Monthly Archives: October 2012

Chocolate(chips) Anyone?

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I thought I would share a couple of my, “deals of the week. ”

A couple of weeks ago Hershey put out a .50 cent coupon for any size chocolate chips. Whoohoo! With holiday baking right around the corner, this was the perfect coupon for me. I knew I would need these chocolate chips if I was going to make my PIC (sister in law) her favorite peanut clusters for Christmas. I was on a mission to score some cheap chocolate chips.

I had already used 4 of my coupons at Walgreens and got chocolate chips for $1.50 a bag (12 ounces). Not bad, since in the store they are running around $2.50 a bag. But my eyes about bugged out when I seen that a local grocery store was doing a 10 for $10 deal on chocolate chips. There were just the 6 ounce bag, but with .50 cent coupons that doubled, it would make them free.

Problem was I only had one coupon left.

I had to somehow talk my daughter out of her coupons. She does not cook anyway. (Don’t tell her I said that.) I needed those coupons.

I asked her real nice, she said she would look for them. I asked her again, she said she would look when she had time. I was getting desperate. I asked (really told) her that the sale was ending soon. I got the LOOK. You know what look I am talking about.

I was able to print off some coupons for .50 cent off of two bags and decided I would make do with those. The store I was going to has a 3 same coupon limit. I used the one .50 cents off of one, and then three .50 cents off of two. This is what I came home with.

         

Yippee! I got seven 6 ounces packages of chocolate chips for $3.13. Not to bad right??? 

I was still on a mission to get those coupons from my daughter. I had to take matters into my own hand.

Hand me the scissors.

I found her inserts that she had not had time to cut out and found her coupons. By this time she came home and I got caught in the act. She really did not care. I told you she does not cook. I also told you not to tell her I said that! : ) Anywho, this is what I got on my, round two, shopping trip to buy chocolate chips.

         

For $10.85 I bought, two-8 count cinnnamon rolls, four-8 count cresent rolls and (what I really went after) five 6 ounce packages of chocolate chips. PLUS….I got a register rewards for $2 off my next purchase for buying 6 General Mills items. In addition General Mills will donate $2 to Susan B. Koman for the Cure. Since my Mom had breast cancer three years ago (she is a survivor YEA) this was really a easy way to coupon and support breast cancer research.

Whew….pass me some chocoate (chips).

What are your, “deals of the week?”

Becky

 

Ordering Coupon Inserts by Mail

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Have you ever forgotten to buy your newspapers for the coupon inserts on Sunday Morning? Or, you have gone to your favorite grocery store to snag yourself a couple and they were all out? Or WORSE, bought your newspaper only to find out when you got home that someone has taken the inserts out of your newspapers….UGH!!!

I have had all of these things happen to me.

If you want to spend a little more money (for shipping) you can always order your inserts. Sometimes the coupons are higher value coupons than the ones you are getting in your local newspaper, or in my case, even when I purchase the larger city newspaper.

Today, when I got home from work, I found this package on my front porch. 

 

A couple of weeks ago I could not get out to get my newspapers. My daughter (who coupons too) could not either. We just decided to order them. We do not do this every week, because the purpose of couponing is to save money, and the shipping does add up. But, when you need them and you do not have another resource, you can always order them.

When you order your coupons, you get charged per insert. So, if that week has 3 inserts, and you want to order all 3 inserts it will cost more money plus the shipping. On the flip side, it is nice to just have them come in the mail. You don’t have to have the hassle of running to the store in your pj bottoms, hair clip and dark sun glasses, hoping not to see anyone you know. (but you usually do)

In this order we recieved a Red Plum, and two Smart Source.

             

 I ordered 5 of each insert and my daughter did too. This might be too many coupons for you. Sometimes, it is a lot to keep control over but when I can get 5 items free from my 5 coupons it is worth it.

If you are interested, check out, thecoupongirlz.com web page to see where you can order coupon inserts.

