10 Last-Minute Gifts You Can Add to Your Grocery Pickup Order

I haven't been inside any sort of store since early November. I am doing all of my holiday shopping either online for shipping or through my grocery curbside pick-ups. 

I've needed to add several items to my next pick-up order to round out my gifts for family members and friends. When browsing my Walmart grocery store's website, I found a surprising variety in what I could buy for all of the people on my list. No, this is nothing like Alex P. Keaton's Christmas morning gift shopping at the 24-hour mini-mart. There are abundant gift possibilities in regular grocery stores. And you don't need to step foot into the store to find them -- just add the items to your order.

I came up with a whole bunch of possibilities and am actually using several of these for my own family members. Here you go -- 10 last-minute gifts that you can add to your curbside pick-up order from your local grocery store.

1  Pasta dinner basket -- pasta, jar of sauce, wedge of Parmesan cheese, bottle of olive oil, Mediterranean olives or giardiniera, a nice jar of fruit or some Italian cookies, and a tool like a colander or mini- cheese grater.

2  Bag of spa goodies -- make a bag (like the one here  or this one here) from your paper stash or reuse a good-condition, previous used bag, fill with any of the following: loofah, bath poof, or brush, and bottle of foaming bath, bath bombs, mineral bath soak, moisturizing bath beads, moisturizing face masks, a shower cap, foot cream, foot scrub, and a bar of dark chocolate.

3  Caramel apple basket -- basket filled with fresh apples, mini caramel dips, and an apple wedger/slicer

4  movie night in a bag -- popcorn (maybe the kind in an aluminum foil pan that you pop on the stove), boxed candy, soda pop, then download or email a gift card to a streaming service like Netflix or Disney+

5  game day gift -- a bucket filled with favorite snacks like everything to make nachos, some nuts and jerky, and some upscale soda pop 

6  a trio of rubs for grilling

7  for kids and families -- toys, games, or puzzles. On your grocery website, search "toys for girls", "toys for boys", "toys for toddlers". On my Walmart Neighborhood Market site, (the grocery store, not the big store), I found: a great safety dart board that would have been enjoyed by either boys or girls; Baby Einstein and VTech electronic toys, shape sorters, spinners, and soft books for toddlers; and puzzles and games that the whole family would enjoy.

8  a box of chocolates and flowers or flowering plant

9  a bundle of the more upscale versions of any favorite food/snack/beverages than the recipient might normally buy for themselves

10  a coffee or tea basket -- a couple of bags of good quality coffee or nice boxes of tea, coffee flavoring syrup, unbleached coffee filters or refillable/reusable k-cup coffee filter pods, and a package of biscotti, amaretti, or Lotus Biscoff cookies

While browsing, I also found many, many possibilities for stocking stuffers or small gifts. 

So, here's a bonus: 15 + stocking stuffers to add to a grocery curbside pick-up order.

1. individual items from the above list
2. small bags of chips
3. individual bags of cookies or crackers
4. oranges/tangerines
5. nuts in the shell (of course, you need a nut cracker handy)
6. cocoa packets
7. individual servings of cereal (those tiny boxes are fun)
8. nice chocolate bars, any individual spa item, candle and candle holder for a grown-up small gift or older teen/young adult stocking stuffer
9. men's travel kit/travel sized toiletries or full-size body wash
10. bath toys or bath crayons for young kids (search your store's site for "kids bath")
11. gold foil-wrapped chocolate coins
12. markers/colored pencils, coloring books for young kids
13. small balls, silly putty, silly string, flarp for slightly older kids
14. flashlight
15. hair accessories, nail polish/file/adhesive nail art, lip balm for teen and preteen girls
16. car maintenance items, such as snow and ice brushes/scrapers, chamois/microfiber towels, or air fresheners for teens who have a car or responsibility for the family car (search "car tools" or "car" on your store's site)
17. mittens or socks

Stay well, friends, as you do your holiday shopping!

Fat Substitutes for Butter (for Use in Baking)

from my collection of vintage holiday postcards

Whether you're making the substitution for reasons of health, budget, availability, or religious observance, substituting other fats for butter is not always a straight forward endeavor. 

Butter is more than simply fat. By law, butter must contain a minimum of 80% butterfat. The remaining components of butter are milk solids (roughly 2%) and water (roughly 18%).

An American stick of butter is 8 tablespoons, 1/2 cup, or 4 ounces. Going by our formula of butter's composition above, the fat content of a single stick of butter is about 3.2 ounces. And a tablespoon of butter contains about 12 grams of fat. We'll use this last info as a comparison for other fats.

Margarine

Like butter, margarine also contains water, about 20% water/80% fat for stick margarine. Margarine spreads (tub margarine) can contain as much as 40% water and less than 60% fat. Knowing the water vs. fat content of margarine informs us that stick margarine can be substituted in equal measures to butter, while margarine spread may cause some baking recipes to fail. A tablespoon of stick margarine has about 11 grams of fat and one tablespoon of tub margarine has about 7 grams of fat.

