Keeping it Simple (part 2)

In part 1 of my Keep it Simple series we cleaned the girls' playroom in little over 9 minutes.  The toys that they have are kept very simple so that even when it is a mess it is easy to clean.  This is the goal for the rest of the house.  I would like to make clean up in each room in our house this simple as well to make for a quick clean up.  

Part 2 of this series was to clean the girls' bedroom.  Here are the BEFORE pictures of their room:

It doesn't look too bad, but there were a ton of little toys and random items, trash and papers all over the floor. So this took us a little bit longer because there were so many random things to put away.  

Here is our stopwatch time:

 End result including vacuuming the floor:

Tips:

*I usually make a list of things that need to be put away in the room.  

example: books, clothes, stuffed animals, puzzles, cups in sink, make beds, etc.   I can then let the girls know what needs to be done and they can choose which item they would like to start with.  This way things get done, but they get a choice of what they would like to clean up.  

*Having the timer running while we were cleaning made the girls work a little faster.  They thought it was neat to see how quickly we could get their room done.   Next time we clean we will see if we can beat out previous time.  Each of the girls have a sticker chart (more about sticker charts later) and they may get a couple sticker for their chart if we can beat out time.  :-)  

$50/week Shopping

I try to keep a pretty tight weekly grocery budget for our family of 6.  I have strayed from sharing my weekly grocery hauls (I guess they aren't really hauls, but, whatever!), but I have recently had a few people asking me about how I do that, what do I get, what do I make, etc.  So, I figured I would try to get back into the habit of posting them at the end of each week. 

$37.05 was the total for my first trip.  We already had meat in the freezer so I didn't need to get any meat.  We did however need shampoo, conditioner and kids toothpaste. 

We were also able to stock up on some shredded cheese, pringles (this was a real treat!), potatoes and bread. 

This is not grocery related, but wanted to share.  :-)  I needed to get some ink for my printer and as always when I go into CVS I scan my care card and the scanner to see if there are any coupons available.  There was a $4.99 coupon for this acetaminophen which was on sale for $4.99.  FREE!!  WooHoo!!

When I got home, I realized I had a $5 off coupon for an ink cartridge so I returned the ink the next day and then bought it again, but used my coupon.  I got the ink for $17.49. 

I was disappointed with is quick trip.  One thing we always have in our cupboards are pasta and pasta sauce.  Well, I was making chicken parmesan for dinner and realized I didn't have any sauce.  I make a quick trip to our local store and had to pay $1.99 for this jar of pasta.  :(  This was a bit more than I would usually pay, so I was kind of bummed. 

This was my last trip and I was MEGA excited about this one!!  I am NOT a couponer, but recently a friend of mine and I were talking about it and she was telling me that she was trying couponing.  After chatting for a bit I was getting a bit excited and after looking a couple sites I started printing a couple coupons.  I don't like using coupons because I usually buy generic products and there aren't many coupons for store brand items.  So I thought......

As I started looking I found several coupons for the generic store brand items I had on my list!!  This got me pretty excited.  I was able to combine all sorts of sales and coupons and finish off my week with a trip that cost me $8.85!!  I saved over $21.00!!  This has gotten me motivated to try couponing a little more.  Am I going to go crazy?  NO, but I won't rule it out completely.  ;-)

Keeping it Simple (part 1)

Sometimes I get frustrated with how messy my girls' rooms get and how quickly they get that way.  I find myself and/or my husband telling them things like 'Do we need to throw some of these toys away since you can't put them away?' or 'Maybe you don't need to get anything for Christmas.'  But when it actually comes time to clean their room, I realize how many toys they DON'T have.  Compared to the amount of toys their friends have, you would think we didn't have any money!!  This last time we cleaned their room I decided to take before and after pictures and time us to see how long it took myself and the girls (ages: 6, 4 and 3) to clean their room.  I wanted to show myself that even though it may look awful, it really isn't that bad and maybe we really don't need to threaten with getting nothing for Christmas.

The room I am going to share with you today is Emery's room/playroom.

BEFORE:

Pretty bad, huh??

Well, like I said, I set the timer on the ipad and......

