Friday, October 6, 2017

Weekend plans?

Does anyone have weekend plans? We don't make plans usually. We always hang out at home, go to the park, go for walks, go to the library, or just enjoy each other's company. Last Saturday we went to a bar and grill to listen to some live music. We had a GREAT time. We each had soda, tea, and appetizers (chips and salsa). It was a lot of fun and the music was amazing.

Meals yesterday consisted of scrambled eggs for breakfast. Lunch was tomato soup (for myself and my son), my husband had tuna sandwiches, and my daughters had ramen noodles. Dinner was two from scratch cheese pizzas. I made the crust with my bread machine. There was nothing left of the two cheese pizzas I made. I had mozzarella cheese in the fridge, used a half jar of lurking spaghetti sauce, and of course, some onion powder, garlic powder, and Italian  seasoning. My kids loved the pizzas.

I made a vegetable pizza for my husband and myself. We used the same pizza crust recipe for the bread machine. I had some small colored peppers (red and yellow) that I cut up, two chopped up roma tomatoes, some fresh garlic, and sliced onion. The pizza was pretty good. It was less expensive to make verses ordering out from a pizza place. There were two pieces of veggie pizza left this morning that my husband had for breakfast.

My son had his carnation instant breakfast this morning when he woke up. He also had two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch. My daughter had a bowl of cereal. My middle daughter had some leftover pork, gravy, and mashed potatoes that were in the fridge.

My husband asked for scrambled eggs, bacon, and fried potatoes for dinner tonight. This is an easy meal to make. We have some laundry to get done. I have washed two loads so far. I was at Dollar General this morning to get some drain clogger stuff for the kids bathtub. I found a shopping cart full of xtra laundry soap 75 ounces marked 50 percent off. I asked for the price and it ended up being 1.30 a bottle. I only bought one bottle but will consider going back for the rest (there was about 12 in the cart) since we use this liquid detergent for laundry.

Have a good day!

Wednesday, October 4, 2017

Meals today

I had a bagel with cream cheese, a cup of decaf tea, and a small peach. My son had an instant carnation breakfast shake. We bought a 6 pack of them in bottles for him. He has not been eating much and he is so thin. I am concerned about his nutrition. The bottles of carnation instant breakfast have 15 grams of protein verses the dry mix that has 13. The bottles are easier for him to get and use since he has a developmental disability.

My daughters had bowls of cereal.

Lunch consisted of a ham sandwich for me, my DH didn't want anything, my girls made sandwiches, and my son refused stating that he wasn't hungry.

Dinner consisted of the rest of the pork tenderloin in the crock pot with the remains of mushroom gravy I had in the freezer, mashed potatoes, and a small salad of sorts with two roma tomatoes, sliced cucumber, and two small yellow peppers.

I am completing the modules that are required for my work. I had 29 to start with and as of right now I have only 5 more to complete. I am making a lot of progress, but it gets tiring staring at a computer screen for hours at a time.

We did a load of laundry, folded about four loads, and my son put them away. We ran the dishwasher once and are about to run the second load in a few minutes. I didn't do dishes yesterday because I thought my family may want to do them (HAHAHA).

We got the water bill. The last water bill was 145 dollars for the month. This month is was 146 dollars and some odd change. I guess that is going to be our norm here in this rental. The rent is paid for October and November. The bills are paid in full. Our freezer is full, the pantry is full, and we are blessed.

I have learned a few things about us and our pantry since moving here to Florida and having limited funds. We are not buying things that won't be used. I no longer have the mystery challenge of what to do with odd and ends that have been in the pantry for a long time. I have used almost everything in the pantry when our funds are tight and found that my family will not complain if they are hungry enough.

I spent 198 dollars at Aldi on Thursday and it felt really good. I guess having my old job give me my vacation time in the form of a direct deposit works wonders for the budget, even if the federal government took a large sum of it to the tune of a bit more than 2 thousand dollars.

October 3rd meals

My kids had cereal for breakfast. Lunch consisted of some frozen ravioli that I had in the freezer from Aldi. I simmered them and added some jarred spaghetti sauce. There was nothing left over and there were also no complaints. 

Last night's dinner was a medium size pork tenderloin that I bought a couple of weeks ago from Aldi. I cut pork chops an inch thick and baked them in the oven with some salt, pepper, onion and garlic powder. We also had fried potatoes (4 medium size potatoes with 1/4 of an onion, and one clove of garlic), left over baked beans (finally they are gone), and I sliced a few roma tomatoes, half a cucumber, and two mini yellow peppers to have as a side dish. 

I was going to use the lettuce I bought from Aldi, but I think it sat too long and went bad. I will try and not make that mistake again. 

Tuesday, October 3, 2017

What's been happening?

I finally received my PTO from my old job! I did have it in my checking account on Thursday. I was so thankful. I paid November's rent, got my car registered, paid the bills, got groceries, and we went out for dinner. I still have half of the money in my checking and this has to be transferred to my savings.

My husband asked me to buy a new box spring and mattress. Ours is terrible and very old. I will have to look at prices this week.

Dinners have been very sporatic. I did 20 hours at work last week on orientation. I was given 29 modules to complete for critical care staff. I was told to complete these at home and I would be paid 37.5 hours to complete them before October 7th.

I start in the cardiovascular intensive care unit on October 10th with a night shift position. There's a 12 percent differential for 3 to 11, 12 percent diff for weekends, and 20 percent diff for 11 to 7 pm.
I also enrolled the five of us in our health benefits.