New Counter Tops Today Yippee!!!

So we moved here 8+ yrs. ago. It was NOT the house I wanted to buy but like The Rolling Stones sang, "You can't always get what you want". I have spent the last 7 yrs. slowing fixing the kitchen up. Here's a photo of the kitchen before we cleaned it out last night.

I wish I had a photo of what it looked like when we moved in, in 2000. There was a layer of gunk & dirt on the cabinets such that you couldn't really see the grain of the oak & cheap aluminum door handles with 'patina' which turned out to be oily dirt from too much frying and not enough cleaning. The table area had a dusty BLUE ceiling fan, which matched the dusty blue duck wallborder that ran from there into the attached family room. This wallborder/fan coordinated with the dusty blue colonial dot wallpaper w/an ivory background that covered the kitchen walls. Add in ugly tan vinyl flooring and 15 yr. old white/half broken appliances and you have my kitchen in 2000.

Here's a photo of the kitchen floor AFTER hubby tried to melt a saute pan on the stove and then carry it from the stovetop to the sink. Nice molten globs of metal pattern burned into the flooring, huh?

Actually, that floor wasn't the original kitchen floor. When we took it up, we found 2 more layers of vinyl flooring under it. The original was gold & brown and SCREAMED UGLY rather than 'whispered bland'.

I have slowly been changing out everything in the kitchen except the tile backsplash.

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Kitchen TimeLine

2001

We cleaned the cabinets and oiled up the wood until it shone. Then we invested in quality cabinet handles and face plates. Changed out the ceiling fan and light fixture.

2002

The wallpaper came down and paint went up. We added crown molding after the painting.

2004

Ripped up the flooring and had Ceramic Tile put down in the kitchen and front hallway. Changed out the window coverings to valances and a rolled bamboo shade.

2004-2007

Replaced the stove, refridgerator & dishwasher as they broke with stainless &/or black. Also replaced the non-working stove vent hood with stainless steel one.

2008

Which brings us to today, the day I get new countertops, a sink & a new faucet.

Finally!

I hated the old countertops. You can kind of see in the AFTER CLEANING photo the color. They are not as 'tan' as they look but rather a pale washed out yellow. NOT attractive. And the SEAM running diagonally across the corner of the long 'l shaped' counter is hideous. It looks like the 2 sides of the seam never matched thicknesses, so it was always noticeable that there was a seam there. Plus at some point before we moved here, someone let the area get saturated with water for an extended period of time, and the pressboard under the formica coating swelled where the water seeped into the seam and made the seam area raise up all down the seam. Then they never cleaned the countertops and it turned black. So I had a nice pale yellow counter with a big black diagonal LINE.

Attractive?

Not on your life!

But before the day is out, that will all be in the past. and my modest costing kitchen redo will be complete. Well, except for the tile backsplash, which has baby blue accent tiles. I plan on painting or reglazing or whatever you call it on those light blue tiles, as they don't go with my vision.

I think I did a pretty frugal job of it, not going with stone/granite counters and floors and top of the line appliances when less expensive would serve just as well. Plus I never replaced anything until it either broke, wore out or I could find someone who wanted it. I couldn't justify just sending perfectly good working appliances or materials into a landfill.

Check back later tonight for photos of the new Counters!

Sluggy

The Return of the White Stuff

I was just thinking Saturday, "We haven't gotten much snow this winter. I wonder if we'll have a drought this summer?" We had that freakishly warm spell in February and ALL the snow melted. I have lived in northern/mountainous Pennsylvania for 22+ yrs. and have NEVER seen a winter where all the snow cover has melted before the spring thaw.....until this year. Could spring be close by??

Evidently not. The photo above was taken from my front porch. I woke up this morning to a new inch of snow on the ground and we have 3 inches currently. And it's still snowing sporadically.

It generally snows here until after Easter.....that would be the late April Easter.

This snow was NOT predicted to hit us!

Can I just go back to bed now?

sluggy

Meal Plan Monday

Here's what is on the Menu at Sluggy's house this week.

I'm trying to use up all the leftover so we have no food waste this week. The beagles will take care of the leftover sweet potatoes and a bit of roasted turkey I found in the fridge from the week before.

Monday-Chicken Parmesan(carry over from last week, as I made Fried Chicken instead), Carrots(leftover from Pot Roast last week), Corn-on-the-cob

Tuesday-Take out(The new countertops are being installed this day!)

Wednesday-Spaghetti w/Meatballs & Sausage, Spinach Salad, Garlic Bread

Thursday-Chicken & Bean Enchiladas(leftover chicken from Sunday), Spanish Rice, Green Beans

Friday-Baked Fish, Steak Fries, Asparagus, Apple Sauce

Saturday-Clam (& Fish if leftover from night before)Chowder & Grilled Cheese or Chicken Sandwiches

Sunday-Kielbasa w/Onions & Peppers, Mixed Vegetables

Desserts for the Week-Pineapple, Carrot Cake, Hickory Farms Petit Fours

Organizing Junkie is the home to Menu Plan Monday.

Go see what's on her and many other Home Cooks' Menus for the week at Organizing Junkie's website.

