Today I Am . . .

by Katy on January 20, 2016 · 41 comments

one-hour bread

  • Cooking up some meals to have in the refrigerator and freezer. I’ve lazy about this lately, so it’ll be nice to have a few made-ahead dishes. What am I making? Kale pesto, marinara sauce, baked beans with ham, potato-ham soup and ginger snaps.
  • Running errands to the credit union and the grocery store.
  • Hoping to get some writing done before my son comes home from school and commandeers my laptop for his finals.
  • Pleased with the one-hour bread that I made last night to accompany our leftover squash soup.
  • Happy that someone from my buy nothing group quickly offered up a hair dryer, almost within minutes of me asking for one. (My older son took the family one back to school with him.)
  • Being the bad cop, and telling my son that there isn’t time for him to both study for finals and go to indoor soccer/futsal tonight.
  • Laughing at my older son, who messaged me a photo of some stuff that he’d taped onto his dorm room wall, writing “I’m making a collage out of trash. On my wall. You love my trash wall, it’s frugal.” Good thing he’s not studying interior design!

Now your turn. What are you doing today?

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

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{ 41 comments… read them below or add one }

Kate January 20, 2016 at 1:06 pm

Today I
– met with the professor of the class I started last night(it’s been 21 years since I finished college and I. Am. Freaking. Out!) during his office hours – at Starbucks and I didn’t buy anything. I thought about it before I went, but I don’t drink coffee, have only had horrible tea there, and don’t need any more sweets.
– am mindlessly following the meal plan I made on Sunday. It says “skillet meatloaves and potatoes or rice” for today, and since bags of potatoes were buy one get one free, potatoes it is!
– am trying not to get too excited about our local library book sale preview night for members tonight. Maybe I should go take some of the cash out of my wallet… 😉

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Amanda January 20, 2016 at 1:08 pm

I sold some never used scrapbooking supplies and bought my eldest a used snowboard (with boots!). They went up to Mt. Hood Meadows a couple weeks ago for the “World’s largest ski lesson” and now they’ve got the skiing bug. I couldn’t find skis (still looking) but I found this nearly new $500+ snowboard for $50 and talked her into trying out boarding instead of skis. My Hubby just gave her lessons going down one of our hills and she did great. Saved $37 for a lift ticket, $35 for rental, and the gas $$ to get there! As an extra bonus, I now have a shelf cleared off for craft stuff that will actually generate more money for us! (I make goat milk soaps and sell it at farmers markets).

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Rachel H January 20, 2016 at 1:16 pm

Today I have washed and dried a load of towels, made some cards for my monthly exchange club. Got those addressed and ready to go. Ran to Winn Dixie for bananas, tangerines and stamps. I’ve just been going through the New weeks sale paper. I will be stocking up on chicken, .85 lb, Apple’s, $1 lb., butter, $2.50 lb., tuna, .50 a can, wheat bread, $1, tea bags, but one get one free. We are trying to spend only $60 a week on groceries. The bag of tangerines took the last $5 from the food envelope. So took the money from miscellaneous for bananas. I’ve never done the cook in large batches thing. I go day to day. For entertainment we have been doing jigsaw puzzles at night. Dollar Tree has some with 500 or 1,000 pieces. I will probably pick up a couple of them tomorrow.

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Marcia January 21, 2016 at 4:36 pm

Online jigsaw puzzles are fun. Try Jigzone.com for a daily one. There are other sites as well.

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Krystal January 20, 2016 at 1:16 pm

Today I am…
-Putting in a full day work. Finally feeling myself after a nasty, week+ long cold
-Watching soccer while I work (my team is winning!) The joys of a home office!
-Giving serious consideration to adopting 2 cats rather than 1. We get to meet a nice 7 year old pair on Friday who recently lost their wonderful owner in a car accident a few weeks ago. Hoping they are a good fit for us.
-Drinking tea, and using the leaves twice!
-Grocery shopping, with a list and meal plan so I don’t go over budget or get too impulsive.
-Cuddling with my dog, keeping on top of a clean kitchen, and practicing my tax prep skills for a volunteer position at our local food bank.