In the meantime, I will be bribing my daughter to cut out my coupons.

Where’s the scissors?

Becky

Is 40 Boxes of Cereal too Many?

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We love cereal at our house! Not just love love. We LOVE LOVE cereal at our house!

Kellogg’s, General Mill, Post and Quaker Oats; I could have used these names for middle names for my girls.

But, I ask you, is forty boxes of cereal too much???

Normal people would be aghast and fall over in a faint!!!! Not so, with people that use coupons.

I will try to explain.

The coupon deals comes in waves and you got to catch the wave and buy buy buy. It means you will save save save.

My stockpile of cereal had a wee little bit of empty space.  Youngest college daughter came home for the weekend and poof an empty space in cereal stockpile appeared. I wondered why her car looked loaded down when she waved bye and peeled out of the driveway.

I have not bought cereal for several months because we have been using from the stockpile. (Stockpile is a couponers term for, “kitchen pantry is too full”) My family and I would just go to the stockpile, like you would at a cereal isle in the store and get another box of cereal when we needed it. The main rule is that you have to get the cereal from the front row. So sorry, if you are craving frosted flakes and the only box of frosted flakes are in the back row. The cereal is put oldest to the front and newest to the back. The only way the rule is broken, is if you are sick for 10 days and the doctor orders you to eat the frosted flake cereal from the back row. OR, if you are the Mom….and if the kids are not looking,  grab the frosted flakes from the back row, hide it under the bed and go happily to the bedroom with a glass of milk and a bowl…oh, a spoon too. : 0 )

Anywho, going back to my wee bit of space in my cereal stockpile. There just happened to be a sale on Cheerios and other General Mills cereal this week at Gerbes. I could buy cereal, with a coupon, from 75 cents to $1.69 a box.

Hallelujah!

First, I bought 4 boxes of cereal; 3 cheerios and 1 cocoa puffs.

         

I got four boxes of cereal for $4.11.

The cereal zombie in me took over and I bought eight more boxes.

This time 4 cheerios, 2 cocoa puffs and 2 golden grahams for about $11 dollars. I would show you my receipt but the wind grabbed that receipt and took it on a trip down the street. I could not decide whether to drop the cereal in my arms and start running after the receipt, or just saying bye bye receipt?  It is probably in Kansas by now.

12 boxes of cereal for an average cost of $1.30 each. (I added $4.11 plus $11.50 and divided it by 12)

Whohoo!!!!

I can sleep like a (cereal) baby tonight. I have that wee bit of space in my stockpile filled with cereal, I bought it for a great price, I don’t have to worry about buying cereal again until college daughter comes back into town with an empty trunk, and the best part is that I still have a hidden box of frosted flakes cereal in the back row…..

Is 40 boxes of cereal too many????

Well…..do I have to answer that question or can I just go eat some frosted flakes….

Where is my favorite spoon??

Cee–re–all later!

Becky

Stop and smell the flour!

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I have postponed cooking with my students at school, as long as I could get away with it!

Every day they would ask, when they came in the classroom door, “When are we going to start cooking?”  Sigh

We have done some “baby” cooking as they call it. We have made microwave monkey bread,  microwave pop corn balls, and microwave frittatas.  Do you see a theme here?.

The students thought it was high time to use the “grown up” ovens.

Students and cooking and stoves……oh My!

One of the first things I let the students make in the oven is either biscuits or cookies. They decided to make biscuits. Of course, the main ingredient for biscuits is flour.  Usually, I can get free flour through the commodity program at school. The commodities are provided free or at a very low cost to the schools for the lunch program. What the schools feels like they have a surplus of, we (the FACS teachers) get to order. Flour, has been on the list for the 13 years I have been teaching.

This year is a little different.  The midwest was pretty much in a drought all summer and it has caused a drought in the flour availablity.

 I even loaned our school kitchen two bags of flour I just happen to have have on hand to make apple crisp. This was serious business!  What would school lunch be without their famous apple crisp????

