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Delicious, nutritious, and convenient!

Now that's a winning combination! I didn't tell you, but the other night when I had my uncontrollable urge for a salad, I actually bought two. The one I am eating today is the more expensive of the two. It priced out at $4. It's a good sized serving, and this salad was definitely designed by someone who has some nutrition knowledge. First, it contains broccoli slaw--shredded broccoli, shredded red cabbage, and shredded carrots. (That's 2 of the 5 highly touted crustiferous vegetables in this one salad). Then they've layerd on a good amount of kale and we've talked about what a super food that is. Then, there are unsalted sunflower seeds. I'd estimate as much as 3 tablespoons. You may not know that sunflower seeds are great for maintaining blood sugar. The unsalted variety are best as they don't cause us to retain water. Then there are some dried cranberries. Excellent for the kidneys. And finally, some chicken white meat to provide lots of protein. AND, it's yummy.

Years ago, my DD was in junior high school and was having problems with low blood sugar. After researching, I found out that sunflower seeds were the perfect snack. We had to get special permission for her to eat them when she needed them. However, since the alternative was her passing out or getting the shakes, most of her teachers cooperated. So there you have a little info on sunflower seeds.

If you decide to go looking for this salad at Trader Joe's, I should tell you there is just a little bit of heat in the salad dressing. Now, I don't like hot spicy food; I'm a real wimp when it comes to thing like hot peppers and such. So, if I tell you there is "just a little bit of heat", believe me, it really is just a little bit. Otherwise I would hate it, LOL.

So, I've been working on design. I've added quite a few elements to the in process kit this morning, and I've kind of made a change to my preview. Normally there are all the papers and then the frames and then all the other elements. The usual result is that the frames become invisible behind all those flowers, ribbons, and whathaveyou. I usually try to give my customers frames in a variety of colors, finishes, and shapes. So, a kit will probably contain a round frame, a rectangle frame (landscape), a rectangle frame (portrait), and maybe a square frame. But, you'd never know they're in there unless you read the product description. I'm trying bring the frames forward on the preview. This particular kit has one really chunky frame and I think that one is going to have to stay in the background. If I bring it forward, you won't be able to see anything else, LOL. But, I've placed 3 frames front and center and so far, you can still get a pretty good look at the other goodies in the kit as well as a good look at the frames. I like it!

Any way, this kit has some unique elements in it. However, at least 2 of the 3 are not going to show up in the preview, which is sad. It has two different styles of border. If I use two in the preview, I'd have to cover one with the other. I don't think that would be very helpful, do you?

So, I am going to show you a photo of one of the people in my life that is just completely precious to me. I am this kid's biggest fan. I know his mama loves him dearly, but she has to deal on a day-to-day basis with his flaws, foibles, and faults, as well as all the things about him that are wonderful. In that I am the Grandma, I get to love on him, admire him, compliment him, and go home. I think he's the greatest.

If he weren't facing directly into the sun, you'd see his beautiful brown eyes. I'm not sure what he's all dressed up for, but I know that's a brand new suit (might be his first), and I also know his talented mama tied his tie in a full Windsor for him. I am not totally thrilled about how grown up he looks though. He could walk into a time machine and come back out at about age 3 and I'd be thrilled. Isn't he a good lookin' kid?

Okay, that's all from me for now. I've got lots more to accomplish today!

 

Workin' it..........

I'm still workin' my tax and accounting to do list. Now it has 15 things to do on it, but 8 are crossed off. We're hanging in there...... I have two very simple jobs targeted for today which I WILL complete and mark off that list. I'm not sure what else I'll get to, but those two for sure.

The house is a shambles and desperately needs vacuumed. I think that is the most urgent task here. Little mounds of mud and dog hair everywhere.

I am closing hard on the new kit I've been working on. Still needs some more work today, but with any kind of concentrated effort, the possibility exists that I can finish it today.

Of course the "concentrated" effort is the trick, in all of this. I tried to say good morning to the Lord about 3 minutes after I got out of bed. Within seconds, my mind was flooded with everything else. Looks like someone wants me to have an ADD day.........

