to confuse washing soda with regular baking soda, while I've used baking soda in homemade clothing detergent in it's place, it's not the same product and it does NOT work in this recipe!

Finished and cooled dish soap with a drop or two of blue food coloring (optional!)

It took less than five minutes to "cook up" this bottle of dish soap. And it's enough for at least two weeks. We made the soap different colors just by adding a drop or two of food coloring, but you can simply leave it natural and it's a light lemon yellow color. Somehow my husband seems convinced it works better if it looks like Dawn! lol... So buy some castile bar soap, some washing powder (the stuff will not go bad, it's good forever!) and next time you run out of dish soap try making your own!

I use Dr. Bronner's castile soaps. I generally keep several bar soaps on hand along with a large container or two of the peppermint liquid castile soap and the lavendar liquid castile soap. Those scents are just personal preferences and you could use any scent for dish soap. Castile soaps are crazy useful and super inexpensive (considering they are very concentrated) and will clean just about anything. I've used them for washing everything from clothes, to floors, to bathrooms, to windows, to using them in the shower when I was out of our regular shower scrub! It's a very versatile and frugal item to have on hand.  

I would say this soap works just as well as any type of  non-concentrated Mrs. Meyers or Dawn or Joy dish soap. You can play with this recipe and add additional washing soda and grated castile bar soap to the small amount of water for a more concentrated soap. Beware though, that the more soap is added, the thicker the soap will become as it sits or ages. To thin it down, simply add a bit of warm water and close the lid and shake to thin it down.

A Small Batch of Homemade Dish Soap
Adapted from this recipe

Ingredients:

• 1 1/4 cups boiling water
• 1/4 cup grated castile bar soap (I don't pack it - this also helps save money and keeps the soap from getting too thick)
• 1-2 tablespoons washing soda
• 1/4 cup liquid castile soap
• 10-20 drops essential oil (if desired)

 Directions: 

• Add grated castile soap to the boiling water. I do this right in my small stainless steel pot that I heated the water in. 
• Add the washing soda and liquid castile soap and stir to combine into a slowly thickening liquid. 
• If you are using plain castile soaps without any scent, once the soap has completely COOLED,  feel free to add 10-20 drops of your favorite essential oils such as lemon, orange, cinnamon, or mint to create your own favorite scented dish soap (you can also use this as a hand soap.)
• Pour cooled soap into a recycled plastic bottle or even a glass jar dispenser.  We've been using a ketchup bottle we washed out and re-used.

Bread, Broth, and a Menu

It's become a tradition on Sundays to bake bread. We've been pinching pennies for several months to get our budget back in order and as much as I love Udi's... it's too expensive right now. So I pulled out the old bread machine and started cracking out a loaf on Sundays. We use it basically for sandwiches one night a week and sometimes as toast in the morning. I realize those of you who follow this blog are wondering why in the world I'm eating sandwiches when I'm supposed to be following a paleo diet.

Balance... I've realized it's very hard for me to follow an extremely strict diet for the long term. It tends to set me up for failure to say I'm not going to eat an entire food group forever and then when it happens that I eat carbs, I go WAY overboard. It works well for me short term, but not long term. So right now, we're just focusing on balance and healthy choices. I don't eat carbs at every meal, and when I do eat them, I eat small portion and get on with my life. So no need to get all tangled up in paleo politics and food judgement.

This bread is Elizabeth Barbone's recipe. I make it dairy-free by using blanched almond flour in place of the dry milk powder and it works beautifully. I make the loaf in our old "Breadman" bread machine on the quick setting and it takes about 75 minutes total. We let the bread cool completely and then I slice it and freeze it. We get about 14 slices from this loaf.

With a tight budget comes ways we can stretch our food dollar. I realized last week I had a small center cut of a beef shank in the freezer. The entire package was less than a pound which included the big shank bone in the center. I asked friends on facebook what in the world to do with such a small cut of beef and many suggested making a soup stock.

This led me to remember my grandmother making "stew beef" (which is different than beef stew... basically an even more frugal version of the stew!) So I looked around and found this recipe which intrigued me. This sounded a lot like the dish my grandmother used to make. I recalculated the recipe to make the dish with only 1 pound of beef and I made my own homemade version of onion soup mix since I didn't have any.

