This Week on the Dining Table

The "New Car Edition".....

Thankfully we have the cash to pay for this in full, no financing and no eating of rice and beans for the next 5 years to afford it.

We still have leftovers.  This week will be all about using them up.
Hopefully this will translate into a small grocery bill for this week ending March.

 

Here's what was planned last week.......

 1.  Lasagna, leftover Collards
2.  Salmon, Broccoli

3.  Irish Stew

4.  Rueben Sandwiches
5.  Roasted Turkey Breast, Stuffing, Cauliflower, Cranberry Glop leftovers

6.  Kielbasa on Rolls, cabbage leftovers
7.  Leftovers of some kind 

 

And this is what actually happened--

1.  Lasagna, leftover Collards
2.  Salmon, Broccoli

3.  Irish Stew

4.  Rueben Sandwiches
5.  Leftovers

6.  Leftovers
7.  Leftovers

Everything went as planned except no turkey leftovers eaten nor Kielbasa on rolls and leftover cabbage.  We ate an extra night of other leftovers instead.

Last week I made 5  trips to the grocery store(and have a carry over from the previous week I forgot to put down then), so I spent $126.51 OOP on $222.98 worth of reg. retail groceries.
I also earned a $7 gift card for some of those purchases so $7 in future food paid for already.

I had 3 transactions at Rite-Aid last week and spend $1.25 OOP on $127.79 worth of toiletries.

For the week, $127.76 total spending on $350.77 worth of food/toiletries/HBA.

$242.70 spent of my $300 March food budget, leaving us $57.30 for the next 7 days of the month. ($64.30 if you count that $7 gift card.)

Leftovers going into this week are collards, corned beef and cabbage, turkey and stuffing, lasagna and Irish stew.  Yep, we still have a LOT of leftovers.

Here is the plan for this week.........

1.  Turkey, stuffing, corn, cranberry glop leftovers
2.  Lasagna, salad or collards leftovers

3.  Irish Stew leftovers

4.  Rueben Sandwiches using corned beef leftovers
5.  Sloppy Joe sandwiches, cole slaw

6.  Kielbasa on Rolls, cabbage leftovers
7.  Salmon, leftover assorted veggies, cole slaw

3 nights of new meals, 4 nights eating up the leftovers.

 

What I need to buy for this menu......nothing.  We stopped at the Bread Outlet as we were down in the city buying the car on Saturday and I got some on special Salmon filets also while out on Saturday.

Then I bought some Zero Powerades for $1 each and got a $7 Catalina at Weis before that deal ended.
Actually the Catalina did NOT print so they gave me a $7 gift card which won't expire so it's even better. 8-)

I may pick up some salad greens, tomatoes, milk and honey this week as we are out/those are on special this week.
 

What is getting fixed and served at your house this week?    

Was last week's plan successful, did you go off plan or did you not even plan what was going to be eaten that week?

Any great deals on food at your stores this week?

Sluggy

Well That Was Quick!

Hubs started talking about getting a new-to-us car about a month ago.  He's been driving what use to be the kids/third car after we got rid of his car but it's been having issues like recalls and check engine lights going on and off randomly.

So we went out yesterday and we came home with this..............

a 2014 Chevy Malibu

We got it from Enterprise Rentals and the price was right.
So the bulk of Hubs bonus has now been spent.

I wasn't expecting him to act on this so soon since we don't need a third car for College Boy until May but Enterprise was running a special on Malibus until the end of March so he jumped on this.

It was so much fun to see the sales persons eyes get real wide when they pulled out financing forms and before they could start pestering us with questions, we asked if they wanted us to put the whole thing on our credit card(which we pay off each month)or write them a check for the entire price. lolz
I guess they don't get many people coming in and paying cash in full for cars.  ;-)
We put it on the card by the way, just to get the points.

Hopefully we have enough in bonus monies left to get our bathroom fixed up, buy a small freezer and seal the new driveway in the Fall.

