Happy Lobster, er....Labor Day!

Some special eats were to be had at our house today......




Of course I got them on sale for a low price. ;-)

Oh and I named my lobster "Maxine" before I took her apart and put her succulent morsels in my belly.
8-))

PS.
The neighbors grandkids did leave this afternoon so I didn't need to take a "nerve" pill......

Sluggy

This Week on The Dining Table

This Week on The Dining Table

Here's what was planned last week--
Sunday--Broccoli/Chicken Quiche
Monday--Broccoli Cheddar Soup, Fresh Baked Bread
Tuesday--BLT Sandwiches(garden tomatoes)
Wednesday--Eggplant prepared some way?, Tossed Salad
Thursday--Broccoli Casserole, Caprese Salad(garden toms)
Friday--Green Beans, Leftover Quiche
Saturday--Leftovers

We didn't get around to the Eggplant, Caprese salad or Broccoli Casserole.  We had burgers one night and ate green beans another night as well as Friday and had an Asian Salad.  We also got Chinese take-out one evening.  Items we didn't eat are getting moved to this week's menu.

  

As for food spending last week.....as reported a couple days ago in the August Food Spending report I spent $125.05 on groceries.  Most of that was for stuff to eat this week.
 

No food waste this week thank goodness.

  

Leftovers going into this week?  1 quiche which is getting cut in half and wrapped and put in the freezer for another time.  We only need half of one to feed us all for 1 meal.  The second London broil I got on the BOGO sale that we aren't cooking today is also getting cut in half and wrapped for the freezer.  Again, we'll only need half of it per meal/week.  I still have eggplant, cukes and green beans from the garden to cook this week.  The only cooked/served last week food here still is 1 loaf of the bread I made.

Here's this week's meal plan---
 

Sunday--Hot Dogs on rolls(leftover), homemade Pickles
Monday--London Broil sandwiches with mushrooms and onions, Salad
Tuesday--BLT Sandwiches(garden tomatoes)
Wednesday--Leftover London Broil & Green Bean stirfry
Thursday--Eggplant Parmesan, Caprese Salad
Friday--Tacos, Corn
Saturday--leftovers or Fend for Yourself Night

On the shopping list......We splurged on lobsters at $6.99lb. for lunch on Monday so I've spent $30.54 already this week.  Still needed for this menu is fresh mozzarella, salad greens, turkey deli meat and nothing else that I can think of at the moment.
I'm figuring about $25 more for food spending this week, not counting any good stocking up deals.

That's what's appearing on the kitchen table this week here at Chez Sluggy. 
  

 What's getting fixed and served at your house this week?

Sluggy

Labor Day Weekend Paint Deal

We hit our local True Value hardware store this past Saturday for paint.
They were having a killer sale of their private label brand paint, Buy One Get One Free, limit of 10 gallons. 
Their $23.99 a gallon paint was 2 gallons for $23.99.
And we needed paint to do the living, dining rooms and the stairway walls and ceilings.

So we got 6 gallons of wall paint and 4 gallons of ceiling paint.
Any leftover we can keep to use this winter in the upstairs hallway(and buy some more to finish that job later)when we are ready to have that space painted.

We got an even better price by having Hubs apply and get a True Value Discover card at the store.  Instant approval meant we could put this transaction on that card(and pay it off with the first billing statement so no interest), which also meant we got a bonus $25 off of a $75 purchase.....the paint came to $119.95 before tax so $94.95 with the discount.
After sales tax the $254.29 worth of paint cost us $100.65.

Nice. 8-)

Though our local True Value is closed today, this sale is still going on through today, Labor Day.

Now we just have to wait for the handyman guy to repair the walls and ceilings and get outta my way so I can paint! ;-)

Sluggy


 

The Weekend

I think I've finally gotten over my after vacation funk/blues.  So glad to be past that.  I love getting away but always crash big time when we get home.
Next time I plan to just drink more the first week home from vacation.  At least that way I won't notice I'm depressed. lol

I've gotten past it just in time for workmen to arrive tomorrow at the ass crack of dawn to start banging hammers and making noise.....along with improvements to Chez Sluggy. ;-)

We got the dining/living room cleared out today and I'll run the vacuum in there tonight so the clouds of dust don't rise up and choke the guys working in the rooms.

It's been muggy as a $20 cup of coffee here(yah, that was a pretty lame simile, wasn't it?)all weekend.
And the expensive a/c system we just had put in is still not taking any moisture out of the air nor is it conditioning/cooling the air.
Hubs put in a complaint to Sears on Friday so hopefully they'll come and fix/replace whatever is keeping the blasted machine from working.....probably just in time for the Fall weather to kick in, right? LOLZ

I've been trying to stay cool, get a few things worked on(mostly Etsy/eBay  or blog related)and pick green beans.  I'm picking every day now to stay ahead of the crop.  The problem is I have no room in the two little fridge freezers to put them so we are eating a lot of green beans lately.  I'm hoping to make some rom soon(if #2 Son will just eat that ice cream and all those frozen chicken strips!lol)to freeze some of this crop.

We are also now getting tomatoes in.....sorry no photos of those yet.   7 so far and a ton more out still on the plants.  I'll need to can some later this week if the weather cools off a bit.  We are putting tomato on everything and have had BLTs twice in the last week....which I don't mind as I need no excuse to eat bacon.  lol

Oh, I sent a little package to my Aunt, whom I just reconnected with before we went on the Road Trip.
Taking all the good advise to heart, I bought a nice frame and put my latest pic of my 3 kids they had done for me at Christmas in the frame(since she's never seen my kids).  I then took a set of 8 nice notecards I had--with assorted Flower Fairies by Cicely Mary Barker--and stamped and addressed 4 of them to me and just stamped the other 4 so she can write and send those to whomever she wishes.
The cards were sent tied with a white ribbon....

