Grocery Smart

So a few months ago I went to a grocery shopping class to learn how to save money. The class was about clipping coupons and stocking up while things are on sale. There is a web site (www.grocerysmarts.com utah password g84cjh) that will tell you what is on sale at each store and what coupns to use to make the sale even better and they also rate each item to let you know how good the sale really is. Along with this I have subscribed to the Sunday paper and each Sunday morning if you drive by my house you will see a pile of 5 papers sitting on the driveway. If you are buying the paper for the coupons the newspapers will give you bulk deals (I think we pay somewhere around $12/month for the paper). I used to be horrible with grocery money, I just bought what I needed when I needed it. Now I buy things that are on sale and I stock up, that way I have them when I need them. So far in the few months that I've been doing this I have saved about $200/month and I still have tons to learn in the coupon world.
Yesterday I went to the store to get my groceries for the week. The total came to $55.39 and this is what I got for that:

1 Bottle of Murphy's Oil Soap

2 Cans of Pam Cooking Spray

3 Boxes of Kellogs Raisin Bran

3 Boxes of Kellogs Frosted Flakes

2 Loaves of Bread

1 Bag of Hamburger Buns

1 case of Bottled Water

10 cans of Manwich

10 boxes of Pillsbury Brownie Mix

1 gallon of Milk

3 Dozen eggs

5 packs of Danimals yogurt

4 Angus Beef Steaks

3+ LBS of Bananas

2 LBS of Red potatoes

2+ LBS of Granny Smith Apples

1 Onion

1 bag of baby carrots

Not only was all of that only $55, I also have $10 coupon to spend on my next shopping trip.

After looking at the list you may wonder why I didn't buy any "real" food, well I have already stocked up on my chicken, roast, lunch meat, cheese, etc. It may be a little time consuming, but it is very exciting, this girl likes a challenge, and it is fun to see how cheap I can get things for.

Sneaky Kids

Pretty often my kids will get "sneaky" and hide and typically be doing something they know they should not be doing. The other day I caught them being sneaky.

I would by them all the books they could read, if this is what "sneaky" typically means.

We Love the Carnival

Every year we look forward to the local carnival. On opening night they always have dollar day. It is one dollar for a ticket and one ticket to ride each ride. This year we were pleasently suprised to find out it was actually 50 cent day. That meant we could save some money for some yummy funnel cake. What is a carnival without funnel cake???

Here are some photos of all the fun:

Noah liked the little roller coaster so much, he wanted to go again.

Not Much Going On

Really we have not had much going on, which really is okay for now...

Tanner and Isaac have started swim lessons. We are only 2 days in. This year I decided to do private lessons at 7-Peaks. They raised their prices on normal lessons, so this was not that much more and it is totally worth it. One on one attention, that is just what they need. The only problem is it is a little chilly at 10:30 am and they have ZERO body fat (I wish I had their problems) so they shiver the whole time.

Tanner is doing pretty good. He is starting to learn different swimming techniques and he has shown good progress already. I feel like if he fell in a pool he is at a point where he could save his life and swim to the edge.

Isaac on the other hand has digressed and it is like we are starting all over again. He is working on learning to float, AGAIN. Hopefully by the end of the 2 weeks he will be to a point where he could save his own life if he fell in.
Noah and Sydney have been really well behaved so far, this sure makes it nice.

Noah is going through a phase, some call it the terrible two's. When he does not get his way, he will run up to his room and slam the door shut. If I follow him up there he will climb into his dresser and shut the doors. Today I decided to take some pictures, by the end of it he forgot he was mad and came down for breakfast.

So in my last blog post I said I was going to be better about taking more pictures of Sydney and I have been (look at me reaching my goals). Here are a bunch of them.

2 Month Update

I'm a few days late on the 2 month update, but....I'm trying.
On Friday Sydney had her 2 month doctor appointment. She had to get 4 shots and she did not love that, it was a rough day. We did find out that she weighs just about 11 lbs (she started at 9 lbs 3 oz, so she really hasn't gained that much). She is 23.75 inches long, very tall and skinny. My dreams of having a chubby baby girl are out the door.
Speaking of dreams, mine have been great. On Mother's Day Sydney decided to sleep through the night (what a great gift, thanks), and she has continued with this new found talent ever since (except one congested night). She typically sleeps from 9pm to 7 am, I love her. Her temperment is overall pretty good (of course she has her moments, don't we all).
She started smiling a few weeks ago, and she is especially happy first thing in the morning. I tried to get a picture of her smiling, but no such luck, you'll have to settle for not crying. I haven't been that great about taking pictures, I thought I would be better, I definetly need to start doing better, and that will be my goal. So at 3 months expect more pictures.