Vegetable Oil (such as canola, corn, olive, or nut oils)

While vegetable oils are almost completely water-free, most can hold a trace amount of water, up to .10% (not 10%, but .10%). (Side note: In the processing, a small amount of water is introduced to the oil as a method of deodorizing the fat. The water rises and almost completely escapes through steam, carrying odiferous particles with it.) 

Because vegetable and nut oils are almost entirely fat, the measurement when substituting oil for butter needs to be adjusted. According to Joy of Cooking, about 7/8 cup of oil (liquid or semi-solid, such as coconut oil) is a substitution for 1 cup of butter/stick margarine. A tablespoon of vegetable oil contains 14 grams of fat. Therefore, 7/8 of a tablespoon of vegetable oil contains 12.25 grams of fat, very close to the fat content of butter. I should point out that many folks recommend that you can get by with 3/4 the amount of oil when substituting for butter, if you find that formula more user-friendly.

If baking cookies, you may want to decrease the quantity of oil even further. Go Dairy Free recommends using 1/2 the measure of oil as called for of butter, adding a small amount of other liquids as needed to pull the dough together. Other sites recommend 3/4 cup oil for 1 cup butter, such as Bread Dad's recipe for drop chocolate chip cookies made with vegetable oil. 

Lard

Lard is rendered pork fat. Like vegetable oil, the substitution ratio of lard is 7/8 cup lard for every cup of butter. A tablespoon of lard has about 13 grams of fat. So, 7/8 tablespoon of lard would have 11.375 grams fat, again fairly close to that of butter.

Solid Vegetable Shortening (named brand: Crisco)

Solid vegetable shortening contains the same amount of fat as the same dry measure of butter, about 12 grams of fat per tablespoon. As such, products like Crisco shortening can be used cup for cup as butter in recipes. Just note that if you are measuring by weight, hydrogenated fats weigh between 6.4 and 7.2 ounces per US cup, whereas butter weighs about 8 ounces per cup. 

Solid vegetable shortening has virtually no water content, making it ideal for "thinning" melted chocolate for dipping or coating (no water content to cause seizing of the chocolate).

Clarified meat fats

Bacon fat

From my 2014 post on using meat fat in cooking and baking:

"clarified bacon fat in place of lard or Crisco in pastry  To clarify fat, add fat to a small saucepan of water. Heat to boiling and simmer for 5 minutes. Allow to cool, chill and pour cloudy water off of the solidified fat. Add more water to the saucepan and repeat the simmer/chilling process 2 or 3 additional times. The final clarified fat has lost its "meat" flavor, and can be used for baking biscuits or making pie pastry."

Joy of Cooking suggests 4/5 cup (or 3/4 cup plus about 2  1/2 teaspoons) of clarified bacon fat for every cup of butter. A tablespoon of bacon grease has about 12.9 grams of fat.

Chicken fat

Clarifying chicken fat uses the same process as for bacon fat, simmering in water, chilling, and pouring off the cloudy water, repeating about 3 times.

Joy of Cooking recommends substituting 3/4 cup of clarified chicken fat for 1 cup of butter. A tablespoon of clarified chicken fat has about 13 grams of fat.

To simplify the above, here's a quick-chart for reference.

None of these fat substitutions will give you the flavor of butter that many of us love in holiday baked goods. However, you can boost the flavors in your baking with spices, toasted nuts, citrus zest, extracts, and even imitation butter flavoring.

In addition to substituting other fats for butter, most of us also know that you can use applesauce, pureed pumpkin and other pureed fruits and vegetables for butter or oil in baking. This post was just intended to clarify how substituting one fat for another is not so straight forward.

Healthier Gingerbread Cupcakes *plus* Homemade Spice Cake Mix Recipe

The cupcake that you saw in my post yesterday was a slight modification of these delicious gingerbread cupcakes from Hungry Girl. HG uses commercial spice cake mix as the base ingredient for the cupcakes. Moisture is added with applesauce and molasses.

I made her recipe almost entirely as she instructed, with these exceptions:

• for the cake, I used whole eggs in place of the egg substitute (2 whole large eggs plus enough white from a third egg to make 1/2 cup total)
• for the icing, I used regular cream cheese and regular butter instead of light versions
• I made my own spice cake mix from scratch ingredients (see below)
• I lightly brushed my cupcake papers with oil, so the cake would easily come out of the paper. Nonstick cooking spray on the papers would do the same thing. I've found this necessary in low-fat muffins/cupcakes.

I have to say, these were so delicious and not cloyingly sweet. (I know I linked to the cupcakes twice -- they were that good!) I would say they were a cross between a muffin and a cupcake, which is exactly what I was searching for.