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Ruby January 20, 2016 at 1:29 pm

Two cats are great together, especially if they’ve already bonded like the ones you’re looking at. And they’re not much more trouble to take care of than one. Now, when you get to three cats, like us, that becomes a different story!

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Krystal January 20, 2016 at 3:20 pm

Thanks Ruby (and LisaC!) It’s great to hear this feedback. We didn’t have luck with 2 dogs, but everyone we spoke with that has had 2 cats has enjoyed it and mentioned the same things you both have. I’ll be sure to report back once we have a chance to meet them.

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LisaC January 20, 2016 at 2:51 pm

We have adopted brother cats twice now. They love each other and don’t destroy things out of lonliness. Plus it’s fun to watch their interactions

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tonya parham January 20, 2016 at 6:49 pm

I hope you do take the two cats– at seven, most folks won’t want to adopt them and they would be so stressed to lose both their human and each other. My heart is breaking just thinking of it!

I have seven cats. Not frugal, but, you know….that’s okay.

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Bettypants January 21, 2016 at 5:09 am

So happy to read you are considering adopting a 7 year old pair of cats. I think so highly of people who intentionally choose the older cats and dogs.

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Dianne January 21, 2016 at 6:52 am

I hope the pair works out for you. It would be wonderful to keep them together. We adopted a 14-year-old brother and sister (both black cats to boot) at the humane society and were so glad that we did (owners left them because they were moving). I have always thought that two weren’t much more trouble than one.

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K D January 20, 2016 at 1:29 pm

Today I

– ate oatmeal for breakfast, beefed up with raisins, cinnamon, ground flax seeds, and chia seeds.

– Ran to the grocery store. There is a blizzard watch for Friday – Sunday so I wanted to get my weekly trip in before the masses. There were already a lot of people there at 8:30 am but I persevered. They were out of a few items I wanted to buy but I got great deals on almond milk and yogurt and scored a free muffin and a bag of baby cut carrots.

– I talked to a friend that invited me over for lunch on Friday. She is making a pot of ham and bean soup. I’ll make a bread product.

– I checked our gas can and found we should buy gas for the snow blower. I’ll do that I fill the tank on my car early tomorrow.

– I bundled up and went for a walk. I believe fresh air and exercise are good for my mind and body.

– I attended a yoga class.

– I spent three hours volunteering at a school.

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JD January 20, 2016 at 1:30 pm

Today I am:
At work, drinking iced tea made at home using loose leaf tea in a muslin bag (okay, I bought the bag new, but I had no fabric suitable to make one, and it was less than a dollar to purchase. I’ve used it for almost 2 years now.)
Resisting the siren song of Girl Scout cookies. Yet another year of successfully avoiding Thin Mints!
Wearing a $1 shirt my sister gave me after she found it at the Hospice Thrift Store. It’s in one of my favorite colors, light aqua.
Getting ready to “small group” with friends. It’s a session with a real purpose– spiritual accountability– but we enjoy each other immensely to boot.
Wearing the lipstick I made for myself. I put cocoa butter in it this time, and it is lasting so long. I really like the color, too — I’m an amateur, so I never know just what color I’ll get with a pinch of this and that.
Hoping to see the “trash on the wall” picture.

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Brenda January 20, 2016 at 4:19 pm

Did you know you can make thin mints? I recently learned how. I melt 1 cup chocolate chips, add 1/4t peppermint extract, and dip Ritz crackers in it, coating well. Let harden on wax paper. Simple, makes about 12-15, just enough to pack for lunches and not go crazy eating a whole sleeve!! And so much cheaper!

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JD January 21, 2016 at 6:03 am

Oh no! Now I will have to try that — and EAT THEM. ALL.

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Ruby January 20, 2016 at 1:38 pm

We are having sleet and freezing rain here in my corner of Tennessee. All the out of the house errands and chores were done yesterday, since we knew this weather was coming.

