Living Green Doesn't Need To Hurt

2008-08-17T20:06:00.000-07:00

The Saving Dinner website is a pretty neat thing, as it works for us. There are times when I need somebody else to decide for me what we'll have that week. I want some new dishes in the mix. I want variety. A while ago I got a coupon for the site and bought a menu mailer ebook. It has a whole season's worth of menus. The way it is laid out makes life even simpler. Every week there are six meals. The first page is the Master Shopping List. Just print it out, cross off everything you already have, and shop from the rest of the list. Each ingredient is cross-referenced to which meal it belongs with, to make substitutions easier. The recipes are simple and easy, with nutritional information worked out.

I let my fingers walk through that ebook this week and the first meal I worked with was a huge success. As most of my recipes, I studied it and then took it a different way. My variation on the Asian Spinach Salad follows.

You'll need: a bag of spinach greens
a couple of boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cooked and chopped
some honey-roasted peanuts
a bottle of sesame-ginger marinade (or your favorite asian-type salad dressing)

Into a large, lidded container (I used an entree-sized gladware-type container) put two handfuls of spinach. Toss in the chicken, about two tablespoons of the sauce, snap on the lid and shake to coat. Lay a fresh handful of the spinach on your plate, then a portion of the sauced spinach-chicken mixture (this is so that if there's too much sauce, the spinach doesn't drown in it). Top with the nuts.

It was incredibly easy and my husband loved it immediately. Makes it a winner in my book!

A side-benefit of the saving dinner menus is that with the detailed menu planning you can save a lot of money at the store. We all know that to save money, shop from a list and avoid impulse items. How much simpler is it when the majority of the list comes pre-made with healthy recipes that you don't have to think too-much about ahead of time. Plus, you get away from the trap of the same 7 rotating meals. It's Monday? Must be meatloaf night. Tuesday? Sloppy Joes.

2008-07-09T09:14:00.000-07:00

The electric bill from last month got here, and I was pleasantly suprised with the amount. It was just about right where I expected it to end up, the amount is within my standard budgetary amount, and since we're starting another heat advisory month out here in the middle of the nowhere I'm glad that I don't have to feel too guilty about cranking the AC up this month.

In other news... I'm tired. That's not a new thing, but it's definately been getting better. I'm feeling less overwhelmed as a mother of two these days. Better able to cope. To roll with the challenges that each new day brings me. To meet my obligations to my kids and husband and make a happy home.

That probably sounds very Stepford. I don't care. It's me, right this moment, and I'm happy. Genuinely happy. And I won't trade that feeling in for anything.

2008-06-27T10:19:00.000-07:00

The cloth diaper experiment is going well. Since the Toddler/Preschooler is home for the summer break, we're not going as many places, and I can stick to cloth diapers during the day and disposables when the family's all at home for the evening (and overnight)

In the past week instead of going through 80+ disposables, we've gone through almost a package of 40. Only added two loads of diaper-laundry a week, and it's hung on the drying rack to save the electric. Sun-dried diapers also smell very nice.

Next payday I'm investing in another drying rack. Then I can do two loads of laundry at a time if I need to, and have them all dry at once. Right now it's getting only mostly dry by the end of the day, and I either bring it inside and run it through the dryer for five minutes or leave it out overnight and half of the next day risking pigeon droppings and small bugs taking up residence in the cool shade of our shirts.

2008-06-24T08:46:00.000-07:00

Chicken Gravy with Rice and Carrots

brown 1 pound chicken thighs (boneless, skinless, I buy these in a 3pound bag in the freezer case). Sprinkle Mrs Dash to taste. After they're browned, simmer in white wine until it's cooked. Remove from pan and fork-shred. Stir a packet of gravy mix into the pan and continue simmering until thickened. Add back the chicken.

Serve it over rice and carrots on the side.

Cost of meal:
canned carrots- $0.75
rice- $0.25
gravy mix- $0.50
chicken- $2.00
total: $3.83
Serve 4 at $0.96 each

Note: I didn't factor in the cooking wine or the Mrs Dash- they are pantry staples for me, and the cost over several dishes comes out to pennies. Your mileage may vary.

2008-06-17T19:41:00.000-07:00

Hamburger Helper is one of my favorite main-meals. It's the perfect one pot meal. Everything in one pot, cook, serve, less dishes and a fairly easy cleanup. The only problem is the price. Around here it runs around $2 a box, on sale. The generics are a bit cheaper, usually.

Here's my variation on the theme.

Cheeseburger Helper

brown and drain one pound of ground beef. Season to taste, I usually sprinkle the beef with seasoned salt as it's cooking. I drain the fat by pouring it into a colander and than rinsing the meat with cold water. This way I can use the cheap grades with the fat that makes it extra tasty and get rid of said fat without having it irritate my tummy.

Cook one box of mac and cheese, to the directions. Use whatever brand floats your boat- at the deep discount places I can get it three for a dollar.

Mix beef and mac and cheese, and add a can of peas/cup of thawed frozen peas. If you want, stir in a few handfuls of shredded cheddar and let it get all melty and happy.

This serves 6 people with normal helpings. Or me and the Boy for one hungry night. You can add the meat at a different proportion, if you want, or vary the vegetables. This is a very convenient alternative to the norm. I've seen other people do this, with their own twist on it, and I know it's not a new concept.

Be creative with the pantry. What's your all-time favorite dish that you only let yourself have once in a blue moon because it's too expensive? Is there any way you can substitute ingredients and make a more thrifty alternative? Stick with the stuff that you really want, and mix it up with the base or the toppings.

2008-06-12T20:19:00.000-07:00

How could it be since February that I posted here???

Oh, right. I have a life. And another blog, which I've been faithful to. And two kids and husband, which really suck up the time I have. My blogging comes out of my sleep time, more often than not. This is right when I should be tucked up in bed for the night. Am I? I am not. I'm trying to get just one more thing done before the bedtime. I also need to wash my hair.

What have I been up to in the pursuit of a greener life? I've been cloth diapering, a bit, again. I've been scrubbing my kitchen floor with non-toxic cleaning solution every three days and it looks better than it has since we moved in. Three days seems to work out best with the foot traffic in there, and the spills, and the small children who (still) lick the floor on occassion. Please don't ask me why, I don't know, and it makes my brain hurt to think about it.

The food shopping is upon us this weekend- stay tuned for the adventures of my meal planning and food budgeting. It's going to get very interesting this summer.

2008-02-18T19:27:00.000-08:00

Tonight featured ham, broccoli, caramelized onions, shredded mozzarella, and angel hair pasta. It was yummy. So yummy that I'm tempted to forget how tired I am, how much I ate for dinner, and go back in for seconds and thirds.

I also am craving chocolate tonight. No clue why. Is it the lactating thing? Is this a sign that my body might suddenly decide to give up more than it's currently doing? Should I just give up and let go of my hope to breastfeed this child altogether?

It's been nearly three months since I began to pump. Nearly three months of this, every time I wake up, every time I wake up in the night and think of going to pump and deciding that I'd rather get the rest than the milk. Watching drips turn to drops and back to drips. Never even coming close to filling a bottle. A 4oz bottle. I have absolutely no hope of ever filling an 8oz bottle.

I've done a good job. I'm hopeful that this will last a bit longer. Just a bit longer.

2008-02-11T10:05:00.000-08:00

I've been trying to drink vegetable juice lately. About a cup a day. It's healthy, it's good for me, and I hate veggies. Maybe hate's a strong word. I just don't like it much. At all.

This leads me to wonder what the stuff tastes like. It doesn't look very appealing. But the juice seems okay; cold tomato soup. Cold, healthy, tomato soup.

I never thought that this would be the solution to drinking the stuff, but I serve it up in a small cup with a handful of saltines. Thinking of it as cold soup is the trick to get it into my stomach.

Who knew?

2008-02-10T20:41:00.000-08:00

Am I the only woman here that gets the tax refund and rubs her hands in glee at being able to restock the pantry shelves with canned goods and paper products? I've got a serious trip to Costco to make in the next week. Serious. I mean, we're talking about cases of canned vegetables, flats of peanut butter, and all sorts of other stuff.

If I'm bringing home an infant in the next few days/weeks I'd better finalize some of those great plans I'd started running together in my brain. There are some library books to read, some menus to plan, some recipes to try out and freeze (once my freezer stops having to store lots and lots of bottles of breastmilk) and start planning ahead how we're going to arrange the car seats so that we can fit one more human in the back seat.

Speaking of fitting people in the car, we're also beginning to plan a small road trip. A day trip, to a national park, so my girl can hug a tree. She loves hugging trees. I'd shake my head wistfully, to be so young again, but then I'd not be her mother and I'd miss that more than a second childhood. Her daddy wants to show her snow, and I believe that this park is high enough to still have a decent chance of snow on the ground. I don't know how we'll manage all of that, but it's going to be fun.

Another weekend draws to a close. My tip for today: my family's version of tuna noodle is a box of mac'n'cheese, a can of tuna, and about a cup of peas (or a can of them). Did you know that if you're using frozen peas and want to make sure that they're fully thawed and heated through, you could add them to the boiling water when you're cooking the macaroni? Then just drain them together. Voila! Hot peas. Also: toss in a couple of handfuls of shredded natural cheese to counter the cheese powder/cheese stuff in the pouch. Extra cheesy. And me? I'm all about the cheese.

2008-02-06T09:23:00.000-08:00

Sometime in the next year we're going to have to get a second car for the Boy. Now that he's got his license it's nice to let him take the car by himself to work for the day and let me grab a few more seconds of sleep. Precious, precious sleep. How I have missed thee! And how much more important is that going to be in another week or so when I've got the babe home with us?

So back to buying cars. If you're like us, you know the benefits of doing a lot of your research on the Net. The days of going to the library and poring over back issues of consumer reports are mostly behind us. A simple web search allows you to get all the information you need from multiple sources without ever leaving your chair. If you're working a desk job this is also a benefit, because so often the dealerships are further away from your office and you don't need to leave work early just to go look at cars. When I bought a used car about 6 years ago, I did everything but test drive and buy the car online. Saved me a ton of time and hassle, and I didn't feel rushed into an impulsive buy without taking time to consider it. Car Prices being with they are, and insurance and gas usually being worse, this is not the time to make impulsive purchases.

2008-02-05T20:11:00.000-08:00

Sometimes it's easier than others to stretch a dollar. I've been wishing for another pair of sweatpants lately. Sure, I've already got two pairs. Except one pair is getting worn thin in places and the other pair has a hand-sized white patch on the butt from the Bleach Incident of 2004. (Did you know that if you shove a bottle of bleach into a backpack and it lands upside down the bleach can, sorta, leak? And that it makes a godawful mess of whatever was inside the backpack?) So the gray pair with the bleach stain can only be worn with a long shirt when I'm in public and even then I feel very self-conscious about it.

Today we stopped at our favorite thrift store on the way home. The place looks like a castle, complete with crenelated turret on the top. Once again they were having a major half price sale, and I got sucked in to browse a bit off the racks.

A pair of sweatpants caught my eye. While I don't have the funds or the emotional ability to commit a chunk of change to new sweatpants, I did have the money in my change purse for these. They are a nice shade of light periwinkle. Perfect for house wear, they will go with all but two of the shirts I own, and they are decent for street wear. I brought them home and am now happily preparing to wear them to bed tonight.

