September to do's

New month new to do's, ok so that might be a smallish lie since not all of August's to do's got crossed off.

August leftovers:
1. tuck both vehicles into garage at night.

2. get color painted on the walls

3. get pictures hung on the walls
4. decorate guest bedroom

Newbies:

1. refinish table and chairs

2. Clear out furniture from garage this will assist in accomplishing August list #1

3. Kitchen upgrade

4. locate new to us appliances (more on this a little later)

5. close pool for the season
7. order prints of latest professional pics taken by Knox Photography

8. continue to work on printing off pics from snapfish

9. run in a 5k race with Ian and finish so he his the 1st finisher in his age group, ambitious?? Maybe but still worth a shot. Oh and not to pee my pants while running said race.

Again there they are on paper well on a computer screen waiting to be crossed off.

August list update

Another month in the year 2011 has come and went and in that time we crossed off and/or added and crossed off the following:
1. tuck both vehicles into garage at night--> we got one in as of last night. yeah this is moving onto September's list as we bought a new to us dining table that has to be refinished.

2. get color painted on the walls Ian's room is painted as is the dining area

3. get pictures hung on the walls ah yeah this will be added to September

4. decorate guest bedroom does it count if decor has been purchased??

5. get better with couponing, I coupon but I really think I could do better. couponing is one that some weeks you do really well on and others that are as steller so I'm going to continue to just do my best each and every week.

6. get into a nice weekly routine of having an errand running day and a stay at home day, one would think that by now I would have been in this routine but since the move the word routine has been boxed up. this is another one that some weeks are good and others are just impossible so I'll just continue to do my best.

7. budget...budget...budget we are slowly getting things paid off, Ian's helmet (gosh that was a long time ago) will be paid off before the end of the year, YAY

 

8. dive a little deeper into paleo eating, I have breakfast nailed down and lunch somewhat. Chelssie confirmed that I do have both breakfast, lunch and snacks (we won't mention those keebler cookies i just ate or the sandwich and broccoli/cheddar soup I had for lunch)

9. go through everything we moved into the basement and figure where it needs to go, I have a feeling this one will be on the list for a while. Maybe I'll find our routine down there- Basement items have been organized as far as items used more than once a year and those that we don't use often.

10. get some quality family of 3 time in- this is something that will continue to get better, Marcus received a promotion at work which means a change in daily work hours (downside to salary) we did make a trip to Indy,

11. get a post up about the books i've been reading. I'm in a Book Club (woohoo we meet tonight) and so this will always be on my monthly to do list we have a whole year of books to catch up on.

Items added:

12. landscaping around pool. - this is going to be a slow moving project that hubby's BIL started and we are left to finish with our non-exsistent landscape budget.



after

before

 

what's left to do



12. purchase new dining table and chairs- thank you craigslist and the use of my dad's truck we found a table and 5 and 3/4 chairs for $50!

chairs it came with



chairs we want, only need 3-5 more



our 3/4 of a chair

 

There it is the official list of August the completed, uncompleted and what is transferring over to September's list. How was your month of August??

Paleo

What does paleo mean here is what Wikipedia says: The modern dietary regimen known as the Paleolithic diet (abbreviated paleo diet or paleodiet), also popularly referred to as the caveman diet, Stone Age diet and hunter-gatherer diet, is a nutritional plan based on the presumed ancient diet of wild plants and animals that various human species habitually consumed during the Paleolithic era—a period of about 2.5 million years duration that ended around 10,000 years ago with the development of agriculture. In common usage, such terms as the "Paleolithic diet" also refer to the actual ancestral human diet. Centered on commonly available modern foods, the "contemporary" Paleolithic diet consists mainly of grass-fed pasture raised meats, fish, vegetables, fruit, roots, and nuts, and excludes grains, legumes, dairy products, salt, refined sugar, and processed oils.

Alright now that we have that out of the way we will go on. My friend and Paleo follower Chelssie came over last week and while J and Ian played we talked Paleo. After going over what I eat throughout the day I'm already following the Paleo way in some ways such as (this is what I'm eating today and usually eat everyday I like routine what can I say):

Breakfast: scrambled eggs- paleo approved
morning snack: rice chex- not paleo approved but doesn't have gluten so still kinda good
mid morning snack: carrots- paleo approved
Lunch: Applegate deli meat, strawberries- paleo approved
afternoon snack: rice crackers- not paleo approved due to the rice but better than other crackers
pre-dinner snack: protein bar- no good
Dinner: chicken teriyaki- good but the rice is not paleo approved but better than noodles

So overall on any given day I'm eating at least 80% if not more paleo than not. Which is good and I'm staying away from glutens which is also good.  One can determine on their own how strict of a paleo follower one wants to be.  Come Christmas I may fall off the paleo wagon but I won't fall off without trying to hang on I've got almond flour and I'm researching alternatives to refined sugar and brown sugar as well and will playing around with some of my favorite Christmas cookie recipes. My Trader Joes shopping list is growing.