I am dreading the bump up in car insurance we will be paying though.  It was nice to only have 2 cars on it for the little while it lasted. 8-(

Sluggy


 

Random Stuff

Lots of small items to cover today---

*  We got word this past weekend that Hubs sister, who just got remarried Aug. 2013(and we traveled to the Midwest to attend the wedding ceremony), is getting divorced.
Things just didn't work out due to her husband's issues so instead of just riding it out until he drinks himself to death and being miserable, she's bailing.
I don't blame her at all not that I would have married the guy in the first place, but that's just me.
8-(

*  College Boy has the promise of a Summer job in a town nearby here.  And hopefully it's more hours than the bakery he worked at in high school use to give him.  He also has a possible second Summer job if the first one doesn't keep him working enough hours per week.
Being broke his first year of college has spurred him into going back for his sophomore year with the cash he saves from this Summer employment.  Hopefully he feels confident enough in his course work next semester that he can try to get a part time job while attending school.  That would help a lot to keep him from draining his college fund at the alarming clip that it is now being depleted.

*  Now seeing as College Boy will have employment this Summer this also means that he needs transportation.  We are down to 2 cars here--my purple bop around town vehicle and the old used Malibu(which was the 3rd kids' car)he took over when we donated his Elentra last Fall. 
So Hubs has decided to get a new, used car within the next month.  He may even buy it this weekend.
He found a good deal at Enterprise(the car rental people-they also sell cars)on another Malibu.
We'll be using part of his yearly Bonus which we received in February to pay for this.
Not only does this mean forking over $$$ for a new-to-us cars but having a third vehicle will mean our car insurance will again go up.  *sigh*  Well that reduction in insurance was nice for the 7 months it lasted......

*  Speaking of bonuses--Hubs and I need to sit down and talk about how the rest of the Bonus money will be spent this year. 

*  We need to pay for a bathroom redo this year so most, if not all, will go toward that.  It's a redo but we aren't going high end.  Just replacing worn out fixtures/cabinet/floor/toilet and taking out the moldy tile(yuck!)and fixing the wall behind where the tile is and installing a new tub.
Pretty much everything is being changed because we can't even THINK about selling this house until this work is done.

*  I would also like to get a freezer as I never replaced the one that died 3 weeks after buying it.  We've been limping along using the small compartments on two fridges-the one in the house and the older one in the garage.  I am figuring on getting a small chest type since we don't need/use as much food as when all the kids were home.  A small freezer will be adequate and will fit just fine where the older fridge resides in the garage.

*  I just saw that cable channel TLC is bringing back another episode of "Who Do You Think You Are?" this Sunday.  And we no longer have cable.
Bleh.
I suppose eventually they'll put the episodes online or on YouTube and I can catch them there.
So don't anyone give away the endings to me, ok? lolz

*  We are set to travel to Louisiana in mid May.  The Daughter has gotten time off from work so we are trying to plan some activities and such.  There is the Bonnie & Clyde Festival(weird)and a War of Northern Aggression Battlefield/Museum(boring) and a new brewery to visit(hic).  I just hope the weather down there in May isn't too humid.
I am still trying to set up motel reservations that don't cost an arm and a leg.  I don't want to stay where we were last trip there(too far)but I don't want to spend a fortune.  I found a reasonably priced motel but the reviews mentioned roaches and crack 'hos in the lobby........ick.

*  I go to the eye surgeon on Monday for my cataract surgery consult.  Still have forms to fill out before then and decisions to make about what type of lens to get.....the regular or the corrective lens.
I am sure insurance won't cover the corrective lens as much so that decision may be already made due to cost differences.  I still don't know when they will cut my eyeball open but it had better be well before the middle of May.

*  Easter is sneaking up on us soon.  College Boy won't be here for it this year, so I've got to decide if we just have a small meal Hubs and I or invite the brother in-law and nephew over.  We'll probably just hide out from family this year and relax. ;-)

*  Speaking of genealogy......I've already heard back from the Huguenot Society folks.  On the positive side of thing, there is someone who was confirmed into the Society using my Huguenot ancestor already and our lines are in common down to my 2x GGs, which means if she agrees to let me use the information in her application, I only have to prove 4 generations back from myself instead of 8.  It will be much easier to obtain documents going back to the 1800's rather than the 1600's, but while easily to get, it will cost me for official state vital statistical forms.
On the negative side here, the cost to apply is $20.  Then there is the annual dues to the National Society($25 or if over age 50 you can pay a one-time lifetime membership fee of $500) and then there are the yearly State fees for your chapter($10 or included in the lifetime membership fee).
So I'll be out $55 to start and then $35 each year.....or $520 in fees now and forever more, no more fees for my lifetime.   If I pay for the lifetime I'll have to live another 13 years to break even and after I am 69 it's all gravy.  ;-)
I also need up to 8 different vital statistical forms at $12 a pop to apply, so another $96 + postage.

