Using up Our Garden Goodies!

Hello Family! So today our temps only reached into the high 70's. That's pretty great. We are having a lot of fires though so the air is pretty bad. We seem to have this happen every August. Sadly, many people have lost their homes. Makes you very grateful for your home I'll tell you.

For dinner tonight I found a great recipe for a potato soup without bacon. I know that bacon adds a great taste to the soup, but I can't rationalize paying the high price. Bacon runs over $4.00 for 12 ounces here. I call that highway robbery! Anyway, here's a recipe that makes a hearty and thick potato soup that tastes amazing! It's from the Taste of Home website and I highly recommend it:

Hearty Potato Soup

6 medium potatoes, peeled and sliced

2 carrots, chopped

6 celery ribs, chopped

8 cups water

1 onion, chopped

6 Tbls. flour

6 Tbls. margarine

1 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. pepper

1 1/2 cups milk

In a soup pot cook the potatoes, carrots and celery in water until tender, about 15-20 minutes. Drain, reserving liquid and setting vegetables aside. In the soup pot saute onion in margarine until tender. Stir in the flour, salt and pepper. Then gradually add milk. Bring it all to a boil, cook and stir for 2 minutes or until thickened. Gently pour in cooked veggies and then add as much of the reserved liquid as you need to bring it to your desired consistency. Yield about 8-10 servings. 

This was just wonderful and very filling. I used potatoes and onions from our garden. When I'm out of fresh potatoes and carrots I'll use some of our canned potatoes and carrots. 

• 
  
• 
  

HARVEST TIME!

Fall is my absolute  favorite season! So much to do and never enough time to get it all done, but what fun to try! We went to our garden out at Grandma and Grandpa's on Monday and brought home lots of summer squash. I was able to freeze most of it and some I used up in a great recipe I found online. 

You layer sliced squash and sliced tomatoes in a shallow dish about 2 times or more if you have lots of people to feed. It was only dad and I so I only layered twice. Then I put sliced red onions on top. It called for green onions but I made do with what I had. Then I mixed about 2 Tablespoons of olive oil and 4 Tablespoons of apple cider vinegar along with salt and pepper. I poured this over my veggies and cooked in a 400 degree oven for about 15 minutes. It was great!

Well anyway, that's how I took care of the squash. Yesterday I went up to the 5-mile garden and brought home lots of tomatoes and 3 huge yellow and red onions. The red onions were the size of softballs! I made a tomato basil soup with 3 pounds of the tomatoes and it was delicious. I didn't have heavy cream but when I looked up a substitute it told me to mix butter and milk. Who knew? I had previously used up some tomatoes in a salsa recipe that I found online. Hoping it's good. 

I had book club last night and when I got home dad was just finishing up 3 pints of green beans that he got from our garden in the back yard! And he says there's lots more coming on! 

As I said, I love the fall and I love harvest time! Making do with what the Lord blesses us with is awesome!

Winner for dinner

Another winner for dinner!

A favorite blog that I follow is The Iowa Housewife. She always seems to have simple recipes that require ingredients that are usually found in my home! I like that. I did of course make some changes; I put in some ham for dad, some red peppers from the freezer and since I didn't have corn I just excluded it! I think you'll like it. A great vegetarian recipe that also tastes great!

Baby Potatoes with Tomato Saute'

12 ounces potatoes, peeled and quartered

1 Tbls olive oil

1 cup corn

1 1/2 tsp garlic

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp crushed red peppers

1/2 cup halved cherry tomatoes

1 ounce Parmesan cheese

Boil potatoes in pan covered with water for 10-15 minutes or until tender; drain. Heat a large skillet over med-high heat and add olive oil. Add corn, garlic, salt and red peppers and saute' for 2 minutes. Add potatoes and tomatoes and cook for 1 minute more. Top with cheese. Serves 4!

Yes, it's that time of year again! Zucchini time!

