The Mess-Free Way to Recycle Spent Jar Candles into New Candles

Again, one of those thoughts, "how can I do this with what I have?"

The other day, I cleaned out an armoire for one of my daughters to use in her room. I found 4 spent candles that had some sort of evergreen scent, some fir, cedar, and pine. There was between 1/4 inch and 1 inch of wax at the bottom of each jar. My goal was to combine the wax from all 4 of the jars into one evergreen-scented candle, and not have a pot to scrub out afterward.

This was so simple. I can't believe I haven't tried this before. I placed the jar candles into my crock-pot and added about 3 cups of water to the pot, enough so that the water level was as high as the wax remaining in the fullest candle jar. I set it on LOW, and left it for an hour.

An hour later, the wax was melted. I removed the jars from the crock-pot and set on a towel.

I poured the melted wax into one of the larger jars and put that jar back in the crockpot to keep the wax liquid and left the other jars on an old towel. I chose another of the larger jars for my candle and wiped it out with a paper towel. I have some candle wicks leftover from making candles many years ago.

I took one of the wicks and dipped the metal end into the melted candle wax then placed it in the center of my cleaned-out jar. Once that wax hardened, I poured the melted wax into the jar, screening out the largest of the burnt wick bits/ash with a plastic fork.

After the wax had set, I trimmed the wick. I now have a candle with about 4 or more burn hours left on it.

One of the bonuses is the cleaned-out candle jars that I have saved for future candles. This particular one, above, was from a Thymes Frasier Fir votive candle. Thymes sells the votive refill candles at a fraction of the price of the votive candle in the container. Next Christmas, I'll buy the refill candles for this container and have a "brand new" holiday candle.

Just to let you know how simple all of this was, I spent way more time writing this post and taking the photos than I spent in hands-on time melting and pouring the spent candles into one container. Using a crock-pot with the candle jars set inside saved me from having to scrape out and wash a wax-coated pot.

Making Heart-Shaped Chocolate Candies Without a Mold

You know, this is just how my mind works. I think about the great products out there, then try to think of a way around buying them. Owning a heart-shaped silicone candy mold would be a nice thing to have, but in truth, I would only use it one day per year. The other night I was thinking, "how could I make my own heart-shaped candies for Valentine's Day?"

Here's how it went:
At first, I thought that maybe I could freehand some melted chocolate with a piping bag. I tried one, and then realized that I did need some sort of guide, a template.

To make heart-shape chocolate candies, I used semi-sweet chocolate chips, red candy melts, white chocolate chips, Crisco shortening, 3 snack-size ziploc baggies, 1 sheet of waxed paper, 1 sheet of white paper, scissors, pen, small bit of scrap paper.

To make a template, I cut a paper heart out of the scrap paper and traced its outline onto the sheet of white paper.

On the kitchen counter, I laid a sheet of waxed paper over my template. 
I used the baggies as piping bags, one for each color of chocolate, snipping a tiny corner off of each before filling with melted chocolate. In a glass measuring cup, I melted 3/4 cup of semi-sweet chocolate chips with about 1/2 teaspoon of Crisco. I used my microwave and melted in short 10-15 second bursts, stirring with a table knife in between bursts. When the chocolate was melted I scooped it into one of the prepared baggies.

I piped the outline of the heart onto the waxed paper which was over the template, following the lines of the heart.

I filled the outline in with more piped chocolate. (This is the single larger heart that I made. After my first heart, I decided to make a smaller template in order to make hearts the size of a Dove chocolate piece. So I made a smaller template.)

To make multiple hearts, I slid the template around under the sheet of waxed paper. Whenever the chocolate became too thick to pipe smoothly I put the baggie of chocolate into a custard cup and microwaved for about 6 to 9 seconds.

The hearts were thin, so I decided to build up the hearts with a second layer of chocolate. I added the second layer inside the outline of the hearts by about 1/8-inch. You can see the difference between a single layer heart and the built up heart in the photo below.

I didn't worry about how neat the hearts looked as I had a plan for concealing the messiness -- add some deliberate messiness in contrasting colors!

I let the hearts firm up while taking care of other tasks. 

Next, I melted some red Wilton Candy Melts. I have these leftover from last summer when I planned on making red, white, and blue dipped pretzel rods. I had a coupon for JoAnn Fabrics and the candy melts were on sale. However, the chocolate hearts could also be drizzled with just white chocolate chips, milk chocolate chips, or a combo of both of those. Just so that the color contrasts with the semi-sweet chocolate hearts. Here are the hearts ready to be dressed up.

