We had Codi’s 1st birthday this weekend at Chuck E Cheese. I know lame huh? But, every kid coming was so much older then Codi it made sense to have the party somewhere that would entertain them, and also somewhere that I DIDN’T HAVE TO CLEAN UP AFTER!

The party was mass hysteria. Seriously that place is like a hornets nest. Only imagine hornets who scream and yell and push and shove and steal other kids tickets and break games and spill juice on themselves and get stuck on the slide and OMFG GET ME OUT OF HERE. Our two tables were actually very pleasant. Codi loved his cake the food was devoured and I think there was only one or two crying incidents from my table the entire time. And one of them was totally MINE!

You see. There was this game there. Ginger played it once and got a ton of tickets so I figured sure why not. The premise is there is a ball attached to a rod. The ball spins around in a circle clockwise. What happens is, you put in your token and the machine gives you a number like 4. Then you have a mallet thing and you get to smash this button in attempt to make the ball spin around the number of times shown or more. Only it doesn’t give you a number like 4 it gives you numbers like THIRTY FUCKING TWO! Right. So Ginger says it’s sooo easy and she did it the first time and played for like four hours on one token. SO. I whack it. the ball goes around 7 times. I get a little mad and put another token in. Ginger says it’s easier if you put your other hand on the mallet when you whack it. So I try. I make it around 18 times toward my new goal of 31. Cram another token in. 17 spins. Now I’m just getting mad. I never got a number lower then 31 to try and beat. Now I’m seeing red. I finally decided it is because the mallet is attached to a string no more then a foot long. You can’t even lift the mallet to get good leverage (well you could if you were three feet tall).

I stare at this stupid machine and figure I’ll just hit it harder. I smash another token into the fucking machine and mash it with the mallet. FOUR. FOUR FUCKING TIMES AROUND. My cousin Lisa walks up and starts laughing at me. “Four times Shannon is that all.” That is why they don’t make the mallet string longer because if they did I would have mashed her on the fucking head while she teased me.

THAT WAS IT!

I crammed a final token in the machine and before I knew it I was seeing red and BAMMMMMM!!!!!!!!! I mashed that bitch button with my fist.

OWWWWWWWW!

Fuck me. Now Ginger and Lisa are both laughing at me, shaking their heads obviously thinking this is something only Shannon would do at a kids place. So this morning when I was trying to cut some stuff for dinner, and last night when I was typing that is why my fucking hand hurts.

So. Some advice. Next time you are at Chuck E Cheese, maybe try stepping away from the stupid fucking game before you mash it and nearly break your hand. Perhaps go try something less dangerous like playing in the ball pit.

And NO! I didn’t win. Even when I mashed that fucker with all my might bare fisted I still only made it around 9 times. Stupid fucking Shannon proof games.

You are about the be stranded on a desert island. You can bring 3 things but!

You will be provided with all of the basic food and drink items.
You can not bring anything electric or battery operated.
You can not bring a person.

What three items do you bring?

I finished book four yesterday. I think I read all four in about 5 days. I must say the Twilight series might be the best set of books I’ve read in a really long time. I loved how it made me feel emotions. I was sad, mad, happy, hysterically crying, and furious at least once in every book. Every character made me mad and every character had some redeeming quality that made it so I loved them a thousand times more then I hated them. I dreamt about the book and thought about the characters and sympathized and empathized and just plain fell in love.

Yes. I feel like a dork. Yes. I told my husband I had a crush on a vampire and YES I really really do have a crush on a fictional vampire.

I love how this book was never written to be about traditional vampires. It wasn’t all blood sucking and coming out at night. The book was never based on common myths and while of course the whole thing is fake the book is written in a way to make you believe it is TOTALLY FACT!

I would be lying if I said, the same way Sundry is consumed with zombies, I’m now convinced my husband is a secret ware wolf and both of my kids are half breeds, which is because of course I’m a secret vampire. Why else would I be so cold all the time, and why else would my husband radiate heat through me so well and why else would Codi have so much fun biting my boob when he nursed?

