Another consignment sale in the books.  Why yes, I went shopping on my birthday.  I didn't really have much of a choice, they didn't ask if they could have half-off day on my birthday, so yeah.  I ended up also hitting a certain grocery store in the same town, and also Old Navy, all by myself.  So it was a decent birthday.

Oh, back to the stuff.  Why yes, I was on an orange spree.  Why?  Because the kids wear orange when out wood cutting with Daddy.  It's just the way it is.  Secondly, I also use orange to my advantage.  Most folks don't buy orange for their kids, let alone all four of them.  So...  When we're going to be at a busy park [playdate] or at the children's museum or at the local theme park, I will totally dress the kids up in the same color shirt.  My favorites are orange and lime green, sometimes red.  Because those stand out.  Plus when you're introducing yourself, being able to say 'oh yeah, mine are all the kids in orange shirts' is kind of handy.    Yes, I know I'm not normal, but hey, after so many years of doing headcounts at playgrounds, you might do the same. 

When this sale was all said and done I ended up with....
5 pairs of pants
3 pairs of shoes
2 pairs of sandals
1 Mario Kart backpack
1 cotton twin duvet cover and pillowcase
1 purse for me (the cute little black one!)
2 little (greenish) purse/containers (the bigger flower one will be an activity book thingie for the 3yo, the smaller one may end up being used for essential oils, we'll see)
2 sweatshirts
15 orange shirts
3 other shirts
1 set of pajamas
1 play dress (as in, it cost a dollar, she can scuff it up all she wants)
1 towel cover up
1 snorkel (which the 7yo promptly used at the next swim lesson)
4 swim suits (I like having 2-3 per size, I suck at laundry, plus with our season passes to the local theme park that has a water area, yeah)
19 books, including 7 American Girl books.
The ending total for my haul wasn't super cheap, but hey, it's not the rock-bottom priced consignment sale.  Most things I got were half priced or decently priced at any rate - there were a few things I came across that I liked, but I just wasn't up for paying $10 for a pair of obviously used sneakers, no matter the name brand.



Canned goodies headed across the state.  My sister gets the box on the left because she knows what to do with the reusable lids.  As in, *not* throw them away.  The other box is off to be divvied up between two cousins and three uncles of mine.  Hopefully it doesn't turn into a brawl over Grandma's secret recipe relish.



The main basement room before.  Yeah, it was looking a bit like an episode of Hoarders.  I'm working on it...  Difficult with kids around that keep wanting to be fed, plus we're still working on storage and I'm constantly trying to think up ideas to put more storage up on the walls and use the vertical space.


The main basement room after.  There's still piles of things....  Empty jars in boxes to either put aside or take to the storage unit until they're needed again, a basket of stuff to sell, a pile of Goodwill stuff, a few jarred things I need to puree and dehydrate, some old and busted versions of our filing system that never worked, the things that take some time to deal with.


These are all empty, clean jars.  And this is just a tiny, adorable stack.  Storing empties is one of my constant issues it seems.  I need to figure out a better, more consistent, easy way to do it.


These two boxes contain a bunch of dried plant matter.  A bunch of herbal goodness I got during my trip to Portland.  They hopefully won't always be here.


Hopefully sometime soon, we'll have some narrow little shelves (those Bekvam spice racks from Ikea to be exact) hung up all above my drawers of spices and by the carbon monoxide detector.  Easy to see and grab, but the herbs will still be in a cool, dry, dark place.

Finally got my vanilla extract steeping.  On the left, I saw a cheapy raspberry vodka, and decided what the hell, worth a shot.  In the middle is an extract with a locally made (read: expensive) vodka.  And hot damn, that stuff'll put some hair on your chest just from sniffing it.  On the right is my first multi-vitamin tincture attempt.  That was before I'd gotten a lid on it and shaken it up - you can see the different levels of herbs (which were still kinda hydrating from the fluid), the vegetable glycerine, and filtered water. 



MIL and her boyfriend took us to Cabela's today.  Leave it to me to find randomness there for myself.  New sandals without a heel for me, a new tackle box for more essential oils/herby goodness, and two sun hats.  I couldn't decide between the two, so MIL bought be both for my birthday.    The pretty blue one because, well, it's pretty.  The light green one has a longer/floppy part in the back to cover my neck - I've been haphazardly looking around for something to wear while out in the garden or whatnot, and this'll do the trick. 


And I started loading up my new pretty first aid kit with the essential oils and other goodies I've accumulated over the last several months.  Put some colloidal silver in smaller dropper dram bottles, some calendula succus in tiny little orofice reducer bottles, and plain EO's in some of the half/one dram bottles.  In the bottom so far are vitamin C drops, honey sticks (hey, you never know when you'll need those!), a spice bottle of gummy bears (again, you never know), and the little 4oz jars each have plain ground flax seed, dry Redmond clay, bee pollen, and a mixture of charcoal and ground flax seed (add some water/honey and you have a poultice ready for yucky bites/stings).  Need to get more bandaids and gauze for the whole house regardless, but one thing at a time.