I only used about a dozen of the red wafers. It melted into about a 2 tablespoon pool. I scooped this into the 2nd prepared baggie. Before drizzling, I zapped the filled baggie in the microwave for about 6 seconds, to insure that it would flow easily. 

I drizzled in one directions, then turned the sheet of hearts around and drizzled in the other direction.

Following the red drizzle, I added a bit of white drizzle, using about 2 tablespoons of white chocolate chips and 1/4 teaspoon of Crisco melted in short 10 second bursts in the microwave. Again, just before drizzling, I zapped the filled baggie for about 6 seconds for a smooth flow. Whenever the tip became clogged, I either microwaved for additional few seconds, or cleared the clog by squeezing any hard lumps out of the bag on onto a bare spot on the waxed paper with my fingertip. 

As you can see, the imperfections of the semi-sweet hearts are concealed with the contrasting drizzle. After the hearts had set up, I used a paring knife to trim the edges a bit. For a first time go at these, I think they turned out nice. I am still working on how I'll package them, although I can tell you this much, I'll be just using what I have on hand for the packaging, which may include recycled cracker boxes, ribbon, and spray paint.

FYI, because of the white bloom that develops on candies made from packaged baking chips, they have a shelf-life based on best appearance (not taste or safety) of about 10 days. The white and red candy coating should maintain a good appearance for a longer period.

For this project, I used 3/4 cup of semi-sweet chocolate chips (68 cents), about 10 cents each of red and white chocolate candy, and about 1 cent of Crisco, for a total of 89 cents for 30 Dove-size small hearts and 1 larger heart, about 4.5 ounces of candies. I've made these as gifts for 3 people, so each gift cost under 30 cents. 

Making Valentine's Cards Using Clip Art

Valentine's Day truly is a "homemade" holiday in our house. Not only am I making some gifts, but I'm also making Valentine's cards, using free clip art. Clip art really makes card-making easy. As with other projects, I am using clip art from Graphic's Fairy. My Mac came preloaded with the apple word-processing program Pages. I also have MSWord on my laptop. However, I find pages is easier to manipulate images and transpose type over images. So, whenever I am using clip art, I choose Pages for my creating.

Things that Pages can do with which I have difficulty when using Word:

• duplicate images rapidly to create all-over patterns
• flip images vertically and horizontally, then adjust the angle of the image (for placing images on a diagonal)
• provide guidelines for placement of images
• overlay text on images without using a photo editor
• easily move images around without the text or other images jumping out of placement

Here are two Valentine's Day cards that I made using Pages. I used a combination of clip art, simple frames available on Pages, and text available on Pages. 

On the left, the filigree heart is a frame from Graphic's Fairy, and the roses are from Graphic's Fairy as well. I overlaid a text box to include the greeting. The shadow frame around the composition is an option on Pages. The floral bouquets are from 2 images. I duplicated and flipped each to obtain a mirror image effect. I also adjusted the angle on the floral images to suit my composition.

On the right, The retro heart and smaller heart pairs are images from Graphic's Fairy. I added the greeting banner using a text box with white fill, overlaying the message on the heart image. I adjusted the angle of the greeting with a simple Pages feature. The pair of hearts were plain, so I overlaid a text box with the message "You + Me" in white text. The large heart is surrounded with a simple frame available on Pages.

At the top of the full sheet is a custom "made by" emblem. I used images from the cards and text to create this. Pages allowed me to flip the text and small image upside down, so that once the card was folded, the "made by" emblem would be right-side-up.

The nitty-gritty. I was able to print 2 cards on 1 sheet of paper, using landscape orientation and cutting the sheet in half after printing. I only have black ink, so my cards are black and white. I had 1 print out that I thought needed adjustments before a final copy, meaning I printed 2 sheets. So, my copies were 3 cents each (paper and ink), or 6 cents total. That's 3 cents per Valentine's Day card. If I decide to make more of the same cards, then those Valentine cards drops to 1 and 1/2 cents per card.

A little project that I really enjoyed making, and it saved me some money.

Saving Money on Meals on Traveling Days

This is nothing new, but I am grateful that I was able to make some advance preparations before a very long day this past Saturday. This was the day of the burial service for my FIL, which was held out-of-state. I knew that the day would be long, and therefore, I spent a good part of Friday preparing all of our meals for Saturday. We brought our breakfast and lunch with us in the car, and had a dinner ready to be heated when we walked back in our own door, late in the evening. It all worked out well. With the exception of a package of English muffins, I made all of our meals with what we had on hand.