Got to love those finds.

2008-02-04T13:38:00.001-08:00

About a month ago I made some nifty wool socks for a friend of mine who's been having all sorts of foot troubles. It was great. The color was pretty, the wool was soft and warm, it gave me a great excuse to pick up a set of #8 double-points in wood. Which as I had hoped was really great. And she loved the socks as much/more than I did.

Last week I got a call that the socks had suffered an unfortunate accident. They met up with some hot water in a dark washing machine, and shrunk. Well, not just shrunk. Let's be truthful. These socks got boiled and felted.

Which means that they're now on my feet, since I've got small feet and she needed extra extra large to fit over swollen ankles and bulky toe bandaging. So nice. I mean, I'm sorry that they don't fit her, but now I've got a wonderfully warm pair of felted slipper socks that fit me perfectly and the bonus of getting to knit another pair in that pretty, pretty color on my wooden double-points.

2008-02-02T15:11:00.000-08:00

I made the tuna casserole. It wasn't as good to our taste as promised. I'll tweak it a bit sometime in Feb and let you know the revisions. Until then, is there a point in sharing a recipe that I wouldn't really want to eat again?

How about another thought. It's Saturday. I'm making my homemade mac'n'cheese tonight, with hot dogs and peas. Another fine, traditional weekend Mom's busy meal.

My little boy was transferred closer to home this past week. I just got up to see him today. Not before today; well, it was cold and wet and we're all sick and I've been exhausted. Is that a real reason? It's A Reason. He need not need me hustling over there to be exhausted and emotional by his crib. Speaking of which, he's in an open crib now! Hot ChiliCheese Dog! Only one more step and he's eligible for coming home. That's the feeding aspect. Right now he's a poky little baby. Doesn't want to get down to business and nipple feed. He'd rather sleep.

2008-01-28T12:17:00.001-08:00

I'm starting to fall back into a workable routine around here. Dishes, laundry, baking, laundry, scrubbing, laundry... Want to keep me company while I'm dragging this household back into shape? Here's the easy swipe I did today: grab the washcloth from the bathroom, spritz with cleaner, swipe the floors with it. Don't worry about scrubbing Filth of the Ages, this is just a quick swipe. Swipe the floor to the edges, and then give the baseboard thingie a swipe to grab the lint and dust. Rinse your cloth, repeat the swipe across and around your sink. Dump the used cloth in the hamper, and set out a clean cloth in your shower/tub/area.

It took me maybe two minutes to do this while I got dressed. A second habit that I started to use last summer which has really helped is to spritz the inside of the toilet bowl every morning when I get up with cleaner. I hardly ever remember to scrub the toilet, but a quick spritz of my multipurpose cleaner is perfect to keep it looking nice and non-icky. If I do this everyday, I actually don't need to use the scrubber more than once a month on it to get any stray Ick out of there.

2008-01-24T07:08:00.000-08:00

Alright, so I have yet to get my butt around to making that tuna casserole. I did make something else last night, however, that turned out way delicious and super-easy.

Smothered Salisbury-style Hamburgers.

Cook 4 hamburger patties -note, do not add salt or any other seasoning to this stage. Remove from pan and set aside. Add a can of cream of mushroom soup to the pan and stir around to loosen up all the brown crunchy bits left in the pan. Add to that a few shakes of minced onion, about half a Tbsp each of ketchup and mustard, and return the hamburger patties to the pan and simmer for a few minutes.

Serving suggestions:

I put it next to white rice and green beans. It was yummy. Because of the salt content in the soup, it was quite seasoned enough, and I can only think that adding anything extra by way of salt would send it over the edge with that flavor.

2008-01-23T09:19:00.001-08:00

Did you know that a snuggly toddler in the morning makes up for all the screaming of last night? It's true. This morning she greets me with a smile and a hug, running to the door and happily sitting in my lap to eat cheerios and drink her milk.

Excuse me, but what did you do with that other toddler? The one that indicated that her heart was breaking last night, that bedtime was the saddest thing to happen in your short life and an indignity from which you would never recover?

Chalk it up to a learning experience. Again. Or just one of those things. I don't care, the gray skies this morning don't faze me at all. The rain is icky and it makes my bones ache. There's a happy child playing in the other room right now, and she loves me, and that makes everything completely perfect in my world.

2008-01-22T20:28:00.000-08:00

Potstickers come in big bags in the freezer case and I'm hopelessly hooked on them. How easy is it to fry up half a bag and serve them up next to a bag of stirfried vegetables? Delicious, easy, and less than half the price of a chinese takeout dinner for two.

Of course, that's always assuming that you like potstickers and don't mind skipping a lot of high-sodium sauces. While I didn't check the salt content of either the plain potstickers or the vegetables, I also didn't add sauce to it. It was still delicious. It still made my family pile their plates high and pig out.

The bag was about ten dollars. Five, for half the bag. Vegetables about two dollars. That's thrifty, right? And healthier than takeout.

2008-01-22T15:20:00.000-08:00

The NICU is starting to encourage us strongly to arrange for an overnight trip so that we can spend more time with Robbie as he comes closer to discharge. Eep! My preemie is coming home soon. When did this happen, it was just two months ago that he was born. Um. Well. I've looked into getting Hotel Reservations but it always seems like such a hassle. I hear that this site removes a lot of that hassle for me. The deals are great and I can check out the accomodations before I get there. There's a toll free number to book with, or I can do it online. A lot of times the discounts brokered by sites like this are better than what you can get at the front desk, so definately plan ahead when you're traveling. If you are traveling by air you can book the whole thing as a package and save even more money!

2008-01-18T11:44:00.000-08:00

In the past two weeks I've been really using the library system here. I've paid them $3 to hold 6 books aside for us. Of those six books, I'll be reading all of them, and the other two adults under this roof will be reading about half. I have the edge- I have the library card and PIN number that lets me do this.

Recently I was reminded by how much I'm coming to rely on this system. How else to effectively use my time and funds while carting a toddler around? While she loves to go to the library, I find that I can't chase her around as much as I used to be able to. This ability will go down even further in a month or so when Robbie comes home again. How to cope? I can maximize the time we spend over there by me pre-reserving everything I want to check out. We can go for a few minutes, explore the books, pick out some for the children, and check out everything all at the end. A small price to pay for avoiding the screaming child pulling books off the stacks while I'm trying to look for something interesting to me.

2008-01-18T10:21:00.000-08:00

Online coupons are a great way to save money, and they have the added benefit of not needing you to clip them ahead of time! Most web merchants have promo codes and deals, and there are now several sites around to help you find them. With Valentine's Day sneaking up on us -and how does it manage to catch me by surprise every single year?- this is the time to plan something special for your loved one. Of all the places I could get my husband a present, I'll feel better getting it with a discount. Since he loves computer stuff so much, Dell coupons are a safe place to start looking. Or I could look for Best Buy deals. He wants a new laptop more than anything (aside from a clunker car just for him, a million dollars, and a trip to somewhere he could hang out and do nothing but laze around on the beach all day long.) If I had all the money in the world I'd do all of this for him this year. He's been my greatest supporter of all ever since we first decided to see if this relationship could work between two incredibly stubborn pigheaded people.

So far it's coming up on 6 years together. 6 years, 1 enlistment, 2 deployments, 2 preemies, and uncounted tears and laughter.

2008-01-17T15:45:00.000-08:00

Hey, so I just remembered that I forgot to a) make that tuna casserole and b) blog about it. Forgive me? I've been slightly insane, what with the child who won't sleep and the anxiety surrounding billpaying, and with the hundred other things I'm obsessing about.

My crockpot meal for today, however, is smelling and looking just lovely, so why don't I tell you about that?

Creamy scalloped potatoes with ham and leftover pork.

4cups of potatoes, sliced thin (about 20cents worth, they were on sale)
1 can evaporated milk (fifty cents)
1 can cream of mushroom (sixty-eight cents)
1 and a half cups chopped ham (leftover, maybe a dollar's worth)
1 cup of frozen chopped onion (fifty cents)
a handful of leftover fried potatoes from a dinner last week (I count this as free)
about half a pork chop, ditto, sliced up (ditto)

cook in crockpot for one hour on high, rest of day-ish on low. The recipe doesn't call for stirring, but mine was starting to scorch at the sides of the bottom so I started stirring every two hours or so with a wooden spoon. This has caused the potato slices to crumble a bit, making it look more creamy and less lumpy.

So I've got a full crockpot for $2.88 This is supposed to feed 6-8 people. That works out to either .48 or .36 a plate. Not too shabby a frugal meal, hm? I'll plate it next to green beans, which will only raise the total a little bit.

2008-01-16T15:43:00.001-08:00

Sometimes I feel that running this household turns into managing an office. Except that I do have the power to spank unruly children, and I never get the luxury of calling in sick or taking a three week vacation on the beach. Around here I'm in the process of instilling communication skills training in the children. One kid already has a communication problem, the other may -too early yet to tell- and either way I feel like organizing my Plan of Action in a real business-like manner.

I used to watch all sorts of motivational videos when I was employed. Some were training films, some were designed to reinstill a sense of pride in work. The best I ever saw were funny; I wish they had the animated clips back then. The cartoon-style teaching films are not only great at motivating and teaching adults, they work well for teaching kids. As always, I have to say that I do favor tv in my kids' lives. With moderation and parental supervision. That's the key for us- and everybody knows how to use the "off" switch.

I don't know why animation holds this kind of ability. Is it the sense that we, as adults, are indulging our childhood selves? That as long as it reminds us that we're still young and cool we can't possibly have turned into responsible adults with car loans to pay and budgets to adhere to? Animation is fun. Cartoons are more fun, and watching them when you're supposed to be working is a lot like having fun on the clock. Which makes the day go faster, the employee more productive, and everyone a lot happier with their lots in life. Or their low pay, middling benefit package that sounds a lot better on paper then it ever does when you're sick... I could go on, but I don't want to depress anyone. Let the reader beware: there's always something that your boss won't tell you when you take the job that may just change your mind about taking it in the first place.

2008-01-16T08:34:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I renewed the costco membership for another year. It may seem as though it's a tad wasteful; I mean, how often do I succeed it getting over to the warehouse and when am I going to find the spare funds to go there monthly? Well, let's look at one of the things that we use and consider a "good" buy.

Baby wipes come in a big box, 740 wipes in 8 packages for a little over $15. That comes out to be about 2 cents per wipe. Luvs is a fraction of a cent higher, and Pampers is a whole cent more per wipe. Since we don't tend to buy the Luvs brand in any case, that's a cent cheaper than pampers. I like the popup style; the reach in style (I'm looking at you, Huggies) always gets stuck together and I can't separate them easily in the middle of the night when I'm asleep.

Also, chicken of the sea tuna is .66 a can. And gas is cheap. And both yeast and benadryl are cheap as dirt. Which is something I really approve of. Later today I will be preparing a new casserole based upon a classic tuna noodle that I found online. I'm going to prepare it a tiny bit differently, and I'll let you know how we find it.

