Cherries are Yummy!

Salem had his first taste of cherry today. He loved them and really chowed down.
Here he is hamming it up for the camera.
Cherries were on sale for $2.49 lb. That is the cheapest I've seen this year so we bought a bag.
YUM!

Back to School Deals

We went to Office Depot and Office Max today for the penny deals. I spent around $11 for all this. I would have gotten 3 Office Depot glue bottles but they were out (a penny each).
Backpack
Accordion File
5 Crayola colored pencils
5 composition notebooks
3 blunt scissors
3 rulers
3 boxes of crayons
3 mini Sharpie highliters

Kelsey was wearing the backpack when we checked out and I didn't realize it until we were out the door! So we had to go back in and pay for the backpack. Luckily I noticed before we even got to the car. I would have been mortified if we'd made it home with a "hot" backpack.

Target Clearance is Rockin' this Week!

I had to go to Target today to get some stuff for the kids. I ended up spending a long time looking through all their clearance items! I had to control myself or I would have spent a lot more. I actually kinda freaked when my total was so high, but a lot of this we needed or I am saving for next summer.

I spent under $100 for all this!

Boys Hanes socks (10 pk)
Girls Hanes socks (6 pk)
Boys dress socks (2 pk)
Baby socks (10 pk)-clearance $3
toddler socks (2 pk)-clearance $1.74
Princess Underwear (7 pk)
4 pair shorts for Kelsey (3 are long and modest!!!)-clearance 50-75% off
2 pair sleeping shorts for Jordan-clearance $1.98 each
Boys White t-shirt-clearance $1.48
6 pk Elmers Glue-Sale $1
5 pk of spiral notebooks-Sale $0.50
Black backpack-$19.99
Crayola foam sidewalk chalk refill-clearance $4.18
Transformer toy-clearance $1.74 (stocking stuffer)
Wooden Macaroni & Cheese Playset-clearance $6.94 (Christmas gift)
Boys Elastic waistband cargo type pants-clearance $4.48 (they are huge so I might return)

I am seriously tempted to go to a different Target and see if they have a better selection. I got size large for Jordan which is just waaay too big. I'd love to exchange for mediums. There are tons of toys on clearance, too. Like I said, restraint was used.

Our summer vacation this year took us to South Dakota. We had a great time! We got to see Mount Rushmore and some of the attractions in the area.
This was our first family vacation since starting our Total Money Make Over using Dave Ramsey's plan. We paid CASH and it was great (ok, the cash was in our checking account, not actual cash). We actually stayed under budget.
We planned for $700 and actually spent less than $600. We drove our own car, camped and packed our own food. We did go to dinner twice.
Even though we had some thunderstorms and rain that interrupted our sleep I would totally do the camping again.
I would totally recommend going to Old McDonald's Farm when you go. My kids had a blast! Kelsey is obsessed with horses right now and really enjoyed the pony rides. The entrance fee lasts 3 days which totally rocks. Make sure to check the free coupon book by the front door BEFORE paying! It has a coupon for the entrance fee and free pony rides. There are baby animals to see and pet, pig races, a playground and covered picnic tables.
We went over the Fourth of July weekend. We missed the fireworks display at Mount Rushmore, but saw a great one in one of the nearby towns. We were parked on the lawn where they did the display. It was so awesome. I've never done that before.
Hurray for family vacations paid in cash!!!

Boy, oh Boy!

Jordan is becoming a young man. He is cute, too! He is fun to be around and enjoys using humor to entertain people. I get comments from adults all the time about how wonderful he is. It warms my heart to hear that I'm raising a "good kid." He is a very good kid and for that I am grateful.

Those Eyes!

Kelsey has the most beautiful blue eyes. You can't really tell in this picture because she is squinting. I'll have to find a better one some time. She has recently started wearing dresses and skirts a lot more often. I guess she is becoming a "girly girl." Her features are becoming more of a child than a toddler. She is a beautiful child and it is so fun to watch her grow up.

That Face!

What's a mother to do? I just want to gobble him up! We took these pictures for Salem's first birthday. He is wearing a vintage baby outfit that I got from DH's mother. The shorts have built in plastic pants which is very convenient for cloth diapering.
This is my favorite picture from the bunch.

A Little Paint Goes a Long Way

I have gotten into a upcycle kick lately. It is so fun to turn old things into something new and exciting!

My most recent projects include a couple of wood frames that I got free from my sister. They were black and I just painted them LIME green! They turned out so cool. These will end up in the garage or basement play room. If they go in the garage we will frame real bike parts.

The other project is one I have been meaning to do for a couple years. I got an old metal cart at a garage sale for $1. I think it used to be a sewing machine cart or something like that. Anyway, I painted it aqua blue. It is so pretty. I still need to paint it with polyurethane to seal it. It will end up a plant stand on our patio. Or maybe a snack table. I can't decide. I wish I had more of these!!!
I'll have to post pictures when they are totally done.

Right now on my patio I am taking the finish of a lamp table and paint off an old ammo metal box. The wood of the lamp table is so pretty I almost don't want to paint it. Maybe I will just restain it. The ammo box is going to be blue to match the cart. I think we will keep garden and work gloves in it so they don't end up all over the yard and garage!

Great Garage Sale Success!

We had a huge garage sale over the weekend. It was a lot of work, but we did great!
It was a multi-family sale, so there was stuff from my mom, sister and a friend. Most of it was ours, though!
The total sales were over $1000!!!!!!!!!!! After paying for the newspaper ad ($60) my family made over $720. I was hoping for $600 so I am on Cloud 9.
The kicker-we still have so much stuff that we are doing it again in 2 weeks. Yikes! My sis and friend will have much more for the sale too.

It feels so good to be getting rid of this stuff. Let me tell you what kinds of things we got rid of. I quit selling on eBay so I had some merchandise leftover from that. My DH remodeled his office and the last tenant left a whole bunch of office furniture so we sold all that. Of course there was outgrown clothes from the kids and toys, games, puzzles, etc. We decided to get rid of (almost) all the VHS tapes. Boy they take up a lot of room! I also sold health and beauty items that I got free with coupons. That was fun! I also sold some Pampered Chef cookware and tools that I replaced at my Pampered Chef party in June.

What are we going to do with the money? Remodel our TV/living room. We want to redo the fireplace wall. We have wall to wall brick and want to remove it and put built-ins on either side of the fireplace. This is going to be a huge project. We are going to sell all our old TV and media equipment and get a new (to us) system. We are currently doing our research and looking for deals on CraigsList. I'll try to post pictures of the remodel (before and after).

One resource I find helpful in planning and holding a successful garage sale is this little booklet I ordered from the Internet years ago. It's called How to Have Big Money Garage Sales by Catherine R. Pedigo. It costs $9.95 and I think it is worth it, especially if you are new to the garage sale scene.