For breakfast, I made breakfast sandwiches, using eggs, the last 2 patties of sausage, turkey bacon, cheese, and English muffins. I chopped the cooked sausage and turkey bacon and added both to the eggs, cooked omelet style (not scrambled in the pan), so as to divvy up the breakfast meat between 4 sandwiches. I wrapped the sandwiches individually; then, in the morning we heated them just before leaving, to eat on the drive down. With the breakfast sandwiches, we had tangerines, coffee, and juice.

For a midday meal, one of my daughters helped me put together a substantial lunch for all of us, which included sandwiches, apples, celery sticks, crackers, raisins, peanuts, and cookies. And finally, for dinner, I had made pizza from scratch on Friday. So I simply doubled the recipe and made 2 pizzas. It was just after 8 PM when we walked back in the door after a grueling drive, so I sliced and heated the pizza and served with juice for a quick dinner.

Preparing all of our meals in advance saved time (no stopping at restaurants along the way*, or once back in town) and money (I figure we saved about $35 by packing all of our own food).

I add the * as we did make one stop just before getting back on the highway to come home. The cemetery did not have bathroom facilities available, and we wanted to use clean restrooms before getting on the road and eating our lunches in the car. So, we stopped at McDonalds. Using the app on my daughter's phone, we bought a medium-sized order of fries for $1 (no tax, as this was in Oregon) after using their restrooms. We also received free cups of water to drink in the car along with our packed-lunch.

My usual immediate thought, when planning for such a long day, is to plan to eat lunch out and pick up a quick dinner as we drive back into town. On this blog, we have talked a lot about bringing our own food and beverages with us for long days in the car. I am often inspired by all of you and your efforts to save some money by preparing in advance. For this occasion, I used you all as my inspiration to make these meal preparations z day ahead, so our family could save both time and money. My sincere thanks to all of you for inspiring me to do better!

Using a Snow Day to Make Gifts for Valentine's Day

This is what we woke up to today. Beautiful! And it made me slow down for a day and cancel errands. What to do on a snow day? How about making a couple of Valentine's gifts.

I've always given my family members a small gift for Valentine's Day. It's usually a handmade gift. The budget for gifts just after Christmas is often very small, so handmade certainly fits the bill. The two gifts that I am making today are for my daughters. In thinking what I could possibly make from the supplies that I have at home, I thought about these -- knitted, reusable make-up remover pads. My thinking was that these would be a perfect use for the odds and ends of the all-cotton yarn that I have leftover from making dish and spa cloths two years ago. Each of those cloths used 2/3 of a 2.5 oz skein of cotton yarn, leaving me with a few 1/3 skeins in different colors. I thought that surely I could get 3 or more make-up remover pads out of those 1/3-skein remnants of yarn.

I didn't know if anyone else ever made these before, but I checked online just in case. And sure enough, lots of people have made them -- lucky for me, as I could follow someone else's pattern and not have to figure it out myself. The pattern that I chose is this very easy pattern. I will say this much though, if I could crochet, I would crochet round pads, as I think they would look prettier. But as I only knit, these had to be squares.

So, I've put in a couple of hours of knitting this morning and have made 4 lavender and 1 ecru, so far. My plan is to make about 7 of each color and give each daughter a full set to get through a week. In my knitting today, I discovered that 1/3 of a skein will make 4 of these 4-inch square pads. The small ball of yarn in the photo is a 1/3-skein remnant, just to give you an idea of how little yarn one needs to made a single square. (I had two of the lavender yarn remnants before beginning today.)

As I was knitting, I thought of several aspects of this gift that makes me happy. These will be totally free to make, as I am using the leftover bits from other knitting projects. Using up the odds bits of yarn that I have means that I am not generating any new waste in the from of packaging or manufacturing. They are reusable, to be washed after each use. They can be tossed into the laundry with towels, sheets, pjs, etc. Judging by how well my knitted dishcloths have held up, I expect these make-up remover pads will last several years. As a reusable product, they replace a disposable item that would end up in the garbage (cotton balls or squares). In addition, as a reusable item, they will save my daughters a few dollars as they will not need to buy the disposable, commercially-made product. And they are made by me. A handmade item from me adds an extra measure of love to my gifts.

After I finish knitting both colors, I will finish the ends then package up. Stay tuned, you know how much I like packaging and presentation. I have an idea that I think will be really nice, and also won't cost a thing by using some odds and ends from home.

So, this is how I spent my freebie snow day.

Fast Food Hack with a Bonus

This is a fast food burger bun that has been kept in our freezer after an outing to McDonalds -- that's frost, not mold.