2008-01-13T14:27:00.000-08:00

It's kinda a nobrainer that you save money by using the library for all those books instead of buying them. You save on household clutter as well. But there's a bit of a gray area when it comes to holds and reserves. It might be considered less than frugal to pay the fees that so many libraries are charging these days, but I like to weight that against what it costs me in time and aggravation to get the exact things I want. Right here it costs 50 cents to go online and reserve a book. I can have access to anything in the combined collections of the entire San Joaquin Valley Library system (spanning a couple of counties). It arrives at my local branch in about a week, and is held there for another week until I can come in and pick it up. Half a dollar per book, I know it's there before I leave the house, and that to me is worth that fifty cents.

2008-01-12T14:27:00.001-08:00

Another pantry essential for me is flour. Lots of flour. I say this because I forgot, then I made bread yesterday and found to my horror that we're almost out of flour. Flour, and yeast from costco that is almost cheap enough to offset the entire membership cost for a year for this family, and which will keep safely in our fridge until we get ready to move again.

Then there's paper goods. All sorts of paper goods. And dish soap. And cases of canned vegetables.

I like to think that I've generally got two weeks worth of meals from these staples on hand most of the time, but this past year I've slowly whittled down that two week window to maybe two days worth. How did it happen? I had a complicated pregnancy and a lot of stress with the Toddler. I tell you, fairly soon I'm going to sit down again and start working my way through that pantry and get it back up to speed.

2008-01-10T20:44:00.000-08:00

It's critical to me to know what I've got on the shelf. A good deal of that comes directly from pantry basics. Some of my basics are freezer quart-sized ziploc bags. Spaghetti sauce (spaghetti too, usually), rice, otter pops, canned tomatoes.

Other staples of life include peanut butter (chunky), wheat bread, and generic crystal light. With these in the house I can survive. The Toddler can be fed. Sure, it seems a bit monotonous on occasion, but I know she'll eat the stuff. I do feel like a bad mama for letting her eat nothing but peanut butter sandwiches for dinner on most nights. On the other hand, it's nutritious and she'll consume it without a fight. I am always looking for good deals on these things. Note: some stuff is a trade off between price and quality. What's your minimum standard on a product? At what price point do you find yourself doubting the quality of the item? I paid 75 cents a can this past week for sauce. That would have been my limit, and to be honest I would not have trusted the sauce had it not been of a known brand. Usually I can get a jar of sauce from walmart for a dollar, and feel good about it. Also, there's so much I can do with the sauce. I can fill calzones, spread pizzas, dip garlic breadsticks, or do spaghetti or a lasagna. So many options. It's definately one of the multitasker foods.

2008-01-07T21:10:00.001-08:00

Another way I save a little money and cut back on sugar-laden stuff is to use generic crystal light drink mix instead of apple juice for the Toddler. Now, she does get fruit juice. The real stuff, about a cup a day in addition to her milk. But for hydration purposes we use the other stuff. I know that I can drink as much as I can stand and it's water flavored with artifical stuff and not sweetened with sugar that bounces both of us off the walls. I get generic, and I mix it up half strength (thus stretching it much farther) without losing any of the taste. That stuff can be pretty strong if at full-strength; I have to admit that I don't really notice a drop in taste or quality at half-strength.

As far as jugs go, I got one of those gallon jugs of apple juice, the kind that comes in a heavy plastic. Very durable plastic. I bought two of them on sale for $5, and am still using them a year later. Every third or fourth refill I empty the whole thing down and wash out thoroughly. One jug is drinking water, the other is juice.

Anything to make the job of staying hydrated go a bit better. It can be hard enough getting enough fluids in the body, especially in the heat we get here in the summertime. I didn't get used to it last summer, not really, and I know that I'll find the coming year just as bothersome.

2008-01-07T07:58:00.001-08:00

Ever throw something together on a whim and had it come out of the oven so perfect that you didn't want to touch it or eat it? I had this happen over the weekend. Fortunately the batteries in the camera were working.

Why is it that I hate to take pictures so much? Is it because I did not grow up in a high-picture family? I take a few snaps of my kid(s) every few weeks and think nothing of it. I certainly do not walk around with a camera all day waiting for them to do something picture-worthy.

The dish in the picture is a simple plate of loaded potato wedges. Baked potatoes, leftover, wedged and sprinkled with seasoned salt, chopped broccoli, chunks of freshly fried bacon, and cheddar.

2008-01-02T09:16:00.000-08:00

I'm still waiting on this baby. That sounds odd, doesn't it? It's just that I'm in this strange in-between time of being mother of two and not being mother of two. I'm still nesting. I'm getting ready to hear a sudden phone call that it's time to take my baby home now. I'm recovering from the delivery like it was a bad case of the flu or something... except that I'm pumping breastmilk day and most nights. It's wierd.

But at least I'll be able to move when he's home with us. When I'm called upon to take midnight diaper changes and feedings, I'll be awake. When he needs me, I will be able to get out of bed without wincing and pick him up without pain.

This waiting game, though. I'm not so good at it. I hate waiting. I hate being patient. What a thing to have to be patient on. Motherhood- with any luck these two children's start in the NICU will be the last major medical crisis I'll sit them through. Can I get the hardest part over with now? Or, as I thought the other night, is this not the "hardest" part yet? Would it not be harder to see them in ICU later on, after I've bonded and grown to love them more than life? Right now it's beginning for Robbie. I love this newborn. I'm his mother, I love him, but it's not set in place by those long afternoons together. I have yet to bond. Yet to hold him against my skin, to feed him myself, to fall asleep listening to him breathe. To do all that and then see him go off for days and weeks on end without seeing him; that would be worse.

I have GOT to stop thinking like this or I'll drive myself crazy. Crazier.

2007-12-27T20:42:00.000-08:00

I'm sitting up after I've promised myself twice that I really truly was going to bed right away. This, after knowing that tomorrow will be starting earlier than usual, end later than I want it to, and be filled with running around two towns, a military base, and Toddler-tickling. Because, you know, it's just so much fun to tickle little toddlers. Especially when they laugh, make lots of eye contact, and use their words to initiate even more of the playing.

With all this knowledge of tomorrow, why am I still awake? Sand Tart Cookies. It's my mom's recipe, I don't know where it originates or how long it's been around, but my mom has made these for me since I was a toddler myself and they're striking a hit with the next generation. I sit up tonight stuffing as many as I feel I can get away with into my tummy because tomorrow morning there will be no more left. Because every time I sit down with one of these in front of my daughter she cruises by and deftly plucks it from my hand.

She's definately mine. No baby-switching here. Big smile on my face as I think about that. The more I see this things of mine in her, the more I love her. I didn't think that was possible, to love her more than I already do. When I think back to the hard first years of her life, and how hard it still is sometimes, I am amazed at how far we have come. She's better at initiating contact with me. I'm better at reaching back out to her when my depression threatens to get the better of me.

Those commercials abotu how depression hurts? I've lived them. I can't stand to watch those commercials on tv these days because I know how close I skate to them, from time to time. Right now I skate again. This NICU thing. It's getting to me despite my positive spinning of things for the greater public. I try to seem hopeful, I try to talk up the side of how things should go and need to be. Believe me, that doesn't mean I ignore the reality of it.

Reality is what it is. All the hopefulness in the world is not going to change that. I just feel that if I admit defeat in my outloud voice at any point yet it will seal the deal. I don't want to give up just yet. So I'm taking things fifteen minutes at a time. Which brings to mind another post that I've been meaning to write. I'll let you know when that post lets me know what it needs to say.

2007-12-26T00:07:00.000-08:00

Moo.

The quest for breastfeeding is not an easy one around here. Best intentions, right? The reality of it is that, for me, supply is likely to be a constant worry even as we get further down the road. I guess the biggest barrier is that I need to try to get a certain amount of sleep every night so that I can keep up with the demands of the family and not have a sobbing emotional moment at the tail end of the day. To do that, I can't be up in the middle of the night pumping every 2 hours. The Toddler's schedule means that I can't pump regularly at set times during the day either; I catch it on the fly. And so reality keeps creeping in to my best intentions.

Right now I'm stalled out at just under a quarter ounce every time I pump. Except for first thing in the morning when it's nearly a whole half ounce. With this sort of output I should open a dairy, right? Maybe a micro-dairy. Specializing in the finest of preemie milk. Formulated especially for my newborn micropreemie and his needs to help him grow into the biggest and best that he's capable of. Added benefits are an increased immune system, and a lessened chance of catching a nasty bacterial infection in his intestinal tract.

The latest and greatest protocol I've come across is a pump and rest (and pump and rest) method. I think it's supposed to simulate a newborn cluster feeding, but I don't know. I'm trying it for the next few days or as long as I can stand it, because I'll try just about anything if I don't have to force myself awake in the middle of the night to be milked. Pump for ten minutes, rest for ten, pump for ten... do this for four pumps and rests, then repeat in 2-3 hours.

It's only been three sessions of this so far, and I think I'm seeing a slight improvement. Instead of a bare quarter ounce as normally achieved at this time of night, I got a full just-over quarter ounce. Those little drips just kept coming along. Very encouraging. So is the recurral of my intermittant insomnia. Hey, isn't the trick learning how to make your challenges work for you instead of defeating you?

2007-12-11T21:40:00.000-08:00

The pumping of milk, it does not go smoothly today. I know, realistically, that the milk supply at the end of the day is not the bountiful supply that comes at the beginning when you're all rested and cozy in a full night's sleep. At least, that's a full night for me. I choose to sleep through rather than get up and pump twice because I get little enough as it is already. (Back to the original topic) but really, going from my measly almost one ounce at wakeup to a bare covering for the bottom of the container for nighttime? That's like adding insult to injury here.

Among the many other decent and medically sound reasons I'm pumping is to save money down the road. I'd do it if only because it will give my Robbie a better chance to stay healthy in the NICU. The part where the preemie formulas cost almost 20 bucks for a 12.8 ounce can of powdered formula is not an insignificant factor in wanting to give the breastfeeding my best shot now. So you see when the emotional piece comes in, when I look at many other mothers and the Breast Police who all insist that this is a piece of cake and that every woman's body is fully capable of producing enough to feed their infant- it makes me want to cry. Two weeks in and I'm trying to pump fenugreek and blessed thistle into my body with as much water as I can remember to drink and pray that it will kick something loose in there. I'm trying. When I cry to the Boy about it he leaps to my defense. Among many things said to me the first night Robbie was born was that he fully supported whatever decision I came to about this. He saw what I went through with the Toddler. He saw the endless pumping and drinking and supplements and the tears when I'd fall into bed exhausted because there was just nothing more in there to give. When the nurses at the NICU ask you every day for more milk because they keep running out, I felt like a bad, neglectful mother because I could not produce any more. The LCs and nurses told me for weeks that the supply would come, that it would eventually come, that one day it would step up. It never did. Combined with the Toddler's refusal to latch and I gave up in a mess of tears and guilt because the milk? There was no more milk. There was one bottle of pumped milk for every two or three of formula, maybe a half ounce for every feeding that I could give her. I gave her every drop I had.

For Robbie? I'll do the same. I'll keep praying for a miracle with milk this time around. I think I may stand a chance. I hope so. I'll hope for anything at this point.

2007-12-07T08:48:00.001-08:00

It may not be the most economic idea, but what I like to do when pumping breastmilk for the freezer is to pour it into the disposable nurser bags. They're fairly cheap- 150 in a box for 3 dollars. I then roll the top down tightly, fasten with an address label, and then place inside a larger freezer ziptop bag for storage in the freezer. I can get away with this easily because I don't produce a lot of milk. Maybe one ounce, combined, if all the stars and heavens are in alignment and there's a blue moon.

