No lunch round-up -- holiday, yay! -- but lots and lots of potatoes

With a shortened work week, we're just making do for lunches for this week. So I thought maybe we could discuss something that's been a question of ethics in my mind for years.

When there's a limit placed on a sale item, what do you think is ethical to do?

I've seen limits worded in a couple of different ways, which I do, in turn, interpret differently.

"Limit 1"
"Limit 1 per customer"
"Limit 1 per household"
"Limit 1 per transaction"

"Limit 1 per transaction" definitely implies that you may go through the check-out line numerous times, IMO., and multiple family members may make the same purchase.

"Limit 1 per household" states that you may NOT have multiple family members go through the check-out line, to purchase more of the limited item. (I've only seen this limit a couple of times. It was on turkeys at a special low price, a couple of years in a row, at one particular store.) And I also interpret their intention to mean "limit 1 per household, per sale per period". If a special price runs in 2 separate ads, one week following another, with this limitation, then I figure I am entitled to make the special purchase in the second week, as well, as the sale ads usually have a calendar at the bottom of the front page, indicating the sale period for which they are advertising. So, I feel I am may make the sale purchase once per sale period.

But the "Limit 1" and "Limit 1 per customer" have more ambiguity built in. One per what? Per transaction? Per family? Per day? What constitutes a customer? Am I a new and separate customer each time I enter the store?


I did some calling around and discovered that policies do vary from one store to the next. Some stores will allow you to go through the check-out line and buy the "limit" several times per car trip to the store, but with a stated limit, like 4 times. Other stores discourage this with wording in their ads, such as, "we reserve the right to enforce limits". Mostly, I was given the same basic explanation, along the lines of "we wish to provide enough stock of any sale item, so that all customers will have the opportunity to make this purchase." And there is some basic kindness and courtesy, here. It seems selfish to clear a shelf of all of the advertised items.

So, where do you fall on this issue? When a store imposes limits to a sale-priced purchase, what do you feel most comfortable doing?

For our family, here's how we interpret, and act on "Limit 1" or "Limit 1 per customer":

When our children became adults (age 18), they also began contributing to our household finances. I consider them all as paying rent, here. This became the age when I felt most comfortable giving them the cash to make a purchase, for our family to acquire more of a limited item. They could just as easily be renters in their own apartments, doing all of their own grocery shopping. We don't hide this in any way, but follow each other one right after the other in the check-out line. (And with identical twins, it would be pretty hard to try and "fool" the checker!) With 5 of us in the household, we can acquire 5 of a "Limit 1" item.

I figure that each time I drive into the parking lot that I am a new customer, as grocery stores encourage and hope for customers to make repeat visits throughout the week. So, in 1 week, I may go to the same grocery store multiple times, to purchase as many of an item as I need, at the special price. If they wished to only sell me the item at the special price once, then I would expect the limit to read "Limit 1 per person", and I would abide by that, one per person in my family.


So, this week, potatoes are on sale at Albertson's, 10-lb bag for 99cents, "limit 1". On several days this past week, myself, and any family members I had with me in the car, stopped at Albertson's and each bought our 1 bag of potatoes. Yesterday, I picked up our last bag of potatoes for our winter supply. We now have 100 lbs of potatoes to get through the winter months. And I feel we worked within the rules imposed by the store.

What are your thoughts on store limits?

My Thanksgiving sweater: dressing up a plain sweater with too long sleeves

(sorry for the poor-quality photo -- taken with an ipad)

I have this off-white, ribbed, cotton turtleneck sweater that I got a fabulous deal on, a while back. It fits great in the shoulders, I like the length and body fit. But . . . I don't like having to turn up sleeves on my sweaters. Extra long sleeves seem to be "in". And, turning them up makes me feel like I'm back in 4th grade, wearing my sister's hand-me-downs.

In looking through my closet, I came across another sweater that I love, love, love. It's a short-sleeved sweater, with turned up cuff on the short sleeves. The "cuff" is secured with a single rhinestone button. This gave me an idea.

I poured through my button box, hoping to find matching pearl buttons. Unfortunately, no matches.

So, with coupons in hand, my daughters came with me to the fabric store. We looked through all the pearl buttons and found some with "brass" trim that we thought would look nice. And, as both my daughters and I had our own coupons, I could use two 60% off coupons, to buy 2 cards of these buttons (2 buttons per card). The buttons cost a "whopping" $1.60!

