$50 a week

This week was a maintenance week for me.  I have plenty of veggies frozen from the garden and still have plenty of pasta/rice from before. So this week it was just the fresh items I needed. 

New Seasons

$2.69 Gallon of rbst free milk
$4.19 Ground Sirloin 5% fat ground beef ($3.99 per lb sale this week)
$2.42 Nitrate Free bacon ends (cheaper than bacon slices! )

Total minus bag refund $9.25

Whole Foods

$1.89 rbst free Vit D 1/2 gallon milk (used for creamer)
$1.99 Free range veg fed eggs
$3.99 Fragrance Free Lotion (my daughter is allergic to just about everything)
$4.99 3 bean dark coffee beans whole

Total=$12.86

Trader Joe's

$3.98 Two bags of puffiest white cheddar puffs (my girls lunch snacks)

Total=$3.98

Albertsons

$4.99 Tillamook 2lb block white cheddar w/coupon (normally $9.99 woot woot!)
$2.50 Darigold Butter (usually $4.39 woot woot!)
$1.25 Frozen Apple Juice (on sale. Using for daughters science project)

Total=8.74

Fred Meyers

$2.69 International Creamer Cinnabon
$2.69 International Creamer White Chocolate (my husband wanted these)

Total=$5.38

GRAND TOTAL=$40.21

I'm under budget by about $10.  Payday isn't till Friday so money is tight right now.  I'm trying to save where I can because it seems like prices of any type of food has increased.  To offset those cost I am trying to cook as much as possible and have no extra expenses.  Just going to have to get creative. 

So have you noticed all the prices going up?

Anyone else notice the shortage of organic sugar in the bulk?

Have your peanut butter prices gone up?

Comments?

The A to Z Guide to Me

The A to Z Guide to Me

I totally stealing this and would love to give credit to whoever started it but cannot find that person. So I will give credit to Crunchy Chicken and call it good. Enjoy and pass it on!

Age-35 but feel more like 20

Bed Size-Queen. Big enough to scoot away from the hubby when I'm hot but small enough so I don't go too far away.

Chore I hate-Bathrooms, putting away clothes, sweeping and dusting. That's one right?

Dogs-One dog and her name is Riley.  She's afraid of everything but is strangely addicted to the red laser. Even more strange is the fact that I can play with the laser for hours. Run dog and cat....run

Essential start to my day-Coffee whom I owe everything to.

Favorite color-Any shade of green and deep purple.

Gold or silver-I prefer silver but some how gold slips into my life.  Beggars can't be choosers.

Height-5'5 on a good day.

Instruments-iPhone.  Only thing I know how to use that makes noise besides my mouth.

Job title-Mom, wife, sister, daughter and volunteer. Or as I like to be called Awesome.

Kids-4. Alyssa 13, Hailey 11, Emma 7 and Megan 7.  This is why I'm crazy.

Live-Southeast Portland, Clackamas, Forest Grove, Hillsboro, St Helen's and now Northwest Portland Oregon.

Mother's Name-Debra, Debbie or as I call her Mom.

Nickname-Mama, mom, Mah Ther, honey,  nany, aunt nany and Nanc. I'm sure there are some I'm leaving out as well.

Overnight hospital stays-Each time I gave birth which was 3 times.  Also the day my father passed away. Technically I didn't sleep over but I was there ALL day long. Never want to do that ever again. Although I should note that the hospital food has come a long way so...

Pet Peeve-People who drive like slugs on the highway but speed down regular streets. WTF? People who park their big ass trucks into compact car spots. I park my euro van way out in the parking lot because of this.  People who don't use their turn signals. I literally want to bash my vehicle into them each time I see this.  I'm seeing a pattern here.

Quote from a movie="My daddy HATES these boots!" Anyone tell me which movie this quote came from?

Right hand or left hand? Right hand. All but 3 of my kids are right handed as well. Emma has to be different of course.

Siblings-I am the youngest of 5. 4 brothers and 1 sister.  Tim, Mark, Dave and Deb. I only grew up with my sister but these last few years I have been given a chance to grow up with my brothers.  Love you guys.

Time I wake up-During the week 7am but during the weekends I try to sleep in as much as possible.  I LOVE my sleep. But my kids like to ruin it for me so I'm usually up at 8:30am.

Underwear-Well I own too many because I cannot say no to a good cute pair of undies.  How many can one lady own? Well apparently like a hundred. Story goes that my grandmother from my DNA dad's side said always wear clean undies because you never know if your going to be in an accident and get your clothes cut off. Always wanna look like a lady. Yeah and you wonder why I'm weird.

Vegetable I hate-Love everything except okra and eggplant.  It's all about the texture.

