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Top 20 Christmas Break Activites to do on a Budget With Your Family

Top 20 Christmas Break Activites to do on a Budget With Your Family

ChristmasActivONBudgetThis post contains affiliate links.  As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

It’s almost Christmas!  Yeah!  I look forward to the break that my kids get from school more than anything!  I love having them home…I really do!  Trust me, I have my days when I want to pull my hair out because they are home, but for the most part, I love to hang out with them.  Yesterday, I was sitting down to my computer to make a list (yes, confession time, I’m a HUGE list maker – anyone else out there make a cazillion lists just so you can cross stuff off them?!) of all the fun things we were going to do over Christmas Break.  Or should I say, a list of all the things I’m hoping we get to do over Christmas Break.  This year, my husband is going to take a week off – and we don’t plan to go anywhere – it will be a sort of “stay-cation” and I’m super excited!  We all know Christmas can be expensive enough, so we plan to do a lot of fun things, that make lasting memories, that don’t cost very much – which you all know is how we roll around here.  There are all sorts of fun things you can do that don’t cost much and I plan to have a blast doing them (and hopefully my family will too)!  Grab a pencil and make a list!  Here is my Top 20 List of Fun Christmas Break Activities To Do On A Budget With Your Family:

 

  1. Make a Dollar Store Ornament:  I found clear plastic bulbs at my local Dollar Store and we plan to make these cute Time Capsule ornaments that I found on Pinterest.  If you can’t find any clear plastic bulbs at your local Dollar Store – try these instead.
  2. Gingerbread House Competition: Every year we have a Gingerbread House competition – usually boys vs. girls and we set a time limit and use these store bought gingerbread house kits and get crafting!  If you love to bake, you can make your own gingerbread ahead of time like this recipe from tikkido.com to use, or do what I do, buy the kits the day after Christmas and use them the following year!  The kits are everywhere after Christmas and are usually 70-80% off!  I always pick up a few and pack them away with our Christmas decor to use the following year!
  3. Play a Family Board Game: One of our family favorites is Headbandz!  We giggle and laugh like crazy when we play this silly game – especially at our youngest son who loves to cheat!  Actually, he loves to win at all costs so he tries to find creative ways to cheat!  Silly kid!  I picked up my copy of Headbandz on VarageSale for only $2!  You can also check your local Goodwill, or Thrift Store and even a kids second-hand thrift store.  Or you can buy Headbandz now!
  4. After Christmas Clearance Sales: Our family loves to hunt for good deals the day after Christmas!  While this may not sound like a family activity, it sure is in our house!  Or family gets very into decorating our house with Christmas Lights!  We all love to help and we have a tradition of going shopping for clearance deals on lights and decor the day after Christmas!  All three of our kids think it’s an adventure to find the best deals on decor for the yard and we spend a good portion of the day after Christmas out hunting for deals!  Of course, we usually go out for lunch too!
  5. Go to a Cheap Holiday Movie:  Our local movie theater shows early movies before noon on Saturday mornings for only $5!  When you are taking a family of 5 to see a movie this is a doable deal every once and while!  There always seems to be a good holiday movie that comes out around Christmas time and so this is a cheaper, fun thing to do, especially if your kids don’t get to go to the movies very often.  I have a movie gift card that I was given last Christmas that we still have not used, so we plan to use that and with the money we save we might spring for popcorn!  Of course we will get the BIG one and share it, and our theater gives free refills on the BIG popcorn!  Score!
  6. Go Out to Eat:  Find some local restaurants that have Kids Eat Free or Kids Eat for $1.99 and have a special meal out!  One of my local favorites is Newks and right now they are offering Kids Eat for $1.99!  Not too bad for a meal out!
  7. Play Snow Soccer:  We recently did this in Montana over Thanksgiving when we were visiting family.  Our family LOVES soccer and what better way to play it than on a field of snow?!  Sounds crazy, well, it was a blast!  We had a decent snowfall, and we cleared off some of the snow on a much smaller field, but left enough snow to run across it and kick a soccer ball.  We set up 2 pop-up soccer goals and put on all our snow gear and played a soccer game!  It was so much fun!
  8. Have a Snowball Fight:  If you have snow, then have a snowball fight!  Use these tools to help you make snowballs or just go ‘old school’ and make them yourself.  I’m praying for some snow here in Colorado, but it’s almost Christmas and we have had 60 degree weather all week.
  9. Go Sledding:  We love to go sledding in our neighborhood and have recently found a great hill not far from our house that is perfect for sledding!  I found all our sleds at garage sales and am thankful, because we seem to go through a lot of them!  If you need some sleds, you can buy them here.  Call some neighbors to join you in the fun!
  10. Go Look at Christmas Lights:  Looking at Christmas lights has to be one of my absolute favorite Christmas traditions!  I love it so much that I make our family go look at lights on Christmas night!  Thankfully, my family loves this activity about as much as I do and will go look at light multiple nights in a row!  Living in a big city helps as well, there are so many lights to go see!  We usually start in our town and work our way out from there!  We have been doing this for so many years now that we have some of our favorite houses that put up lights every year that we go see and then we love finding new ones!   We don’t just jump in the car and start driving around, we ALWAYS splurge and stop at McDonalds (which is right around the corner from our house) and get $1 drinks to sip along the way!  You can always make your own hot cocoa and take it along with you.  My kids love to put their PJs on as well!  I’ve also learned that if I want this activity to last awhile, I need to bring snacks too!  I usually get a BIG bag of Smartfoods Popcorn to take along and that seems to keep everyone happy for quite some time!
  11. Christmas Color-By-Number:  Even though my kids are getting a bit older, they still love a good Christmas craft and I stumbled upon some Color-By-Number sheets that I could just print off from Pinterest.  I’ve been surprised how long they sat their together and colored the sheets.  There are lots of them online and on Pinterest and this makes for a frugal activity you can do with your whole family!  These are the ones I found on Pinterest.
  12. Bake Cookies:  Get the whole family together and spend some time baking!  I realize this may not be fun for some people, but goodness, in our family we all love to bake! I have a ton of great recipes on my KatrinasWorld Pinterest page you can check out!  A few of my favorite Christmas cookie recipes are: Peppermint Meltaways from CookingClassy.com and  Cherry Chocolate Kisses from CurvyCarrot.com.  We make both of these every Christmas and then hand them out to all our neighbors!
  13. Watch The Grinch: Rent from your local library or buy, How the Grinch Stole Christmas and bake these Grinch cookies from inKatrinasKitchen.com!  Then, you must also make Grinch Punch and sit down and watch the movie and eat your yummy treats! It’s a silly tradition, but one that our family does every year and we just love it!  It’s a great night-time activity to do and is so much fun!
  14. Home Alone + Breakfast:  This activity may sound silly, but somehow it’s grown to be one of our family favorites.   Have friends over for breakfast and watch the original Home Alone movie – or have breakfast for dinner and watch the movie at night!  I’m not sure why we picked Home Alone, but it’s a classic that our family loves to watch, plus we have dear friends that we’ve made this a tradition to do every Christmas break and it’s something I look forward to each year!  This year we are planning to have our friends come over for dinner instead of breakfast, but we still plan to eat breakfast for dinner!
  15. Read the Christmas Story:  On Christmas Eve, act out the Christmas Story directly from the Bible – you can find it in Luke 2:1-20.  If you have young kids, have them dress up and act out the parts as you read.  We have done this since I was a little girl and I even have a rocking horse that is perfect for the Donkey that Mary rides on!
  16. Birthday Party for Jesus:  On Christmas Eve we throw a birthday party for Jesus!  After we read and act out the Christmas story from the Bible (this can be found in Luke 2:1-20), we have birthday cake and celebrate Jesus’ birth!  Get creative with your kids and have them help you make the birthday cake earlier in the day – it can look like whatever you want!  We even put candles on our cake and sing Him “Happy Birthday!”
  17. Friends + Chili + Board Games:  Invite a family over to share chili and cornbread and play board games.  We have a couple favorite family board games right now, Qwirkle and Wits and Wagers!  Both are great family-friendly games!  Wits and Wagers is so much fun for a larger group and even younger kids can play along!
  18. Volunteer:  Volunteer your time as a family helping at your church for all the extra Christmas Eve services they will be having.  Our family helps out in the Children’s department with the 4year olds so the adults can attend the Christmas Eve Candlelight service.  If watching kids is not your thing, I’m sure there are lots of other things your family can help out with, like: serving coffee and cookies, greeting at the door, handing out bulletins, cleaning, helping set up extra chairs, etc.
  19. Go Look at Lights Again:  In my area our local newspaper puts out a list of addresses of the best Christmas lights to see all over our city – look up the addresses and go see some more lights!  We also have a lot of local Facebook groups in my area that keep a running list of great places to see lights.  Don’t forget to stop and get drinks along the way!
  20. Go Caroling:  This is completely FREE!  Gather some friends together and go sing Christmas carols to your neighbors!  I’m horrible at singing, but goodness, how fun is this to do?!   I know in my neighborhood, it would shock my neighbors to have me ring the doorbell and then start singing!  We’ve never done this before as a family, but we just might give it a try this year!