Once home, I turned up the cuff to the right length, then sewed two buttons to each cuff, on the outside of the wrist.

*One thing to note, when adding "fancy" buttons, the back of the button card will say whether the buttons can be laundered, or need dry-cleaning.

Anyways, this is my Thanksgiving sweater. I'll be wearing this on Thursday for our family dinner.


About those mailer coupons for craft and fabric stores -- all three of my us, my daughters and myself, are on their mailing list. So, when coupons come out, we each get a set. And when the 3 of us are hitting the fabric or craft store, together, we can swap coupons. (Well, actually, I'll give a couple of dollars to one daughter for her to purchase my item with her coupon, and vice versa.) When my daughters are no longer 3-some-ing to the fabric/craft store with me, I'll probably sign my hubby up for the mailers/coupons. I'm sure he'll REALLY enjoy an afternoon at the fabric store, waiting in line at the cutting table, etc, so that I can use all of the coupons allowed for our household!! ;-)


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If the stock market is doing so awesome, why do I feel so poor?

Property taxes are up. Grocery prices are up. Utility costs are up. Insurance costs are up. The only expense that has gone down is gas for the cars.

Those are the basics for our household. And, yet, salaries are only rising modestly, if at all, for most folks.

What am I doing about the rising costs of living? I'm continuing to watch our grocery spending very closely.  I am being careful as ever to make sure we turn off lights, turn down heat when we won't be home, use equipment like washers and dishwashers only when full, and taking advantage of free entertainment whenever possible. And, I am NOT allowing myself to be lured into spending more than I intend, with this Black Friday coming up.

I remember feeling this way in the 90s. I kept hearing reports about how amazing the economy was doing, yet our family seemed to be moving only slowly towards our financial goals. I guess the good news is we were (and are now) moving towards our goals, and not away from them.

And I keep repeating to myself, "stay the course", "don't give up now", "your work will pay off", "keep your head about you", etc.

Then, I remind myself of just how "rich" we are. There may be less disposable income, after paying bills. But we have a roof over our head, we are well-fed, we are warm and clothed, and we have some money for items and services that the rest of the world would determine are luxuries.

As we enter into Thanksgiving week, here in the US, I can count so many blessings for which to be thankful. As I am sure can you.

Have a great weekend!

Ouchy stuff and this week's lunch round-up (or how in the world do I cook while keeping my leg elevated?)

Monday, I was doing my good-for-me thing, out for a run, when my left foot slips and down I go. It's slick in places still (and may very well be for the next few months -- ack!) I landed on my hands and both knees. I just missed hitting my head and I felt grateful for that. I was also grateful that I fell forward, to take the brunt of the fall on four limbs and not backwards, which would have likely meant a cracked tailbone. I fell that hard.

Anyway, sitting there stunned for a minute, I checked out my knees. Nothing appeared to be loose in any abnormal way. It looked like I might just be bruised. So I picked myself up and finished off my run. It was a long-run day, so I put a lot of miles on my injuries. And really, my knees weren't hurting me in any appreciable way, so I thought, "wow, I lucked out there!"

An hour after getting home, I could not bend my left knee. I took a look and it was badly swollen. Frozen peas for half an hour, and lots of advil. But I still needed to get myself into the kitchen to make something, anything, for the next day's lunches, make dinner and get ready to take my daughter to a piano concert in the evening.

So the afternoon was challenging. I could only make one item for lunches. The family will have to fend for themselves for a couple of days. But this is what I made -- a large casserole dish of Pizza-mac.

Pizza-mac is cooked macaroni, tossed with some protein (I used cooked pinto beans and a diced pepperoni-like beef hot link), some veggies (I used a can of green beans, chopped parsley and some sliced olives), and all held together with pizza sauce, and topped with mozzarella cheese. Bake in the oven at 350 F until the cheese is melted and everything is heated through, about 30 minutes.

Pizza-mac is NOT gourmet, but good ole comfort food, and will fill stomachs for lunches this week (and breakfasts, I had some yesterday as my breakfast).

