Cooking for a Lifetime

I think we all can agree that raising children who can feed themselves healthy, budget-friendly meals is crucial. I really didn't feel like Elijah was prepared for cooking for himself as an adult. He enjoys cooking and has cooked next to me since he could hold a spoon, but cooking independently was not a common occurrence for him. Then during the last few years, he stopped cooking during times when he was drained of energy from the academic demands of high school. So during the past few months, I determined to make his cooking be a priority. He has been working his way through the book How to Feed Yourself by Spoon University. I love almost everything about this book. It talks to its audience as if they are a college student or perhaps just starting out in their own apartment with very little money or skills. It has a fun, youthful, non-judgmental vibe. 

Much to my delight, he hasn't complained about cooking the meals at all. He mostly makes them for me and serves them to me for lunch. I can't say he is the greatest fan about eating the meals himself. He is in that phase where he would rather survive on Cheerios, gallons of milk, any soda he can acquire and meat. However, he does try each dish and says that they taste good. I agree. I am very impressed with the meals so far. Most of them are single serve, but there are a few to make for your "roommates" or if "your mother is coming to dinner and you don't want her to think you are going to starve".

Fancy ramen

Frosting cupcakes

Healthy Mexican rice bowl

Scrappy cream cheese pasta

Shrimp and steak

Rotisserie Ceasar chicken wrap ~ this was my favorite so far.

A microwaved egg

We plan to continue with the book until he has cooked everything at least once (less one chapter). My only complaint is that there is a small section in the book for making fun, boozy cocktails. We are a dry household and with two adopted fetal alcohol syndrome kids, we focus a great deal on the dangers of alcohol. I wish they had left those recipes out. I may consider how they can be made into mock cocktails.

Blessings, Dawn

Thrifty Thursday ~ Buying Used Items

I get asked often how we "make it" in this area and still have a stay-at-home parent (for the past 20 years). We live in the city with the highest cost of living for our state. Stay at home parents are hard to come by and many are working two to three jobs to make ends meet.  There are a host of reasons why we are able to keep a parent at home that stem from careful lifestyle choices to some wonderful blessings. Today, I am going to talk about one of the main ways we stretch our pennies. We buy very, very few things that are new. I rely heavily on thrift stores for almost everything we want and need. In fact, I kept very careful records in January, and we only bought new (outside of food and medications) two school workbooks, a puzzle, a package of copy paper, plant-based trash bags, two panels of drywall and a can of paint. That actually seems like a lot to me, yet I know it isn't in comparison to what many folks buy.

I keep a running list of what we are looking for, and we patiently gather things as we see them. We practice patience. After all, there are very few items that are needed instantly. Most things can wait. We visit thrift stores every week. We are blessed to have about eight really nice thrift stores in the area. I have found that, in our area, thrift stores run by charities or the hospital tend to have the best finds. Church thrift stores are small or very picked over and consignment shops tend to ask bigger prices than I am generally willing to pay. This is what we found this week.

I found a brand new Vicks vaporizer still with tags on it, a cheese dome, a can organizer for the pantry and a dish drying rack.

• The dish drying rack cost me $1 and retails for $15 at Walmart.
• The cheese dome was $3 and retails for $32 at Walmart. We will use it for parties.
• The can organizer was $2 and retails for $8 on Amazon.
• The Vicks vaporizer was $3 and retails for $15 everywhere I looked.

We did the math and determined that we paid just 13% of what these items totaled would have cost new from a retail store. All of these items would have made a serious dent in my budget if I had purchased them new.

Now, the second part of this is to only buy what you need. The thrill of the hunt can become addictive. My daughter and I love to search for new to us stuff, but we hate having tons of belongings cluttering our home. So, we only buy what will truly enhance our lives and get rid of stuff as soon as it is no longer needed or enjoyed. This revolving door of belongings is easier to stomach, because we paid very little for them in the first place. Thus, parting with them is pretty easy.

