Trash or Treasure?

Over the summer I worked on clearing out the clutter and organizing our house. In the midst of it I went on a binge and bought a dozen storage containers for our crawlspace. My girls' outgrown clothes filled up most of those. But two remaining containers seemed perfect for storing the keepsakes DH and I each had stashed away in old cardboard boxes.

This week, as my daughters worked to shift some of their treasured things into storage, I finally transferred my keepsakes to the container. It was fun looking through the odd assortment of toys, awards, and other momentos as I worked. I found my cloth frontier doll, Mary, with her faded dress and redrawn face. And the "My Friend, Mandy" doll that I didn't get until high school (after wanting her for years), looking barely worse for the wear after several decades in a box. There were old journals and class photos. Florist cards and address books. Letters and programs. My Romper Stompers, now too small for my own children, joined the collection.

At the bottom though, I discovered a softball trophy. The placard read "Hinsdale-Clarendon Hills Juniors Softball 1979 - 2nd Place". I remember that team. Our color was orange. I played right field. Apparently I'd joined a decent team. After all, they did take second place.

The next day I threw that trophy out. I don't know why I had kept it, other than that it was a trophy. I don't like playing softball now. And I don't recall liking it then. I didn't play very well, so the trophy said nothing about me and my abilities. Nor about my interests in childhood. Just that I'd played on the second place juniors softball team. Not the first place team even, but second. Runners up. Did it really ever matter, even back then?

I explained this to my daughters when they asked why I would throw it out. They nodded in understanding.

"It's like our participation medals we get in soccer," Timid Daughter said. "It doesn't mean we did anything, just that we played soccer." She scrunched past me into the crawlspace to put her participation medals into her own keepsake container.

I wonder if she'll wait until she is my age before she throws them away.

Rolling in the dough - or maybe not

I bought 50 pounds of bread flour last weekend. Not ten 5-pound bags. I bought one 50-pound bag. The price on bread flour has really gotten to me lately. Buying the 50-pound bag at Costco cost less than half the price at the grocery store. That can really make a difference for us, especially since we go through a bag about every two to three weeks. I use it for weekly pizza night and for dinner rolls and foccacia. You see, I have one of those fancy bread machines. For the past five or six years I've used it as a dough machine. Not any more.

With that big bag of flour staring me down, things had to change. I scoured my pantry and cabinets and unearthed any and every container I could find to fill with flour. I passed some along to my mom. Then my enterprising husband stopped at Menards Home Depot to get me one of those huge plastic paint type buckets. That left me with only about, oh, say ten pounds of bread flour to use. What's a mom to do? And what's a mom who's run out of bread for her kids' lunches to do? Bake!

Before I went to bed Sunday night I read the bread machine manual. Then I poured in the ingredients, pressed all the right buttons and went to bed. Would you believe it that my family was greeted by the smell of fresh baked bread when we woke up the next day? That machine worked! It actually baked a nice loaf of bread.

My kids were thrilled for fresh bread. The first loaf was devoured in a little more than a day. So Tuesday night I repeated the process. Now that loaf is nearly gone. And I've been told by my children that they would prefer I not buy bread at the store any more. They'd just rather have homemade. I can see their point. I'm pretty sure it's costing me less than buying bread at the store too. I'm only wondering why I hadn't done this before.

I still have about 40 pounds of bread flour. At this rate it won't last me nearly so long. But I'll still ask:
anyone have a use for some bread flour? I'm happy to share!

Epilogue: Just learned that a great deal on flour at Jewel (a Chicagoland grocery store) starts tomorrow! Would have been even cheaper. But then again, I wouldn't have bought 50 pounds of it and have all the stories to tell and probably wouldn't be baking nearly as much fresh bread.

Works for Me: Summer Chore Jar

Right now as I type, my children are happily setting about getting their morning chores done. Did you get that? They're happily doing their chores. In fact, breakfast is rarely over before they start asking about the special chore for the day.

How do I do it? A "chore jar". Each week I make a bunch of slips of paper containing the chores that I want my children to get done for the week. I usually use flylady's zone for the week as a starting place and often follow her suggested zone chores (if you haven't checked flylady out, she has a great method for simplifying the job of housekeeping). I put in enough chores for each child to do one a day, minus one day off (so with 3 children times 4 days, I usually come up with 12 tasks). Every week I also put in a slip that says "bye" - meaning no chores for the day. If one child draws that slip, all the rest of the slips go back (except for the "bye") and we take the morning off.

