Felt Like Knitting

No knitting, no gas

Still no knitting to show.  My freetime this week has been taken up with reading, couponing, and robotics.

Due to the recent hurricanes and some panicky drivers, there is a gas shortage here in the Atlanta area.  Most gas stations are out of gas and the lines are amazing at other stations.  Fortunately, I was able to find gas on Tuesday and only had to wait about three minutes.  A friend of mine recently waited 30 minutes for gas and thought that was good.  We're supposed to go on vacation soon and I'm wondering if we'll have the gas to get out of town.

                    

Have a great weekend!  I'll be staying close to home and maybe I'll get some knitting done!  :)

Freeze your credit

Oops!  I forgot to post on Friday.  I thought about it Friday morning then didn't think about it again until Saturday.

Brr, it's freezing!

While the temperature has cooled, I'm actually talking about credit freezes.  A (former) employee at our mortgage company sold personal information about clients and ours may have been included.  We've been meaning to freeze our credit and this was the impetus we needed to do it.  It can be done easily online.  I would recommend first getting your free annual credit report because it's a little more difficult to get it after you've frozen your accounts.  Ask me how I know.  :)

Weekly menu

Since our data may have been compromised, we've been looking more closely at our credit card and financial statements.  I was amazed by the amount of money we spend on eating out.  Grabbing a burger here, enjoying some ice cream there - it sure adds up!  So I've issued an "eat in when possible" mandate.  For this to work, I have to have more meals prepared, so I've created a weekly menu.

Monday:  Roast chicken, rice pilaf, peas

Tuesday:  Foldover biscuit pizza, salad

Wednesday:  Chicken & biscuit casserole

Thursday:  Shepherd's pie, salad, jello salad for dessert

Friday:  leftovers

I like this menu because I can prepare ahead for some of the meals.  The leftover roast chicken is already cut up for Wednesday's casserole.  I boiled the carcass (isn't that a gross word?) for broth for the casserole, too.  Tonight I'll make half a batch of pizza, saving some of the biscuits for the casserole.  And so on...

All work and no play...

There's not much knitting to show (just another hat), but I've been making cards.  Some people make stunning cards, but I'm not there yet.  Just as knitters have to start with smaller projects, so do card makers, right?  :)

                         

                        

Well, it's Tuesday, one of my self-assigned blogging days...and I've got nothing.  No special knitting to show.  No new recipe I've tried.  Nothing.  So how about a little random?

-  It's a bit cooler here these days and the humidity is lower.  I even spied some changing leaves in the tops of the dogwood trees.

-  I bought a KitchenAid mixer the other day.  Our hand mixer burned out when E was making fondant one day.  She requested that we buy a KitchenAid stand mixer, so we saved up and got one.  I love it already!  We bought the white one.  The red one was more attractive to us, but we figured it might not fit in with the kitchen when we (eventually) remodel.  

-  S asked if I would help coach robotics this year.  I agreed.  My robotics name is Coach KnitBot.

-  There was a great Electrasol coupon in the paper recently. Today I combined the coupons with a deal at Target and got each box for 54 cents.  (By the way, many product websites have printable coupons available when you sign up for their newsletter.  Also, Kotex.com is having a free sample pack giveaway right now.)

-  Molly and I got together for coffee yesterday and talked about couponing.  It was fun to chat with someone who's into it.  Most people aren't.  It's kind of like how you feel when you finally finding a person to knit with.  :)

-  A friend loaned me a couple of her Maggie Sefton knitting mystery books.  I've enjoyed reading them, though reading about murder isn't my favorite thing.  What books have you been reading?

-  Did I tell you I bought a harmonica (Hohner Blues Band, key of C)?  I'm learning from this web site.  So far, so good.  :)

Off to read or practice my harmonica...  :)

Save

Most of us are probably trying to save money these days.  I know I am.  I've talked about using coupons before, but this summer I also started shopping at CVS.  I still like Walgreens and their rebates (which can now be filed electronically!), but CVS gives out Extra Care Bucks for certain purchased items.  These are coupons for $1, $2, etc. so they are like an instant rebate for your next trip to CVS.  Here's an example of how it works:

The other day I bought Right Guard deodorant.  Each package sold for $2.99 but came with an ECB of $2.00, thus bringing the price to 99 cents.  Since I had a $1 manufacturer's coupon, the deodorant ended up being free.  Cool!  This is a thrifty way to help others, too.  Right Guard isn't a brand my husband uses, so the four I bought will go to the local food pantry.

My friend Molly let me know about Hot Coupon World.  Wow!  This place has so much going on - information sharing, notices of future sales, coupon trading, etc.  I haven't even started to scratch the surface of what's there.  (Check out Molly's blog - she does way better than I do and it's fun to see what she's saved.  And she posts her menus each week.  How organized is that?!)

Here's what I bought last week from my trip to Walgreens and CVS.  After rebates, my cost was $16.86 for these items.  The shampoo, lip balm, toothpaste, and nail polish were free after rebates.  I've found that I can get some good deals by trying different brands, like the shampoo and lip balm.  After the shopping trip, my family and I watched a movie I had rented for free with another coupon!  (Have you  seen Batman Begins?  It was an excellent movie!)  Every little bit helps, right?  :)

            

Hi there!

There's so much to say since I've been gone from the blog for a while.  Today I realized that I need to put blogging into my schedule.  Since blogging almost every day (how do some of you do it?!) would be hard for me, I'll try for Tuesdays and Fridays.  Now to catch up...

-  I was in a serious "do nothing" slump over the summer.  The routine that began when school started was a nice change.  I pulled out my organizational cards again and have started catching up.  The other day I even found the candles that I lost when I decorated for Christmas.  (They were in a box under my dresser.) 

-  There was pie this summer, though!  This is a delicious recipe and I made it twice.  I was surprised at the difference between the peaches I used.  The first peaches came from J, my walking friend, and the pie was wonderful.  The second batch of peaches came from the store.  That pie was good, but not exceptional.

-  If something felt weird to you toward the end of August, it may have been due to the fact that I had nothing on the needles.  I think the universe was a bit off because of it.  :)  All of my projects were either finished or frogged.  (Ariann and the Lace Surplice Top are both gone now.)  Now I'm knitting charity hats and Alhambra is on the needles, too.

                                 

                   Fake Isle                           Claudia                              Hurricane

(Details will soon be on Ravelry.)  I have to say that the Claudia hat and Hurricane hat don't look like anything special in the pictures, but they look great when worn.

 -  Have you seen this Japanese knot bag?  I made one for a friend, but it wasn't perfect on the inside (I always have a terrible time with fusible interfacing) so I kept it for myself.  I love this bag!!!  It is perfect for taking outside with me while Trump is on a bathroom break.  It's just the right size for one of the hats and it hangs from my wrist while I knit.  The tutorial comes complete with pattern pieces.  I changed a couple of construction techniques when I made mine.    

- Something has infected my right eye for three+ weeks now.  The doctors think it's bacterial conjunctivitis, but say it's strange that it comes back after being cleared up for several days.  I've thrown away eye makeup, changed my pillowcase, etc. so I don't think I'm reinfecting myself.  It's like I'm allergic to something and ragweed has been high lately.  Do any of you suffer from ragweed allergies?  How does that affect your eyes?

I hope you're all doing well and knitting beautiful projects!