Back from Black Friday Shopping

Wow. I have never seen our Walmart so busy! The parking lot was packed.

I picked up my sister at 5:15 and got to Walmart about 5 minutes later. By the time we got there, all the carts were gone. I finally had to stand by the cart corral and wait for someone to bring a cart back. Luckily I saw someone I knew and offered to take their cart back inside for them. LoL

I went over my budget. I spent $241.52 but I had a blast.

This is what I got:

1 6 foot Christmas Tree $25.00
1 Bissell Vacuum $28.00
1 50 piece canister of Play-Doh $10.00
1 100 piece Mega Block Lego type things $10.00
1 Surge Protector $9.94
10 Bath Towels $1.50 ea
1 Hand/Stand Mixer $15.00
1 GE Microwave $25.00
1 28 piece Rubbermade Foodstorage things $7.00
2 Kids Sleeping Bags (1 Sponge Bob and 1 Wall-E) $15.00 ea
1 2 pack DVD (Ratatouille) $10.00
2 Toothbrush/Cup Sets (1 Sponge Bob and 1 Spider Man) $5.00 ea
2 Dog Toy Stockings $5.00 ea
4 Sippy Cups $2.96 x2 and $7.68
and 2 BBQ Rib Sandwiches $1.50 ea

I am on such a bargain high.

Black Friday Shopping

Hubbs finally gave in and told me that it was okay if I went shopping in the morning. He said he thought $200 would be reasonable. That's fine with me.

So I am getting up at 4 to get showered, dressed and a little coffee in me by 5:30. Since we live in such a teeny town, Walmart is the only store within a hours drive. That's fine with me too.

I got my Black Friday ad yesterday and have been planning my shopping trip.

This is what I am getting (hopefully) with my $200:
$49- Portable DVD Player
$10- Portable DVD Player bad and Car Charger
$28- Bissell Upright Vacuum in any color but pink
$25- GE Microwave
$15- Hamilton Beach 6-Speed Stand or Hand Mixer
$25- Christmas Tree
$10- DVD 2-Pack Assortment
$10- Trivial Pursuit Totally 80s
Grand Total= $172 plus tax

Since it is such a small town, I am not expecting there to be many people there tomorrow so after I find the stuff I want, I might just wander around to see if there are any other things I want.

Happy Freaking Thanksgiving

Well, the plan was to spend today over at FIL's.

Things never end up the way I expect them to.

Last night, we stopped by FIL's for a quick dinner and to spend some time with BIL. While we were there, my FIL's bulldog almost bit Bobblehead. He was just standing in the kitchen between Hubbs and I with his back to the dog, minding his own business. All of a sudden, the dog rams his head into Bobblehead's back, knocks him down and lunges at his face.

Unfreakingbelievable. This dog has been an asshole since they got him. He is a chronic biter. He has bitten step-MIL, FIL, BIL, Hubbs, the mailman (twice), all of FIL's friends, who knows who else, and now has tried to bite my youngest.

That stupid dog is lucky that Hubbs got to him before I did.

Anyway, we left shortly after we got Bobblehead calmed down. On the way out to the car, Hubbs and I decided that we didn't want to spend Thanksgiving trying to protect our kids from the asshole dog.

We stopped by Safeway on the way home and picked up Thanksgiving dinner. We spent $41.40 and saved $23.25. We bought a Rotisserie Chicken, a bag of Clementine Cuties (oranges I think), 2 more gallons of milk, stuffing, boxed potatoes, green beans, cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie filling, cream of mushroom soup, gravy powder and black and green olives. All the stuff WE like, not what everybody thinks we like.

We got up around 8 this morning and dinked around until about 10. Then I started making my very first Thanksgiving dinner. Yes, I am 26 years old and have never even helped with the holiday cooking. That's why we got a chicken instead of a turkey. I wouldn't even know how to get the damn thing out of the bag.

So I made a pumpkin pie, stuffing, green bean casserole, the chicken, gravy, a relish tray, and scalloped potatoes. By myself, with absolutely no help. It was super good. I am so impressed with myself.

Of course FIL is pissed that we missed Thanksgiving dinner. Ummm, control your asshole dog? Its simple.

All in all, today turned out pretty well. It wasn't the disaster I dreamed it would be and it was nice not to have to deal with the other people in our family.

I even got out the good dishes that I have never had a chance to use. Hubb's grandma Betty got us a set of beautiful dishes for our wedding present 6 years ago and I FINALLY got to use them.