 I felt like I had “saved the day” at lunch, you know kinda like the old Mighty Mouse cartoon…… FACS Teacher to save the day!…(ouch, that dates me doesn’t it?).

Bake, no, back to the flour shortage.

 I felt like Old Mother Hubbard, when I looked and saw my storage room was bare.

I was checking the sale ads in the paper and Hyvee had a two day sale on flour. UMMMM..I did not see a limit. I wondered if they would happen to have an extra 100 bags of flour just laying around. I wondered if I could get 100 bags of flour into my car. I wondered if I could talk 5 teachers into putting 20 bags of flour into their cars and bringing them to school. I wondered if I could required all my kids to bring in a bag of flour instead.

I wondered if I was crazy. Help!

I just decided to call Hyvee. To make a long story short….I got my flour for 99 cents a bag, they shopped  and delivered all 100 bags to my classroom. I even ordered 30 bags of sugar they had on sale too, you know, to sweeten the deal!

         

This is what my storage rooms looks like now with 100 bags of flour and 30 bags of sugar.

 Well…not really.

We used 3 bags of flour to make biscuits, (I will post about that later this weekend).  The students used one bag of sugar to put in their koolaide. Yes, the whole bag into one pitcher of koolaide. ok…almost a whole bag before I rescued the sugar from them.

Now, I can go into my storage room and look at all my flour. The pretty yellow color with blue trim…..and I can stop, and smell the flour.

Better than saying, “I can smell something burning, right?”

The day of a FACS teacher,

Becky

Baking Powder Biscuits

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At the Ladies Day at church, I won some jelly. Not just any jelly. I won corn cob jelly. Well, it was the jelly that no one else wanted at my table. Maybe it was the yellow color tinged with green. Or, that it was made from left over corn cobs.

Sounds yummy right?

I have never tried corn cob jelly and have hardly seen it before. I felt like I had stepped back in time when I seen the name. I wanted it!

When you have a special jelly, made by special ladies, you need to make something special to put it on. It was time to make some home made baking powder biscuits.

This biscuit recipe is my “go to” biscuit recipe. It works when, I am camping, on vacation and it works every time in my kitchen when I want to make my family a special breakfast. Today, they do not know that they will be putting corn cob jelly on their biscuits. I made bacon to bribe them with, eggs too, and lets not forget to mention gravy. I had this in the bag!

First thing you need to do is measure the flour and put it in a medium size bowl.

Next, add in the baking powder, salt and sugar. Stir to combine.

         

Next measure the shortening and take a pastry cutter and cut the shortening into small pea size pieces.

Did you know that each one of these pieces of shortening make a flake?

         

Now, add the milk. Stir, until all the flour is moisten. Take the dough and put it on a floured surface. I just use my kitchen counter.

         

Knead the dough about 20 times. Roll the dough to about 1 inch thick.

         

Cut out the dough with a biscuit cutter. I found this old very large biscuit cutter. It was perfect for cutting out this monster biscuits.

Place the biscuits on a cookie sheet The two misshapen biscuits are made from the left over dough. I call these my “taste tester” biscuits.

         

Place biscuits in the oven and bake for 15 minutes at 400 degrees or until they are a golden brown. I always brush melted butter on the top. Can you see my reflection?

Now, it was time to try the corn cob jelly.

Does anyone want some butter to go with their CORN cob jelly?

My girls said no, and asked to pass them the grape jelly. My son tried it and said it tasted better before it was on his biscuit.

City kids!!!

I went ahead and let them eat some bacon and eggs and even some gravy anyway.

I really liked it! I don’t have to share it now, either.

It is fun to try something new, even if it’s yellow and made out of left overs : )!

Enjoy!

Becky

Baking Powder Biscuit Recipe

Ingredients

I doubled the recipe when I made these

2 cups of flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon sugar

1/2 cup shortening

3/4 cup milk

Directions:

Mix flour, baking powder, salt and sugar together. Add shortening. With a pastry cutter, cut the shortening into small pieces.

