Little Monsters

Frugal Friday

Sewing a monster tote

 

In my quest for frugal living, I have decided to make as many gifts as possible using items from around home. This means that there will be a lot of reusing, recycling and creative thinking going on!

 

Today's gift was inspired by a craft on Hideous! Dreadful! Stinky!

 

Being in a slightly (enormous) hurry, I merely used the pictures to create my own colouring book monster tote. While not perfect, I am reasonably happy with the finished produced.

 

Drum rolls please.....

 

While I was not able to take photographs due to the camera batteries being drained, I will look at posting the process of this again at a later date once I have perfected the craft.

Each item was sourced from home excluding the colouring book and the crayons. The tote is made out of a mixture of sweatshirting, felt and ribbon scraps that were hiding in our VERY disorganised garage. All it needs is a colouring book ($2 shop) and some crayons (I have a spare packet downstairs).

Miss Cupcake watched me sewing the tote together and proudly informed me that I would need to make her a mermaid version of this tote. Hmmm. Watch the space!



"Comfort me with apples...."

Yesterday I went out and bought a large number of apples. Who could resist? They were 49c per kg at the local green grocer and were in pretty good condition. So I may have bought 3kg...or 4.....

Now what to do with them?

I've put aside 2kg of them into the fridge for snacks this week as my girls are apple mad. In fact, given the choice between cupcakes and apples, they'd choose the apples.

I'm still left with 1.5kg. Last week I made my own dehydrated apple chips using a recipe from Frugal Kiwi. They were an instant hit with both children. This week, I've decided to use 4 of the apples to make some applesauce for Toto, who loves his sweeties. The rest, will be used to make fruit leather, which I've always had a hankering for making myself.

So I've found a recipe from NZ Eco Chick and am going to try it tomorrow. I'll post up some pictures of how it goes!

Livin' on a Prayer

There are times when I'm reminded forcefully that whenever we are in need, all we have to do is ask, and God will provide. Well, we've certainly been provided for this week! I decided that we need to refine our grocery budget a little as we seem to have items in our pantry, fridge, and freezer that we do not necessarily need or use.

Enter "The $21 Challenge"!!

 

"Pretend you have no income for one week. Now imagine you have $21 in the bank left for groceries. How are you going to survive? Its like the reality show 'Survivor', but instead of going away to some remote location you are stranded in your kitchen with only your pantry, freezer and fridge to help you. You have been given lifelines, like recipe books. Will you win the Challenge?" (simplesavings.co.nz)

 

First off, I sat down and wrote a list of the things we usually need to buy. Things such as bread, milk, margarine and laundry powder made it to the list. Then I went exploring.

 

 

I dove through our pantry, freezer, downstairs storage pantry, and fridge, mentally listing the items in the above places. Then I started hunting. What recipes did I have that used those items?

 

 

What I came up with was healthy, frugal and fun for the whole family. Here is our weekly menu for this week:

 

Breakfast

Slowcooker porridge with stewed apples, cinnamon, dried currants and almond meal.

1c soy milk (for Cupcake)

 

Snacks

Rice crackers, carrots, apples, celery, homemade white bean dip, homemade choc chip biscuits, dried fruit (bananas, apples, apricots, sultanas), popcorn.

 

Lunches

Soy yoghurt (Cupcake), homemade plain yoghurt, sandwiches with leftover jam/marmite on them, homemade tomato soup with homemade bread.

 

Dinners:

Minestrone soup with homemade rolls

Honey sesame chicken with rice and vegetables

Devilled sausages, potatoes and vegetables

Chicken schnitzels with vegetables

Beef enchiladas

Pumpkin soup

 

(Both soups will do 2 meals each)

 

Baby food

Broccoli and potato puree

Baby rice

Peach, apple and strawberry puree

Mango and banana puree

 

I then sent hubby out to do the shopping (cringe!) but surprisingly, he only got what was on the list! No chocolates, icecream or things that were on 'sale'. Here is what we spent:

 

Sour cream tub $1.29
Margarine $1.99
2ltr budget milk $2.97
White bread x4 $5.50
Frozen corn $3.89
Sugar $2.49

Total = $15.90

 

Mission Accomplished!



Kia Ora from the Land of the Long White Cloud!

Kia Ora and welcome to the Land of the Long White Cloud - otherwise known as Aoteoroa, New Zealand.

I guess since this is my first post, I'll begin by introducing myself and the goals of this blog.

I'm a lot of things: mother, teacher, student, budgeter and creative genius (well, I like to think I am!). I live in the growing town of Pukekohe, which is 40 minutes South of Auckland, near the Bombay hills.

I live with my darling husband and my three gorgeous children. Obviously I won't use thier real names, so we'll get creative. Cupcake (4 years) is my boisterous, clever, bundle of mischief who loves using her imagination and dancing through her life. Tinkerbell (3 years) is a quiet, loving girl, who loves exploring the outdoors, babies and helping out around the home. Toto (8 months) is a small ball of energy who loves laughing, talking, drinking milk and snuggles with anyone who will give them to him.

© Sharp Shooter Photography Limited

I was trained as a teacher and taught for 7 years before beginning my journey as a homemaker and full-time mummy due to the health problems of my little Cupcake. Its been a hard journey, but I don't regret a moment of it as I've had the priviledge of watching my beautiful children growing and changing for a year and a half now.

I've decided to write a blog detailing this journey and how we've gotten to where we are. I want to explore living with a child with food allergies, asthma and high health needs. I want to share recipes, tips and tricks to make your money go further. And I want to share the joy of learning that I have been priviledged to share with my children as we grow and learn together.

I hope you enjoy reading and contributing to this blog and that it helps you or those you know as you learn and grow along with us.

xxx
Chelles