​Hi everyone! We just finished up "Birthday Week" here, starting with Baby's birthday last weekend and mine this weekend. Have I mentioned how much I LOVE this time of year? Hubs took me shopping to my favorite store and out to eat at my favorite restaurant. On the way, we stopped at a cemetery and found my great-great grandparents' (our daughter's great-great-GREAT grandparents!) headstone, which I'd never seen before. Cemeteries are often so quiet; it's like touring a museum of stone artwork. The occasional stroll through a graveyard is a good reminder of how short life is and how long eternity is. Plus... they're free! And it's even more fun when you can find your relatives!

Anyhow... onto frugal accomplishments.

1. Writing: I've been spending a lot of time editing and coming up with marketing materials for my next book. 🙂 🙂 I took a rather long break from writing after Baby was born, and it feels good to have another project nearing the finish line. I'm hoping it will be published by the end of this year.  

2. Cooking: I made a pumpkin roll, cookies and chili for Baby's little birthday party. We had some other things as well that were not homemade, and I made her a tiny birthday cake. I used half a 10 lb. roll of ground beef for the chili, so I used the other 5 lbs. to make a double batch of meatloaf and freeze several pounds of cooked burger. I figure if you have to repackage and freeze the meat anyway, you might as well cook it or mix it in with other things and make it a "freezer meal".

3. FREE BOOKS! While we were on a bike ride, I stopped by the side of the road to dig through a trailer pile of free stuff. Most of the time we just come home with empty beer/soda cans, but this time I brought home nine books!!! Some of the books were in fair or poor condition, but to me a free book is a free book. "The Prize Winner's Handbook", "The Art of Italian Cooking" "The Bicentennial Cookbook" and "Everything You Want to Know About Feet" were some of my finds. I also got a little book about how to save money on groceries (which included no less than 18 hot dog recipes) and three homemaking humor books. 

My favorite finds were two vintage magazine-style books. One was a McCall's Cookie Collection book from 1965. The second was a "Learn How Book" with instructions for knitting, embroidery, crochet, and tatting from 1941. I wanted to learn crochet on my birthday, and the book provided some good tips. I have another book with crochet instructions, and I've watched various Youtube videos, but have only slightly got the hang of it. The hook and yarn are still clumsy in my hands, and my work doesn't look consistent. I think I'd benefit from having an in-person lesson.

4. Birthday: I picked up a free personal-sized pizza for my birthday. I also received some mums and an orchid as birthday gifts. Two gifts that keep on giving! My grandparents also got me a cinnamon broom—something I'd never seen before. It makes our house smell wonderful! 

5. Cloth diapers: As I mentioned a few weeks ago, we've been battling smelly diapers and diaper rash for awhile now. Rash is not uncommon when cloth diapered babies transition from exclusive breast milk to solids, but it's certainly not pleasant. I invested in some buffalo/Native American polar fleece to make larger fleece liners to use with her diapers. The other roll of fleece in the clearance bin was printed with the presidential seal... I had to chuckle to myself at the thought of using it for diaper liners. Out of respect for the current President and all that came before him, I left that roll for someone else.

In addition to adding fleece liners to the diapers, I increased the temperature of our wash water and started changing Baby more frequently; every two hours or so. While the additional changes are annoying, they do cut down on diaper rash. Unfortunately it meant I had to buy some more diapers to stretch the stash.

Since I needed some extra inserts anyway, bought a pack of flour sack towels from Walmart to try as boosters for our Alva pocket diapers. I really like them. The cotton doesn't hold stink like microfiber does, and the flats are so, so fast and easy to dry. If nothing else, the flour sack towels will give me an extra day to dry the other inserts. When we first started cloth diapering, I purchased what I thought were "bamboo" inserts at $2.00 a piece. Last week I cut one of the inserts open and discovered that they're actually three layers of microfiber sandwiched between two layers of bamboo. No wonder ALL of the inserts stank! I'm going to stop using those for a while and instead use the flour sack towels as boosters. If I can do without the "bamboo" inserts, I'll try selling them. There's no reason to keep around a bunch of additional, stink-holding microfiber inserts if I have perfectly good hemp and cotton inserts to use.

I think that's about it for the week's accomplishments! I hope you are all having a lovely September.