So here's how it works: each child draws a chore. I keep them simple like "wipe the baseboards and door frame", "dust the fan blades", "clean the bathroom sink". And with using one zone/room for the week, a lot of those putzy spring-cleaning type chores get done. They're allowed to trade if they want (rarely) and they get one "do-over" for the week if they really, really don't like the task they drew.

And that's all it takes to get some happy workers. I think it's a combination of the element of surprise and the simple tasks that make it work. They know once they've done their regular morning routine (get dressed, make bed, collect laundry, etc.) and completed the chore for the day that they are pretty much free from work. And me? I make myself available to assist on the daily chores, but usually I also manage to get in one or two cleaning tasks too before calling it a day on house cleaning.

It works for me and it might work for you too. For more Works for Me Wednesday tips check out the list over here.

Resolved: Spend Less

Can you remember the last time you bought a candy bar for a quarter? That was the going rate for candy when I was a kid. And if you were lucky enough to have a quarter, there was a tiny shop in town called Jimmy's that had shelves upon shelves of candy and you could squeeze in there with your friends and pick out a treat.

Ah, memories! But guess what? I bought two candy bars today for 25 cents each! And I got a bottle of dish washing liquid for 55 cents. Two 100-count bottles of Exedrin cost me $6, but I received a $5 coupon in exchange. I'm finding the deals!

It's all part of my New Year's Resolution to cut our grocery bill by 30-40% this year. I'm feeling the need to cut costs, what with the economic uncertainty and my own bent toward thrift. It won't be easy, since I've always been one to shop the sales. But I'm feeling armed with the right tools to really make a difference. This year I'll be "Super-Couponing".

What's that you say? No, it's not cutting and cataloging all the Sunday coupons. That's too much work for nothing. I used to do that and was happy when I could save 10% using coupons at the discount grocer. Nope, Super-Couponing is much more savvy than that. It involves matching coupons to sales in order to cut costs or even earn money shopping. And I'm doing it with the help of some great web sites.

For starters, shoppers in Chicagoland can benefit from the Super-Couponing Queen, Jill Cataldo's advice. Then there's Coupon Mom who has lists for different stores in different states (plus the big Chains like WalMart & Target) that match up the current coupons and sales and show the percent savings on items listed in the current ads. To do your own coupon matchup, check out Coupon Tom's searchable database.

Two quick examples to show you the savings:
This week Jewel grocery store has a promotion going on where if you buy $30 of specific products you'll get coupons back for $15 on your next shopping trip.
I bought:
1-100 oz. bottle of Tide for $11.47 (rings up as $15.99 toward the $30)
minus $1.00 coupon
8 rolls of Bounty Paper Towels for $10.00 (rings up as $14.99 toward the $30)
minus $2.00 in coupon savings
Total Out of Pocket $20.03 plus $15 in savings on my next trip (in theory, the same as spending $5.03)

At Walgreen's I got:
Fructis Hair Styling Mousse (my favorite) for $2.99
less $2.00 Walgreen's coupon
less $1.00 mfr. coupon equals FREE
one box of Quaker Oats Instant Oatmeal for $3.59
less $1.60 Walgreen's Coupon
less $.70 mfr. coupon
one box of Electrasol tabs (20-ct) for $3.49
less $2.50 mfr. coupon
with $1.50 rebate coming (hence they "paid" me 50 cents for this one)
Colgate Toothpaste for $3.49
less $.75 coupon
take off the $5 coupon I had from a previous trip where I spent $14.85 & got $20 in coupons for future trips.
add one Christmas clearance glitter pen for 12 cents to bring me up into the positive before tax
Total out of pocket: $.71

Just on those two transactions I bought $50.97 of groceries for $20.74, with $15 to spend later.
I'm hoping this all brings me closer to that resolution (and closer to prices not last seen since the 1980's?).

Any Maids Looking for Work?

Combine one five-day weekend, including a trip out of town, with one laptop in need of a tiny repair that the repair folks turn into a much bigger deal. Result? AMusing Mom is all out of internet sorts.

I function very well with routine. Disrupt that routine and I'm honestly lost. I need to have my Monday through Friday "work week" with it's attendant flow of events. I need to have my laptop environment, complete with flexibility to work at the kitchen table while the Uber-Princess plays in the next room. I need my Simpleology to do list and my inbox folders for sorting email. Otherwise my ability to navigate the complex world of cyberspace and even the simple world of my little home just fizzles.

Enough about my virtual absence. Here's a quick story for you to show that my youngest child still deserves the title "Uber-Princess":

Last night, after a round of torturous room cleaning, which precluded having any dessert, she climbed into bed with a bit of grumbling.