When it comes to Sunday lunches out two of our family members have a penchant for McDonalds. So we do choose that establishment once or twice per month. It doesn't hurt that it can be very affordable. However, I'm not a huge fan of all of the bready stuff -- burger/sandwich buns. What I do love are salads. When we choose McDonalds, I order a side salad ($1.99), and a McChicken sandwich ($1.00). I open the salad and sandwich and scrape the lettuce and mayo from the McChicken onto the salad, then I slice the chicken patty into strips to add to the greens -- my own chicken and greens salad. If the McDonalds has Caesar dressing, then I get a Chicken Caesar salad for $2.99. And yes, it is tasty -- so much so that one of my daughters now follows me in her fast food lunch choice.

bread crumbs from the above, salvaged burger bun

Here's the bonus. You know that I don't like to waste food. McDonalds packages the salad dressing with a fork and knife in a plastic bag. I use this bag to hold the burger bun that is leftover from my McChicken after removing the lettuce, mayo, and chicken patty. Once home, I pop the bun into the freezer. When I make meatloaf, I pull one of these saved buns from the freezer and pulse into crumbs in the food processor to add to the ground meat. Nothing wasted, and I got just the lunch that I wanted at a reasonable price.

To give you a price comparison, the same McDonalds has a Chicken Southwest Salad that sells for $4.79 and a Chicken Bacon Ranch Salad that sells for $4.59. Both of these salads contain a comparable amount of food to my chicken salad concoction. Yet, my salad is 1/3 cheaper.

How about you? Do you ever take the various components of fast food items and concoct something more to your liking? Would you save a burger bun to use as bread crumbs for another meal?

Back to Blogging: Putting the Alphabet in Soup

Thank you, all, for your kind words this past week, both here and privately to my husband or me in email. My father-in-law passed away last Thursday afternoon. It was teary -- hard to be unselfish when loved ones pass into the afterlife and leave the rest of us behind. Anyway, thank you all so much for your kindness.

I wanted to share something that I bought a couple of weeks ago, as I thought it was a terrific grocery bargain and a way to make homemade soup fun for children of all ages. So, you know that I scour the Hispanic aisles at the grocery store. I find fantastic bargains there (remember the tea cookies for 37 cents a package?). This time, I bought alphabet pasta for a whopping 38 cents a 7 oz. package at WinCo. That's just under 87 cents per pound, which while not the lowest price that I've ever paid for pasta, it was a pretty good deal considering that it kicks homemade soups up a notch when it comes to kids. When my son was small, I bought a US brand of alphabet pasta, but I recall that it was much more expensive than the Hispanic brand.

One night, during this very hectic period, I needed a quick dinner that used scratch ingredients. I made a chicken and vegetable alphabet soup, using a chicken breast, carrots, celery, some of the alphabet pasta, chicken soup base, and dried rosemary. It was delicious. Combined with tangerines and grilled cheese sandwiches, we had a complete meal 20-25 minutes after walking in the door. Due to the small size of the pasta, it cooks up very quickly -- about 6 or 7 minutes of boiling along with the chicken, vegetables, water, and seasonings. Check the Hispanic aisle in your grocery store or an ethnic market in your area. The brand is El Guapo. 

Update on My Life This Week

Hi Friends,
I am pre-occupied this week. My father-in-law is on end-of-life care at the hospital right now. He is 97 years young and has lived his life to the fullest right up until this past October, when he had a bad fall. He lived in a nursing home near my family for a couple of months, providing so many opportunities for us to enjoy time together. He has read my blog from its inception and even linked to it from his own blog. His name is Dr. Robert H. Mounce, and he is primarily known as a New Testament scholar, although his career was expansive. My family has been blessed to know him and learn from his example.

I do have other things that I want to "talk" about with you all, but just don't have the time to type it all out right now. I'll be back very soon, though.
Take care,
Lili

Classy, Free Gift Wrap for a Small Gift

So this is not quite free, but very close. My cost was the printer ink and copy paper. I have figured this cost to be about 4 cents per page.  I didn't need a lot of gift wrap, just enough for one small package and one slightly larger package. I ended up using 4 sheets of printed paper, for about 16 cents for both gifts.

Those gifts that I bought at clearance and semi-annual sales now need wrapping. The above gift is part of a birthday package for someone who is special to me. Wanting a chic and classy look for this birthday gift, I decided on a black and white color scheme. (By the way, this is very inexpensive to do with home office supplies.)

Using free clip art, I made this pattern on my laptop for printing onto a sheet of paper. In my experience, Apple Pages seems to work better for cut and paste of images than MS Word, so it's what I have used here and with other printed images.

