Saved Quarter Challenge Week #9 Sold Items On Ebay and Amazon Plus Check Received FINALLY

Well another week of working at making more money or saving money from the budget. Was not able to save any money from the grocery budget, but we did sell few things on eBay and Amazon.

Not much really so the money will go towards the cost of running the business on the Internet.

We had sales of $28.71 before costs on eBay and a net profit of $13.00 on Amazon.

I got a surprise check in the mail today. Even though I should wait and report it next week but instead it is going into todays blog.

Back in July of last year I had left some items at a auction houes in Richmond Texas. We then moved back to Minnesota end of July.

We got busy with life and sort of put it on the back burner just waiting for a check in the mail.

Months past with nothing. Finally a couple of months ago I started to wonder what was up. Found the paper that listed our items and found a phone number. After several trys of no answer hubby found another phone number for me. I called and left a detailed message along with my phone number.

Nothing and weeks passed again. I kept planning to call them, but it got put off day after day.

Much to my surprise I received a check in the mail today for $118.12 from the auction house.

Just a check along with the tags from each auction showing me what the item had sold for and then an adding machine tape adding it up. No note or letter along with it.

I can not believe the poor service we received. No explanation for delay of months, no explanation of why no phone calls. I would never recommend this place of business and I believe if I had not made a phone call my items would of just sat there waiting to be auctioned off in their sweet time.

At least we have the check now and will come in handy .. brakes are making noise and of course there is no money in the budget for car repair.

Lesson learned make noise rather than just sitting back and waiting. I am sharing this over at Saved Quarter Challenge

Thanks for stopping by... lets keep saving together.. and please remember

Never under estimate the value of a small amount of money... Grace

Monday Menu Plan March 7th

Another week another menu. I want to buy a pot roast and make my crock pot recipe again. It was unbelievably fantastic. Planning my menu helps me get through the week with more ease. Of course nothing is in stone and if plans change we flow with it.

This is what I am planning this week

Chili with cheese, sour creams and crackers

Crock Pot Roast Beef with potatoes and carrots

Beef Barley Soup recipe to be posted later

Baked chicken with baked potatoes and vegetable

Beef Stroganoff using left over pot roast

Chicken Stew over left over baked potatoes

left over buffet

check out some of my recipes on the side bar.. there is some tasty stuff there. I will be sharing my menu plan at

Menu Plan Monday over at Organizing Junkie

thanks for stopping by... lets keep saving together Grace

3 OUT OF 4 Americans Signed Up For Overdraft Protection

The bank overdraft fury that wasn't is an article written by the Minneapolis Star Tribune. The article tells us that 3 out of 4 Americans with checking accounts have signed up for over draft protection. They are signing up with the banks saying yes charge me if I over draft. Yes I want this because I can not live on a budget, I can not balance a check book, I may not want to go with out.

What is up with this? Why would you want to pay $25.00 because you over draft your checking account?

I would love to tell these 3 out of 4 Americans .. How about growing up and learning to balance your checking account. Reasoning is suppose to be because they live check to check but if you are giving the bank $25.00 or more in over draft fees you are throwing this money away and will continue to live check to check minus the money you are giving the banks.

The article tells us .. that public fury over the overdraft charges may have been more manufactured than real. People may grumble about the fees, but millions who live paycheck to paycheck rely on overdraft protection as a backstop when their accounts run dry, researchers say.

When we signed up with our bank for a new checking account after moving back to Minnesota we signed a paper saying NO to this over draft protection.

Come on you three out of four.. grow up.. go on cash so you know how much money you really have. If the money is gone you are done for the week or month. Put that $35.00 into your savings account.. do with out that expensive coffee, McDonald's drive through, stay away from the mall for a while. By the end of the year you will have almost $2,000 saved. Now that is the start of real protection as far as I am concerned.

I have been there, done that. I have thrown more money out the window than I want to admit. I have smoked my money away, drank my money away, ate my money away at restaurants and even gambled my money away.

No more thank you very much ...this girl has gotten off the merry go round.