Then she turned her round eyes up to me and said, "I wish I had a maid".

"Why?" I asked.

"If I had a maid, then I could just leave my things on the floor and she could put them away".

Who can argue with that? That's my Uber-Princess... And I think I'd like to be the Uber-Queen.

I Think I'm Starting to Understand Archaeologists

I cleaned out the bottom of my closet today. It had been much neglected since I'd done a wardrobe overhaul in it last April. Things were strewn about:shoes, boots, purses, beach balls (three), sunscreen, board games, and more. So I rounded up Uber-Princess to go on a dig with me. We pulled and hauled and tossed until the floor was empty on one side. Then I ran the vacuum and we sorted through what would go back. Simple enough. Not an eventful dig, but thorough and...done.

Then we turned to side two. This one didn't seem so bad. How could it be with a wedding gown box taking up over half of the real estate? Simply a few pairs of boots and a pile of magazines to dig out. So dig we did. And that's when the discovery happened! Sifting through the pile of magazines I came across a library book that had long been given up for lost. I turned to the Uber-Princess, holding the book triumphantly in the air.

"Look what I found!", I said.

"The Lion King!", she exclaimed and took the book from my hand, threaded her way through the debris to an empty spot in the room and sat down to read.

I was a little disappointed that the celebration was so short-lived, but I went back to the magazines...and found a SECOND missing library book!

"Woo hoo!", I hollered.

The Uber-Princess didn't even look up. So I tossed the book in her direction, figuring she'd devour it next and with another joy-hop, went back to my cleaning.

The magazines have been recycled and the closet put back to rights again. The books will go back to the library (which had graciously overlooked their misplacement) this afternoon. All that's left of that fortuitous project is the question: just HOW did those books get into that pile anyway?).

Domestic Diva I am NOT

Yesterday things were humming along the Musing household. I'd been up early, had a quiet time, exercised and ran a several errands before picking Uber-Princess up from preschool. Ah yes, the items on my list were being checked off at a feverish pace and I was feelin' mighty good.

Then it came to my attention that the comforter in my guest room needed to be laundered. So I stripped it off and took it to my laundry room, smug as could be about this task that I'd soon be checking off my list as well. Loading the comforter into my Super Large Capacity washing machine, I found myself pushing and shoving at the piles of fluffiness. I'd always washed the queen-sized comforter off my own bed in the machine, but it hadn't ever been such a chore to get it in. Still, the lid closed and I went off to do the next chore on the list, making a mental note to check on the washing machine part-way through the load.

I forgot. Or nearly so. I jumped up during the spin cycle, wondering if the large load might throw it off kilter. And as I burst into the laundry room, a splash went up from the floor where two rivulets of water were streaming toward the wall. I stopped the machine and dashed to the basement. More water. Not lots mind you, but a puddle of some size.

And so commenced the mopping and drying. When I called my husband to check on the proper process for drying out a partially flooded laundry room I gave him the good news first: the floor had never been cleaner under the washing machine since we moved into our house. Thankfully the water was contained to a small area of the basement and things were dry relatively fast.

Well, the weather man called it pretty well yesterday morning: high potential for possible flooding. I just never considered it might occur inside!

Home Grown Cleaning Service

The uber-princess and I washed our hardwood floors today. She loves to do this chore because she feels like she's being Cinderella (surprise,surprise). I love having her do it because it gets done faster...most of the time.

So what happened today while we were doing this? Well, you know how it goes. Looking down at the floor, I noticed the basedboards were dusty. And since I was looking at the baseboards, that made me pay more attention to the doorframes. They were full of grime and fingerprints. But if you're going to look at doorframes, then naturally you'll see the doors themselves, which I could tell were not very close to the white color I'd painted them. At this point one would assume I'd start looking over the walls themselves. I didn't.

Instead we finished washing the floors and then we stopped. We were both tired out from all the floor scrubbing. I put the uber-princess down for a nap and went on to other things. But...later in the afternoon, after homework was done and snacks were eaten, I called upon my other two daughters to tackle the baseboards and doorframes. They jumped at the task with glee, prompting the uber-princess to join in. In little time the task was done.

So now I sit in a kitchen with gleaming floors (oops, ignore the crumbs left from dinner and the leaves tracked in by Musing Dad) and shiny baseboards. The doorframes have no fingerprints and the doors... Well, they're still not quite white. I'll have to save them for the girls to do another day. But what a joy to share my burdens with my kids!