It was all packed up with a nice Happy 80th Birthday card and sent out via Priority mail.  I see it arrived 2 days later, in time for her actual birthdate(Aug. 9th)but I have yet to hear back from her about the package.

I have almost finished editing all the photos I took(including tons during the wedding ceremony)from our road trip.  Having to upload the videos to YouTube is proving to be VERY time consuming.....can you say slow as molasses uploads? 8-(

I promise I will get around to posting in excruciating detail about the Road Trip and Tanner's visit earlier in August hopefully this coming week.

Except for my colonoscopy and #2 Son's wisdom teeth removal, August was a very FUN month for me.
Yes, it was also very EXPENSIVE but what the heck!.....that's what money is for, right? 8-))

But with this heat/humidity I am SO ready for Fall weather to kick in so I can feel like being more active physically.
And I have a TON of things to get done this Fall too.

So that's what's happening around here this weekend.
What's up at your house?

Sluggy

AUGUST 2013 Budget Results......Food & Toiletries Spending

Here are my FOOD BUDGET spending totals for AUGUST 2013.

I have posted August's totals on the Total Grocery Savings for 2013 Page located HERE and have updated the Yearly Totals there.
I am listing subtotals for each store I purchased from in August.  If you aren't interested in that much detail, just skip to the bottom for the Totals Summary.

My spending includes Food, Toiletries/HBA, Pet Supplies, Cleaning Products, Paper Goods & tax where applicable. We are a family of 5(3+ at home this month)& 2 dogs. No kids under 17.
******************

BREAD OUTLET
OOP  $4.00
Value  $11.67
Savings  65.72%

BERGER'S FARM MARKET
OOP  $9.00
Value  $15.00
Savings  40%

DOLLAR GENERAL
OOP  $32.86
Qs/Ads  $7.70
Value  $40.56
Savings  19%

MAINE SOURCE(restaurant supply)

OOP  $28.57

Value  $44.81

Savings  36.24 %

OLLIE'S
OOP  $24.47
Value  $36.60
Savings  33.15%
 

SHURSAVE STORES(small local independent affiliated stores)
OOP  $27.48

Qs/Ads  $33.07

Value  $5.59

Savings  16.90%

WEIS MARKETS

OOP  $225.48

Qs/Ads  $147.36

Value  $372.84

Savings  39.52%

I am no longer adding my rebates received into my food budget directly. I will use them on food on occasion and will note that when used.  I will keep track of rebates/gift cards/certs received here as before however.

REBATE CHECKS RECEIVED IN August.....$0.00 (Last month's $35 rebate received was given to #2 Son to use for groceries while we were away.)

GIFT CARDS and CERTIFICATES....$0

TOTAL Value of Cash/Store Checks/Gift Card Rebates Received...$0.00

COUPONS and FREEBIES

Zero

*********************
My best 3 Store Savings Totals were the Bread Outlet at  65.72%, Berger's Farmstand at 40%, Weis PMITA Markets at 39.52%.  I food/toiletries shopped at 7 different stores this past month.

TOTAL Out of Pocket........$391.86

TOTAL Coupons & Store Sales Savings...$202.69

TOTAL Value of Items Purchased............$594.55

TOTAL Savings of...................................34.10%

This closes out the August food/toiletries spending.

THOUGHTS & COMMENTS for this month.....

I went into August with $300 budgeted for food/toiletries for the month and was going to shift the last $100 into the Vacation budget for extra spending money.  Well that would have worked out fine, except I spend $108.48 on the 29th, after we got home, at the grocery store.  Ugh.  I could have waited 3 days and spent that $ on the September food budget but no, I had to go and screw that all up.

So instead of taking $100 less out of savings to cover the miscellaneous spending on vacation, the whole thing comes out of savings.  I am not too concerned by this, since we have the extra money in savings to cover whatever we spent.  It would have been nice though to finish out August with $100 less in food spending. 8-(

So going back to my $400 food budget, I ended the month with $8.14 leftover.  And that includes $40 in cash given to #2 Son to use for food while we were on vacation(plus the $35 from the rebate check we received last month).
 

I did NO Rite-Aid shopping last month again.  In fact, I gave away about 3 bags of toiletries while on vacation plus another box of toiletries/HBA in July for a blog giveaway.

While spending $400 in August on food/toiletries is good, considering we ate out for 11 days of the 31, that puts our daily food spending a bit higher than I like to see.  30 days for $400 comes to about $13.33 a day, while 20 days for $400 comes to $20 a day for food.
 

Looking ahead to September---We don't have any parties or special meals going on this month except for a Family Reunion at the end of the month and we aren't bringing/making any food for that.  We will need to eat-out a few meals.  The Labor day cook-out/sort of,  I already have the food bought and paid for that.   We are going to try to stay out of restaurants/fast food/take-out meals in September and eat home cooked only.  I need to drop these 3 pounds I picked up last month by eating restaurant food on vacation.  Meals this month will be back to reduced sodium and fresh seasonal veggies and cheap.

 

And here is the run down of my Food & Toiletries Spending for 2013 so far this year--
 

2013 Total Saved $2,032.80

2013 Yearly Total Value of Items  $4,990.08

2013 Yearly Total Spent $2,957.28

2013 Yearly Savings Total of  40.74%

 

In August, total savings percentage for the year has gone DOWN .89% over July's total of 41.63% to 40.74%.  So we saw a slight decrease in our savings rate on food/toiletries spending for the year.
We are holding steady in the 40%s.
Works for me! 8-)

 

How much did you spend on food in August?
 

Sluggy