Comments On Article: I Live Here

I started keeping a journal last year. It was for 5 years but I only kept it up a few weeks. I was trying to create a log for a large, long term quilting project. It was boring. I’d like to restart though with more of a daily activity theme.

Prices are absurd. I’m trying to only go to Aldi or Walmart and avoid local Publix due to price increases. Eat at home. Try meatless several times a week. Bake my own bread. I’m going to restart making my own yogurt.

I live in FL, USA so no snow here but has been unusually cold. Love the blog and forum

JoAnn

JoAnna J's post reminded me I do keep  sewing journal.  I write down details about my completed sewing projects.  Plus I add any notes about adjustments I made or if I need to change anything if I make it again. Not anything to save for posterity! Lol.

Grandma Donna wrote,

JoAnna J, I am happy to that you made a comment, it is nice to have you here "talking" among us. :)  I am not good at journaling but Charles is.  He has many journals and I do not know how he keeps it up but he does.  He journals about the electricity and water we us, the temperature of the day, the changes outside that he notices, when certain birds arrive or leave out to migrate. Just yesterday he noticed that the wax wings have arrived.  The wax wings fly in and eat berries on certain trees around our yard.  As cold as it has been here in the southeast, I know that they were ready for those berries.  Charles also keeps a book and pen in our car and he writes down the mileage each time he goes somewhere in the car and when he gets gasoline and how much he got and the price. Then there is the budget.....  :)  

There may come a time for that journal as we change what we want to do all through our lives. :)

It is another cold morning here in the southeast. 

Grandma Donna, your description of Charles' journals I must say is like my sewing journal. I can refer back to it and make adjustments if neccessary to my next project. I never thought of expanding that idea to other things.  I hadn't considered the usefulness of recording information for future use. 

I will say that while keeping journals as Charles does appeals to me the thought of starting overwhelms me. What kind of journal? How many do I need? What do I write? Etc!!

Just like Charles, between us my husband and I record things - he does the power usage and the water usage as well as petrol and anything the car (and ride-on mower) has done regarding maintenance and the like, I record the budget and the spending as well as my every day diary, and I record temperatures and rainfall - many things and seems like being a bit fiddly but many a technician has advised us to record our water and power usage each day so we do have a record of it all and have done for years now.  It also leaves us able to see how much we spent in such and such a time on whatever we are researching.  I also record major purchases, and the cost of same for future reference.

https://youtu.be/wNsRSuX6Lrc?si=_wWQX3uvdzZbD0Oq

• Not a comment on this particular blog post, but a video I thought you all would love! Those of you in the UK may know of Beamish, but being in the US, I had never heard of it. This youtuber, Kate, does a lovely tour of it! Many different time periods of history represented. I think you all will especially love hearing the recycling journey of the proggy mats. 
  
  Kate is quite a textile artist, and though I am not, she is just mesmerizing to watch! 
  

Joanna J, I hear you on the grocery prices!  I shop at Aldi, Walmart (we have a smaller neighborhood store that is a grocery store), and then at Costco and Sam’s Club for specific foods that are either less expensive there or less expensive when on sale.  My guys eat meatless meals 5 nights a week and then I eat meatless 2-3 nights per week (they can eat beans, I can’t).  They only eat fish, not other meat, so I am working more with canned tuna and canned salmon.  I am always tracking the price of protein — eggs were on sale so we will have rice bowls with eggs and vegetables this week, instead of tofu because the tofu costs more than the on sale eggs.  I went though the budget and determined that I can afford fish 2-3 times per week (very modest portions and mostly tilapia and ahi tuna as they are cheaper than salmon), and I can afford a whole chicken a couple of times a month and ground beef bought on sale.  That really simplified it — fish, 1 - 2 whole chickens (only in the months I make soup), 2 - 4# ground beef per month.  I don’t look at sale prices for other chicken or beef cuts because they don’t compare.  I can get pork for less but really I prefer fish or vegetarian meals, and then beef for tacos and burgers.

Almost everything that can be baked with flour is baked at home.  For bread, I stopped making a honey wheat loaf that also includes egg, and started making a more simple Amish style sandwich loaf with sugar and no egg — it’s not like honey adds significant nutrition, but it does cost a lot more than sugar!  I bake cookies, muffins, pita bread, and biscuits.  I make our pizza dough, French bread, and dinner rolls.  We prefer corn tortillas and they are super cheap (110 for $4.68 which is only .0425 per tortilla), so I don’t make flour tortillas anymore.

A lot of what I am doing is making substitutions that aren’t all that noticeable.  I realized spaghetti is cheaper than other shapes of pasta, so now I stick to spaghetti.  I stopped making mashed potatoes and now just cook big potatoes in the Instant Pot.  I found an Alfredo recipe that uses less Parmesan cheese but still tastes great.  I stopped buying ice cream and make tapioca pudding at home instead.  I bought pizza sauce in huge cans and froze it in smaller amounts.  I buy a 6# block of mozzarella @ $1.79 per pound, shred it at home with the food processor, and freeze it in meal sized amounts.  Not everything works out, we didn’t like the cheap block of cheddar and went back to Tillamook.

I also bulk buy what I can, to save money and time.  I buy 5# of carrots and shred them in the food processor before freezing them in the amount I put in soup.  I buy celery in November when it is super cheap, then chop and freeze enough to last me the year for soups.  I buy a big bag of peeled garlic, mince it in the food processor and freezer it flat in bags so I can break off what I need.  Same with ginger root, and I don’t even peel it.  When applesauce goes on sale super cheap I stock up, and we eat it as dessert and I use it to make muffins (just like bananas muffins, but with applesauce and cinnamon).

I’ve found that some frozen vegetables are less expensive than fresh, like green beans and chopped spinach.  I also buy frozen diced hash browns, which cost more than raw potatoes but are great for traveling.  I add them to taco filling!  In summer potatoes don’t last long in our warm house and I can’t buy the big 10 - 15# bags without them spoiling, so the frozen potatoes fill in nicely.  Sometimes I will turn a bag of them into potato soup, or an Indian-flavored curry with peas — I buy the peas frozen too.  Next up is going to be trying the diced potatoes in potato salad, to see if that is a dish I can make on the road.  I’ll steam the frozen potatoes in the microwave, cool them, then mix with hard cooked eggs and mayonnaise