What makes me run late-My kids. (fist in air)

X-rays-None that I can think of.

Yummy food I make-If you ask me I say everything.  Ask Alyssa and it would be Macaroni and cheese.

Zoo animal-Strangely my favorite thing at the Oregon Zoo is the farm animals.  All of which you can see if you just drive on the country roads out here. Well sometimes in friends backyards too. 

Fun huh? Pass on and have fun.

Stretch marks can suck it!

When I thought of pregnancy the first thing that came to mind was this. I had no idea my body would stretch beyond its limits.  For some reason I thought my body was just made to do this so it would stretch and go back to normal.  My first pregnancy I didn't gain much weight except for in my belly.  This was years before I was living a green lifestyle.  I was 20 and I didn't think of my body and the affects pregnancy would have on it.  I wasn't thinking of products or their ingredients.  All I knew was that my stomach was itchy from the stretching and I needed something to make it stop. 

My second pregnancy was a different story.  I still didn't know or understand products and their ingredients.  This time I craved Pepsi and Dairy Queen.  A cheeseburger, fries and a Pepsi to be exact.  Memories of getting my favorite meal and waiting till I got home to enjoy and devour each bite when I got home and all that going down the tube when I dropped my Pepsi and cried for a half an hour on the porch.  Lovely memories like that. Well as you can imagine I gained a bit more weight with my second pregnancy.  Even better was the fact that the baby weight spread to my legs, neck and fingers. 

Then in 2003 I found out I was pregnant with twins.  All I remember was leaving the doctors office and my husband was quiet all the way home.  We pulled into the driveway and got out of the car still in silence.  My neighbor came outside and asked how the doctors visit was and if we knew what we were having.  One word came out of my husband.  Twins. It wasn't that we were upset...more shock than anything.  I convinced my husband to have another baby insuring him that we would definitely having a boy.  Two girls already so it was a definite thing.  100% sure. But no.  Instead we were having twins.  Doubling our children in one pregnancy.  Later we would find out we were having twin girls. Yeah. No more kids for us. We learned our lesson. 

Now to get an idea of who I am just imagine this.  I'm 5'5 and small framed.  Ever since Ive stopped actually growing I have weighted about 105 pounds.  Ive had the body of a boy.  No boobs not butt no nothing.  Always waiting for puberty to kick in.  Just ask my classmates. Only when I was pregnant did I ever gain any weight.  So you can imagine what my little body did when I was pregnant.  My single pregnancies made me look like I ate a basketball.  Then with the twins I looked like I was smuggling a beach ball in my shirt.  All the weight went into my belly and you would never have known I was pregnant looking at me from behind.  Now just imagine what that does to a persons skin. 

Okay.....here it is.

Yep, that's me.  No its not a boy. Want to know my secret to no stretch marks? Vitamin E and olive oil.  That's it.  Ive given birth (close your eyes men....all natural no C sections and breastfed each one of my children) to four children.  Two of which were born on the same day.  Now I'm not in as good as shape as before kids.  Looks flat huh? Yeah not so much.  I'm just skinny and I run a lot.  Makes you want to run with my in my next half marathon huh? I don't use any toxic products.  I try to make everything I can from nature.  I am as green as I can get.  I eat pretty healthy but I have my moments.  I'm not perfect in any way.  I'm just fumbling my way through life just like everyone of you.  I just hit the jackpot when it came to this.

You hear that stretch marks? GO SUCK IT!

Directions: Each day I slathered myself with either vitamin E or olive oil.  Pretty easy huh?

Now that I have exposed myself to you how about exposing yourself to others.
 What did you use when you were pregnant?
Do you have a secret recipe?
Did you get stretch marks?

Biryani Rice with chicken

While I was at Trader Joe's on Friday they were handing out samples of this yummy food called Biryani Rice.  It was $5.99 for a bag plus $2.49 for the chutney plus $1.99 for coconut water.  It was pretty darn good and I thought maybe it would be nice to try something new at home.  To buy this from Trader Joe's I would of needed 2 bags of the rice mixture and one jar of chutney.  Total dinner would cost me $16.46 and that is the reason I was determined to make it myself. 

Biryani Rice with chicken

1 chicken breast
Rice
water
1/4 cup of chopped onion
1 cup of frozen pea's (or fresh)
1/2 cup of red bell peppers chopped
1/2 apple peeled/chopped
1/4 cup raisins
1 can of garbanzo beans
2 tsp salt
2 palm fulls of curry powder
6 cups of coconut water (or 6 1/2 cups of water boiled with coconut for 10 minutes.  Strain and use water)
1 tsp of butter

1. Ccoconut and 6 1/2 cups of water simmered on medium heat for 10 minutes. Strain and set aside water till you need it.

2.  In a separate pan saute apple, red peppers and onion till tender. Once tender add in curry powder, salt, peas and chicken.  Add water till the water covers the chicken.  Drain and add in your garbanzo beans.  Boil till you are left with half the water you added in the first place.  Turn off heat, mix in your teaspoon of butter and leave.