The rest of the lunch round-up will be:

• oranges
• pbjs
• last of the yogurt
• anything else anyone can find in the kitchen

As for Monday's dinner, I had a homemade pizza in the freezer, to go with the thawed frozen peas, and brownies from the weekend. Good enough!

The concert was really fabulous, but I couldn't keep my leg up, or even out of the way of the folks at the end of the row who kept needing to get up and pass me throughout the evening. Grrrr -- why on earth would anyone allow their phones to be on during a lovely piano concert?! (I glared at them appropriately every time they passed in front of me.)

It's not how I planned for my week to go, but I am able to take care of my knee, and other things, like budgeting and bill paying, nonetheless. Switching gears.


The good news on my knee -- it looks and feels a lot better this morning. I've got it wrapped in an Ace bandage for this week. I won't go for my Wednesday run, but will try for a walk at the end of the week.

Hope your week is going well!

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If you have to make a minimum purchase to buy a turkey at the best price . . .

. . . this is what I do.

Our grocery store's deal this year is spend $35, then buy 1 turkey at $1.19 per pound, and get a second turkey for free. If I find 2 turkeys that weigh about the same, then my price per pound is about 59 cents per pound.

But I have to make that minimum purchase of $35, to get that deal. For someone who only buys groceries at rock-bottom prices, this can be a challenge to spend $35 at a regular grocery store.

But I have a system/plan that works for us. The bath tissue that I regularly buy is this store's own house brand of Scott's 1000. It's not comfy tp, but I did some figuring several years ago, and this bath tissue, store brand, at the current price, is the best bargain for our family. (Here's the post I wrote on making that calculation.)

So, I let our household run very low on bath tissue in the weeks leading up to my turkey purchases each November. It got so low this month that I was redistributing tp from one bathroom to the next, so no one in the house would have one of those emergencies. Yes, it was dangerously low, in fact! I didn't mean for it to get this low, but it did.

And to make my $35 minimum spend at the grocery store, I do a major stock-up of bath tissue for the bulk of that dollar amount, buying the economical tp, as I have already calculated. 

Anyway, on Friday, I made the first of our turkey purchases, buying two 19-lb turkeys, plus 40 rolls of bath tissue, 4 dozen eggs, and 1 tiny treat for myself. I was 2 cents short of the $35 minimum purchase, so I checked out the clearance racks at the grocery store and found a marked down Hallowe'en treat for myself. It was a Russell Stover's candy, very yummy, and 39 cents.

If you need to make a minimum spend in your grocery store to get the deal, look around for what else the store might carry, that is well-priced for your area. Some stores allow the purchase of alcohol or gift cards to go towards the minimum spend. I had thought of buying another bottle of vodka for making more vanilla extract. Or, if you know you would like to give a gift card to someone at some point, you could pick that up now, and have that go towards your minimum purchase. Or, perhaps a major stock-up of bath tissue would work for your household, as well.

Happy bargain shopping!

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Which financial path did you choose?

Choices. We each get to choose our financial path. We can choose living life way beyond our means, or we can choose to live within our means.

I'm close to someone who chose a very different financial path than my husband and I. They live a life that looks affluent to me. They travel a lot, eat out frequently, have not just one extraordinarily lovely home, but a second home, as well. They drive very nice cars, have gorgeous clothing and furnishings, and would shudder at the thought of "having" to live the life that I chose.

My family shops discount stores, thrift stores, clearance racks, gladly accepts hand-me-downs, makes do with what we have, and drive our cars until they just won't move any more. We rarely eat out, our travels are limited and so feel very special, and our home is almost entirely furnished with second-hand furniture, most of which was given to us by relatives who were down-sizing.

Looking at the surface, it would appear that this other couple is doing much better than my husband and I, financially. Their career paths have been far more lucrative than ours. My husband and I have always managed on about 1/3 to 1/4 of the other couple's income.

However, looks don't always tell the whole story. My husband and I don't have 1 stitch of debt, not one tiny bit. Our house is paid in full. We paid cash for our cars. We have enough comfort in our lives that life is indeed enjoyable. And we have a significant savings to ward off any unforeseen financial disaster. This other couple is in the retirement zone, but unable to retire for several more years, due to debt. They try to be upbeat, but I can hear between words that they wish that they could be enjoying retirement right now, as are all of their friends.

