organic sheets on sale:)

Under the Canopy is having a good sale on organic sheets/bedding right now....twin sheet set $19.99 and some super cute duvet covers. I'm resisting, so I thought I would pass it on:)

Quotable Sunday

(please excuse the spacing of this poem, for some reason I couldn't change it, so there are a couple rows between lines??)

The Song Of The Shepherd's Purse Fairy

Cicely Mark Barker

Though I'm poor to human eyes

Really I am rich and wise.

Every tiny flower I shed

Leaves a heart-shaped purse instead.

In each purse is wealth indeed-
Every coin a living seed
Sow the seed upon the earth-

Living plants shall spring to birth.

Silly people's purses hold

Lifeless silver, clinking gold;

But you cannot grow a pound

From a farthing in the ground.

Money may become a curse:
Give me then my Shepherd's Purse.

food budget and frugal links

I originally wanted to post weekly about frugal/simple living/conscious living, something I am striving to balance. Problem is, each post I made (there were 3 of them) ended up being very, VERY long. I then realized that the topic is a blog of it's own that I should not start at the moment. So I just want to share a few links and thought.

The main area I'm working on is our grocery spending. Our budget is quite snug, but that it a trade off I'm happy to work with so that I may stay at home and home school our children, plus at some point my sweet husband will get his next promotion:)

We spend a lot on groceries. We live in a high cost area, we are mainly vegetarian and eat mostly organic. Organic coffee is in the picture too. Not cheap. I have been trying on and off for years to lower our grocery bill... "trying"...but now we have hit a little tighter spot and "trying" is not an option, doing is. So far this month has gone very well. These are the main things that have helped-

-Meal planning dinners

-Grocery shopping once a week

-weekly farmers market, right now prices are good...

-cooking bread, tortillas, baked goods, sweets from scratch

-eating a little less

-using dry goods (beans, grains) to bulk up meals (like add brown rice to our eggs and veggies)
-cut back on coffee, more tea

*

This weeks dinners-

-homemade pizza and salad

-crock pot chili and cornbread

-root bake

-wheat pasta with pesto, mushrooms, greens

-Polenta eggplant bake (in crock pot)

-bean tacos (homemade tortillas, salsa, avo)

-left overs

It does help that we have a big freezer stock of tomatoes from this summers garden:)

Another world I am trying to get into is coupons. I've never really used them, but am starting to get it.... I have read a lot on Money Saving Mom's blog all about stacking coupons and taking advantage of rewards cards, etc. I love her blog, she post a lot, but I generally don't use 'mainstream' type products and don't eat most food from regular grocery stores, but I still have found some good stuff on her site. She often links to giveaways and free samples.

Alices Kitchen has some good post about eating organic for less and frugal eats that are still healthy.

The Grocery Cart Challenge is a great site, she feeds her family off $60 a week. Her family of 6!!!! She feeds her family pretty good and links menus and recipes, she cooks a lot, they eat some produce and I haven't seen Top Raman on the menu, so it is quite impressive!

For some 'health food' brand coupons, this site has some good ones. Also, a lot of HF companies give coupons on there sites.

Also, for general frugal living topics, I enjoy visiting Mothering's frugal board.

OK, that's enough for now, it is getting long...

*blessings*

Giveaway at Gardenmama

Gardenmama is having a 3 part giveaway, check it out!

homemade tortillas

*Homemade Tortillas*

In a effort to save $, I make our bread and baked goods from scratch. I've made homemade tortillas a few times, they are sooooooooo good! They are a bit time consuming to make, but if your kids are old enough to help, it's fun:)

What I use-

3c flour (white, wheat, or a mix of the two)

1Tbs. baking powder

1tsp salt

3Tbs veggie oil

1c hot water

Mix it all together and form a ball, if you use whole wheat flour you may need to add a little more water. Grab a small ball (maybe a little less then a donut hole) and smooth out a bit in your hand. Roll with a rolling pin on a floured surface until round-ish, flat, and thin.

On an ungreased preheated griddle (I use cast iron/ medium heat) cook the tortilla until bubbles start to form, flip over and briefly cook.

Experiment with the thickness of the tortilla and how well you like it cooked. I was all proud of myself when I could finally get them really thin, but discovered I like them a bit thicker and not too well done:)

Give it a try!

catch-up with ketchup

My first try at making ketchup!

I have gotten so little done in the past couple weeks, I had a catch-up day:) Besides all the normal household things I needed to catch-up on today, I also had some good kitchen time baking and making ketchup!

I think the ketchup turned out great, It taste a little more vinegary then I would like, but the recipe said to wait 2 weeks before eating so maybe it will balance out. Made with beefsteak tomatoes from our garden. I used a recipe from the book Art of Preserving, modified a little of coarse:)

(I really need to take a photography class and get a good camera!)

canning

Pickles! My first shot at canning them:) I only got a total of 6 jars (gave 2 away), but I am happy I got some canned. It's hard to get enough cucumbers ripe at the same time!

Not that pretty, but here is my lil canning stash this year:) I still need to can my frozen tomatoes!

Early morning floor snack...


The power was out for 32 hours this week and I was getting ready to can everything I have frozen. I started with strawberry jam and strawberries in sauce. When I had almost finished them up the lights went back on:) My frozen tomatoes luckily were not very defrosted, so I can procrastinate them a bit more. The strawberry jam turned out great:)

This year I canned apple butter, vanilla pear butter, pear sauce, mixed berry jam, strawberry jam, berries in juice, and pickles.

I hope to make ketchup, tomato sauce, and maybe another batch of apple butter:)
Yum!

new used car

We went garage sale shopping today and bought a ride in car for the boys. We have this really cute wooden ride on toy that Everest fell off of yesterday, so I like this car because he can't really fall off! We don't have many plastic toys, and the ones we do have are 'outside toys', so while I wasn't thrilled to buy a big ol' piece of plastic, it is used and the boys love it.

The only problem is that Kylan can share, but Everest can not! So we drove back over to the garage sale and bought the other one they luckily still had! They were both so happy. We washed the cars and then played in the mud. Good times-

Kylan's car:)

A berry disaster

Well, I'd like to have a picture of a bunch of beautiful jars of canned blackberry jam. But I don't. After many picking sesions of wild blacberries, I had a good freezer stock. I thawed them all out to make blackberry jam. I did something wrong and ruined the WHOLE BATCH! So sad! But I do have this cute picture of Kylan, who clearly enjoyed cleaning out the bags of berries:) There is always next year...

Cut my hair!