Crock Pot Wednesdays

Visit Dining with Debbie for Crock pot Wednesdays for more recipes!

Crock pot Lasagna

12oz box lasagna noodles(uncooked)

1 jar Spaghetti Sauce(or homemade)

1 12oz bag Mozzarella(I use more)

1 small container ricotta(I omit, husband doesn't like)

1 pound ground beef

Brown ground beef and drain. Add spaghetti sauce and stir. Add sauce to bottom of crock pot followed by a double layer of noodles(I have to break mine in half). If using ricotta add it next followed by mozzarella. Keep layering in that order until all ingredients are used. Cook on low for 4-5 hours. I use a crock pot liner to make cleanup a snap!

Kitchen Tip Tuesday

If you watch Rachel Ray then you know she uses a garbage bowl while cooking for all the trash. I use a plastic grocery bag instead. I just hang it on one of my drawer pulls and fill it as I cook.

If I am peeling potatoes or carrots I lay a plastic bag flat in the sink and peel the veggies right on the bag. When finished I pick it up by the four corners and throw it right in the trash. I used to use my garbage disposal for peelings, but once my drain got clogged doing that so I started using the bag.

Check out other tips at Tammy's Recipes

Menu Plan Monday

This my first time posting on Menu Plan Monday. I normally just fly by the seat of my pants. Organization does not come naturally for me...I have to work at it! So, in an effort to save money, organize my shopping and know before 4pm what I'm serving for dinner that night, I'm going to plan my menu for the week. Here goes:

Monday:Marinated Pork Chops,Broiled Potatoes,Applesauce

Tuesday: Baked Flounder, Sweet Potato Fries, hush puppies

Wednesday: BBQ Chicken Pizza

Thursday: Roasted Tomato Soup and grilled cheese sandwiches

Friday: Mexican Meatloaf (in the freezer) Mac & Cheese, green beans

Saturday: Spaghetti and Garlic Bread

Sunday: Hot Dogs and chips

Check out other menu plans at Orgjunkie.com

CVS

I sent my oldest son to CVS to do my first deal this week. It was any easy one:

Transaction #1
Buy 6 12pks of Pepsi products for $20
~use $4/$20
~use $3/15
~use $2/$10
Total $11 oop on Gift Card
Received $10 ECB

So, essentially I paid $1 for 6 12 packs! Technically, I didn't pay anything because I used a coupon to get that $25 gift card when I filled a new prescription there.

I'll post the other transactions as they happen!

Wet and White

Here in the Piedmont of NC we only get snow 1-2 times a season if we are lucky. Today is one of times! I was awakened by my 4 year old's sweetest voice saying "It's snowing". Actually, now it is raining, but I snapped a pic of it before it all gets washed away.

Free Online Budgeting Site

There is a lot of talk about budgeting this time of year. BudgetSimple is a free online budgeting site that I use. The site lives up to it's name as it is truly simple! Works for me!

Kitchen Tip Tuesday

When mixing meatloaf, rolling up meatballs, or just shaping sausage patties to fry for breakfast wet your hands. Wetting your hands before playing in ground meat keeps the meat from sticking to them so much and makes them easier to wash afterwards. Check out other kitchen tips at Tammy's Recipes.

Newbie to Recycling

This month our community started a recycling pick up program. As a frugal person recycling just makes sense to me. So, since mid December I have been saving all paper, cans and plastic bottles. I rinse the cans and bottles, remove the bottle caps, as they are not recyclable, and put them in the bin. Well, being winter time bug attraction is not a problem, but I can see how this may attract unwanted pests in the summer. I was just wondering what some long time recyclers do to avoid this potential problem. Any advice would be appreciated!

Tip Nut

I check out Tipnut.com about once a week. They post a large array of household ideas from recipes to sewing pattern to how to's. It is neat check it out!

Free Money

I am not a big fan of Suze Orman, but if she is giving away $100 I like her a little better (Ameritrade is really doing the giving). Some of you may have already heard of this account, but it is over in March and I wanted to bring it to light before the deadline. Check out the details.

Quick and Easy Meal

I ideally like to cook from scratch, but in a pinch I have a few quick helpers in that I like to keep on hand when I need to whip up something fast.

Bush's Chili Magic is just one of those qick fix meals. It is stocked on the canned bean isle in the grocery store. It has the beans and all the spices, you just add ground beef and a can of tomatoes. It is relatively inexpensive too at only around
0.79-0.89 for a can.

If you have ground beef crumbles in the freezor, the meal comes together even faster. Does anyone else have a quick fix meal they could share?