Here's something I ran across the other day. If you're a little OCD like me, it might appeal to you. Not too many of us bake our own bread these days. Some of us are trying to reduce/eliminate grains from our diet, so bread is kinda "the enemy". Add to that the fact that fresh baked bread has that totally tantalizing aroma and taste, well, I could eat a whole loaf in one day. So, I don't dare bake fresh bread. But, if you do, you probably want it to look really good when you present it to your family. After all you spent time and effort creating it and it is so great when that's appreciated. How about a bread slicer doohickey?

Amazon.com has a whole selection of things like this priced from $7.48 up to around $50. This one is about $25. Anyway, you lay your bread loaf in there and just slice away and your slices come out all uniform in size and cut straight across. Cool, huh? When I slice fresh baked bread it looks more like a 3 year-old got hold of a knife.......... Anyway, I thought it was a cool idea and, in case there's a bread baker hanging out here, it was worth showing you.

Well, I need to move along. Nothing will get done around here if I just sit here and do a brain dump on my blog, right?  I think I have one more piece of eye candy.

Christy S. did this layout and I think it's sensational. I just do not have a talent for multi photo layouts. Years ago I was on multiple CTs and I got into doing single photo layouts because that allowed me to conserve my photos for the next CT assignment. So, I never really developed the skill to create layouts with multiple photos. But, Christy sure has! I am always amazed that she can put 11 photos on a page and have them all visible. And I think it really does give a sense of the impact that Disney parade can have on the senses. I am also taken with the way Christy used the floral border under that aqua paper to add in an additional layer and pop that hot pink color. Good job, Christy!!!!!!!!

Color me gone. I've got lotsa work to do. While I'm slaving away, YOU be BLESSED!

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Smoothie for lunch day....

It is not often I pre-plan lunch. Usually I just go out to the kitchen, dig around, and eat whatever happens to appeal to me. But, I had decided yesterday that I'd be having a smoothie for lunch today.

I put a couple of handsful of blueberries in the blender. I topped those with some kale. I found some blueberry yogurt and threw that in, just for some protein. Then I added some cranberry juice and one artificial sweetener. And threw in about 6 ice cubes. It is very tasty and ended up being just a smidge over 16 ounces, a size I can definitely deal with without spending the afternoon trying to drink it all up.

The kale does have those stem/spine things in it. I somehow knew that having those removed was too good to be true. However, since I bought the kale to add to smoothies and therefore to be minced to smithereens in my blender, it's not a problem. I wouldn't like it as much if I wanted to cook the kale and had to fish those things out, though.

So, the whole smoothie thing worked out pretty well. I haven't figured out what I'm doing for dinner. I have to be at a client's house between 6:30 and 7:00 so........ it will be whatever I can throw together VERY quickly. Or maybe I'll just wait and eat when I get home.

Hey, this is a picture of my mom. She complains that she has wrinkles. I think she needs to remember she's in her 90's now........ Looks pretty good for 92, dontcha think? (I snagged this photo from Facebook). I see an awful lot of my Grandma in this photo!

Gotta run. Client due in 47 minutes!

Glory Hallelujah!

My Social Security Survivor's benefit just arrived. I checked last night before I went to bed and there was no sign of it, but it's in my account this morning. Saints be praised! Now I can pay the gas bill with all the red writing on it!

Yesterday was a productive day. The house looks the worse for it, but I got a lot of tax work finished. And, today, there'll be a bit of money coming in. Phew! Add that to the SS benefit and I can breathe a little bit easier til I'm forced to pay it all out on bills, LOL.

I am going to have to do a Costco run this weekend. I am just about out of dog food. If you remember I bought 156 pounds of it on January 3, my last trip. It was on sale for $4 off per bag so I got as much as they allowed. I had considered going back and buying another 3 bags, but I've thought several times this past few weeks how very glad I am that I didn't do that! That would have meant another $66 gone from my already sad checking account. But, this weekend, I have to do it! It will be a fairly small shopping list, mostly staples and the dogfood. I am still going to work on clearing food out of the pantry and freezers.

So, which of my many chores shall I concentrate on today? Hmmmmmmmm.

Well, I worked my way through 7 of 11 items on the tax and accounting to do list. I think I'll try to knock at least 3 of the remaining items off today. By tonight I'll be adding more to that list so I need to keep moving on it. In fact, I just added two things to the list as they came to mind. I need to deliver a couple of returns and collect for them. Money would be nice........

