The Frugal Gourmet, Oh My!

I found a recipe this morning on The Pioneer Woman's website for homemade egg pasta.

You must must must try this recipe! It's easy. It does take a while though because you really have to knead the dough. I think next time I'll use my Kitchen Aid mixer. I'm sure it will make my life much easier. :)

To the basic dough recipe on the website, I did add just a little salt probably a 1/2 tsp full and a palm full of dried parsley flake (This was to 3 eggs and 1 1/2C of flour. If you read the original recipe, you'll see how you can gauge the ratios you need). Yes, I measure ala Rachel Ray. I really only use measuring spoons when I'm baking.

To go with this yummy yummy homemade pasta, I made a tomato cream sauce. Who says you have to spend a fortune to eat a gourmet meal!

Here is the recipe for my tomato cream sauce:

2 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp garlic, minced <--- no that's not a typo! I like garlic.
3 tomatoes diced
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp onion powder
1 tsp dried basil
1 tsp salt
1 tsp sugar
1/2 C pasta cooking water
1/4 C half and half
1/4 C grated Parmesan Cheese

• Heat your pan to medium high heat.
  
• Add your olive oil and butter to the pan. When the butter starts to bubble add your garlic. Cook until the garlic is fragrant and lightly browned. Add your diced tomatoes and pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, basil, salt and sugar. Cook about 2 minutes so the tomatoes can soften.
  
• Add your pasta cooking water. Turn your heat down to medium low and simmer your sauce for about 5 minutes.
  
• Add the half and half and Parmesan cheese and simmer for another minute. Taste your sauce and adjust your seasonings as necessary.
  
• Toss with your cooked pasta and serve with additional grated Parmesan cheese.
  

ENJOY!

Note: Jeff even ate two servings of this and it has no meat! Ms. Picky Kaitlynn ate this with a declaration of "Num, Num" "Num, Num".

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Okay so a note on the frugality of this recipe. You know how I like to calculate how much something really cost me so here goes.

The homemade pasta:

1 C Flour is approximately $0.10 (1 5lb bag of flour is about $2.00. There are 18.75 C of flour in one bag. So to make it easier to calculate lets say 19C. So each cup is about $0.10)

1 egg is about $0.07 (I just bought eggs on sale for $0.88 a dozen)

Total for homemade pasta is: $0.46 (I ended up using about 2 1/2 C of flour total after kneading some in.)

The pasta sauce:

3 tomatoes, $1.00 (purchased in a 3 pk at Walmart)
garlic, nominal
butter, $0.06 (32 tbsp in a lb and I pay $2.00 for a lb of butter)
Olive Oil, $0.16 (I purchased a bottle of olive oil for $9.99, there are 133 Tbsp in the bottle)
Spices and water, nominal
Half and Half, $0.08 (there are 31 servings in the container of half and half I purchased for $1.12. I used 2 servings)
Parmesan cheese, $0.25 (I purchased a 24oz container of parm cheese for $3.00. I used probably about 2 oz)

Total for the pasta sauce: $1.55 (if you use fresh tomatoes from your garden, it would only cost $0.55! Can't beat that!!)

Total cost for the meal for 4 people, $2.01

SwagBucks!

Have you heard about this? You search online, you win points and you can redeem those points for things like gift cards, video games, even airline miles!

It's simple, you sign up and download their toolbar. In no time, you're searching the internet and earning points. Their search engine is powered by Google btw.

I have been using SwagBucks for a couple of months now and have racked up about 94 points. With those 94 points, I could get a ton of stuff, including MP3 downloads, gift cards, video games, books, etc but I'm saving up my points for the end of the year. I'm going to try to see if I can pay for most of my Christmas presents with SwagBucks. Wouldn't that be cool? To have a FREE Christmas?

There are other ways you can earn points on SwagBucks:

• You can send in your old cell phones, MP3 players, video games or consoles and earn more points. I just found a bunch of video games from Jeff's old PS1 that I'm going to send in to get more points.
  
• You can also get points when you shop online. There are partner sites like Hot Topic, Walmart, Lane Bryant and many others. For every $5.00 you spend, you get one SwagBuck.
  
• You can also get your friends to sign up. When your friends earn SwagBucks you do to!

So yes, if you sign up I will earn some SwagBucks. But the main bonus to you, would be to earn your own SwagBucks and invite your friends to earn SwagBucks. How great will you feel when you can get yourself something nice FOR FREE all for searching and shopping online!

If you are interested in signing up for SwagBucks just click on the image above and get yourself signed up!

Confessions: Why I Don't Like Mother's Day

Mother's Day is always a day where I try to keep my expectations low. After all, I try to tell myself, it's just another day. Another day in this mad and crazy house. I tell myself that if things don't go the way I want to, that's okay. I tell myself that I don't need to be celebrated...again it's just another day. It's just another day, an ordinary day. Nothing special about this day. I build myself up to think that way every year. And every year...When I wake up on Mother's Day...I'm still upset and disappointed.

