New Recipes

If you're anything like me when it comes to cooking, sometimes you just get in a "rut." Please tell me I'm not the only one!? =) I like the food I normally cook. It's flavorful, pretty healthy (for the most part!), and best of all-- CHEAP. I am a coupon-er, I go to 5 different stores to shop the "deals" and hate hate hate when our grocery bill gets above $50/wk. That doesn't include Lucy's formula.....so I guess groceries cost a little more. Anyway, overall that's pretty good!! :)

This week I decided to get out of my dinner rut and cook some amazing recipes I found. I totally splurged and spent way over our grocery budget! I was completely out of meat, so that did it. BUT, the meals have been incredible! I can definitely re-make these recipes again for much less and plan to put them on rotation.....all while sticking to my $50/wk. budget!

Mon. and Tues. we ate up some leftovers....so those days don't count. Here's what we had Wed, Thurs, and Fri. I have 3 more meals to try next week! I can hardly wait!

Before I give you the links to these fabulous recipes let me say: EVERY one of these meals gets 2 thumbs up from me and my hubby! Carey exclaimed, "This is excellent!" every meal. Bad news: I now will be held to a higher standard of cooking. HA! =)

Here's what we ate this week:

Pioneer Woman's Chicken Tortilla Soup. Oh my. So good. 

Murphy's Hot Hamburger from Tasty Kitchen. Yeah, it was as good as it looks! (I used ground turkey and made sure to use olive oil.....had to add a little extra for the gravy since turkey doesn't have a lot of fat. Anyway, it turned out great. My hubby had lots of great things to say about this meal!) AND.....I maybe devoured it too. :)

Chicken Parmesan found on kevinandamanda.com. This was oh so yummy! I have never made this dish. We had it a lot growing up but I never really enjoyed it. BUT, when we were at Olive Garden a few weeks ago I got the Tour of Italy. Chicken Parm. was on the plate and it was so good! I knew right then I had to give it a try. Very glad I did!

Also.....I gave Lucy spaghetti for the first time last night. ......um, yeah. Let me just say we're not doing that again maybe ever. :) She was not a fan of the flavor and decided finger painting with marinara sauce was tons of fun. Also, rubbing the sauce through your hair is fun too. I was smart enough to undress her before eating, thankfully. She went straight to the bath after dinner. Here are some pics of the damage. Yuck.

Merry Christmas! Love Carey, Tali and Lucy

SO, check out our Christmas card above!! Shutterfly has really made me love them this year. I got $120 worth of cards---FREE! I just had to pay shipping (which could have been cheaper if I didn't procrastinate making cards and then have to rush my order!) =)

Anyway, Shutterfly is also giving me $25 to use on future projects just for posting our card on Blogger! Great for me since I don't have enough cards to give to EVERYONE.

Now all my Facebook friends can see our card up close. Yay!

It seems like Santa HAS been good to me this year.

I'm going to use my $25 to Shutterfly on a cute calendar full of Lucy pictures

---just what I've always wanted! So excited.

Merry Christmas from the Wilsons!
Carey, Tali and Lucy

Little Orange Packages of Happiness....

From the moment I received the first e-mail about my little orange package arriving from Shutterfly, I knew we would have a long lasting happy relationship. :) The reason: inside the email there was a note. This note said, "Exciting news. A little orange package is on it's way with your pictures!" For some reason, I loved the way they worded the "exciting news " part. Short and simple. It made me smile. 

Since my first picture order I have put together these awesome photo books for some family members. I am currently playing around with their calendars--LOVE them! Maybe Santa will be good to me and bring me some holiday $$...then I will use that $$ for my calendar. :) (Filled with pictures of Lucy, of course.)

Anyway, Shutterfly has made me happy all over again. They are offering Bloggers 50 FREE Christmas photo cards. Yes, please! I have seen a few blogging friends post this and decided I had to get in on it too! I love love love saving money! Plus, Christmas cards didn't get done last year. Our sweet Lucy was born December 7th, and well, Christmas cards weren't at the top of my list. Plus, I was gigantic and didn't want my photo on a card for all to see! Ha! 

