homemade tv antenna

We have worked really hard at cutting down our budget and one of the ways that has worked for us to not pay for cable tv. When we moved here, we never signed up to have our cable hooked up and since we are trying to save some money, we have decided to wait as long as we can. Honestly, we don't watch much tv. In fact, the girls like a few shows on PBS and Chuck likes to watch a football game every once and awhile, but we have learned to do without the rest of tv.

With football season here, Chuck was pretty disappointed with our $5 rabbit ears the reception that it was getting. The one stations that plays the football games wasn't always coming in clear. He tried getting a powered antenna for about $40 bucks, but it wasn't any better (so that went back to the store). So....he did a little research and came up with this.
He spent about 4 dollars and found some wire hangers and came up with this. I think he got some inspirations from a site like this (HERE). It sits outside under our deck and gets great reception. Like I said, we were only hoping for PBS and at least one network that shows some football. He is still working on exactly how the wire will run to the tv, but for now it is working great. I love his determination and his passion for being thrifty.

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I have been working on making an adoption blog. My desire to have a neat journal of our process and have something to show our new sweet pea some day. That is what we call our new little one - sweet pea. I have taken older posts that were adoption related and put them on that blog. I plan on blogging about adoption on that bog instead of on here. For those of you that are interested you can follow along HERE. We would appreciate prayer for our journey. I hope and pray that God uses that to be a place of positive connections and encouragement to all of those who have the heart of adoption.

I'm hooked....

...on couponing. Yep, it is now a verb. Mainly because it is an action. I have to seek out the web sites, print the coupons, clip them, organize them, write my shopping list according to them, get myself to the right store on the right day, hunt for the B1G1 deals, make sure my coupons match, gawk at my savings when I check out, leave the store on a coupon high, rush home to show my family the savings, and plan my meals according to what was on sale.

It has been a really LONG time since I was able to feed my family on less than $100 a week, but it can be done (as long as I do my work). For us, right now, it is the best way to trim the budget. And we are saving every penny we can (I am sure you can figure out why). I spent a lot of time on this site trying to figure it out. HERE

Just wanted to pass it on if any of you are looking for a way to save some money (and get a new hobby). My cart was full on my shopping trip on Sunday and here is a little break down of what was spent. Not trying to brag here, just wanted to pass on some ideas of how to save.

Total bill: $151.15 - $83.60 (coupons and advertised deals) = $ 67.55 spent

Old Mother Hubbard

I have been avoiding the store. Trying to use what I have in the cupboards and not buy a bunch of things when I have perfectly good food that needs to be used up. So after I served cereal and ramen for a few days, I have resorted to getting more creative. Last night we had 2 kinds of pasta, found some meat balls in the freezer and mixed it with a jar of sauce. I served that with corn and green beans from the farm produce. It was a great meal and didn't seem odd at all.

This morning I am serving muffins and hot cocoa. Now, lunch might get a little more creative and I haven't given too much thought to our dinner. I want to use up the produce before it goes bad and I hate to waste food. It kind of is a game. To see how long I can go with out going to the store for food. Now the snack food like chips and crackers ended days ago, but we might be better off with out it.

This morning, the girls were thrilled to have muffins. They love muffin mornings. My mom used to make muffins when we were little and we loved it too. We even had a very unique tradition of hiding coins in the muffins cups. Has anyone else heard of that? I am assuming my mom would clean the coin and then drop them in the bottom of the paper liner before the batter went in. I haven't done it yet with my girls because I haven't taken the time to sanitize the money. Just wondered if anyone else has heard of that idea.

So, just call me Old Mother Hubbard...I am going to try and pick these cupboards bare.

Creative laundry line

Now that we are in a neighborhood that won't let us have a traditional laundry line out in the yard, I have had to get a little creative with our clothes drying. Missing my old laundry line when we lived in the country (HERE). In my ever striving desire to go green, I am coming up with ways to not run the dryer and still get my laundry dry.