Not much else has been going on. This last few weeks I’ve been having the WORST round of vertigo. I go to bed spinning like some drunk idiot and wake up swaying and rocking so bad I nearly dropped Codi walking from my bed to the door the other day. I’ve been nauseous and just plain feeling shitty. You know that feeling girls that you sometimes get once a month where you feel like an empty cavern. Like even though you’re not hungry you feel like you are starving. Like nothing can fill that void. That is how I’ve felt. I tried going back on iron to see if it helped. I messed with my vitamins, I ate a little different and nothing helped. I remember last time this happened I spent hundreds of dollars to hear the doctor tell me that with vertigo you have to wait it out. I know there is a pill I can take when vertigo gets too bad but of course since I’m nursing I can’t take it.

Codi had his first birthday this weekend. As soon as I get the pictures off Katies camera (my battery died right when we walked in) I’ll show you how my son showed his cake who was boss. He has his 1 year appointment this week and I’m sad because I know he won’t make the weight requirement to turn around, hes one freaking pound short. I’ve gotten him to eat saltines and pancakes right now and that is it. Even now I put some cinnamon sugar toast in front of him and he looked at me like I just tried to feed him fois grois. Just to be clear if that was chocolate toast he would totally be eating it.

This just in, Brandon just sneezed a booger so long it DANGLED into his cereal bowl. Eww. Good thing he was almost done.

My parents let Brandon have their copy of Toys R Us Biggest Toy Book Ever. He now spends every night “reading” this book and telling me every single thing he NEEDS! He also points to everything and tells me what is a girl toy and what is a boy toy. Did you know a Hot Pink monopoly set is for boys only?

Brandon just whacked Codi in the head with some big piece of rubber thing while yelling JUKE! WTF is a Juke hmm? I have no clue. Earlier last week Brandon looked at me and told me I was a dork. Gee thanks kid. This weekend at the store with my husband we ran into some of his old work friends. Brandon looked at them and said, “you don’t say shit.” Hey thanks for that kid!

Oh yeah. We switched his daycare. And I plan to write a ton more about that on Wednesday. It is an excellent story! Seriously, watch for that one!

I feel like I spent the whole weekend doing the same things. I woke up and swept the floors and went to bed and swept the floors. I’ve cleaned my tables and counters like 6 times this weekend. I’m sitting here right now staring at the food on the floor wondering why kids have to spill so much. It is like they have some kind of built in mechanism forcing them to drop everything in an effort to irritate their parents. I think it is attached to the same mechanism that makes them wake up the second you fall asleep.

Oh did I tell you about this weekend when the giant motherfucker spider came running across my couch this weekend? The spider I tried to kill but instead watched in horror as he ran down the couch and hid UNDER IT. Yeah I didn’t sit on that couch for two days because I was convinced spiders were going to come out and kill me. Yes, this was just a day after I was woken up by eight tiny legs crawling on my arm. You know eight tiny legs that fucking disappeared when I woke up and went to mush them! Fucking spiders.

Okay have to go and sweep the floor and try and convince Codi to stop climbing to the top of the stairs and then crying because he can’t get down.

Yeah I know I promised you some of the great money saving tips I got. But then I started reading Twilight. I finished it in 24 hours and went on to the next book, New Moon, 15 hours later I found myself sucked into part three. So that’s where I’ve been. I only have about 100 pages left of Eclipse before I can start book four and then I need find book five online so I can read it before it comes out. My husband is laughing at my crush on a fictional vampire. He’s also shocked it’s a vampire and not, a cowboy or something. Sigh. Am I the only one who finds Edward so dreamy?

Jiff said

I have done a couple things to make it better for myself: store gift cards. I load money on it and leave the debit card with hubby at home. I have been known to cook a few meals in bulk and store them in the fridge or freezer and just heat them up later. The most common is my friend Courtney’s chicken spaghetti.

A recipe that’s simple and easy… not gourmet or fancy like what you and Cristina do, but:
cut up and coat ckn breasts in flour. Brown and then add the shells only from Kraft Shells & Cheese with two cans of Rotel. Don’t use water, the Rotel is what you use instead. When the pasta is cooked and tender, add in the cheese sauce and it’s done. A little spicy for me, so sometimes I use one can of Rotel and one can of water. But whatever. Z and Joe love it.

