Can't Beat It!

Right now Steak n Shake has their kid's shakes for 99 cents! It comes in quit a few flavors, not just strawberry, vanilla and chocolate. We have gone a couple of times and I also get the kid's size. They use reusable cups that I am using to restock our cabinet, because our supply of restaurant cups is quickly dwindling. Has anyone else noticed that they don't do a lot of reusable kid's cups at restaurants anymore? Those are the only cups we use for the boys, so it is a double bonus in my mind! Can you tell that I am excited about the Steak n Shake deal? Oh and I must point out the fact that it is only one mile from our house, so we are not burning through a lot of gas... very important now a days!

Our Date Night...

I am SO thankful to Michelle for doing the bloggy giveaway that I won. Here are the details on what we did with the Visa giftcard that I received.

Last Friday night, Monte and I were able to go to a Japanese Steakhouse here in town. There are two of them, but we chose the one that we had a coupon for… BONUS! This is something we have never done together. I went to one when I was in 4th grade. That was 22 years ago, I am surprised I even remember going.

We had a wonderful time! Was it because we were eating for free? Um… maybe that had something to do with it, but I just love spending alone time with Monte. I know it is important to have that time together, but sometimes it is hard to accomplish!

This was the second date that we have had in a month and that is a record for us. Our babysitter, Cassie, is in college, so we are only able to have here when she is on breaks. This summer she is going to be a camp counselor, so we knew we needed to make the most of her being home.

We are planning on going away for a long weekend when Cassie comes home in August. Isaac stayed with our friends overnight when he was 8 months old, other than that we have never left the boys. I was originally thinking we would go to Chicago, but Monte HATES cities. So, I am thinking about the Indiana Dunes. We have never been there and it looks like a lot of fun!

Any other suggestions?

Green Smoothies... UPDATE!!

I wanted to let you all know that I had a success today with the boys drinking the green smoothies! I used bananas, strawberries (with stem on), a little spinach (very little) and ice. It was a really neat pink color with a little green mixed in. They drank it down and asked for more. John is by far my pickiest eater and he had two servings. I was so excited and wanted to share. I will SLOWLY add in more spinach, but for now I am happy that they are drinking it with no sugar.

Green Smoothies

Last week when I did my budget busters I tagged Michelle. One of her busters was spending too much on her green smoothies. I was like, “green WHAT?” So I looked into it and I was amazed. I went out the next day and got all the things I needed. In one glass of my green smoothie I get FIFTEEN, yes 15 servings of fruits and vegetables. My boys still are not in love with them, so I keep trying new ingredients with theirs.

This is what I use in my smoothies: raw spinach, kale and many fruits (banana, apple, strawberries, raspberries). I have done some reading and I leave the steams on the strawberries (they have TONS of nutrients).

If you are going to go to her site, I suggest that you watch the video on the first page. She'll tell you what she puts in the smoothie. I just use the $40 blender that we have and it works fine, so far.

Monte thinks I am crazy, but it honestly tastes good or I wouldn't do it. I know I am treating my body well by getting in so many servings of fruits and vegetables. I haven’t been spending a lot on them either.

Our second chance

I feel that Monte and I are in the mist of a second chance from God. Let me explain myself a little bit further…

Monte and I have had debt from the day we got married. I think our biggest mistake was not having a budget for the first 6 years of our marriage. I feel that if we did have a budget from day one, we would of had more control.

On our honeymoon we bought a very expensive timeshare that we have only used two times. At the time we thought it was such a great idea. We didn’t think about kids or the fact that we didn’t live anywhere near our parents and had to use our vacation time to visit them. Oh how they prey on honeymooners… grrr! We would love to sell our timeshare, but they are hard to sell. I have found that out the hard way, they are just a pain in the neck! I think Dave Ramsey would refer to this as a stupid tax. Making this mistake has taught us a lot about buying anything on an impulse. It will never happen again.

Between our three boys they have had six surgeries and many doctors appointments. We have always had a lot of medical bills.

Also, most of our married life we have had a car payment. So all those things add up quickly and have left us living paycheck to paycheck.

In 2005 Monte was a part time pastor in Sheridan. We lived rent free in a parsonage for 10 months. Monte was working 2 jobs, so there was little time for budgeting and I was beyond busy caring for an infant and two toddlers.

About eight months into our rent free living, I started to take over the finances. One of the reasons I did it was so Monte would have more time with the family. I also felt like the Lord had given us this opportunity and we needed to be doing something constructive with our money. I wanted to become debt free. I wish I would of come to the realization earlier because 2 months didn’t help a whole lot. Shortly after we moved to Avon and accrued moving costs. We found we were back at square one.

