My newest way to save money in the kitchen? Grow it yourself! Since we bought our house last fall, we have been discovering all kinds of goodies in our yard. When we first moved in, the previous owners left behind a full harvest of carrots and beets for us. We discovered we have a pear tree which gives off a hefty harvest, and the pears are SO yummy! Then we realized we have a blueberry bush … that actually produces. Now there are a few blackberry vines trickling through. My hubby is all about destroying them, but I am (not so) secretly hoping they will survive, because I love fresh blackberries! Our tomatoes are producing, and it looks like we have about 10 bell peppers starting to grow. Also hoping for some corn and more lettuce.


I have always joked that I have a black thumb. But I have discovered this odd new love of gardening since buying our own home. I think there’s some special sense of pride when it’s your own and when you grow it with your own hands. My flowers and vegetables are all thriving this year! I actually planted flower bulbs last winter … and they actually grew flowers this spring! I know it makes me a total geek, but it was like I had accomplished climbing Mt. Everest or something when those tulips actually bloomed! Apparently, my gardening gene was just being repressed during all those years of apartment living. And now it is starting to thrive and grow … and I love it!


I am so excited to be able to put food on my family’s table in the coming months. Food that I didn’t go and pay retail for at the grocery store. It is such a money saver to grow it yourself. Now, I cheat with the tomatoes and refuse to plant seeds. I buy starter plants, because growing from seed has just never worked for me. But it’s still cheaper! I am planning to learn how to can this year, so I can stash away some of those pears for winter time. If the corn works out, I will freeze a bunch for later. Our blueberry plant seems to be producing a LOT, so I’d like to freeze some of them as well. Since we are on a much healthier eating plan now, all this “fresh” produce is going to save us a lot of money in the coming months. So I’m challenging myself to see how much I can grow, produce and store away this year … and then I’m going to try and double that next year!

Today was a massive pantry clean-out. Hubby and I are getting ready for our new weight loss plan, and I am determined to do this right. We have been using up as much as we could, but there’s just no getting around the excess that is left over. So, the unopened cereal boxes have already been donated to other lucky users, along with things like Hamburger Helper and those lovely blue boxes of Mac & Cheese.


But today it gets serious. I emptied out partial containers of “mashed potatoes” (you know – the boxed variety – don’t ask – my hubby loves the boxed stuff over the real thing – I know), emptied out the last of the white rice, scarfed down the last of my Apple Jacks, threw out partial packages of buttery crackers and dried fruit I’d forgotten we bought. I managed to clear 3 full shelves in the pantry! Which was just enough space for MY meal stuff for the next month. Guess I’m gonna have to get SUPER serious tomorrow if there’s gonna be room for hubby’s food! Which means saying goodbye to my yummy croutons, all the cans of divine tomatoes and corn, the brown sugar … and, I guess, the chocolate cake mix. Probably not on the diet. Probably.


Good thing tomorrow is trash day. No time for me to change my mind and rescue a few old favorites. By the time I get up in the morning, all those yummy temptations will be long gone. Time for a fresh start … stay tuned!

So, my hubby started his new work schedule this week, of 3 days on, 3 days off. Which is actually quite fabulous. I am really looking forward to having some weekdays to do things as a family or just get stuff done around the house that we want to do (but can’t seem to cram into the weekends). However, it is going to create an interesting dilemma for dinnertime on certain days.


For example, today he gets off work at 6 pm, which means arriving home at 7 pm after he deals with the evening commute (and this is if he gets off work on time!). The kiddo gets up from her nap around 4:30’ish usually. Most days, she gets a little snack to tide her over until dinner, and dinner is between 5:30 and 6:00. No way can she wait until Daddy gets home from work on a night like tonight. So, do I make dinner and have it ready at 5:30 for the two of us girls and then just re-heat for hubby? Or do I make her something quick and easy, then wait and eat with hubby when he gets home? If I do the latter, the little girl will undoubtedly mooch off both our dinners and end up with an extra meal for the evening, right before bedtime. If I choose the first option, hubby has to eat alone, and said child will still mooch off his plate. 

At least for tonight, I am leaning towards fixing dinner at the normal time and re-heating for hubby after he gets home. But I hate to do that to him on a regular basis. Do any of you have weird schedules that you have to work around? How do you handle it? What are some of your ideas for handling multiple meal times? I would love some ideas!

It is officially that time of year when it suddenly becomes affordable to buy (most) fruit again. And, since there has been more variety in the store, I have been trying to buy more than just bananas for my daughter. This past week, I bought a beautiful bag of grapes … which are already growing fuzz on them. Grrr. Apparently, my problem is that I left them out in the basket with the other fruit. I am going to try the advice I found and store them in the fridge the next time. I am not entirely convinced that will solve my problem, but I will keep you posted.


However, in my quest to find answers about how to keep the nasty fuzz off my grapes, I stumbled across a really nifty website I thought I would share with you. http://www.lovefoodhatewaste.com/ They have tips for just about anything you can think of – tips for fruit, meat, storing things in your fridge, freezer ideas, etc. I have barely skimmed the surface of it, but I have bookmarked it to spend some more time at. Just thought I’d pass my new find along to you, in case anyone is as challenged in the fruit area as me!