Yep, that's right!!  LESS THAN 10 minutes!!  and that includes getting it vacuumed!!

Not too shabby, huh?!

AFTER:

 1st picture -  You can see we have the work bench and a chair and there is a basket in between the crib and the tv stand with all the dress up clothes in it.

 2nd picture - All of the stuffed animals and dolls go into the blue bin.  The baskets on the shelves have little toys that aren't necessarily a part of anything else.  

3rd picture -  The desk and any workbooks, a couple coloring books and pens.  Really anything to play school with.  The purple shelf in this picture is one of my favorites.  It is magnetic!!  I didn't take a picture of the shelves on the other side, but it has baskets with play food and dishes, magnetic dishes and the tools for the work bench.  

All that mess for so few things!!  See when I type out what they actually have it really isn't that much.  KEEPING IT SIMPLE makes for a quick, easy and painless clean up!!!  

Stay tuned for other rooms we KEEP SIMPLE!!

Clean Eating - A New Way of Life

I was recently introduced to 'clean eating'.  I joined in on a 90 Day Clean Eating Challenge a little over a month ago.  Some people have asked me what kind of diet I am on or is there a weight loss program I am doing.  Clean Eating is NOT a diet, it is a lifestyle change!!  I recently posted this on our 90-day Clean Eating Facebook Support page.....

At the beginning of the year I weighed 195lbs. If I ever told people how much I weighed they usually wouldn't believe me. I am 5'10" so my height helped me to carry the weight well. I had also had 4 babies within 5 years (none of them were twins). So, needless to say, my body had taken some hits with not much time to recover between pregnancies and lots of cravings. 

Although my body and weight weren't where I wanted them to be, I felt relatively healthy and in decent shape. I played basketball every now and then at the park with the guys, did Zumba occasionally, would go for a run sometimes and had been able to complete 2 mini triathlons during the past 4 years (I was pregnant for both of them). 

At the beginning of the year one of my resolutions was to lose 20lbs. In April I decided to make a change. I tried a 21 day cleanse (no carbs/dairy type of thing). It was intense, but I lost almost 20 lbs! I was so excited! However, it didn't teach me anything and the weight started to come back pretty quickly. By the end of summer I had gained 10 of it back.  

As I mentioned earlier, I carried my weight well, but I was eating JUNK!! Looking back it was ridiculous!! I could easily eat an entire package of EL Fudge Double Stuffed cookies by myself. Not a sleeve of them, an ENTIRE package. I would actually buy them and hide them so my girls wouldn't get any of them. Then after they went to bed, I would sit on the couch with my bag of cookies and a glass of milk and eat. My breakfast on my way to work consisted of a package of ho-ho's, a bag of chips and a pop (Roglenda Smith can confirm that). I had no problem eating half of a bowl of brownie mix and making and 8x8 pan instead of a 9x13 because I had eaten so much of the mix. Pretty sick, huh?!?! I didn't think so. 

I was VERY nervous about this 90 day challenge. First of all it was NINETY days! That's a LONG time and I am a picky eater so I was worried about failing, but I needed a change so I figured I would give it a try. I am AMAZED at how I am feeling!! 
I have already lost 15 lbs, but what I am more amazed at is how easy it has been to not eat the sweets. Some people are struggling with this, but when I see how much energy I have by having apples and peanut butter as my go-to snack instead of candy and cookies, I am even more motivated to pass those things up. 

My best friend came over the other night and I knew we were going to be getting pizza (one of my cheat meals). We got Little Caesars because that's my favorite and I was craving their bread sticks!! I was ready to CHEAT! After only 1 piece of pizza and 1 bread stick, I sat there wondering why I hadn't already gotten up to get another piece of pizza or even 3 more bread sticks.....weird.....was I really done??? I WAS!!!  What a great feeling to know that I didn't NEED to have more. I was satisfied! YAY!!

This IS going to be a LIFE CHANGE for me and I am excited about learning more and being able to share this experience with others. This challenge is so different from the cleanse I did. That just deprived me from eating things I liked. This still allows me to eat those things, but it is also teaching me the RIGHT things to eat. Roanna and Karla, you have an amazing program here and I am so grateful to both of you for this opportunity for me to change my life! 