Hopefully this will change. I'm eating well, drinking lots, taking fenugreek to try and up the supply, and emptying my breasts completely when I pump (frequently). I try not to obsess too much over supply. I realize that's a lost cause because I'll obsess about something and this is custom-made to all my obsession tendencies.

Another day, another pumping session, and another washcloth in my bra. That portion of the current experiment in thriftiness is, at least, going very well.

2007-12-05T14:18:00.000-08:00

I'm taking an unexpected twist on frugality this week. Since I'm pumping breastmilk for Robbie, and since he can't use all I pump right now, I'm starting to squirrel away the extra bits that I won't be able to use up at the NICU in our freezer here at home. This serves several purposes. Not only does it give me a wall-o-breastmilk in the freezer to use if the Boy and I ever go out for an afternoon, not only does this give us a laid in supply of the best food for strengthening his immunities, but when my supply eventually tapers out and falls by the wayside I've got something extra to fortify the formula with and help it stretch just a little bit further.

Does that sound too much like I'm giving up on the supply issue early? Believe me, I don't want the supply to dry out like it did for the Toddler. I'm just trying to realistically prepare for that day. Just like I didn't want a 29week preemie, but I prepared for it in the back of my head and now the Boy and I are coping relatively well. I say that. I hope it's true. I mean, I am not the emotional wreck I was last time. I'm about as prepared as it's possible for me to be. I'm thinking... that can only be good.

2007-12-03T19:19:00.001-08:00

This is my new little Robbie. He weighed 1lb 3oz when he was born last week. Good news is that he was delivered before suffering any distress in utero, and that means an excellant chance of doing just fine. For the moment he's in an isolette at a facility about an hour's drive away from me. He's safer there. My body was not a good place for him by the end of the pregnancy. Now money's going to be tighter than ever, so keep on reading for new and more interesting ways that I'm saving a buck. And possibly ways to also save my sanity.

2007-11-26T19:05:00.000-08:00

Why do I alter nearly every recipe I make? Where does one draw a line between acceptable convenience and thrift? It's hard- one woman chooses to spend her budget on x but not y and her neighbor scoffs because to her x is an unnecessary luxury. Who makes that decision? I have two shelves of cookbooks and recipes. Some are based on convenience foods, canned cream soups and boxed mac'n'cheese. Some come with lists of fresh vegetables and spices and presume that you have a freezer full of homemade stock. Personally I take a middle ground between the extremes. While I do enjoy preparing those fancy meals time means that I can't spend hours prepping vegetables. Frozen pre-peeled and chopped? You betcha. White sauces share kitchen time with cream soups and stock bubbles in my crockpot only two or three times a year.

Last night I altered a recipe designed for my diabetic diet. Take out some spices, substitute juices and type of rice, cooking method and time. Is it still the same recipe I started with? I'd say- vaguely. Very loosely based on the original. Unless stated otherwise all the recipes I post here are such vague interpretations of the original and tailored to my needs and convenience.

The same could be said of housekeeping. One person scrubs daily. One uses the Swiffer system. Another clips coupons and eats lentil soup by the pot to pay for a cleaning service twice a month. It all depends on what works.

Apricot Chicken:

4 chicken breasts (half a 3lb bag of frozen skinless boneless breasts)
1 1/2 cups orange juice
1 cup low-sugar apricot preserves (smuckers makes one)
three or four good shakes of allspice

mix up in gallon-size ziploc bag and sit out to defrost, turning every couple of hours. When defrosted and ready to cook, pour out over cooked rice in the bottom of a 9x13 baking pan. I used leftover rice that had been sitting around for a few days. Or you could use 3-4 cups of a new batch. Whatever works. Cover and bake for about an hour at 350 or until the chicken is done.

2007-11-25T13:30:00.000-08:00

Leftover Surprise was on the table for lunch today. I chopped up leftover turkey, tossed it with half a jar of leftover cheesy alfredo sauce, tossed that with a bag of frozen green beans and topped with half a cup of italian breadcrumbs spritzed with two tablespoons of melted butter. Real butter.

I may be watching carbs, but I have to have real butter in some things. This is one of them. It may have been solely a figment of my imagination, but I choose to believe that the real butter made it taste better.

Of course, the Toddler took one look at it and screamed for a poppysicle. Such is the fun of life around a two year old. Every time she goes to church she grazes off her plate, my mom's plate, and my plate to get the maximum treats she can scrounge up. The end result of this being, of course, that she is never really that hungry at lunchtime.

2007-11-24T09:55:00.001-08:00

Did everyone have a great thanksgiving? We did. Despite me not being able to really get off the couch, and the rest of the family recovering from one massive cold, we managed to pull off a decent spread. The Toddler enjoyed everything except the cranberry sauce- I think she was expecting a different flavor when she crammed the lump in her mouth, which is why it all came right back out with a complaint. She loved the french vanilla ice cream though, and the cool whip.

Yesterday was Black Friday, a massive event of consumerism that has either surpassed last year or been horribly disappointing, depending upon which network you're reading. I only went out because there was a big computer chair that I needed to get the Boy for Christmas. You can see what happened here. Fortunately I survived little worse for wear, although when I saw my blood pressure numbers I shuddered and once again vowed to take it easy, stay off my feet, and behave.

See how long that lasts? Maybe a day. Maybe less. I'm feeling more worn out than ever. On the other hand I did get the last chair in the store and today I'm spending it in my jammies and fuzzy bathrobe. Thank God you don't have to get dressed up to type on the Net.

2007-11-16T12:32:00.000-08:00

Why is it that the manufacturers of car seats find the need to name each pattern of seatcover fabric some ridiculous thing? And then discontinue the pattern every season? Is it really so important? Why can't they just make the things in solid colors or one consistent pattern? I swear; two years ago we got a zooy animal print. We now need to replace the seat and the car seat base. That's fine. I didn't expect to match it. But how in the world can I "almost" match it... with two different choices, both with ridiculous names, and one is so much cheaper because it's a discontinued fabric? I think the only difference is the pattern of palm trees strewn through the thing.

I expect to have several more rants about the changes in baby gear in the past two and a half years. Stay tuned for more insanity brought to you today by the baby industry. Which is beginning to make the Wedding Industry seem sane to me.

2007-11-15T13:04:00.000-08:00

One of the biggest things I learned from reading FlyLady is that as long as it gets done, does it matter how? Is a room any less clean for being done in five minute bursts over the 8 hour day instead of being done in a two hour frenzy of cleaning that makes me want to cut corners by the end? Those five minutes are quality segments, not something that starts out quality and ends in slackness. Also there's the concept of being more gentle with yourself in order to get it done. Don't focus on the ten things you didn't get done in a day, look at the stuff you did get done.

My living room is a mess, true. There are dustbunnies under my unmade bed that may have formed a civilization of their own. Yet my sink is clean, the dishes are done, the trash is taken out every night. Laundry is done and put away, not stacked all over the house. This is good.

So to keep on keeping on- I shouldn't be overly worried how I'm going to handle my new baby and new responsibilities. I should be focused just on keeping on. My sink is still going to get cleaned, my dishes put away, the trash taken out. It's such an automagical thing for us that nobody thinks twice about those things. That's the style of housekeeping I want to get to. It's possible. As long as I focus, it's possible.

2007-11-14T13:45:00.001-08:00

One more time I'm fighting the fight of the disposable diaper vs cloth. One more time I'm wondering if this is the right solution for us? If ease is worth more than green, if the pennies are pinched to throw away dollars? I don't know. I'm still hashing this one out.

I think the only way to know for sure is to try it. We're going to try, to make the effort, to do what we can to make life a little better for all of us. If we go cloth, more money will be left. If I cannot breastfeed due to similar circumstances of last time, we'll have to buy formula- and the income limits will now price us out of WIC. Maybe not for the specialty stuff if we've got another SGA preemie, but is that something I want to hope for just to avoid the expense of formula? I'd rather tighten the belts a little further to buy it at the store. And just maybe we'll get a bouncing big boy, hm? One that does not need ICU care and time. One that sleeps through the night and changes his own nappies- hah! Delusional, much? And while I'm wandering through the land of make-believe, why not wish for a few golden nesteggs?

2007-11-10T11:26:00.000-08:00

Do you know what I need? A Complete Idiot's Guide to Everything. Think about it. Such a volume would be immense. It would cover everything in the universe. There would be simple, easy to follow checklists and instructions for every last little bit of how to run your life or household or how to breathe.

Somehow I don't think it would sell a lot of copies though.

I find myself wishing sometimes for someone to give me that magic checklist. But it wouldn't be my magic checklist unless I was the one to create it. Everyone's life is different and so are their needs. That's what keeps it interesting for the rest of humanity.

2007-11-09T10:12:00.000-08:00

Bedrest is cheap. Apart from the boredom, the need to get up just for a minute to do just one more thing that I can't do while laying on my side. So what to do? Dig out again all the serious reading books that I used while suffering my horrid insomnia in the first year of motherhood? Those are great- I could never quite sleep at night, but I could be improving my mind. Which helps, believe it or not. I've been steadily queuing up my library list.

The problem with my reading seems to be that I read too fast and absorb the book rather than "reading" it in the normal fashion. I can knock off a couple books a day if there are no distractions. This is the problem. Other women in this spot could get a stack of paperbacks next to the bed or couch and be set for a few days. A week. Me? An afternoon. With predictable results. I come to the door of the room all whiny that "There's nothing to read". While staring at 7 laden shelving units filled to overflowing with books that I've read cover to cover so many times that I might be able to still quote a few of them.

What are your thoughts about this? Looking for a few good recommendations.

2007-11-07T06:51:00.001-08:00

How do I define myself? What are my labels, my tags? Whyever on earth does this matter so much to me? Is it that I'm so insecure- or is it more that the normal validation that everyone needs must currently come from a far more limited source? A two year old, after all, does not provide much in the way of nuance in feedback.

Yet I push on. Thrift in juggling our resources. Repurposing. Squeezing those nickels and dimes- even finding ways to make real money blogging, which I'd still be doing just to let myself feel like a productive member of society. Those five dollars here and there for paid posts on Another Day in Paradise do help out here and there. It's my pin money. I can contribute to this family in ways other than the housewife gig.

But why is it so awfully important that I feel that the housewife thing isn't quite enough as a personal career?

2007-11-05T07:43:00.000-08:00

What do you think about gDiapers? They have flushable liner inserts, the standard cloth cover, and they seem very fine. That's the problem for me. They seem fine. But how would it work for us in real life? How many parents get so attached to the thought of cloth diapering, stock up on what they think is going to work (it has great reviews, so why shouldn't it be the best?) and when reality takes a turn from their fantasies throw up their hands and go right to disposables by the case?

Not that there's anything wrong with that either. I am a believer in disposables. Especially for those who can't afford a weekly service or have no access to washing machines on a regular basis. I'm just saying... Reality trumps the imagination in nearly every circumstance. Penny wise and pound foolish wastes a lot of your precious time and energy that could be better spent with your family.

In the kitchen- meatballs!