Blessings, Dawn

Thrifty Thursday ~ An Efficient Kitchen and a Plan

Today I am going to talk about having an efficient kitchen. Having a kitchen that works smoothly goes a long way to getting three meals and numerous snacks produced every day. When the top rack of my dishwasher died a few weeks ago, I started off washing half the dishes and washing the other half in the dishwasher. This was not efficient and was causing all kinds of "dish traffic jams" around the sink. Clean dishes and dirty dishes were getting mixed up and it was a mess. My reaction to this was to empty all of the cupboards and completely redo the layout of the kitchen. A bit of an extreme reaction, I know. BUT...There were several areas in the kitchen that were not working, and it was very much time for a change.

Washing Station

The first change was to stop using the dishwasher completely. Now we wash the dishes two to three times a day or whenever the dishpan in the sink is full. I leave the dishpan out all of the time and people place their dirty dishes in it. When it is full, I fill it with soapy water and let it soak for a few minutes. Then I put on my gloves and wash the dishes. A full dishpan takes about six minutes, if there is a stubborn dish or pan in the mix, although it can take less than that if it is mostly cups and silverware. My gloves hang over the sink to dry and the dishes dry on a towel. When you do dishes in small batches, they are easier to put away quickly. I find it easier to find two or three minutes to do a chore than finding ten minutes. It is simple, quick and there are no more dish traffic jams.

I love looking at homes on the Internet and in magazines. I love to see all of the beauty in those showcased homes, but I really wouldn't be that comfortable living in one. There is beauty in the domestic home as well. A house that is truly working for its family is going to stay tidier and be more comfortable. The gloves hanging over the sink don't bother me a bit. Their presence mean my kitchen is clean and my hands aren't chapped. 

Breakfast Area

I created a breakfast-making area right next to the sink. Everything is at arm's reach. The coffeemaker, toaster, fruit bowl and cereal jars are on the counter. The cupboard above the counter has dishes in it, and the drawer below the counter has everyone's medications and supplements. Of course, the medications would have to go up if we had little people in the house. The cutting board no longer has appliances on it, so fruit can be cut up right there and left on a plate for breakfast stragglers. The black cutting board is right next to the under the counter trash and recycling area that my husband installed this past weekend. I love it. Most of my kitchen trash is created when I am prepping meals. Now, the trash is right there, and I don't need to walk across the room dripping gross stuff. 

Baking Area

The baking area is now in a spot that used to be the disaster zone in our kitchen. It used to hold the coffee station, spices, water filter and miscellaneous "projects" such as thawing meat for dinner. Now, it is devoted to baking only.  The drawer and the cabinet below the baking area hold everything I need to make our baked goods. All of the flours and mixes are above the baking area. There are no more wasted steps to find the items I need all over the kitchen and I have enough space to whip up bread or biscuits whenever we need them.

I also switched the cabinet contents under the breakfast bar and the stove top. Now all of the pots are under the stove and all of the entertainment items (less the china which is still up high) and rarely used items are under the breakfast bar. Now, we have a large cabinet that we rarely have to go into which helps prevent things getting "lost" in the kitchen. 

There used to be a day almost every week that a few or all of us would break down and get pizza or eat crappy fast food, because the kitchen was a disaster or we just didn't feel like we had time because an item was lost in the kitchen or we forgot to follow the meal plan for the week and thaw meat. Now, I look forward to working in the kitchen, which is half the battle. The new kitchen layout has already saved us from ordering pizza or eating out this past week. That is a huge savings to our family. I can see that it will continue to save us $20+ a week, if not a bit more.