-Bethany

​Whew, nap time. I set a steaming cup of tea on the side table and sank into our comfy maroon glider. Propped my feet up on the ottoman. I opened up the little black book I use to record all of Baby Girl's accomplishments, quirks and funny stories. Today was her first birthday, so I wanted to make a special entry. I wrote about how much I loved being her mother, about all of the bike rides and walks we'd taken, Bible stories we'd read together, songs we'd sang and played on the piano together. I wrote a little more and then paused. What were some other things we'd done together? I read back over my list. Then all of a sudden I felt my throat get tight. Tears started welling up in my eyes and the back of my neck tingled.

I wasn't just writing down a few fun things we did. I was writing down my hopes and dreams of the last fifteen years. Slowly opening the door to the bedroom after nap time, saying, "Do I hear a baby girl?", then seeing her little head pop up in the crib, her little cloth diaper butt bouncing up and down in excitement.  Sitting at the breakfast table, scraping some eggs off of my plate and onto hers, talking about what a fun day we're going to have. Buckling her little bike helmet under her chin as she swings her fat little legs against her seat. Passing her pieces of celery to chew on as I chop some up for lunch. Feeling the weight of her body on my back as we walk out to the mailbox, then handing back a piece of junk mail so she can share in the fun. Hearing her shrieks of laughter as Hubs and I tickle and play with her at the end of a long day, even though we're both so tired.

All at once the past and present got tangled up. For years these had been my dreams, and now they were memories. Already done. 

Do you ever feel like your life is full of waiting? I do. Waiting to graduate high school and "be an adult". Waiting for the right man to marry. Waiting for a baby to come. Waiting, waiting, waiting. There are still big life events that I'm waiting for. The Bible says that hope deferred makes your heart sick, BUT when desire comes, it is a tree of life. 

The little black book became a blur in front of my face. I couldn't hold back tears, sobbing uncontrollably. No human being deserves the kind of happiness, the tree of life I've experienced in the last year. There are no words to express the extreme joy and constant satisfaction that comes from spending every day with a tiny companion; watching her grow and learn new things, sharing in her excitement and she sharing in mine. Watching her grimace as she sucks a bit of my smoothie up the straw. Wiping bubbles off my face because she's splashing in the dish water. Popping her in the front of the grocery cart, letting her hold the grocery list so we can go grocery shopping together. Her cute little fake laugh that tells me she's only laughing because I am, not because she thinks something is funny. The way she bobs up and down when she hears music somewhere, or starts clapping when I sing "Do Lord... oh do Lord... oh do remember me!" Helping her drop pennies in the big glass water jug that we call her "wedding fund", watching the intense concentration on her face melt away when her hot, sticky penny joins its fellows at the bottom of the jar. Watching her fall asleep at my breast.

I write about saving money. Saving money is not my passion. I write about saving money in hopes that some unhappy wife or mother can quit bagging groceries, waiting tables or cleaning offices and come home to create sweet memories and a little piece of heaven with her family. No regrets.

Love,
Bethany

​1. Groceries: We spent $34.25 on groceries this week, all from Kroger. You can see a picture of my haul below. There were so many manager's specials this week! Everything except the sugar and chicken breasts came from several different clearance sections.

You can see there are quite a few random/abnormal things:

1. Groceries: we bought a block of cheese for $12.00, and a half-bushel of peaches for $18.00.

2. Cooking: I froze most of the peaches, froze some Chinese long beans, made one batch of wine from our own green grapes, plus made three pints of tomato sauce.

Hubs and I had a great conversation last week about canning. I expressed frustration at spending my two free hours every day canning tomatoes, only to save $5.00 or less. Not only that, but my tomato sauce never tastes as good as the store sauce, or even sauce I can make from tomato paste that costs $0.40 per can. I asked Hubs if he had any ideas about how I could make the sauce better without spending even more time cutting and canning tomatoes. I wondered if we should buy a Kitchen Aid Victoria strainer attachment.

“You know, I don’t really like canned food,” he said. At first, I was shocked. There was no amount of work I could do to make my canned tomato sauce perfect. I would never win the battle for a perfect sauce! “What I like about having a garden is how fresh the fruits and vegetables are, and how good they taste,” he continued.

Suddenly, I had an epiphany.