2007-11-04T12:37:00.001-08:00

One of my new favorite pantry staples are frozen meatballs. They're precooked, individually frozen so they don't clump up into one whole ugly mess. I can microwave 4 or 5 for a quick snack with mozarella cheese and a spoon of spaghetti sauce -great for the current gestational-diabetes diet. I can nuke a cup and a half of them and toss into a box of hamburger helper for a quick last minute dinner. I bought a big bag of them for cheap, and they stretched with almost daily use for about 2 weeks. Very easy and delicious.

2007-11-03T19:43:00.001-07:00

A science experiment that we're going to try in the next couple of days, involving baking soda and vinegar. Do you remember when you learned what a fun chemical reaction can be had by these two simple things? We're going to rake up an anthill, douse it with the baking soda raked in the dirt, and pour vinegar over the top.

I suspect this will be interesting. And fun. And hey, if yardwork can be combined with fun AND get rid of ants invading my personal space?

I'm all for that as well.

2007-08-20T12:59:00.000-07:00

500 Uses for Baking Soda

I picked this up at the library and have to say that a lot of these are wonderful tips that I've never come across (in a very frugal and thrifty upbringing!) It's amazing. There's a method to get rid of anthills by baking soda and vinegar- as soon as I can get outside to locate an anthill I'm going to try this one. If it cuts down on the Sugar Ants, I'm going to be the happiest wife on the block.

2007-08-20T12:53:00.001-07:00

Baked Ham with Apples:

1 smallish ham (I opted for the smoked, fully cooked ham. No risk for possible undercooking in crockpot).
5 apples, cored, peeled, and sliced. I didn't bother making them all neat and pretty- they are cooking down in any case.
3 Tbsp butter
3/4 cup brown sugar
cinnamon to taste -try a handful of cinnamon candy hearts, if you have them. These are great to find on sale after valentine's day, and they keep. They also turn applesauce pink when cooked in!

Throw in crockpot. Cook on low. Eat.

Honestly, I don't think a recipe can get much easier than this. The hardest part was chopping apples. Especially since my apple corer/slicer broke shortly after we moved into this place. Not fun- the Toddler loves apples. Especially fresh apples. Tonight she'll be introduced to baked apples and ham. I suspect this will be another case of love at first bite.

2007-08-10T13:16:00.001-07:00

Vegetarian Lasagna

about 46oz of your favorite spaghetti sauce
4oz can mushrooms
a handful of frozen chopped onion
10oz brick of frozen chopped spinach, thawed and drained
between 5 and 6oz firm silken tofu
1 tsp powdered garlic
8oz shredded mozzarella
lasagna noodles, uncooked

Start by sauteeing the onions and mushrooms until they're nice and warm and sizzly. Add the spaghetti sauce and remove from heat. In another bowl mix the spinach, garlic, and tofu together. In a large baking dish layer: sauce, noodles, spinach/tofu, sauce, noodles, spinach/tofu, sauce. Cover with foil and bake at 350 for 45min. Remove foil, cover the lasagna with cheese, bake another 15min.

Let set for about 10 before eating. I made this during the post lunch nap, let it sit on the stove all afternoon (hey, not that long, just around 90minutes or so) until the family started needing dinner. Then we cut and ate it with a salad and bread&butter. Some chose to reheat it, some ate it cold with great enjoyment.

This was my first experience ever with cooking tofu. I expected to be able to tell it was there; when I went to eat it I could not detect anything other than cheesy lasagna goodness. The Boy bitched about the inclusion of mushrooms. He doesn't like them, but I put them in for added nutritive value. He survived.

2007-08-08T13:55:00.000-07:00

I was looking through this month's issue of Leadership in Action (the monthly magazine from Melaleuca, whose products I am seriously hooked on) and came across the cost comparison table for household cleaners. These are things we all use every day/week, are buying every month, and which for some of us are a pretty big deal. Now, I used to be a Lysol Girl- all the time, that was the best thing since sliced bread, the ultimate product for my home. Then I had a preemie, and by the time Tiff started creeping around and putting everything in her mouth (including the desk chair, the sides of my cabinets, and shoes. What was that about???) I started taking the fine print on my lysol bottle a bit more seriously.

I'm a grownup. I know not to put the stuff in my mouth, not to lick a surface that I've just cleaned, I even know how to wash my hands when I'm through scrubbing the floor. Tiff didn't. Which is why when I talked to a friend of mine who had just been introduced to these products, I jumped at it. Is it a cost every month? Yes. Would I be spending this kind of money anyway? Yes. And I'd be spending more of it to get a house this clean. By comparison, costs are per fluid oz.

laundry detergent
tide: .31
melapower: .16

fabric softener
Downy: .26
Melasoft: .08

Whitener/brightener
ultra clorox 2: .29
melabrite: .16

dishwasher:
cascade: .42
diamond brite: .28

all purpose cleaner
409: .11
tough and tender: .05

bathroom cleaner
limeaway: .22
tub n tile: .05

window cleaner
windex: .15
clear power: .05

After you get done looking at that, look at how much you use per job. Instead of filling the dishwasher cup, I use maybe a third as much detergent to get perfect results. So the cost comes down more and I don't feel stingy with cleaning products. I look at all the stuff they make, the phosphate-free formulas, the non-toxic ingredients, the part about how it's cost-efficient and eco-friendly. I see that I don't have to have every door and window open if I need to deep-clean my bathroom- it's fume-free too. Which gets rid of my excuse for not cleaning the bathroom as much as I should, but that's no reason to trash the product, right?

A completely unexpected benefit of buying through Melaleuca is that they send me a check each month. It's only a small itty percentage of what everyone else who enrolled through my friend makes... Instead of the company going out and spending millions on advertising, they send a percentage of revenue back to the people who use and buy the products. My friend signed up 8 people in her first month; as long as they are customers she sees about 7% of their orders come back to her. Plus there was a bonus for enrolling a total of 8 people that month. About $500 worth. I often wish for the kind of people-skill that would let me talk to the people I know in real life about this. Darn the shyness, the non-outgoing person I am, and most of all the stomach-paralyzing fear of public speaking. It's hard enough to make small talk while hanging out with the other mothers at my daughter's weekly school/therapy session. Unfortunately, I can't seem to do it. Which is why I've got to rely on online surveys, paid blogging on my main blog site, and advertising on my blogs in order to bring in a few extra bucks every month. Right now I get about $15 a month in my Melaleuca check. It pays for the shipping of my order. If only... I could pay the rent on our house. Maybe I'm just not really motivated enough yet to get past the anxieties.

Now if I could just talk to enough people online and do my enrollments over the Net and through the mail? I'd be set.

2007-08-08T07:19:00.000-07:00

Something I find myself taking for granted is that Stay-At-Home-Moms have all the time in the world. We don't work, right? How can we not find the time for gourmet meals or spotless homes? An hour or so for one, same for the other. Day in and day out. If only it were that simple. It takes time to learn any job. How do we juggle dishes and diapers- one can wait and the other sometimes can't. More resources are out there than before to help us learn our ways around. FlyLady offered me hope for housework. Saving Dinner is going to help me put nutritious meals on the table every night- we're still in the honeymoon phase, but the optimism inspired by these sites gives me warm fuzzies.

More efficient use of my time, available these days only in small chunks of uninterrupted status, lets me spend more happy time with the kid. Time not spent feeling guilty over an unmade bed or a sink full of dishes. Perfection is not found on earth. Happiness is what you make of it.

2007-08-03T12:07:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I was catching up on my FlyLady.net mail and came across one of their featured summer recipes. It looked tasty, but I know I couldn't get my family to eat it so I just scrolled through, skimming to see if there was any further content I could use. And then I learned that the recipe was credited to the fine ladies at savingdinner.com (Note: this is not one of those paid/sponsored blog posts. This is an actual kudo from my life to yours) Well, checking into the site further I found I could afford to subscribe to a three month package of weekly menus/shopping lists mailed to me. I can also go online to download it.

The first choice I had was which plan to sign up for: they run them by the standard year, but can break down quarterly for those of us who hesitate to commit to a full year. The second choice was which specialty I wanted to choose. They feature plans for weight watchers, health restrictions, seafood/meat/vegetarian only options. The choice I went with was frugality. I signed up, paid them, and a few minutes later I had the introductory menu in my inbox.

The first page of the pdf file is the grocery list. It gives you a brief synopsis of the 6 planned meals for the week, with suggested sides, and breaks down the necessary ingrediants into grocery-store sections. Meat, produce, condiments, dry grocery, etc. After each ingrediant is a parenthetical notation that tells you which meal it goes to- in case you need/want to alter their plans in any way. Cross off the list anything you already have, and off to the store you go. I crossed off about half the meat section, half the spices/condiments, and a few other things. My grocery bill this morning at Food Co came to $68.56 which included several little extras that we eat regularly and were out of. Each recipe serves 6-8, and I'm thinking that the way we eat/stretch certain things out that this shopping/menu plan will last more to 10 days rather than the 7 it's designed to cover. Assuming a couple of leftover nights and the weekly pizza delivery, I'm thinking that my three month subscription could be stretched out to cover 6 months of real-time. I'll let you know how it goes.

2007-08-01T09:16:00.000-07:00

update/family review on the beef barley.

Overall this was a winner. I was generous with the barley and it plumped right up to make the whole thing less stew-like and more main-dish like. Overnight in the fridge the stew solidified, and when reheated did not provide extra broth... so if you like having the brothy-goodness you should be gentle on the barley and maybe add some extra broth to the pot.

The picky Toddler liked it. Or didn't like it. She couldn't make up her mind what extreme to follow, and so I can't give a true opinion on her behalf. Broadly I'd say that she accepted it, loved the big chunks of soft meat, especially liked being able to pull it apart with her fingers and get messy with it.

2007-07-30T13:25:00.001-07:00

Ready for some Crockpot Fun? Here's today's experiment, happily bubbling away for the past few hours: Beef Barley Stew.

about a pound of stew beef, cut in chunks.
a bag of stewing vegetables, if available, otherwise any favored vegetable medley that seems like it would play well with beef.
5 cups of beef broth/stock
3/4 cup pearl barley
a pinch of garlic powder. By which I refer to the actual powder/granulated garlic product, not the garlic flavored salt.
half a cup of chopped bell pepper
basil and thyme, to taste.

Combine in crockpot, stir once or twice to mix it up, cook on slow for 9-10hours or high for 6. I chose the "high" option because everything came from the deep freeze and I started this at 1030 this morning.

In the past I've economized on the stew beef by looking for a cheap discount steak. Sometimes I can get them on the last chance discount, use/freeze date of the same or next day, and saved a dollar more per pound than official stew beef. Sure, I can chop it up with a big knife myself and save the money. Remember: keep your knives sharp, your work surfaces sanitary, and wash your hands often when working with raw meats.

Salmonella and other nasties are everything they're rumored to be. I'll take that as true. I have no wish to experiment on it.

2007-07-27T18:25:00.000-07:00

It's been way too long. I do apologize... so, want to grab the recipe of the day? Modified from about three other recipes, I think that with this many mods it qualifies as a New Recipe? Or at least one that requires no attribution.

I took:
4 Tbs of butter
1/4 chopped bell pepper
two or three dashes of dried minced onion
1 can of crabmeat
3/4 lb of tiny cooked shrimp
2 cups milk
3 Tbsp flour
8oz pasta, cooked
mozarella cheese for topping

Melt the butter until it's all bubbly and frothy in the pan, starting to brown. Pop in the bell pepper and onion, stir and cook for two minutes. Add the flour and milk to make a roux. Stir in the crab, shrimp, and pasta. Bake covered at 350 for 40 minutes. Remove lid, sprinkle liberally with cheese, and pop back in the oven for five minutes.