Blessings, Dawn

Thrifty Thursday ~ Buying a Used Minivan

This may seem like a strange post for Thrifty Thursday, since I am going to talk about spending lots of money. Sometimes you need to spend money to add security and save money down the road. Our former minivan cost us several thousand dollars in the last year. It had high mileage and was obviously nearing the end of its life. We probably held on to it for too long. When the transmission began to go a few weeks ago, we knew it was at its end. We had invested enough money into a car that was pushing 200,000 miles, was 13 years old and had potentially expired air bags (they are only guaranteed by the manufacture for 10 years). We were also well aware that newer minivans had many more safety features, such as a backup camera, additional roll bars in the roof, Bluetooth for hands-free calling and alerts for if you are getting too close to a wall, etc. These extra safety features felt even more important knowing that we were on the cusp of having two brand new teen drivers in our family. Anything I can do to increase their safety on the road is high on my list of things to spend money on!

The short story for those who don't want to read all of this. Always buy used and always do your best to pay cash.
So, we decided to buy a relatively new mini van...just four years old with low mileage. However, we made the commitment to buy it for cash and not to take on any debt. Fortunately, we had a small inheritance from my father, which we spent a good portion of last year to buy a used car for my husband to replace his 19 year old car. After much deliberation, we decided to spend the rest of our inheritance to purchase a used (but as new as we could get for cash) minivan. Now, if we hadn't had the inheritance, we would have had to buy something much cheaper, older and probably not even a minivan -- or even gone to sharing one car for a year or so. We have gone down to one car before for months on end. We even went through a spell once when our one car did not fit our entire family and we had little ones at the time. That was an interesting period. However, this time we were blessed with this pocket of money. So, we set out to spend it as wisely as we could.

Why we chose a minivan ~ Several people have asked why we purchased a minivan when our kids are practically grown up.

• We love to travel and traveling by car is always cheaper than other forms of travel. We have six family members including grandma and often take the dog with us as well.
• Our children are not likely to leave home immediately due to special needs and the cost of living in our area. It is just hard to launch into complete independent adulthood around here.
• When I return to work in the next year or so, I will most likely be providing in-home childcare, and a minivan will be useful to my job.
• We cart lots of teens around. My kids have lots of friends who visit us frequently, and I often end up carting around four to five teens on the weekend.

We did tons of research and decided that a KIA Sedona was the best fit for our family. They are very affordable (next to their competitors), have a 5 Star Safety Rating, affordable maintenance outlook, and plenty of bells and whistles. 

Consequently, this is what we bought! A 2016 KIA Sedona with back-up camera. It even came with an eighth seat if we want to put it into the middle row. It drives so smoothly. I am sure anything would drive smoothly after my former minivan that was shaking violently at every light, plus and the transmission was slipping when you least expected it. What a relief to teach my kids to drive with a reliable vehicle!

One funny aside. During the haggling process over price at the dealership, an elderly man came up  to me while the car dealer had stepped away. He told me he was enjoying watching me haggle. He said it was a lost art and I was doing a great job. Now, I really don't enjoy haggling, but I hate paying an unfair price even more. My husband doesn't haggle. He is given the price and he pays it. We knew going in that, if we wanted a fair price and something we could afford, I would be in charge of the purse strings and haggling. I did a bit of research on getting a fair deal from a dealership before going in to buy both used cars that we purchased in the past year. I knew what were fair charges and what were up charges that I could insist that the dealer make disappear. I was honest about other minivans that I could go and see and that I fully understood that it was January and that this was a minivan, so they were going to have trouble moving it. Minivans aren't super popular right now. My husband said it looked like the salesperson's eyes were going to pop out a few times. But I just remained honest, patient, steady and true to our bottom line. In the end, we got very close to what we wanted to pay.

Speaking of teens driving -- in our state, teens are required to have six hours of driving instruction from a professional driving instructor before they can get their learner's permit and practice with their parents. Now, I could have picked the free way and gone through the school system. However, I heard many horror stories from my kids' friends. They told about being forced to drive on the highway in the first two hours behind the wheel even though they were shaking and crying! They told stories about other teens arriving to take their lesson high on drugs and the instructor not noticing (at least not right away). The more I listened, the more I knew this was not the way for us. I am more than happy to spend money when safety is involved and there is nothing more important for my teens to be learning right now than how to drive safely for a lifetime. I am investing in their lives and all the other lives they meet on the road. So, we decided to go with a private driving academy, which isn't cheap. However, the instructor teaches only one student at a time, welcomes parents to ride along so parents can learn techniques to teach their kids later, tailors the lessons to each individual teen instead of scrolling through a check list, and is happy to work with special needs.