I Just Had To Open My Big Mouth

Yesterday I was commenting on a blog I stalk about the lack of cold weather and snow making me feel not too into the holiday spirit.

Well, it is 8:40 a.m. and it is still dark, dark, dark outside. Weatherbug says it is 39 degrees with a 33% chance of precipitation.

Oh great.

At least if it snows I will get some cute pictures of the boys out in it.

Oh damn. It just started raining.

Bring on the chaos!

Typealyzer

So I found this neato little thing on Cheaper Than Therapy.

The analysis indicates that the author of http://mommycrisp.blogspot.com is of the type:

ESFP - The Performers
The entertaining and friendly type. They are especially attuned to pleasure and beauty and like to fill their surroundings with soft fabrics, bright colors and sweet smells. They live in the present moment and don´t like to plan ahead - they are always in risk of exhausting themselves.
The enjoy work that makes them able to help other people in a concrete and visible way. They tend to avoid conflicts and rarely initiate confrontation - qualities that can make it hard for them in management positions.

Very interesting......

Plug in your blog on their site and see what they say about you.

Red Bull Friday Update

I made a little progress on my laundry piles. I lost count of how many loads I did but it is all washed and all dried except for 1 load.

AND instead of taking the clothes out of the dryer and tossing them on the floor next to the bed, I actually sorted them into laundry baskets. And the towels got folded.

I am getting better about this laundry thing.

On top of getting the laundry done, I got the grocery shopping out of the way and I wrapped the rest of my Christmas presents.

Hooray!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
My shopping totals:

~~Walmart: $111.97 0 Coupons
I picked up the last of the Christmas presents for Hubb's grandpa and Bobblehead. Plus Monk Man needed a bigger pair of shoes and I found a pair of adorable Sponge Bob PJs for him and Cars PJs for Bobblehead. And they both needed new socks. The washer and dryer eat Monk Man's socks and Bobblehead just loses his. For some reason, Walmart didn't have my el-cheapo creamer that I love and they only had the Coffee Mate super expensive not as tasty creamer.

~~Bashas: Total before coupons= $40.41 Total after coupons= $26.61 Savings of $13.80
I bought 20 Yogurts, 1 bag of Meow Mix and 2 containers of Frozen Rolls. All on sale and had coupons for the cat food and rolls. I had to get a rain check (cheque?) for Kibbles and Chunks though. Monk Man managed to sneak in a bag of M&Ms (no coupons and not on sale). Bashas is still doing double coupons up to a dollar so I might have to hit it again, without the kids, and walk up and down the aisles to see if there are any smokin deals since I was in such a rush on Saturday.

~~Safeway: Total before coupons= $220.44 Total after coupons=$143.58 Savings of $76.86
Safeway is my grocery store preference. I usually do the bulk of my shopping there because they always double my coupons. Either I missed a bunch of deals from the flier or the stuff was just unadvertised. I got 4 12-packs of Pepsi, 2 for free, 2 brown sugars, 2 cake frostings, 2 salad dressings, 2 diced tomatoes, 2 bags of chocolate chips, 2 Martinelli apple ciders, a french fried onion, a mayo, 2 brownie mixes, 2 Pam sprays, 2 Christmas Pez and refills, 24 cans of Fancy Feast, 2 gallons of milk, a tub of sour cream, 2 tubs of ice cream, 4 chocolate milks, 2 Kotex pads, 2 4-packs of o-celo sponges, a London Broil, a bunch of bananas, 2 bags of salads, and a 30 pack of Budwiser.

So, all 3 stores totals before coupons=$372.82 Totals after coupons=$282.16 Total savings=$90.66

Not too bad for a day that involved the dreaded Walmart. I can't wait to see how well I do next week.

Thanksgiving is when????!!!!

My mom just called to give me my Thanksgiving Dinner assignment. Soda and my wonderful Green Bean Casserole.

Huh? Thanksgiving is a week from yesterday?

No! Get out!

I was really hoping we would go to Colorado for Thanksgiving at MIL's.

I wonder what I have to bring for Thanksgiving at FIL's.

Update on Last Week's Red Bull Friday

1) Paint the walls. --Didn't happen. Hubbs looked at me like I had 3 heads when I brought it up.

2) A backsplash behind the stove. --Didn't happen either. Hubbs wants to (say it with me in a whiny voice) "save money now".