Preschool Solo

Yesterday was Isaac preschool spring program and graduation. As part of the program Isaac had to sing a solo. He chose to sing On Top of Spaghetti, and without further ado here he is:

Isn't he cute. He was a major spazz the rest of the program. He just would not sit still. His poor teacher, I'm sure he challenged her this year.

Mad Science

Well my oldest baby turned 7 yesterday, crazy. For his party this year he decided (with a little encouragment from me) to have a Mad Science Party. One day when I was at the doctor I picked up Family Fun Magazine and on the cover was a mad science birthday, so I got some ideas from there, as well as some from my big sissy Andrea (who did a science party a few years back), of course some ideas were from my birthday-go-to-source birthdaypartyideas.com, and some I even came up with all on my own. Here are the party details if you want them, if not just scroll down and look at the pictures. I am writing down the costs of everything, so that if you want to do a similar party you will know how much each thing cost.
Invites:

This is what I did for the invitations. I printed this out in 5 by 7 inch size on cardstock. I rolled it up and slid it in a large test tube (baby soda bottle found at stevespangler.com) and filled the test tube with homemade confetti. The big expense for this was the test tubes, which were $10 for 15. So in total the invites cost me $10.

Costumes: From Family Fun I got the idea of making costumes for each of the kids which included lab coats, safety goggles, name tags, and rubber gloves. For the lab coats I bought plain white tees at a $ a pop and just cut them down the front, easy. I bought the safety goggles for $ and the rubber gloves I got at the dollar store, I bought mad science name tags on clearance from Oriental trading for $2. The costumes were the biggest expense, but totally worth the $28. Check out the picture of these MAD SCIENTISTS.

The Cake: I gave Tanner the choice of what cake he wanted I told him I would do a science flask or an eyeball and brain. He chose the flask, this I found on Family Fun. You bake 2 bundt cakes, place the first bottom-side up and frost then put the next cake bottom-side down on top of that. You put a paper towel roll (wrapped in foil) in the bundt cake hole. Then you just frost to look like the flask. You can get details on familyfun.com. I am not good at making frosting smooth so that part was a bit tricky for me. Also, you put blue cotton candy in the top of the paper towel roll to look like vapor. The only kind of cotton candy I could find was from the dollar store and it was not light and airy like you would get at the carnival, so it did not acheive the exact look that I wanted. But all in all it turned out and Tanner thought it was great. Total cost for cake and frosting $5.

Mad Science Word Search: As a gathering activity I painted the words MAD SCIENCE on a big piece of butcher paper and then wrote 75 different science-ish words very small. The idea of the game was to find as many words as you can using a magnifying glass, the 2 who found the most words got a big box of Nerds (because scientists are nerds, right?). I bought little science notebooks for about $4 and magnifying glasses for $3, Nerds for $2, I had the pencils and the butcher paper and paint. So in total this game cost $9.

Test Tube Lava Lamps: For this we used the same tests tubes I used for the invites. The kids used droppers (also purchased from Steve Spangler for $4 for 50) to fill the test tube 3/4 of the way full with oil and then the rest with water. In the end you add several drops of food coloring. We then used super glue to keep the lids on and then you just rock then back and forth and you get the look of a lava lamp. This experiment cost about $15.

Drops on a Penny: Next we used the same droppers as before and slowly dropped water onto the surface of the penny. The water will form a big bubble on top of the penny (pretty cool), I was able to get 42 drops of water on the penny. The kids just had a good time squirting water on the penny.

Diet Coke Mentos Geyser: This is a pretty fun experiment. You quickly drop 7 mentos into a bottle of soda (Diet Coke works best because diet has no sugar = easy clean-up). What happens is the soda erupts out of the bottle and goes very high. If I can figure out how I will put a very short video clip on of it. This experiment cost me about $15 for soda and mentos.

Cornstarch and water: The kids got to mix cornstarch with water. If you have never done this before you take 2 parts cornstarch and add 1 part water. The mixture will react differently to metal, plastic, wood, rocks, etc. Sometimes it is a solid other times a liquid. I spent $2 on disposable containers to mix in and $3 for cornstarch. In total $5. Cheap and easy, just make sure not to pour the mixture down the drain, it can mess up your pipes.

We ended the party with cake and ice cream which I served with Capri Suns ($2), then we opened presents. Everyone left with a goody box filled with candy and things from the experiments we did. The cost for those were about $10 for candy and $2 for the boxes (on clearance from OT).Everything went well, it seemed like all the kids had a splendid time.

So sad, no more parties till November.