I have design stuff that needs completed. I've got a kit in process that is well along the way, but it needs ribbons, ricrak, more frames, maybe another set of flowers, and whatever else comes to mind.

The house needs attention. I've wreaked havoc in the kitchen, as usual. The desk is getting piled up and needs to be un-piled before I lose my way. I should dust and vacuum as well. I can tell you right now, all that is not going to get fixed/done today. I am still intent on clearing out the tax and accounting stuff. I know I have stuff for several tax returns coming in the mail and there's certainly more coming than I know about. It's just that these folks called ahead. This tax thing snowballs fast and I have to stay on top of it or else.

Here's an idea I found the other day on Pinterest. I'm gonna show you what they've done and then give you a better idea (at least I think it's a better idea). I cannot link you up because the link doesn't work, but the idea apparently comes from joyastle.com and this photo comes from the same source.

What they have done here is split toilet tissue rolls and slipped them around leftover wrapping paper to keep it together. Now, I've tried doing something like this and found that the parts not covered still got ripped, wrinkled and otherwise abused.In other words, rendered useless.

Here's my "better idea". Remove the wrapping paper from its original roll. Roll it tight and slip it INSIDE the original roll. It will be held together, will not unroll, and all the edges will be protected. When you're looking for just the right wrapping paper, just slip a finger down inside the roll and pull out enough to see the pattern. If it's not what you're looking for, just tamp it back down into place. This will stop the waste of a lot of wrapping paper!

Okay, well, I think it's time for eye candy. We still have some morea inspirational layouts with Tang, this week's kit.

Lori did this page using one of our templates. She altered the template to allow for the use of an extra photo. I like her subject matter--snacks her granddaughter loves at this particular stage in her life. She's also giving you a good look at the plaid alpha which is included with the kit but not featured on the alpha preview. Thanks, Lori!

Now, I'm gonna run. Time to do something other than blog, haha. Actually, I have designed a very special element for the current kit this morning, so I'm a little further along than you might think. Anyway, YOU be BLESSED today!

Please pass the oxygen.........

Well, if you want me to do any more work tonight, you're going to have to provide the oxygen. I'm thinking that that is the only way I will have enough energy to keep going.

I've plowed through 7 of the 11 items on my tax to do list. Considering, that's pretty decent productivity. The Lord is making me younger and stronger every day, but I started out at a pretty low level before this became my prayer, LOL.

So, that's it. I'm outta here for the night.

Giving in to a craving.......

It doesn't happen often, but I had one of those evenings where I just HAD to have a salad. Now, you know, I do not keep fresh produce around the house unless it is something like oranges with a really long shelf life. I buy the fresh stuff with the absolute best intentions, but then, somehow, before I can use it all up, some of it spoils. This is lousy budgeting! What to do? How to satisfy my craving?

Well, it just so happens I live less than a mile from Trader Joe's. Now, if you need a prepared salad for one, say for your lunch at work, that's a good place to go! I picked up a Greek salad with feta cheese, lettuce, black olive slices, diced red peppers, julienned cabbage, cucumber slices, and sliced red onions. And, of course its very own little plastic container of salad dressing. Yum! And even though Trader Joe's is pricier than El Cheapo, I thought the price for this salad was reasonable. Certainly less than I'd pay for a salad like this from the local Greek restaurant (actually, theirs doesn't even have all these great ingredients--and it was WAY less). And, less than you'd pay in most restaurants for a cheapie little "dinner salad".

I picked up something else I never even knew existed until a few days ago. I grabbed some frozen kale. I started cooking kale long before it was cool. I happened on one of those copy-cat recipes for the "Zuppa Toscano" that Olive Garden serves (I LOVE that stuff). And it called for chopped kale. I wasn't even sure what kale was, but by the process of elimination I figured out that it was the kinda ruffly green stuff that you see floating around in that soup. Anyway, we decided we liked it and I started cooking it in lieu of spinach on occasion. In those days, I was constantly on the prowl for something healthy to feed Mr. Joe.......

Eventually, as had to happen, the rest of the world discovered kale. And, worse yet, they discovered that it is super vitamin rich. So, lately when I go to El Cheapo, there is no kale. They are always sold out.