This received rave reviews. My own tastes are suspect, as I've been craving shrimp, crab, and chinese stirfry all week. However I'm pleased to report that the Toddler ate a good amount without trouble. I used a small, finger-friendly salad macaroni pasta.

2007-06-22T15:36:00.000-07:00

A good way to reduce the grocery budget as well as lose weight?

Morning sickness.
Also, afternoon sickness, evening sickness, and middle of the night "I can't think about food or I'll vomit" sickness.

Not particularly a fun way to do these things, but it does work. Now, how about remedies? My mom suggested a lollipop as the best way to help shake the aftereffects of this morning's bloodwork. I spent about an hour on this gigantic thing, and drank 3 bottles of water. Headache is receding, thoughts are returning to normal speed, body is willing to contemplate a major cooking event tonight as well as consumption of food.

I also need to pee.

So for tonight's dinner (or more likely tomorrows): Crab/Spinach Shells with Parmesan Cheese Sauce.

1 15oz tub ricotta
1 package or can spinach, drained and squeezed
1 package imitation crabmeat

mix well with a bag of pasta shells, cooked and drained.

Make a standard white sauce, while stirring add a bag of shredded parmesan cheese. Let the cheese get all nice and melty and pour it overtop the rest in a dutch oven. Bake covered at 350 for about an hour, or until things get bubbly and hot and cozy.

I modified this recipe from my Casseroles As Comfort Food cookbook (will provide full citation upon request, but I don't want to get off my butt this minute to look it up)

2007-06-12T11:47:00.000-07:00

Shepherd's Pie, our variation on a theme.

some leftover meat, if available, otherwise a pound of ground beef or turkey. cooked and crumbled. Tonight I'm using three leftover teriyaki beef steaks.

some leftover vegetables. Tonight this is a can and a fifth of diced tomatos, drained; a can of mixed veg, and a cup of buttered carrots. Another night a good substitute is: two cans of condensed vegetable soup and 1 can of mixed veg.

About 4 cups of mashed potato. I'm using a pouch mix, because I'm lazy.

Sprinkle shredded cheese over the top, cover if you feel like it, and bake for about 40 minutes on 350. The pan I'm most fond of using is my big dutch oven. It's the biggest pan in the cheapy starter set I bought at walmart ages ago when we set up housekeeping. Toss it all in and bake. If I have to cook my meat first, I don't even bother using an extra pan; I drain off the meat juices/fat and dump everything else in.

2007-06-06T14:20:00.000-07:00

Once again the FlyLady has inspired me to new and greater acts of tidyness. To quote her excellant summation: it doesn't have to be perfect to bless your family.

How often do I stop and throw up my hands on the housework entirely for a day because I feel overwhelmed by it all? I can pick up five pieces of trash on my way to the bathroom, I can shuffle all dirty dishes to the sink and deal with the whole thing once a day in the evening- making my sink shine before I go to bed.

Not hard, once I get in the habit of doing it. Of letting go the quest for perfection which insists that cleaning must be done in one act; clean a room from top to bottom all at once until it shines. And that is overwhelming to me when I have a toddler hanging on my leg, a meal to plan, laundry to do, and trash spilling out of the trashcan.

Despite all these things today I've done laundry, taken out the trash, picked up the bits of paper on the floor, and decreed that dinner tonight will be the consumption of leftovers in the fridge. I even had a twenty minute nap. The Toddler had a nap. My house is tidier and I feel better about myself for having done this.

2007-06-05T14:25:00.000-07:00

The Diaper Report:

do not be penny-wise and pound-foolish. While it costs more to keep the Toddler in either costco brand or name brand (huggies or pampers) diapers, the alternative is a red butt. It's more effective to spend a little more and buy the diapers that do not give her a rash or make her cranky. And a not-cranky baby is a happy mama. A happy mama who can devote her energy to more positive things, like cleaning and doing laundry.

Speaking of laundry, we're almost ready to run a few loads. I've started only doing one load a day because of the amount of heat the dryer puts out. Even though it's vented, and in a closed off room, it's truly amazing how much it spreads to the rest of the house.

Is it a greedy thing that I'm starting to come up with an amazon registry for the Little Bit? I really don't think so, and this is why: We live on the opposite side of the country from family and family friends, and indeed from almost everyone who will feel the desire to give us something for the baby. Is it not more efficient to create an online list of what we actually want and need? This can be viewed anonymously by the gift givers, used as a guideline for the gifts they wish to send, and it will save them asking the grandmother's to be what to get. I am completely comfortable with my mothers' tastes, but this will also save them time and save me from a potential miscommunication about the nursery plans. Note: the most critical thing to note about the registry is that I'm choosing not to share it with anyone except by request, and until my motherinlaw asks about it I'm not telling her it exists. (although I will tell her and my mom about it around the traditional baby shower time).

Most of what we received for the Toddler was clothing. I told everyone that I didn't know what I needed, and as a new mom I was generally clueless. I got a lot of clothing. This time around it's less on the clothing and more practical stuff. Gear. The Toddler was very hard on both her infant toys, her Boppy, and believe it or not she wore out the Glider rocking chair. I can jury-rig it to work, but the gliding mechanism that makes it function is seriously broken.

2007-06-02T07:19:00.000-07:00

How can economizing fit in with a healthy pregnancy, and can I continue to save money and live on a shoestring through another "highrisk" pregnancy? I'm screwed with a highrisk label no matter what I do, but is it actually possible to carry through my current plans while improving the overall health?

One way in which I suspect I'll do better: Last time I constantly lost my shit thinking that I'd be a horrible parent; I second and third-guessed myself before baby was present. I had insecurities so deep it's a wonder I could move. I felt like shit and thought like shit and the outcome was very nearly that. Now I've got a beautiful little girl [despite her efforts to drive me nuts on a regular basis] and I've got two years of successful motherhood behind me. This bodes very well.

Stay tuned for further updates!

2007-05-31T14:05:00.000-07:00

pork chops, baked stuffed potatoes, and cake.

Is there a better dinner than this? Seriously? Cause if so I don't know what it is. I'm seriously looking forward to dinner tonight, even though I'm currently dead tired, the living room floor is covered with itty bits of paper from Tiff's pick-pick-picking at everything with words or pictures on it, and it's thursday.

Doesn't that mean that this week is nearly over? That soon we'll have a whole new week to look at? That before we know what's happening, it'll be a whole new month?

No time at all before my little girl is grown up. Like my mom's little girl grew up. Sometimes I wish I could take back all those years and be her little girl again... but I don't want to take back the bad as well as the good. Only go back to the good; take with me the best of the Now. Good times.

2007-05-30T12:44:00.000-07:00

I noticed that every so often Grocery Outlet has some pretty sweet deals. It makes shopping there fun, and no so much like I'm trawling the bottom bargain basement deals... This week, for example, I scored 8oz bars of Land O Lakes cheddar for 79cents. That's what, half price? I also picked up some sausages yesterday that I'm making for tonight's dinner. Cross my fingers, I don't know what they'll turn out like since it's a type and brand I've never heard of, but it sounded yummy just from the label.

Garlic, basil, sundried tomato sausages. Hmm. The pack made 8 little 3"-4" segments, and it was 2.49. This won't break the bank. I fried and simmered them up on the stove a little while ago but haven't tasted it yet. From the smell alone I'd say we have a winner. Maybe I should try to eek out a few more pennies from my sugar bowl bank and grab another pack before they're all gone?

2007-05-28T10:41:00.000-07:00

A great way to incorporate relaxation breathing into daily life- bubbles. You know you need to take those deep, cleansing breaths. Maybe you're working on increasing lung capacity, or on reclaiming it from the stress that gets you all knotted up inside. It's hard to know when you're doing it right, hard to tell exactly when the breathing is only another way to express your built-up tension.

I blow bubbles almost every day with my two year old. She loves them. Aside from being pretty, they are another way to play with mommy. She has my undivided attention. In the shade, they're cool. In the sun, they're shimmery and beautiful. I blow them inside, sitting on a chair, sitting on the floor, or standing up and moving around. One thing I've discovered with blowing bubbles is that I get the best results by a slow and steady blow- the same sort of exhale that comes with doing the deep breathing properly. I've now got a few times a day in which I stop, step back from everything else going on, and there's nothing to focus on but the smiles on my baby's face and the breathing. And the bubbles.

Talk about the ultimate in multitasking!

Beer and Pizza time again, where does the week go?

2007-05-25T11:13:00.000-07:00

A highlight of our day so far:

woke up to the absence of screaming, shrieking, or emergency vehicles. Decided that the house could run without me a while longer. Went back to sleep.

Woke up again. Suspiciously quiet. Ventured out of bed to find a toddler happily watching PBS and husband happily gaming.

After cleaning the kitchen and beginning to tackle the laundry Situation (3 loads clean to put away, 2 loads dirty to wash, an untold amount of stuff that cannot be identified as one or the other due to toddler learning how to pull out her clean clothes and built a nest in them).

Went to the store to get milk, cheese, pepperoni- the key things for a successful Friday Pizza/Beer event. It's been french bread pizzas for weeks now and I'm starting to like it a lot better than the cardboard box delivery stuff. I don't have to look at the remnants of the pizza, it's hot in the toaster by the plate, doesn't take much to make it and best of all it's about a third the price of a standard delivery. Today that's even cheaper: 68 cents a loaf for french bread at walmart (on sale, fresh baked), the cheese is 1.66 a bag (it'll last maybe until tomorrow's breakfast, we're heavy on cheese around here), pepperoni for 2 dollars a bag (it will last two weeks or more) and canned tomatoes (62cents a can) drained and seasoned up with basil that I've grown on the windowsill.

All told this pizza night is 6.26. That's using all the bread, cheese, pepperoni, 2 cans tomatoes. The beer is for the Boy; Amber Bock at 4.97 plus CRV. Just under 12 bucks for the whole night. I think that's a pretty good bargain.

2007-05-23T15:34:00.001-07:00

dinner tonight is not fancy; more a method of throwing random leftovers and pantry stuff into a pot and see what happens.

I have a quarter of a picked-over bbq chicken that I got for Sunday lunch. A box of pasta-roni. A can of corn. It smells really good; right now we're letting it set a minute so that the sauce will thicken up.

I'm feeling awfully tired and sluggish today. This promises to be a nice, yummy, dinner.

2007-05-21T20:06:00.000-07:00

I am ashamed to admit that I'm not coming up with any ideas this week, and I lost my costco receipt from last week, and so I'm opening up a question to the general public:

What's your favorite Mama-hack? In other words, what one thing enables you to retain the greater part of sanity in your life?

2007-05-16T12:52:00.001-07:00

Rest assured, I'll be back to update this soon. It's been a week; payday came and went and while we acheived our #1 goal of no overdraft we paid all the bills and ended up with maybe a fifth of the pay left. Which is nice, but OY! Sticker shock, much?

The good part is that my netflix rental finally arrived; it wasn't available any closer than MA- which is literally an entire country away from us. There are not many states further away from central CA than MA. I really hope this disc is everything I hoped it would be. Kinda eccentric. I have a knack for picking eccentric and outre things. At that, I'm being charitable. It's probably more accurate to say that I have a knack for being wierd and picking the wierdest shit that noone I know has ever heard of.

