Wednesday, March 22, 2017

This Week...Beyond Money 3/13 - 3/19

For me, a life beyond money is making choices so that you can live the best possible life, regardless of your income level. Obviously, you have to make a living, but there are many ways to improve your quality of life without increasing your income levels and correspondingly your expenses. This regular post will be some of the ways that we improve our quality of life beyond just trying to make more money.


Gardening:
* I harvested more herbs from the indoor garden. I really do love having instant access to fresh herbs whenever I want them. The oregano plant was looking pretty rough for awhile, but has exploded with new growth. The basil plants are barely growing, but I can harvest occasionally. The sage plant is pretty huge.
* Two pepper plants are alive and two are dead. One of the live ones put on a heavy load of flowers. I picked them off this time, but I think it will do well this season.

Cooking/Groceries:
* Trucker made pasta for dinner one night. He added leftover sausage and onion to the sauce. Served with garlic toast made from bakery manager's special bread.
* We made popcorn for snacking.
* Trucker made BLTs one evening. He used bacon we got on manager's special for $1.29/12 oz, iceberg lettuce (aldi, $.99/head), tomatoes (aldi, $.99/lb) and jalapeno rolls (manager's special, $1/8 pack). While BLTs are best in summer, it was still a lovely treat. We saved half the bacon to use in other meals.
* I found eggs on sale at Aldi for $.69/dozen. I bought two dozen although I had two dozen at home already. When I got home, I used boiled the older two dozen. We used those for snacking and breakfast.
* One day I made goldenrod eggs and used about 8 eggs. This time, I sauteed half an onion in the bacon fat before making the roux so I could pretend the meal had some redeeming nutritive benefits.

Fun:
* We stayed in and watched movies from the library and napped one evening. After everything that has been going on, it was perfect to get to finally relax.
* We went out and shot a couple games of pool one evening. I'm not very good, but want to learn. Trucker was patient in teaching me.
* We went out with my sister and her boyfriend for coffee at Panera. We brought our travel mugs to get a discount. We had such a good time. They are a lot of fun, and we have good conversations.
* We went to Half Price Books with half off coupons. We each got one book. Mine was Gene Logsdon's The Contrary Farmer. He got a philosophy book by an author he really enjoys.
* We took my parents out for ice cream. There is a local place with my parent's last name, so I thought it would be fun to take them there. We had two BOGO coupons, so we each paid for one of them. Total cost: $10. Not too bad for four people and we had a great time laughing with them.

Frugality:
* We stopped at Dollar Tree for a few essentials: a couple two-packs of toothbrushes since we have no more in storage, some pain-relieving patches ($1/20 vs. $9/60 at Kroger the day before) and some items to add to work lunches.

House and Home:
* Trucker decluttered a lot one day. He put some large items out to the curb and posted curb alerts online.
* Trucker fixed a slow drain in the bathroom sink.

Work:
* I worked some overtime to make up for lost hours.
* I packed my lunch each day.

Health:
Gym visits this month:
Trucker: 12
Me: 5

Community:
* While our car was being worked on, my parents let me borrow my dad's truck. On the way home from work a couple days later it broke down on me. I was able to get it into a parking lot and Trucker picked me up. My parents came out the next day and we fixed the truck with Dad. They brought mom's van out in case we couldn't get the truck running. While it was very cold and a bit frustrating (it was a broken serpentine belt), Trucker kept teasing my dad and we would laugh until we were almost in tears. It was kind of nice.
* We helped my sister and her boyfriend figure out some financial things to help them get ready for grown-up life. I am so insanely proud of those kids. They are being incredibly responsible to cover all their bases before moving out.

How was your week?

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