Since our anniversary had come and gone on April 16th with neither of us doing anything special for that day, my husband and I were overdue for a special time together to celebrate our 3rd year of marriage. So, after much discussion and going back and forth on whether or not to go on a weekend trip, we finally settled on taking one whole day to spend together on Saturday. We arranged for grandma to spend the day with Gregory and made a list of some things we could do that day.

After the drop off at grandma’s house, we began our journey and headed up to Grand Island (30 min away) for the day. Our first stop was downtown to confirm that the downtown coffee shop was indeed having ‘open mic night’ that evening. Adam go some sort of mocha coffee drink and I savored my deliciously milky and creamy hot chocolate (giving away that I do not drink coffee.) After peeking in a little country shop next door, we decided we would eat lunch at Perkins because Adam had never eaten there. He ordered an outrageously delicious omelet and hashbrowns, while I savored a yummy sandwich melt on sourdough.

We were so excited about our next plan for the day. Neither of us had entered a roller skating rink in years. As we recounted our youth roller skating days, we both had a longing to do it again. We had joked about it a couple of times before and we finally did it! We were horrible at first. Though we came very close, I am proud to say that neither of us fell, not even once! It took us an hour or so, but we both began to finally get our skating legs back. We plan to do it again. It was so much fun, despite our blisters and sore muscles, and great exercise. Although, I am sure it was quite comical to those watching the pregnant lady skate. I did well, but I don’t think I quite found my center of gravity.

When we left the skating rink I realized I was one hungry pregnant lady (and thirsty, too,) so we happened by a Baskin Robins for some ice cream and a cold drink. We also killed some time before dinner by wondering through Hobby Lobby and the Hastings Book Store. Adam bought a wow worship CD that we have been listening to a lot lately.

For dinner we decided to eat at Red Lobster. We usually only eat their once every 1-2 years, for a very special occasion. My husband absolutely loves lobster, crab, and seafood. So, despite a longer wait in line, it was a wonderful choice for our evening meal. Adam ordered a large plate of king crab legs and I ordered a stuffed flounder and snow crab legs. It was a great meal with great conversation.

To top off our evening we returned to the coffee shop downtown where we were entertained by a couple of local musicians. The first sang vocals and played his guitar, sometimes in a blues fashion and other times not. He made us laugh and it was a cheerful performance. The second musician described is style of music as ‘unknown’ or whatever sounded good to him at the moment. He played only the guitar. For me, his music was soft and melodic, almost to the point of lullaby guitar music. I closed my eyes and just savored the calm and beautiful melodies that he played. I was tempted to go to sleep it was so dreamy.

And on we went on home, to find our son sound asleep in his bed and hear the tales of his adventurous and fun day with grandma.

“Load up the pantry” as advised by the Wall Street Journal (and Wendy Jeub)
Friday, April 25th, 2008

As Wendy and I prepare for another presentation of “Cheaper by the Baker’s Dozen,” we are tempted to rename the presentation “Hurry Up and Stock Up the Pantry.” News item after news item is validating what we have been saying ever since oil began its rapid increase of prices. Add the minimum wage increase, growing demand in Asia, and government environmental policies for biofuels, you’ve got a recipe for expensive food!

The Wall Street Journal came out with an incredibly persuasive article on stocking up the pantry. Columnist Brett Arends lists the reasons with logical analysis in his article “Load up the pantry“:

Food is a global economy, so economic food prices in Asia does effect us in America.
Inflation in 2007: Flour up 13%; dairy up 10%; eggs up 30%; poultry up 5.4%. Compare that to the average money market fund (2.5%).
Food companies are no longer absorbing costs for raw materials (e.g. wheat has tripled in three years).
There aren’t “starving children in China” anymore, as a rising middle class is demanding more food (same in India).
Now, I just want to note that I was NOT one of those alarmists freaking out about Y2K. Back then I thought the claims of food shortages and riots were greatly inflated. You remember, computers would all collapse and ships would stop shipping food and chaos would consume. I remember thinking, “If that happens, I’m going hunting,” and I let others stock up on food and candle wax.

