Food and Gas

I've decided that I'm going to shop a different way.

I'm going to shop a'la Tightwad Gazette. Remember that book? It's one of my favorites. I have the big compilation book and look at it often. In it, the author talks about how her husband shops (shopped?) for them and their six kids by the stock-up method. They only buy what they need to refill their stock and they buy according to loss leaders at the stores.

Here's my take on it:

I'm going to look at the flyer each week and only buy the things that are on a good discount. And then look at things in the clearance areas of our local store. Every morning the butcher marks meat that needs to be sold that day down to half and there is usually some produce marked down that much on a rack in the produce section. There's also a bakery discount rack and a giant box (think of those huge-mungus boxes that watermelons and pumpkins are sold out of) of marked down grocery items.

I went to the market today armed with my list from the flyer. Here's what I got:

8 1-pound things of ground turkey
10 pounds of fresh broccoli
10 pounds of apples
6 pounds of oranges
1 pound of cherries (because I love them, and they were on sale!)
4 cantaloupes
2 big bags of frozen raspberries
1 package hot dogs and 1 of buns from the bakery discount (the dogs were on sale, too)
about $5 worth of stuff from a grocery cart full of seeds and seed starting stuff marked for clearance
5 bags of honey mustard pretzels from the big box of marked down stuff
A half-gallon of orange juice (on sale)
A gallon of skim milk (regular price, but what are you going to do?)
and a raincheck for 4 whole chickens that were sold out

I spent $70, not including the chickens. Shocking, but if I'd paid full price for everything it would have been $110.

I'm going to freeze the broccoli today. I might have to go back and buy more of that, it was a really good sale.

I am constantly shocked at how much we spend on food. It's outrageous really. Six years ago, when I was a single mom with two school-aged kids, I fed all three of us on about $300 a month. I would say we're easily spending $200 a WEEK on food right now. Unreasonable. But, damn. Food is so crazy expensive. And there are five of us, two adults, two teenagers and a toddler. But milk used to be like $1.80 a gallon. Now it's almost $4. Eggs were about a dollar a dozen, now they're $2.50.

Gas is $4.21 a gallon this week. I'm so glad that school is out next week. That will free up a whooping $100 a month just because I don't have to drive Adrienne to school everyday. If we let our vehicle run to empty, it would cost about $110 to fill it up.

Scary shit.

And Bush is talking about how this is a 'slow down' and not a recession. I guess it's easy to say when you're a millionaire who doesn't have to worry about how he's going to feed his children or get them to school.

So we're spending quite a lot more on food and gasoline, but our family income has remained largely the same for the last five years.

This freaks me out some

We have several gas stations in the little town nearest to us.

Most are chains, like Shell. One is a family run full-service gas station where you pull up and someone runs out and gases you up and washes your windows.

That station has big signs on their pumps right now.

They ran out of gas.

Yikes.

My Garden in Waiting

I thought I'd share some pics of my seedlings. I'm so proud of them!

Here's what I have:

broccoli (3)
sweet peppers (4)
eggplant (4)
Watermelon (4)
Cabbage (8)
Zuccini (4)
Onions (4)
Brandywine tomatoes (6)
Cherry tomatoes (6)
Pumpkins (4--did you see those monsters?)
Birdhouse gourds (2--more monsters!)

The orange pot has dill, chives, chamomile, and lemon balm.

I'm going out this afternoon when Ruby goes down for her nap to plant some peas, radishes, beets, spinach, and lettuce outside. It's finally warmed up enough for those, I think. I'll be ready with a tarp or something if it gets cold one more time.

Next week Kevin is going to help me build some cinder block raised beds for my warm weather veggies. I ordered some seeds and they should be here today (whoop!)

Independance Days Update

Man, I'm a really terrible blogger. I'm sorry I've been missing in action for so long. No wonder only a dozen people read this thing! lol

I am anxiously awaiting warmth. We had one freak weekend (not this weekend, last) that included three days of 80 to 90 degree weather. I got all excited. I dug up a bed for my peas, and set up my outdoor furniture. The day after the last day of 90 degree weather it snowed. Yes, it snowed and was 29 degrees for an overnight low. That's a 60 degree difference. Unbelievable. And it's been cold ever since. So my peas didn't make it to their new home.

It's supposed to warm up some today, and it's been raining, so the ground is sort of loosened up. I'm going to try to get out and dig up some more today.

Plant Something: Like I said, I dug up a bed for my peas. It's still too unpredictable to plant out until mid-June. It snowed on the last day of school last year! I also planned out my raised beds, which I hope to put in next week. I ordered my warm-weather seeds from a company that specializes in high desert gardens.

Harvested: Nothing.

Preserved: Since I harvested nothing, I had nothing to preserve. I want to start watching my grocery store for the produce that they mark down sometimes, keeping an eye out for anything I can preserve. I am also WAY TOO excited about hearing that there will be a farmer's market here from August to October. I'm planning on participating. And also buying up the goodies to preserve.