We are into the 5th week of the challenge and I have already lost 20lbs!! Can you believe it?!?!  20 lbs, just from eating better and exercising  20 minutes a day.  I am loving the way I feel and how much more energy I have.

The ladies who started this challenge are working on copyrights to the program so I can not share too many details about it, but here are a few:

*you are on a team of 4-6 people
*there is a points system (I love this, it keeps me motivated) - points for getting at least 7 hours of sleep at night, points for communicating with a member, points for watching certain DVDs or reading certain books on a given list, attending classes.
*report in with your team leader once a week with weight and points
* 2 'cheat meals' given each week

I will keep you posted on my progress in the next 6 1/2 weeks.

Meal Planning

Now that I am home all day meal planning is something I am hoping to get much better at.
Breakfast - is usually pretty easy and doesn't consist of much planning
Lunch - I watch another little girl during the day, so I have 4 kids here for lunch
After School Snack - the littles I have during the day eat about 15 minutes before the big kids get off the bus. Then when my oldest gets off the bus, so do the other 3 kids I watch after school.  So that's 8 kids for snack
Dinner - we are usually all (6 of us) home for dinner.

On the night that someone is not going to be home is when we usually have leftovers or save them for a busy weekend.

This weekend I went to a class on Clean Eating for Kids.  I am a picky eater myself and found many of the topics discussed very useful.  One of them was about meal planning.  I am going to try it this week for dinner and see how it goes.  This will be our menu for the week. 

Meatless Monday - Grilled Cheese
Taco Tuesday - Regular Tacos
Souper Duper Wednesday - Pizza Soup
Crockpot Thursday - Chicken and Stuffing
Fishy Friday - out of town for the weekend

My grocery list:
chicken
hamburger
lettuce
taco seasoning
milk
bread
eggs
cream cheese
butter
mayo
sugar

With a $50 budget this leaves me quite a bit of wiggle room. 

Back in the Swing

Day 1 Week 3 of being a SAHM.....

We are finally getting into a routine and I am LOVING being at home!  The lack of stress I feel this year so far is wonderful.  

Last year I was staying up until AT LEAST midnight or later.  For several reasons:

* just needing some 'me time' after the girls and Jason went to bed, 

*needing to get the dishes done - if not, they wouldn't get done in the morning and then they would be sitting there when I came home, we wouldn't have any dishes to make dinner, so we would go out to eat.  :(

*needing to get laundry washed, dried and folded

The last two weeks, I have been consistently going to bed between 10:30-11!!  I know that if those things don't get done before I go to bed they will be there in the morning and I have all day to get the, done.  That alone is a huge stress relief!

_________________________________________________________________________________

Well, in the last couple weeks I have had people question me about my budget/financing and grocery shopping/meal planning.  I really want to get back to these postings to help show cooking for a family of 6 (small children) does not have to be expensive.  More posts to come!!

Life Update

It's summer break and I have been loving every minute of it so far.  As I write this I am sitting outside, under the big tulip tree in our yard, as the girls play around in the yard.

 To be perfectly honest, I would normally be inside trying to get dishes or laundry done, or trying to pick up the house so it looks presentable if someone were to stop by unexpected.  Even then, I would apologize for the way the house looked.  But not today!!  I need to make the most of what God has given me.

On March 11th my brother in law (29) was told he had less than a week to live - when he was 22 doctors found three, inoperable, cancerous, tumors on his brain.  On April 15th he lost his battle with cancer and went home to be with his Father.  This opened my eyes as to how short life is/can be and I made it official, that I am NOT going back to work next year.  I will be a SAHM!!

When I was working, whenever I was home I was trying to clean up, as I mentioned above.  I am not quite as worried about the house being clean because I know it will get done at some point. Jason is happier because he actually has clean clothes for work and I am actually motivated to make him a lunch.  :-)

I guess I might need to change the title of my blog since I have accomplished that goal!!

$50/week Shopping

I did my shopping for the week today.  I was able to get the rest of the ingredients for my 'Baked Potato Soup' I will be making for our freezer meal swap this Sunday.  I am really excited and will post more about that later.