Below is a picture of a meal Chelssie made this past month:


Fresh strawberries, roasted squash and broccoli, carribean jerk chicken

Can you say yummy?!?! She also just sent me a link of some info to read through that I haven't gotten to look at it throughly yet but from what I did read and what Chelssie told me as well is that paleo requires preperation.  Off to prepare some sweet potatoes which are my new protein bar replacement.

Smile

A couple weeks ago we met up with our photographer from Knox Photography for 5yr anniversary, family and 18mos photos. We of course had a great time, we went to the school area that is right near our house where there is a Prairie and served as a great background.  I also wanted to get some of Ian on the playground since he is after all a 18mo old boy who doesn't spend his days wearing white linen pants or white button down shirts.

Paleo Police

So in order to dive into this paleo world a little more than just for breakfast I have decided to call in my good friend/Paleo know-it-all friend Chelssie. She and he family have been living paleo for almost a year.  When I asked her to come over and go through my pantry and fridge she said I will probably hate her so we will see come Thursday.  I did remind her that I am the one that is asking for this.  I won't be throwing anything out but when it's something I only eat and it's not paleo approved then once it's gone it will not be purchased again. So we will only be focusing on the foods I eat (good thing I indulged this past weekend into some of the naughty stuff) not what Marcus or Ian eat. I'm quite certain my fruit/veggie bowl will be safe...I HOPE!!!

Till Thursday check out this video that kindergartens the paleo way of eating.

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Sunday nights

My Sunday nights usually look like this:

Earlier in the day I already went through all the ads and coupon inserts and pulled out the coupons that I will use and clipped them.  Don't get the Sunday paper then sign up to receive notifications of coupons via email (I sent up a gmail account for all coupon notifcations to be sent too) from websites such as RedPlum, Print Coupons Online, also check out TheKrazyCouponLady there she will do the research for you if you don't have the patience or time.

I gather up my 4 store ads that I always look at: Meijer, Target, CVS and Walgreens.  I compare my list to the ads and what coupons I have.  When it comes to bathroom personal essentials I feel we can never have too many now too many to you may be different than too many to me so that is up for translation. I'm in no means a candidate for Extreme Couponing.  As the week goes on and we run low/out of something then I add it to the list and come Sunday night I break my 1 list down to 4-5 lists with the store names on top and then what I'm getting from that store and cross the item off my master list of needs.  The other thing we do is make out our menu for the week based on what we have in our freezer, what's on sale and what our palettes are craving.  Now when I say a menu I don't say on Monday we are eating such and such and Tuesday such and such.  Instead when I make out our dinner options I choose 3 that are kinda quick and easy and 3 that are a little more time consuming for the days I'm off work.  And we pick that day which one we are going to have for dinner.  I know some families have it planned down to the day and that is a bit too much structure for our family.

I primarily look to CVS and Walgreens for our bathroom personal essentials: razors, shampoo/conditioner, body wash, face wash, lotion, girly items, etc.  With both of these stores they often have money back offers with different products for example a couple weeks ago Walgreens had the brand of tampons I buy for 6.99-$2 (in store rebate, to be used on a later purchased) then I had a $2 off coupon. I also had buy one get one of the same product and for each of those I got $2 so I really got buy 1 get 2 free with the coupon and in-store rebates.  Another great buy I had was on Bic razors they were buy 1 get 1 50%off and I had a $2 off coupon which was applied to both packages of razors. I also used some in store rebates from the previous week to help pay for the items.

At all 4 stores you can combine manufacturers coupons with store coupons this is where my research comes into play.  Since we don't buy pre-packaged meals I turn to stores websites for coupons off produce and deli.  I also go to Aldi for produce and items that we aren't brand specific about such as certain cereals, baking items, milk, etc.

Meijer: you can sign up for mperks where you can "clip" coupons and when you go to check out you select the mperks logo and you enter your phone number into the kiosk and any coupons that correspond with what you purchased.  Last week I decided before going to the store to print out a list of the coupons I "clipped" and  I'm glad I did as I purchased items I had "clipped" coupons for but it wasn't taking them off so with my proof of clipped coupons an employee was able to make the proper price adjustment. 

Target:  there is no limit to how many times you can print the same coupon from their website unlike brand websites.  They also take $0.05 off for each bag you bring in to bag your groceries with.

Brand Websites: If you are brand specific on certain items as we are in our house then go to the brands website they often will have coupons that you can print off.  If we buy juice at our house then it's V8 Fusion juice so i will google V8 Fusion and find their website where they almost always have coupons for.  And then if I have a store coupon I pair them together and wait, I wait for the store that I have the coupon too has the juice on sale and then I go in for "kill", haha.

Diapers:  I have stopped buying diapers from big box stores and now they get them sent to our door on a monthly basis from Amazon if you sign up for their subscribe and save program you save 30% and you can cancel your subscription at anytime.  So right now I get 192 Pampers size 4 for $31.49 that's $0.16 a diaper and free shipping.  If I went to Sam's Club I would buy Sam's Club brand and would get about 147 diapers for $35.00...

Couponing is not hard once you get started and organized and have yourself a game plan.  Happy clipping and if you have any questions feel free to email.

California Girl