Baby, It's Cold Outside!

Oh my, we had a nasty cold front come through! But, I guess we were not as cold as places up north, so that was a blessing. But, the day before the cold front came through, our furnace went out. We thought it might have just been the pilot on the furnace, but that was going full force :) Happy lil flame burning away. It turned out to be a part that was easily replaced by a repairman, but we had to go through the day of the cold front coming in, the cold, cold night, and part of the cold, freezing day-lol! Then, it took almost the whole rest of the day to get the house up to a comfy temp! UGH! Our fireplace was nice and all, but it just did not get the heat around the room like I was wishing it would. The kids slept in the living room and I ended up in the living room about midnight when Levi kicked me out of bed (he stayed in bed with us so I would be sure he was warm enough). I stayed up most of the night putting wood on the fire.

But, another problem was found with our furnace. I am Praising God as I think the part that went out was a blessing now. There is a crack somewhere in the furnace that when the blower comes on, it cause a downdraft to the flames on the coils. This causes them to dance a bit wildly, and it could be dangerous. Thankfully, two different repairmen both comfirmed this and said it would need to be changed out this weekend-no later...the furnace would need to be changed out. So, Eric and our landlord will fix it Saturday, when it is also a bit warmer ;)

Just when you think something is so frustrating and wondering why it happened, God lets you know, He really does have it all under control ;)

Free Suave Today

I think yesterday, I said this was a printable coupon but it is not-they send you a coupon for a free bottle by snail mail-still nice :) Here is the link again:
Free Bottle Of Suave

Free Suave Starts Tomorrow

Free Bottle of Suave Go here tomorrow morning (Jan 14th, 2009) and get a coupon for a free bottle of Suave. Don't forget :)  Even if this is not your preferred shampoo (but my hubby uses it and sometimes my kids) you can keep it for some other things-perhaps a food pantry, a gift basket for someone with some other 'freebies' added in, or keep on hand for company to use during a visit and if they forgot their shampoo at home...or you could even use it for emergency soap ;) Im sure there are other ideas you can come up with :) Free shampoo-always nice ;)

Goal Setting Sunay

I got the tree taken down finally on Thursday :) This was after a good friend was talking about her goals and I realized I had not done mine-YIKES! Good thing too, since I got some sort of virus on Saturday and still have it today. I am forcing myself to post this-really, I am :P Anyone have some good mint tea? I sure could use some!

And, I am forcing myself to make a goal...no, I don't have a cannon pointed at myself...Hmmm-I noticed, and I also posted this the other day, my coupons are out of hand in my accordion file. But, they are also not organized in my shopping notebook. It was no fun when I went shopping yesterday with coupons falling all over the place-plus, my stomach was hurting...So, my goal this week is to organize my coupons again and also to clean out the expried ones. This will be easily done and make room for new ones I will get from today's paper.

Check your coupons...are they organized? Do you know where your coupons are (play spooky music here)?

Food Pyramid and Reasor's Ads this week

Just going to highlight things I know are a pretty good deal, so be sure to check these ads out yourself before you head out to the store and be sure you see all the good deals according to your own shopping lists :)
http://www.mypyramidonline.com/weeklyads.php -Food Pyramid
http://www.reasors.com/services/adspecials_serv.php -Reasors

Food Pyramid
*8 lb bag of Red Delicious Apples or Navel Oranges-$3.99
*Hunts Spaghetti Sauce 26 oz-.87
*Martha Gooch Pasta-.87
*General Mills Cereal, Select Varieties 9-14.25 oz (showing Cheerios in ad)-$1.87 printable qpon here-www.coupons.com $1.00 off 2 boxes-making them $1.37 each (also a qpon in Sunday paper for $1/3)
*Cambell's Tomato or Chicken Noodle-3/$2-about .66 each, but you can save more if you can find a coupon-FP doubles up to 50 cents.
*3 lb bag of frozen BL/SL chicken breasts-$4.99
*Midwestern Gold Ground Round -$1.99/lb
*Tyson Fresh Boneless/Skinless Chicken Breast-$1.99/lb
*Old South Sausage-.99/16 oz

Reasors- Havng a big 10 for $10 sale -Yippee!!
* 10 4 $10-
1 dz med. eggs
Dole Classic Romaine Salad 10 oz bag
Pepsi 2 Liters
Fresh French Bread
Tostinos Pizzas 9.8-11.5 oz
Royal Gala Apples/ lb
Hostess Single Serve snack cakes
Borden Dip or Sour Creams 16 oz
Best Choice Ketchup 36 oz
Bar-S Lunch meat 1lb


*Chuck Roast-$1.98/lb
*Ground Beef-$1.48
*Cambell's Tomato or Chicken Noodle-3/$2

Reminder-Go through your coupon stashes from previous months and clean out old, expired coupons :) I went through my Oct coupons and found about 2 that were not expired, so I need to get to cleaning these out :)

Right@Home Back to Basics Gift Pack-!st 5,000

Sign up for the newest Gift Pack Right at Home  If you are among the 1st 5,000, you will get a \Ziploc Big Bag gift pack-details are on the site). But, don't worry if you are not among the 1st 5,000 as they do send out nice coupon books to the non-winners :)

Goal Setting Sunday

I did not get to my blinds-we had those two nice warm days, but I just spent that time enjoying watching my kids play outside :) And, I ended up doing some other cleaning in my kitchen-moving the fridge and cleaning behind and under it (my cat had fun helping me since he found a long lost marble that was his in my cleaning process and don't ya know how fun dust bunnies are to chase around? they are-try it-well, if you are a cat and reading this blog...ahem...)