Here are my purchases from this week:

I felt like this was a really successful trip.  I had gotten 

*4 - 1/2 gallons (5/$5)  and 1 gallon of milk ($1.79)

*3 - 8 lb bags of potatoes - .99 at Groceries by Joe

*chicken broth

*toilet paper

*cantalope, carrots, bananas

*bread - .50 at Aldi

*cereal 

*eggs 

*freezer meal bags

*syrup

*puffs  

*sour cream

*peanut butter

*shredded cheese (3)/chunk cheese (1) - Cheese was only .99 at Kroger!!

I did not get any meat on this trip, but we have a little already and I know that we are going to be getting 6 other meals at the meal swap on Sunday.  

$50/week Shopping

This week my trip consisted of going to Kroger, Aldi, Al's Supermarket, and Groceries by Joe.  

Milk at Kroger this week was a STEAL!!  5/$5  (half gallons)

I am also making Baked Potato Soup for the Freezer Meal Swap I have coming up this next week.  I was able to get some potatoes and bags of frozen broccoli (only .59 a bag!!)

Some of my other purchases included:

*Totino's pizza (4/$5)

*toilet paper

*pasta

*chunk cheese

*shredded cheese (I only got 4 bags, but they were 10/$10 at Joe's - another STEAL!!)

*cream of chicken soup

*cream of mushroom soup

*pancakes

*chicken nuggets

*pork chops  (these will go with the ones I bought last week to make a full meal)

*sour cream

*hot dogs

*cheese puffs - the girls were really excited to have these!

*cheese slices

*2 cans of corn

*2 cans of green beans

*toilet paper (I will need to get more next week because this pack ended up getting used during an impromptu tp-ing trip)  :-)

4 Bags in 4 Weeks (Bag 1)

BAG #1

Most of what was in this bag was clothes.  There were quite a few clothes that I just pitched because they were stained.  It was really hard to get rid of some of these clothes because they are so cute, but the child they belong to NOW doesn't wear them.  I wanted to save them, in hopes one of the other girls would wear them, but we have SO MANY clothes, it just isn't worth saving them all.  

Freezer Meals

At the start of the new year, my sister and I decided that we would get together once a month to do some freezer meal cooking.  We would make between 6-10 meals.  We figured this would cut  down on the eating out due to lack of motivation to cook dinner.  So far I think we have been doing pretty good.

We had a Freezer Meal cooking night last night.  I always feel so much better after those.  In a couple hours of cooking and chatting with my sis, my freezer is a little fuller and I feel ready for the next couple weeks.

I ended with:
Tatertot Casserole
Baked Potato Soup
Broc/Cauli Cheese Soup
Egg Salad (for lunch, not for the freezer)
Chicken and Rice
Chicken Stuffed Crescent Rolls

My sister's birthday was coming up, so I made a little more of the Tatertot Casserole and the Baked Potato Soup and gave them to her (for her and her husband) as a birthday present.  

This is the Chicken Stuffed Crescent Rolls.  Can't wait to try them!!

These are the dishes my sister made.  Her menus consisted of:

(I have to double check with her and will update as soon as I find out.)

The first time we cooked we met at my sisters house and it worked out well.  I had to be very prepared because I needed to haul all of my supplies to her house.  

The second time, we each did our own because we couldn't find a time that worked for both of us.  

This time we met at my house.  Even though it was nicer to have all of my things at my house, I was not as prepared.  I think I figured I didn't need to have everything planned out because I would already have everything I needed.  I was so scatter-brained though.  :(  It didn't help that there were 5 kids (including my nephew) running around asking for snacks and drinks, etc.  Next time we will definitely do it at my sister's house again.  

*sigh*

This was the picture I took just before dinner last night.  This is a chair in the corner of our dinning room.  What a mess huh??  Well, all of this was either already piled on this chair or piled on the table. 

There are papers, school bags, computer bag (for school), diaper bags, shoes (those weren't on the table), bags of items that needed to be returned to others, and I'm sure much more.  