2007-05-14T10:28:00.000-07:00

The Apple Report:

Tiff loved it. I'm eating the rest of it poured over homemade bread. It's safe to say that this is a huge winner over here.

Melt 1 Tbsp butter in frying pan. Brown 1 apple- cut into chunks/wedges/bits. Sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon.

Eat.

Simple, quick, tastes good. With the added bonus over store-bought that I actually know to the last bit what is in this. Makes me feel better as a mom.

2007-05-14T09:10:00.000-07:00

Coming soon: the panfried apple report

Stay tuned for the toddler rating. Yummy? Hide in Mommy's hair because maybe Mommy won't notice? It could go either way today.

2007-05-13T14:51:00.001-07:00

New Fav Summer Supper!

tuna salad, over tomatos (the canned diced tomatos, drained) with a side of mahatma saffron rice.

It felt right, and the fryup the other night didn't turn out as well as I'd hoped -I blame many factors, including the part where the rice I used hadn't been fully cooked and turned up with a crunchy center. And so I was still craving rice.

Now? I'm so stocking up on saffron rice this week. I adore it, even though I probably shouldn't cause it's more expensive than regular long-grain white rice. The taste is only part of it. The biggest love comes from having the whole spice packet included and I just have to add water and simmer.

2007-05-12T14:31:00.000-07:00

Simple Leftover Fryup

I've got a cup and a half of frozen mixed vegetables that are thawing. Maybe two cups of rice. A couple of porkchops. I'm going to cut the pork into strips and stirfry, then add the other stuff and fry some more. Then I'm going to smother it in alfredo sauce, since I feel like alfredo and don't have stirfry sauce in the house.

I've got a couple of rolls as well, and I could turn them into garlic toast while the rest of it is cooking. Sounds yummy. Added benefit? It's going to clean out my fridge.

Ooooh, just remembered I have two eggs left. Beat them and toss them into the fryup? Maybe. Anything goes tonight.

Shopping Alert: I am going to do my every-other month stockup at costco this week. When the list has been prepared, I'll share. This is the major pantry stockup; during which I purchase everything bulk that I like to have on hand all the time. The stockup is what enables me to go 6 weeks living paycheck to paycheck with hardly any slush in the budget for things like bread, soup, "extra" items.

2007-05-10T10:54:00.001-07:00

I'm still finding new ways to use clothespins. Who would have thought that I'd like them this much? Granted, I only like the clippy type of pin; the straight wood peg does nothing for me. I like using them to clip the tops of bags, both frozen veggies and cereal- forget lusting after those special plastic bag clips. Why spend more for them when you can keep a bucket of clothespins under the sink?

This week so far I've used them to hang my elastic dish covers, fasten the silicone baking sheets to the dishwasher rack for drying, keep the toddler out of cereal bags, clip a dishtowel around her neck as a makeshift bib, hold my hair out of the sink while I was doing dishes, and a few other things that I can't remember right now.

I never got into using bibs for this child. They seem to be so one-purpose. When the meal's over I still had to go and find a clean wipe to tidy her hands and face, then deal with all the cleanup and remember to get the bib to the laundry basket. And then the bibs started to get too small. They were always too big or too small, she plays with them and sometimes it was impossible to get her to sit still enough that I didn't run the risk of choking her while applying the bib... but clothespins? I can fit a whole dishtowel over her front, there's always a dry bit that I can use to wipe hands and face before de-bibing her, and I get to keep my one bucket of dishtowels for multitasking in the kitchen. Winner!

Plus, clipping the towel to one side takes one hand and minimal child-shuffling to go quickly to mealtime.

2007-05-08T19:55:00.000-07:00

I've been looking over all the stuff I've learned about tea tree oil and it's uses over the past year and thought I'd share some of it with you. It has proven to be the best cleaning agent I know of, meeting my personal criteria of effectiveness, price, and safety. With every other cleaner I've tried I was worried about rinsing afterwards, because I didn't want the residue of it to come in contact with my food or my daughter's internal organs (she's mostly over her habit of plastering an open mouth and tongue to every surface she encounters, but the knowledge of what she must be ingesting makes me cringe even now.) The tough and tender spray, I don't worry. I don't have to run her highchair tray through the dishwasher anymore, which never fit right in the dishwasher without it being the only thing in there. This saves the time, money, and both of those are in short supply around here.

The laundry detergents I switched to: to start with, I don't need bleach anymore. Last's week's stain on the Boy's Whites is undetectable to him, although I didn't do anything special in the laundry this time. Not even pretreating. I just used the detergent and the melaleuca equivalent to Clorox 2 and presto! Clean, sparkling Whites. Cheaper too.

The personal care products? Shampoo that lets me wash my hair three times a week instead of every day this month to get rid of the flakiness and general ick that hot weather creates? Shampoo that doubles as an effective body wash on those days when I'm covered in outside dust, bug crap, and the kind of dirt only a small human can instill on it's mother? No more scrubbing of my skin trying to get all that off with three or four applications of heavy soap and a stiff brush. And it smells good. Acne treatment that works in a cream I can apply post-shower? Since I have to use it over most of my torso this is a majorly good thing for me.

Read some of the product literature, and the oil is a natural germicide/anti-bacterial. With the happy note of not killing the skin of the person using the product, just the invisible nasties that it's meant to kill. Talked to my grandmother, who has the dry and cracked skin of her years and medical conditions; it's working better than the uber-expensive stuff her doctor tried to prescribe. Talked to my mother, who has allergies and gets sick from breathing the fumes coming off normal cleaners in a ventilated environment- she doesn't get sick with this.

I guess I'm sold. No. I Know I'm sold. I'm going to keep on with this stuff. Better, cheaper, and safer.

2007-05-08T13:02:00.000-07:00

I just got around to cleaning up a little of the house- I don't tend to count the normal chore roster as "cleaning up". Dishes, laundry, toy picking up; those are all necessary things that get done every day come hell or high water. Vacuuming happens as toddler and time permit. I've been particularly peeved at myself for the past two weeks because while I'm able to come up with ideas and plans for getting beyond the daily chores and into spring cleaning stuff I can't seem to get the time or energy to do these things. Today, I've done it.

Whether or not this has to do with the part about my caffeine intake has now regained the level it was at before I lost all that time and energy... let's not go there, okay? Let's focus on the positive. I'm reclaiming my living room. I'm reclaiming the kitchen table. One of these not-too-far off days I'm going to rediscover that there really is a kitchen counter underneath the piles of stuff and assorted trash that's built up. Why do we save all these bits of paper that come into the house? Why do we save oodles of things that we'll never use again, never see again, never need for any reason at all? It's not that much harder to put it in the trashcan than it is to put it on the counter. Is there hope that I can be retrained? Is there the possibility of *gasp* a picture perfect house in my future?

Note: I have a two year old. I'm not looking at an issue of Beautiful Homes here. I'd settle for something lived in but extraneous-clutter free.

2007-05-04T08:44:00.001-07:00

French Bread Pizza

First, make a batch of bread to the recipe I posted down a bit. When you get to the shaping part, divide the dough into two pieces. Roll it out with your hands like two playdough ropes, then set it on your greased cookie sheet and let rise the second time until roughly double. Bake at 350 until done -somewhere between 45-60 minutes.

The doneness test that I was taught is as follows. Use your fingers to lightly tap the top of the loaf. It should sound hollowy. If it sounds like you're tapping a brick, it's not done. If it feels like you're tapping the table top (remember, folks, the table top has a lot of air underneath it thus creating that nifty hollow sound) then it's done. My mother used her fingertips. I'm always a little afraid of burning my hands in the process, so I reach in the oven with either the flat side of a knife or a wooden spoon.

Options: brush the tops of the loaves with garlic butter before baking. Sprinkle the tops with a little bit of Mrs Dash. Or shredded cheese. Or if you feel ambitious, do all three!

So you've got your french bread. When it's cooled off, split the loaves, spoon some sauce over them and top with cheese, toppings, whatever, and then back in the oven until it's all melty and toasty and wonderful.

Of course you can substitute store-bought bread. I recommend using the day old stuff, on the reduced shelf. Since it's stale it will soak up the sauce and toppings better. As far as what sauce to use... I don't bother buying pizza sauce anymore. I use spaghetti sauce from a can. The store brand that's in an unattractive can may not be all gourmet, but it's a very decent basic sauce. I can add my own basil, other herbs, meat, to suit the tastes of my family at any given time. Plus, it's almost always the cheapest brand on the shelf! I win again!

2007-05-02T11:51:00.000-07:00

Hawaii Pork and Pineapple, modified from the WW cookbook I referenced earlier in the week.

4 boneless pork chops, cut into 1" chunks.
1 can chunk pineapple, no sugar added, drained
1 can water chesnuts, drained

Stirfry the pork cubes until they start browning up. Add the pineapple and water chesnuts, and continue to cook until the pork is done and the veggies are browning. Serve over steamed rice or alongside of wild rice pilaf. I almost always go for the serve over bit, because our family is fond of the meal-in-a-bowl concept. Less dishes, easier to balance on lap while eating in front of computer or tv.

2007-04-30T11:47:00.001-07:00

tonight's dinner is taken from the weightwatcher's new 365 meal/menu cookbook. Apologies for not having it in front of me to crosscheck the actual name of the book; around here I call it my diet book. I took some liberties with the base recipe, roast beef braised in red wine. I started with the chopped onion, caramelized in some oil, then added my chopped carrots and some finely diced celery and garlic, then after that had gotten all nice and friendly in the pot I set in my meat and a mini bottle of wine. I didn't have a roast. I still have a freezer of individually flash frozen omaha steaks, and since the recipe is supposed to serve 8 I figured hey, what the hell... I've got 4 filet mignons and 4 strip steaks sitting in there.

Instead of simmering on the stove top for two+ hours, since the outside temp is going to rise significantly and I'm trying hard to keep this place cool so the AC doesn't kick on... I put the whole thing in the crockpot to finish out the slow long simmer. So we'll see how that works out, right?

2007-04-27T11:14:00.001-07:00

Maybe this site should be more about how to stretch a dollar than how to be evironmentally conscious. Or it could be both. Both is good; of my choices the two are not mutally exclusive.

Anyone want a bread recipe? The one of the week is:
2 and 1/4 tsp yeast
1 Tbsp sugar
1 and 1/2 tsp salt
1 cup flour

stir in this a cup and a half of very warm water and 2 Tbsp melted butter. (Butter because you get what you put in. Good stuff in only makes it taste better) Let it rest until it's all bubbly and yeasty.

Then add the rest of the flour. Oh, say 1 cup and a bit -the bit is always variable depending on the dough. It should be like warm playdoh in your hands while kneading it through this step. And yes, your hands are going to get covered in large amounts of dough. You could try a spoon, or a heavy duty mixer, or whatever else seems good, but I've always had great luck with my hands. Better control over the dough.

Let your warmed kneaded dough rise until doubled in the bowl -I never really found a difference in whether or not it was oiled or not- but you need to cover it. Plastic wrap works. so do plastic shower caps (clean) or processing caps (from the beauty supply store) or even the elastic banded caps sold specifically for the purpose. When I was younger, a dishtowel served exactly the same thing with the benefit of being able to throw it in the washing machine.