Just a quick hello and I wanted to tell you about the dinner I made tonight! It was one I found by typing in 'easy zucchini lasagna' and it was great. I used our mandolin to slice one huge zucchini into strips. It took dad and I working together to get that big thing sliced! But then you add my canned tomato sauce, some added onions and peppers from the garden, frozen spinach from last year, mozzarella and Parmesan cheese and just a little bit of cottage cheese to make it perfect! I do appreciate that your dad will try all my recipes without complaint but even he liked this one. And the calories were reduced substantially because there were no noodles or meat! It was great! I hope you are each trying something new with fresh veggies! One of my favorites with zucchini is to dip them in egg and then a bread crumb mixture and fry them up. A lot of calories but so delicious. Here's to eating well and frugally! 

Dinner Ideas!

When we were last at Becky and Brian's I noticed that Becky had a menu of sorts for her daily meals. So I thought I should do one of my own. It's a pretty loose menu but it works because it's so flexible.  Here you go:

Mondays - Soup & sandwich

Tuesdays - Breakfast for Dinner

Wednesdays - Stir-Fry

Thursdays - Casserole

Fridays - Pizza (of course!)

Saturdays - Crock pot

Sundays - Meat

Let me tell you how it works. On Mondays I will either cook a store bought soup, we still have plenty of Healthy Choice soup from my shopping spree at Albert son's a few years ago. Or it could be a homemade soup or one of my home canned soups. And it's often accompanied with a toasted cheese sandwich. 

On Tuesdays I've been making pumpkin waffles or last night it was strawberry pancakes. And I bought some bacon which was on sale a while ago and I'll cook up 3 slices each. I've also done omelets and toast. Last week I made potato latkes!

Wednesdays are stir fry and this means I'll use up leftover meats and vegetables from the fridge. Tonight I mixed some sliced peppers that I froze from this summers harvest, mushrooms that we got on sale and froze, and sliced zucchini from our garden. To this I added leftover chicken from fajitas on Saturday and it was great. Here's how we make our stir fry. I'll cook all the veggies and meats in a stir fry pot on the stove and then I make the sauce. In a small bowl I'll mix 2/3 cup water, 3 Tbls.. soy sauce, 1 Tbls. vinegar and 2 tsp sugar. To this I'll whisk in 3 tsp cornstarch. Pour it slowly over the veggies and let it cook for about 5 minutes.  

Thursdays, it's a casserole using leftovers or frozen meat. I love casseroles because they take so little meat and instead use lots of pasta or rice which is a whole lot cheaper!

Fridays we make either a regular pizza, BBQ chicken pizza or pizza on bagels, English muffins or french bread. 

Saturdays are crock pot because we serve in the temple and I no longer want to pay to eat out as much. It's so nice to come home to find dinner pretty much ready.

Sundays are the only day that we have a meat like a beef roast or pork ribs. It's a special meal.

So there you have it. My food bill is low, low, low because of this and I'm grateful to be using our food storage. 

Thank goodness it's the weekend!

It's been a long week and I'm ready for the weekend! But I'm excited to take Grandma Eva's name to the temple tomorrow for an endowment session! That will be glorious! And I'm hoping to spend the day re-organizing my office. It's just not functional the way it is. So that will be fun!

So what did I do to save money these last few days? To be honest it's more what I didn't do. I didn't use my dryer at all. I didn't go out to dinner. Instead of buying treats for Book Club I made cookies. I didn't buy any extra groceries this week other than salad. Instead of buying fresh fruit from Costco we're eating our canned peaches and other fruits. Boy do I love our peaches! So I guess I haven't actively done anything new in the last few days but there's always tomorrow! 

So when you're making choices with your hard earned money, stop and think about:

1. Is it made from quality materials?
2. Will it last 10+ years (5 for clothing)?
3. Is it made in the US?
4. Is it something I have a specific use for?
5. Can we make it instead?
6. Do we have something else we could use?
7. Who are we supporting if we buy it?
8. How long will I have to work to pay for this?

These questions are courtesy of www.LittleHouseLiving.com

Have a great and financially stable week!

Mason Jar Herb Gardens

What Did You Do Today to Save Money?