Homestead Barn Hop.

I love that my local grocery store has their very own Beyonce the chicken.  Love it.  I have yet to pull aside one of the workers and ask about it though.  Makes me chuckle every time I pass by it.  Why yes, my 4.5yo and the little cart she was driving for me posed right there next to mini-Beyonce.



Last week when Grandma was up.  Why yes, her 9yo grandson is almost as tall as her.  Same size shoes already.  Yes,  I know they're making funny faces, they are my children after all.



Sigh.  Sometimes you just see things in this house.  And go get the camera.  He wasn't asleep (although I wouldn't put it past him), but he was burrowing for whatever reason.



Cute little spice rack, eh?  The tall jars are pint-and-a-half (hard to find locally!) next to pint jars.  It's a simple little wooden spice rack from Ikea that is all over pinterest as bookshelves and who knows what else.



So...  Hubby finally had a chance to put up my Fintorp rails to organize our crap on the dining room wall.  The thing we had before... just wasn't working.  I think this will.  So anyway, see that blank foot and a half/two feet above those rails and the giant wall calendar?  I'm thinking of having the hubby hang a bunch of those spice racks to put my herbage so I can grab it quickly if need be.  Plus I think it'd be cute, and hey, we're going vertical with storage.  If it's up in the kitchen, I can put other stuff down in the basement.



Here's an awesome Photoshop "nailed it!" kind of rendition of that possibility.  The spice racks are actually half the length of the rails, so the dimensions are just ever so slightly off.



Ah, our lovely 3sf bathroom.  Well, it's not three square feet, but it sure feels like it.  Here's our newly organized bathroom wall here.  I got a few Bygel (from Ikea) rails to put up in the bathroom.  Each little white cup has each child's toothbrush and their own toothpaste (no more fighting about that is my goal, and hey, if they want to choose their toothpaste from what I've got on hand, groovy).  The rail on the right wall has a hanging basket with a few meds, a cup hanging off it with random toothbrushes I can't figure out the owners to, and then there's a bucket for hubby's razor.  Nice and handy since the outlet is directly underneath.  So there's not much clutter left on the counter - looks cleaner, and easier to swipe down so it doesn't get so nasty. 

So, if you want to know how small this room is?  See that full garbage can there?  And that plunger to the right of it?  (yes, we're classy, what of it?)  The toilet is *right* there - you can see the top of the tank in the mirror's reflection.  And the tub there, a mere 6-8 inches from the side of the toilet.  You can literally (if your arms are long enough) sit on the toilet doing your business, start up the shower, turn on the sink, and rifle in the cabinet under the sink.  While still doing your business.  I have to block the door with my feet while on the throne when the kids bust into the room because the door will effectively take off your legs because it just barely skims past the toilet bowl/seat.  Still not 100% if there's a better way to layout the bathroom, but damn, they sure squeezed a ton in there in a small amount of space.


More freezer meals.  Ham and cheese croissants.


Trying out a little something extra for me/my planner.  Monthly menu planning.  I can magnet up the current week on the fridge, but this can hopefully help me plan out the month and using freezer meals a smidge better.

The beginning of Easter.  Had to go find my sneakily placed Lego sets I'd accumulated for the kids.  Then sort the eggs into colors.  Why?  Because each child gets to hunt for their own color.  This year, the 3yo is orange, the 9yo is yellow, the 4yo is purple, the 6yo is blue, and green is for everybody.  Each child is getting their own Lego set, hence the need for specific colors.



After my little marathon of opening up Legos and stuffing them into things.  The bag on the right is eggs to hide.  The yellow bag has too-big parts and directions that will somehow appear.




This year I did something a little different.  My 9yo and 6yo boys have been bugging me/teasing me that they know I'm the Easter Bunny.  I don't say anything definitive one way or the other (gotta love leading questions to make them think!  all these years of homeschooling and using that technique to help them learn pays off!), but come on now, if you're going to accuse me of something, you boys need hard proof.    So, in a quiet, thinking restroom moment, I had a flash of brilliance.  The Easter bunny won't make a stop by our house.  He's going to be confused (or drunk for the older set I suppose), and "accidentally" leave the kids' eggs hidden in our neighbor's yard!  I figure it's a win-win.  It's not our yard, so the kids can't straight up accuse me of being the bunny (they'll have to think about it - we're big on critical thinking here).  As long as hubby and Grandma keep the front curtains closed (usually not a problem), we're good.  And then, we'll get to hang out with our elderly, twice widowered neighbor for a bit.  He seems to get a total kick out my crazy little kids, thought my idea was strange, if not fun sounding, and acquiesced.  He's a kick in the pants personality wise, and since being widowed, I keep showing up on his doorstep to bug him/drop off the latest yummy creation and let him know we're thinking of him and all that jazz.  I figure this is just another way to do that - even if I *am* sucking the poor man into our holiday insanity.