This post contains affiliate links.  As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

ChristmasActivONBudget

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December 19, 20180 commentsRead More
10 Easy Ways to Make Extra Money From Home

10 Easy Ways to Make Extra Money From Home

10waysSAHMearnmoney

This post contains affiliate links.  As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

 

I’ve been a stay-at-home-mom for 12 years! 12 years! Wow! I love being home with my kids, but it’s not always easy and anyone who says it is, well, they are lying!  If you’ve followed my blog for a while, you know I’m a true entrepreneur at heart – I’m always trying to think of ways to make money in my everyday life. I’m so thankful I get the pleasure (although like I said, it’s not always a pleasure) of being at home with my kids and taking care of our household. But, let’s be honest, being at home all day taking care of laundry and kids doesn’t pay the bills.

We chose to wait to have kids until we were ready and able to have me stay at home to take care of them, knowing that I would not bring in an income. While I know that a lot of couples do not have this choice, it was our desire for our family.  After reading Dave Ramsey’s book, Total Money Makeover, we decided to work extra jobs for the first 5 years of our marriage to pay off all our debt and that sure made it easier for me to be home not working.
I’ve tried over the years to find ways to make money, but most of my efforts are on the money-saving side instead of the money-making side. I use coupons for everything, I try to make a lot of the products we use such as all-purpose cleaner, food items like taco seasoning and granola (find my granola recipe here – it’s yummy and healthy – WIN WIN), my kids take their lunch to school every day and we like to use plastic lunch box containers that we can reuse to save on those little plastic baggies, and much more. I know many moms are in my same spot – they are at home, trying to save as much as they can, and longing to also earn money doing it! Well, here ya go – my top 10 ways you can make money being at stay-at-home-mom and I have personally tried all 10 of these things and currently do a few of them right now:

  1. Nannying 
    Nannying is an excellent way to bring in extra income while staying at home. The best part of nannying is that it goes right along with what you already do as a stay-at-home-mom, especially if you are able to nanny a child around the same age as your own kids. Plus, having another child around to play with your child is also a bonus! I nannied a little girl last year for the duration of the school year. She was with me 3-4 days a week and she fit right into our daily schedule of kid activities. Plus, my kids loved having her around the house and always wanted to play with her.
  2. Make Your Own Product
    I have been making my own all-purpose cleaner for years and recently while sitting at church I had a bright idea that I should bottle it and sell it for all the people who just don’t have time to make it themselves.  It’s called CLEAN MOM Homemade All-Purpose Cleaner. Plus because I’m making it myself, it’s pure, natural and has no harsh chemicals. If you have a product you can make and sell, go for it! I’ve chosen to advertise my cleaner on a local Facebook page dedicated to Homemade products, as well as my own Facebook page, my Katrina’s World facebook page and my Katrina’s World blog. The sky is the limit on where you can post your products to sell them. Use local online pages, or consider setting up a booth a local Farmer’s Market or craft show on a weekend to display and sell your products. If you know any business owners with a storefront, consider approaching them about possibly setting up a little point-of-sale spot in their business.
  3. Start a Blog
    I’m working on this now!   I’ve had my blog for about 4 years now and it’s never made a single dime of income for me. I’ve taken it very slow, built it from scratch, spent countless hours pouring my heart into my posts, and have loved it. I take a lot of breaks from my blog to focus on other things especially when life just get really stressful. For me, that’s ok. I never started my blog to be popular – I really don’t know why God lead me to start my blog…I still wonder. I can tell you this, I like working on it, it’s a lot of work, but I know from all the other blogs out there that I follow that you CAN make money with your blog. I would love for my blog to make a real income for our family – even just a little bit would be helpful, but it’s all in God’s time and I’m willing to go along for the ride. Most of the money made on blogs comes from advertising income, guest posts, sponsored posts, etc. It all comes down to page views on your site and how many people are active on your blog. I’m currently working on that aspect right now.
  4. Take a Work At Home Job
    The sky is the limit on the work-at-home jobs that are out there, you just have to get creative on where to find them.  A few of them that I have done are: Data Entry, Virtual Assistant, Lead Processor, Appointment Scheduler, and Research Assistant. When I really think about it, most of these jobs have just come along when I’ve been in the right place at the right time. I never really went out looking for them. I did some data entry – but I did struggle with this, as I’m not good with numbers. I’ve been a virtual assistant many times over the years, but mostly for friends. I also recently spent a few months doing some lead processing which tied right in with appointment scheduling for a local doctor and loved the job! It was simple to do, didn’t take very much time, and made great money! I got paid every time I called a lead and got them scheduled for an appointment. If they showed up to their appointment, I was paid. It was a perfect job to do at at home, I just needed a phone and my computer. Again, this was another job I did that found me.   I really liked it, much more than I thought would and hope to do it again soon! For work-at-home jobs, sometimes you just need to jump on Facebook and tell your friends and family that you are looking for something you can do from home and then list off all your skills and see what comes back to you!
  5. Freelance
    I’ve done lots of freelance design jobs over the years. Since I have a degree in graphic design, all my work 20 years ago centered around design. I worked full-time doing design for other people and then for my own business for many years! When I stepped away from my design business I still would do all sorts of freelance design jobs on the side for different people. I still do – especially for close friends and family and a few local doctor offices. If you are able to do any type of freelance work, it’s a great way to make extra money. I have friends who code apps, space plan, or stage houses – the sky is the limit for what type of freelance work you can do!
  6. Multi-level Marketing/Network Marketing
    Join a network marketing company or multi-level marketing company. There are so many of them out there – find something you are passionate about like lipstick, makeup, health products, vitamins, candles, essential oils, etc. Instead of just consuming the products, sign up as a consultant and sell the products to your friends and family and then you can earn what you consume for free usually! It’s a win-win! I’ve had my own network marketing company and boy does it come with it’s ups and downs – be ready for a LOT of rejection, and a lot of triumph! I’ll be honest, it just wasn’t for me – but that’s a whole other post to write some day!
  7. Teach Classes
    There are 2 ways to do this – if you have a 4 year degree you can teach in many different ways – Community College, Substitute Teaching, Online Classes to foreign kids (and I’m sure there are many more).  A long time ago, before we had kids, I was working full-time as a graphic designer and we had just finished Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University course and we were committed to get out of debt as soon as possible. We both worked extra jobs and for a while I started teaching at our local community college. I taught basic graphic design classes at night and it was hard! The workload was a lot because I taught 2 classes a week , but it was so worth it! We made some great extra money and payed off all our debt in one year! I’ve never done substitute teaching or online teaching, but I’ve considered it. I have quite a few friends who teach online classes to Chinese kids and they love it! I’m not a fan of the hours though – it’s typically an early morning job – which is one reason I’ve not wanted to give this a try. I’ve also never tried substitute teaching at any of my local schools, but have considered it as well!
  8. Public Speaking
    I love to speak to large groups! If you are passionate about a topic, find a way to brush up on your speaking skills and share your knowledge with others! Join your local Chamber of Commerce and start out small by speaking for free to a small group. I used to speak about inexpensive ways to market your business with my local Chamber at a monthly luncheon and it was a great way to share my knowledge and also get my company name out there. I loved it and would love to do more speaking! I’ve also spoken at my local MOPS group about couponing, as well as how to raise kids with God’s grace. While I never made a lot of direct money from speaking – I did make money in other ways from it – such as I grew my graphic design business by gaining new clients by just putting myself out there and I also was given gift cards as payment for speaking for a my MOPS group.
  9. Dog Walking
    I don’t do this as much as I’d like to!  I love dogs, especially mine, and I walk her ALL the time – usually about 6 miles a day broken up into 3-4 smaller walks.  Sometimes I think she’s taking me for a walk more than I am walking her. I need some breaks all day long to stay focused and walking her is the perfect way to do it! She’s still a puppy and is FULL of energy, so walking her is a perfect way to give us both a break. I’m walking so much all the time, that I sure thought it would be nice to find a few other neighborhood dogs that needed walking as well and make some money getting exercise! I’m still open to this idea and hoping to find the right pups to walk!
  10. Bake Sale
    Have a bake sale with your kids on your front lawn! I do this with my kids every summer and it’s a blast! We bake up a whole bunch of treats and make a festive table in my front yard. We stick up signs around the neighborhood and viola! It’s great to pair a bake sale with a garage sale if you really feel like doing some work!