I wish I could say that the above was a picture of my mason jar herb garden but that would be a lie! However, I did see a post about this on one of my blogs and decided to try it. Mine are sitting on a tall stool up against the dining room window. I planted parsley, basil and thyme. What's pretty cool is that I didn't spend a dime on this experiment. We had a pot of dirt in the shed out back, I have lots of wide-mouth mason jars and we had herb seeds. I also had a decorative jar with some clear beads that I put at the bottom of each jar. I'll let you know how it works out.

I also spent my day off from school taking an inventory of our 4 freezers. Yes, I do know how to live it up! I discovered that I have a lot of squash that I need to use up as well as a lot of corn. But now I have an inventory sheet hanging by each freezer and hopefully this will help me use our freezer food better.It feels really good to have that done!

And now I'm making bread! I love the smell of baking bread and i also love toast made from homemade bread! Dad is out in the gully cutting branches from the tree that fell in the gully during the last windstorm. They make for a great fire in the wood stove downstairs!

So what did you do today?

Let's remember to be frugal, conservative and smart in our financial choices!

Love you all!

Thanks Emily, for choosing to be baptized!

How did you save money today?

From the delicious looking picture that Ginanne posted on Facebook and Instagram, she made homemade doughnuts! They actually made my mouth water! Great job Ginanne!

We saved money tonight by not going out to dinner after serving in the temple. It's become a habit to pick a restaurant and enjoy a meal before going home. And we really enjoyed that. Such a treat. However, it could cost us anywhere from $20 to $30 dollars for the meals depending on where we went. Double that each month and that's just not contributing to our goal to get out of debt. So tonight we came home and had chicken fajitas and enjoyed the Packers-Cardinals game!

This morning we saved money by using our drying rack to dry our bed sheets and clothes. Just a little thing but it does all add up!

So what did you do today to contribute to your goal of freedom from debt?

Happy Winter!

As you all know, this family has had Friday night pizza for decades! And through the years we've grown to include BBQ Chicken pizza as well as our basic family pizza. Last Friday night I made Calzone's. They were delicious! You make your regular pizza dough and divide it into 4 balls. Then roll them into 8 inch circles and put your toppings and cheese one one side. Then fold over and seal them tightly. I dipped mine into pizza sauce but dad put the sauce right on the calzone before he sealed it. What a rebel. He also decided that he needed to put more toppings inside. Dad really likes toppings! But they were great and very filling. I recommend them wholeheartedly!

I finally spent some grocery money today. Yoke's had 3 great deals. So early this morning I bought bananas for .33 cents a pound, eggs were 4 for $5.00 and a pound of bacon was $1.88 each, of which I bought 5! So my total was $17.41! That's all I hope to buy this month.We'll see! But whatever I save from grocery and mad money will go to the mortgage! Ya baby!

I also want to report that Dad is now on board with getting chickens of our own! Rejoice, rejoice! He's waiting for a book from the library that teaches about raising backyard chickens and building the coop. So very excited! I try not to worry about the future but the stock market craziness and employment concerns tend to raise a red flag. So the more we can become self-sufficient, the better I feel.

So I hope that each of you will work on becoming more self-sufficient in your lives.Whether it's building your food storage, saving money, doing without the extras like cable or making other sacrifices. It's worth it to have peace in your life!

What a Wonderful Day!

I haven't posted a recipe in a while but it's been a while since I've used one that impressed me. However, tonight I made a great Breakfast for Dinner recipe! Let me tell you that it can be time consuming. But Dad went to a Shadle Basketball game after work and I had scripture study so I didn't get started until almost 7:00 PM. So I recommend that if you try this that you make the syrup earlier. Here we go:

Apple Pancake Syrup

1/2 cup sugar (I recommend maybe 1/3 cup instead. It was too sweet for me)

2 teaspoons cornstarch

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1 cup pure apple juice (I used the apple juice we canned when we made applesauce)

1 Tablespoon lemon juice

2 Tablespoons butter (I used margarine)

1. In a small saucepan, combine sugar, cornstarch, and cinnamon.
2. Whisk in apple juice until mixture is smooth.
3. Cook over medium heat for 5 minutes or until bubbly and thickened.
4. Stir in lemon juice and butter.
5. Serve with pancakes
6. Yield: Approx 1 cup

Apple Cinnamon Waffles

For the apples:

3 apples  peeled and quartered (I used only 2 wrinkled apples)

