UGO SAVINGS

My UGO deals today. Broken down each item cost me $1.25 each. Pretty sweet! I bought: 9 boxes of gluten free Honey Nut Chex cereal, 4 boxes Cascadian Farms cereal, 3 boxes Mom's Toasted Cinnamon Squares cereal, 4 big family size cans of... Campbell's tomato soup, 2 bottles of Hunt's ketchup with NO high fructose corn syrup, 3 bags of Thomas' English Muffins (2 are cinnamon raisin), 12 containers of Pillsbury Gluten Free cookie dough, 2 cans of green beans, 2 - pkgs. of raisins, 2 packages of celery, 1- 3lb. bag of apples, 2 rolls of wrapping paper, bananas, a package of whole wheat corn syrup free hot dog buns & a big package of Twizzlers.  I'm trying to make some changes little by little and UGO is really helping with their fabulous prices.  I think I may have to make this a weekly stop.  =)

STOCKING UP

We've been getting ready for fall & winter.  There have been some great sales on apples, chicken, beef, and ham.  I even found one on bread.  I love stocking up our pantry and freezers.  It gives me a cozy feeling.

 

 Time to defrost and make some room! 

 Boo helped me package meat from today's local meat sale.

 Some of the goodies we bought at the sale today.

Since our local thrift bread store closed I have been bummed to have to pay full price for good bread.  How thrilled was I today when I found all of these loaves on sale for a little over $1!  Normally they are almost $4 a loaf!

HOMEMADE JAM

It was our first ever attempt at making homemade jam today. Both Dave's Mom & my Mom and Nana too have always made homemade jam. But though I've helped prep as I was growing up I never knew the final process. Today we learned it was much, much easier than we had thought. I am praying it sets because we have some very eager jam eaters awaiting these homemade treats.

I received this little guy for Christmas.  This was his first time out of the box & he worked like a champ!

Do you think he may be a little excited?

Blueberries are squashed in a flash!

After we put together the blueberry jam it was time for strawberries.

Dave worked on finishing up the blueberry jam.

The kids wanted to be right in the middle of it all.

Thank you, Mom!  She got this for us to use in our jam making.

Our official taste testers.

She wanted to help stir & was very happy when it was finally her turn.

Next it was time to taste test the strawberry jam.  What a tough job, eh?

9 jars of blueberry jam

Daddy giving Boo instructions on how to fill the jars.

Boo & I finished up the strawberry jam and filled 12 jars.  This is all freezer jam.  We plan to make some hot jar jam with the rest of the strawberries sometime this week. 

STRAWBERRY PICKING

BOYS ROOM ~ THE FINISHED PRODUCT

PART TWO:

Cleaning up the tubs & making sure everything is in it's place.

Doesn't she look thrilled?

The kids wrangled the extra mattress across the room into the closet.

Scrub those spots, Mr. Pirate!

Tubs back into the closet, please.

Princess has a little playtime.

The girls helped lift the mattress so we could clean underneath.

Princess loves being a helper.

Bugsy vacuums in the corner.

Mopboards must be cleaned too.

Vacuuming behind the beds.......

And scrubbing the walls.

We even cleaned behind all the furniture.

The corner walls needed some paint to freshen them up.  Thank God for leftovers.

Hmmmmmmm...........now how will we get that train table in there?

The dresser gets a new view.

Bugsy cleaned his bookcase.

Elvis spiffed his bookcase up too.  Looks great!

The reward for all their hard work?  New curtains!!!!!!

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Elvis is in love!  Lol!

In case it's hard to see they have Star Wars Clones all over them.  My boys are HUGE Star Wars fans.

Long lost posters were put up too!  

Can you tell what's missing?

The 3rd set will go up when I get another curtain rod.  I bought these months ago when they were super cheap on Amazon.  I believe they were $16 for all 3 sets including shipping & tax.  Sweet!

Oh, and the train table DID fit!  

We did some rearranging in the Family Room too.  Both the boy's desks are where the train table used to be.  

And it's ALL DONE!  Now to maintain.........