This post contains affiliate links.  As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

10waysSAHMearnmoney

 

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September 25, 2018Comments are DisabledRead More
CLEAN MOM – Homemade All-Purpose Cleaner

CLEAN MOM – Homemade All-Purpose Cleaner

CleanMOM_KWYou all know me, I love to make things at home that I can make cheaper than buying at the store.  A few weeks ago I shared with you all my recipe for Homemade All-Purpose Cleaner that I like to use at home – it’s cheap to make, easy to make and has NO harsh chemicals!  The best thing about this cleaner is that it smells great and is super easy to make with things around your house!  I know our lives get super busy, I mean seriously, we are moms – so I’ve decided to bottle my cleaner and sell it in case you are too busy to make it yourself!  :) Yep, you got it – I now offer my Homemade Cleaner to any Parker, Colorado locals.  If you would like to buy a bottle of my CLEAN MOM All-Purpose Cleaner – please email me.

CLEAN MOM All-Purpose Cleaner is pure, natural, and cleans better than anything you can get at the store – without the harsh chemicals!

It works awesome on mirrors and glass leaving a streak free shine! Use also in your kitchen, bathroom, countertops and even on carpet stains!

*Ingredients: Water, Vinegar, Pure Lavender Castile Soap, Coconut Oil, Olive Oil, Hemp Oil, Lavender Oil and Jojoba Oil.

$3/bottle (28oz) or $10/4 bottles
Pickup in Parker, CO.  I accept Cash, or PayPal.

Order NOW!

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February 14, 20180 commentsRead More
#1 Homemade All-Purpose Cleaner

#1 Homemade All-Purpose Cleaner

BestAllPurposeCleanerMy favorite scent is Clean.  I’m serious, I love the smell of Clean.  No real scent needed, just Clean.  For me, that’s the smell of vinegar and a little water!  :) I’ve made this amazing Homemade All-Purpose Cleaner for years and never thought to share it until now.  It’s super simple, cheap, easy and you can vary it a little bit if you want.  All you need is a spray bottle – either go buy a new one, or save one of your old Windex cleaner spray bottles – I promise you will love this cleaner so much better than anything you can buy at the store for double the price!  Get your spray bottle and mix:

  • 4 Cups Water
  • 1/2 Cup White Vinegar
  • 1tsp (I like Palmolive or Dawn, or 100% Pure Castile Soap)
  • Squeeze of Lemon Or Couple Drops Lemon Essential Oil (Optional)

Shake and viola!  It smells great and works so much better on glass and mirrors than anything else you can buy!  I don’t always add lemon, but you can if you want to make it smell even better.

USE FOR:

  • Kitchen Counters
  • Glass
  • Mirrors
  • Bathroom Sinks, Counters, Toliets
  • Carpet Stains
  • Tile Floors

It’s awesome, cheap, easy, and smells so Clean!

**UPDATE – I now offer Katrina’s World readers the option to buy a bottle of CLEAN MOM All-Purpose Cleaner directly from me!  Click Here to find out more!

BestAllPurposeCleaner

 

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December 4, 20170 commentsRead More
How To Throw A Hot Wheels Birthday Party

How To Throw A Hot Wheels Birthday Party

HotWheelsThemedPartyMy youngest son, Rylyn, just turned 5!  We had such a fun birthday party for him – you see, Rylyn used to love trains more than anything – but as the years have gone by, his love for trains has turned into a love for all things cars, especially Hot Wheels tracks and cars.  He loves them!  When we started to think about themes for his birthday party, we knew we had to do a Hot Wheels themed party.  If you have been reading my blog for a while, then you know that I love to plan birthday parties for my kids and I love to plan over-the-top fun parties on a serious budget – in my mind, there is no other way to do it!  I think if you work at it, you can absolutely have an amazing birthday party for your child without spending a lot of money – and, you can do it from home (which saves even more money)!

 

I wanted to make this party for Rylyn extra special because it’s the first “friend” party he’s had!  I know what you are thinking, Katrina, he’s 5, why in the world is this his first real party?  Well, I’ll be real honest with you, take a seat…. I’m a mom of 3 kids, and he’s the 3rd kid.  Simple as that – plus I’m smarter now.  :)  I didn’t want to start off this awesome birthday party tradition with Rylyn too soon, because I have many years ahead of fun parties with him.   He’s a crazy boy with so much energy, that I honestly wanted to put off the “friend” parties with him for as long as I could.

 

This was the first year that he finally noticed the fun parties that my other kids had and was already planning his own party.  When I think back on it now, I can’t believe that my oldest son, who turned 10 this year, has had 10 amazing at-home birthday parties.  His parties have been over-the-top!   He’s had really fun themes like: Messy Party, Star Wars, Science Lab, Minute-To-Win-It, etc.  My daughter, who turned 7 this year, has had a few less than my son (you see, I was starting to wise-up).  Her fun at-home parties started when she was 3 with her first “friend” party.  She’s had 4 great years of fun parties with themes like: Tea Party, Italian Cooking Party, Cheerleader Party, Daddy-Daughter Construction Building Party, etc.  Now that we are on to my 3rd, I’m older and wiser and think it’s ok that he’s just starting his “friend” party tradition.

 

When I’m planning a birthday party I start out by making a quick Word doc with all my ideas of themes that they might like.  I then make a guest list and ask for input from my child on who they would like to invite.  We go over the themes and I let them pick one.  Thankfully this year I pretty much knew what theme he was going to pick, it was either going to be Trains or Hot Wheels.  He chose Hot Wheels and I was off the races to start coming up with games and things to do for a November Hot Wheels party indoors with a bunch of 5 year olds.  What in the world can you do inside with car track? I did what any mom would do, I got on Pinterest to see what everyone else has done.  I found a lot of great pins for decorations for a “car-themed” party, but I know my son, and he could care less about the décor, he’s all about the fun things you would DO at the party.  He’s a very active boy and so are his friends, I knew I needed to keep them very busy or I’d lose control of them all.  I really didn’t find very many ideas at all of fun Hot Wheels themed activities we could do and was bummed.