*  I bought that Steve Jobs biography that came out a year or so ago at Ollie's(Good Stuff Cheap!) It was less than $3 with my discount card.  I'm about 2/3rds of the way through it and I can safely say the man was a narcissistic jerk!  I am glad I never worshiped at the Apple altar......

*  In other news, my oldest son is going to an educational job fair in Pittsburgh this weekend.  His GF is finishing up her degree in nuclear medical imaging and by August they will be ready to relocate so he has begun the search for a "real" job in his field.  He has a teaching degree in History and wants to land a job in a high school setting.  Please keep him in your thoughts this weekend that he gets some interest from the school districts in a state he has targeted and that his GF can land a job in her field in the same city/area.

*  Oh, and Happy Spring!
I went out for an Rx first thing this morning.
Now look at my backyard......

Mind you yesterday this ground was bare, save a few areas of leftover snow.

@#%$&%!@$@

Spring my ass........

Sluggy


 

Started the Ball Rolling

Well I went and did it.
I sent an inquiry about joining one of those "Genealogical Societies".

You know what I mean.......
The DAR-Daughters of the American Revolution
The SAR-Sons of the American Revolution
The UDOTC-United Daughters of the Confederacy
The SCV-Sons of Confederate Veterans
The JS-Jamestowne Society
The PS-Pilgrim Society(both UK and USA)
The SDWAVF-Society of Descendants of Washington's Army at Valley Forge
......et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

The list goes on and on.

I am not a big fan of these organizations or any big organization.  It's full a people who seem full of themselves, right?

They go to meetings, hold offices, throw parties and/or conferences and try to out snob each other as to their ancestry.
And they charge BIG $$$ to join and be members and I suppose(though I don't know for sure)they solicit you to donate $$$ to them and their causes.

And just to document your line to join said societies can cost you a lot of $$$$$ gathering legal/genealogical documents which said societies will deem acceptable.

And an aside, these types of genealogical groups started out as a way to separate the people who were here before the American Revolution from the large wave of later immigrants to American in the mid to late 1800's.
Yes, "we" are more American than you because our forebearers were before yours so "neener, neener, neener"! ;-)

But anyway, I went and started the process to join one such society......

Not the National Huguenot Society but the HUGUENOT SOCIETY  FMVC.
This is a much MORE "exclusive" club society. 8-)

The HS-FMVC is the "Huguenot Society of the Founding Members of the Virginia Colony".

Background--Way back in 1400's France there was a small faction of French who were members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France and followers of John Calvin's teachings, rather than the Catholic Church.

Long story short, the crowned heads of France persecuted those Protestant French(called Huguenots)and either killed them or drove them from France into other European countries like Holland, Belgium, Germany and England which granted them refuge.

With the opening up of exploration to the New World with the founding of Jamestowne in 1607,  many of these Huguenots hoped they would be free to practice their faith peacefully across the sea in this new land.

In the 1630's a few intrepid Huguenot souls made the journey to the Virginia Colony on their own in small groups.  Two of my ancestors, my 11th Great Grandparents, Gyles Taverner, a Huguenot, and his wife, Elizabeth Payne, made the trip around 1635 and they eventually settled in York Co., Virginia where their three sons were born.  Gyles is said to have gone to England and returned at least once with Nicholas Martiau(who claimed Gyles as one of his headrights on that trip).  Nicholas Martiau had come to Jamestowne in 1620 for the first time and was to become the 3x great grandfather of George Washington(Nicholas Martiau, Elizabeth Martiau, Mildred Reade, Mildred Warner, Augustine Washington, George Washington).

Then there is another Huguenot ancestor, John VASSAR(9x GG), who came on his own to the Virginia Colony in July 1635 on a barque "The Alice" with his wife, Elizabeth Dowe/Dewe and their infant daughter, Ann, and an indentured servant, William Baker.

Anyway, Gyles and John, though my earliest Huguenot ancestors to settle in the New World, weren't founders of Manakintown, the first Huguenot settlement in the Virginia Colony.

That honor would fall to Abraham SOBLETor SUBLETT(8 x GG)and his wife, Suzanne BRIANT and their son,  Pierre Louis SOBLET/Peter Lewis SUBLETT(7 x GG).

In 1700 5 ships were contracted to transport between 700-800 French Huguenot refugees from their embarking point at Gravesend, London, England to the new Virginia Colony.

In April of 1700 the first of these ships, "The Mary & Ann" with over 200 French and Swiss passengers headed for Virginia, among them Abraham SOBLET and 2 of his older children. 

