Love, Peace & Frugal Accomplishments

Hello, friends.  Last week, I made spaghetti, using our tomatoes, garlic and herbs.  A $25 Amazon GC was redeemed through swagbucks.  I was mad at myself, after a trip to Walgreens.  I received an in store coupon for $5 off $20.  I had also received a couple of these coupons via email, but deleted them because I had this one.  When I went to use it, I found out it had expired the day before, unlike the ones sent via email.  I tried to bring one up on my phone, but couldn't find it.  Oh well, I did receive $2 off the cards I purchased, as well as another 20% discount for seniors day.  Organic navel oranges and gala apples were bought on sale at Aldi, as well as a mango for .49 and grapefruit for .49 ea.  Along with the usual deer tracks, I've been seeing raccoon tracks on my morning walks.  In years past, we've had them come up to our door, and get into the chicken coop.  Hopefully, they'll stay in the wilder places. 

I contacted amazon customer service, as a $1 promotion for no rush shipping was credited as .01.  I ended up receiving a $5 credit for my trouble.  A batch of bird suet was made.  I needed some more pillows for the day bed, as the back made it really uncomfortable to sit on.  I found the perfect large pillows, covered in linen, as the local Dogwill thrift store for $4 each.  They're perfect, and it is now a comfy place to sit.  I made the salad dressing in this post, using homegrown thyme this time.  We're having some warmer days.  I enjoyed being in the garden, and fertilized all the greens in the main garden with fish emulsion.  At almost dark, I remembered the cabbage and collards in the pond garden, but that will wait for another day.  A small amount of weeding was done.  I tried a new recipe, using our canned green beans, which we both agreed was just OK.

While dropping off orders for Fedex at Walgreens, I noticed all their Christmas items were marked 70% off.  I found holiday cards, and bought two boxes for $4.50 each.  They also had reader glasses BOGO, so I got 2 pairs for $9.99.  I tried on two pairs of jeans I brought home from the shed clean out, and both fit great.  I've long wanted to read the UK version of Country Living, but didn't want to pay the high cost of a subscription.  I looked to see if I could purchase one at the news stands in Germany, but never saw any.  I asked J for some for Christmas, and he gifted me two issues from 2019.  I've read one of them, which was lovely, though I'm really surprised by the pages and pages of advertising, which seems much more than my US version.  I guess it's good I never splurged to get a year's subscription.

My initial daily swagbucks goal was made most days.  Walks were taken with the pups.  Wild greens were harvested for the chickens, with occasional kitchen scraps thrown in.  Some of our sweet potatoes were baked, to go with leftover cabbage and noodles.  A batch of yogurt was made.  While in town, I ran by the discount grocery, but didn't find anything I wanted.  I dropped off bags I'd been saving for them to reuse.  Recyclables were dropped off.  Though I canceled my newspaper subscription in the late summer/fall, it took them this long to finally stop it.  I would love to continue supporting them, and know it's got to be a tough job to reliably provide newspapers in rural areas, but I just can't convince myself to pay for a service I don't receive on so many occasions.  I'm sure they'd love subscribers to use the online version, but that's not for me.

Though I'd read about others doing it, I'd never cut open a tube of toothpaste until now.  There really is quite a bit of toothpaste still in there, which I'm working on using up.  A neighbor gave me 60 tulip bulbs last month, which I finally planted on Sunday.  Better late than never, right?  The warm weather allowed me to open windows over the weekend,  and the fresh air was wonderful.  J helped me put Christmas boxes back into the attic.  My studio is returning to some semblance of order, though I decided to keep the tree up a bit longer.  All the Christmas themed ornaments were taken down, and the nature related ones remain... bird nests, feathers, bird houses, chickens, as well as anything related to love and peace.  I'm thinking we can always use more of that.  Wishing you a plentiful amount of both this week.