My quest for a homemade spice cake mix

As you likely guessed at this point, I didn't have spice cake mix on hand. But I still wanted to try this recipe. The homemade cake mix recipes that I found online didn't contain any milk or fat, but instead called for adding those two ingredients when actually baking a cake. In contrast, commercial cake mixes instruct the baker to add water (not milk) and a portion of the fat. Some boxed mixes contain dry milk and almost all contain fat. Here's an example: Betty Crocker Super Moist Spice Cake mix contains flour, sugar, corn syrup, leavening, corn starch, cinnamon, partially hydrogenated soybean/cottonseed oil, salt, other spices, and a bunch of chemical-sounding ingredients. When you bake the boxed cake mix, instructions call for additional fat in the form of oil, plus eggs and water. 

In order for me to have a homemade mix that would be compatible with Hungry Girl's recipe, I needed to modify a homemade spice cake mix recipe that I found online. 

The most fundamental changes that I made were the addition of 2  1/2 tablespoons of vegetable shortening (an approximation of what would be in a boxed mix) and 3 tablespoons of powdered milk. You can make this mix without the powdered milk, but adding milk to cakes improves the texture. In a commercial cake mix, the function of some of the chemical-sounding ingredients is to improve the resulting texture. 

I also substituted granulated white sugar for brown sugar. Boxed spice cake mix ingredients simply call for sugar, not brown sugar or even molasses solids. Finally, I made my own substitution for pumpkin pie spice and used 1  1/4 teaspoon cinnamon, 1/4 teaspoon ginger, 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg, and 1/4 teaspoon cloves.

This very long-winded explanation is to say that if you wanted to bake Hungry Girl's gingerbread cupcakes, but don't have the spice cake mix, you can make your own cake mix that will work with her recipe by following my homemade mix recipe below.

Homemade Spice Cake Mix (yields 2  1/3 cups mix)

ingredients:

1  1/4 cups all purpose flour

1 cup granulated sugar

2 tablespoons corn starch

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

3/4 teaspoon ground ginger

1  1/4 teaspoons cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

1/4 teaspoon cloves

3 tablespoons milk powder

2  1/2 tablespoons vegetable shortening

instructions:

Combine all of the dry ingredients with a wire whisk.

Cut the shortening in with a knife and fork, then with the whisk until shortening is well-incorporated.

Store in a tightly-covered container in the pantry. I checked several sites and all seemed to indicate that homemade cake mixes should keep for a minimum of 2 months.

I used my mix in the Hungry Girl gingerbread cupcake recipe, as called for on her site.

However, to bake my mix as a regular spice cake:

Using a mixer, combine a full recipe of homemade mix with 1/2 cup water, 2 eggs, 1 tsp vanilla, and 1/4 cup vegetable oil and beat for 2 minutes.

Pour into prepared pans and bake at 350 degrees, until toothpick inserted comes out clean:

• two 8-inch round pans, bake for 17 to 19 minutes, or 
• one 11 X 7-inch rectangular pan, bake for 28 to 30 minutes, or
• 14 to 15 cupcake liners, bake for 15 to 18 minutes

Comments on this mix

This mix recipe was a good size for the Hungry Girl recipe. HG called for 1  3/4 cup of mix, and my homemade mix yielded about 2  1/3 cups of dry ingredients. Leftover dry cake mix can be added to pancakes or other scratch muffins/quick breads.

To note, this homemade mix is considerably smaller than a typical commercial cake mix. A 15.25 oz boxed mix contains about 3 1/3 cups of dry ingredients. 

If you are following instructions for a doctored spice cake mix that calls for a whole box of commercial cake mix, you'll want to multiply my recipe by 1.5. That amount would yield about 3 1/2 cups of mix, which is a little over 2 tablespoons greater than a boxed 15.25 oz mix.

Happy holidays without the guilt!

Being frugal is about so much more than just saving money. Being frugal allows one to thoroughly enjoy all that they have, regardless how great or small the size of their income.

Cheers!

Create Stylish Outdoor Planters for the Holidays without Spending a Penny

materials needed:

• the pot, trough, or planter from your yard, patio, or garden, already filled with soil (if starting with an empty pot, fill with garden soil not potting soil, which is too loose for holding the branches)
• evergreen cuttings from your yard
• berry-laden branches from your yard
• interesting-looking bare branches and long twigs
• large pinecones
• weatherproof bows, stars, bells, small patio lanterns

basic instructions:

• if the soil in your container is frozen, use a screwdriver or other similar tool to poke holes about 4 to 6 inches into the soil
• insert evergreen branches and bare twig branches into soil first, then add berry branches
• finish with pinecones or other ornaments, if desired

From my own yard, two pots filled with evergreen cuttings, berry-laden branches and bows. As simple as cutting a few branches and poking them into the existing soil in winter-bare pots.

More artistically done than my own -- a pot on my neighbor's driveway. They've included several types of evergreen branches, pinecones, tall cuttings of red twig dogwood in the back, and the remaining flowering kale from their fall pot.

Another neighbor -- not a pot, but some evergreen branches tied onto a brick lamp pillar, with star embellishments and a red bow.