Anne started her lessons first. She is ready to move on with driving lessons. Dean would rather wait a few more months. He tends to prefer to see how it goes for a sibling before he will try  something out. It has been a fantastic experience for Anne! We may even decide to do a few extra lessons once she has her learner's permit. The instructor is calm and has really put Anne at ease. I am learning a lot from the back seat. I didn't expect to learn much of anything. I have a completely clean driving record and consider myself a law abiding, good driver. However, I am learning each time.

We had wanted to replace the roof on our home with the remaining amount of our inheritance, but having two safe vehicles was more important. The roof can wait for now. We are abundantly blessed.

Blessings, Dawn

Thrifty Thursday ~ Throwing a Party for Pennies

We had our annual New Year's Day party last week. I thought I would share how we create a fun party for less than five dollars a person. In fact, this party cost $4.20 a person. We had 15 people, including ourselves. Now, if you are looking for amazing decor, you probably want to move on. We did not focus on that this time and I only took about six photos. I was way more busy playing hostess than photographer. Also, I knew upfront that this needed to be a budget-friendly party and that we were inviting people that were just happy to be with us and didn't need amazing decor and frivolity.

Anne wore a dress that was from the 1920's and gifted to her from an aunt. 

My daughter really wanted a 1920's theme for the party. She researched popular party styles of the early 20's (before the wild parties represented in the book and movies, The Great Gatsby). She said group game nights and dinner parties were all the rage. Now, it just so happens that we were gifted an organic turkey, and our family doesn't really care much for turkey, plus we love games. This sounded like a real possibility for our party.

We decided on a full dinner with turkey and all the usual trimmings. We then decided to play two group games. We also found lots of 1920's jazz music on YouTube to play in the background.

The Dinner ~ The number one rule is use what you have.

• I used our own dishes. We had exactly 15 Corelle dinner plates that are our everyday plates and 15 punch glasses. I had to borrow a bit of flatware from my Mother to have enough for everyone to have a full place setting. 
• We used that gifted turkey, which didn't cost us a thing and made a wonderful filling meal.
• I made cranberry sauce from frozen cranberries that were sitting in the freezer.
• I shopped the after-Christmas sales and got two frozen name brand pies for $5 total.
• We bought pre-made mashed potatoes, pies and stuffing for time management.
• I used my own linens mixed with dollar store gold tablecloths for the table settings.
• We DID NOT serve any alcohol. We don't drink it anyway and the cost is exorbitant.

Our menu included: turkey, boxed stuffing, cucumbers with dip, rolls, gravy, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, Key Lime pie, Ice Cream pie and clear punch (ginger ale, lemon lime soda and white grape juice).

We struggled with having enough chairs. We ended up using our outdoor chairs, the piano bench and two folding chairs. Like I said, this was about having friends over to ring in the new year, not about creating a show stopper. 

After a lovely meal, we started the games. We played many rounds of Bingo. I didn't get a single picture because I was the bingo caller. We had prizes from my Mother's and my own gift boxes. I am sure we aren't the only ones that keep a box of brand new items just in case we are invited to a party or event and need something quickly. We also had a selection of candy from the Dollar Store. Our prizes consisted of candy, multi-gum packs, lotion, candles, post card books, a few travel games, an ornament and Pringle chips. I was surprised how much everyone was into this game. Even the adults were very serious about winning. We played until everyone won and we were out of prizes.

We also played a Skittles tournament. The winners received a box of Skittles. You can see that, for comfort's sake, Anne had ditched the dress for a onesie pajama by then.