“So you don’t like canned food. Come to think of it, I actually don’t love canning," I said. "What I like is the gardening! Why don’t I work on extending the garden season instead of planting so much to freeze and can?”

A weight lifted off of my shoulders. I’m not going to throw away my canner, but for this season of life it doesn’t make sense for me to do a lot of canning, especially for low-value products like tomato sauce. Why not spend time doing something I enjoy—gardening—and create food that my husband also enjoys? Nowadays there are all sorts of ways to grow things early in the spring, late into fall and even through the winter if you are willing to invest in a hydroponics or aquaponics system. I am so excited to be shifting my focus with the garden.

3. Thrift store: I bought some things at the Volunteers of America 50% off sale. I got a wicker tray for $1.50, a water container for $0.75, a book for $0.30, baby shoes for $1.00, a bowl for $0.50, brand new muffin cup liners for $0.30, and a belt for $0.50. The water dispenser and basket tray work great for a kitchen station that I’m working on for Baby (who is quickly becoming more of a toddler and less of a baby… sniffle!).

4. Collected cans to recycle on several bike rides.

5. Rearranged my recipe cards into days of the week and months of the year, rather than in categories of “Drinks,” “Soups,” “Desserts,” etc. I hope this will help me to have a more seasonal menu plan, while not changing the basic plan much. This system is a lot like the Sidetracked Home Executives plan for cleaning, except I’ve used it for cooking instead. My goal is to find specific recipes for each month that will utilize fresh, in-season and on sale ingredients as much as possible. The rotating menu plan is something I’ve wanted to implement for a long time, but wasn’t sure how to organize it. If the note cards work as planned, I’ll refill the “weekly” tabs once a month with new recipes. Then when I go to cook each day, all of the recipes will be in one place. I’ll also be able to peek at the next day’s note cards to see if I need to thaw out any meat or start cooking anything the day before.

6. Cloth diapers: I tested our water for hardness, and it came out at an average hardness of 250. I’ve been trying to resolve ammonia stink issues that developed over the last eight months. I stripped the diapers, which seemed to help a lot but didn’t entirely take away the stink. Supposedly your wash routine is not optimal if the diapers ever have stink issues, so I want to fix the problem and not have to strip again. Stripping isn’t particularly expensive or complicated, but it’s a hassle. It cost $5.00 for the bottle of Calgon, plus at least $1.00 for disposables that I had to use while stripping.

I also spent $29.00 on five new diapers from the Alva factory in China. We had some diapers poop out (haha) due to delamination, so I wanted to buy some more. I looked into some other different diaper options, but none were as cheap as the Alvas. Plus, I like the prints and how they fit.

As I continue to do cloth diapers, I hesitate to recommend it as a frugal activity for anyone besides first-time moms. At this point, I’ve spent at least $300.00 on cloth diaper related supplies—some of which worked, some of which didn’t. Diapers, inserts, pail liners, a sprayer, gloves and a spatula, more diapers and inserts, store-bought laundry soap, stripping supplies, special cloth-friendly clothing and clothing patterns. I’ve spent hours and hours crunching numbers, checking for deals, trying to fix issues like the ammonia stink one. I save less than $30.00 per month. Every time I buy new stuff for the stash, it cuts into savings. For example, I spent all of August’s savings on new diapers. Not only that, but I’m not saving 100% of the time because I still keep a small number of disposables on hand for road trips, stripping, severe rash, etc. Now I'm looking at adding water softener to the list, which would cost about $2.00 per week. I’m not saving as near much money as I originally thought I would. 

I’m convinced that the big savings from cloth diapers come mostly from use on the second child, and subsequent children; after you’ve worked out a lot of the kinks in your system, and when you’re not burning through diapers from misuse or buying accessories willy-nilly to find what works best. That means that the key to saving money with cloth diapers is to make your diapers last as long as humanly possible, while carefully limiting the ongoing costs of laundry detergent, disposable liners, etc.

So yeah, I’m feeling a little burnt out on canning and ambivalent about our cloth diapers. But excited about other things, like fall and new gardening projects and my birthday coming up. It’s important to re-evaluate what you’re doing at regular intervals to see if it’s still a good fit. Why settle for good when there is a “best” still out there?

Til next time,
Bethany