But, I did get my baseboard cleaning goal done as I posted already :) And, I got most of my tree taken down--packed all the ornaments into new boxes, and organized those boxes. I have bad light sets in one box with some bad Christmas decorations-ones I really do not want to throw away in case I can come up with something to do with them (yes, I am a bit of a pack rat). Then, I put all the nice decors into another box and the good lights/new lights into another.

This week's goal is to get the tree put away and to ask DH to help me put the boxes away :0) My goal will be easy, but we are starting back to school this week and I just want to focus on that. Plus, my laundry is growing again and I need to get that down. I will be able to tackle quite a bit of that today when I get the fire going and can hang clothes near the fireplace to dry ( and put some moisture into the air ;)

Have a great week everyone! I would love to hear from others on what their goals might be this week! Feel free to share :)

Bagels and pancakes and Ziploc

I made the bagels. I will say this recipe was a new one and I really did not like how they turned out. It called for 7 cups total of flour, with the first 6 cups being mixed in and the last cup used for kneading--oh goodness, I did not need it! With just the 6 cups, the dough was so stiff! I didn't even need to flour my board while kneading and actually had to add some water into the dough. It was extrememly stiff and made for slow rising, as well as hard forming of the bagels. I could not get a good ball going and that is why my bagels look a little funky-lol! Here is a pic:

Did they taste good-well, yes, they actually did-they were VERY chewy right out of the oven and slathered with butter :) Today, after being in a baggie all night, they are nice and soft and ready to be toasted. So, they are getting eaten-the kids love them. IF--IF-I use this reacipe again, I will watch the flour at about 4 cups-maybe 5. I know when using flour in making bread, you have to watch it due to humidity-you may need more or less flour in certain situatins. Also, I will saute some onions to add into the mix-I did add in onion powder and garlic powder, but I love onion bagels and these needed something. Also, I will be sure to buy some poppy seeds too :) I love them in bagels!! So, these were not a total failure!!

Now, I got a special treat the other day :) It made me very happy! I could not wait to use it but didn't know what to use it on until I went shopping....From Right @ Home I got the new Ziploc Vacuum Starter Kit. It removes air from special baggies you use with it so you won't get freezer burn. I have wanted one for a long time-going back and forth between this one (because it cost less) and the Reynold's one which my sister and mom have (they love it). Well, my decision delima was over when I got this. Every so often, you can go to http://www.rightathome.com/ and sign up to get gift packs-it is limited to a certian number, so you have to be fast-this is the first time I have ever won in probably 2 years-lol! But, if you do not win, they send out a nice coupon pack to the others, so it is still nice :)

I got in quick enough last time and got the Ziploc kit--I used it yesterday on my pancakes-it came with 3 qt size baggies (which I must add do not fit alot of pancakes in them, but that's ok-lol). I put some pancakes in a regular baggie (note here-not a freezer baggie but it is all I had on hand) and some in the Ziploc vacuum baggie....here are my results after one night of freezing:

Not the best pic but you can sort of see the ice crystals starting to form inside the regular baggie-also you can see there is air back in the baggie-this is not the Ziploc one but a regular gallon sized Great Value brand baggie.

Here is the Ziploc Vacuum baggie-no air and no ice crystals formed. It held up through the night and Im very pleased. I will try to remember to post the price of this Starter System when I go to Walmart next and also the price of the baggies-hopefully vs the price of the Reynold's system. The Ziploc System uses no batteries, so that is a plus. It only took a few pumps to get the air out. Others have reported being able to reuse the baggies after washing and drying.

In a Baking Frame of Mind

I have been in a bad mood/bummed out mood since Christmas I think...definitely since Christmas but perhaps longer-lol! Poor, Poor Hubby!! There ARE real reasons for this, but I won't explain...
Instead, I will tell you I am now in a baking mood. Perhaps this will help my bad mood--unless the things I am making don't turn out and then, my bad mood will be exasperated-uhoh!

I am going to make bagels (looking for a recipe right now) and that will take care of breakfast for the kids tomorrow (though, I can somewhat imagine them not lasting until tomorrow, so I will throw in a quick batch of waffles or pancakes while I am letting the bagels rise).

Then, I am going to make these: Marble Squares
I will let you know how it all turns out-and perhaps post a pic or two-that is if I can beat my kids to the food before they eat it all! LOL!

Well, I managed to get one goal finished already. I decided to get started on the baseboards in the kids' bathroom. It was the worst and drove me nuts every time I went in there-lol!


Here is a picture of one of them before:

You can see, sort of, how the caulking around this board is not very smooth. I think that made dust get trapped more and it got very grimy...

 Problem with that was, I had a hard time just using a cloth to wipe it down. I went to softly scrubbing with a scrub brush--new problem:

These are clean, but do not look like it-though I promise they are. The brown you see is paint that rubbed off-even though I was gentle with the brush :( I will show Eric when he gets home and I think will take on a project when it is warmer of removing these baseboards, removing the caulk, repainting them and letting Eric re-caulk them. He is really good at that-makes a very pretty bead :) So, I know they will look nice when he is finished and they will be easier to clean next time. I think the paint used in our bathrooms is not a bathroom paint, and that might be why it rubbed off so easily. I will be sure to use a good bathroom paint when I repaint :)

Here is an area away from the tub that needing cleaning, but I could just use the damp towel due to no caulk-crevices :) It looks much nicer!

On another note--]

This is what my kids did yesterday :

Levi wanted to make a lemonade stand to sell lemonade, but I had no disposable cups. So, they decided to raise money for a local animal shelter/rescue. They raised over $12 in just a few hours :) They are out there again today and hoping to raise more :) I honestly did not think it would work out for them, but it really did! They made this all up on their own, didn't even ask me-lol, and did a great job! Im proud of them :)