Sluggy

Food Budget Part II

Ok, here are my grocery spending totals for Feb. 2009. Please sit down before you read if large sums of money make you queasy.

This Monthly total includes Toiletries/HBAs/Paper Goods/Cleaning Products/Pet Food & Supplies....oh, and food too. We are a family of 5-2 parents & 3 eating machines, er....I mean teenagers(God help me).

Merchandise Value Total: $2524.90
Deduct....
Value of Coupons: $561.89
Store Sales Savings: $758.29
Rewards/Gift Cards/ECB's Used: $118.96
You get.....
Paid Out of Pocket: $1085.76

Savngs Total(Coupons/Sales/Rewards):$1439.14
Average % Saved: 56.9%

Rewards/ECB's Earned: $62.92
Rebates Sent For: $138.43
(ECB's & Gift Cards balance rolled over into next month: $20.99)

Total Cost to me (after rewards earned and rebates): $863.42

I found a Food Plan chart from the USDA that I am going to use to set a monthly food budget. The chart is located Here.
The dollar amounts of the Plans are based on food prices for Dec. 2008, which is the latest month for which the info. is available. There are 4 levels of food spending-Thrifty, Low Cost, Moderate Cost & Liberal. According to this governmental chart, my family should be spending anywhere from $784.30 a Month to eat on the cheap to $1542.40 a Month to dine on steak & caviar.....well, maybe NOT the caviar.
I am all about eating on the cheap but not so cheap that it has questionable nutritional value and/or it tastes bad. Yes, I let the kids eat their share of Pop Tarts and Kraft Mac & Cheese in the box but it's not an everyday thing and they get plenty of 'real' food most of the time. We eat well here and I'm not going to put the family on a ramen noodles and generic hot dog diet to save an extra buck or two.

But I just can't believe we spent that much on food for a month. Granted, I'd guesstimate that about $300-400 of what I spent was stocking up on things we use at incredibly LOW prices so that makes me feel a little better.

I guess I'm just shocked by the current cost of food. I read recently that food on avg. has gone up in price about 9-10% in the past year? Can that be right?!

I remember when husband & I were in college....back when dinosaurs roamed the earth as my kids say, but really it was the early 1980's/late 1970's. The two of us ate, albeit it WAS a meager menu, for $20 a week. Nowadays you can't even eat for 2 days on that! I use to wheel our little grocery handcart up the 6 short blocks to the big A&P on the main thoroughfare bordering the ghetto-esque part of the neighborhood in Baltimore. As starving students, we ate alot of Kraft Mac & Cheese with either hamburger or tuna fish mixed in, hot dogs & beans, hamburgers, pasta with sauce or for a special treat-Lasagna. You could buy a pound of mozzarella cheese for $1.99. Generic Kraft was 8 for $1., a can of tuna was 49 cents, pasta was 20 cents a box & spaghetti sauce was 89 cents a jar & a can of green beans was 29 cents. I'd love to go back to prices like that but not the quality of food it bought.

Except for the price of lobsters. I'd love to go back with my income TODAY to my 1st summer job in Maine in 1980. There was a guy selling lobsters out the back of his pick-up truck in the parking lot of the Stop & Shop. 1980 price for fresh just off the boat lobster in 1980 Maine?.....$2 lb.
To have a spare $20 and a Time Machine right about now.
I would eat myself into a lobster stupor.
Seriously.
In a heartbeat.

Back to the point.
I am going to try to stick to the "low cost" monthly food plan this year, the $1038.70 one.
That will include any stocking up I do too.
For Savings Challenge Goal Challenge purposes, I am going to put a Food Budget Limit of $250 for March however. I want to try to get through March with only buying milk, bread and fresh veggies/fruits, as I plan for us to eat down the pantry this month. I figure $150 and another $100 for any seriously low deals for stockpiling that may pop up later in the month.
Then for April, I'll go to the $1038.70 monthly budget.

So what do YOU spend for food a month at your house?
Do tell!

Sluggy

Food Budget and Low Spend on Food March

Hubby has always said I never do anything halfway. When I get 'into' something I jump in with both feet. The month of February was a blur of Couponing & Rebating for me. I am still wading through the mounds of grocery/drug store receipts but I know I waaaaay overspent stocking up on foods for the family at very good prices, in addition to my normal monthly grocery spending.

I am putting myself on a $150 grocery budget for what's left of the MONTH of March. Yes, I hit CVS AND Walgreen's on Sunday already this week, so I should have that out of my system for a few weeks now and can devote March to not spending & eating down on our stash of food.

I figure, with all the preserved, frozen, canned, boxed food I have stockpiled, we should only have to buy milk, some bread and maybe some fresh fruit & veggies sporadically to get through March. And we shouldn't need to buy any paper goods, cleaners or HBAs either this month. I am betting on $150 to cover the little we may need. Unless hubby runs through all his coffee, then all bets are off!lol

After I sit down and finish calculating the last 4 month's grocery totals in the morning, I can decide on a realistic monthly food budget for the rest of the year and post it.
Then I need to do a Menu Plan for the week, which I didn't get done on Sunday.
Sunday was one big mental block for me. Ugh

Sluggy