It was a great afternoon filled with fun and friendship. I got several texts afterward thanking me for the wonderful food and fellowship. It just goes to show you don't need a ton of money to have a wonderful time. 

We could have saved even more money by making everything from scratch or having a hot chocolate bar with light snacks instead of a full meal. 

Blessings, Dawn

Finding Christmas Money in a Tight Budget

We have lived on a tight budget for years. However, this year the budget is much tighter because of the costs associated with providing our daughter, Goldilocks, with mental health boarding home care. Our monthly co-pay after insurance is a fourth of our income. Last year I tried to supplement our grocery bill by eating out of our freezer to clear up Christmas money. While I saw the value of my plan, I hadn't thought of it soon enough to really stockpile. This summer I realized that, if we were going to have Christmas and extra heating bill money, I was needed to half our grocery bill each week from mid-November to Christmas. So, I made a real effort to add one extra thing to the freezer and one extra food item to the pantry each week. We will see how I did.

Week One ~ I spent $90 on groceries to start this week. I usually spend about $180. I hope that I do not need to buy anything more. Our groceries include food and household products. This week I needed a new mop head which set me back $4.70. I also am in charge of providing snack for Lego Club this month. I am feeding the 20+ kids a 3 oz. cup of Whole Grain Goldfish and a 3 oz. cup of grapes. We try to eat as organically as possible, and all of our meat is cage free and as grain free as possible. We eat very little organic dairy.

Menu Plan ~ 

Dinner

• Homemade chicken pot pie
• Chicken drumsticks with rice and salad
• Spaghetti with meatballs and peas
• Colcannon with diced ham and peas
• Pancakes with sausage and oranges
• Baked potato bar

Lunch

• Leftovers a few times
• Homemade bread and fruit salad
• Nut and veggie platter
• Cream cheese and cucumber sandwiches
• Banana bread with oranges and nuts

Breakfast

• Waffles with apples
• Oatmeal with apples
• Homemade pancakes with oranges
• Smoothies (frozen fruit and Greek yogurt) and toast
• French  toast with oranges

The only things I took from the freezer was a can of orange juice and a bag of smile potatoes which will supplement the kids' luxury liquids when they get bored of tea and cashew milk. We drink water with most meals and snacks.

Here is what our freezer looks like on November 17.

Right side of Freezer

Left side and top trays

If I don't need to spend any more grocery money this week, we will have saved $90. That money will pay some of the donation shipping cost on our Operation Christmas Child boxes and offset the cost of an emergency repair our furnace needed this weekend. The rest of the money for the furnace repair will come from switching cars with my husband this week. He drives much less than me and had almost a full tank of gas. 

Blessings, Dawn

Week 20 ~ Photography, Astronomy and Not Buying It

Artist Study of Dorothea Lange ~ We finished an artist study of Dorothea Lange this week. We studied many of her photos from the 1930's to the early 1950's. We used the books Restless Spitit The Life and Work of Dorothea Lange and Dorothea Lange Looks at the American Country Woman. We talked about staging a shot versus candid shots. We talked about how a picture is worth a thousand words. We then looked at famous portrait photos from other photographers using the book, Life Faces. Some of the photos were candid and others were staged. I then challenged the children to take their own staged photographs of each other. I asked them to try to catch an emotion in their pictures. Once they were pleased with their creations, we loaded them to Photobucket and turned them into black and white or metropolis. Here are their results.

Goldilocks's Pictures ~ 

This picture was staged and taken by Goldilocks (13) of her sister. She was trying to get a sad or reflective look.

She also staged our dog, Lady, getting into the recycling. She wanted the edges of the photo darker when we edited so the picture would look more like a scary or mysterious photo.

Tom Sawyer's Pictures ~ 

Tom Sawyer (11) wanted to catch a picture of his sister being contemplative. He set her up holding a wooden apple.

He also staged this shot of kids peeking through a doorway. However, he wanted to be in it, so Goldilocks took the picture with much directing from Tom Sawyer.