The only thing that I am proud of it the big white bag.  That's my first of '4 bags in 4 weeks'.  This is a frustration.  I need a better routine of where things go so that this doesn't happen.  It frustrates me and then I sit down to dinner frustrated about the way our house looks and how messy it is and then I don't know if I fully enjoy the company of my family.  

This will be my focal area tonight.  This area will be cleaned before I go to bed.  This does not guarantee that is will stay this way, I need to establish a routine first, but it will hopefully last for a little while.  

$50/week Shopping

So it has been a little while since I have been to the store.  The last time I went to Aldi, I forgot to bring my debit card and didn't have any cash on me.  I got to the register and pulled out my checkbook (hoping they would take is just this one time) and of course I was turned down.  I had to leave my cart, which had lots of great meat deals, and walk out empty handed.  So that week we ended up grabbing a few things here and there as we needed them.

This week I was able to make an actual trip to the store and get what we needed for the week.   My purchases this week came from Aldi and Grocery's by Joe (a local grocery store).

I am always super excited to find bread on sale at Aldi.  This is the second time I have found bread for .49 a loaf.  I got 4 of them and we will freeze them until we need more.  We had most of our meat that we need for the next couple weeks so I got a handful of random things.  

*Draino (our bathroom sink is plugged)

*tums

*pasta salad

*half and half (for some soup)

*chicken broth (for soup as well)

*2 boxes of stuffing (I have a turkey in the freezer that I plan to make sometime soon and we didn't have any stuffing)

*2 porkchops (I know it's not enough to feed our family, but I didn't want to go over my budget and figured I could freeze them and use them when I got some more.)

BTW - My sister and I will be having our monthly Freezer Meal get together on Wednesday of this week, so be on the lookout for our meals.  

Baby Shower Gift - so proud

This past weekend I had a baby shower to go to.  A couple weeks ago I ordered my gift, an Amber Teething Necklace.  The necklace came in a small drawstring bag, so as I was getting ready for the shower,  I put it in a small gift bag and attached my card.  I took a look at it and it looked absolutely pathetic!  

I debated weather of not I should go to the Dollar Store (the only store here in town - the nearest Walmart is at least a 20 minute drive) and pick up something else to add to the necklace so my gift would look a bit more presentable.  After much debate, I decided that since we are really trying to watch our money, I didn't need to get anything else.  However, I felt really stupid walking into this shower with a super tiny gift bag when everyone else had arms full of large gifts and packages.   

In the end it was a HUGE hit and the couple thought the necklace was such a great idea and can't wait to see how it works on the new baby.  I was so proud I had made the decision to save our money and stick to my original gift.  

4 bags in 4 Weeks

Since I am putting my 31 Days to Declutter Your Life on hold for a little while, this is going to be my new challenge to myself.  It will help me declutter, but not get overwhelmed.  

I have been trying so hard to keep up on keeping things clean and laundry done, but there are nights when I just need to SIT!  Of course, it is those nights when the house seems to be the messiest, dishes are piled in the sink, laundry is sitting in heaps on the kitchen floor (because there is no room left in the bathroom) and the girls need a glass of water or have to go to the bathroom 50 times!!

In the next 4 weeks I am challenging my self to get rid of 4 garbage bags of 'stuff'.  These bags will get donated to Goodwill or Salvation Army, but they will no longer be at my house and that is the goal.  

This week will be my first week to get rid of a bag.  So before this Saturday I will have one garbage bag of 'stuff' ready to go.  I know clothes is a typical area to find things to donate, so that's where I plan to start.  As I have been trying to keep up with laundry I have noticed just how many articles of clothing the girls actually have.  I want to get rid of it, but there are so many cute things.  I think to myself, 'she may not want to wear these, but the next one might.'  So I don't get rid of anything.  This needs to stop.  I need to figure out a system to their clothes.  This is definitely going to be something I look into.  

This is Rough

I am so ready to give up on the 31 Days to Declutter Your Life.  I just can't seem to keep up.  I am doing pretty good at keeping the living room clean, but the dining room, where our table is a catch all when we all get home from school/work, the bathroom, where the laundry never-ever ends and the girls' room are always a disaster.  Our kitchen counters are also a place for clutter to gather, not to mention how awful our bedroom is!