Well between El Cheapo being sold out of kale all the time and my own decision to forego fresh produce, I figured that was that. But, lo and behold, Trader Joe's has FROZEN KALE. They even had fresh kale, but the fresh kale was a smaller pack and cost $.60 more. I didn't want that anyway, LOL! But a bag of frozen kale came home with me.

Do you remember that I've pretty well made up my mind that I'm going to try to eat out of the freezer and the pantry for a while? And I'm going to try to up my servings of fruits, veggies, and meats, and skip the refined carbs wherever possible.

In my freezer is a big bag of frozen blueberries and a big bag of frozen strawberries. I originally bought them for smoothies. And I was trying to have one of those smoothies every day. Well, I couldn't do it. I made them too big. I bought spinach for in them and the spinach spoiled. The little bits of blueberries and strawberries stayed in my blender long after I washed it. And so on and so forth.....

However, I am going to eat those blueberries and strawberries one way or another, so help me! So, I'm going to try the smoothie thing again. It may be worse for my blender, but it will definitely be better for my hips and my body in general than the blueberry cobbler I made last week. Only this time I'm going to try it with a bit of frozen kale. Ha! No more spoiled spinach for me! So, I think tomorrow's lunch will be a smoothie.

Kale is notorious for having these "spines" that are hard and chewy going up the middle of the leaves. When you prepare it fresh, you are supposed to tear the leafy part away from that "spiny" thing and just cook the leafy part. One of the things I'm interested in seeing is whether or not this chopped kale has just leaves or if they've included the hard stuff. If it's just leaves and they're already chopped and I can't possibly let them sit around and spoil, I think I have discovered green gold.

I actually wore a coat to Trader Joe's. I think this is only the second time this winter I've worn a coat. Of course there have been times when the trip from the front door to the car was not pleasant and times when I prayed for the heat to come up faster in the car. Funny thing though is that on Friday and Saturday we are supposed to have highs in the low 70's. Now that should be some FINE weather. Can't wait!

So that's it for now. Will I be back later? who knows..........stay tuned, LOL. Do not adjust your sets.

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The Good and the Bad.........

About that roast beef..............

Did you know.........

that as we age, our thirst indicator becomes less efficient? I have known for a good while now that it is not sufficient, for optimal body function, to drink water only when I'm thirsty. So, being thirsty is not a good indicator of when I need water. I need to drink water whether or not I'm thirsty. This is particularly important when you realize that the human body is 75% water, or at least it's supposed to be, if you're drinking your water.

I did not know that this habit of drinking water, thirsty or not, was even more important as we get older. Common symptoms of dehydration include severe headache, dizziness, feeling faint, and confusion. If you get dizzy when you go from lying down to a standing position, dehydration may be the reason. Did you know you can even die from dehydration?

So, thirsty or not, drink that water. The "average" person needs about 64 ounces of water a day. If you are substantially overweight or if you are working hard in an area that's really hot (like the Florida sun or a hot commercial kitchen), you need more. Now, don't make the mistake of thinking that just because you spend most of your day in your desk chair or your rocking chair that you need less. The honest truth is that most of our water is lost through exhaling. SO, if you're breathing, you need water. If you have to, set a timer to go off every half hour to remind you to drink.

Drink up! That's my public service announcement for today!

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Two things that confuse me..........

I am able to do a very complex tax return, recalling tax law at a moment's notice. But, here are 2 things that confuse me.

1) I bought a package of rubber bands so that I could just pull my hair back in a ponytail. Until yesterday, the rubberbands would all wrap around my hair three times. Yesterday I hit one that would only wrap two times. Was my hair fatter or thicker than usual yesterday?

2) The water delivery guy is a nice guy, but he, too, is confusing. Last trip he picked up an empty and delivered nothing. Sometimes there are no empties and he delivers anyway. I just can't quite figure out what he's going to do next. What he's supposed to do is deliver one for each empty picked up. Period. Unless he gets instructions to the contrary. Sometimes I'll leave a note sticking out of the top of an empty. Then, he is supposed to do whatever the note says. Well, I just wish all that worked!

It is warm and beautiful out today, at least in the sun. I was outside talking with the water delivery guy and it was enjoyable except for the squinting. Of course, I was in an area that is sheltered from the wind so that might have made a difference. It's about 56 degrees out there.