Christina said
Some of my tips might be a bit more expensive the first time but it adds up over time.
I buy meat in bulk and then seperate it when we get home ( I do one big shop a month and then bi weekly for fruits veggies milk things like that)
That means I have two envelopes(jars here) for food one for the big shop and then the one that is for the bi weekly shop.
I find buying in bulk evens out over the months because I seem to run out of the bulk stuff at different times.
On my big shop I buy ALL the diapers and wipes(gave up cloth for disposable due to the bedrest with the twins) I buy the months supply of cleaning products if I have run out, I buy a huge bag of rice every 4 months (like the mamoth ones). I found with things like sour cream as I don’t use it daily and to prevent it from going bad I buy the no name smallest containers then the fresh ones stay sealed in the fridge and it can usually last us through the month. It is hareder for perishable in bulk as I tired the huge block of chesse but it took two months to go through. If I find something fresh I can cut up and freeze I do, my kids don’t get the individual snack pack things in there lunch as it costs to much niether do they get juice it is water all the way here. For lunch snacks I bake and freeze things individual pop them into the lunch and they defrost by lunch or snack time. All the older kids (my blog list 3 of my 5 (not including the twins) as I took custody of my step kids prior to my spilt with hubby and am still in the process of them becoming officaly mine yes that will mean 7 with the twins…where was I the bigger kids all have theromoses as it is so easy to make more of a meal ad reheat it the next morning and pop it into the thermoses (which I preheat by pouring in hot water then dumping out). I will compile a bunch of my easy cheaper recipies for you in the ext cuple of days most are convetable with vegetarian meals.

I forgot the sick cupboard have the cupboard pre stocked for colds flus stuff like pop jellp juice crackers whatever you use when someone gets sick then you wont spend as much as if you ran out and grabed anything you could think of.

Mrs J said

We are on a tight budget right now and we try to be as frugal as possible. I haven’t done as much menu planning as I should but we really reduced our grocery bills. We use couponing, setting a budget of $30/wk, comparing prices and buying only the best deals, no eating out and learning to say NO to ourselves everytime we’re in the grocery store bombarded with so many temptations! Our pantry hasn’t been so full since we did this compared to our $200 grocery trips before and we have MORE food now!

Anonymous said

My husband and I just recently ended up in that same position where we’re finally being forced to cut back on the excessive grocery spending, and focus on not wasting food… what a bummer! But in the Cooking Light magazine, they just featured a whole series about “cooking once and eating twice.” I love this! I just made spaghetti the other night, and then re-used the left-over sauce for lasagna. Or making a tri-tip one night, then re-using the leftovers on top of a salad the next night. It’s worked really well for us, and I’ve definitely seen some savings already since we’re not throwing all that extra food away! Good luck… can’t wait to hear all the other ideas!

As I mentioned before I was able to go to the store and buy 7 full days of food for $89.00. A few days later I think I’ve found more ways to cut it down more. So. Here are all of the things that worked for me.

First. I made a list 2 days before going to the store. I did this so that I could really look at it and make sure I needed what I said I did and also made sure I didn’t forget anything.

Second. I put my menu on my list. For instance I knew that one of my breakfast meals was sandwiches (don’t ask husband loves sandwiches for breakfast). I also knew I was having tacos for dinner and that salad would be my side dish for at least two nights. SO when I wrote tomatoes, I wrote (tacos, sammies, salad). Then when I was standing in the produce isle I was able to buy exactly what I would need, no more (no waste), and no less (no tempting me to go back to the store).

Third, I listed the items I ALREADY HAD with my menu. For instance under stuffed bell peppers it read:
Stuffed bell peppers
-rice
-sausage
-canned tomatoes
-garlic
-onion

That way I could easily look at it an know that all that meal needed was bell peppers. I can’t tell you how many times I get to the store and think I have everything for a meal and get home only to find I did not in fact have any onions. This is why I made the list early. I made the menu, made the list and then checked my kitchen. So far I’ve been right on target.

Another huge thing I was able to do is know that every meal I made would turn into a left over for lunch. I’m lucky that my husband would prefer a warm left over meal for lunch to a cold sandwich (cuz he likes it for breakfast, dork). It cost me maybe $1.00 more average per meal to double it. 1 pack of any meat makes two meals for him (and even a small portion for Brandon.) The best benefit of this is the time saver. I save SO MUCH TIME in the morning not having to make him a breakfast and lunch. Not to mention there is usually enough for him to share and I can’t say that I don’t love hearing all his friends swoon over my cooking. The other day one of his friends even told me if he sees something that I made even if it has stuff he hates, he will eat it, just because he knows he will love it! Talk about walking on air for the rest of the day.