3.  Take coconut water and 3 cups of white rice and put into a large pot.  Heat till boiling then turn down heat to medium low and put a lid on it.  After a few minutes you will notice the water is almost gone and you will see holes in the rice where steam is coming through.  Turn heat off and set aside for 10 minutes.  This ensures that the rice will absorb all the water and your end results will be soft and fluffy rice. 

4.  Once the rice is done add in your curry mixture and mix till you see no more white rice.  Put a lid on this and let set for another 5 minutes.  Again this ensures that the rice will absorb all the liquids till nice and fluffy. 

5.  Put rice into bowl with 1 tbsp of chutney. Done!

Here is what my cost was to make this whole dish.

$1.19 chicken breast ($5.99 for bag of 5 breast)
.50  3 cups white rice (at $1 per lb)
FREE water
FREE onion(my sister gave me them)
.41 frozen pea's (bag has 6 cups was $4.99)
.33 frozen red peppers (used about 1 which bought for 3/$1)
.10 organic apple (was .79 per lb, used 1/2 apple)
.41 raisins (used 1/4 cup pack was 3 cups at $2.49)
.99 can of organic garbanzo beans
.99 curry powder ($1.99 jar used 1/2)
.10 Organic coconut flakes (was $5.99 per lb used very little)
1.24 Chutney ($2.49 per jar used 1/2)

Butter/salt I had

TOTAL COST=$6.26
Serves my family of 6 plus enough left overs for lunch tomorrow. Makes about 9/10 cups. 

Honestly I was a little freaked out by apples and raisins in the rice. I have never been a fan of sweet stuff in my main meals and the thought of chewing on them freaked me out. BUT once this dish done there were no chunks of either of them and you would never know they were there unless you made this dish.  If you like the taste of them try not cooking them all the way. 

This meal is slightly spicy so if you cannot handle spice then instead of adding coconut water try adding coconut milk.  Or maybe try adding some plain yogurt for another added creamy flavor. 

Nancy

$50 a week

This week I didn't really need any fresh veggies or fruit because I still have some from last week.  Today's shopping was about snacks, new food items and things we ran out of.

Grocery Outlet

$5.94 Organic Garbanzo Beans-Really into hummus right now. Easy and healthy snack.
$2.69 Oats-I don't normally buy these prepackaged but my daughter needs the package for school.
$2.99 Challenge Butter
$5.99 Salami 2lbs-Usually deli has it $4.99 per lb so I'm saving $4 by buying this way
$1.98 Organic Kidney Beans 2 cans
$2.38 Tomato Soup 2 cans.  My oldest is loving grilled cheese with soup.
.59 Mustard
$1.98 Organic Black Beans 2 cans
$1.98 Organic Pinto Beans

TOTAL=$26.52

Whole Foods

$4.99 5lbs of White Rice
$3.99 12 rolls of Recycled Bathroom Tissue
$4.99 Stainless Steel Cleaner/Wax (damn Kitchen Aid fridge is starting to rust. WTF?)
$2.50 RBST Free Milk 1 gallon
$4.99 Coffee Beans Whole 1lb

TOTAL=$21.46

Trader Joes

$3.98  Puffy treats 2 bags
$3.87 Organic Pasta 3 bags
$2.29 Ginger/Mango Chutney (new recipe)
$1.99 Curry Powder (new recipe)
$2.69 Organic Raisins (new recipe plus for snacks)
$3.29 Jasmine Rice 3lbs

TOTAL=$18.11


GRAND TOTAL=$66.09

So I blew my budget. As you can see I got a little carried away with the organic beans but in my own defense this was a good price and I wanted to get them while the Grocery Outlet had them.  Things sell out and are lost forever in that place.  You really cannot snooze or you will lose.  Now I will not have to buy these for a long time.

I am not in the red because last week I went way under budget.  My favorite produce stand was closing for the season so I scored some great deals on fresh produce. He was selling everything at 50% off and I went a bit nuts.

I am trying a new recipe and once I make it I will take a picture and share the recipe with you.  Well honestly I don't have an actual recipe. I was at Trader Joe's and they had a sample of this rice dish so I wrote down the ingredients and thought "I can make that!" . So we will see. lol

Chinook books are here!

Only $20 and full of great green deals!! Don't forget to get their free app for your phone!

Oh no...

I went nuts and cut my hair.