My tax and accounting to do list for the day has 10 items on it. I've completed 30%. I actually broke all the pending tasks down into steps so that I could tick things off on my to do list more often. It's more motivating that way, LOL. And, actually, I omitted one task so I think we will have to stick that in at #5. So, I guess I've done 3 out of 11, not 3 out of 10. Oh, well, still plenty more hours in my day.

Beyond tax and accounting, I've laid out a sweater to dry. And I spent 15 minutes deleting e-mails. That's it! Ambitious, right? Hopefully I'll accomplish a bit more as the day goes along......

I do have to go out and drag the trash bin back in. I did something yesterday I've been avoiding, out of consideration for the trash guys. I had one trash can that had trash in the bottom of it and then it got rained on/in. The rainwater made it very heavy. I did not want to dump it out and then have to pick through the soggy messy trash and put it all back in the can. I finally just let it sit, hoping the water would evaporate. Well, if it were summer here in the desert, that would not have been a problem. However, it simply has NOT evaporated in the colder weather. Well, I hauled that thing to the curb last night, rainwater, ooey-gooey trash and all. I'm going to have to go see just what the trash guys did with THAT!

So, what have YOU been doing today?

Well, it's time for me to figure out something to eat. I'm hungry and it's lunch time. Later.......

 

Good news/bad news

The good news is that the skies are blue and there's no wind. The bad news is that there's still no electronic deposit of my survivor's benefit. The good news is that I have two tax returns ready to deliver, two more ready to print and quite a few more appointments this week. The bad news is that the yard guys once again did not close the gate properly, resulting in one of the hinges twisting and breaking/cracking several rows of blocks below the hinge.

I just sent an inquiry to my bank to start them looking for my money. I am trying to call Social Security now. This is my second try. Last time they hung up on me. Yup, literally. I worked my way through the electronic answering system, then asked to speak with an "agent". They came back telling me it would be a long wait, told me to call back later, and hung up! Of course, "they" was their computer..... Second try got me scheduled for a call back. What a giant pain this is!

So about the gate. I have two gates on the block wall around my house. The first is at the front of the garage, more or less. Then there is a little "garden" area, and behind the garden area, there is a second gate. These dufuses improperly latched the back gate so often it was beginning to pull out of the wall at the top hinge. I took the guy who owns the service over there and showed him what was happening and asked him to please ensure it didn't happen again. And it's been good for months. However, yesterday, it was not latched properly. It came open and the torque was enough to crack several blocks and pull the bottom hinge out crooked. Now I am not strong enough to lift the gate into proper position and latch it. It's closed for the moment, but I doubt that will last.......... This is of great concern to me because of the dogs.

I don't think Punkin would run off, and I don't think Max COULD run off. Then there's Parker who has managed to get out twice, once because someone did not come in through the front door promptly and he slipped out past them and once when the front gate came open and the back gate had been improperly closed. The first time Parker ran off, I had to go collect him from a neighboring town 30 miles away. The second time a neighbor one street over caught him and held him and relinquished him to me when I went looking. So, this gate thing is a big deal.......

Other than that, everything is peachy. I found this post on FB. I do not subscribe to this guy's theology, but he does have something worth reading, particularly when taking into account the state of my life today, LOL.

So, my motto today will have to be "Thank you, Lord, for the ride".

Well, I need some goals for today. I have one return printed that needs to be stapled and it's ready to go. I need to call 2 clients and arrange delivery dates. I have two returns that need printed and assembled. These will bring in decent bucks because the clients literally flew in from the midwest to get their returns done and, unlike Nevada clients, they need state returns as well. (Of course, it doesn't hurt that I live in Vegas; people are pretty inclined to make that kind of trip, LOL.) Anyway these two returns will go out tomorrow as they leave town on Thursday.

There's a kind of funny story associated with these two returns. The lady has been my client since 1990. At that time she had paid $2500 for her previous year's return (yes, that's a real number, $2500). I prepared her 1990 return for way way less (I no longer remember what I charged her but it was right in line with my usual fees). We have been "friends" since then. We do not see each other often. Particularly since she moved to the midwest. In fact, many years, she just mails me her stuff. Then we have a good 2-3 hour phone chat and go on our merry way til the following year. She called over the weekend to say she would be in town with her SO and wanted to drop off all her stuff on Tuesday. We set that up for noon today. Imagine my surprise when she called yesterday from her hotel, saying she'd be here in an hour and a half. Apparently, when she called to set the appointment this past weekend, she had her days all confused. Anyway, the returns are done!

