Doing Spring Cleaning in Winter

Winter seems to be a better season than spring for me to do a major cleaning. In winter, I'm not working in the garden, creating holiday stuff, shopping, cooking, and baking in a frenzy, or vacationing. Everyone in the house is back on their regular schedules, so I'm not as busy with them, either. 

I am still a pretty busy person, however. So, I tackle the "winter cleaning" in small chunks. Each day, I take on a new task or work on a different area of the house. While I don't get that great "doesn't the house just sparkle" moment with cleaning in bits and pieces, by Easter I have cleared out the cobwebs and cleaned up all of the little messes and stains so my home is pleasing.

Yesterday, I tackled one small section of the kitchen, wiping down the appliances, cupboard doors, and counters, editing out unnecessary stuff, and touching up nicks in the paint on the door and drawer fronts.

a small scratch that also had a stain next to it

We have several tiny nicks in the surface of our painted cabinets. Nicks in light-colored paint appear like small dark marks. 

I mixed a tiny bit of each paint until it looked about right

I used some acrylic craft paint and a craft paint brush to dab on a tiny amount of paint and camouflage these little nicks.

The scratch is much less noticeable, I think. Other nicks look much improved, too.

I'm very happy with how well this worked. While these things may seem insignificant, I like to take care of them as I find them. That way, the jobs don't pile up and seem overwhelming. Plus, it just makes me feel better about my house when I think it looks nice.


note: yesterday's cleaning was a bigger job than I take on most days. The day before, my cleaning task was to wipe down all of the light switches in the house with rubbing alcohol, and the day before that was to clean the washing machine. So don't get the idea that I spend lots of time cleaning every day.

The Wrap Up for January's Groceries and February's Grocery Plans

I can scarcely believe that the month is nearly gone! We're doing great on groceries this month. The only food that we ran out of was whole milk for homemade yogurt. We finished off the last batch of yogurt a week ago. So, I will have to wait until after Fred Meyer's Senior Discount day on Feb. 4 for more yogurt. We have plenty of canned vegetables (green beans, corn, tomatoes, yams, pumpkin), oranges, carrots, a whole hubbard squash, lots of frozen green veggies and berries, flour, oats, canned tuna, eggs, cream cheese, and butter/oil, with some meat and some milk to get through February. As I mentioned before, February is month 2 of my coasting months, using the supplies that I stocked up on in the fall.

I spent another $2 over the weekend. For the month of January, I spent $85.10, leaving $20.94 in the budget to roll over into February's allocated budget of $105. This, with the surplus from January, will give us $125.94 for our groceries in February. 

There are only a couple of special food days in February. The first one is Superbowl Sunday. I like to have something fun and snacky that day. This past week, that $2 ($1.98 actually) was spent on a large bag of tortilla chips and a 16-oz jar of salsa -- both special sales w/coupons. I'll use those on SS.

I also like to prepare something nice on Valentine's Day, so I'll be looking for a nice meat option, such as beef or boneless/skinless chicken breasts. In addition, I bought red-wrapped truffles on clearance after Christmas for the sole purpose of using for Valentine's Day. I think they'll be a hit.

For the rest of the month, we will rely on our basic stores with the following additional purchases:


Fred Meyer Senior Discount Day, Feb. 4
Smidge n Spoon sugar, 10-lb bag, $4.47 Fred Meyer

Fred Meyer milk, gallon, $1.79 ea, get 1 whole, 2 2% ($5.37)
meat for Valentine's day (boneless chicken breast or beef) -- budget about $4.50

Walmart

bananas, 10 lbs, 42 cents/lb
tofu, $1.44

cabbage, 2 heads, 58 cents/lb

1 jar decaf instant coffee, $3.57

Cash & Carry/ Smart Foodservice
Gulf Pacific long grain brown rice, 25-lb bag, $11.95

Simply Value 32-oz vanilla extract/flavoring, $3.05

First Street shredded mozzarella cheese, 5-lb bag, $12.79
russet potatoes, 10-lb bag, $2.45
onions, 25-lb bag, $8.69

WinCo
$2 of bulk dry milk powder
$1 of bulk dry coffee creamer
$1 of bulk onion powder

The dollar amount for this list comes to $64.91. That leaves me with $60.93 for anything else I may need in February. 

I checked my sugar supply and I have about 10 pounds remaining, so no urgency on that item after all. I'll set my errands to take me to the complex where Fred Meyer is located on Tuesday, then pop in, get milk, and check for Valentine's meat and markdowns. There's enough in the budget for me to continue looking for clearance deals and special sales to stock up on.

It's a very lucky thing that my family and I have such simple tastes when it comes to food.