Over the years, I've felt envy for all they seemed to have. But now, I feel sorry for them and their financial choices. If my husband and I had to retire right here and now, we'd do okay, and find happiness regardless of our finances. If something were to happen and this other couple were to be forced into retirement, they'd be miserable with the style of life that they'd "have" to live with.


Often times, these choices are gradual. You find yourself in the fast lane and boxed in, unable to move over to a slower lane. In no time, the spending-lifestyle has escalated, and debt builds. Or in my family's case, our income was quite small, and we needed to trim costs a little bit, all those years ago. And before we new it, 27 years had passed and we had developed many frugal habits, and managed to snag a bit of financial freedom for ourselves in the process.

Either way, it takes just one step in the direction of choice to set a new path for yourself. Just one step. I'm grateful that my husband and I took that one step in a frugal direction.

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Veteran's Day week lunch round-up

Ack! I got totally sidetracked on Monday. Not one single item made for the brown-baggers to take for their lunches! But I did make my standard 5 loaves of whole wheat dough for sandwich bread. And I sidelined 1 portion of that dough for a dozen homemade cinnamon rolls. Mmmmm, those were at their absolute best right out of the oven, all warm, sticky and very cinnamon-y (what do you think, is cinnamon-y a real enough word?). And they reheat in the microwave very well!

Anyway, Tuesday was a holiday for 3 of the 4, so I had a bit of a reprieve on making lunch items. I'm still struggling with what to make for lunches for Wed., Thurs., and Fri. of this week. It's looking like lot of pbj's, plus some:

• tomato-vegetable soup (the garden is coming to a close with the cold temps this week, so will use what still looks good, and add it to some of the very large batch of marinara sauce that I made on Saturday. That should make a quick, easy and flavorful soup.)
• more homemade Greek yogurt (I got a deal on whole milk last week. I love how creamy Greek yogurt turns out when I use whole milk for the base yogurt -- and the higher fat content is good for my daughter who still needs to put on a few lbs.)
• pumpkin-praline granola (did you know that Dollar Tree now has pecans in stock? Not a bad price per pound, either.)
• fresh oranges and bananas (Cash and Carry has 40-lb cases of navel oranges on for $16.98 this week, or 42cents/lb -- great price.)
• more baked apples (nearing the end of the apples from our orchard -- they've been fantastic this year!)
• mini strombolis (using canned biscuit dough, marinara sauce, mozza, olives, onions and peppers)

As the school year progresses, I notice that my daughters get up later and later each morning, leaving no time to make breakfast or lunch for themselves. These ready-made items are a huge help. And I know that I'm saving them some of their pocket money (hard-earned from cleaning dorm rooms this past summer), as I no longer provide any of that for them.

I hope that your week is going well!

"Now there's something I didn't know that I needed!"

Picking up a few things at Dollar Tree yesterday afternoon, I noticed an end-cap on one of the aisles with Christmas-themed chair seat pads, like for kitchen chairs. I had a flash of a thought, "oooh, I don't have chair pads in a Christmas-y fabric. Maybe I need a set!"

Fortunately, it was only a flash of a thought, and my better sense took over immediately. But it did make me think about how many products are marketed, that we've never even thought we may "need", but are persuaded by marketing/advertisers that we do indeed "need" these items.

Maybe you would like some chair pads in a nice red and green poinsettia fabric. That's okay. But what annoyed me was I had never even thought I might want some sort of seasonal chair pad before. Just the sight of them made me think I could use some.

This time of year, I receive stacks of catalogs with all manner of Christmas decor items. Several years back, I saw some Christmas bed sheets that I felt I "just had to have". Fortunately, again, better sense prevailed and I skipped them altogether. I've found that it's just best to toss those catalogs into the recycle bin without ever opening them.

I must confess, I've even been tempted to buy Christmas sweaters in the past. If you like them, and will wear them, that's great. But many of these impulses to buy seasonal items are often regretted by me later. I'm really not a Christmas sweater-type of girl. (I do have a couple of nice red sweaters (plain, red sweaters), and I do wear those on or near the holidays.)

While keeping the commerce wheel spinning is important for our economy and keeping folks employed, what I feel is excess begins to bother me after a while.

