Fourth & Final Frugal Friday of January 2023

Welcome to Frugal Friday! 
Quote of the Week

Cook your own, serve it with love, keep your money where it should be, paying off your mortgage, for your childrens education, your emergency fund, or for a special holiday.  Stop giving it away to others.

...Mimi from A Tray of Bliss

My heart goes out to Kim over at Out My Window and Sam over at Sam, Coffee, Money, and Thyme who have both lost their husbands recently. 
Nothing in life can prepare us for the death of a loved one. With every death there is loss, which brings us grief in a very painful season of our lives. Please know that so many are praying for both of you. We love you both. 💕 
Psalm 34:18 tells us “The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”
Business
A couple of weeks ago I mentioned that there is a new way to follow my blog via email and that is through the Follow It link on the top of the right side bar. I had to work out a few kinks, but it is finally working. Yay!
My Frugal Week
Last Friday while I was washing dishes, the water stopped pumping into the house. I called our local well drilling service company and they were out here within twenty minutes. Turns out the points on the pressure switch went bad. Total costs for parts and service was $209 and we had water again within an hour. I’m very thankful for them and an emergency fund to pay for such emergencies.
The house has been chilly inside this week at sixty-one degrees Fahrenheit. I do not have the heat turned on though, just a warm sweater and blanket on my lap. 
It has been so long since I had a haircut. It was last summer I believe, so with Bailey’s help in the back of my hair, I did get my hair cut this week at no cost to me. We use these Wahl hair clippers from Amazon to cut our hair and they have more than paid for themselves over the years. 
Decorating Our Homes
Decorating and furnishing a home infrequently was normal back when I was growing up. My parents didn’t change the décor, paint or add new carpet every year and neither did my friends parents. In fact, it was sixteen years before my parents ever remodeled. They took care of the things they had, so they would last for years. It was considered frugal to hang on to the same things year after year. 
One of my teachers in high school said they had their house built specifically to house certain pieces of furniture and they did not move them. They had lived there for many years with the furniture pieces in the same arrangement. 
Many people yard sale to be able to decorate their homes more affordable. My sister has a really cute decor and she did a lot of it by going to yard sales. And I do change things up if I find something I like at a yard sale as well. 
When my Dad built the house we live in, he did it with the intentions of not having to remodel it later. He put in popcorn ceilings and paneling, so he wouldn’t have to paint. The house is 36 years old now and those things have not been replaced. Bailey thinks the decor is outdated, but to me they are just the same as they always were. 
So, our question of the week is…
Question of the Week
Do you change the decor in your home every year or no? 
How often do you change things?
Joy of the Week
Finally getting my hair cut has been one of the joys of my week. I hadn’t realized how long it had gotten and feels so much better shorter. 
Income/Money
This week I received $10 in PayPal money from MobileXpressions and also received $10.00 in Amazon money from the Consumer Opinion Institute, so an extra $20 for me this week.
I filed my income taxes this past week and am looking forward to a small refund soon. Unless Congress does not raise the debt ceiling as delayed income tax refunds could be part of that problem. 
Avoiding Spending
I’ve spent this week at home, so no spending for me. We will be going to the grocery store over the weekend though to restock, so that won’t last long. 
Saving Money In My Frugal Kitchen
This small bottle of Dawn is the one we got free from the Trading Group this month. I decanted it into my squeeze bottle of Dawn. 

I perused the grocery store sale ads online. Food City has ground chuck for $1.99 with a limit of ten pounds when you buy $25 worth of store brands. Many of their “sale” items are not really sales. Bags of flavored popcorn for $6 a bag is no sale to me. We buy popcorn kernels and pop our own cheaper than that. 

I used to pop our popcorn on the stove using a tablespoon of vegetable oil, but now I use a glass popcorn maker that we bought at a yard sale. It requires no oil, which is a money saver, and you can put a pat of butter in the top if you want that. It’s an inexpensive snack when compared to store bought chips or ready made popcorn. 
My own food, cooked at home, is so much better than a disappointing meal outside our home. For example this week I made pizza for us to enjoy and I made it exactly how we like it. No excessive spending for a possibly disappointing meal we are not satisfied with. 
I read a tip this week that said people add milk to scrambled eggs to stretch them out so they will cost less, which made me wonder about it. I add milk because that’s what my Mom did, but when I’m out of milk I add water. I don’t do it to stretch money, but rather to make the eggs fluffier. We aren’t eating as many eggs as we usually do due to the price. Bailey wants to get a few chickens again. 
I watched another video where someone added enough flour to mashed potatoes to make a pastry for pot pies and such. I usually make potato pancakes with leftover mashed potatoes, but I will give this a try soon. 
I made a batch of Chicken & Rice soup in my Instant Pot using the Universal Soup Recipe I posted earlier this week. For the dried herbs I used Herbes de Provence and for the broth I used Better Than Bouillon in the reduced sodium version. There was no need to add salt as there was some in the bouillon. 
The night that I made Taco Rice I made a little extra rice to have for dinner the next night in Chicken Fried Rice. I doctored it up with Sun Bird Fried Rice seasoning mix, toasted sesame oil, soy sauce, butter, some of the Better Than Bouillon, rice wine vinegar, ginger, garlic salt, and pepper. 
Meals This Week
All meals are served with either salad or vegetables and may not always be listed here. 
* If you see a dinner in bold print that means we had it more than once this week.
Chili with Mexican CornbreadStir Fry Polish Sausage, Cabbage, Onions, Carrots. 😋 Chicken & Rice Soup, Saltine CrackersTaco Rice Belinda, Corn on the Cob, Mexican Cornbread. Chicken Fried Rice, Green Beans with Onions and Garlic. 
Recipe of the Week
One way to save money in the kitchen is to make recipes with thrifty ingredients that don't require butter, eggs or milk like those crazy cakes from the Great Depression. 
We had a big can of pumpkin that someone gave to us, so on Tuesday I made these Pumpkin Chocolate Muffins. They are egg, oil, milk and butter free, so they are inexpensive to make. 
Doubling the recipe gave us forty-eight mini muffins and thirty regular muffins (I used a small cookie scoop to fill the muffin tins), so I put some into the freezer. Since they are muffins they are not as sweet as say a cupcake. The pumpkin makes them very moist. 

Pumpkin Chocolate Muffins

Ingredients:

2 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 cup sugar

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 cup cocoa powder

1 can (14.5 ounce) pumpkin

1 cup water

1/2 cup chocolate chips (optional)

Directions:

Whisk all the dry ingredients together. 

Add pumpkin and water.

Fold the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients until just combined. 

Fold in chocolate chips.

Place batter into 24 prepared muffin tins and bake at 350°F for 10-12 minutes

Saving Money YouTube Videos
Loving Life on Less Channel ~ Dave & Liz from Yorkshire in the U.K. are a thrifty couple sharing ideas and wisdom that enabled them to be debt and mortgage free and early retirees at the age of 50. 
Saving on Entertainment
I'm still enjoying Mama's Family for free on Facebook. 

Thank you for dropping by my frugal blog, you are always welcome here. We would love to hear all about your frugal week in the comment section. 😊 

BelindaMortgage & Debt Free~ Living within our Means ~My Linktree
~ She looketh well to the ways of her household ~Proverbs 31:27