Today I am:
_Making two loaves of homemade oatmeal-honey bread, which required scraping every last bit out of two opened jars of honey.
_Finishing up some laundry. The load of cleaning rags and dish towels dried fast on the drying rack. The rest of the stuff was heavier and I used the dryer.
_Went through the bottom drawer in my dresser (the junk drawer) and found some clips to use to pull my hair back as it grows out.
_Trying to make it through January on a ridiculously tight budget that had $833 in vet bills taken out of it. Thank goodness the pantry and freezer were well-stocked in December.
_Bundled up in my wonderful thick cardigan bought at the Salvation Army. We’re keeping the heat low because of the ridiculously tight budget, and this sweater is amazingly warm.

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Juhli January 20, 2016 at 1:55 pm

Today I:
– took the dog to the vet for the monthly shot that keeps her alive since she has Addison’s disease; walked same dog
– bought groceries, stuck to my list and used coupons/senior discount day to save
– made a point of buying winter veggies for salads – red cabbage, yellow beets, radishes
– altered an old sweater and started altering a thrifted sweater and jeans
– came up with another cozy outfit for one of our few winter days
– paid bills as they arrived
– handled Friends of the Library business via email
– decided to serve leftover chicken veggie soup, cornbread from the freezer and a huge salad for dinner

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Alexia January 20, 2016 at 1:57 pm

Is a high dryer supposed to be a hair dryer? Or is that just something I’ve never heard of?

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Katy January 20, 2016 at 2:02 pm

Must have been an autocorrect. I’ll go fix it. 🙂

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Alexia January 20, 2016 at 3:36 pm

Gotta love autocorrect. Someday I want to send a text message where I don’t correct any of the autocorrects just to see what it ends up saying. 🙂

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Anne January 20, 2016 at 5:01 pm

I was wondering about a “high dryer”, too. I honestly thought it was some sort of tall rack on which to hang your wet clothes.

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Ella January 20, 2016 at 2:48 pm

Today I am:
-Disputing a bill from Kaiser, who double-billed me for my insurance plan (working with Covered California has not been very easy…)
-Texting someone who posted a free washing machine on a local message board to maybe replace mine. I replaced a 25 year old Maytag my mother gave me when it started leaking and I couldn’t fix it with a new GE. The GE has been absolutely horrible, and I hoping the free machine will be better. Wish I had paid to repair the old Maytag!
-Hosting a movie night for friends!
-Cleaning my house with home-made cleaners
-Cleaning up some estate sale finds for my etsy shop

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marie January 20, 2016 at 4:03 pm

Today I found that the little light bulb over the stove that is always dying after a couple months is easily replaced with one of the twisty type bulbs {sorry, can’t keep track of all the new lightbulbs} We are slowly replacing with led’s, and i’ve saved all the twisty one’s. Now they will have a purpose!!
I made a stewed pork and white bean soup\stew. I’m still on my 0 grocery budget for a month, and this is a recipe that i’ve wanted to try, and had all ingredients. Recipe called for 1 can of white beans, and I cooked up dried white beans.
My new dog keeps losing her dog tags, third one now, but today takes the cake, she’s lost even her collar. We live on property, and she like to visit thru the wire fence with the neighbors dog. I walked the fence line, but no luck, it’ll turn up someday.
Spent the morning weeding thru the file cabinet, and got rid of a ton of paper.
Still posting things for sale, after 2 months finally sold an clay bean pot.Hooray!