People say that if you keep your expectations low, you'll never be disappointed. I think for me, I try to keep my expectations low but there is something at the back of my mind tugging at my heart saying, "what if..." What if this year it will be different. What if this year I will have my ideal Mother's Day. It is that very thought that raises up my expectations and then brings my world crashing down upon me every single Mother's Day.

This morning I wake up to a filthy kitchen and a filthy living room. I have been so busy the past couple of weeks. I have been working extra hours, shuffling the kids back and forth, drafting patterns, preparing and opening my girls boutique, stocking us back up on groceries and trying to do enough around the house so that we don't get too far behind on things. But no matter how much I do around here, I never seem to get caught up. While I'm running around trying to be super mom on 4 hours of sleep, my husband sits on his computer and plays games or looks for jobs. Sometimes he'll clean the living room. Sometimes he'll do a half load of dishes and sometimes, he'll actually pay attention to the kids like he's supposed to. Most of the time, I'm hurrying to do a load of dishes while I'm trying to cook dinner or yelling at the kids to pick up the living room when it's not all their mess or walking into the house after a day at work and then errands to find that Kaitlynn has marked her entire body with Kylie's pens and is drinking of of a cup that only God knows where she found.

I'm tired, I'm exhausted and I desperately need a break. More than that, I need a clean house. My mind is so unfocused because I'm thinking of all the 50 million things that need to get done around here on top of what I have to do for work (I still need to write this month's newsletter article). I just deep cleaned the kitchen 2 weeks ago and now it's trashed again. I go to work and come home and the dishes are piled to the faucet (one of my biggest pet peeves) and I know that it didn't look like that before I left...

So I guess this rant is really about two things:not feeling very appreciated and a husband who is being awfully self centered right now.

So now I'm off to do a load of dishes, make the girls breakfast, get them ready for church and head out the door. And when I come home, I know that the house will look exactly the way I left it. And when I come home, I know that I'm not going to want to be here. And when I come home, I know that I'll probably have to start making my own Mother's Day dinner or we will be eating at 10 o'clock tonight.

Yes, I Have Been MIA.

Okay so I bet you're wondering what happened to me and where I have been right. Well I have been a busy busy bee! I have been working on two other blogs as well as being a guest blogger on a third. I have been drafting all kinds of new clothing patterns and on top of all that I have just launched my new little girls clothing line.

Are you tired yet? I know I am.

So if you don't see me posting here, please check around... You never know where I'm going to pop up!

If you want to see my other blogs:

Future Homeowner Online is the blog I created for work. So far I haven't had too many reviews on it. So if you visit it, tell me what you think! BTW if you are in the Colorado Springs area, I post weekly grocery deals there.

KyLynn Designs is my new little girls clothing boutique. Custom clothes for your unique little princess. If you find something you love, drop me a line!

And my guest blogger spot appeared here. This blog is mostly geared toward Hawaii Moms. It's authored by my dear friend from high school Andrea.

I'm telling you I have been a busy busy...bee? beaver? duck? horse? Okay I'm strange and I need to have some coffee! :)

Another Great Recycling Project

Recycling, re-purposing. Whatever you call it, this project is super easy and quick.

Not to long ago I purchased a copy of Amanda Soule's "The Creative Family." In it, she describes the idea of re-purposing clothing. Her book details how to take an adult shirt and turn it into a pair of kidlet pants. This idea of clothing re-purposing intrigued me so I started to google it and I found a ton of information. But the best one was a tutorial on how to turn a man's t-shirt into yoga pants.

I filed this tutorial on my to do list and forgot about it for a while until I was in Goodwill the other day. It was military discount day, 15% off so I figured that if I could find a plain black shirt in decent condition, I would give it a go. I found a shirt and checked out for all of $.90, went home washed the shirt and started to cut it up. Really from start to finish this project took me about 45 minutes. The extra 15 minutes were for seam ripping and restitching when I sewed a seam on the wrong side.

This is a must try! It comes together quickly and easily. And once you're done no one is going to know that your new yoga pants used to be a man's t-shirt!

I would take a picture but I'm kinda wearing the pants now and I need to shave my legs. You're welcome for the visual. :)

Happy Earth Day, Plant a Garden!

So after my long and tired rant yesterday, I thought I would spread some good cheer today with a tutorial. Now I'm not always the best at explaining how to do things, that's why I hesitated at posting tutorials before. But this project is easy, so I figured that even a dunce like me could explain it.

To celebrate earth day, my daughter and I decided to make a seed starting tray out of a recycled egg carton. Are you ready?

Recycled Egg Carton Garden

Gather your materials:



A paper egg carton with the top removed (save the top, we'll use it later)
Seed packets, here we have Marigolds, Daises, Sunflowers and Rudibeckas
Soil that has been mixed with water until it's damp
A spoon to scoop the soil
A Travel sized (ours was 1 oz) pump bottle

Step 1:



Use the spoon (we switched to a plastic one) to scoop dirt into each egg cup.