A Dozen+ Holiday Gift Wrapping Ideas Using Recycled Materials

Here's an opportunity to combine repurposing materials that were destined for the landfill or recycle center with staying out of stores this holiday season to minimize virus exposure. There are so many ways to use recyclables in creative ways. And in some cases, the end result can be so spectacular, one may permanently stop buying holiday gift wrap. Here's my list. If you have links or ideas, please leave a comment below.

cereal boxes

image source: http://stuffyoucanthave.
blogspot.com/2010/10/cereal-boxes.html

This creative box is the gift wrap and box in one, using an empty cereal box. Instructions and template on Stuff You Can't Have by Catherine McEver.

image source: https://www.cucicucicoo.com/
2013/12/tutorial-make-gift-bag-cereal-box/

Looking for something more, um, pop fun? These cereal boxes are not at all disguised, which is part of their charm. Instructions for how to make a "gift bag" from the base of a cereal box by Lisa on Cucicucicoo.

festive printed grocery bags as wrapping paper

image source: https://acreativemint.typepad.com/
a_creative_mint/2010/12/trader-joes-a-little-red.html

Some grocery stores print their holiday grocery sacks with fun and festive images. Cut open the bags along the back seam, smooth out, wrap gift, then add some red ribbon. Voila, festive gift wrap from a paper grocery bag. Leslie on A Creative Mint demonstrates how a Trader Joe's grocery bag is transformed into charming gift wrap with the help of red and white baker's twine, red and white Japanese printed papers, plain white gift tags, white paper doilies, and white adhesive label blanks.

paper gift shop or clothing store bags

image source: https://the-feathered-nest.
blogspot.com/2008/12/
great-tutorials-from-last-christmas.html 

Small specialty gift shops in my area often use brown paper bags for purchases, sometimes adding a sticker or ink stamp with their store name and logo. You can cover the store info on the bag with a sheet of music (printed from your computer or from an old book of sheet music). Add a bit of greenery and wisp of thin twine with hot glue, and you've got a lovely gift bag. The Feathered Nest by Dawn Edmonson features this project and several others on her site.

I made this bag last year with an H & M shopping bag and some brief shots from 2 cans of spray paint. I used the bag in a gift exchange with my garden club. The first comment the recipient made was what a beautiful gift bag this was. Not seen in this photo, I also tied 2 of the spray-painted leaves from our Thanksgiving table onto the handle. I posted about how I made this bag in November of 2019.

potato chip bag

image source: https://www.marthastewart.com/
274678/gift-wrapping-ideas?slide=f5120c45-a763-4676-8b50
-53ad9e564df5#f5120c45-a763-4676-8b50-53ad9e564df5

Who doesn't love receiving a shiny package to open during the holidays? Potato chip and other packaged snacks often come in bags that have a silvery interior. Cut an empty chip bag along the bottom and main back seam to make one large sheet. Wash the silvery side with hot, soapy water and dry. You now have a large, sheet of shiny wrapping "paper" for stylish and chic-looking gift wrap. Of course, Martha Stewart does an excellent job of this.

your leftover newspaper

image source: https://yourstrulyg.wordpress.com
/2011/10/16/diy-newspaper-gift-bag/

We all know you can wrap a gift in the colorful comic section of the newspaper. What about making a gift bag from the Sunday funnies? You've seen how I make small gift bags out of copy paper (with sheet music and DIY celebration wrap). You can make larger gift bags from larger sheets of paper, such as a map or a newspaper. Here's a comic page gift bag, using 2 sheets of the Sunday newspaper, some cardboard squares to reinforce the front and back, some glue, and a couple of lengths of ribbon. Gwyneth on Yours Truly, G gives all of the how-to's that you might need to turn your Sunday funnies into a cute gift bag.

image source: https://www.ariyonainterior.com/
25-newspaper-gift-wrapping-ideas/

Another option for your leftover newspapers is to simply use them as the gift wrap. Black, white and red make a classic holiday combination. If you're like me, you have a stash of saved red ribbon from previous years' packages. 

If your gift didn't come in a box, you can repurpose empty cardboard packaging from cake mixes, mac 'n cheese boxes, cereal boxes, or cracker boxes to give your newspaper-wrapped gift a more polished look. You can even cut a larger box down to size to fit a smaller gift.

Add a sprig of greenery from your yard or houseplant and you've got a beautifully-wrapped gift. I also love the look of black or red ink stamped images on the newspaper. Rittika from One Brick at a Time offers 25 different ways to use newspaper as the base paper in wrapping gifts -- all of them are very lovely.

catalogs or magazines

image source: https://snapguide.com/
guides/use-magazine-pages-as-gift-wrap/

Are you inundated with catalogs this season? Or do you have a stash of magazines in your basement? You can do lots of clever things with magazine/catalog pages. The covers (made of heavier weight paper stock than the interior pages) are perfect for making bows. Magazine or catalog pages can be taped or glue-sticked together to make larger sheets or use single pages for smaller gifts. 