After researching some ideas online, I found this inspiration for indoor laundry line (HERE). And it inspired me to rig up a way to dry big towels and sheets in the basement.It takes a little longer, but with the windows open, it works pretty well. And I needed something for all those big items like sheets and quilts.

If I can get my act together and get a load washed each day, I can get them on these portable racks and put them up on my deck. I figured this will be still be obeying the rules for the HOA and it still accomplishes my goal of living green and living thrifty.
These are pretty flimsy, but for now this is the best idea I can come up with. The wind and the sun really help the clothes dry quickly. And an added benefit, I can rush the racks inside when it starts to rain.I did dry a whole load inside in the family room the other day. It worked pretty well to dry them inside. My sister, drys all her clothes inside all year with out the use of a dryer, so I know it can be done. My other ideas were to string a line in the garage. Again, getting creative trying to abide by the HOAs.


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Thanks to Stephanie K for the info about Project Laundry List. Check it out HERE if you want to continue the right to dry your clothes outside and use the free sun and wind that God gave us.

Another new favorite - contact paper

On my quest to get organized and my desire to use what I have (you know the old reduce, reuse, recycle - green way of life), I have renewed my love of contact paper. That wonderful sticky paper that covers a multitude of "stuff". Rather than buying a bunch of plastic containers, I am trying to use the ones lying around the house. I got a large roll of contact paper for less than $6 (you can hardly buy 2 storage bins for that). I have been using contact paper to make cute containers. I found some sweet printed contact paper at Target the other day and have had fun making some containers.
Turning this veggie can into this cute pencil can (or May Day basket, or pony tail holder, or catch all on your desk).Turning this laundry soap box into a use-able container for holding cereal boxes that are broken down and ready for the recycling bin (or a magazine holder, or book box, or to hold the mail on your counter, or to catch miss matched socks in the laundry room...let your imagination run wild).

Here are my finished projects. The box on the left we use to hold our recycling boxes (cereal or granola bar style). The can is being used to hold pencils in the school room. The box on the right is being used to store misc. papers in the school room to keep it tidy.

thrifty finds at a library sale

We went to a used book sale at a local library not long ago and picked up some good deals. I encouraged the girls to bring their own money and see if there was anything that looked good to them. Tally picked out these books. They have kept her busy for a while. She loves stories about animals.We have always been the kind of family that hits the library every week and brought home a big stack to read. Each time we moved, the library was an adventure as we found new books that we hadn't found before. Our local library in our small town is pretty small and it is making me miss our old library. So creating our own library might be worth investing in.These are the ones that Tristen found. She loved the one on the bottom, "Mr. Popper's Penguins". My girls love reading the same books over and over. Familiarity seems to be a comfort for them. These are the ones that I picked out. Or at least these are the ones that I paid for. The girls have enjoyed these too. Not a bad way to increase your home library. Thrifty finds for sure.

Next I will have to share how I organize all of our books. I am on a huge organizing kick around here. With my trusty label maker in hand...all these books will find a place on the book shelf in the school room...stay tuned.

Bookmarks from food boxes

We have a collection in our home of home made bookmarks cut from food boxes. I have to give Chuck the credit for these creative little things. Though we try not to eat a lot of junk, there are times we get items at the grocery store as a treat for the kids when the are on sale (like fruit chews for example). When we get those kinds of kid treats, we always check out the box and find where we can cut out a cute bookmark. Some ideas are boxed cereal, granola bars, fruit chews, frozen waffles, snack cakes or graham crackers or gold fish crackers.


It is great to have bookmarks that are "OK" if you loose them. The card stock/cardboard seems to be just the right thickness for a bookmark. Just look for cute or creative or colorful patterns on boxes of cereal, or frozen food products or even from a box of tea (sleepy time bear). We have even cut them from the cover of coloring books or workbooks for school. We keep them in a bag in a desk drawer and we are always grabbing a new one when we start a new book (I have passed on the habit of reading more than one book at a time to my kids...at least they are readers).

What are we going to do with all this candy???