She is living by cash and paying for what she wants or needs that way. If we do not have the money .. so be it.

I say these things because I want my children and grandchildren to learn by my mistakes. I do not want them living on social unsecurity.. SAVE SAVE SAVE.. do with out today so you can live tomorrow like you deserve to live.

thanks for stopping by... lets keep saving together and if you see that penny or nickle on the ground pick it up. If you don't want it send it to me .. I'll take it .... Grace

TIP FOR THE DAY ~ MAKE A POT OF SOUP

Tip for the day ... make a pot of soup. Once a week I like to make a pot of soup. Not only is it a thrifty way to have a quick dinner or lunch .. just think of the money you will save in the long run.

On the end of the store aisle you see a brand name soup advertised 4/$5.00. For $1.25 you get this little can of soup. Grab a chicken from the store. Cook and have some for dinner and boil the bones to make a broth. ( you can always buy broth if necessary). Add the left over chicken make a soup using left overs from the fridge or some of that frozen mixed vegetables you bought on sale. Throw in some pasta and some spices and you will have a nice pot of soup to last you for a week of lunches.


Check out my recipe for Chicken vegetable pasta soup here or cheesy lasagna soup or any of my other recipes on the side bar of my post. I try to make a pot of soup every week, not only does it make our life easier but I know it does not cost me $5.00 to make what would be 4 cans of that name brand soup.


Thanks for stopping by.. lets keep saving together and please always remember

Never under estimate the value of a small amount of money.. Grace

Frugal Thrifty Decoating Ideas For Apartment Living

one of the thrift stores we will visit today.. love the reading chairs

For most of my life I have owned a home or condo. The last few years we have been apartment dewellers. There are so many things you can not do usually when you are renting an apartment. This morning I went to swag to do a search on decorating apartments a thrifty way. I came up with this link. Frugal thrifty apartment decorating ideas
Take a moment and look through the ideas. I love the use of blue, the curtains letting in the light and the rug on top of carpet. This can be found at 10 ways to customize a rental.

Lots of fun things to look at. I have just begun to look around, but for the moment I am off to the thrift store to look for treasures.

See you later.. thanks for stopping by.. and please remember. Never under estimate the value of a small amount of money.. Grace

TIP FOR THE DAY CREATE A CHEAP AND EASY DESK

Tip for day.. create a cheap and easy desk for your self.

Here is a fun easy way to create a desk. Search the thrift stores or garage sales for two metal 2 drawer filing cabinet. Then buy a piece of plywood and have cut to fit the size of the cabinets. Make sure it is long enough to give you a good amount of desk area. Place the plywood on top and you have a desk. If you want to spend a little money you could varnish or paint it.

At this moment hubby I are using card tables as easy move able desks. I could use a file cabinet for my genealogy files. We will be moving this fall to a bigger apartment and I hope to get a better bigger desk some how.

Thanks for stopping by.. lets keep saving together..Grace

Grocery Shopping Challenge Roundup 3/3

Time to total up what we spent on groceries this last week. Our week runs Friday to Thursday.

I started out at Walgreens. This week deals are slim for me. Nothing I really want and I had Walgreen rewards expiring within a couple of days. Hubby and stopped to see what I wanted to buy so I would not lose the $2.00 in register rewards.
Bought 1 bottle of Dawn dish soap and 2 cans of bumble bee tuna.
After flyer coupons and my $2.00 register rewards
cost me 25 cents out of pocket.
Retail value $5.25
cash out of pocket 25 cents

Then to Target
I went to Target to buy the Kellogg's Crunchy Nut Cereal at $2.99 a box. I used $1.00 Target coupon and $1.00 Kellogg's manufacture coupon bringing the cost down to 99 cents.
Bonus is that on the box is the Try me FREE rebate offer.
We will send in for the rebate as soon as possible. I bought one box for me and then in a separate transaction bought a box for my son to send in.