The small gift used 3/4 of a sheet, while the larger package used 3 sheets, with strategic piecing to minimize visible seams. The most obvious seam runs across the center of the package and shall be concealed with ribbon.

I did invest some time making the pattern, but I considered this fun, down time. In addition, I now have this pattern stored on my laptop for future use.

For a price comparison -- I could have bought some gift wrap. Even at the Dollar Store I would have spent $1 for wrap, and likely would have used about 1/3 of one of their small rolls, or 35-cents' worth. Printing gift wrap at home was about half of the price of the least expensive option for me, meant that I could skip a trip to the store, and was an outlet for my creative energy.  A win all around! And I don't have any leftovers lingering in a closet, as I printed only what I needed.

The Finished Towels

The project was definitely not for the impatient, perfectionistic, or those who give up easily. Trying to dye a group of differently-colored objects a single final color is tricky. A very close approximation of color for all items is possible with patience and multiple steps. However, I was able to get the batch close enough in color to satisfy me and my daughters.

In case you didn't know this about me, I have a bit of a perfectionistic streak in my disposition. So, when everything is not easy-peasy, or a project does not turn out exactly as I had planned, it takes a while for me to shake that "failure" feeling. It doesn't make any sense to me, as I can look at the towels and think they turned out beautifully, but my mind remembers the missteps along the road to get to the final outcome. Now, after a little time to relax, I can see that they turned out nicely. The bathmat is just a tad more intense in color than the towels, and the washcloths are slightly more peach than the rest of the batch. Despite this, the group looks great in the bathroom.

Old towels, new life. Final cost for a "new" set of bath linens -- $3.74, including sales tax (I forgot to add in tax in yesterday's post). I don't think that you can't buy a single bath towel at Target for that price.

Value Village Finds this Afternoon

I have great luck at Value Village this afternoon. I was searching for a bathmat to go with the towels that I am dyeing for my daughters' bathroom. My plan is to dye the whole lot a peachy-pink, using fabric dye that was leftover from previous projects. At Value Village I found a pale pink bathmat that almost exactly matches the pink towels that I already have, so the dye job should look pretty good. And get this, my cost was 99 cents!

My out of pocket cost for this revamped towel set will be the 99 cents for the bathmat, and $2.40 for the 4 washcloths that I bought last summer. The pink bath and hand towels were hand-me-downs from my in-laws 15 years ago, and as I mentioned, the dye is leftover from other projects. Therefore, my total cost for a "new" set of towels for this bathroom is $3.39! I've run the wash cloths and bathmat through the laundry to remove any sizing (new washcloths) or fabric softener (bathmat), as either of those substances could inhibit the dye job. I'll let you know how these look when they are dyed and dried.

One of my daughters came with me to Value Village, and she had a lot she wanted to look at, so I lingered for a bit while waiting for her. In the glassware section, I found 3 juice glasses that will go with the 4 we currently have. Super glad to have found these juice glasses. I prefer a small glass for juice, and as we only had 4 juice glasses, whenever the entire family was there for a family breakfast, we were short on these small glasses. I had been pricing replacements through Amazon, and the cost just didn't seem worth it.

Revamping Old Bath Towels

This afternoon I am dyeing a set of towels for my daughters' bathroom. Currently, we have light pink bath and hand towels and a set of 4 new, white washcloths. I bought the washcloths on clearance last summer in a set of 8 for $4.80, or 60 cents each ($2.40 for 4 of them).  (Story on the washcloths -- I was placing an order online and needed to spend a couple more dollars to get free shipping. As we wear out washcloths faster than other types of towels, I checked for sets of washcloths on markdown.)

I asked what color of finished towels would be preferable, and peachy-pink was the answer. So, I went through my craft supplies and found partials boxes of orange and light pink fabric dye. Now, I'm off to Value Village and Goodwill to find a bath mat in white, cream, pale pink, or pale yellow. I'll let you know how these turn out.

In Pursuit of the Hospitable Home: Upgrading the Appearance of Bagged Breakfast Cereal

Yesterday I had a dental appointment. It sort of knocked me off of my regular activities. I need more work done, unfortunately. Okay, back to regular life.

Keeping bagged breakfast cereal

I thought that I'd share this with you because I've been so pleased with how it looks and works in our household. This past fall I began buying bagged breakfast cereal. Up until this past year we haven't really been cereal eaters, but instead have opted for toast, muffins, and other highly portable breakfasts. For some reason I can't explain, one week I bought cereal at Dollar Tree. When I was shopping at WinCo later on, I discovered that WinCo's house brand of bagged cereal was less expensive per ounce than Dollar Tree's off-brand cereal. So I began buying bagged cereal. My family seems to really appreciate having this as an option at breakfast time, and it appears that we now have cereal about half of the time. (I still prefer cooked breakfasts, but will eat the cereal when I wake up tired.)