Here's a picture of my little bundle of joy last Christmas. 

This year I have no excuse. 

Here are some of my favorite card designs. It's so hard to narrow them down. I love most all of Shutterfly's adorable holiday photo cards. Let me know what you think!

I'm leaning toward card #2. It's Carey's fav. But it doesn't have quite enough spaces for photos. How do I choose just 3 pictures of Lucy? 

Actually, 2 pictures. 1 is going to be of all 3 of us. 

Decisions. 

At least I don't have to decide where I'm getting my 2010 Christmas cards! 

Thank you Shutterfly!!!

Want to get in on it too??
http://bit.ly/sfly2010

Shopping with Pocket Change!

How would you like to get over $50 worth of groceries for under $10?? Well, that's what I did this week! And I can't hide my excitement! :) It's SO FUN to go into the grocery store and have the total come out to pennies. This week 2 of my totals came to $.04 and $.01! Almost $15 worth of groceries for a nickel! Side story here....when my total came to $1.04 and I gave the cashier a $1.00 coupon she just looked at me with a mean look and said, "I don't think you can use this because then you wouldn't be paying anything. I don't think it's allowed." Hahaha!!! I told her that "yes it is allowed and paying nothing was the whole point." Of course the manager approved it---I don't think they were thrilled. But I sure was!! :)

***If you are local: LAST day to do this awesome deal! Go to Hen House and there is a list of items that if you buy 5 they will take $5 off of your order. PLUS, they will donate $2 to Breast Cancer research. A few of these items are on sale for $.99 this week. If you buy the $.99 items your order will cost you a penny!! You can do this once a day. I will have done it 3 times. Wish I would have done it every day this week!

Anyway, I have recently started "couponing" and am really excited about all the $$ I'm saving our family!! A friend of mine hosted a couponing class where we learned the art of saving lots of cash! :) I always thought I did a pretty good job shopping the deals and going to EVERY grocery store in town to get the best prices. Ha! But I never did much with coupons and rebates....or CVS extra bucks. I've saved a lot more in just the last couple of weeks!

I'm not going to go into every detail on couponing and CVS extra bucks. There are great websites that will explain all of that. If you are interested: becentsable.net and samssecrets.com. The last website is mostly for those of you who are local because of the grocery ads. But her posts on CVS and Walgreens would work around the country. Basically, buying the Sunday paper and matching up coupons with store deals has saved me lots. It does take time....but I'm a "stay at home mom" 3 out of 5 weekdays. I have the time while Lucy is napping or playing to sit down and clip coupons and find the deals! And I have time in the afternoons to go to 5 different stores to pick the best items. 

Shopping with a list for each store is key. Don't buy anything that isn't on the list! And I don't take my hubby with me. He always adds to the cart....cookies, chips, coke, etc!! :) I am easily able to keep my grocery budget to $50 a week this way. 

I had never done CVS extra bucks before. I tried it out this week and got $30 worth of stuff for $10. Usually you can do better at CVS. But it was good for my first try! :) I am looking forward to the day I will get free diapers at CVS!! Woo hoo!

I won't bore you all with any more details. If you want more info, let me know! I just wanted to share my excitement in saving $$! I feel like we can have a fun family day or enjoy a little something "extra" because of all I'm saving on groceries and toiletries. It's awesome! 

Here's the list of items I bought this week for under $10!

--6 Totinos Party Pizzas

--7 Green Giant boxed frozen veggies

--1 Yoplait Smoothie Mix

--5 (yes, 5!!) boxes of cereal. And one was a large box!

--1/2 gallon of Bluebell Ice Cream (usually super expensive....but oh so yummy!)

--2 Pillsbury crescent roll tubes

--1 Pillsbury cinnamon roll tube

--6 Yoplait yogurts

--1 Gain dish soap