Monte lost his job in July 2007 and within one day he was employed. The Lord has always take care of us and supplied all our needs. I often forget this and get stressed when an unexpected problem arises.

With this new job I feel that God has given us a second chance. Monte is able to get a bonus based on his volume. He has to work long hours, waking up at 4:30am and not getting home till 6:30pm, to accomplish this, but we feel this is our chance. For the last eight months we have been living off Monte’s salary and using his bonus checks to pay down our debt. We should be out of debt (not including our house) in five months. I am now starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel and it is so exciting. We are so thankful for this second chance and are looking forward to yelling, “WE’RE DEBT FREE” in October!

I've Been Tagged... My Five Budget Busters

This has been a great blogging week for me. First I won a $50 Visa Card from Michelle and now I have been tagged for the first time!

I've been tagged by Monica! She shared her top 5 budget busters and "tagged" me to do the same! So here goes in no set order...

1. I think every American is dealing with higher gas prices, but it is really affecting our budget. Monte drives 60 miles a day to and from work. He has a Ford Explorer (V8, all wheel drive) and it is a gas hog. About 4 months ago, he started driving my beloved van because it gets a lot better gas mileage. Last fill up it cost $70 and we have to fill up every 5 days (my husband works 6 days week, at least twice a month). A month ago it cost us $50 to fill the van up. I can’t believe in one month it costs us $20 more to fill up.

2. Josiah is on a special diet (no wheat or dairy) so that makes our overall food budget higher than most “frugal” families. He will not be on this diet his whole life (at least I hope not), but until then we are going to have to deal with the higher prices.

3. Last year when food prices were *normal* I was able to buy a lot of organic food, but now I just can’t justify paying $6 for 8 organic strawberries. So I have had to go back to conventional, for the most part. The one thing I will not budge on is milk that is hormone free. For a gallon of organic hormone free milk is $6.00. We go through 1.5 gallons of milk each week (Josiah is on Rice Milk). I have found that some grocery stores (like Meijer) are now advertising that the farms they buy their milk from guarantee that they do not use hormones. I am not so anal about it being organic as I am with the hormones. I gave it a try last week when it was on sale at Meijer and the boys didn’t notice the difference!

4. The boys have 3 sets of grandparents and none live near us. The closest set live 7 hours away, with the furthest ones living 20 hours away. With summer approaching we’ll be making our yearly venture to the grandparents. This always puts a strain on the budget. Honestly, I don’t do well planning ahead. I am sure it wouldn’t put as much of a strain on the checkbook, if I did a better job preparing. Maybe next year that can be one of my goals!

5. I am going to throw Monte under the bus now and say that another buster is his hobby… hunting. All hobbies are expensive, but hunting has got to be close to the top of the list. There are always supplies he *NEEDS*, lotteries to get into, licenses to purchase, new defenseless animals that needs to be killed and with each new animals there is always a need for a special gun for that certain game. Each year he needs a new gun for whatever hunting season he is participating in and or game he is hunting. OK, I am exaggerating a little bit there. He has bought two new guns in the eight years that we have been married, but he would buy one each year if I wasn't in charge of the finances! Plus in my mind ONE gun is more than enough. The BIG kicker is… WE GIVE THE MEAT AWAY.

I am now tagging Shannon and Michelle.

Life is sometimes too much...

Things at the Alexander house have been a little crazy the last couple of weeks. I have been more than over whelmed with life. Sometimes it is hard to stay on top of it all. I started having issues when it started getting warmer out. The last thing I wanted to do was school, housework, or working out when the sun was shinning and it was 70 degrees. Spring cleaning needed to get done, but I put it off. The park hadn't been visited in many months and the zoo was calling my name. So I am paying the price now and it makes this momma a little stressed.

God is also working on Monte and I in other ways that leave me up at night. I know without a doubt it'll all work out, but the waiting game is hard. I am hoping that I'll be able to share more in a week or two, but until then can you pray for our family please?

Tonight I needed a good dose of stress reliever, so I went shopping. No I didn't go to the mall or even Target, I went to CVS and got myself some free stuff. I can't tell you how much I heart CVS. I love going in there knowing that in most cases they are going to pay ME to take their things home. It is great!

TOP SECRET...

It is sunny out today and going to be close to 70... it is going to be a good day. In honor of the warmer weather that I love, I thought I would pass along a little secret about saving money!

If your kids are anything like mine, they love Chuck E Cheese! They opened a store just down the road from us almost a year ago and we visit often. Most people go at night and on the weekends and it is always very crowded. My youngest falls apart because he doesn't do well with a lot of people, it makes the trip a stressful one. So here is the secret I want to share...