 

It was close to Halloween and I still didn’t know what we were going to do at this party, but I had the invites made, the décor picked out and a cake ordered (from my mom of course).  A local high school in our area was hosting a Halloween Party for little kids, so we got ours all dressed up and headed over there for the free candy!  Once inside they had transformed the whole school into a Candy Land themed Halloween Party with tons of carnival games and it struck me, we could do that for Rylyn’s party!  Carnival type games that are Hot Wheels themed!  Genius!  My older son even mentioned to me much later that we should do a bunch of those simple games for Rylyn’s birthday party because Rylyn had so much fun and so did all the kids his age!  He even offered to help me make the games, and viola, we were off and running.  I was pumped because they all were fairly simple and inexpensive to put together, and they would work as indoor or outdoor games if the weather was nice enough (which at the time I had no idea what the November weather in Colorado would be like).  We got super lucky and had very warm weather the day of his party and could do most of the games outside, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

 

Here are all the game stations we came up with:

 

  • “Tire Toss” – We set up some old tires which I just so happened to as we had just put new tires on one of our vehicles.  YouHotWheels6 could also use ring shaped floaties used for the pool for kids who can’t swim yet.  You just set up the tires staggered and use beanie bags to toss into the tires.  If they make it into a tire, then they win a prize.
  • “Ring Toss” – We used glow necklaces hooked together to make a ring and had the kids toss them on to yellow caution cones that I happened to have for coaching soccer.  I found both at the dollar store.  The children had to take a “tire” glow necklace and toss it onto the cone.  If they made it, they won a prize.
  • •“Pin Wheel”– Think of Pin the Tail On The Donkey, same idea but I made a big poster board of a Hot Wheels Car instead.  Then I printed and cut out a page of small tires.  At this station, I had my dear friend give each child a tire with some tape on the back and after they spun the child around a few times, blindfolded, they got to try to get their tire on the Hot Wheels Car.  We gave everyone candy for just trying this one no matter where their tire ended up.  I hung this poster on my garage and it worked out great.
  • “Car Walk” – Just think of a good old fashioned Cake Walk!  Same thing, except if your number is called you win candy instead of a yummy baked good.  J I made numbers 1-10 and taped them to my driveway for the kids to walk on.  We played music and when we stopped the music you had to be on a number.  You would then pick a number out of a jar and whatever number was called won a piece of candy.  My daughter helped with this station and loved every second of it.  Hands down, this was the wall time favorite station by all the kids at the party.  I mean, who doesn’t love a good ‘ole cake walk?!HotWheels5
  • “Tire Eating Contest” – This was so fun!!! We hung mini chocolate donuts, which were the “tires” with fishing line from a low branch on our big tree in our front yard all at different lengths.  We then lined all the kids up in front of a donut that hung basically right in their face.  At the same time, with their hands behind their backs, they had to eat the donuts without touching them.  HILARIOUS to watch and so yummy!  The kids loved this one as well.  We only did this station one time as a group.
  • “Car Race”  – this was the last activity.  My older son built a Hot Wheels track that went down our stairs and made the cars go really fast!  We had everyone use the Hot Wheels car they were given from the “Car Fishing” game to face off with each other and see which car was faster.  I initially planned to make a big tournament poster with individual heats for the cars to race, but time got away from me and I realized that being 5 year olds, they didn’t really care who won!  They just wanted to race!
  • “Stop Light Piñata” – I made a VERY simple piñata from a tall rectangular Amazon box and stuffed the candy in the bottom of the box.  Taped it together and then decorated the box by wrapping black streamer paper all around the box completely covering it.  Then I cut out a red, yellow, and green circle from construction paper and taped them on the front of the box and it looked just like a stop light.  We hung the piñata from our front tree and used a very hard baseball bat toHotWheels4 whack it.  I was worried it might have a hard time busting open because it was a real cardboard box, but thankfully, that also meant that each child got to hit the box a few times and then we let the birthday box pound on it until it all feel apart – which he loved.  Was a very cheap way to make an adorable piñata.  This was another all group activity that we did only one time.
  • •“Car Fishing” – This one is where you hold a fishing pole with a string hooked to it, then the child tosses it over a big board and the person behind the board hooks a toy to the string and tosses it back like the child “caught” a fish!  We changed it up a bit and attached a red Solo cup to the end of a string on a wooden pole I had.  When they child tossed it over they were given a brand-new Hot Wheels car in their cup! They all seemed to love this and the best part was that the Hot Wheels cars are usually on $1!  We then planned to have each child keep that Hot Wheels car and use it for the Car Race that would happen later.

 

Other Things I Made:

The Decorations:

HotWheels3If you have read my posts from my other parties, you know I like to keep things cute, but simple and budget-friendly!  Rather than buying official Hot Wheels branded décor, I believe in picking solid colors that match and making my own birthday banners out of poster board and ribbon, and making my own signs and hanging them up.  Plus, we always use matching streamers.  I also made a simple tablecloth for the main table to look like a road.  I picked up a black plastic tablecloth from the Dollar Store as well as some white duct tape made my own road!  It was cute and cheap!  Don’t forget the balloons!  I always get about 10-15 solid color balloons and disperse them around the house – as well as outside so it sets the mood when you guests arrive!  Simple, cheap, and awesome!