1 Tbsp margarine or olive oil

1-2 Tbsp brown sugar

1/4 tsp cinnamon

For the waffles

1 egg

1 Tbsp melted butter (margarine)

1 cup milk

1 Tbsp honey

1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce or pumpkin puree (I used some leftover pumpkin)

1/4 cup brown sugar

3/4 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 Tbsp baking powder

1 cup flour (I used 1/2 whole wheat and 1/2 regular flour)

1/4 cup oats (I used quick oats)

1. Saute your apples in a skillet over medium heat. When it's hot add butter then the apples and stir. After a few minutes add in brown sugar and cinnamon. cover to steam and soften, stirring frequently. Let it go for 4-5 minutes them remove lid to let caramelize a bit more
2. For waffles mix egg and then add honey, applesauce or pumpkin, oil, brown sugar and whisk. Add milk and stir once more.
3. Add flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon to a sifter and sift over wet ingredients. (I just added everything together) Gently fold in oats, then the apples. You may want to add only 1/2 the apples and use the rest to go over cooked pancakes. I added them all in. Let batter rest for 5 minutes while you warm up waffle iron.
4. Once preheated, generously spray the waffle iron with cooking spray and spoon about 1/2 cup of batter onto the center of the iron, press down to spread the batter, and cook according to your machines instructions.
5. Once done, remove and serve with pancake syrup. Very filling and delicious! 

I hope you try this recipe. Dad and I really enjoyed this and I'm adding this to our faves list!

Love, love, love this picture!!

So here we are in January of 2016! Can you believe that your baby brother will be home in FIVE MONTHS! It was so great to chat with him and see how much he's grown spiritually. 

But we have a new, wonderful year to fill with family fun and wonderful memories. We are still trying to figure out a good time to visit everyone this summer so that Brady can reacquaint himself with his growing family! We'll let you know as soon as we have solidified dates. 

This year your dad and I have set a goal to pay off this home no later than March of 2017, earlier if we win the lottery! Just kidding! But we are making double payments now and  hope to continue until this house is officially ours! Why are we doing this? Well first because we have been instructed by our church leaders to get out of debt! And your mom and dad really, really hate to be indebted to anyone! So this is our main goal for 2016. 

How am I making this a reality? Well, first it helps that I'm working right now. I was telling your dad that we could have probably paid off the house earlier if I had worked when you children were young, but I am SO HAPPY that I didn't. It was such a blessing to be at home when you were home and I so appreciate your dad working so hard to make that a reality. But now I am able to work and so I am helping by paying the extra on the mortgage. And there are also a few extra things I'm doing. Little things maybe, but they add up. Like this:

1. We got rid of cable and we have Netflix only. Again a huge thanks to Jordan and Ginanne for our Roku! I love getting all the extra channels for free, including BYU!
2. I'm making more bread and using whole wheat in my loaves. Nothing beats homemade bread and soup for dinner! It also helps to have a wheat grinder.
3. We've started to use our drying rack during the winter to dry our clothes. We use the outside line during the Spring, Summer and Fall. And dad makes our laundry soap. Win-win!
4. Dinners out are becoming fewer and fewer. And the fact that so many restaurants are having problems with their ingredients being safe makes this another win-win.
5. Of course my commute across the park to work has made my gas portion pretty nil. Love that!
6. I'm already planning what we'll have in our gardens this year. And I'm hoping to utilize the areas around the house for veggies instead of flowers.
7. I found a great list of questions to ask yourself before you buy anything on a blog called www.LittleHouseLiving.com. There are 8 questions which include 'Do we have something else we could us?' This reminded me of Patrick making a chicken feeder from items he already had around the house. Good job bud! So check out that list if you're interested. They're called the Spending Initiative Questions!
8. I love our composter and I just know it will help our garden to do even better.

I know this probably sounds boring and mundane but we are so excited to pay off this house and hopefully be able to help you kids more, or spoil the grandchildren more! 

The guidance we receive from our church leaders will lead us to safety and peace. I truly believe this! Stay faithful, stay close to the Spirit and be obedient to the leadership of our church and you will forever be joyful!