I may need to start calling in the reinforcements.  I am planning on scheduling a day one weekend in March  (or April because we have some pretty full weekends in March) to have a 'let's clean Jessica's house' party.  I will be sure to have lunch, drinks and snacks ready for those who come over to help.  I think I just need Jason to get the girls out of the house for a day so I can go through everything without little hands pulling it back out of the Goodwill boxes that I put it in.

I will keep plugging away, but I think I am going to pause on my 31 Days to Declutter Your Life and pick it up at a later time.  I am a very poor blogger to my fans (not that I have too many right now), and for that I apologize.  I guess I shouldn't have started with such a time consuming blog series.  I thought it was going to help me get my life organized, but I have felt like I haven't been able to keep up and it gets me down.  I will be posting more often, however, they will be random topics.  :-)

31 Days to Declutter Your Life - DAY 14 (Office)

We have 2 bedrooms upstairs and a landing in between the two.  Mac(kenzie), our oldest had one room, Teagan, our second, had the other room and Skylee our third, was had her bed and things in the landing area.
Over Christmas break we decided to move all three girls into one of the bedrooms and use the other room as a play room.  This also left an open landing.  My desk/office area had been in a corner in our dining room and I suggested moving the desk and file cabinet upstairs to the landing, so that's what we did.

I thought that was a great idea.  It opened up our dining room and gave me my own work space for Thirty-One.  The only problem is that the girls thing that means they can play there too because the area is in between the play room and their bedroom.  The girls will make forts in this area and try to play in the space under my desk. This is what it looks like at its worst.

Yesterday, after Emery's birthday party (our youngest), my mother-in-law took Teagan and Skylee.  Today school was cancelled and while Emery was napping and Mac was playing I decided to conquer

this area.  I started with garbage.  I grabbed myself a plastic bag and started pitching.  In my decluttering process I am not keeping things that are broken that I MIGHT be able to fix at a later time. I just want it GONE.  I started throwing away any papers the girls had gotten out/colored/written on and small toys that were broken and not going to be missed.  Any toys that needed to go into either the play room or their bedroom went into a box and there was a second box for all of the toys that could be donated.  

After this was done, it was easy to get my desk/office area looking good.  I will admit that I did not go through the drawers of the desk or file cabinet.  That will be for a later time.  I just wanted it looking good for now.  

Here is my AFTER picture.  :-)  I was very pleased!!

31 Days to Declutter Your Life - DAY 12 & 13 (Retrace Steps)

This weekend I have been going back and retracing the steps I have already taken to make sure the rest of the house isn't falling behind.  I need to do this more often.  I tend to get lazy during the week because I am so wore out from work and don't want to do anything when I get home, but then I find myself cleaning and doing laundry like crazy on the weekends to try to catch up from what I let go during the week.  I don't get to enjoy my weekends as much because I am too worried about getting the house work done.

I have been looking for a quick cleaning checklist online.  Not sure if something like that will help, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to look.  If I find something I will be sure to post it.


Here are some (more embarrassing) pictures of what is yet to come in my decluttering journey.

31 Days to Declutter Your Life - DAY 11 (Bathroom)

This will be short and sweet. I finished the laundry room and is pretty please with the way it looks now.  I got rid of quite a bit, condensed some things and put other things in their proper place.

The bowl on the dryer  has the girls' stickers for their sticker charts (taped to the dryer) for going to the bathroom.

The only thing that is left hanging up in a Girl Scouts vest.  

My goal is to eventually put up a curtain up in front of the 'laundry room'.  

31 Days to Declutter Your Life - Day 10 (Bathroom)

So here is the progress on the bathroom.  

I know this should be a given, but I have learned that it is much easier to take 5 minutes 3-4 times a week to pick up the bathroom (or any room, for that matter), than it is to wait until it is complete mess and have to go through all of the junk/randoms that have accumulated over a longer period of time.  

GOAL:  Spend 5 minutes 3-4 times a week, picking up and wiping down the bathroom/laundry room.  

I hate cleaning the tub.  :(  That is the absolute worst part of cleaning the bathroom (I think).  If you have any good suggestions for tub and shower cleaner, please let me know.  I have heard there are things that you can just spray and rinse.  Have you tried any?  Do you like them?

