Last weekend I ended up hurting my back while lifting a garbage bag into our county dumpster, so much so that I went to the doctor who prescribed me pain medicine and a muscle relaxer. The pain was rough and while not 100% yet, is better than it was. I ended up working every day this past week even with the pain.
My long term sub job ended on Friday and since Monday is a federal holiday there will be no school. But, I do have a job lined up for Tuesday already.
My daughter stepped up to the plate for me this week as making dinner was causing the pain to be even worse. We made it through though and did not succumb to any take out food.
My daughter received her scholarship funds within the last week and created a very detailed budget for every dollar. She moved some of the money into her savings account and will use those funds to pay her monthly car insurance until September when her next scholarship funds come through. She is very good at managing her money, has no debt, makes sure all her bills are paid on time, and is a whiz with couponing, which saves the whole household money. I'm very grateful for this.
Friday was payday for me, so I've been going over my budget the last week with a fine tooth comb. I transferred money into both our emergency funds savings account and our "new home" savings account. I have five paydays left until the end of the school year, and I want to make sure that my budget will work based on my income and our expenses during the summer will be as small as possible.
Our electric bill was down this month to $133 instead of the $200 bill from last month. We've had a mild winter here this year, hardly using any heat, and our bill reflects that.
Some deals that we were able to get in on this week include:
24 boxes of Barilla pasta for 4¢ each. Here is a video my daughter made about the deal.
Since we have all this pasta, I'm going to be making a pasta salad for lunches this coming week. I like to combine ranch dressing with Italian dressing for the sauce in my pasta salads, but I am out of ingredients to make my homemade version.
I do have some Greek dill yogurt dressing that my daughter bought but did not care for, but I think I can substitute it in the pasta salad and disguise it. That will save money over buying ingredients for homemade ranch and I'll be using this dip instead of tossing it, a win-win situation.
For dinner on Saturday I made soup using up the remainder of a pork roast that I had stored in the freezer, along with carrots, potatoes, onions, and corn. I seasoned it with a bay leaf, Hungarian paprika, Worcestershire sauce, and salt and pepper.
Then on Sunday for lunch I thickened the soup with some cornstarch and turned it into a stew for lunch ad served it with bread and butter slices.
Other frugal things this past week...
- I received a $25 Amazon gift card this week for renewing my Norton antivirus protection last December.
- Picked up a free newspaper at school with the sale ads inside instead of paying 50¢ for one.
- The last three days I've stayed home to rest my back as much as possible, so it has been a no spend weekend. Did not use any of the gas in my car either, so a win-win situation there as well.
I woke up bright and early today thinking that I would NOT be working today, but then I received a call to sub around 6:30 this morning. I have never worked the first day back to school, but one of the teachers woke up sick this morning and needed a sub, so she called me. Last year I worked on the second day of school, but never on the first day until today. I am so, so glad that I made lunches yesterday and went ahead yesterday and made today's dinner, which was Chili Mac. Turns out my daughter was sick at school today and I ended up making her a doctor's appointment after school. She is now on antibiotics. We didn't get home until after 5 o'clock and it was so nice that all I had to do when I came home was to heat up dinner and serve it along with a salad, which was also already made. Planning ahead made my day run a whole lot smoother. Today was a good day for me sub-wise as my phone stayed busy with requests. I even had to turn down a couple of days as I was already booked. I am very grateful for each and every request.
In years past I always bought a calendar/planner to write down the days I am subbing, but I haven't done that for this school year and my calendar from last school year ran out in July. There are some beautiful planners out there that I would love to have, but they also cost money. I paid $7.00 for one I used last year and it was a plain, no frills one, but I've seen them cost a lot more than that! The Erin Condren planners are beautiful, and I would love to have one, but I cannot pay over $50 for a planner. One of our local banks gives really nice calendars to all the teachers, but unfortunately that does not trickle down to the substitutes. My daughter made me a calendar for August, but I already need at least the rest of 2015, so this year I am just going to print them off the Internet for free instead of paying $7 or more for a planner. I actually found one that was advertised as a printable ink saver calendar. The school where I subbed today gave me a folder of important papers and I can keep my new calendar in the inside pocket. I've just reached the point in my life where I am tired of some things costing so much money. I said at the beginning of the year that one of my goals in 2015 was to avoid consumerism, and this is one of those times. I think times are tough right now, and I have read and seen things financially that concern me greatly. For now, I am going into gazelle mode when it comes to spending any money. So, for right now I am counting my blessings and grateful that I was able to work today. :)