Step 2:



Add your seeds to the egg cups. The size of the seeds determined how many we added. You don't want to crowd them after all. The Rudibecka seeds were small so we added 5-6 per egg cup. The sunflower seeds were large so we added 2 per cup.

Step 3:



Add a bit more dirt on top of the seeds to cover. I told Kylie just to sprinkle some additional dirt on top. She eventually decided to use the spoon because she felt that she wasn't getting enough dirt on top just by sprinkling.

Step 4:



Water your garden. This is where I had a flash on inspiration. I filled the travel sized pump bottle with water and let her pump out some water onto her newly planted seeds. Brilliant right! This way she doesn't over water the plants. Two squirts is all you need. Sometimes I really surprise myself at how smart I can be. :)

Step 5:



Your done! This is where the top of the egg carton comes in. Place it under your newly planted seedlings to prevent too much seepage from the paper container getting on your table tops. Place in a sunny spot and let the children watch in amazement as their seeds grow.

Speaking of growing seeds. Check this out!



I just started these seeds last Friday and look! I'm so impressed with myself because normally I have an extremely brown thumb. Can I tell you the only thing I could grow before was aloe. And that's only because it's a cactus and if I forget to water it for a week or two...or three. It's not such a big deal. I can't wait until after Mother's Day! That's when they say that it's safe to plant things in the ground out here.

Lending a Helping Hand or Not...

This is something I have been thinking and talking about (to Jeff) all day. When your husband puts in his ear buds and turns his head toward you and with a glazed over look says, "Ah huh." You know that you have probably talked a subject to death. But I think no matter how much I talk about it, obsess over it really, I think it will continue just to bug me.

So dear readers, I'm going to tell you a story. If you read my blog, even if I don't know you personally, please feel free to respond with your thoughts...

An old man sits on his motorized shopping cart, in a busy parking lot. He wheezes, trying to take deep breaths from his oxygen tank while struggling to put his groceries into his cherry red S.U.V. He's alone, and in obvious need of help. People walk by him, but he's not unnoticed. A young couple strolls by on their way into the store. Their eyes wander and rest on this man. They stare at him as they walk by and just as they pass him, their eyes shift focus. The doors to the store are calling. The scene repeats itself over and over. An old man struggles, people walk by noticing him but not caring. Until...

This was the scene at Walmart this morning. I noticed this man as I pulled into the parking lot. His car was parked in a handicapped stall by the main entrance. As I pulled in, I noticed that people were staring at him as they passed but at no time, did anyone ask him if he needed help. He was clearly struggling and in need of assistance. He was having a hard time pulling himself up to put his groceries into his car. I parked, got out of my car and went over to him and asked him if he needed help. He thankfully accepted. His name is Sam by the way.

I just can't understand how people can walk by someone who is in obvious need of help and not stop. It's self-centered and selfish. It's one of my biggest irks. But sadly it's the culture that we live in. If there is nothing in it for us, why do it? I just don't want to get involved. I'm in a rush. The excuses go on and on. I was in a rush this morning. Jeff was at home with Kaitlynn. He was tired and in a bad mood and had already yelled at me the day before for "taking too long". I didn't want to upset him but at the same time, I knew that helping someone was more important than irritating my husband.

But this is not the first time something like this happened. There was one occasion in particular that happened a couple of years ago that was much more dramatic.

Jeff and I were on our way home. We had been helping one of our friend's parent's unload their moving truck. As we were driving home, there was a white car rolling down a hill, backwards. The hill wasn't very steep and the car was rolling slowly. There were at least 5 cars in front of us that passed this car and did nothing. As we drove past, we noticed that there was no adult driver. There was a child about 7 years old in the drivers seat, a baby and a 2 or 3 year old. None were wearing seat belts or in car seats. I yelled at Jeff and told him to help them. He stopped the car, jumped out and ran over to the kids. I jumped into the drivers seat and drove the car into the gas station and waited for him. The kids were scared but eventually let Jeff into the car. He was able to unlock the steering wheel and pull the car into the gas station. Right as Jeff pulled the car into the gas station, a frantic mother sprinted over from the strip mall across the road. She was thankful and obviously shaken.

Can you imagine what would have happened if we had not stopped? These kids were rolling into on coming traffic. It just takes one person who is not paying attention and the outcome could have been much different. But what about the other cars who passed this trio of distressed kids? I don't know. Maybe they just didn't want to get involved, after all there was nothing in it for them.

Tomorrow is Earth Day. So how about a challenge. Instead of thinking about going green and all the things you can do to save this planet, why not focus on a smaller picture. Notice someone and care. Help someone with their groceries. Pay for the lunch of the person behind you in the drive-thru. Practice some kind of random act of kindness. Because if we don't take care of the people of this planet, why would care about trying to save it.

Okay so I'm feeling a lot preachy tonight. But this is a topic that is near and dear to my heart. I believe it's fundamental to help those in need in whatever way we can. I believe that it's part of the reason why we are put on this earth, to take care of each other and respect each other.

Rant over.