I know there are special plastic containers for storing cereal. I even have one, given to me by my sister-in-law. My container is currently in use holding paper grocery sacks in the trunk of my car, as it's the exact size to hold a stack of folded-up grocery bags to use at WinCo (where they give me 6 cents rebate for every bag that I reuse). So, I was looking around the kitchen to see what I could use for storing cereal and I came across my glass cookie jar, which I don't really use any longer. An image of the breakfast set-up at an inn at which I once stayed flashed through my mind.

The two glass containers just off-center on the buffet held cereal. I recall the breakfast buffet as being a very lovely way for the host to share the breakfast items with the guests. The glass jars were much more inviting than plastic dispensers. Although, I understand the practicality of plastic, and the need to keep food dispensers sanitary. But for home use, a large glass jar, such as a cookie jar, is a nice way to both store and display the cereal.

And here's our home cereal jar which has a permanent home on the kitchen counter. That's a shallow measuring scoop in the container for serving -- we leave it in there all of the time. This is just one of those little things in my kitchen that makes me smile.

Yesterday's Lunch: Letting Nothing Go to Waste

Since I don't plan to spend as much as usual on groceries for this month, I am making use of every leftover that is possible. For breakfast yesterday, I had the leftover serving of potato casserole that one daughter didn't finish. Usually, I won't eat someone else's leftovers. You know, germs and all of that. But hey, we are family, she did grow inside of me long ago. So, to get over the hurdle of "germs," I changed the casserole serving into a fried potato dish. Quite good. Lunch, though, is really where I excelled at using the leftovers.

This is what I used from our assortment of leftovers for my lunch yesterday. On New Year's day we had a ham dinner with asparagus (and that potato casserole). When I prepare asparagus, I break the bottom of the stems off at the tender point. This is the portion that many people discard. At almost $3 per pound, I was not about to throw these pieces away. So I saved the tough ends of the stems in a plastic container in the fridge.

Yesterday, I peeled the tough ends and was able to salvage all but the bottom half to one-inch of each stem after peeling. That bottom bit was still too tough to cut through easily, so those bits went into the compost, figuring their stringiness would be unappetizing.

Still, I had a nice pile of asparagus ends to steam and accompany my lunch. Going back further on the calendar, Christmas Day dinner was homemade pizza. I had mixed up a pizza sauce for the occasion, using herbs, seasonings, and tomato paste. There was a small container of this leftover sauce lingering in the fridge. Pushing the limits with how long to keep something, I wanted to use this up right away.

I took 3 whole English muffins from the freezer and made 6 mini pizzas for my week's lunches. I also used more of the wrinkly green pepper plus sliced olives that were lingering in the fridge to top the pizzas. There was also a bit of soft tofu leftover from our tofu and chocolate pie dessert on New Year's day. The tofu was bought on markdown and was past its expiration date, so I knew it was use it or lose it time. I melted a small amount of chocolate chips in the microwave and pureed the tofu with the chocolate, adding in some honey and vanilla extract for a creamy chocolate dessert.

My lunch made use of several of the lingering foods in our fridge, and it was very delicious, to boot!

Roasted Red Peppers for Half Price

A couple of weeks ago, my daughter was asking if we could buy roasted red peppers. I checked our local Fred Meyer and they wanted $4.69 for a 16 oz. jar (about 29 cents per ounce), while Walmart wanted $2.29 for a 10 oz jar (about 23 cents per ounce). I told my daughter that we'd make roasted red peppers when we find a good deal on the peppers in the produce section. Then, last week, I found a $1 bag of 2 green peppers and 1 red pepper on the markdown rack at FM. We used the green peppers on homemade pizza and in burritos. As promised to my daughter, I saved the red pepper for roasting. The pepper was getting a little wrinkly, but it was still okay for roasting.

I used my oven for the roasting, baking at 400 F degrees for 20 minutes, turning, then baking another 20 minutes. (Fortunately, I had other items in the oven baking along with the pepper.)

Immediately after removing the baking sheet from the oven I put a glass bowl over the pepper to steam it for 15 minutes.

When done with the steaming, the pepper's skin slipped off easily.

I sliced the skinned pepper into strips, put in a canning jar, and covered with a 50/50 blend of olive oil and vegetable oil. The jar of roasted red peppers will keep for 5 days or so in the fridge.