Oh, but we're still doing Legos in the eggs.  That was a total hit last year.  Not only does it cut down on the sugar, but it gives them something fun/creative to do for the rest of the day, and I'm not stuck with dollar store garbage I'm just going to have to toss within the week anyway.  They will be getting *some* candy in a few eggs though, don't you worry.  But not near as much as some other kids.  I also got some (free from the dentist) kid-sized Star Wars toothbrushes for Easter baskets when I was there getting fillings redone, but considering we just opened some new ones back in October (Halloween, a local dentist gives out brushes instead of candy), December (Christmas, yes, they get toothbrushes and toothpaste in their stocking, they love it) and February (tooth-cleaning time), I'm going to wait for summer solstice or something.  Dentists love to give away toothbrushes, especially to folks excited about them.  We've barely paid for toothbrushes in a good 2-3 years (the Angry Birds ones I found cheap at Grocery Outlet that we used for Christmas stockings are the exception).  When I relate my stories of how/when the kids receive them and how they love those colors I saw in the array or they love these characters, most dentists are thrilled to give up the goods.    Anyway.

Heading across the street after Mommy got a note in an egg that'd been left on our neighbor's doorstep.  Ahem. 


And the hunt begins!!






She chose her outfit.  I asked her if she wanted to wear a dress with her leggings.  Nope, she likes that shirt (from Auntie!) and that is what she was wearing.  Sigh.  Wasn't something I was going to bother pushing her on, at least she dressed herself.


The 3yo strutting around with Grandma.  He was still a little bit confused about the whole ordeal, but he did pretty good at going and getting his orange eggs when a sibling yelled out "here's another orange one, 3yo!"








Love this photo of all four of them running off together to check the clothesline pole.  :D


On our way back home.  That's neighbor's sister hanging out on the bench, hubby was off to the right chatting with neighbor. 


And here they are with all their loot.  Time to rip into it all.  Which they did right after I finished this photo.  And then they stayed almost quiet for the majority of the afternoon with Grandma so I could go out and de-stink the garage/fridge.  Photos of that adventure tomorrow.


Yup, digging in.

Sometimes, you just want something fun or nice.  Especially kids. 
My kids love when I do something fun to their sandwiches.  Friends' kids also love it (one friend's boys *still* talk about the dinosaur or train sandwiches I made one time years ago!).  The current favorite is uncrustables.  My hubby...  yeah, he playfully threatened me one day when I said the giant box of uncrustables from Costco looked awfully tempting one day.  Me on the other hand, I totally get it.  I've always had a tendency to cut the crusts off my sandwiches.  I'm weird, I own it.

So, a box of 10 Uncrustables is $7.13.  That's $.71 for a little circle of a sandwich!!  Yeah, with four kids, that ain't gonna happen.
Solution?  Make my own, of course! 
I went and got myself one of these square doohickeys (vs. the pricier Pampered Chef one some folks rave about).  Buy my own loaf of bread, pull out the PBJ, and get to it.  It takes some time and I do use my microwave a little, but still.

A loaf of cheap generic bread from the store is $1.18, makes about 9 sandwiches.  Peanut butter used to cost around $6.99/32oz at Costco, I usually use about 4-5 ounces of peanut butter per loaf.  Yes, the trick is to thinly coat each side of bread with the peanut butter and put the little lump of jam there in the middle.

Jelly/jam, depends. 
The grape jam costs about $2 for the grapes (or free if we count my yard grapes) + $.60/sugar or $4/local honey + $1.19-$2.28/pectin + $.10/lemon juice + $.75/disposable canning lids (or free-ish if we're counting my reusable canning lids) = $4.64-$9.13/batch, each batch is 4-8 half-pints, we'll go with 6 half-pints to split the difference.  Equals $.77 to $1.53 a half pint.  I only use about half of a half-pint per loaf of sandwiches.
Strawberry jam is about the same, costs a little more because it's u-pick at $1/pound, but it also tastes loads better than anything (anything!) you'll find at the store.

So...  one loaf of bread ($1.18) plus 5 ounces of peanut butter ($1.10) plus $.76 for the jam = $3.04 for 9 uncrustables.  Aka, a whopping $.34/sandwich.
Sure, it takes some time and prep work, but it can be done.  :D