Tulips

Tulips
Friday April 30





The love of flowers,
brings me joy!


Tulip is probably one of my
favorite flowers.

Frugal Tip

Frugal Tip
Tuesday April 27



Frugal tip of the week, making waffles.

My family loves waffles. This is our
typical breakfast. Our biggest expense
is the syrup. In the spring when the
strawberries come into season I will make
strawberry syrup. Then in June blueberry
syrup will get made also. These are my
substuites for the maple syrup.

I can make these in large batches and
put them in the freezer.

Starting Seeds

Starting Seeds

Monday April 26

This is how my husband started our seeds.
Amongst all the wedding activities he sat
down and began planting. This all happened
one day before the wedding, while I was
finishing my dress.

In a small amount of space you can start about
200 plants. We have two lights on top of our
refrigerator which helps with the germination.
Your biggest job at this stage is spraying the
soil with water. We also build our own soil,
using deyhdrated cow manure, peat moss,
triple phosphate.
These squares are called the mini blocks.
You can buy the tool from Johnny Seeds.
All the information came from Eliot Coleman's
book The New Organic Grower.

Whats coming up in the garden?

Whats coming up in the garden?
Wednesday April 21

Red leaf lettuce

Rhubarb

Our two ducks

I have Iris's, daffodils, tulips and

apple trees in this bed.

These are my prize tulip this year.
They were the first to come up.
They open very large.

Enjoy spring!

Cutting Food Costs

Thursday April 15
Cutting Food Costs

This is the time of the year where our food costs
start to decline. My husband and I love eating our
own produce. We are eating greens we planted
last fall, that we grew in our cold frame. This is
what I call the salad season, which means we are
eating local produce from the right season.
We are currently munching on broccoli we
put in last fall, it is quite tasty.

The Freedom Harvest Challenge that the Dervae Family
did last year I am attempting to do this year.
Click on the title for a link to the family site.

The Dress

The Dress
Monday March 29

The Dress for the mother of the Groom.
The wedding has come and gone.
To accomplish my goal I had to focus
on what I had to accomplish. I choose
only to have a small amount of outside
distractions to get my goal accomplished.
The goal to make my dress.

My dear daughter in law helped me
pick out the material back in January.
Then I found a pattern on ebay for the
what I was looking for.

A friend of mine helped me work
on putting the dress together.
The dress is lined along with the
bodice. We then decided to add
some glitz which is the jacket. The
sleeves have the scalloped edges
the same as whats on the edge of
the hem. The picture is below.

The waistline we added some jeweled ribbon.
This is also around the neck line of the jacket.

My dearest brother is standing next to me.
It was such a joy to have my family with me.
The wedding was just beautiful.

Frugal Tip

Frugal Tip
Tuesday March 2

Reading is one of my great joys
in life. Due to being a person who
always likes a new book. Being a
frugal woman, I buy my books used.
There are many sources of buying
books used. Half.com, ebay, and Amazon are
three places I buy from.
I do love to go to the bookstore and
look through books but rarely do I buy
from the store. For the price of one book
in the store, you might be able to buy
many used from another source.
Your local library is also a great place.

There is a giveaway that I thought I would mention.
A Joyful Chaos has a giveaway.



http://ajoyfulchaos.blogspot.com/2010/03/giveaway-time.html

Daily Sewing

Daily Sewing
Friday February 26


Daily Sewing is something I have
been thinking about this week.

If you think about the amount of
sewing women used to do, it was
a lot!

I am setting aside my afternoons
for sewing projects. It also serves as
a resting time. Resting is something
we should do especially so were not
so worn out.

Becoming organized in my activities
during the day is especially important.
That way dinner time still can go as
planned.

Daily Sewing is a blog I follow.
I like her idea.
Check out the link by clicking
the title.

IF

Wednesday February 24
IF







If my attitude be one of fear,
not faith, about one who has
disappointed me;
if I say "Just what I expected,"
if a fall occurs,

then I know nothing of Calvary love.

written by Amy Carmichael

Frugal Tip

Frugal Tip
Tuesday February 23


Stacking Wood
Burning wood is one of the biggest
way we save money. When we moved
to our home in Jackson we payed for propane
to heat our house. Then one day we decided
there had to be a better way.
Burning wood seemed more economical.
Even if we don't cut enough wood ourselves.
We can buy wood since we live in the woods.

Keeping a fire going is something that
is part of my daily routine.
My kids call me the fire queen.
Thankfully, I have a house full of men.
The men chop the wood in the summer
and split it and stack it for the winter.

Thank you Lord for giving me boys first.