These same folks bought a Chevy Volt (yes, they were one of the 10,000 who bought them). And there's a substantial tax credit available to anyone who purchases one of the first 200,000 Volts. Here's the funny part of that story. Chevrolet dealers apparently sold a lot of those 10,000 Volts to their employees. They may or may not have made them special deals on the pricing. In any case, the employees collected the credits and sold the Volts. Since the tax credit (and it's a hefty credit--up to $7500) goes ONLY to the original purchaser, in spite of the amount of money involved, that might account for why that huge tax credit didn't stir more interest amongst consumers. All the dealership employees took advantage of the credits and then sold off the cars on the used market. The best laid plans of government........

Well, I just got a call back from Social Security. The person with whom I spoke was a little bit snippy. I got her calmed down, but it wasn't easy. Anyway, according to her, there is no specific day of the month my check is due. Instead, it is to be direct deposited on the "4th Wednesday of every month". Now, never having been party to any of my previous dealings with Social Security, the "agent" insists I've been told that before. (How would she know? Was she eavesdropping on my previous conversations?) Nonsense! When it concerns the bulk of my monthly income, if I'd been told that, I'd remember it. Instead, in my previous dealings with them, I've always been given a specific date. For example, when I switched to Direct Deposit, I was told November's money would be deposited on the 28th. However, we will now all hold our breath for tomorrow to roll around.

Well, I want to make the gift of Tuesday count. What shall I do today?

Design--I have a new kit that I have just whizzed through. It's flowing like it's supposed to, praise be! I think I will try to add a few more elements to it!

House--I will try to spend some time dusting. I don't mind it so much with my two new dusting thingies. I need to dust the living room and dining room and then get started out here on another round.

Tax--Print and assemble those two returns for delivery tomorrow. Finish another individual return.

Accounting--THIS is priority #1. It's not a lot of work and I HAVE to get it done.

I forgot to tell you that once I got all that pork and sauerkraut packaged up and in the fridge/freezer, I have calculated that I will have about 12 meals from that one pot. I think we calculated that because I had the pork in my freezer (from God knows when) my out of pocket cost to prepare that stuff was around $2. Wowie! That's some pretty cheap eating. Now, what else can I conjur from the freezer?

Okay, let's do eye candy.........

I am trying to decide whether this is the perfect kit to scrap this photo or whether this is the perfect photo to scrap with this kit. It's kind of a "which came first, the chicken or the egg" question. In any case, Miss Nancy has created the perfect combination of kit and photo. This is one gorgeous layout and I love seeing the pinks and oranges and yellows play together. Nancy always does a great job with the paper layering and I always applaud her title work. This layout makes me proud to have created the kit!

Lori created this layout. I love how the orange picks up the colors of the balls in the photo. That light minty green sure pops off the page when it's placed against the orange, doesn't it? Lori loves to create borders on her pages with the papers from the kit and I think she's done a great job with that here. I also really like her cluster of flowers and elements.

It's time for me to move on. Y'all come back, hear? And BE BLESSED today!

 

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I checked again..........

The link to my bank is now showing up on my Mozilla "launch pad". I don't know what the official name for that thing is, but you open a new tab in Mozilla and it shows you "pictures" of your most frequently visited sites so you can click on them and go there quickly. Anyway, I checked the bank account--AGAIN. Still no money. Now we are all going to say a silent prayer that the yard guy to whom I just gave a check for the past two months does NOT go to the bank and cash my check today. Ready? PRAY.

I have lived on a budget pretty much all my life. I know how to budget and I know how to live on a budget. It's a learned skill. I'm pretty good at it when there is money to spend and the decision is just how best to allocate it. However, when what comes in is less than what goes out, I just don't know how to operate. I've been reading budget posts on various blogs to see if there are any tips or tricks I've forgotten. I don't really think there are........nothing strikes a chord as something I've overlooked.

There are still a few ways I think I can spend less. First, I think I can live out of the freezer and the pantry for a while. This will serve to clean those areas out as well, which is always good. For example, I ended up spending about $1.50-$2.00 for dinner last night. I had some pork in the freezer. I added two cans of sauerkraut (from the dollar store) which cost $.59 each. And I made dumplings. I figure that cost me about $.75 at most (it's hard to estimate, but the only ingredients were Bisquick and milk). I have pork and sauerkraut for at least 3 more meals. And, I threw an extra piece of pork in there to cook which I hope to use for pulled pork.That way I don't have to spend $$$ to cook two separate meals.