And, since I probably will not have time to get on the computer tomorrow, I wanted to wish everyone a Happy 4th of July. Take a moment to remember why we celebrate, and if you know a soldier or their family, give them a big hug and say thanks!

Today is officially one of my least favorite days of the year. I knew it was coming. I have dreaded it’s arrival. I thought maybe it might still be a few days away … until my husband muttered those ominous words, “Something smells funny in the refrigerator.”


Time to clean out the fridge. Blech.


About the only thing that ranks lower on my list of chores I hate … is scrubbing the toilet. And thank heavens for a husband who has made cleaning the toilets his official job for almost 15 years now. He is a life-saver!


However, I am on my own with the fridge. Oh, he would probably do it, but things would disappear that weren’t supposed to. Food that is perfectly good would get thrown away, and my tupperware containers would disappear into this weird black hole that only my husband seems to know the location of. It is for this same reason that he is no longer allowed to unload the dishwasher … things disappear.


So, I’m off to peer into the depths of my fridge, trashcan in hand, and get rid of all the food we’ve let go to waste. I think that’s the main reason I hate to clean the fridge. I hate acknowledging that we have let perfectly good food go to waste. Leftovers that got shoved to the back of the fridge after I went grocery shopping, and then they were forgotten. Condiments that went bad, because we forgot we had them. Things that just don’t smell quite right. It’s sad to say goodbye to what should have been a perfectly good meal for someone but will now take up space in my trash.


However, it’s time to throw out the old, do a little cleaning and scrubbing, and welcome in some new, fresh, yummy, healthy food. A bit like life, really. Cleaning out all the icky bits in our lives is never fun. But it’s necessary if we’re going to make room for the new, healthy, wonderful stuff that God wants to fill us with.


Who’d have thought I would gain a life lesson out of cleaning my fridge?!

I am attempting to get back in the habit of planning my menu each week. When I have done this in the past, it saves both time and money. Not to mention I don’t have to listen to my husband asking every morning and evening, “What’s for dinner tonight?” 🙂 So, last week, I posted our menu for the week on my lovely new organization center that is hanging from the side of my fridge. And we managed to stick pretty closely to it. But, it is a new week, so it is time to start over again.


Once I get done sipping my first cup of coffee and enjoying this rare, quiet, beautiful Oregon morning, I am heading inside to peer into my freezer, rifle through my pantry, and see if I can manage to make a menu for the week that does not include shopping. I think I’m in pretty good shape this week. I still have plenty of meat in the freezer, and we bought fresh veggies at the Farmer’s Market yesterday. My pantry is starting to look a little less crowded, thanks to doing the same thing last week. However, I still have about 18 cans of various stocks and soups, lots of canned tomatoes, a big ol’ container of V8 (which means I MUST make lasagna this week!), and about 10 cans of sloppy joe mix. I even have a full thing of milk in the fridge. I think I really might stand a chance of (mostly) avoiding the stores this week … which makes me very happy, since I hate to shop!


So, my challenge for you today is to see if you can make an entire week’s meals from your pantry this time. What are some cheap and easy recipes you can make that include what you already have? Plan ahead for refrigerator goulash night – put it on the menu! If your household is like mine, the last week of the month is always a good time to save money, since that pesky mortgage or rent payment is coming up on the 1st! Try it, and let me know how it goes!

I am planning on making beef pot pie for tonight’s dinner. I had the menu card in my organizer box, so that must mean I have a recipe card for it, right? 


Wrong.


So, I headed over to one of my favorite websites, http://allrecipes.com, and searched for “beef pot pie”. It returned some promising selections, one of which was this one: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Beef-Pot-Pie-II/Detail.aspx. However, I am missing onions, Beau Monde seasoning and buttermilk baking mix. But, I have all the other basic ingredients, so I will just make a few substitutions. 


My hubby doesn’t really like onions in his food anyway, so he’ll be happy that it didn’t turn out quite the same. I have onion powder, so I’ll just add that to the meat as I cook it. I actually had to “bing” Beau Monde seasoning, because I had no clue what it was. I have a steak seasoning packet that has been in my spice cupboard for a while now and needs to be used up anyway. It will make a fine substitute. And buttermilk baking mix? I don’t know if that’s a specific mix, or if the original chef meant the equivalent of Bisquick … neither of which I have on hand. However, I have some cornbread mix that really needs to get used up (and which I am tired of taking up space in my pantry). Hubby loves cornbread, so again, he won’t mind the substitution.


Substitutions really are pretty easy. I used to be scared of using an ingredient other than what the recipe called for. I have learned, though, that it really is not that scary. Do it one ingredient at a time. As a whole, if I looked at a recipe and saw I was missing half the ingredients, it’s a little daunting. But, if I break it down, one ingredient at a time, it’s not as difficult as it seemed at first glance. It gets those creative juices flowing, it gets rid of random things in your pantry that you weren’t using anyway … and sometimes, you end up with the best recipes you’ve ever tried!