There are worse addictions

As a frugal person, I believe every person has a least one frugal bone in their body! I often turn people on to deals I hear about and how I save money using coupons, thrift shopping, and buying from garage sales. I have been talking a lot about my CVS deals with some of my friends and a couple of them are hooked! Especially my friend Karen. She reminds me of myself when I first started CVSing, by making 2-3 runs a day to get the bargains. She calls me all the time to tell me her lastest deal. She also has recently started shopping at Goodwill with my encouragement.
I warned her yesterday to be careful because the frugal lifestyle is addictive!

But I personally love it!

Does anyone else share your deals with others?

Unknown Illness

My 16yo son has been really sick for about three 4-6 weeks with abdominal pain, nausea and vomiting. He had no appetite and lost 35 pounds in the last 2 months, 5 of those pounds he lost just this week. He is a big guy(6'2) so he had a little to work with..thank goodness. Every test, blood,stool and diagnostic, they have performed on him has been negative. Well, he woke up yesterday and said "I'm hungry". That was music to my ears, because all I have heard was "I'm not hungry", "I'm full" after only a few bites, and "I'm nauseous".
So, what was this mysterious illness? I wish I knew. If I had to guess I would say it had to be some sort of virus. I don't think we know what all kind of "bugs" are out there. It's really scary!
He was able to go back to school today after missing the last 7 school days. I just pray he can make it through today without any problems and then I'll consider him out of the woods.

Free Jeans, if you're lucky

I, like the Homemaker of the 21st Century, love Gap jeans. Although one of my favorite pairs of jeans are made by Express. I recently heard about Steve and Barry's store, but have never been there. Apparently, they sell Sarah Jessica Parkers jeans Bitten and Homemaker was so impressed with them she is giving away a free pair!!

Free cookbook

I use my crock pot a few times a month. In an effort to increase it's usefulness, I went looking around on the web for new recipes specificly to cook in it. I found this free downloadable crock pot cookbook in the process at Easy Crock Pot Recipes. They will send you other free cookbooks and tips and tricks via email when sign up, but you can cancel anytime.

Sometimes you have to ask

After church yesterday our family went to Pizza Hut for the buffet. My little one is four and they charge $3.59 for a child's buffet and .99 for a child's drink. After we had finished eating my 4yo had only eaten shredded cheese and drank all his drink. I ate the piece of pizza I had selected for him. When I went to the register I explained that he had only shredded cheese off the salad bar and asked for his buffet to be removed. The manager was called and gladly removed the charge. My husband thought I was crazy to ask, but that saved us almost $4. Not a bonanza, but to have paid for that meal would have been like throwing $4 out the window while driving home from the restaurant.

No More Bows

I always wrap all the Christmas presents, write the persons name on the back on a piece of tape that holds the package together and go back later and add a bow and tag. To me this is a faster process. I was adding ribbons and bows to my presents tonight and realized I really like the look a simple ribbon tied around the packages more than a store bought bow. So, tonight I decided not to buy anymore bows. I always recycle all my bows (because I hate throwing them away) and storing them until the next Christmas season leaves them looking less than desirable. I have a big stockpile of bows and I plan to use them up and not save or replace them!

Ace Hardware Freebates!

If you have an Ace Hardware store nearby they offer monthly rebates. The rebates can be mailed or entered online. Often the items are free after rebate!
Oh, and while you're at the website sign up to win the $500 sweepstakes!

Free Spice Islands Calender

Go here to register your spice and get a free calendar! Looks very nice!

CVS Run, Can This Be Legal?

I think this was my best week ever at CVS. I won't delve in to all that I bought, but Ill tell you that I spent $1.58 oop and the total before sales and coupon and ECB's was $94.56! After the cashier rang all my coupons the cashier said, "wow you saved $60"...then I handed her a ton of ECB's(thanks Black Friday). Shocked at the total she said "I've never seen this happen before!"
Then she proceeded to hand me a few feet long receipt with a lot more ECB's attached(I haven't even looked to see how much money I made)!

My teenage son calls my CVS run my moonshine run because it's like I'm doing something illegal! Hey, getting all those good deals is hard work. It takes time to research the sales and match the coupons. Let alone trying to match the amount due at the end of the deal with the amount of ECB's that are my wallet.

Speaking of ECB's, people ask me a lot how I keep up with them, because they get them too, but forget about them. My answer to that is this: Every time I get ECB's I tear off my receipt and wrap the ECB's around my Extracare card so I can't forget or lose them and stick them in my wallet!