The Governor of VA and the wealthy planters already there by then were eager for new settlers.  Dr. Daniel Coxe, a favorite at the court of King William III(of William & Mary fame), held massive tracts of land in the new Colony, and the Crown agreed that these immigrants could settle on his Norfolk County lands(encompassing present day Norfolk/Virginia Beach Counties of VA).  The English Crown, having religious/political upheavals of it's own in England, was anxious to help these Huguenots leave England and monies were raised for the transport and supplies.

Upon landing at the mouth of the James River the ship was met by Virginia Colony Lt. Gov. Francis Nicholson.  Other wealthy planters in the Colony had other plans for these Huguenots.  They redirected that the immigrants should settle on William Byrd's vacant lands instead.  This 25 mile tract was the site of an abandoned Monacan Indian village and was a sort of no man's land that stood between the confederated Algonquin native tribes in the area and the English settlement at Jamestowne.  These wealthy planters wanted somebody between them and the Indians to bear the brunt of an attacks and raids by said natives.

In Oct 1700, the second of five ships arrived in Virginia, "The Peter & Anthony".  On board were Abraham's wife, Suzanne BRIANT SOBLET, and their three remaining children.

So even though the land around the abandoned Monacan village was fertile it was cut off from Jamestowne and any services they needed.  Plus many of these Huguenot immigrants were tradesmen and not farmers.  Between a hard winter in inadequate housing, having to learn to work the land and a lack of supplies and sickness(malaria in the Summer and other deadly diseases in the Winter) these hardy souls set to building a town, named Manakintown, built and founded a church(King William Parish) and a community.

After many hardships over the first few years in Manakintown, most of these settlers moved out into adjacent lands and new towns sprung up around the area.
Manakintown, though no longer a town, is located in what is present day Powhatan County, Virginia.

My Sublett ancestors on two different family lines moved, over successive generations, west and slightly south of the Manakintown area until my mother's parents moved back East from Charlotte/Campbell Counties area, to South Norfolk, VA in the late 1930's.

So to bring this to an end(thanks for reading it all!), I've started the process to join the Huguenot Society FMVC and we'll see how/where this goes.

Sluggy




 

Grocery Shopping

Well I bought a few extra things at Weis today while grocery shopping because the discount stickers were out in force! lolz

The only things I needed were the rye bread(NOT on sale!)and sour cream(on sale).

1 x box of salad greens $2.99 50% off=$1.49
2 x bags stir-fry veggies $2.99 50% off=$2.98
1 x bag coleslaw mix $2.49 50% off=$1.24
1 loaf sourdough bread $3.39 50% off=$1.69
1 loaf rye bread=$3.39 *not pictured*
1 roll BE sausage=$4.49-.50-$1 instant sticker=$2.99
2 salmon burgers=$4.00-$2 instant sticker=$2.00
2.50 lbs B/S chicken breast marked down $2.99 lb=$7.48-$3 instant sticker=$4.48($1.79 lb)
2.33 lbs ground beef marked down $4.49 lb=$10.46-$3 instant sticker=$7.46($3.20 lb)
1 x sour cream on sale=$1.50
4 x 8oz blocks cheese on sale $1.67=$6.68
10 x PowerAde Zero on sale $1=$10.00 *not pictured*
SubTotal.....$45.90 + .84¢tax=$46.74

I also had a .75¢/1lb. ground beef Weis Q so $46.74-.75=$45.99 OOP
$74.60 reg. retail value makes a 39% savings rate for this shop.
I also have $22 spent toward $30 to get a $7 Catalina(the PowerAdes count toward this at their full reg. retail price even though they are on sale)Q.

I'll make a healthy coleslaw and serve that with the salmon burgers one night.
The stir-fry veggies will go into a stir-fry dish(duh).
Some of the chicken will get pounded down to make chicken parmesan next week and some of the ground beef will be made into burgers for next week and the remaining portions of both meats will be put into the freezer for an even later time.

Total spent this week on food=$52.00.
Oh, and I forgot when we picked up College Boy last Saturday we stopped at the Surplus Outlet so I have to add that to this week's tally because I forgot it last week.  That shop was under $40 so still under $100 for the week and under $206 for the month including Rite-Aid monies spent.

Between leftovers and what I picked up on discount today I've probably got most of next week's menu planned and items bought already for the meals.

Ok, I am done spending $$$ this week.
How about you?

Sluggy