Also note, however, that the Y2K fears were not based on economics: they were based on technological opinions that no one fully understood. As I claim in Cheaper by the Baker’s Dozen, “Economics is as sure as gravity.” You can always count on it to work out, for the better or for the worse.

What should you do? Our third Principle of Frugal Living listed in the presentation states, “Frugal living requires creative solutions to economic realities.” Notice we didn’t say “economic problems” or “catastrophes.” There is really no such thing. Economics is amoral and simply a “reality” that we must deal with. The ideas Wendy and I come up with are simply ways we have dealt with the reality for 17 years of our marriage raising 14 kids.

Wendy’s Love in the Kitchen cookbook has a section in it called “Stock your shelves.” No kidding: nearly the exact same title as today’s Wall Street Journal article. She explains how she frugally keeps a tight reign on our family budget and how you can too. It isn’t computer engineering; much of it is simply understanding the family economic unit. Really, the advice she gives is worth much more than the price of the cookbook.

Could you do us a favor? Cut-and-paste the content of this post and send it to your friends. We’re onto something here, and you can help. Spread the word, for I believe our cookbook and CD ROM are rightly timed to serve a growing need out there. Thanks!

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I found this guy on youtube today with great info and tips on becoming a power shopper. You can check out all of his youtube videos here. You can sign up for his free newsletter and tips @ CouponstoFreeGroceries.com and visit his blog to find out more about free groceries and items for the week. If you are looking for a simple yet effective way to get started with coupon shopping, check out the links above. He teaches you how to spend minimal time cutting out coupons, the secrets to getting cheap/free stuff instead of just getting a “good deal”, and more. The best part is that you will see the effects, free stuff and savings of your efforts in less than 4-5 weeks. You could have a stockpile of stuff for free or next to nothing in no time at all.

I decided to steam clean my kitchen carpet yesterday b/c there was a sticky spot, and i was horrified at what came out of that carpet. Bleh I hate dirt. I just steam cleaned them in the summer/fall last year! LOL. It was bugging me so I went ahead and steam cleaned the whole first floor carpets and the couches. I just love the feeling of a fresh clean home! On top of that it was a beautiful day today. I had the windows open with a wonderful breeze flowing through the house. I am so glad that spring is here! Fresh carpets and fresh air beat the musty dusty house of winter by a mile .

Yesterday my husband and I decided to buy coin rolls, sort and count the canisters and piggy banks full of coins we had laying around the house. When we first started my husband guessed that we may have $30 and I guessed that we may have around $40. Here are some pictures of the afternoon we spent talking and counting coins!

Drum roll please…..

The Grand Total: $72 !!

This is just a reminder that your chump change is worth more than you think. We are planning to put this money toward our “vacation” fund for a small weekend mini vacation before the baby comes. Just our change will pay for a motel room.

I already had a trip to the store planned today, but when I got wind of some great deals I jumped right on the deal wagon today. I checked YDF this morning and found out about the coupon for a free Scotch-brite disposable toilet scrubber starter kit. I checked into it and yes it is ligit. The coupon can be printed directly from the manufacturer’s website.

Then someone pointed out to us online that we could get Old Spice Red Zone trial size body washes for free with $2/2 coupons in last weeks paper. The coupon does not specify a size or exclude trial sizes, so it was actually a money maker @ Walmart.

The best deal of all is the B1G1 %50 Register Rewards deal at Walgreens this week. Suave, Dove, and a few other products are B1G1 %50 off and also print Register Rewards cash when you buy at least 2. The deal is supposed to be that you buy 2 items you get $2 RRs, buy 6 items you get $6 RRs; But, for some reason if you buy 4 completely seperate items in the deal you get the $6 RRs. This is a money maker if you buy all basic suave shampoos, and even more so if you use coupons. You can read more about it here. The best part? The RRs for Suave seem to be “rolling over” for use on more of the same deal. Essentially you could keep making transactions using your printed $6 RRs for more free suave or other products. Here is how it will look for me:

First trip to store:

1 suave coconut shampoo

1 suave coconut conditioner

1 suave ocean breeze conditioner

1 suave mens shamp/cond

1 $.79 candy bar

Total= 6.68 RR printed= $6

Second Trip to store:

4 seperate suave/dove RR deal products

filler items if needed to reach total purchase of $6

Give RR to cashier, then ring items..