As a bag of peppers was $1 on markdown, the red pepper cost 34 cents. I used about 1/3 of a cup of oil to cover the peppers, for a cost of about 50 cents. I would estimate the my half-pint jar was about 5/6 full or about 6  3/4 ounces. My cost per ounce, then, is about 12 cents, about 1/2 price from the jarred red peppers. If I had wanted to use the peppers immediately, then I would not have needed the oil to cover, and my cost per ounce would have been around 5 or 6 cents. By the way, the oil will not be wasted but will be used in salad dressings and to saute meat and vegetables.

January Spending to Save Big Later in the Year

Although I am trying to keep a grip on spending this month, there is one kind of spending that I am allowing because it will save me big bucks later. That's gift spending. In the past 10 days, I have been stalking websites and brick and mortar stores for gift-ables to use for birthdays and Christmas 2019. This is how I can afford a few sort of high-end gifts for my family. In very early January, many retailers have not only their holiday clearance sales but also have their annual or semi-annual sales. Deals can be found both in-person and online. In addition, by shopping online, I also targeted department stores that are not even in my area. I upped my savings by signing up for email lists to get an introductory discount to combine with sales at various online retailers. On a variety of gift items, ranging from bath and body products to cashmere accessories, I saved between 40 and 75% off of the regular retail price for everything that I bought. I now have gifts for spring and fall birthdays, Easter, and Christmas for most of the people on my gift list. I will fill out my gift closet throughout the coming year and add items that become favorites as I hear about them.

I am careful to buy gifts that are versatile, in that they could change recipients if needed, avoiding sized items. For example, a cashmere wrap could be a gift for many of the women in my family, and it would fit any of them (although, for the time being, I have it earmarked for one specific female). In bath and body products, holiday gift sets, such as sets of travel-sized, assorted scents of hand cream or shower gel, are often deeply discounted. These can be given, as is, during 2019's holiday season, or they can be taken out of the holiday gift box and presented in a sheer fabric bag for a birthday gift. These gift sets can also be broken up for smaller gifts, such as for Easter, Valentine's Day, or a small birthday gift for a friend. While it may sound like my purchases are primarily female gifts, I have also bought several men's gifts, such as sweaters and men's grooming products, as well as some couples' gifts, such as household and holiday items.

In addition to gifts, I stocked up on gift wrap, tags, and boxed Christmas cards for 50 cents a package at Dollar Tree's clearance sale, and next year's Christmas candy for the family at 50-75% off retail price from several grocery stores. As a bonus, one of the candy items (truffles wrapped in red foil) will be used for Valentines Day treats for my family.

I think I mentioned this before, but I keep a log of all of the gifts that I have bought and who is to receive them. By shopping in advance, and tracking for whom things are intended, my gift-giving has less last-minute spending, which in my experience has always been the most expensive kind of gift spending. Plus, birthdays and holidays are less hectic, and I feel more organized going into any gift-giving season.

I know, by January, most of us just want to put Christmas behind us. For me, as our family continues to celebrate Christmas through Epiphany, the gift-shopping is just one extension of the holiday season, with the added perk of the charge that I get when I know that I am saving our family money. So, for me, this works.

Those Holiday Leftover Odds and Ends

I could not coax anybody to drink that last cup of eggnog. It sat and sat in the fridge for days and had developed a hint of a sour taste to it. So, what do you do with leftover eggnog or flavored coffee creamer? Two of our favorite uses for leftover eggnog are these Eggnog Scones and eggnog pancakes. As I was making dinner last night, I also cooked a batch of eggnog pancakes for today's breakfast. I used the last cup of eggnog in place of some of the milk and added a 1/4 teaspoon of nutmeg, 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract, and a bit of butter flavoring in a regular pancake recipe. They turned out delicious and were a great use for that last bit of eggnog.

Pumpkin Spice coffee creamer can also be substituted for some of the milk in pancakes or waffles. The Peppermint Mocha coffee creamer is a little more difficult to use in recipes, as the main flavor notes are mint and cocoa. However, I think this creamer would be a tasty substitution for milk in a fudge frosting for brownies. We've also been using it in mugs of cocoa and may try the last of it in a pot of mint-chocolate pudding or freezing it in small single-serving containers for use some time in the future.

I don't normally buy flavored coffee creamers. However, having these at home kept my seasonal coffee drinking costs to a minimum. The creamers were on sale for $1.99 each. I used a couple of tablespoons in a cup of coffee, making my cost for a Pumpkin-Spice Latte or Peppermint Mocha Latte about 10-15 cents per cup. A single, green mermaid seasonal coffee cost more than the entire bottle of flavored creamer. I think it was a pretty good deal for me.

