My frugal productivity for the weekend

I hope that you had a wonderful weekend.    Normally we would go to the lake and swim, but my children were pretty tired from the busy week that we had.  Instead of making more chaos in my home, we decided to just stay home and keep things normal.

They got to sleep in and our list of things to do was pretty small. It made for a good day.  I was planning on letting them swim but instead it decided to rain for most of the afternoon.  This resulted in blanket and pillow piles in the living room:)

Meanwhile….I was busy in the kitchen.  Even though this is my week to do my monthly shopping, I decided to put it off for another week.  Thus it requires me to dig into that freezer and pantry of mine and find what we have to eat.  Trust me, there is plenty hidden in the back.  I would encourage ALL of you, to dig deep this week and eat up what you have hidden away in your freezers and pantry’s.

Here is what I made…….

Last year I froze diced up apples, shredded zucchini, and butternut squash –which we use in place of canned pumpkin.  I took the last remaining packages out of my freezer and decided to bake up some treats.

I was going to make our old standby of apple dapple cake, but wanted to try out some apple muffin recipes instead.  I found this apple cinnamon muffin recipe and love the way that it tastes. 

I grew tired of waiting for the muffins at this particular moment so I decided to put the remainder of the batter into a cake pan.  It baked beautifully and came right out of the pan.  (The key is to wait until the pans are completely cooled)

I still had plenty of frozen bananas in my freezer so I had to make the yummy banana bread that we discovered last month.  This time I did a batch without nuts so that a friend of ours could eat it.   (This is the bottom of the breads as I had just flipped them out of their pans from cooling)

I also had been given a bunch of tortillas from a friend–thanks Tammy:)  So we decided to put them in the oven and make tortilla crisps.  Our favorite.

We also made up the last of my frozen pumpkin(butternut squash)  and made chocolate chip pumpkin muffins.  Something I have made forever.When we go to the lake, which is a few times per week it is nice to have a healthy snack that will fill up their bellies without loading them down with sugar and junk.  I love taking breakfast cookies for this time.  These are packed full of good things and taste good as well.  We freeze a big container and pull out as many as we want to take with us.

  I also made some chocolate zucchini bread with my remainder of zucchini.     That was it for baking.  We ended the use of the oven with chicken nuggets for dinner!! A well deserved easy meal for mom:)

Since I was all about gathering up my fragments and using what I had….here were a few other things we threw together this week.

Since it is hot here, it is nice to be able to make cold dinners. We make a salad for everyone. I added lots of different vegetables, hardboiled eggs, and shredded chicken pieces.  This way everyone, including the picky ones, can have what they like.

I also tried something new this week—-cooking a turkey in my crockpot. 

A great idea —especially in the summer time.

My husband brought home a basket full of beets this week.  I love them and can eat them everyday.  Everyone else thinks they taste like dirt.I have only had canned beets never  fresh. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with them and then my new friend Kayleigh is a vegetarian and she gave me this great shredded beet salad recipe.  It is delicious.

She also gave me an idea for twice baked sweet potatoes. That night was my favorite dinner night.  This was my dinner plate.  No one else would eat it, but I sure enjoyed it!!!   We have been doing a lot of grilling lately.  Hmmm seems to be because of the weather.  I decided to make some tin foil potatoes like I had growing up. 

We also had a bunch of corn on the cob for the week.  Instead of boiling it last minute before our meal, I decided to put it in the crockpot to cook on low while I was away during the day.  Worked great.  I am loving the crock pot:)Okay….that was what I scrounged up this week for meals.  Were you creative in your ventures this week for meals?? See if you can go for a few days without going to the grocery store.  Save that gas money!    Enjoy the extra time at home doing something that you love to do!  Be blessed as you begin your week!!