I have been buying some convenience foods. They are not expensive and it has made sense to me in that it is just me eating them. I'm not trying to feed a family of 5 on convenience foods. But, I could probably make some of these things from scratch and freeze them ahead. I am not going to try to make my own ravioli, but I could just substitute spaghetti which would be cheaper. I CAN make burritos from scratch and freeze them. This kind of thinking might save a few pennies here and there.

I am also going to try making deeper cuts as far as design supplies go. I have a good inventory of things to use, some of which has not yet seen the light of day in my designs.

I cannot see any additional places to cut. And, honestly, what I've listed above isn't going to make a big difference. I have dialed the temperature in this house down to 1973 "energy crisis" levels. I do allow the heater to warm up the house initially when I get up, but then I set the thermostat down, way down, the first time I pass it. So, it's warm clothes and layers even in the house.

I don't spend money on entertainment except my $8 a month for Netflix. I own a few movie CDs and I watch them over and over and over. They're classics and I use them mostly for "company" so I don't mind. So, I can't really cut the entertainment budget.

Last year, I bought 6 pairs of panties, one pair of running shoes, and 2 shirts. I can cut the two shirts this year. I don't think I can cut the clothing budget any more than that, LOL.

I have already cut the yard guy to every other week. I can't cut him out entirely as I do not own a functional lawn mower.

I drive a van (it's fully paid for and I am not planning on buying a car that gets better gas mileage--can't handle the payment). I get about 16mpg around town. I last filled the tank on 1/3. That's 53 days ago and I have used only 3/8's of a tank or about 6 gallons. I don't think I can drive less!

What I am saying here is that I cannot make any significant cuts in my budget to balance things out. There has to be more income from somewhere. Las Vegas has some of the highest unemployment in the nation. A good part of that is as a result of the economy and layoffs in the hotels and casinos. That resulted in folks not being able to afford other goods and services. So, jobs are hard to come by. We are going to have to see what God's favor will do for me in a job search under adverse circumstances. The good part is that, without a windfall miracle, I will never be out of debt as things stand now. And, I'm struggling with that verse that says "Owe no man anything, save love". So, a job will help to solve that problem. Even a part-time job. The debt load is not insurmountable except for the lack of income. Increase the income and the mountain begins to shrink.

I am still standing for the "dream job". It's out there and, even in THIS government, clearance for the product has to be inching closer. But, I have to put a patch on the budget in this house. I have to.

I have voted today tax and accounting day. I have work to be done in those areas and today is the day. I have one return that just needs printed and it can be delivered. It won't bring in much, because the guy insisted on giving me $50 up front. I've NEVER before taken money in advance, but I did this time and was mighty grateful for it. I have another return that was completely finished and printed when the client called to say he found another deduction, UGH! So, I can make that entry, save him a few dollars, and reprint. I'll try not to think about the few extra pennies it will cost me for ink and paper and the cost of power to print the first set of copies. I have one more return that just needs some entries sorted out on one form. Had to get a breakdown of expenses (client gave it to me in one large glob, but I can't put it on the form that way or he's doomed to an audit). So, I should be able to stay busy today........

It's time for eye candy (and warmer clothes):

This page is by Deanna and I have to tell you, it just made me smile when I first saw it. It is the perfect playful layout! Deanna used our templates but with a creative twist. The template shows one photo in the lower right corner. Deanna substituted that frame which gave her space for 3 more photos and a bit of journaling. I just love that idea! Love the ricrak used as a border too!

This bright and colorful layout is by Laura. She has chosen to scrap photos from their 2010 Easter Egg Hunt. So cute. I think this kit is just perfect for Easter photos! The stitched flower shape is included in the kit. Laura's creative twist on that was to enlarge it and use it as a way to tie her whole layout together. I love how the stitching runs under and around all the photos, drawing the eye and leading the eye all at the same time. This is one super layout!

Well, I'm going to go bundle up. I've already turned the heat down for the day so I need socks and a couple of shirts, LOL. YOU be BLESSED today.