3) Storage. --I didn't get this done either. I was VERY lazy.

4) Caulk the windows. --This didn't get done either. Hubbs was lazy too.

5) Grocery shop. --I did get this done. Yay. 1 out of 6.
**Bashas-Before Coupons=$122.99~~After Coupons=$81.70~~Saved $55.29
**Safeway-Before Coupons=$141.21~~After Coupons=$94.05~~Saved 47.16

6) Pictures. --I did take before pictures (before Hubbs lost the camera) but I don't want to post them unless I have something to post as after pictures.

Update on Mixing it Up and Red Bull Friday

My freezer was delivered this morning. Yay. Its still empty since I grocery on Saturday mornings. Plus I still have to figure out what I am going to keep in the fridge freezer and what I am going to put in the chest freezer.

I left work at around 3 yesterday. I went straight home to get started on the crazy mess. First, I cleaned out the used-to-be-play room. Hubbs took apart Monk Man's bed and took it out of the room sometime yesterday morning so I had a lot of room to clean in. I started on the toys first. And oh my hell were there toys. I dumped them all out on the floor into a pile and set out boxes. 1 box for stuffed animals and 3 for the others. I filled those all up, took 2 bags of broken and Crappy Meal toys out to the trash, AND I took a bag of baby toys to my moms for Ollie.

It only took about an hour and a half to completely empty the used-to-be-play room. Well, the clothes are still in it but I will get to those this weekend.

My living room was packed with boxes of crap. Sorry, no pictures. I was going to take them but Hubbs cleaned off the computer desk and lost my camera.

Then FedEx showed up with Hubb's computer. A day early. I was in the middle of running the vacuum and the driver was lucky my dogs think they are tough otherwise I wouldn't have even noticed.

Hubbs was at Wal-mart getting storage boxes for this weekend's divide and conquer.

When he got home and saw the boxes, all hopes of getting any real work out of him were gone. And so were my hopes of getting all of this done uninterrupted.

But he did manage to help in between trying to get it set up and all the programs loaded.

After the used-to-be-playroom was empty and clean, I moved on to the used-to-be-pantry. I had to put on my MP3 player so I couldn't claim not to hear Hubbs yelling, "Honey! Come here! Where does this plug in?" and "Honey! Come here! Look at this!".

I unloaded the food into laundry baskets and in piles on the floor so Hubbs could move the book cases into the now-a-pantry. Then all the laundry baskets got pushed into the now-a-pantry and emptied. Eventually all the food and stuff was in the now-a-pantry and put back.

By then it was time to pick up the boys. It was an interesting rest of the night. Bobblehead and Monk Man wanted to help. Ugh. Don't get me wrong, I appreciated the attempt, but at 3 and 1, they didn't really help until it came time to put their crap in the empty now-a-play room.

I think I made myself quit around 10, 10:30. But it was around midnight when I finally fell asleep. I think.

Tonight, I still have to go through my artsy-fartsy-craft stuff and put it all away in the now-a-pantry. And move all the clothes from the now-a-pantry into the now-a-playroom.

So that's whats in store for this week's edition of Red Bull Friday.

Clothes. Moving them. Washing them. Putting them away. Maybe. We did rent a bunch of movies on Wednesday.......

Tomorrow, I promise

to have a better post for you.

Today, I am leaving work early so I can switch my pantry and playroom without Monk Man and Bobblehead under my feet.

Why am I switching things up?

Well, Hubbs bought me a freezer for Christmas. Yay! And it is being delivered in the morning. Double yay! He paid cash for it, btw.

The pantry has a TV already set up but the playroom doesn't. So instead of having DirecTv come out and run another cable, I am moving the rooms around. Yeah, I don't do anything the easy way. The pantry would be better accessible in the playroom anyway.

Don't laugh. It makes sense to me.

I promise to take before/after pictures. And actually post them.

Doh

I am super far behind on posting.

I have some posts in the works, plus a RBF update.

Maybe this afternoon.....

Red Bull Friday

I got a head start on my Red Bull Friday list. I got the cleaning bug last night after work. This weekend I am focusing on the Kitchen.
Yesterday:
1) The floors were nasty. I have white tile and it shows messes like you wouldn't believe. Plus I have really slacked off on cleaning the kitchen. I mopped. Then I put the mop away and pulled out my cleaning toothbrush and scrubber thing to get what the mop missed. And I scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed. I got all the junk off the tile from under the cabinets. I got all the grease from under and in front of the stove. I got the yuck from just under and in front of the fridge.
2) My fridge is supposed to be a bright white. It was brown and sticky from about halfway down. So I got out the baby wipes and scrubbed the fridge doors. It is bright white again.