After this weekend one of the things I came up with to save even more money is to remember that on Friday and Saturdays meals I don’t need left overs. I forget that my husband loves to have ramen or use some of his budgeted SUPER BURRITO money. Sometimes he likes to have frozen pizzas or..well bachelor food you know. So now what I’ve decided is that I will either make a really good favorite meal on Friday that can double as Saturdays dinner. Or I will make something both nights that will use the same meat but can be done different. For instance one pack of chicken can make grilled chicken and chicken tacos and I’ve spared the expense of a whole other pack of meat. I learned that this weekend when I had the greatest left over stuffed bell peppers and my husband ate burritos instead. And then Sunday morning when I had awesome chicken left he ate ramen. Luckily today at work he was going to be out of town and not near a microwave so I shredded the chicken and made chicken salad sandwiches.

I also planned breakfasts. I bought stuff to make breakfast burritos, breakfast sandwiches, and of course his beloved turkey and roast beef sandwiches. I think I did pretty good.

One thing I will say is, shopping on a budget takes time. You can’t rush to make a list and you can’t rush at the store. I only forgot one thing, potatoes. I saw them on the list as side dishes but I totally spaced actually writing them on the other side. Luckily they were cheap and something I could easily run in and grab. I think forgetting only ONE thing my first time was great. I highly recommend taking a little more time to make a list and plan. Plan menus, think ahead for the other meals too. I made sure if we were having tacos that I grabbed some beans for me too. When I picked cheeses I picked cheese that could work with tacos, stuffed bell peppers and breakfast burritos (Monte ray Jack). I also knew I had cheddar that was almost done so I picked a meal using that (cheesy chicken pasta). I also knew this recipe, my chipotle lime chicken and my bell peppers all took green onions. Because I had a list I was able to buy a large enough amount of green onions for all of the recipes. Normally I would have seen green onions, grabbed one bunch, and by mid week I would have run out and found myself at the store grabbing those and BROWSING other isles.

Finally I got some AWESOME tips from y’all in my comments section. Tomorrow morning I plan to post those and link to all of you. I can’t believe the great tips you gave! Thanks a bunch!

As I mentioned before my husband and I are working on our finances. I also mentioned that I was reading this book. One of the chapters in the book talks about the people around. Dave (the author) says that often people trying to make changes in their lives will meet with violent opposition. These last few weeks as I’ve slowly told my friends and family that my husband and I are going to be making some drastic financial changes I prepared myself for that. For arguments, looks, laughter and snide comments. I was stunned however when none of this happened. My parents have been amazing. They have been understanding and helpful and UNDERSTANDING. When I’m not all there at work they get it. When I say I can’t afford it, they respect it. They gave us this amazing house to live in, helped us remodel it and have gone above and beyond to make this easier on us.

My cousin Lisa spent TWO HOURS at Walmart with me tonight shopping. Actually she sat yesterday with me online as I created a menu, planned a list and calculated the money. She then went with me to the store while I WHINED and bitched and cried about prices and what I couldn’t get and WOE IS ME! When we got to the check out instead of ridiculing me for my meager purchases, or teasing me for budget shopping and penny pinching she looked at me and said “I’m really proud of you.” I was thrilled.

On a walk with Katie today she talked to me about money. Listened and shared her stories with me and DIDN’T EVEN MAKE FUN OF ME when I said I’m strongly considering giving up my Yukon for a more budget sensible (mini van). Knowning I’m on a budget and that I was going stir crazy she asked me to go on a FREE walk with her. I loved it. It was so nice to go do something that cost nothing and have some really good really honest conversation with a friend and walk away knowing you weren’t judged and things won’t be said behind your back.

Ginger and I are always frugal which is nice. She totally udnerstands everything I’m going through and has been so great with me. I love knowing I can talk to her 100% honestly.

I was stunned to discover the peopel in my life are so amazing and rad that I experienced ZERO opposition. No negativity, no one telling me I’m crazy, or wrong, or stupid or silly. I’m sure it has something to do with the current economy. Maybe some of them even think I’m being smart right now. No matter what it is, I wanted to tell all those close to me THANK YOU! Thanks for being so open, and accepting of my mess! You’re all the very best!