Add milk and stir until all the flour mixture is moisten. Be careful to not over stir.

Put dough onto floured surface and knead about 20 times.

Roll dough out to about 1 inch thick. Using a biscuit cutter (my grandma used a cup) cut the biscuts.

Place them, barely touching each other, onto a cookie sheet.

Bake at 400 degrees for 15 minutes or until golden brown.

Urban Community Farm Hootenanny

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My oldest granddaughter and I took another adventure to the local urban farm.

They were having a Hootenanny.

 You have not heard a hootenanny?  Well, it is a old country word for “party”.

Today the urban farm had a big street party with square dancing and a meal cooked from their garden. All you had to do was make a donation to help provide raised gardens beds for low income families and the party was free. It was a bargain.

My granddaughter went on a scavenger hunt around the garden. I walked around looking at all the silent action items. Local businesses had donated all kinds of gift cards, garden tools, jewelry and gift baskets. I had my eye on a cast iron skillet, $40 gift card and 3 embroidered hand towels. Musicians were playing,  square dancing was going on in the street; this really was a party. 

In all this feel good hootenanny atmosphere….I was worried.

Last week, if you remember from my earlier post, we had visited the urban garden. We had walked down and checked out the chickens. They had white ones in one coop and different colored ones in another coop. The different colored ones followed us around, being friendly and wanted fed. The white ones just laid around looking at us.

Today, there was grilled chicken on the menu.

Did the white chickens know their fate?

I walked down to check out the chicken coops to see if my suspicions were correct. The coop with the white chickens in it seemed a little less crowded. Like 76 chickens less. 

Squawk!!

I had to take this bit of information in. I am not a vegetarian. I like to eat chicken. This just makes it a little more….say….real.

My grandparents had farms. I know what happens.

Better this way then a raccoon…right?

Let’s talk about Mr Bee Bumbles houses instead.

They had two bee hives. They had a lot of bees in them. They were behind yellow tape. Does that tell you something? I zoomed in and the bees zoomed at me while I took their picture. They were a little camera shy.  I beehived it out of there.

Next, came the neat rows of gardens. I wish I had a garden that looked like these. 

         

         

           I read all about the garden program.                             They had a sample of a raised vegetable garden.

After chasing my granddaughter through the scavenger hunt. Running from bees and looking at all the silent action goodies, I was getting hungry. I could smell great aromas coming from the grill.

It was time to eat.

As my granddaughter and I got in line, I was trying to explain about the chickens. This was worse than a birds and bee talk.

My granddaughter chose the free range hamburger patty.

Me, well I chose the……

         

 …………chicken.                                                     I ate squash too.

 Burp! Enough said.

Now, it was time for the games.

As with any good grandma…..or one that is too tired to argue, we had to play some games. This one cost me a dollar.

It was kinda like cow patty bingo, but this was a chicken drop(ping) game. You buy a ticket for a dollar. If the chicken “drops” in your number square you win a all natural Popsicle. 

All the kids stand by the chicken fence and chanted, “Plop, Plop, Chicken, Chicken, Drop, Drop”

I guess they were listening cause…..

Granddaughter won a popsicle (lucky number 19) and was given another one.

         

                    A pumpkin one.                                               A caramel apple one.

I got a bite of both. She said she was full. I think it was the all natural ingredients.

Thank you for letting me share about our adventure to the urban garden. I was so impressed that these dedicated volunteers want to feed and teach lower income families how to raise vegetables and fruit and also provide these families with a free raised garden bed. All I can say is Dedication!

 Besides teaching about raising your own vegetables, they also teach you about composting and using recycled dishes.

         

They taught me to separate my food scraps (from the foil)  for the compost pile. They also use REAL plates and silverware. But, real recycled dishes means you have to wash them, right?  Any volunteers?

It was time for us to go home : ).

Squawk! Squawk!

Becky

 

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