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Kim from Philadelphia January 20, 2016 at 4:06 pm

In my house the men spend more time on their hair than I do…

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Jennifer January 20, 2016 at 4:27 pm

-I defrosted some BBQ pulled pork from the freezer and realized I only had 3 buns for my family of 4. I made myself a nice little stir fry out of reduced portabellas, a shriveled bell pepper, onions, and soy sauce and served my family the BBQ sandwiches. I really didn’t want anything on a bun anyway so it worked out. Kids had Greek yogurt cups I got free from Kroger for dessert.
-I have a headache so am hoping I’m not getting the cold my daughter has. Trying to get extra vitamin C to ward anything off. Healthy is frugal.
-Cut my daughter’s hair myself. I keep the kids hairstyles very simple with no bangs so I don’t have much to maintain. I do think it’s slightly longer on one side so I need to work on that tonite.
– Plan to exercise, in my home ,for free, before bed.

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Bee January 20, 2016 at 6:01 pm

I would like to say that I was productive today, but alas I cannot. I was busy all day and accomplished little. Tomorrow is another day!

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Isabelle January 20, 2016 at 6:04 pm

Today I…
* Worked my usual 3.75 hours shift
* Used my pre-paid pass to go see an Imax movie
* Ate leftovers at home
* Went to a spinning class using my pre-paid gym membership (yes, I like to pre-pay for things!)
* Did my budget
* Prepared daughter’s lunch for tommorow will ingredients bought on sale (ham/cheese sandwich, cherry tomatoes, grapes, home-made muffins)
* Watched an episode of a show on Netflix with hubby
* Emailed a good friend

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tonya parham January 20, 2016 at 6:56 pm

Today,

I had oatmeal with walnuts and cranberries.

I used a swagbucks gift card to buy my coffee while I wrote (I’ve found I can’t write at home and $2 a day for coffee costs less than an office rental!)

Made beans in the crockpot.

Spent $1 for 2 corndogs at Sonic because…well, corndogs! I didn’t get fries or a drink. Just 2 corndogs.

I stopped by Kroger and got 14 limes for $2 and 10 oranges for $2. While there, I filled up my gas tank!

Called my mother for her birthday!

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Teri January 20, 2016 at 8:33 pm

Today I:
-worked a full day but it was early release so I finished an hour early. Took my lunch, read the ads during prep hour and finalized grocery list cutting out ads to price match at Walmart.
-got my yearly mammogram
-stopped by a gourmet food store and enjoyed their samples but couldn’t find anything I couldn’t live without.
-went to an Outreach program where we find and help the young single adults in our church.
-watching a show from the BBC before going to bed.

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Kim January 20, 2016 at 9:39 pm

~Teaching grocery shopping life skills to my 21 year old. I needed a few things at Aldi which is in the opposite direction of my work. He doesn’t start back to college until tomorrow so he offered to go. I made a list of 8 things with 2 being dependent on either price or if they still had any in stock. I encouraged him to go early before the stores got busy due to our upcoming blizzard watch. By the time he got there at 4 PM they were out of 1% milk. He didn’t get the mushrooms since they were over the target price. When I got home everything as put away and he had gone to work.
~Walked from my office to the locally owned grocery store to pick up the milk and some of their wonderful chicken salad. Place was mobbed. Chicken salad was on special and today I save 5% since I’m over 55. Bought DS a bag of Old Bay Cheese Curls as a treat that were on sale for $2. They are really good and I don’t even like cheese curls!
~Getting ready with storm prep. Bread in the bread maker, roasted sweet potatoes with pumpkin pie spice, making brown rice. Tomorrow after work I’ll make pasta sauce, pasta, cookies and French toast. We often lose power in Nor’easters so I like to have food I can heat up on my wood stove.
~Listed a snow block maker on FB yard sale group. Sold in 10 minutes and she will pick up tomorrow. Clutter gone and $3 in the college fund!

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Beth January 21, 2016 at 8:48 am

Yesterday I:

1. Worked a full day
2. Made a small amount of spaghetti noodles to use up some leftover sauce for dinner
3. Did not spend any money
4. Drank a healthy amount of water (and also more than a healthy amount of coffee!)
5. Started planning a grocery list/menu for next week…I have to shop on Friday this week because I have plans for Saturday.
6. Made and drank a green smoothie, and had additional veggies with lunch-trying so hard to get all my fruit/veggie servings in each day.