Signs:

I made my own signs FREE from my favorite website – Canva, that I glued onto poster board and hung it up near each station.  I also recruited a few parents and family members, even my older kids, to run each station so that they could help the kids and hand out prizes.  My prizes consisted of a lot of candy (that I recycled from Halloween, and small little toys like pencils, erasers, stickers, that were again recycled from Halloween and that I picked up at the Dollar store).  I tried to find some fun Hot Wheels themed prizes, but when they got too pricey, I figured kids love candy and I had a TON from Halloween that was just a week before his party!

Goody Bags:

These were very necessary as the children needed a bag to carry around during the entire party so that they could put all the candyHotWheels2 and treats they won at each station – as well as when we did the piñata.  I kept these simple as well, I just picked up a package of red paper lunch bags that I found from my local Dollar Store and printed out a small tag that I made on Canva.com for each bag that I glued to the front and added each child’s name.  I had these sitting out so each child could grab their bag when they arrived to the party.

The Cake:

My mom is our cake maker extraordinaire!  She makes the cakes for my kids every year and they are  amazing!  The best part about her cakes is that they are gorgeous and usually make for an awesome focal point on the main table.  This year, she out-did herself with a Hot Wheels cake that had a tunnel right through the middle that you could drive a Hot Wheels car through (that was the request from the birthday boy)!   Even if you can’t make an extravagant cake, there are so many cute ideas on Pinterest for cakes, treats, and cupcake that go right along with the theme.  If I didn’t have my mom to make the cake, I was going to go with something simple – a “tire” donut cake!  Just take a bunch of small chocolate donuts and stack them up on a plate just like a bunch of tires. Then stick a candle on top and there you go – a “tire” cake!  Viola and super simple, plus this would be very inexpensive!

Invitations and Thank You Cards:

HotWheels7I also made my own invitations on Canva and used the same layout to make a thank you card.  I like to make invites that are simple 3.5 x 5 in postcards that are 1 sided that I can put in an envelope or pop right in the mail as a postcard.  It’s much faster to just make your own, print them out and mail, versus hunting down a matching invitation at the store and hand-writing in all the info (at least it is for me).  Plus, I love to make stuff on my own and personalize it!

 

It may sound like a lot of work, but besides making the signs and few other décor items, it really wasn’t that bad!  The party was a lot of fun and really you could use the same games to fit any theme for any party!  My son loved this 5th Hot Wheels birthday party and for me, that’s all that matters!

 

 

HotWheelsThemedParty

 

 

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February 27, 20170 commentsRead More
Time to Tidy Up: Only Keep Stuff You Love

Time to Tidy Up: Only Keep Stuff You Love

OnlyKeepStuffYouLoveI’ve learned a lot this week, but the best thing so far – it’s ok to throw stuff away.  Really, it’s ok.  Even if that stuff is a gift from someone you love.  It may be a wonderful gift that had great intentions, but over the years, that gift sat on a shelf and collected dust.  It’s taken up a piece of real estate in your house and over the years you can’t seem to part with it since it was a gift.

You know what I’m talking about – that candle that you burned a few times and then you stuffed it in the very back of your kitchen cabinet because you got another one you liked better.  Or, it’s the quilt that someone made you as a wedding present.  While the quilt is lovely, it doesn’t match the decor of your house, or even of your guest room, so it’s been sitting in a box for 15 years.  Or, maybe it’s that collection of items from your favorite sports team – the mugs, light-up beer steins (and you don’t even drink beer), hats, coasters, posters, soda can cozies, tickets from games you have attended, and on and on – while you love this sports team, you may not love all the gifts you are given year after year with their logo plastered on it.

I know how you feel though – being stuck with a gift and feeling like you have to keep it just because you love the person who gave it to you.  In Marie Kondo’s book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, she says, “Too many people live surrounded by things they don’t need ‘just because.’”  Most people have no idea how much space these things are taking up in their homes.

For me, I’ve seen this truth to be true – I can’t believe that in my already orderly (or so I thought) house I found 16 bags of things just taking up space that I didn’t want anymore, and I’m only just beginning.  The question to ask yourself when sorting through gifts is “Does this spark joy?”   Simple as that.  You have to remember that gifts are just things that are used to convey someone’s feelings for you – and after they have given you the gift, the gift’s purpose has been fulfilled.  Think about that.  It’s so true and my mind is blown.  This makes me think about gifts in a whole new light – both gifts I receive and gifts I give – honestly, it makes me want to try a lot harder when I’m giving a gift to someone.

While some gifts are hard to part with, others are easy to discard.  You can part with that engraved china plate you got as a wedding gift that has sat in a box for your entire marriage.  Yes, it was a gift, but do you even remember who gave it to you?  This happened to me yesterday.  We tackled our storage room.  This room holds a giant pile of boxes that are old grade school papers, trophies from Awana, diplomas and awards from DECA and FBLA, Coca-Cola collections, M & M collections of everything you can dream of shaped, stuffed or imprinted with an M & M on it, wedding gifts, old cards and letters, etc.  It was intense.  I can’t believe how much we threw away!  We had so many empty boxes that we had saved and intended to use for shipping gifts to people.  Silliest thing ever, because we maybe ship 3-4 boxes a year!  We had enough boxes and shipping materials to ship boxes for the next 20 years or more!  Not only were these boxes taking up a ton of space, so were all the boxes of momentos.

We spent 5 hours working on this room and have made some great progress, but we still have a long way to go.  The funny thing, I noticed my attitude change over the course of the day.  I was super excited to get started on the room – I loved seeing all the things we were able to discard and haul to the trash.  Once we started unpacking my M & M collection and my box of unexpected photos from college, I started to get really stressed.  I didn’t know what to do with this stuff.  I panicked.  We kept going and I had to walk away for awhile.  I was getting totally overwhelmed.  There were boxes overflowing with packing peanuts,  piles of sorted item we were going to donate, and piles of discarded items.  Just walking from the storage room to the the stairs was like walking through a mine field.  We cleared a path and I set aside all my momentos to deal with at a later time.  The photos and special memory items are the items you sort through last.  Thank goodness, because I like to take photos of everything!