Besides the 2 boxes of cereal that cost me 99 cents each we also bought
7 frozen items to get the $5.00 gift card. They had 5 banquet pot pies at 64 cents each and 2 small turkey dinners at 84 cents each. I do not normally buy these but with getting the gift card I will put in freezer for a quick easy lunch in the future.
2 Kraft miracle whip on sale at $2.50 before 2 $0. 75 cent manufacture coupon and $1.00 Target coupon. This brought the cost down to $1.25 each.
Total spent $8.37 on food and I received a $5.00 gift card to use in the future plus I have the cereal to send in for rebate for myself and will give my son the other box to send in.

Then off to Cub Foods
Stopped at Cub foods to take advantage of a couple of deals plus we need bread. We picked up
1 loaf of bread $1.49
6 packages of Idaho potato envelopes $1.00 each using (2) $1.00 coupon off 3 packages
4 cans of vegetables 79 cents each using coupon 50 cent off coupon ( this was an expired coupon but my store takes them up to 3 months old)
3 packages of ground beef at $2.99 each using (3) $1.00 off 1 pound that was in a cub booklet making each pound $1.99
1 package of Velveeta $4.99 using $1.00 off coupon print here
2 Philly cooking Cream cheese $2.00 each using (2) coupons for a $1.50 off 1 making each 50 cents print here if still available. I had blogged on this a few days ago.
Total spent $21.14 with savings of $7.50 or 26 percent

1 quick stop at Walgreens for milk at $2.79 cheapest in the area and as we passed a gas station saw Sara Lee bread offered at $1.99.

Total spent for the week was 34.54

I will be sharing this

GGC Challenge roundup

Homemaking Mom

Frugal Follies

Southern Savers

Thanks so much for stopping by.. lets keep saving together .. Grace

TIP FOR THE DAY EATING OUT THE THRIFTY WAY

Hubby and I lover to eat out.. that is no secret. Since we have moved back to Minnesota money is tighter. We do go out to eat at least once a week which is budgeted for ..

Here are some ways that we can cut our eating out bill.

Split It The Meal ... some times hubby and I will split a entree and get a bowl of soup to share.

Fill Up On Freebies I love restaurants that bring out free stuff before you get your food. If you load up on free chips and salsa or bread. Doing this makes it so much easier to share a meal or eat only half and bring rest home.

Avoid Appetizers Since appetizers can cost half or two thirds the cost of your main dish, I always go for the free food instead of paying for an appetizer. Unless I am eating an appetizer as my meal.

Skip the Booze Alcohol has a huge markup. Drink water with lemon.

Spend Less, Tip Less If you spend less on your meal the tip will be less since we tip usually a precentage of the bill.

Take Home Leftovers Since so many restrauants serve large portions I like to eat half of it and bring home the leftovers for a simple dinner or lunch.

Use Your Gift Cards When the children want to know what we would like for christmas I always suggest a gift card to a restaurant. This gives us the opportunity to go out a few more times.

Check Out Free Birthday Deals Take advantage of the restaurants that offer a free meal on your birthday.

Eating out can be fun and saving money is fun also. Do you have any suggestions for eating out for less.

Thanks for stopping by..lets keep saving together .. Grace

WALLET FRIENDLY WEDNESDAY.. Searching the thrift stores for treasures

Yesterday we stopped by the thrift store to see if they had any new books or what ever for us to resell on eBay or Amazon.

Not alot was found but I did find two desirable vintage cookbooks.

The first and best is " Love and Knishes How To Cook Like A Jewish Mother" by Sara Kasdan. I searched on Amazon and it was well worth the 75 cents I paid for it. I will put up for sale for around $15.00, but first I will have to try some of the recipes. The potato soup will probably be first.

The second vintage cook book was " The I Hate To Cook Book" by Peg Bracken. I will probably start around $5.00 or so and well worth once again the 75 cents I paid.

Third was a vintage Landmark book hubby found to try and sell.

Plus it was Tuesday .. senior day so I got a small discount on these prices.