Think outside the box, here. For instance, scientific magazines have a unique interest factor and often darker color combinations for gift wrapping. Vintage-y holiday versions of catalogs (like Victorian Trading Co or Vermont Country Store) have images that are perfect for turning into Christmas gift tags. Real Simple magazine used a 2-page spread of images of cookies to wrap a gift. I see possibilities for that stack of old Women's Day and Family Circle magazines that I have stashed in a cabinet.

image source: https://www.salvagesisterand
mister.com/diy-gift-wrap-from-magazines/

Salvage Sister & Mister show how even an obvious catalog page with prices and item numbers can look sophisticated as gift wrap. I love the folded star embellishment added to the package, too.

bows and ties

For tying gifts: raffia, baker's twine, jute or butcher's twine, kitchen string, pinked-edge fabric scraps, cotton yarn, and cut strips of paper, potato chip bags or plastic wrap will all do the trick.

"Bows" don't have to be bows. Some of the most beautiful adornments for holiday packages are made from garden greenery, cinnamon sticks, pinecones, and twigs. However, if you're after that more traditional look, bows can be made from paper scraps.

image source: http://charletswebsite.blogspot.com/
2012/11/holiday-paper-bows-how-to.html

Charlet Mallett from Charlet's Website provides all of the measurements and instructions needed to make star bows out of wrapping paper scraps or magazine/catalog pages. 

image source: https://www.marthastewart.com/
2223350/how-to-make-bows-ribbon

Martha Stewart shows how to make additional styles of bows out of ribbon, but these two could also be made with cut strips of paper. For Martha's details on bow-making, see this article.

gift wrapping as part of the gift

image source: https://mixedkreations.com/
diy-mercury-glass-jars/

While these are all wonderful ways to breathe one last life into something that might be garbage, I also like the idea of "wrapping" a gift in something that can be used again by the recipient, such as a small gift that is wrapped in a scarf, handkerchief, dish towel, or cloth napkin. 

How about "wrapping" a gift in a reusable container that was reclaimed from the garbage/recycle bin, like a glass jar that is either lined with opaque paper/fabric or is covered with acrylic or spray paint. Linda from Mixed Kreations shows how she made these beautiful mercury glass jars. I think they would make fabulous wrapping for a special gift. The recipient could reuse this jar as a personal or bathroom storage container.

making a plan for saving this year's bows and ribbons to use next year

Finally, why not make a dedicated "recycle gift wrap and bows" box to use on your gift exchange day for saving those special wrapping pieces to use next year. If your group knows in advance where to put beautiful bows for saving, there's less chance these items will be tossed into the garbage. The box doesn't need to be anything fancy, simply a dedicated box to store all the wrapping items that you wish to save.

edited to add:

Kris linked to these adorable gingerbread house gift bags made with brown paper bags and white puffy paint. Super cute! 

Two Special Ornaments for Our Tree

If you have grown children who have moved out and on with their lives, this may resonate with you. 

When my son and daughter-in-law married, it became time for them to establish some of their own traditions. All of my kids have collected Christmas ornaments since their early childhoods. And each year, they would put their own ornaments on our family tree. 

With a new family unit formed a couple of years ago, it was time for my son and daughter-in-law to take their ornaments for their own home. As a mom, there's a sadness in that for me. I don't get to look at the collection of boat and airplane ornaments that my son chose in his youth. And I don't get to see the angels, hearts, and stars that we'd given to my daughter-in-law when she was still a girlfriend/fiancée. Those ornaments have their own home now.

Two Christmases ago, our family began a new tradition for tree ornaments. When one of ours moves out and on with their life, they get a special ornament for our tree that lives in our home. I took two of our plain glass ball ornaments and used a gilded pen to write each of their names on them. Last night, I lovingly placed the "Angie" and "Chris" ornaments on our tree, knowing that while the two of them physically live somewhere else, I hold them close in my heart always.

sniff, sniff Someone pass me the tissue box.

Have a great weekend, everybody!

Our Family's Annual Christmas Tree Decorating Party

Bottled Coca-Cola, now that's not frugal! Or is it?

About a dozen Decembers ago, I got a pretty spectacular deal on a 6-pack of individual glass bottles of Coca-Cola -- 65 cents for the whole carton, after sale and coupons. I don't usually buy soda, but I was shopping for treats for our annual Christmas tree decorating party. My family was tickled by the individual glass bottles, so much so that I saved the empties to reuse for the next year. Every year since, I've filled the bottles with store-brand cola (this year -- Sam's Choice, 67 cents/2-litre), and we all get a good laugh over the mileage from that one great deal a dozen years ago.

One of our family's holiday traditions is to gather for a snacky dinner followed by hanging Christmas ornaments on the tree. One way to make any dinner festive is to simply serve all finger food for a meal. For this party, we eat our dinner in the room with the tree (Christmas music jingling and jangling in the background). It's a fun and festive time that costs very little, as most of the treat foods are either homemade or not-terribly-expensive grocery foods.

This year's menu

carrot and celery sticks with dip

black olives

crackers 

homemade cheese spread

sliced pepperoni

cocktail sausages in BBQ sauce

tangerines

dried cranberries

mixed nuts

spanakopita (which has been tucked in the freezer since my daughter's graduation in 2018. It's commercial and unbaked, so it should still be good.)

homemade peppermint swirl bark squares

cola in the recycled Coca-Cola bottles

As I said above, our snacky foods fit within our modest grocery budget. 