We get there as soon as they open, our opens at 9am... yes 9am. Usually when we go at this time we have the whole place to ourselves. It is perfect. Yes, I know we are more flexible because we are a homeschooling family, but we have also done this on Saturday morning. We don't have the place to ourselves, but it is still not crowded.

Also each day they test the games. They have an employee go around to each game and play it and when he wins tickets he just leaves them. We always ask if it is ok if we take the tickets he won and he is always more than happy to give them to 3 cute little boys! We usually walk away with over 100 tickets without playing one single game!

Chuck E Cheese can be pretty costly, but I found these coupons online and it is only $10 for 100 tokens; that is a savings of at least $10. It usually takes us 2 visits to use that many tokens. The coupons are good until the end of the year.

Time for me to get outside and enjoy this beautiful Indiana day!

Saving Money

Last night we allowed a gentleman from Rain Soft to come into our house and give his talk on how bad our water is and how we *NEED* his purification system. I shouldn't say "we" allowed, they flashed a $10 Target gift card in my face and friends I will take that bait every single time... so "I" allowed him in. Well his 40 minute lecture turned into 2 hours 15 minutes, yes Monte was timing him! It truly was a lot of good information, but I am not interested in a 7 THOUSAND DOLLAR purification system. Can you even imagine? I will drink out nasty chemical infested water and not think twice thank you very much!

So when he asked us/me how much we spent each month on cleaning supplies, shampoo, lotions and so on... I told him $50. The man did not believe me... flat out didn't believe me. He told me that on average a family of 5 should be spending NO less than $150 per month on those types of supplies. I love being below average!

So, I thought I would share with you some sites that I use to help us save money each month. Once again I have to give credit where credit is do. I have gotten most of my information from my friend Monica. She is feeding a family of nine, for $400 per month. I am still amazed at how she does it... she is wonderful!

http://www.moneysavingmom.com/ This website has saved me a lot of money!

http://thriftyfloridamama.blogspot.com/ I don't use this one as often, but I really should be.

http://www.couponsurfer.com/ These are online coupons.

I also have been starting to COOK from scratch. Those who know me well know that I do not enjoy anything about the kitchen. A friend of mine, Sarah, got me this accent piece a few years back. Even though I am changing my ways, this will remain in my kitchen! I actually have enjoyed cooking and trying new things. It is by no means a hobby, but more out of necessity and I enjoy saving money.

My better half is a natural in the kitchen. Whenever we have friends over he comes up with some new creative meal to try... I am very thankful I have him! With him being away from the house almost 70 hours per week I knew I needed to start doing something, so I have embraced cooking head on! I have been making bread and pizza dough from scratch... with some small help from my bread machine. If you don't have a bread machine, the recipes will still work! It makes the house smell wonderful. Here are the recipes for those.

http://www.moneysavingmom.com/2008/02/homemade-bread-for-beginners.html This is for the bread

http://tammysrecipes.com/search/node/pizza+dough This is the pizza dough.

http://thefulltableshineagain.blogspot.com/ This is my friend Monica's recipe blog. I have gotten a lot of great recipes from here! They are for larger families, but my bunch does well with leftovers or I just half the recipe.

Of course I have to let everyone know that Davey Ramsey has gotten us on the right track of paying off debt. I could go on for days about this man and his ministry, but I will just direct you to his website!

http://www.daveramsey.com/

As always if you have any questions let me know. I love getting your feedback!

Frugal living...

I have been trying to cut our food budget the last couple of months. With the cost of everything going through the roof I have found this to be hard. We have 3 animals (insane I know) and Josiah is on a special diet, so those 2 things tend to cost a lot. I also buy hormone free milk and organic eggs. I try to get organic produce, but only if it is on sale. So needless to say I haven't seen a huge difference in our grocery bill.

The newest thing I have started doing is going to CVS. I am amazed at how many things they give away for free and when I use coupons they end up paying me to take their things home. If you are interested go here to start.

My grocery bill may not be going down but my toiletries are hardly costing me anything! I will use yesterday as an example. I got $45 worth of stuff and I spent $8.55 out of pocket and they gave me $40 in ECB (extra care bucks) to use for my next purchase. Some weeks are better than others, but I usually do well.

I have decided (now that I have the hang of it) to get everything that is free, even if we won't use it. What I am going to do is sell it at our garage sale this summer. I am told that toiletries go really fast, so I am hoping this is the case!

My friend Monica is the one who told me about the website, CVS and the idea about the garage sale, so I wanted to take this moment to tell her... THANK YOU!!!!!