I will be sharing this at

Wallet Friendly Wednesday

Friendly Wednesday

Welcome Wednesday

Where Are You Wednesday

Thanks for stopping by for Wallet Friendly Wednesday .. hope that you visit real soon.. Grace

LETS BE WEIRD ~ LETS LIVE WITHIN OUR MEANS

I want to be consider weird, I want to live within my means. I want to be able to pay cash for what I want or need for my family.

There are three ways to Live With In Your Means...

1. Increase your income

2. Sell some assets

3.Decrease your expenses

I have worked on all three this week. They may be small changes but baby steps is the way to go says Dave Ramsey.

1.To increase our income we have sold one book on Amazon so far this week. I have some items on auction at eBay and 2 of them have bids.

We sold one item at the antique mall where I have half of a case. It was a key necklace for $10.00. I made several Key necklaces, so that is fun and encouraging to have sold one.

Does not make up for the cost of $36.00 for my share of a glass case for the month of February, but does add a little money back to the checking account.

2. Last Sunday I sold five pieces of silverware at the Gold Guys at the Mall. Thi added $47.00 to the checking account.

3. Yesterday we went and applied for cheaper health insurance for me. We had done this last August and just as I got verbally approved I got sick with a bad infection. We did not go through with the change since I was in the hospital where I stayed for 11 nights. So now we are trying again with the same insurance company. I am hoping for positive results with in 3 to 4 weeks and to report how much money we will save every month. If I am approved our deductible will go to $4,000 and we will need to bank the savings in case I get hospitalized again.

It is Weird Wednesday and we are working at being weird by living within our means. How are you doing? I hope that you consider yourself weird financially also.

TIP FOR THE DAY ~ SOAK THOSE OVEN BAKED ON CASSEROLES OVER NIGHT

Tip for the day.. soak that baked on casserole

You and your family have enjoyed a wonderful hot dish. The house is warm from the oven being on, your tummys are full and happy. Then you look at the dirty casserole with baked on food. I hate scrubbing that mess.

What I love to do is let this soak over night with warm soapy water. The next morning it is so much easier to get it cleaned.

Thanks for stopping by... lets keep saving together.. Grace

TUESDAY TIDY TIP Teach Your CDs Their ABCs

Tuesday Tidy Tip ... teach your CDs their ABCs

Store them in alphabetically order so you will know exactly where to look for the album you want to listen to. It make take a little time at first but once done you will be happy that you have it organized.

Do the same with your movies and evict any that you no longer want. Designate one shelf for your DVDs. Should you get a new DVD get rid of one that you do not care for. 1 in 1 out is the rule to keep your collection under control.

I have a lot of VHSs in my collection. As I find a DVD title of one of my favorite movies I will buy it. The VHS then goes into a box to sell at a garage sale or to donate at the thrift stores.

I need to work at purging my movies and music. I have way to much.

Thanks for stopping by for Tidy Tuesday .. lets keep saving together.. Grace

TIP FOR THE DAY END MENU MAYHEM

Tip for the day.. End Menu Mayhem. Do you have tons of scraps of papers with recipes or printed recipes from the Internet. Get them organized in a short time by finding a free or inexpensive three ring binder and organize them there. You can either just use a hole punch and put them in your binder. For those small pieces of recipes tape them to piece of printer paper, use your hole puncher and add to your binder.

For a few dollars more you can buy Mylar page covers and protect your recipes from smudges. This is what I have done, keeps them clean for years to come.

I have used my binder for years. I love that some of the recipes have been written by friends or family members 20 years ago. I feel they are always near me as I go through my binder.

You can separate your binder just like a cook book is separated so it is easy to find recipes using chicken or your dessert recipes.

Until you get all those recipes organized just put those scraps of papers in a file folder and then organize them in 15 minute periods or maybe during the evening as you watch your tv shows. In this file folder are recipes I have not tried yet. Once I have tried them I decide if it is a keeper. If so they go into my binder right after dinner or if not the paper is recycled.

Hope that this idea helps you get your menu planning and recipes more organized.

Thanks for stopping by... lets keep saving together .. Grace