For this year's peppermint bark, I gently swirled the 2 chocolates together instead of layering. As a result, the squares were less inclined to separate into white and dark when cutting. I like my peppermint bark to be minty, so I added about 2 drops of peppermint oil to both the semi-sweet chocolate chip portion and the white chocolate portion. I trimmed all 4 sides before cutting into squares -- DELICIOUS scraps! I can see that I'll need to exercise some restraint with these.

The cheese spread was simply some cream cheese blended with garlic powder, onion powder, and shredded cheddar. Very tasty!

(raising my cola bottle in the air) Here's to a healthy, safe, and blessed holiday season for all!

Burn Time of Candles and Economy

I love candles. I love the scent of the wax while a candle is burning, as well as the scent of the smoke when I blow it out. I really love how candlelight flickers and affects shadows in the room. What I don't love are the exorbitant prices on premium jar candles that you can buy at pricey shops in the mall. 

Premium 3-wick candles

I had a thought that perhaps those expensive candles make up for some of their cost in a lengthy burn time. I went to Bath & Body Works website and discovered that their 3-wick candles have a burn time ranging from 25 to 45 hours. These candles retail for $24.50; but if you're savvy, you can find them on sale for as low as $9.50. Last year's candle day at Bath & Body works was Saturday, December 7. It's a once a year event and draws large crowds. (ask me how I know -- 1 daughter who loves, loves, loves these pricey candles) So, for as low as $9.50, your premium candle will burn between 25 and 45 hours, and cost between 21 and 38 cents per hour. Of course, I have to admit, I do love the fragrance of many of their candles. And perhaps that accounts for some of the premium price.

Taper candles

The burn time on taper candles is based on their length. The accepted rule of thumb is 1 hour per inch of candle. So, the 11-inch tapers that I've seen at Target for $3.99 a 2-pack will burn for 11 hours each at 18 cents per hour. Jo Ann Fabrics has a 4-pack of 10-inch tapers for $3.99. The burn time for these tapers would be about 10 hours each, for a cost of about 10 cents per hour.  My local Walmart sells Better Homes & Gardens 12-inch tapers in 12-packs for $5.47. The cost per candle is about 45 cents, for a cost per hour of burn of about 4 cents. As you can see, the price on taper candles varies considerably. When buying this kind of candle, it's worth the effort to check several stores, including your local grocery store. To make a price comparison with Bath & Body Work's 3-wick candles, it would take 3 tapers to achieve a similar amount of light. That means I would spend about 12 cents per hour of burn time for 3 tapers. Of course, in contrast to a jar candle which is a self-contained candle within a holder, taper candles need candlesticks. Although, many of us already own this type of holder.

Votive candles

Votive candles can burn between 10 and 15 hours, if appropriately sized for the holder. Ideally, you don't want much air space between your votive candle  and the holder, as the melting wax will pool in the base of the holder and won't be reached by the wick, shortening the burn time. In addition, you should extinguish a votive candle that has burned to within 1/2-inch of its base, to prevent cracking of the holder. This 1/2-inch of residual wax is not lost, however. You can reclaim this wax and make a new candle, see this post.

Yankee Candles sells some really nice votive candles, regularly priced at $2 each. After Christmas last year, I picked up a bunch of their holiday-scented votive candles for 50 cents each. With Yankee Candles, you're paying for the premium name brand as well as the scent. You can pick up decent votive candles from the local drug store for 89 to 99 cents each at regular price or about 40 to 50 cents each on clearance after the holidays. Yankee Candles says that their votives have a burn time of up to 15 hours. My local Rite Aid's website says that their votives have a burn time of about 12 hours. So, for a price as low as 50 cents per votive with a burn time of up to 15 hours, each hour of the candle's life costs about 3 cents. Granted, it takes more votives to create a similar amount of light as a larger candle like Bath & Body Work's 3-wick. Still, 3 votive candles can cost me as little as 9 cents per burn hour.

Battery-powered LED tea light candles

The hands-down winner for cost per burn hour for a candle is not even made of wax. If one is not picky about a candle being "real" or not, then battery-operated tea light candles are the biggest bargain. I bought a 4-pack of flickering LED tea lights from Dollar Tree several years ago and they're still going strong. Dollar Tree has since down-sized the package to 2 flickering LED tea lights. The packaging indicates that each tea light has a "burn time" of about 120 hours. That means that the cost per hour is less than a half-cent. If I group 3 of these together, my cost per hour is about 1 and a half cents. These are best showcased in some sort of holder. I've placed these in a variety of "free" holders, including canning jars tied with ribbon, nestled in juice glasses filled with candy corn or mini candy canes, inside painted and punched tin cans, and in textured glass votive holders. I've even placed LED tea light candles in ribbon-tied canning jars on top of wide glass candlesticks designed for pillar candles, as a bargain alternative to pillar candles for those holders.