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Lissa January 21, 2016 at 10:34 am

Today I am:
1) Working
2) Knitting on my hubby’s Christmas present – a cabled scarf. (Yes I am late.)
3) Making my own yogurt for the first time. (Hubby found milk on sale!)
4) Stash diving to knit a present for my DD friend and a present for my nephew.
5) Hubby used a gift card we found while cleaning the office to go grocery shopping.

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Bettypants January 21, 2016 at 11:14 am

Today I am trying to talk myself out of buying the four flamingo pink vintage Pyrex baking dishes someone posted on a local FB for $20. I think the price is more than fair, but she lives a bit far from me. I don’t need them. I don’t need them. Man I love that pink. I don’t need them.

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LisaC January 21, 2016 at 1:05 pm

You have more willpower than me. I would buy them and sell some of them piece by piece on EBay, keeping one or two.

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Bettypants January 22, 2016 at 5:38 am

They don’t sell that well on ebay. Shipping kind of kills it.

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Mary G January 21, 2016 at 1:24 pm

Today I am
* Planning to start a new scarf using some lovely wool yarn I found in our art supply closet
* Making a simple pasta dinner that I’ll serve with salad and orange slices
* Trying out a new set of strengthening exercises (and hope I won’t feel sore tomorrow)
* Running the wood stove in our family room while I work from home to help keep us warm and save money

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janine January 21, 2016 at 2:57 pm

-Today and yesterday –
*Grocery store had bread on sale for .25 – bought six loaves and shared three with son to store in his freezer – he often makes his own lunch so these will come in handy. Also found some sale priced cold cuts for him.
*Had lunch with some college friends – most of us stuck to water and ordered small salads and soup – still fairly pricey but within reason.
*Cooking dinner at home tonight .
* Making myself check all store receipts and record them in my budget book – great reminder of how I don’t always ‘toe the budget line’.
*Finalized guests for the cable television show I produce. (volunteer job) – one of them will discuss women’s economic security – the topic of an upcoming March conference as well as legislative proposals this year.
* Am delighted that “monster storm” is not predicted for our area at present.

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Marcia January 21, 2016 at 4:57 pm

Today I got up late, (I’m retired so it doesn’t matter) and while poking around the bedroom, decided to roll the rest of the change. Husband had left it overflowing as usual. I rolled it and since I was heading to the credit union anyhow, deposited $26 to the checking account. Also withdrew cash to send some to granddaughter, and to have on hand for our vacation, which we start next week.
Mailed two letters that missed our mailman this morning.
Went to the grocery store, deposited the money in granddaughter’s account, and bought some groceries. A few things we needed and a couple things to take in the car with us for vacation, and that was it. Saw two of my grand-nieces in the grocery store–one works there and the other one was shopping. She has 11 year old twin boys, so I bet she shops a lot. Also a younger girl!
Once home, I put groceries away, made meatballs and spaghetti for dinner with garlic toast, and some applesauce I made yesterday. Filled and started dishwasher. Tried to order Valentine’s gifts but didn’t have all the addresses I need. Wrote a couple messages on computer, and read some on it as well. FOUND a week’s worth of coupons that have been missing for about 3 weeks—I put them in the wrong envelope. I use blank envelope backs for lists and slipped them into the wrong one!! I knew they would turn up eventually.

I think I will be watching TV for the rest of the evening. I do have a couple checks to write if my husband’s TV show bore me. (I already checked-nothing special I want to see tonight.)

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priskill January 22, 2016 at 7:04 am

They DO sound awesome! 😉

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priskill January 22, 2016 at 7:05 am

oops the awesome comment was for Bettypants’s flamingos — although kudos to all posting here!

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Jane January 23, 2016 at 3:45 pm

Today we are going to the market to buy around 20kg tomatoes to make more pasta. We have also diced and frozen some of the mango bought in bulk. Bit by bit we will finish this job today. Also made a lemon polenta cake. Its in the oven. Loving my Sunday so far.

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