Christmas

Mikey’s 4th birthday

Mikey’s Old Testament song

Target diaper sale

Britax carseat search

So if you’ve come to know me (personally or through this blog) then you know I’m a big budget conscious, coupon clipping, deal seeking kind of gal!  I do it because I want to, not because I have to!

That being said, if you’ve become intrigued with my way of shopping and would like to know how I get so much and pay so little then let’s get together on Saturday, Feb. 20 at 11am.  I’m having a Grocery Smarts class at my house AND I’m serving lunch.  FREE food and FREE tips to save you some serious moolah?  Yes, because I care and I want to teach the world a few people at a time how they too can shop and save like me =o)  Consider yourself invited and bring a friend too, or your spouse!  

Leave me a comment if you’re interested or know someone who is and I’ll email you more info!

A few Octobers while I was in college I would go to General Conference with my grandma, mom, cousin, and whomever else was there.  Afterwards, we would pick boxes and boxes of apples from my aunt and uncle’s house.  I think they had 11 apple trees.  My roomies and I then had the daunting task of cooking/ eating/ giving away apples for weeks!  We had a similar experience with watermelons every year as well!  Those were fun times =o)

Well I had some peeled and cored apples in our deep freeze that I finally pulled out today (since it’s a cold cloudy wintery Vegas day) and threw together with some other ingredients to make my Aunt Susan’s famous Apple Dessert.  This recipe is nice since it uses apples and is NOT an apple crisp.  It’s more like warmed apples on the bottom with a sugar cookie topping.  It became one of my favorites back in college so hopefully it tastes just as good now.  (We have to let it cool and we should probably eat dinner first before we try it.)  Here’s the super simple recipe:

Ingredients:

peel/core/ slice 5 C of apples (about 12 med apples)

1 stick melted butter (or margarine)

2 C flour

1 1/2 C sugar

2 eggs

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

Preheat oven to 350.  Butter bottom of 9×13 dish.  Spread apple slices in pan.  Mix remaining ingredients until cookie dough consistency is reached.  Spread dough (use fingers) on top of apples.  Sprinkle more sugar across the top of the dough.  Bake for 30 minutes.  Let cool and serve warm or cold.

Note: I doubled the dough recipe since it looked like I had a lot of apples to cover and it took quite a while to cook through.  We’ll eat it after dinner and I’ll let you know what I thought.  So far, the cooked dough I keep picking off is delicious =o)

There’s a Cox kiddo on the way (due June 15th) and…

Smith’s is having case lot sales!  Get out of my way!  I’m on a mission to stock up my pantry and my new Shelf Reliance food rotation shelf.  So happy!

Harmon’s up in St. George is also having case lot sales through the entire month.  They have food buckets, bucket openers, bread making supplies, and food in #10 cans, in addition to the regular case lots.

Usually these sales are closer to March and September, but I’m excited to get stocked up in January and then see how long it all lasts. 

PS- That kiddie sized grocery cart was found in the Smith’s grocery store in Price, UT.  Mikey was just as much a part of shopping the case lots as I was =o)

Happy shopping!

2009 was a good year, but it’s always nice to have a restart to all the things I didn’t finish, lose, start, or accomplish.

I started off last year with attempting to really clean the house 1 room at a time.  I did start, but didn’t finish.  This year I think I’ll try that again.  I’ve already sorted through all the boys’ clothes and managed to fill 5 Space Bags and 1 under the bed storage bin with any and all clothes related to newborn- 5T sizes.  Next up are their toys- yikes!

And after watching the movie Julie and Julia and can’t help but be inspired to give new cooking a try!  From new recipes to just making more homemade foods more frequently, I just want to do more in the kitchen.  Using the crockpot or sunoven for Sunday for lunch/ dinner is also something I want to do to.  1 crockpot Sunday meal down, like 50 more to go!

Groceries and shopping- think I’ll try the cash method this year.  Well, I’ve already charged a bunch, so maybe we’ll just stick to spending no more than $50 a week.  That means no going overbored when diapers at TRU go down to $1.50 a jumbo pack and I want to buy the whole display in every size possible!  Restraint girl, I’m going to have restraining power during my super shopping trips.  I’m also going to keep up on my coupons!  When they come Sunday I will look though and clip the ones I won’t use.  That way I can send more than I am now to the Expired Coupon Queen in Colorado.  She sends them to overseas military bases where expired (and unexpired) coupons can be used.  I really slack when it comes to clipping my coupons on time and keeping them up to date.  This shall help me be even more efficient.

Of course there’s always excercise more.  I don’t want a gym membership to Gold’s since they are walking distance, have a pool, and kid’s club, but have obstructed my view of downtown.  I just  want to get out of the house more with the kids and go for walks or trike rides.   Maybe we could even start walking to the close stores by our house.

Me time- at least once a month I’m getting a sitter during the day (you should see how many babysitting bucks I’ve racked up) and going and doing something alone!  Shopping, pedi, haircut, whatever! Just kid free is the way to be.

Date time- maybe I should just plan what the heck hubby and I should do and take matters into my own hands as far as the execution.  Attend the temple at least once a month, go see a movie, go out to eat…  Friday date night swaps anyone?  I’m serious!

Crafts- if they get started then they have to get finished!  That’s all there is to it!  I have 2 pillow cases, 1 layered skirt, 1 truck pillow, a big mending pile built up again, and some cards and scrapbooking things that need to get done.  There’s some magnets, Gospel ABC books, nursery CDs, and felt puppets still waiting for my time and energy too. 

So that’s the big stuff.  Nothing too big or small.  Nothing that can’t really be accomplished realistically.  I’m feeling good in 2010 and I’m hoping to make it a great year.

Oh yeah! And actually plant something in my garden boxes this year rather than have them be the kids’ favorite dirt piles for digging and such!

I go to the dentist tomorrow! 

Let’s hope it goes better than last time and I don’t need a mouth full of work, or anything tinsy tiny either.

Wish me luck.  I’ll let you know how it goes.

Well Mikey has finally done something we never thought we’d have to deal with in this house, at least not him.  He’s our well-behaved, follows all the rules, tells us when someone else isn’t following the rules, smart, little boy who last week before Christmas got curious.   We didn’t find it until today!

When all was said and done he managed to highlight the back of our doors in 2 rooms with yellow, blue, green, orange and pink highlighters.  He then got on a chair and continued to highlight on the doors and walls from a higher location.  And that wasn’t enough!  Then he used a whole roll of tape to decorate the doors and walls in these two rooms until the spool ran out.

The funny thing is last week (I think Christmas Eve) I heard him playing with the tape and thought nothing of it.  He usually hangs his pictures and presents for Daddy on his office door.  And I was going to walk into my office and he says, ” Oh no mommy, don’t go in there!  It’s a huge mess and we’ll need to clean it up!”  I peek in and all I saw was my wrapping paper mess from the night before.  Little did I know.

So of course we’ve talked to him and worked together with him to clean up what will come off the walls and doors.  We can’t get too upset, because I don’t think we’ve ever told him before now that we only color on paper.  Lesson learned!  And a lesson in parenting as well!  Make the punishment fit the crime and maybe we shouldn’t have waited until Christmas to give him coloring books, easel refill paper, and art pads!

Grandma’s been begging for pictures of the boys in their new Christmas outfits.  So here’s for Grandma!