Wednesday February 17

If
I cannot catch"the sound of noise
of rain
long before the rain falls,
and, going to some hilltop of the spirit,
as near to my God as I can,
have not faith to wait there with
my face between my kness,
though six times or sixty times I
am told" there arises a little
cloud out the sea,"
then I know nothing of Calvary love.

taken from If by Amy Carmichael

Tea

Tea
Tuesday February 9

Chamomile is far my favorite tea to drink.
So instead of buying it in a box, which's cost
about three dollars . I bought the tea loose in bulk.
No packaging to throw away, and quite economical.
I am now learning drinking tea in this way the
flavor is much stronger.

A Shawl

A Shawl
Friday February 5




A simple shawl for Rachel.
This has to be one of the easiest
pieces of clothing to make. I made
this shawl late one evening after dinner.
The fabric has such a softness to it.

Of course you know this has brought me
to looking for some more patterns for
shawls and capes. Since, I have not
accomplished making jackets for us
yet. If you have never tried one you
must consider this shawl is a great
beginner project.

Cold Frames

Cold Frames
Monday Feburary 1

This cold frame sits outside my kitchen.
In the fall I put arugula in a container.
This is called over wintering. If your not
familiar with this its a great way to start
extra early. Basically, you start it at the
in the late fall and then it continues to slow
as the temperatures decline. In the very
early spring when the weather starts to
warm your plants start to come alive.
My dear husband made the frame and
then he placed some old windows on the
front. This way you can get into the frame.


Inside this glass box are vegetables. As
above they were put in the box in late fall.
Spinach, kale, lettuces, parsley plants are
growing inside. The big piece of
glass lifts up to allow air in.

The great concept behind this is that when its to
cold for seeds to germinate outside. No problem
they are already plants. They just need a little
warmth to get them going.

Your biggest job is timing. In the fall getting your
seeds germinated by a certain time is critical. Then
getting your plants into a protected place.

The rest your creator takes care of.

Hebrews 6:7
Lord that drinks in the rain often falling on it
and that produces a crop useful to those for
whom it is farmed receives the blessing of God.

Parsley plants

Winter Color

Friday January 29

Winter Color

It is such a blessing to have a little
winter color.

In the fall when I ordered my bulbs I
included a Amaryllis bulb. I then
put it in a pot with some soil and
put in the basement for 4 weeks.
Then, after its cooling period I brought
it upstairs and it came alive.

Farm Show 2010

Farm Show 2010
Wednesday January 27

Saturday is the New Jersey Northeast Organic
Farming Convention.
This year I will be a volunteer.
Eating Local is the talk I have choose to listen
to. This is a subject my family hears from me.
In my house buying tomatoes in January is
not something we do.
First off, where are you getting tomatoes in winter
when they are grown in July.

Watch Food, Inc on you tube.
This is a trailer on the movie.
We just watched it on Netflix.

Lets get rid of Warehouse Farming
and lets go back to Local Farming.

Living Simply

Living Simply

Living Simply is the life I strive to live.
My husband and I live on one income.
We don't live the typical suburbia life.
Although, we are surrounded by suburbia.

Together my husband and try to grow our
own food. We are working towards a
self-sustaining style of living.

We purchased a video which I thought
was worth mentioning. Below is a link to a
documentary called A Journey Home.
What an inspiring film.

A New Dress

Sunday January 24
A New Dress

I wanted to share a sewing project with you.
This is my frugul dress. I bought the material
at Joanne's for 6.98. I needed a dress for two weddings.

The picture you see is how I wore it too the first wedding.
My husband really liked the dress.

The dress is gathered in the front and the back.
No zippers or buttons, which made it very quick
to make. I got it done in 3 days.
I do believe I am going to add some black
material to the neckline.

Mother of the Groom

Thursday January 21
Mother of the Groom



I have decided on a dress for my sons wedding.
The dress on the right of the picture which I pulled
from the Sew Beautiful Magazine. My only problem
is I have to come up with my own pattern.
I have purchased the material in a nice green.
Which will be accented with Ecru lace.

Sewing clothes

Thursday January 14

Sewing the old Way

http://zipzipinkspot.blogspot.com/2009_11_01_archive.html

I came across a great blog that I would like to share.
For all the time I have been sewing I always struggled
with sewing gathers on the machine. This ladies blog
just cleared everything up for me.


Making my first tiered skirt was a bit overwhelming
for me. Layer by layer I got it done. I would set it up
at the end of the kitchen table. This way it was out,
this is a visual tactic for me. Sewing during the times
with children coming and going all at different times.
I found even when people were around I was still able
to do a little hand sewing. It was also a good
conversation piece.

I made the skirt from a light weight jean material. My daughter
Rachel likes to where jean material as it goes with everything.
After all the waiting for this skirt to be finished the men in
my house said it looked great on her.

Just one more way to be frugal.
Making clothes is a for sure way to save
on clothing cost in a family.