This weekend's list:
1) Paint the walls. They need a fresh coat of paint. When we first painted (4 years ago) we went with cheap, low quality paint. You can totally tell. I scrub the walls and the only thing that comes off is the paint.
2) A backsplash behind the stove. I am seeing a nice copper color, easy to clean.
3) Storage. When we ripped out the old kitchen we left a good sized wall up. Right now I have a bookcase sitting against it that holds my baking stuff and spices. I want to turn the bookcase so that it sticks out into the kitchen and put another bookcase flush with the hall. It would leave a space of about a foot and a half between the 2 bookcases. I plan to put my mop and broom in the space.
4) Caulk the windows. A whole lot of cold air comes in the kitchen right now. We have newish windows (well, 4 years old) but there are teeny gaps between the window frame and the sheet rock.
5) Grocery shop. The best time for me to go grocery shopping is on Saturday morning. I can hit up Safeway and Basha's (and sometimes Wal-mart) without having to stand in line or take both the kids. I usually take one or the other but I almost can't handle both of them. So my lists are made, my coupons are pulled, I am ready to go!
6) Take before and after pictures. And post them.

New House

So Hubbs and I went to look at the house.

It was beautiful. It was huge. It was overpriced.

Hubbs misunderstood Jimmy. They are asking $165,000.

Ouch. Sorry, we can't afford that. Especially since there are things we would have to do to it.

The attic needs new insulation blown into it and the kitchen cabinets need to be replaced.

I went to see another house today at lunch that was closer to our price range.

It was a wreck. The entire house would have to be gutted. Floors, roof, walls, ceiling, plumbing, electrical, everything would have to be replaced.

It was on the market for $54,900 and would need another $50 to 75k to get it in good shape if we did most of the work ourselves. Even more $$ if we were to have the work contracted out.

Sooooo, we aren't going with that house either.

I think what I am going to have to do is get my trailer under control and be happy with what I have for the next year.

Hubbs took a voluntary lay off for the next 30 days before he goes off chasing work again Since he is going to be home with nothing better to do, I am putting him to work. There are a few things that need to be done that I can't do myself. He is going to be a busy dude for the next 30 days.

The look on his face when he gets his "honey-do" list is going to be priceless.

Red Bull Friday Update

I got more accomplished this weekend than I expected to get done.

**yay**

But it is making me feel a little manic. Oh well. It will pass I'm sure.

I will get to what I accomplished in a minute. First I have to share something. Hubbs and I are going to look at a new house tonight. I am a little scared to own a real house. I was looking forward to having the whole next year to ease myself into this whole idea.

About the house and neighborhood:
The house is 3 bedrooms, 2 bath and on a supersized lot. Its like a lot and 3/4. The house was gutted and completely remodeled. New Berber carpet, updated appliances, everything is new except the bath tub. FIL lives across the street and around the corner. It is half a block from an elementary school, 4 or so blocks to the Jr. High and 5 or 6 blocks from the High School. I am pretty sure Hubbs said that the seller is asking $100k.

Keep your fingers crossed for us that 1)I like the house and 2) we are able to get a loan or convince the owner to carry the papers for us.

Now on to all the stuff I got accomplished:
1) I got LOTS of cleaning done. The laundry even got put away.

2) I made Christmas Crack, Hot Cocoa Mix, and Sugar Cookies. Everything turned out delicious. I brought a Tupperware bowl full of Christmas Crack into the shop today and everybody said that it was awesome!

3) I went grocery shopping. Took Bobblehead with me because Monk Man wouldn't get up from his nap with Hubbs.

4) I wrapped 15 presents. That's about half of what I needed to get wrapped but there are still a few more weekends.

AND, I started a new blog. I need to get all of our shit organized, even more so that there is the slim chance we are getting a house. I need to get our finances under control and I really just want to get my shit together. So I made an all new blog for organization and control. I will post the address as soon as I have an entry up. I am kinda slacking on it already. Whoops

Bath and Body Works

Antibacterial Sale-4 for $10

Plus a free shipping code: FREESHIP60

It says on orders over $60 but I only spent $37.50 and the code worked for me.