I am glad Chuck is home this weekend so we can off load some of this candy onto him. I am really not sure what to do with it all. (I will never let them eat it all). The girls did have a fun time trick or treating and the next morning activity found them sorting the candy. They dumped it all into a common container right off the bat so it became "family property" (they always would ask first before they take a piece).

The sorting was too cute. Had to get a picture. Grouping like candies together.

Then I had to scan the list. I just thought it was cute to take an inventory of the candy.
Aside from sorting the candy (sounds like a math game to me), the girls also made towers out of it. Kind of like building blocks. We also reuse our candy when we make our gingerbread house at Christmas time. We save the candy and decorate the house with it. A great way to USE it with out having to EAT it. There is NO WAY I would let my kids eat all that SUGAR. Tough Mommy kicks in and doesn't let them eat it all. The sticky candy is bad for their teeth and the sugar is just not good in general.


We have always given out toys and treats for trick or treating. (Don't need more candy for me to say NO to). I have ordered things from oriental trading and then I save any extra "happy meal" style toy or birthday goody bag toy for my treat basket (pencils, stickers, rings, trinkets). It is a great way to recycle those toys. I also use that same treasure basket for treats for kids when I tutor. I am all about this kind of "re-gifting".

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On a totally different note, we are showing the house again this morning. One of these times it will follow with a contract.

Homemade Crayons

I got this idea from my friend Debi who watched my girls last week. They had such a nice time there and I was so impressed that the girls did some crafts while they were there. They made crayons out of broken pieces. We gave it a try tonight and it worked pretty well.

We pealed and broke the crayons and put them in muffin cups (I would have used double cup liners next time or better yet, foil muffin liners). We melted them in the 325 oven for 5-8 min. and let them cool for a few hours. ( would link to Debi's post on this but I think her blog is private ~ hers turned out really cute).


I think these would be great for little fingers (pre-school age). The colors are so pretty. And, a great way to use up old broken crayons.

Eating out

In this time of economic crisis in our country I am sure we are all doing things to cut down on the cost of living. In the midst of our own family transition, we have really cut out extra spending. Everything from not driving unless it is necessary, to not buying anything extra.

One of the first things that we cut out to save money was not eating out. We were never a family that ate out all that often. Though there were times that we would be out running errands and pick up some "fast food". Or we might eat out as a family once on the weekends as a treat. Even if we were careful and didn't order drinks or ate off the dollar menu, it still added up. And to think...we are a small family and my kids aren't big eaters.

Now, we can easily go for weeks between eating out at a restaurant. We did dine out for Chuck's birthday last month and it was great. But if I plan ahead, I can pack our food for the car if we are out on the town. And it takes just as long to make lunch after church as it does to wait for a table at a restaurant.

So, I am curious...how often do you eat out? I am especially curious of those larger families. I am sure it is very pricey to eat out. If I had to guess, before we cut back on this part of our budget, we were eating out about 1-2 times a week. Now it is more like once a month. I have been saving my tutoring money to treat the family every once in awhile.

So, how often do you eat out? And what does it tend to cost?

Busy with the sewing projects

I wanted to post some pictures of the sewing projects that I have been busy with the past week. I am not much of a seamstress, in fact I hardly know what I am doing. But as with anything new, I dive right in to try and figure it out.

It has been a treat having my mom's old machine to work with. When it works it is wonderful...when it acts up, well, it is then that I am ready to give up on it. I was able to figure out that it only likes plastic bobbins (not metal). I felt like a sewing machine whisperer. Trying to figure out why it was getting stuck and burping out the back side. But once I figured it out (thanks for the ideas Mom), it all went smoothly.

As I posted before, our first project was the dolly dresses for a friend. That motivated us to make more American Girl clothes. First up...I figured I would make my own pattern for a skirt. That's right, I said make my own pattern. Sometimes I wonder if I am a glutton for punishment. What make me think I can make my own pattern??? Am I crazy???

Here are a few step pictures for my own reference for then next time I feel like doing this.






