Stored: Sadly, nothing. I have these huge plans, but they aren't panning out as well as I'd like them to.

Managed: We started a new program for paying off our debt, which basically is just putting an extra $50 a week toward our card with the lowest principal. When that one is paid off (in July) we'll roll over that $50 a week, plus the monthly payment to that card over to the next card. And so on and so on. In this way, we should be completely out of debt, including out car, in about two years. I hope that the economy holds out that long. I'm not optimistic.

Prepped: See the planted section. I also made a batch of laundry detergent. I bought some things so that I can start really learning how to sew. I am writing a short story, in the hopes of having it published.

Cooked Something New: I made a pork roast in my crock pot. Okay, that's not really a big deal, but I'd never made one before and it was AMAZING. We made pulled pork barbeque sandwiches out of it with coleslaw. Holy cow.

Advocate for Local Food Systems: I've been spreading the word about the Farmer's Market. And planning for it. I want to have some information to hand out to people who come to my booth. I need to start planning what I'm going to offer. We can have what we grow, plus seedlings, seeds, and food. I might order some bulk seeds from Seed Savers and offer them for use next year. I also plan on offering herb seedlings that can be grown indoors until next summer. And bread. I've also been talking up my plan to have chickens.

Reduced Waste: We are still saving our recycling, but not as diligently as I'd like. Need to step that one up.

Learned a Skill: I learned how to line a crocheted wallet. Go me!

I've decided to add a new category that is important to me. Building health. Not just for me, but for my family. I think that it's going to be very important in the coming years to be as mentally, physically and emotionally healthy as possible. So:

Building Health: I lost four pounds this week. Nice, eh? Yeah. I bought some multi-vitamins that were on sale at the local grocery store half off. Adrienne has been having leg cramps and has also been really tired lately. It finally occurred to me that she might be anemic, like me. So vitamins for her, and for everyone for good measure. I ordered some medicinal herb seeds. I also reread SuperFoods, which is fascinating to me.

We really do live in one of the most amazing places in the country. Rural Northeastern Nevada has to be one of the few really unblemished areas in America. Here are some pictures I took while I was on a drive on the Success Loop, about ten miles from my house.

Warm Soil and a Bright Sun

I have made a goal for myself. I am going to do something in my yard every day. It's warm enough that I need to be watering. I wish I had some sort of ground cover other than grass, but I don't want to let the grass completely die and then the soil get all dried out and icky. Plus we rent, and the grass was there to start with. I have no problems planting something else there instead, but until I get there I'm going to take care of the grass to some extent.

Today's plan is to prepare a bed for peas and lettuce and cabbage. This week I'd also like to get one 4X4 plot ready. Top soil is on sale at the variety store (yes, that's what they call it out here in the sticks. Like a mini-non-big-box Walmart with a bit of everything in it.) I bought two bags and a bag of manure to amend my pea/lettuce/cabbage garden.

My allergies are killing me. I've had to sneeze for three hours and it won't come. I feel like I'm losing my mind. I can take allergy medicine now, but I want to research more natural remedies, because the time may come when I need to work outdoors without the aide of medication.

I'm quite happy with my Independence Days experiment. Can't wait until Friday when I'll write a nice long post about the progress.

I am quite unhappy with some changes at Etsy, where my vintage clothing store is. They changed the search function so that it's default is to block all vintage and supplies from showing up when a buyer is looking for something to buy. They can opt-in to vintage, but it's difficult to find and clearly few are finding it. My views have gone from about 200 to about 20 an hour. Sucks. I am in the process of trying to think of ways to over come that. Wish me luck.

Independence Days

Sharon Astyk has a really fantastic challenge going on at her blog.

The goal, the independence she speaks of, is to free yourself as much as possible from agribusiness. This really hits home for me, because pretty much everything my family eats is trucked in from at least 250 miles away. If someone decided that diesel had just gotten too expensive to continue delivery groceries to our rinky dink little town--we'd be seriously sunk.

Because I live in such a tiny community with very little access to local food, I'm going to have to do my best to put things up and grow stuff myself.

So here are some of my plans for the next week:

1. Prepare a bed for cold weather direct seed veggies like peas and lettuce so that I can plant them in a couple of weeks.

2. Make a list of the rest of the seeds/transplants/trees/equipment I need to buy this season so that I can pick them up when I go to Las Vegas on the 15th.


3. Start some extra seedlings for my neighbor and for Candice and Roger.

4. Get some books together to donate to the library sale.

5. I have a goal to not eat out this week. I can do it. I know I can.

6. If there is anything on sale, or on the clearance produce table, at my grocery store this week that I can buy in bulk and process, then do that.

7. Write everyday. I know this might not seem like a prep thing, but in a round about way, it is. There are online publishers that have stables of writers, which would be a good, steady post-peak income if I can find the work.

So that should do it for this weeks goals. I'll update next Friday and have a new list!