I put the beef, onions, water, and homemade onion soup mix in the slow cooker over night. It worked great! It made just enough for about 3 servings (the pared down version) and the next day I served the broth with Cappello's grain-free, gluten-free gnocchi they had sent me for a review. It was a really delicious combination. I'll definitely make this again!

My boys: from bottom to top - Charlie, Whiskey Jack, and Max

Because we're on such a strict budget right now, I decided to go ahead and make up a menu for the rest of the month using what we have in the fridge, freezer, and pantry. So here's what we're having. The best thing about menus like this is that it basically gives you ideas for what you have in your pantry for the next few weeks. You can re-arrange and change the menus to whatever days work best for you. I also based this menu heavily off my ideas for a "yearly" menu that I shared a few weeks ago.

The (remainder of this) MONTH'S Menu!

• Monday Jan 20 - Cheryl's celery in chestnut sauce (as a soup) with leftover turkey
• Tuesday Jan 21- Roast chicken (from slow cooker cookbook!), baked sweet potatoes, sauteed zucchini
• Wednesday Jan 22- ground beef taco salads with tomatoes, lettuce, avocados
• Thursday Jan 23 - deli turkey and bacon sandwiches with sliced apples
• Friday Jan 24 - pan-seared pork chops with sauteed peppers & mushrooms, served with quinoa or rice OR LEFTOVERS 
• Saturday Jan 25 - homemade pizza, using Luce's gluten-free buckwheat artisan bread as the crust
• Sunday Jan 26 - FAMILY MEAL: spiral ham (from the freezer), green beans, sweet potatoes, sauteed kale, deviled eggs
• Monday Jan 27 - LEFTOVERS or venison (no - tomatoes) chili (we leave out the tomatoes as I'm sensitive to them in large quantities) 
• Tuesday Jan 28 - black-eyed peas with leftover ham soup in slow cooker cookbook (will add kale or swiss chard to soup as well)
• Wednesday Jan 29 - breakfast for dinner: bacon, eggs, grits or pancakes, fresh fruit
• Thursday Jan 30 - nomato sauce  over almond flour pasta with a salad
• Friday Jan 31 - deli turkey and bacon sandwiches with sliced apples or LEFTOVERS
• Saturday FEB 1 - FAMILY MEAL: bunless gluten-free hotdogs with homemade baked beans and broccoli salad
• ALL LUNCHES: leftovers, always make sure to have enough for the next day
• ALL BREAKFASTS: scrambled eggs and sausage, oatmeal with pecans and pumpkin seeds (premade, just take to work), turkey bacon and almond flour pancakes. 

My oldest girl: Mollie, don't mess with this chick!

Max with my other girl: Maya... they are snuggle buddies! 

Frugal Accomplishments - December 2013

My friend Carrie, author of the blog "with all that I've been given", has been writing posts over the past few years highlighting all the different ways she's been able to save a penny or two with the practice of frugality. 

I've also practiced frugality much of my life, but most often in seasons.  I hate to admit we often have a "feast or famine" attitude. When we have abundance we live in abundance, and when we've had little we've lived with little....Except over thr past few years when we were used to abundance and started living that way with very little.  Not a smart financial move.

So over the past few months I've been trying to get a true handle on all of our finances and get back into major savings mode.

I wanted to start keeping track of all the ways we've been frugal. Not to show off, but to share tips and hints. Carrie's posts have been so helpful to me,  I'm hoping my posts will also be insightful to others who are trying to live more frugally. So here's my list for December 2013:

Frugal Accomplishments 12/2013

• Christmas cards: used cards I bought last year in an after-Christmas sale at Big Lots. Also used postage stamps I had bought through 2013, so we had no immediate costs for buying or shipping the cards.

• Groceries: saved over $90 (about 30 percent of our total) on all groceries over the month of December by combining coupons with store sales. 

• Pet supplies: we received two free bags of cat litter (with five cats we go through a lot of cat litter!) after writing to the company with questions. This was a savings of $40.00.

• Holiday parties: limited the amount of items we took to holiday parties/get-togethers (usually I go overboard with lots of extra cooking) - we took one or two items only (per event) and used the same recipes for multiple events to save on groceries.  This was helpful not only in grocery savings, but also in time and energy.

