The Sweet Life On A Budget

  Meal planning is essential to eating healthy, keeping the grocery bill down, and maintaining your sanity throughout a workweek.   In addition to meal planning, I try to prepare meals as much as possible over the weekend.   This helps to lower my stress during the week.    However, if we have a busy weekend, I try to plan simple or crockpot meals.       With swim competition season starting, I will need to plan my menu plan out a little more.     There will be a lot of freezer meals, casseroles, or refrigerator-based meals.    To make matters a little more challenging, we also need to start limiting carbohydrates.     Here we go with our first attempt.    Meal Preparation Plan NOTE-  1- Click on the picture and get a link to a post sharing the recipe.  2- Although all prices were correct at the time of the blog postings, the current cost of preparation of these dishes may be higher due to inflation and/or location.      Breakfast Options:  Hard Boiled Eggs Bagels Cereal Monday Tacos S

  The Frugal Five: #29 With inflation on the rise and our salaries not being able to keep up, it seems like we have taken a pay cut and must be more careful with our money.   The Frugal Five is a series where we celebrate our daily or weekly activities that help us live a frugal life.     Last week was a little hard to get anything accomplished, so I needed to give myself grace.   Although I did try to be as frugal as possible, I also needed to keep my life together.     1- Haircut Savings Since haircuts are $30 per cut plus tip, each time my husband asks me to cut his hair, I am happy to.    This is a huge savings!   He gets his hair cut every other week, so on average we save $60 per month on just his hair cuts.    In addition, my salon is offering a special on gift cards this month.   Purchase $100 in gift cards and get $20 free.    Since my hair color/cut runs about $120 per month with tip, this is a 17% savings.    I picked up several gift cards this month.    In addition, for eve

  The weather has started to cool, and it is now time to embrace the fall season.    Warm sweaters, hot chocolate, fire pits, pumpkin spice, and giant pots of soup remind me of fall.    As with all changes in seasons, there are so many different experiences to enjoy.  Our new community has a lot of mature trees along the roads and walking trials to enjoy.    Fall colors and crispy air really makes you feel alive on your adventures.       10/16/22 10/22/22 In addition, our small wooded area has a lot to offer us in the area of beauty and tranquility.   The leaves are turning beautiful colors and I am soaking in the beauty that Our Rich Backyard has to offer.    It is amazing what just one week will change our tree grove.   Each morning I wake up to this beauty and am grateful.  10/16/22 10/22/22 Our woods have a stream running along the edge and it is full of mature trees and a variety of different animals.  Our tree grove has an incredible amount of yellow throughout.   I’ve enjoyed ta

  Meal planning is essential to eating healthy, keeping the grocery bill down, and maintaining your sanity throughout a workweek.   In addition to meal planning, I try to prepare meals as much as possible over the weekend.   This helps to lower my stress during the week.    However, if we have a busy weekend, I try to plan simple or crockpot meals.       With swim competition season starting, I will need to plan my menu plan out a little more.     There will be a lot of freezer meals, casseroles, or refrigerator-based meals.    To make matters a little more challenging, we also need to start limiting carbohydrates.     Here we go with our first attempt.    Meal Preparation Plan NOTE-  1- Click on the picture and get a link to a post sharing the recipe.  2- Although all prices were correct at the time of the blog postings, the current cost of preparation of these dishes may be higher due to inflation and/or location.      Breakfast Options:  Hardboiled Eggs Bagels Cereal Monday Tacos Sa

  The weather has started to cool, and it is now time to embrace the fall season.    Warm sweaters, hot chocolate, fire pits, pumpkin spice, and giant pots of soup remind me of fall.    When the air is crisp and the leaves turn colors, it is time for celebration.   Ever since my husband and I were in college, we celebrated Oktoberfest.     Oktoberfest was started in 1811 as a way to celebrate and support the agriculture and economy of Bavaria. Although in the beginning, the big draw was the horse race, it has not been held since 1960.  Now there are beer halls and German food throughout the United States that host celebrations during this time of year.       We celebrate by making bratwurst, sauerkraut, soft pretzels, and a cold bottle of beer.    We enjoy sharing this feast with friends and family as a way to enjoy the start of the cool months of the year.  In addition to Oktoberfest, this is the time of year to get out your scarves and start to layer up.    I like to use scarves to a

Manicure      Getting a Manicure can range in price from $10.00 - $50.00. Although the experience can be exceptional, you can have a very similar experience at home for a fraction of the price.   Over the holiday season, I was able to get several nail polishes for free and nail polish gift sets (9 small bottles per set) for $.99 each. In addition, you will need a few nail salon tools such as nail file, buffer, nail polish remover, cuticle tools, cotton balls, and Q-tips.        I have systematically acquired a variety of beauty tools at a discount over the years. Thus creating the ability to give me a manicure at home for far less than the salons. However, I gave myself a home manicure long before I had all of the tools. Let’s get started with how easy it is. Tools: The first thing I do is remove all of my old polish and wash my hands.  This will create a a clean slate for the next week. I select my polish based on nail length and weekly activities.  I have f

  Walmart Deals  Perfect Bar Cost: $2.37 OOP: $2.37 IBOTTA: $2.49 Final Cost: FREE + ($0.12 MM) Evolve Protein Cost: $2.78 OOP: $2.78 IBOTTA: $2.79 Final Cost: FREE Breakstone Cottage Cheese Cost: $1.28 OOP: $1.28 IBOTTA: $0.75 Final Cost: $0.53 KROGER CORE Bar Cost: $2.37 Coupon: Kroger Store Coupon  OOP/ Final Cost: FREE  Jimmy Dean Sausage Cost: $5.54 Coupon: Kroger Store Coupon  OOP/ Final Cost: FREE Mountain Dew Thrashed Apple (20 oz) Cost: $2.19 Coupon: Kroger Store Coupon  OOP/ Final Cost: FREE CVS Carefree Liners (20 ct) Cost: $1.99/$1.00 = $2.99 (B1G1 50%) OOP: $2.99 ECB: $3.00 Final Cost: FREE Almay Cosmetics (Concealer and Eyeliner) Cost: $10.49 + $9.79 = $20.28 Coupons: $3.00 (10/16/22 Save Insert)- Eye $3.00 (10/16/22 Save Insert)- Face OOP: $14.28 IBOTTA: $3.00 Eye       $3.00 Face ECB: $8.00 Final Cost: $0.28/2 or $0.14 each These deals are time sensitive so make sure you double check before you