The inspiration of this skirt was the skirt that Molly came in. We thought we would make these a little longer. Here is the side by side with the Molly skirt.

Here is Molly modeling her new skirt with the shirt that Tally designed with her new AG t-shirt gift set. We all thought the mitten design shirt was really cute. (Thanks to our very good friend "earthgirl" for the gift set.)















After all the skirts we had to make jammie pants. Tissy designed her shirt to go with cute plaid PJ pants. This was the first time I had made this pattern too (not my own this time, this one was a store bought pattern). The purple pair of pants were Tissy's choice. She picked out a remnant of matterial that matched pretty well.














A neighbor friend of ours gave us a bag of material that she didn't want anymore and we made a pair of jammie pants for Tally's doll too. We weren't sure what to do with the fabric (most of it is geared toward making baby things or doggy beds). The ABC fabric worked well for the jammie pants.


Then I thought I would try and make a new bag for my clothes pins. My old one didn't work all that well with the hanger (baby sized) it was on. Now it works better. Good way to use that doggie print material. I feel just like Aunt Millie in the Kit books (sorry if you are not familiar with the AG Kit stories), "waste not ~ want not". I didn't want to waste that new material.

So as you can see...we have been busy. I have been sewing like the wind (sorry ~ another vague reference ~ The 3 amigos if any one is still following this rabbit trailing post). {BTW, that last one was for you Chuck}

When the sun is shining...

...and we have no hurricane winds and rain we can actually use that wonderful natural sunlight for great things...like drying our laundry.

A few months ago I asked Chuck to help me hang a laundry line up in the yard. I can take this one down if we are showing the house (not everyone things a laundry line is cute and country like I do). It has been a little challenging getting things dry in this very humid climate that we live in. I have learned the key is the sun. If it is a cloudy and overcast day it doesn't dry as well.












When we lived in California, I hung our laundry outside year round. I would do wash on days that it didn't rain and I was able to cut down our electric bill. It does dry faster in the hot and dry climate of CA, but I am trying to live green and thrifty and so far so good.

One last thought about the out door laundry line...most neighborhoods don't allow this in the deed restrictions. I think in the right way, the laundry line can look sweet (notice my pictures), but I am sure it has that trashy look at times too (notice I didn't show pictures of our undies hanging out on the line). I bet if my neighbors could see this it I would get reprimanded for it, good thing we have a private yard. In our last neighborhood we couldn't have a line outside. It is a fine line between living green and living trashy (um...lets hope we are the first).

Now I need to go and get a load outside and use up that free energy (did I mention that I have to watch for fire ants while I am hanging things up...oh the joys of the out doors).

Where to start????

After my reunion with my laptop last night (yep, I was up past 1:00 trying to catch up on as much as I could) it had another hissy fit this morning. Wouldn't work again and had to have the trusty "computer whisperer" come and whisper sweet nothings in it's ear to get it to work again. I think I am really truly back up and running. Let's hope at least.

So the question is...where to start? Where do I begin with trying to unload all the posts that have been bottled up in my mind. As you all know, once you start blogging you see your world through a blog filter. Everything becomes a potential blog post. This being said, I will try and exibit some self control and not post everything I have been thinking about in the last few weeks. I did have to begin with that picture of Steffany and I really wanted to give her a little shout out since it was just last week that I met her in person.

I can tell you are all on the edge of your seat to hear the bear story. Should I share that now or keep you coming back to read about that one? Um...I think I have to share pictures of the girls hair cuts first. I know, b-o-r-i-n-g for those local friends and have already seen them. But my family far away hasn't seen them and since I am already cut out of all the comrodery it is my attempt to be part of the group.

before and after

In the thrifty way of life that we are in, I took a chance and cut the kids hair on my own. I thought it turned out pretty good. Not TOO much of a homemade haircut look. =) The truth is, we live in a VERY hot and and humid state and the long hair was just getting too hard to take care of. And it is easy to swim with shorter hair. I do think Tally is interesting in trying to grow it out and donate it (she has beautiful thick hair - no wonder it is so hot).