Click on the link below to start shopping!

Bath & Body Works Veterans Day Sale

Red Bull Friday

Hooray for Fridays!

My boss is taking a mental health day so I have a ton of time to screw around on the Internet this afternoon.

Big plans for this weekend. It has started to get really cold and the temperature drop has put me in the Christmas spirit. I have a TON of stuff to do before the holidays.

So this weekend's Red Bull Friday to-do list:
1) Clean-
LoL This is always on my list of things to do.
Hubbs hinted that if we are out of debt in a year he will be ready to buy a house.
**claps** I am so excited about this.
I CAN be out of debt in a year, plus have a decent down payment saved up. I think. Well, if his job keeps going the way it has been going that is.
Soooo, I need to start going through all of our crap we have crammed everywhere and decide what I am willing to drag to the new house and what I am throwing away.

2) Bake-
We decided to go out for dinner last night so I didn't get to bake/cook anything.
Starting tonight the oven will be occupied for my "trial run".
I am a horrible cook so I need the trial run just in case. My first attempts usually turn out burnt, or with missing ingredients or just taste like ass. This way, if anything does go wrong I have time to tweak it or find a new plan.
Sorry kids, its cold cereal and fast food this weekend.
(Just kidding....or am I?)

3) Grocery-
I have decided that I don't hate shopping as much as I thought I did. I still hate clothes shopping (yeah, I know I'm not a normal chick) but grocery shopping has been so much fun lately. Its like a game to try and beat my % saved from my last receipt.

4) Christmas Gifts-
The Christmas presents are bought (for the most part) and sitting in my pantry. I just need to wrap and label them. And I need to start putting together the hand made stuff.

In the Mood Tonight

To do some holiday baking/cooking that is.

Like you couldn't tell from my last 2 posts.

I will let you know how it all turns out.

Christmas Crack

Borrowed from the Bargain Hunters.

Ingredients:
1 lb (2 sticks) butter
1/2 c white sugar
1/2 c light brown sugar
~ 1 sleeve saltine crackers
1 bag semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350

Line cookie sheet (one with sides!) with foil and spray with Pam. Lay out crackers in a single layer and set aside.

Melt butter in a saucepan over medium heat. Add in both sugars and stir to dissolve. Let this cook, stirring fairly often, until it's bubbling. Let it bubble for about 5 minutes, then pour over crackers and spread as evenly as possible.

Put in oven for about 5 minutes. Remove from oven and sprinkle on chocolate chips. I've never measured, but it's probably around the size of a bag--3 or 4 big handfuls. Let it sit a few minutes and the chocolate chips will melt. When they're soft enough, spread them evenly over the crackers.

Put the whole thing in the refrigerator to cool. After it's hardened, take it out and break it up into pieces.

Eat. It is recommended to have supervision for this step, otherwise you run the risk of eating it all yourself.

Homemade pepperment hot cocoa

Ingredients:
2 c. dry milk
3/4 c sugar
1/2 c cocoa powder
1/2 c powdered coffee creamer-peppermint flavor

Mix everything up in a bowl. Transfer to a jar and tie a festive ribbon around it.

Duke and the Door

I was at the bank today making a deposit for work and Hubbs calls my cell phone. He wants me to come by the house, right now. That's it, he didn't say anything else, just come by the house, right now. What the hell right?

So I drive home all nervous. I was expecting anything from the cops being there to someone driving through the front door. Honestly.

Well, when I got home it wasn't really all that bad. I mean, yeah, its bad but I can deal with it.

Our lab, Duke, gets really excited when he sees cats. He runs around in circles, whines and jumps against the front door. Well, our front door is a sliding glass one. Half of it moves and the other half doesn't. Duke got a little too excited this afternoon and broke the stationary part of the door.

I pulled up in the driveway, get out of the car, walk up to the gate and look around. There is glass EVERYWHERE. The door exploded. There is glass on the patio, there is glass in the yard, there is glass in the living room.

Nice. Thanks Duke.

Tonight, after I get off work, Hubbs and I get to drive for an hour to Home Depot for a new front door. Yay, tiny happy dance for getting to go visit Home Depot. Sucks ass to have to drive for 2 hours round trip.

Oh well. That is how things have been going lately.

Oh and BTW, Duke is fine. He didn't get cut or anything. It just scared the shit out of him and I don't expect him to come out from under the bed any time tonight.