This price analysis was an interesting exercise for me. I love my LED tea lights, but who knew they were just so economical?!

Making a Holiday Swag with Branches from My Yard

The elves have been busy in my neighborhood! 

I've been taking early morning walks this past week, enjoying all of the holiday decorations that my neighbors have put up. It seems that there are even more (and earlier) holiday decorations than previous years. Perhaps this is simply because so many folks are home during the week; but I also like to think that we're all doing what we can to provide cheer to one another through outdoor decorations.

This morning, one of my daughters came with me on our walk and we talked about what we could do to decorate our outdoor areas that are highly visible for passersby on the street. I mentioned that I have everything that would be needed to make a swag for the front of our garage: the evergreen and berry-laden branches in the yard, a 12-inch length of heavy wire (mine is green, but silver would've also worked as it would be hidden by the greenery and bow), and a weather-proof bow.

Once home, I grabbed my pruners and gardening gloves then clipped about 7 branches, mostly cedar but also a couple of branches of cotoneaster for their beautiful red berries. I piled the branches neatly on top of each other and used the length of wire to bind them all together about 6 inches from the top of the bundle, finishing on the back side. After adding the outdoor ribbon, my swag was ready to hang. I used our house's flag holding bracket between the two garage doors as my hanging spot, threading the long ends of the bundle's binding wire through the perforations of the bracket and twisting securely. 

I spent about 10 minutes making the swag and hanging it. This is so easy, yet it adds such a festive note to the front of our home.

I hope that my little effort brings a smile to someone passing by.

November Grocery Recap

Another month of spending more than I intended. While I don't feel I was panic-buying this past month, I was definitely emotional-spending. I bought a lot of treat foods and just generally didn't care (all that much) that I would be spending more than I had planned. However, I can also see that almost half of my shopping covered 3 holidays, 1 family party, and our now continuing Friday pizza & movie nights. My household budget allows an extra amount to cover holidays, in addition to the grocery budget. 

In addition to party, holiday, and treat foods, there are certain produce items that I like to buy for my family this time of year, and I'm willing to spend a little extra for them, such as the clementines and avocados. What is conspicuously absent this month/this season is a turkey. And I'm not feeling all that sad about it. I have to admit, the bratwurst were pretty delicious this year.

I shopped twice this month, both times at Walmart, three weeks apart and spent a total of $189.45. In addition to what I bought, I am also heavily (very heavily) leaning on my stock-up pantry for November through February. Our fridges, freezers, and pantries remain very full. I'll shop again sometime in mid-December.                          

Here's the breakdown of all of my November grocery purchases:

Some of these items I ordered specifically for Thanksgiving. (obv. I bought more than needed just for the holiday and plan to use at other times this month and next)

1 pack bratwurst sausage for Thanksgiving, $2.96

1 pack bratwurst buns, $1.98

spicy mustard, $1.27

3 bundles of celery, $1.26 each

4 cans cream of mushroom soup, 50 cents ea

2 10-oz bags frozen mushrooms, $1.98 each

pint whipping cream,  $1.98

I bought the following for our Christmas tree decorating party, again with planned extras for rest of the season

6 lbs clementines, half at $3, other half at $3.98

large box Ritz crackers, $1.96
2 litre cola, 67 cents
Little Smokies sausage, $2.87

16 oz cream cheese, $2.87

I bought the following for holiday baking

3 8-oz cans mixed nuts, $2 ea
2 2-lb bags powdered sugar, $1.62 ea

1 pound pecan halves, $9.48
24 ounces dried cranberries, $4.94

2 bags chocolate chips, $1.74

other special occasion foods

1 bag mini marshmallows, 88 cents, for hot cocoa

2 large packs of pepperoni, $7.47 each, for Friday pizza nights this winter

2 bottles sparkling cider, $1.96 ea, for Christmas and New Year's dinner

20-oz bag frozen sweet potato fries, $2.73, for a treat some night

The rest of the items were just for general use.

3 heads iceberg lettuce (25 cents each, so I figured why not?)
30 bananas, half at 42 cents/ lb, half at 38 cents/lb
2 Folger's decaf, $6.32 ea
1 Folger's regular, $8.12
regular mustard, $1
soy sauce, $1.62
sesame oil, $2.98
raw honey, $7.93
2 boxes toasted oat cereal, $1.23 ea
4 bags oyster crackers, 80 cents ea
2 jars applesauce, $1.98 ea
6 dozen eggs, 96 cents/dozen
12 gallons 2% milk, $2.18 ea
2 gallons whole milk for making yogurt, 1 at $1.50, 1 at $2.18
2 lbs popping corn, $1.83
2 whole butternut squash, $1.18 ea
80-ct corn tortillas, $2.44
4 avocados, 58 cents ea
1 bottle ketchup, 88 cents
large bottle BBQ sauce, $1.88

In addition to buying special foods to lift our spirits, I also think I'm spending more for many of the individual items because I'm not shopping around for the best prices or watching for sales. Also, I think for me personally, I buy more when I'm putting in an order to pick-up than I would if I were shopping in-person. It's super easy to add an item to my online order. In contrast, when I'm shopping myself in the store, I think twice about a lot of items and often skip an item or two that don't seem absolutely necessary. 