Welcome 2019!

Happy New Year, friends!

I love new beginnings. I feel optimistic about life, about my place in this world, and about my prospects for the next season. North American weather may indicate that it is winter. However, in my heart it is spring. Local grocery stores must agree, as two stores that I visited yesterday were selling tulips.

On the topic of grocery stores -- on my list of accomplishments for yesterday, the fourth item was sticking to a budget while grocery shopping. The 1st was Senior Discount day at Fred Meyer, so I turned the morning into my major grocery shopping day for the month. One daughter and I stopped into three stores to pick up deals. I was prepared. I had a list and coupons, and I had read the ads. In the grocery department, January is notorious for a lack of great deals on food items. I have found that  in the lean months of winter, the best way to combat this situation is to shop multiple stores and focus on loss leaders, clearance items, seasonal produce, and price-booking the staples. This is exactly how I tackled the stores yesterday. It's difficult to say what was my biggest score, as I did well on several items. On the list of my great deals: blocks of cheese for $2.24/lb, milk at 89 cents/half-gallon, eggs at 99 cents/dozen, flour tortillas at 89 cents/package, and hot dogs at 75 cents/package. I also bought some produce, bread, ground beef, coating chocolate, tofu, yogurt, peanut butter, and sparkling cider, spending just over $90.

While picking up groceries, I found some clearance items to use as gifts for the 2019 holiday season.
Yes, the holiday 2019 shopping season has begun. I shop year round for birthdays and holidays, keeping my stash of gift-ables in a closet. It would be easy for the gift stockpile to get out of hand, and it has in past years. In anticipation of such a situation, I have a couple of pages in my journal dedicated to how I intend to disperse this amass of gifts. As I pick up items, I enter them both in a general list, as well as in an index with the names of the intended recipients. With these two lists, I can readily see types of gifts that I have in abundance as well as types that I am lacking. I mention all of this as it is a system that works well for me, and could possibly be of assistance for you, too.

If this week's shopping is any indication, 2019 appears to be a promising year for my budget. Here's to new beginnings, budgets that will balance, and a year to be well-lived! Have a great day, friends!

The Finished Treat Tower

This is the finished treat tower. It turned out very nicely, if I do say so myself.  I had most of the ingredients and all of the decorative items on hand, needing to buy just a few items to complete some of the contents. And it is heavy! At least 5 pounds, maybe more. It should be a real pleaser for the recipient.

At the top of the tower, I attached an ornament that was in the free box that I picked up near the end of summer or beginning of fall.

My daughter helped me make the popcorn this afternoon (so it would be fresh, as the tower will be given tomorrow), and I wanted to show you how it looks. It's very delicious! She emphasized that the popcorn flavorings are about half the price at Walmart and WinCo, in comparison to other grocery stores, and she says that Walmart has more flavors. So, definitely do check around, if you're ever looking to buy the popcorn flavorings.

I also wanted to wish you all a very merry Christmas.  May you feel the blessings and joy of this special day.

Filling the Tins: Cookies and Candy

The last tin

This last tin is medium-sized and holds cookies, foil-wrapped chocolate candies, and candy canes. I only have half of the cookies ready -- the Nutty Caramel Bars, but I will finish the other cookies tomorrow -- Chocolate, Chocolate Chip, and Peppermint Drop Cookies. One daughter wanted to help with the baking, so I'm waiting until she can be home.

For the cookies, I put each one in a mini muffin paper. With the caramel bars, this keeps them from sticking together, but also improves the presentation, I think. I'll do the same with the drop cookies.

Here's how the Spiced Nuts turned out. I lined this tin with plastic wrap, then rolled the excess so that it fits neatly inside the tin.

I topped the nuts with a circle of waxed paper, to hold in freshness.

Those are the filled tins. There are 5 tins altogether, holding Nacho Cheese Popcorn, White Chocolate and Peppermint Pretzels, Drinking Chocolate, assortment of cookies and candies, and Spiced Nuts. When I get them stacked and held tight with a ribbon, I'll post the final picture. I think this is a very nice gift. I know that I would be very pleased to receive it, so I am hoping the recipient will feel the same. I took a couple of shortcuts, but by and large, the tin contents are homemade. My total cost was about $11 or $12, not including the leftovers which will become the holiday treats for my own family. A typical snack and treat tower of similar size and variety costs about $35 to $45, retail, if purchased through a company such as Harry & David.