I unpacked boxes that have been packed since I moved into my house 10 years ago.  I had boxes of decor items that don’t match my current house and honestly I didn’t even remember I had them.  I found a really cool set of metal lamps that I really like, but have no problem selling instead of keeping.  In fact, I’m not only donating items, but finding a lot that I can sell on VarageSale.  I have listed over 100 items since I’ve begun my tidying journey and I’m loving the extra money that I’m making.

I’m super proud of my husband as well, he loves to collect stuff and tends to have multiple collections of things,  let’s see, there is the Coca-Cola collection, the Star Wars Lego collection, and the Broncos collection.  I tend to look at these things as ways to collect dust, which drives him crazy.  He thinks I’m boring because I don’t really collect anything.  Yep, we are a perfect match!  He did make some great decisions on things he was willing to part with and we have big plans for our storage room.  We are going to add some shelves and I’m so excited!  Our compromise, I have to find a place to display his Coke collection because he unpacked it all!  I still have to figure this one out.  :)

Needless to say, I survived the day, we still have a ton to do, but we made a huge dent in our stuff that I’m super proud and excited.  As I work through the whole house, I’m finding that I have a ton of storage totes and bins that I no longer need – as I’ve discarded most of the items that used to be in them.  I’m also loving reading Marie Kondo’s book because there are just times in your life when you just need someone to tell you it’s ok to throw stuff away.  I also feel relieved that you really only need to keep stuff that you truly love.  How is your tidying journey going?

OnlyKeepStuffYouLove

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January 16, 20170 commentsRead More
Time to Tidy Up: Tackling My Closet

Time to Tidy Up: Tackling My Closet

ClosetMarie Kondo’s book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, says the best place to start tidying in your home is your closet.  Well, I did it.  Oh-my-goodness.  That was a HUGE job, but it didn’t hurt nearly as much as I thought it would.  Phew.  I’m glad it’s over and I can’t believe how clean I feel – not just because my closet is clean, but my overall life is starting to feel cleaner, and I love it!

Are you ready to begin tidying your life?   Well, here is how you at least tackle your closet.  First of all, Marie says you should gather every last bit of your clothing in your entire house and put it all in one pile on the floor.  I laughed out loud when I first read this.  I remember thinking that I could just leave a few coats and gloves in the downstairs closet and not worry about them, as well as keep my swimsuit in the laundry room –  but the book says to gather every last bit of clothing – gloves, hats, coats, everything.  If you don’t get every last piece you won’t fully immerse yourself in the process…I drug my feet because it seemed like a lot of work, but eventually I grabbed a laundry basket and gathered everything and hauled it upstairs to my room.  I took every single piece of clothing out of my closet – shirts, jeans, fancy dresses, suits, bras, purses, scarves, etc.. – EVERYTHING!!!

I even pulled out my precious tubs of maternity clothes (which I had 3 giant plastic tubs worth) which I swore I would never get rid of.  The dust on top of, behind, and around these maternity tubs was thick, and I was beyond terrified to get rid of any of it.  I’ve had such a journey the last 11 years of being a mom and so many memories are tied to those maternity clothes.  I could not imagine going through them, let alone getting rid of any of them, but I pulled them out of the closet and piled them up with everything else.

After it was all piled up on the floor I sorted it into clothing types and tackled my shirts first.  I was doing great at discarding shirts that were lumpy, stained, pilled, and had holes in them until I found the pink glitter chihuahua shirt.  I got stuck.  I sort of freaked out.  I put it in the discard pile and then I grabbed it back out.  I panicked.  That shirt has such deep memories.  Does is spark joy?  Yes, it does.  It sparks all sorts of memories of a wonderful life I’ve had with my spouse.  I got that shirt while I was dating my husband and was dreaming of marrying him, having kids and of one chihuahuashirtday having a little white chihuahua that I would name Lucy.  For real.  I loved pink, glitter and little dogs and felt like my whole life was ahead of me.   Great memories that make me wish life was simple again.  I cannot part with that shirt, even though I’m fairly positive that I”ll never actually wear it again.

I continued on with my sorting and then my daughter walked in to see what I was up to.  She immediately asked if we could do her room too!  That’s my girl!  Love her!  It’s funny how if you start organizing your own life, that others watching want to do the same thing.  This also applies to my husband.  When he got home that night, he was so amazed at the transformation of my side of the closet that he immediately starting pulling things out of his side of the closet to discard.  :)

Back to my process – I started to fill up bags and bags of clothes to be donated – it’s was liberating and felt wonderful!  When everything else was sorted, I finally tackled the tubs of maternity clothes.  I had to scrape off a layer of dust just opening them.  Ewww.  I plunged ahead and was really surprised when I made it through the first tub and easily discarded all of it.  Nothing sparked joy.  All of the items in the first tub were very  big and out of style – they were 11 years old and from my first pregnancy – I was gigantic when I was pregnant with my oldest.  I hated everything about being pregnant with him.  I was uncomfortable, sick all the time, hungry all the time, wore very big maternity clothes, and when I picked them up and examined them, they gave me a feeling of yuck.

In the donate bag they all went and this process continued until I came to the last tub with all my cute clothes from when I pregnant with my daughter.  I loved being pregnant with her.  I was super thin because she made me sooo terribly sick all the time that I could barely eat, it was summer and I love summer maternity clothes, and overall I felt like a rock-star mommy.  It was one of the best years of my life.  I loved the attention of being pregnant, I felt cute the whole 9 months, and I was elated to be having a girl!  I loved all my maternity clothes I wore during that time – they were colorful, cute, and I would wear them all again if I had another baby.  I even loved my maternity swim suit – and honestly, who can say they love a swim suit?  Needless to say, I kept about 12 items, including my swimsuit and that was all I kept from my 3 big maternity tubs.  These items fit in a small diaper box.