Total= $6 (approx) FREE …. RR printed= $6

Repeat

Genesis 2:24

“Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.”

As I mentioned before, this week I have begun a new study for women on God’s design for marriage. So far, it has been a wonderful look into God’s word and personally convicting for me. You can find the study at bible.org or download the study workbook directly. I would be delighted if you decided to follow along with me. My homework for this week has been to confess my sins against God’s design for marriage to the Lord and to my husband, as well as set goals for myself. I thought I would briefly post my goals for this week.

• Unite with my husband.
• Ask his needs and strive to meet them.
• Say good things to him and about him.
• Meditate on never leaving him.
• Ask forgiveness from him for my sins against our marriage and God’s word.
• Use kind and caring words and expressions.
• Do not correct him in front of the children.
• Ask his input and wishes.

I have made goals for myself in the past, but they usually did not start with a conviction from the word of God and a burden in my heart. This study starts first with your disobedience to God’s word and guides you into obedience to God’s design for marriage. It focuses on our heart towards God instead of only focusing on our actions toward our husbands. We cannot truly change our ways through our own effort, it must start with the word (both Jesus and the Bible) & relying on God’s strength in our weakness. I suppose I cannot express just how excited I am that my heart towards obeying God’s word in my marriage and honoring my husband is being changed by God through his word.

Lately my husband and I have been having some troubles and riffs in our marriage relationship. Both of our stress levels have been a bit high and we have been clashing against each other. As a couple that has dealt with problems off and on in the past, it has been quite discouraging. My approach this time has been to study the Bible, and ask God for help in my obedience to his word. I thought I would share some resources that we have found helpful so far.

Last night, my husband helped me choose a couples marriage bible study to order online. We finally settled on a wonerfully biblical-sounding study called Becoming One, by Joe Beam. We also looked into buying a study for couples called Love and Respect by Emerson Eggerichs. You can find the book and workbooks for each of these studies online, either at online christian books stores or used at Amazon.com.

We also did a small bible reading and questionaire from DoughBrittonBooks.com about serving each other. It helped us to identify the areas we most need to work on for the benefit of our spouse. You can also find more mini studies on marriage and other topics at DougBrittonBooks.

Today I started a free bible study called God’s Design for Building Your Marriage: A Study for Wise Women from Bible.org. You can find and print this study for free here. After finishing the first lesson today I really do think that this is a great bible study that will benefit me greatly in my obedience to God’s word, my walk with Christ, and my relationship with my husband.

There are also some great family/marriage websites out there with very helpful articles. A few of my favorites are:

Focus on the Family’s Family.org

Familylife.com

Last week a friend of mine online introduced me to Hot Coupon World. I had dabbled in coupon shopping awhile back to help save my money family on groceries, but now I am officially addicted to super coupon shopping! I bought a total of 4 Sat/Sun newspapers this weekend for the coupon inserts to jump-start my coupon collection, and began searching for deals immediately. So far I’ve found:

Russ’s IGA:

Farmland Sausage rope/links/jumbo franks,         2 for $5   (two $1/1 coupons) = $1.50 each

Walgreens:

Red Baron Pizza,         2 for $5   (two $1/2 coupons) =  $2 each

Kleenex,    $.89  (one $.35/3 coupon) =  $2.32 for 3

Airwick Freshmatic Mini Kit,   Buy one Get one $9.99  (two $4/1 coupons) = $1.99 for 2

Aquafresh Advanced, $2  (one $2/1 coupon) + (free after rebate) = $2 money maker!

Colgate 360 Manual Toothbrush  ($1/1 coupon) + (free after rebate) = money maker!

Film Developed FREE Wednesday only (limit one)

Being the cheap and frugal person that I am anyway, I could get used to this! You can find tons of information and help from others on how to get started at the link above.