• Travel expenses: while we were home over the holidays we combined trips and only went to town if absolutely necessary outside of the combined errands. We saved a lot of money in gas this way. When I went to visit my dad in the hospital over Christmas (several hundred miles away) I stayed in the hospital overnight with him to save on hotel costs. (Thankfully the hospital was gracious enough to allow this!)

• Cash only: after the recent Target debit-card fiasco, hubs and I were left without debit cards for 3 weeks starting on Christmas day (our bank cancelled all cards that were used at Target during that period). This was incredibly frustrating at first, but we went cash-only for 3 weeks (okay, it was only 2 weeks, but it sure felt like 3 weeks!) and then realized how much less money we spent overall when we only had cash. A silver lining in my book. Now we are committed to living cash only for groceries, home supplies, and gas, etc... we're only using our debit cards for emergency purchases in the future.

• Frugal entertainment: ONLY watched movies and TV shows that are included in our Netflix and Amazon Prime memberships (thanks to not having debit cards!) - We had not realized how much extra money we had been spending on movie and cable show rentals. Those little expenses were really adding up! ALSO: bird feeders are really fun and inexpensive entertainment, both for us and the kitties! Birds are great fun to watch!

• Cold weather savings: started wearing lots of layers instead of buying new clothing when the weather became much cooler a few weeks ago. (Double t-shirts are going to make me quite the fashion icon this year! )

• Kindle savings: Again, thanks to no debit card,  I stopped buying books for my Kindle and have only been reading books that are available for free via the Kindle store.  I've found some really great reads this way as well!

What are some ways you were frugal during December 2013?

A gluten-free weekly menu template for 365 days

BIG BIG BIG THANK YOU TO my sweet friend Jaime who kept my blog post open when it first went live (and therefore had a copy of the text) after I accidentally deleted it via my smarty-pants phone, which is obviously still smarter than I am! THANK YOU JAIME!!! You rock star You!

Okay... back to our regular programming...Let's try this again, shall we? 

Right before the holidays I upgraded to a smarty-pants phone. Something I had avoided for years mostly because I didn't want a more expensive cell phone bill. I knew I would love the ease and versatility of a smart phone, I just hated the thought of spending so much money on a device that I rarely, if ever, would actually use for phone calls. I actually avoid most of those at all costs!

But, as I suspected, I love the phone. Now, I barely spend any time on my netbook. Which can be a problem when you enjoy writing and online journaling.

Soon after getting the phone I discovered blogger had an app, so I had to try it. I'm hoping it will give me the opportunity to blog more often in 2014. Granted the posts may be short and sweet and with a few less pictures and even more grammatical errors (you're welcome!)

And since simplicity is one of my favorite things, it might just work swimmingly!

Over December I started getting really serious about making a weekly menu and being as frugal with our finances as possible. Actually, the frugality started a few months prior... but now groceries are getting into the act full swing as well as everything else!

At any rate, I realized that creating a menu every single week can be overwhelming to me...so after reading a few blogs and books on frugality I realized I could make one weekly menu that we could basically follow all year long. Flexibility is key. Foods can always be rotated and changed...but just think: the entirety of 2014 menus in one go! For me it has been such a huge weight off my shoulders.

As you will see below it's really just a template for creating easy meals any day of the week.

Simply come up with 8 - 15 of your favorite meals that you make really well and that your family loves and create different variations that be used in rotating weeks. I'm going to write more about this method in the weeks to come, but here is our basic template we've been using the past few weeks.

A Gluten-Free Weekly Menu Template for 365 Days:

- Sunday: roast or casserole or large amount of protein to use with several meals + green veggie.. [ie - roast chicken & green beans]

- Monday: soup [in cold months] or salad [in warm months] + gf bread or starch

- Tuesday: international [spaghetti, lasagne, tacos, stir fry, curries, etc...]

- Wednesday: tuna salad or salmon cakes or other easy fish entree + veggies + starch [bread or crackers for salad/sandwiches]

- Thursday: breakfast for dinner [oatmeal, fruit, eggs, bacon, sausage]

- Friday: FREE SPACE FRIDAY

- Saturday: leftovers or burgers/hotdogs or homemade pizza or quiche.

What's on your menu this week?