Then you knead the dough again. Shape it into your finished product and put in the greased container it will be baked in. Cover again. Rise again until doubled. Then bake it at 350 for anywhere between 35 minutes and an hour depending on the shape and size of the product.

2007-04-25T11:00:00.000-07:00

Recipe for today:

slice about 4 pounds of potatoes (I used red ones, buttery-colored flesh)
slice thinly one onion
put into crockpot, and pour over it one jar of classico classic alfredo sauce. Swish about a third of that jar with milk to get any stray sauce bits out, and add to the pot.
Brown up some strips of pork- I used boneless pork chops, three or four, seasoned with rosemary and paprika. Add the strips to the pot.
Add two cans of corn, with juice, to the pot

Cook on low for about 6 or 7 hours. This makes a scrumptious scalloped potato/pork/corn casserole, easy to reheat, easy to freeze, and easy on the budget. Lots of flavor, fairly low in sodium.

2007-04-23T08:46:00.000-07:00

baking soda as toilet cleaner. I haven't tried this one yet, but I hope to. If I ever find the baking soda... Self-directed sigh and eyeroll. The boxes still aren't all unpacked from the move, and I am starting to doubt that they will ever be.

And yet... the mission goes on. How can I decrease our waste? How can I make this house cleaner with less toxins? When I get all the answers I'll let you know, but for now we're all in this together.

2007-04-20T08:16:00.000-07:00

I've been seeing more and more commercials about laundry detergents again. They all say that they are new and improved to work so well; bleach alternatives to make your whites whiter and your colors fresher, and that it's hard to get stains out.

I used to have the sort of problems that these products promise a solution for. But ever since I switched over to the melaleuca stuff, for some reason I don't have this problem at all.

Now my husband told me to go out and get some bleach the other week. I don't like bleach. Why? It smells. It makes me lightheaded to use it. Somehow every bottle of bleach we've ever owned has ended up in a Bleach Incident... leaking on the trunk, leaking on the carpet, eating through the bottle itself... This was bad enough when it was just us. Now the Toddler's involved in the equation I am finding myself getting antsier about the whole thing.

Yes, I bought the bleach. I hid it in the laundry room on the highest shelf. Do you think it's ever going to be opened? Or do you think my husband is just going to forget he ever asked me to get some?

2007-04-18T12:10:00.000-07:00

Today's solution to all my household woes is... duct tape.

Granted, it's an extremely cliched thing these days. It still works, though, and at the moment that's all I'm caring about. Not only will it seal baseboards and dishwasher leaks, it keeps diapers on my squiggly toddler. And is capable of fixing her screens. And is even, on occasion, useful for things like ducts.

I've never tried to duct tape a duck though. Sounds messy. Plus, as someone who once witnessed a grown man trying to blow dry a cat, I choose not to inflict that sort of mental image to my offspring. Or my husband. Or the rest of the Net.

2007-04-17T08:27:00.000-07:00

motherhood is not for the faint of heart. Not only does it start with discomfort and then the Event known as childbirth, but it segues into dirty diapers, the endless rounds of laundry that CANNOT be put off if you expect to ever use those items again... Damn but it's fun though.

This morning my daughter has chosen to entertain herself by putting an empty cardboard tp roll into an empty kleenex box. Then she takes it out. Then she puts the roll over her forearm so that it looks like a little cast- she has decided to use that to whack things with.

Am I going to stop her? Nope. Am I glad that she's using her imagination rather than playing with some specifically designed play set that costs more than an empty cardboard tube? Yep. Money aside, she's learning to reuse things. She still has all those nifty and neat toys, but this? This is pretty cool too. It makes me happy to play all the same games with her that I used to play with my mom. Same sorts of stuff, empty containers that have been washed but I never threw out; and when she inevitably destroys it I can just toss without feeling like we're wasting or destroying expensive stuff.

2007-04-13T18:51:00.000-07:00

Woo hoo for the Corelle! I'm thrilled, my replacement bowls should be here soon. Real soon. And I'm in heaven over it.

Also, woo-hoo for the latest thrifty diy project: I'm knitting up a set of kitchen towels and dishcloth. Will either send it to someone for a gift, or I'll just put it up with the next craft fair.

2007-04-12T20:03:00.000-07:00

Today's discovery is that tough'n'tender, my favorite cleaning product in the whole world, so fabulous that I'm going to send it a posy of roses and build a small shrine in it's honor... kills sugar ants. Those little black pests that make me want to ARRGHH!

Spray, die near instantly, wipe up with kitchen rag, toss rag in washer, no more ants.

Repeat as necessary, although after I've been doing it for a while I've got to say that the population is Way down. Maybe they're learning? Hope so. I don't want to waste this yummy product on ants.

2007-04-11T09:19:00.000-07:00

How do you tell the scams from the real workfromhome stuff? Is it really fair to paint all the websites with the same brush? Sure, there are legit things. There are also scams. I won't pretend to tell you what is good and what is bad and what is a product of the flying spaghetti monster's little green angels.

For myself I judge a site by what is attainable. I'm never going to make big bucks. It is never going to allow us to work a few hours a week and make millions. I can, however, make about a hundred a month through five or six different companies, and this can pay a bill or two. There are companies out there who do, in fact, pay a few cents for reading emails and clicking through to the advertisement. That's not going to buy a cup of coffee more than once a month, but I don't have to spend significant time with it and it costs me nothing out of pocket. There are survey sites that cost nothing to join, and if you just hang with them long enough there are modest returns on that.

Maybe the key here is to not expect an instant fortune. We all want that big payday, the one that means we'll never have to work again and have enough money for anything we want. All I want is a few cents here and there. Squirrel it away in the savings account or in a jar under the bed. Forget about it. And then when you need to buy a tire or two, or when there's something completely unexpected and you have to float a check just to maintain a bare necessity- you will still be able to put gas in the car and feed your family. Even if it's not much, it will be enough.

2007-04-10T07:27:00.000-07:00

Thanks to the reader's digest for sending me an email thingie that I don't remember ever signing up for- but it landed in my inbox with some nifty tips about clothespins. The regular, straight, wooden clips that you can pick up in the dollar store for next to nothing.

Use them to mark your place in a book.
Fasten them to the wall, or a rack, to make your own cheap and useful bulletin board. I use a little piece of duct tape to do it. I have a pin for holding my bills together, my outgoing mail, my coupons; when my daughter was on a special preemie formula that had to be prepared a certain way with extra cereals and baby food, I wrote down the recipe of the week [that's how often it changed, sometimes] and clipped it to the inside of the cupboard where her supplies were stored. This came in as a priceless help during middle of the night feedings, and my husband felt more confident about preparing the bottles. -He hesitated before the clip system because I spent so much more time with her, and when only one person is in charge of the system there's so many fewer ways it can go wrong. And who wants to play that game with their firstborn?

Use clothespins to seal up bags of chips, and to fasten up the innards of cereal boxes or any similar item. Use them to create impromptu bibs for messy meals- faster than tying on an infant bib and the best part is that the child won't outgrow the size of the towel!

2007-04-09T08:17:00.000-07:00

It seems that those plastic hair caps are even more useful than I told you... I used them yesterday to cover plates in the microwave, cover rising bread (didn't need to grease the bag and the dough didn't stick), and the one I decided to throw out is now doing coffee ground duty by the sink -invert grounds, dump, no drip trail across the kitchen to the trash can.

On today's list is coming up with uses for stained and ratty looking onesies. How many things can you use them for before having to throw them out? I've chopped off the top and bottom so that I now have a decent tubular rag. There will be minimal lint, so maybe I can use it for wiping down my silver before putting it away? I've started trying to enforce the lack of spots on my forks and spoons. I could also use it for wiping down a computer screen? Or in place of a paper towel wipe?

Does anyone have hints about what to do with the collection of empty milk gallons? They're not recyclable.

2007-04-06T11:12:00.000-07:00

sounds a bit odd, but works really well.

Those nifty elastic-rimmed saran wrap covers? Forget paying 2 or 3 dollars for a box. Just go down to the local beauty supply store and look for processing caps.

It's along the exact same lines; a clean plastic cover, elastic band around the edge. Fits over my mixing bowls, my dutch oven, and for everything smaller than that I can gather up the excess and tuck it under the dish. I got about 10 tens as many as are in a box of the other kind for the same amount of money.

Did you know that Sally's offers a military discount? Show the ID when you fill out the form and the card is free. I didn't know it, they may not advertise it widely, but it's both encouraged me to shop there and it will save me even more money through the non-label uses of products.

2007-04-06T07:51:00.000-07:00

My goal over the next three months is to get our family down to one bag of trash per week. This should not be hard. I tell myself that if we have another child, we should switch over to cloth diapers... But will it happen? I don't know. I could certainly try it.

The battle of cloth or disposable diapers is not an easy one to judge. Each side has their pros and cons, and they are not always judged the same for every family. For apartment dwellers who must seek a laundromat every day to wash the diapers, for families who choose a diaper service, for the families who find it easier to boil their diapers on the stove to achieve "proper" sanitation. It's really a huge tossup.

Disposables have been demonized as creating mountains of non biodegradable landfills. A single child in disposables will produce hundreds of these a month, thousands before they're potty-trained. The advantage being that they're easy to use, when you change the baby the diaper is tossed and you never have to see it or touch it again, and the child is always in a clean and germ-free environment.

Personally I refuse to say that one is better than the other. I can see both sides. If I had all the things that would make cloth as easy for our lifestyle as disposables, I would switch. Unfortunately I have to live in reality land. We just don't have the setup for cloth diapers. We don't have the money for a service, and there are certain instances where neither my husband nor myself can cope with what a cloth diaper entails. Next time? We might. We'll talk out the decision all over again.

2007-04-04T19:27:00.000-07:00

I'd been toying with the idea of a low-impact, low-budget life for quite a while. Does this mean that I'm all environmentally conscious? Nope. Just on a budget so tight that it might scream if I winched it any tighter.

It doesn't have to hurt. There are all sorts of things out there, and ideas can be had in any "older" book. Shopping? String bags. Or tote bags that can be had easily in thrift stores and yard sales -look for the promotional ones. If you just can't stand the logos and advertising on it, pick up a fabric marker or some fabric paint. Or an iron-on applique. Or even a sharpie. It won't hurt, it might sting a little, but it will take care of things.

No time to bake bread every week, and no money for a machine, and you just get tired of the pre-processed, preserved to within an inch of it's life, store-bought loaf? Yeah, it's a little bit more work to make your own. Cheat by mixing the first half of the dry ingredients ahead of time and store it in an empty [and clean] peanut butter jar. When you're ready, add the warm water to proof the yeast, then add only as much more flour as needed to attain that wonderful elastic dough.

Kneading dough is good for stress, too!

Old t-shirts? Old washclothes that are just too gross to use on your skin? Downgrade them to cleaning rags. I keep a roll of papertowels on the shelf for when I just need one for something, but for all my kitchen wipeups I've been able to switch over to a stack of old kitchen towels. They're so old I don't even remember where I came by them, but I'm fairly sure they were passed down from an older relative shortly after I set up housekeeping. They are older than I am. I am fortunate enough to have a washing machine now, so I can toss them straight over the side of the washtub after I use them.

More ideas when I get online again. Don't want to use them all up tonight.