What I've been doing

We have a friend from Florida that is staying with us for awhile. He is retiring from the military and took a job here so is staying with us while they wait for their home to sell. He has been here two weeks and it has been good to hold me accountable to cook supper. I don't feel I can just say I am tired and go get hamburgers or pizza. I also have tried to stretch our food budget to feed an additional person and have been more careful to plan and use leftovers and stuff.

I bought 2 large packages of chicken legs and 2 large packages of split breasts. I seasoned the legs with a spice blend of onion and garlic that I picked up free awhile back. I didn't feel like taking the skin off all the meat so after that one package I just boiled up the breasts and second package of legs and put up the meat. I got about 8 containers of broth. Since I am eating gluten free I can no longer use the chicken bouillon cubes or powder so I have to be careful to make my own broth and freeze or can.

I used one package of the meat I put up to make a gluten free tortilla casserole. It was 2 cans of Rotel tomato mixed with taco seasoning. I layered corn tortillas, the chicken/Rotel mixture, cheddar and mozzarella.

Today I am making red beans and rice. I have put the recipe on here a couple of times. I can't wait until supper! I need to make some sweet cornbread muffins to go with it.

I still have not made up a lot of items with my flour. I bought a lot of 5# flour at Walmart for $1.28 lb and froze it. It needs to be used so that I can buy a bunch of fresh flour. I have been planning on making up biscuits, pancakes, waffles, french bread, rolls, cinnamon rolls, peanut butter cookies (to use the last of the jar of Peter Pan peanut butter the kids won't eat). I made some of these items but still have about 30 lbs of flour left.

I finally used the last two boxes of Betty Crocker au gratin potatoes. I got these free or very cheap with coupons and I can't have them because they have gluten and we don't like them very much. Still working on about 8 cans of canned milk that are close to expiration. I used one for the milk in the boxed potatoe mix last night. I was going to use the rest when I made up biscuits and pancakes.

My husband and I looked at the laundry room last night and he is planning on putting me in some shelves for food. I have a long rod for hanging clothes and we decided to add a double rod to use more vertical space. That would give me enough room to the right of that for him to make some shelves. I want some cereal box heighth and then a lot of canning jar heighth. I would like to leave room on the floor for gamma sealed buckets of grains.

My second child graduates and starts college this fall. We somehow need to get a car for him to drive. He can't take my car every day. We have been working around everything for two years and it is just getting too tough. We had the third car as a "family" car but my daughter was going to college and working so it just didn't work out for him to ever use it. Our kids pay for their own college above what scholorships cover. My son has been offered a partial scholorship to the university in town. So, he will be working to pay tuition above that. In the midst of trying to save and put up money we know this is something we need to try to help with. The good part is that today is annual reviews where my husband works so we find out what his raise will be. He was offered another job last fall so this company matched that and his boss said that at annual review they would give him a cash bonus- they gave him a very good raise to match the other offer so could not go any higher at that time. Hopefully the bonus will buy a very old car???? I don't know, I don't expect much, and we don't know what to expect.

Stocking Up

i am struggling a little with fear. they are making 1000 cuts within the group my husband works for, supposedly 500 this year and 500 next year. this past thursday 80 people in Huntsville were cut off from computer access and then called friday morning to tell them not to come to work. no two week notice. scary.

my husband feels his job is okay, but you never know. and seeing how quickly it can happen and without notice is not a happy place for me. the planner.

i have always shopped sales and stocked groceries. i try to buy at the best price i can and put up as much as i can so i can spend less, but also have what i need without running to the store so much. i have a lot of food, but i need to get more.

what i am really worried about is money. a couple of months without an income and we'd have food from what is in my pantry and freezer but we couldn't pay our house payment very long. we'd be in trouble. we had a good emergency fund but used it to put on a roof and do some other things. so... my job is to lay up as much cash as we can for a "what if" situation.

• we were planning on putting up a fence with our income tax return. we decided to put that off and just put that money in savings.
• i am extending our garden from four 4X8 raised beds to seven plus a bed 2' wide that extends behind all the beds on the back side. so it will be like 2'X34'.
• i also hope we can get a couple of fruit trees in before it is too late to plant them.
• my husband will work all the overtime he can and we will just put that over into savings
• i have been very lax lately with coupon shopping. i was tired of it and took a month break. i am back on board.
• i won't be buying non-necessary items, even if very cheap at garage sales.
• i have a LOT of material. i need to sew up some items to sell.
• i am being careful to use leftovers. i have saved about 8 bags of bread end pieces in the freezer and this week will make an overnight breakfast casserole with them. i am saving all my little bits of vegetables and rice for a soup.
• i am going to go room by room through my house and have a garage sale very soon and get rid of everything i don't need.
• i just used our vision coverage and got a pair of glasses and prescription sunglasses. i am not due until june for an exam, but our coverage would pay starting january 1 for new glasses. i don't know if the people laid off this week were immediately cut off from medical coverage or not. i know there is cobra insurance for them but i wouldn't be able to pay $1000 a month for insurance if we lost a job. i would feed and house my family first. so, i am not putting off any medical care and keeping prescriptions bought ahead.

i don't want to make it sound like i am freaking out or really living in fear. i trust the One who is my provider. i just feel i have a responsibility to do what i can. we have a wonderful job that provides way more than our needs so it is rediculous we are so close to homelessness without a job. we could cash out retirement funds and be good for awhile if it was the last choice- it would kill me to pay all the early withdrawal penalties! it has been awhile since we have HAD to watch our penneys, but i am thankful for the lean years that taught me the skills to do it.