Friday, December 29, 2017

Frugal Friday 225

Happy Last Frugal Friday of 2017!

Here is how we saved money/spent money wisely/made extra money this week:

- Mark worked a shift at his part-time job.

- Last week, Annabeth enjoyed her dance company's Christmas party. The studio supplies all of the food and fun we just took a $5 gift to trade. Annabeth chose to give a JoJo Bow as they are very popular right now. We had so much fun watching the talent show and she had fun dancing with her friends. She received her company picture and shirt as Christmas gifts.

- Annabeth had a very bad ear infection and her eardrum ruptured. They asked us not to spend time out in the cold and wind until it had some time to heal. Mark bought her a simple black outdoor headband to cover her ears. I added two flower appliques to make it more fancy for her. I used some from my collection from Grandma Chico. I love to add things from her to my kids' things. It's like having a little piece of her with us always.

- We spent Saturday-Tuesday in Evansville with my family. We were able to see many of my aunts, uncles, and cousins. It was wonderful to celebrate in the house I grew up in. The kids received tons of fun gifts and we loved gifting everyone as well!

My sister and I grew up taking "Santa Pictures" with this Santa poster
and now the kids do the same. I love how much they love each other! 

- My parents sent us home with lots of snacks and breakfast food for the week. That helped our grocery bill! Thank you!

- We did our weekly shopping trip when we got back. We spent $75.49 on groceries for the week (which also included two rolls of wrapping paper for next year, laundry detergent, and 2 Christmas gifts) When we got home, I realized a sale item had not rung up on sale. I had purchased two of them so I went back and was refunded $3.80. The two Christmas gifts we will gift this weekend and with a store sale + coupon I was able to get two for the price of one! :)

- It got really, really cold this week! I was extra thankful that the kids got so many activities for Christmas. Annabeth spent hours building with Legos, Owen played with his police and fire garage and house, and we all played the LOL Doll game about 50 times.

- On the way home from Evansville, I broke my sunglasses. I have been wearing them since 2009! I am super picky about the size, shape, color, jewels, etc on sunglasses and have only ever owned three pairs as a result. So, needless to say I was really upset that they broke. Thank goodness for a clean break and some awesome super glue because I got them back to "new" again. A penny saved is a penny earned.

Seriously, I have had them forever - here Mark and I are 
in Brown County (with the shades on) in November 2009. 

After we got home from Evansville, we spent the week taking down Christmas decorations, putting up our snow decorations, writing Thank Yous, and of course playing with all of the kids' new toys. After all of the new stuff comes in, even though I have done quite a bit of cleaning out already, I always get a bit antsy. I expect next week we will do some big clean outs again.

I am looking forward to 2018 and to achieving our Big, Scary Financial Goal.
What are your $$ plans for 2018?
Happy New Year and Happy Savings to All!

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