Little Red Riding Hood's Picture ~

Little Red Riding Hood (10) wanted to catch her brother in a shocked pose. She put her reading glasses on him and made him pose with a "girly" book.

Astronomy ~ We finally got underway with our study of astronomy. We read the first chapter in our books, Real Science 4 Kids Focus on Middle School Astronomy and Beyond the Solar System Exploring Galaxies, Black Holes, Alien Planets, and More. The children learned the difference between Geocentric (earth at the center) and Heliocentric (sun at the center) solar system theories. Then then drew what they had learned and narrated the information back to me.

The kids then went out to look at the night sky with Daddy and found the North Star, the Little Dipper and Orion through our telescope.

Not Buying It ~ I added $10 to my gas tank and spent $90 on food this week. Other than paying our bills not another dollar was spent!! I am very much looking forward to payday on Friday. There is hardly any food left in my home and both of our cars need gas. However, we had good meals all week and no one went hungry. We ate homemade soup many nights and used meat as a flavoring. I kept up with making things from scratch or making do without this week.

Things we fixed this week:

• Glued Little Red Riding Hood's ballet shoes back together for the second time (we are going to need to replace them very soon).
• Sewed up several holes in Tom Sawyers sweat pants.
• Made more dishwashing detergent with borax, washing soda, and baking soda.
• Removed the cast and bandages from Boomer (the dog) so we wouldn't have to pay the vet to do it. I was going to take him in to have the stitches removed, but he  pulled them out last night and the leg looks good. 
• Washed the cars by hand to get all of the salt/sand off of them.
• Fixed the typewriter that had a broken part -- thanks to DH.

The Rest ~ We have a very busy schedule starting Friday. It will be interesting to see if we can avoid buying food out on the road. I have spent much of my free time this week exploring the video option on my new camera. I can figure out how to make videos and download them to the computer. But when I try to upload them to blogger it takes forever and I keep giving up. Does it really take 20 plus minutes to upload a 40 second video? Does anyone have any ideas how to get the video on here?

Blessings, Dawn

Melted Crayon Butterflies

We decided to make melted crayon butterfly suncatchers for Meals on Wheels this month.  We wanted to do something to celebrate Easter and spring.  I had tons of crayon bits and thought suncatchers would be great for the homebound. 

First ~ Grate the crayons into separate bowls by color.  After much trial and error, we discovered that pencil sharpeners worked well.

Second ~ We traced a butterfly template onto waxpaper and put the shredded crayon onto each one (NOTE  ~ less is better).  Then cover with another piece of waxpaper and towel.  We had to leave the iron on each one for a minute or so.

Third ~ We let each one cool before cutting them out.

Fourth ~ We added a little note to each one.  They are really cute.  This was a fun and very inexpensive charity.  It was very time consuming, however.  I think we spent about 4 hours on this project over two days. 

We look forward to dropping them off to the Meals on Wheels headquarters in the next day or so.

Blessings, Dawn

A Frugal, Fun Gift for a Teenage Boy

In the past year, my oldest has been invited to more birthday parties than the total combined in the rest of his life.  I am so happy for him!  However, we are pinching every penny in our family, so it is important to get creative with all of those gifts.  I came up with a creative idea that was a real hit this weekend.  Tim gave his friend Diet Coke and Mentos for a fun explosive science experiment. 

I bought two big bottles of Diet Coke and one package of Mentos.  I taped them together and added the directions, which included one of the videos from You Tube on exploding the bottles.   I recycled the bow off of our homemade wreath so it would be "wrapped".  The young man was very excited -- his eyes got huge and really lit up when he saw the gift.  As Tim was getting out of the car, holding the bottles, other party goers gathered around with excitement.  They even set them off at the party.  The birthday teen said he'd always wanted to do that explosive experiment but hadn't gotten to.  The total cost of this was $5, and it was a big hit!!

Blessings,

Dawn