I will say that I continue to compare unit prices. I may be emotional-spending, but I haven't lost my mind entirely!

So, that's my personal analysis of why I continue to spend more on groceries than I have in past years. And I'm more than okay with it. There is a time and season for everything. This is my season to spend more on food.

What's a Few Raindrops When You're With the People You Love

As so often happens in the Pacific Northwest, the forecast shifted as Thanksgiving neared. However, it didn't look like it would be a complete washout, so we decided to make our outdoor plans a go. Mostly, the rain was just an occasional sprinkle Thursday afternoon. I had suggested everyone wear a parka with a hood. That advice made the difference between being miserable and having fun despite a few raindrops. It was a great day. We stayed socially distant and outdoors. 

This was the first time in almost three months that we've seen our son and daughter-in-law. To get together for Thanksgiving (and stay safe and keep to the governor's orders) meant we would need to do something entirely different. The idea of an outdoor cookout was floated to all parties. Maybe you can guess -- November cookouts are not the norm for our area. 

Around 11:30 AM, this is how the patio was looking -- rather damp, but the heavy rain appeared to be gone. We dried off the chairs, moved a couple of small tables into place, and I began my work transforming the patio into an autumn gathering spot. For social distancing, each household had their own side of the fire ring, more than 6 feet apart.

Over the last week, I'd gathered up all of our autumn-themed decor items, both from indoors and from the porches. I had a couple of table cloths, lots of faux flowers, candle jars, a lantern, faux and real pumpkins and squash, a wicker cornucopia, and some outdoor ribbon.

Since it was still looking like a drizzle could occur, I began my sprucing up with the most weather-proof items first, this time the outdoor ribbon. I tied bows around the 2 newel posts at the base of the deck stair railing. (You'll notice that we desperately need to paint the stair railings and  stair risers.) Ribbon is a super cheap way to decorate for holidays. This is Dollar Tree ribbon purchased about 4 or 5 years ago. I keep reusing it year after year.

Next, I placed a faux pumpkin at the base of the stairs leading onto the patio, one on each side. As I've mentioned before, our yard is plagued with rodents squirrels. Leave a real pumpkin out on the porch and by morning there will be nibble marks. So, for outdoor use, I opt for craft pumpkins. These two are from Michael's, also bought about 4 or 5 years ago.

I have 3 small square tables, which was just right for 1 table between every two chairs to share for drinks or plates. I added a candle jar with battery candle and small pumpkin as decor to the back of each little table. Again, a little ribbon turns a canning jar into a holiday candle jar. The battery tea light candles are from Dollar Tree, bought about 8 or 9 years ago but used judiciously (so they last for many years).

I have one longer bench table that I used as a complimentary decorative element, a second focal point of sorts. Here's where the bulk of my decor was laid out. While my husband was lighting a fire in the fire ring, I was quickly placing items. The table cloth was a piece of yardage from Jo Ann Fabrics about 20 years ago. The galvanized French flower bucket came from Michael's 3 years ago and has different faux flowers rotated in and out of it for the front porch, depending on season. It will go back on the front porch filled with cherry red faux geraniums for the Christmas season later this weekend. Today it held faux sunflowers. The lantern was a clearance find at Kohl's (used a $10 coupon) several years ago, with a clearance votive candle from after Christmas sales at the local drugstore in a cleaned out votive holder from an office gift 3 Christmases ago. The squash is something we grew this summer (actually, it volunteered in a patch in the yard -- Woo Hoo!). And to the left is a wicker cornucopia (bought at the thrift store 6 or 7 years ago) filled with more faux flowers. By the way, my faux flowers for outdoor use always come from Dollar Tree. 

Here's the whole autumn gathering spot, waiting for the six of us to, well, gather. Each chair had a throw blanket and pillow. Some of us used the throws as extra wraps when dusk fell and some of us used them for seat cushioning.

I mention where and how I've acquired all of the decor pieces that I used on Thursday to illuminate just how inexpensively this sort of temporary decorating can be. And in my case for Thanksgiving, all of this cost me absolutely nothing, as these were items that I already had but just moved around and into place for the occasion.

The candle in the lantern was lit just before our guests arrived. However, it wasn't until daylight faded that the candle's glow a became prominent added light source.

The sun sets around 4:30 this time of year. By 6 PM, the moon was peaking through the clouds and stars were out to see. The last of the logs were burning down, signaling an end to a wonderful afternoon.

In the aftermath, I asked all of my family members if they would consider doing something like this again. I received a resounding "YES" from the whole bunch.

You know, I recognize that a lot of folks have no interest in decorating an outdoor space to be enjoyed for 5 or 6 hours total. This is something that I do that I take considerable joy in the doing. Perhaps there is an aspect of home-keeping that particularly appeals to you. This is mine.

Happy Thanksgiving and have a wonderful weekend, friends!