Tips for cleaning the MIRROR.  You always want to keep your mirror clean.  Guests will probably spend the most time examining themselves in your mirror. They will inevitably notice dinginess and streaks.  

You can use glass cleaner or VINEGAR.   Also, you can use newspaper to wipe the mirror instead of a rag or paper towel.  Newspaper won't leave any streaks!  My mother in law taught me that one.  :-)

Well, the bathroom isn't looking too bad, but I still have a long way to go.  The 'laundry room' part still needs LOTS of love.  Take a peak:

Here are my list of things to do tonight to put a dent in the laundry room:

- clean off the dryer

-find a better place for the towels

- organize toolbox

- get rid of hangers and put away clothes that are hanging

That will be a start.  

31 Days to Declutter Your Life - DAY 9 (Bathroom)

Our bathroom and laundry room are combine.  If we ever add on to our current home, purchase or build, I want them separate!!  I feel like there just isn't enough room in my bathroom to also have my laundry in there.  We also only have 1 bathroom, which is eventually going to be a problem when the girls get older. 5 girls + 1 bathroom = NOT GOOD!  But for the time being, we are thankful for what we have.

I have always wondered when I walk into bathrooms at other peoples houses, 'How do they keep it so clean?  Where are all of there things? They don't have their toothbrushes out on the counter.  Where do they keep them?"  I just don't get how some bathrooms have almost nothing in them.  I then find myself looking around their house for their laundry room or a linen closet.  I need to reassure myself that the reason their bathroom looks so much better than mine is because they have some other place to put all of those things that I have to keep in my bathroom because I don't have a laundry room or linen closet.

Here are some pictures of what my bathroom/laundry room looks like right now.

Our bathroom is just off our kitchen.  It normally isn't THIS messy, but Jason has been working on the backsplash in the kitchen so his tools are out.  I also use to keep our laundry baskets in the kitchen by the bathroom door.  Now that the kitchen in clean, I don't want to do that anymore, but I have no idea where I am going to put it now.  So it ended up in the middle of our bathroom floor for now.  

Here is our 'laundry room'.  We have some nice shelving above our washer and dryer.  I need to find a better way to utilize them.  

Alrighty, my goal is to get the 'bathroom' part of my bathroom done by Sunday evening. I think the challenging parts are going to be the drawers under the sink and the medicine cabinet.  I don't use a curling iron or blow dryer, but I have them just in case.  Most of the time 'just in case' items I would get rid of, however, these are items that I might really need and I can't just run to the store to pick up.  As a teacher I get several gift of 'smelly stuff' every year for Christmas and at the end of the year.  I can only use so much so I have a drawer devoted to these gift sets.  

I will work on the 'laundry room' part in the next week.  

$50/week Shopping

This wasn't a huge trip.  There were only a few things that I needed and I ended up getting some things that we could use or add to items I already have at home.  

Here was my list of things I needed to get for the week:

eggs

milk

cheese slices

bread

chicken noodle soup

cream of mushroom soup

tomato soup cereal

As always, I went through the ads at Kroger, Martin's and Meijer.  Here are the items that were on my list of things I wouldn't mind getting:

Joes

pasta sauce - .69 (3)*

tomato paste - .10 (3)*

waffels - .89 (4)

canned tomatoes - .25 already had 6 cans in the pantry

tomato juice - .99 (1)*

ketchup - .69 (1)* - I would have gotten more, but we already had two in the pantry.  

*Buy 10, get $3.00 off (the price shown is what I got it for).  

I know my number don't add up, but I picked up 2 things for my sister which brought my total to 10 items.  

My total at Joe's came to $7.61.

Kroger

hamburger/tuna helper - 10/10 (2)  I ended up getting a couple of these because they didn't have the cheese slices

cream cheese - 10/10 (2)

tortilla chips - 10/10 (2)

marshmallows - 10/10 (1)     These were cheaper at Aldi.

cheese slices - 10/10   (2)      I had to get a rain check because they were out. 

muffin mix - 10/10                Not a necessity.

pizza rolls - 10/10                 Cheaper for a larger bag at Meijer.

milk - 3/4 (about 2.67/gal) (4)

sour cream - 10/10 (1)

shampoo - .89 (2)                  Found another brand at Kroger for only .79!!

pasta roni - 10/10 (2)

biscuits - 10/10 (1)                Got this because I got the marshmallows at Aldi.