I'm not against having "stuff". For myself, I only want to own the stuff that I really want to have, long term. I have a true minimalist brother-in-law. He says that "stuff" begins to "own" him after a while. "Stuff" needs to be maintained, housed, dusted, repaired, etc. He'd rather not spend his time taking care of his "stuff". He's got a point. How much time and space do we want to devote to our "stuff"?

I guess I really don't "need" those Christmas-themed kitchen chair pads. Our backsides will simply have to deal with our regular chair pads -- they are sage green, after all. Maybe our behinds will still think that they are Christmas-y.  ;)

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Can you go a week without spending money?

I'm not talking about not paying your utility bill, or skipping out on your mortgage payment. I'm talking about spending that looks like a cup of coffee at the corner cafe, a tank of gas for the car, a video rental, a new toy, a quick bite out for lunch or even the cart of groceries to get through the week.

I just realized this morning that I haven't spent ANY money whatsoever, for the past week. No gas for the car, no groceries, no extras, nothing. I'm guessing this happens more often than I realize. I just don't always think about it. How about you? Do you ever go a week or more without spending a single cent?

We live in a society where money appears to flow freely from pocket to merchant. Spending money seems to be the path to life's enjoyment, for many Americans. In my area, the mall and movie theaters are packed to the gills on weekends. This may be news to some, but shopping is not a hobby.

I think it is significant when we realize that the enjoyment of our own lives is not dependent on how much or how little we spend. We can find so much satisfaction with age-old hobbies like drawing, reading, playing games (as kids, my sister and I found ourselves enormously entertained for hours, with an ordinary deck of cards), or making music. And many of these past times won't make you cringe when you open the credit card bill next month.

It's Friday. I'm making plans for our family weekend. We won't be eating out, but instead, we'll work together, and have a good time at that, making our Saturday dinner (probably homemade pizza). We may get out the Scrabble board and see who's learned some new vocabulary. There's an art gallery in my area that I've been meaning to check out. That's on my personal plan for entertainment tomorrow afternoon. We won't be going to the mall, plugging our behinds into a theater seat or screaming our dinner order into the speaker at the drive through. I probably won't think too much about how little money we spend, this weekend. But when our financial goals are someday realized, I'll be glad we made the choices that we did over the years.

Early November lunch round-up

Much of what I made for lunches this week was either made Sunday evening (the baking) or were leftovers from Sunday and Monday's dinners. I've been preparing a little extra 2 nights in a row, to provide enough leftovers to get through several days' lunches. I did spend part of Monday afternoon making the pudding cups and zucchini bread and cream cheese sandwiches. My family really enjoys the ease of opening the fridge and choosing from this selection, according to what sounds appealing to them. And I like not having to think about lunches for the week, after I finish making up the selection each Monday.

• apple chunk muffins
• cornbread
• Asian-style turkey-tofu-noodle soup
• bean and veggie burger patties
• baked apples
• "zucchini" bread/cream cheese sandwiches ("zucchini" is a tiny, under ripe pumpkin, peeled and grated)
• homemade chocolate pudding cups

Have you noticed the ads for Christmas yet? I know it's now November, and all, but I'd like to postpone thinking about Christmas for just 1 week.

I hope your week is going well.

Bit of a set-back with grocery shopping and autumn stock-up

So, Saturday (Nov.1) was the local produce stand's clearance sale. My usual is to really stock-up on good keepers like winter squash, garlic, cabbage, oranges, apples, and some nice to have items like avocados, kiwi and pineapple. That's what I *usually* get, at rock-bottom produce prices.

This year, I had something on the calendar that I couldn't change for that Saturday, the whole day Saturday. I had thought I'd hit the produce stand in the afternoon on Friday, and see if anything had been marked down yet, and buy what I could.

I had company at lunch on Friday, so spent the morning cleaning house. Then in the early afternoon, I received a phone call from one of my daughters. There was a lock down on campus, yes, another one. After the shooting that occurred last June on campus, this was worrisome for both daughters (as well as many of the students they were in lock down with). I stayed home for the afternoon, waiting for the lock down to come to a conclusion. By late afternoon, I had heard that an arrest was made, and the campus was secured. At this point, I simply didn't have the energy to drive down to the produce stand. And so, I have missed my opportunity for fall produce stock-ups.

Now, the challenge ahead of me -- finding deals on produce in other markets.

I know that there was nothing I could do about my circumstances. But still, this feels like a set-back.