My total at Kroger came to $16.16.  

Aldi - Aldi is usually my first stop.  I usually don't have a list when I go to Aldi.  I am looking for anything on my list that is not on sale somewhere else and to see if the items at Aldi are at a better price than they are on sale at other stores.  

This week I was able to get bread for .40!!  I got 4 loaves and put 3 in the freezer.  

I also bought a bag of frozen chicken.  

My total at Aldi was $19.59.

Meijer - Didn't end up getting to Meijer.  :(

Chicken Stripes - $3.50 for 32 oz

Pizza Rolls - $1.99/40 ct.  

Martin's

Nothing from Martin's this week.  

My total for all three stores came to $43.36.  I used the last $6 to get some fresh fruits and veggies.  

My first trip on Thursday.  

Meals for the week:

Monday - Chicken and Rice (made during our last 'freezer meal' day)

Tuesday - Nachos (tortillas from this trip, taco meat from our last 'freezer meal' day, lettuce, cheese, tomatoes, onions)

Wednesday - spaghetti and garlic bread

Thursday - hamburger helper

Friday - Dinner at my mom and dad's for my birthday. :)

Saturday - Leftovers for lunch, Pot Roast from 'freezer meal' day for dinner

Accountability

So this is exactly why I needed to let people know that I had a blog.  I went out of town last weekend (Thursday- Sunday) for a retreat for Thirty-One.  My husband is AMAZING and had the girls the entire time so that I could go.  While I was gone he got into a car accident on his way t work and totaled our van, which is our only vehicle that could fit all of us, and we found out some bad new about my brother-in-law (he has brain cancer and it is covering 95% of the left side of his brain.
So needless to say, when I got home things were definitely out of sorts.  All the work I had done in the living room, dining room and kitchen.......gone.  We had to start looking for a new vehicle and Jason and I hadn't had a good chance to talk about how he was feeling about his brother's situation.

So all week, I have been wanting to move onto my bathroom and start getting caught back up on my 31 Days to Declutter Your Life, but I'll admit it has been REALLY hard.  I have felt like I have let people down who read my posts and are looking forward to seeing my horribly messy house, because I am sure some of your think, "Wow, at least my house doesn't look like, THAT!'  LOL!!

This weekend I have a girls youth retreat in Chicago, but here is my plan.....
I will start cleaning the bathroom before I leave tomorrow and will have it finished by Sunday night.  I will get those posts to you soon.  I am hoping to get back on track this weekend.  Also, be watching because I am going to be posting my $50 shopping trip in the next day or two!!

Thanks for keeping me accountable.  I know that if I didn't have people reading, I could just not do it and no one would know the difference.  My house could stay a mess and it wouldn't matter, except I would be miserable wading through the mess.  So thank you to those who read and keep me accountable.  I really appreciate it!

31 Days to Declutter Your Life - DAY 8 (Kitchen - Fridge & Freezer)

Today is going to be my last day in the kitchen.  I PROMISE!!  The last thing I need to do is clean out the fridge, which I am not looking forward to at all.  :(

I started by taking everything out of the fridge and setting it on the counter.  Then I took a really warm rag and SCRUBBED!  It was pretty disgusting. I didn't think about taking a closer picture of the shelves, until after they were all clean.  Those would have been better pictures to show.  The ones below, but show it looking a little more organized and a little more bare from throwing things out.

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

Here are a few random tips for cleaning your kitchen.  

 - Only keep the things on your counters that you use everyday or at least twice a week.  If you don't -   

    Find a new place for it!!

 - Put out one decorative bowl or dish to collect odds and ends.  Then be sure to put them in their place,

   at the end of the week.  

 - How many of you get the stained plastic containers??  Well, before you put that pasta sauce in those 

   containers, spray them with nonstick cooking spray.