I’m so glad I took the plunge and opened up those bins – because it taught me I was holding onto memories that I didn’t need to hold on to anymore.  I don’t plan to have any more kids, but if I do, then I still have a few cute items that I love dearly.  I’m sure at some point down the road, I will discard that box, but for now, I’m so proud of myself for purging 3/4 of a category of things I had that were not exactly what I thought.  I didn’t need to take up a huge space in my closet holding onto things that I didn’t really even like when I further examined them.  Again, it’s liberating to get rid of them!  I also know that someone else could use all of those clothes that I no longer needed, so I posted 3 garbage bags of maternity clothes size Small, Medium, and Large on a local Free Facebook group that I’m a part of and all 3 were picked up the next day by ladies who needed them.  It’s a win-win!

It only took me 3 hours to complete my closet.  I spent the next hour vacuuming, dusting and cleaning my closet floor which had not seen the light of day in probably 6 years.  When you have so much crammed in a tiny space it’s more effort than it’s worth to clean under and around it.  Right?  I love all the white space on my side of the closet now.  Love it!

I learned a lot about myself by the items I decided to keep.  Sorting through your clothes tells you a lot about who you are.  I discarded a lot of things that I’ve held onto for a long time – fancy dresses, high heels, jeans, suit jackets from my working days, etc.  I held onto my leggings, tunics, yoga pants, athletic gear, and running shoes.  Wow.  It’s weird to even write that.  My fashion sense and lifestyle have changed a lot in the last 20 years (yes, there were things in my closet that I’ve had for 20 years).  Honestly, I’m not sure what this says about me.  I’m still thinking about it and mulling it over in my head.  My husband did comment that I used to dress a lot fancier when he first met me.  Of course I questioned him about that and he just said it was an observation, but it did worry me.  Am I looking to mom-ish?  Just stuff to think about.  Wow, who knew that tidying my home could go so deep?

So, what has tidying taught you?  Have you sorted your closet?  How did that go?  Can’t wait to hear all about your tidying journey….

Closet

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January 7, 20170 commentsRead More
Time to Tidy Up: Let The Selling Begin

Time to Tidy Up: Let The Selling Begin

LetSellingBeginI was so excited to get started with my tidying project that I had no problem sorting through stuff in my cabinets and begin the joyful job of discarding.  For me, this job is fun.  I do find joy in discarding objects that no longer serve a purpose or have a use.  You might have a much harder tine discarding items – my husband, for example, has a hard time letting go of things.  Just the other day we were sorting through that big box of cables, cords, old computer parts, etc that everyone has laying around.  We have a pretty big box full of these things to go along with our many other electronic devices and because my husband is a nerd we have a lot!  Yep, I just called him a “nerd” and I mean it totally lovingly.  He’s amazing and I’m so glad he understands computers!

Anyways, since I was dying to get a jump on the discarding process I drug my poor, unsuspecting husband to the basement to begin sorting through the box of cables and then to sort through our big pile of old computers, hard drives, printers, etc that we could recycle and get out of the house!  While I had no problem finding a ton of stuff to discard, my poor husband sorted it all and then sheepishly said he needed to keep most of it!  :)  It was adorable actually!  We had multiple TV cables from DirectTV still in the plastic packaging that were exact duplicates and I was ready to discard every single one, while my husband was worried we might need them ALL someday.  It was cute, and made me giggle.  Somehow I negotiated with him to keep just one of each kind, phew.  I did learn that everyone has a different way of looking at items around the house and the key is identifying it’s purpose and being ok with letting it go if it’s already served it’s purpose.

At least I know that I have no problem letting go of stuff, which I’m happy about considering the journey I’m about to go on, but the best words I’ve read so far into Marie Kondo’s book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up,  are “we should be choosing what we want to keep, not what we want to get rid of.”   Like focusing on the good.  I have a very hard time doing this in everyday life.  I tend to focus on the bad in a situation and in people.  Isn’t that awful?!  I love the idea of looking at an object and asking “Does this spark joy?”  If not, discard.  While this sounds simple, I know it’s going to be hard.

I do love this approach for clothing though, a lot.  I still have stuff in my closet that I wore in college, my “cute days,” as I refer to them.  I keep wanting to be the same size as I was in college – you know, long before I had 3 kids.  When I try to remember what I think I looked like back then, I’m not sure it’s all that different than I do now…it’s silly, yes, I was thinner, but I was 18!!!!  Marie also says in her book to thank the item for the role it played in your life and then let it go.

A great example is a pink t-shirt I still have with a glitter chihuahua on it (ohmygoodness…two of my favorite things – glitter and chihuahuas, especially at that time in my life), and it’s a very small t-shirt.  I loved this shirt, I wore it all the time and for some reason I still have it 18 years later!! 18 years?!!! I can’t believe I’ve had it that long! Why in the world have I held on to it this long?  Partly because it has glitter on it (have I mentioned that I LOVE glitter??), and partly because it has a chihuahua on it, and I have 2 chihuahuas (the same 2 chihuahuas who are now 14 and 15 years old).  More importantly, I keep hoping I’ll be able to get skinny enough to wear it again.  I’ve not worn this shirt for probably 12 years – I don’t think I’ve fit into it for the last 13 years and I still have it.  Marie says you should ask this question, “Does it spark joy?”  It sparks really good memories of a time when I was itty -bitty and cute, but it also makes me sad because I don’t look like that anymore.  Can I actually thank this shirt for giving me joy at the time I bought it and wore it, and be ok with letting go of it?  I’m not sure…..  When I really think about it, even if I could fit into it again some day, I’m not sure that I would even wear it, as it’s really short!  :)  20 years ago short shirts were the fashion trend, but not anymore!   I’m still really thinking about this one and I’ve not even started working on going through my closet yet!! My brain gets really far ahead of me sometimes.

Anyways…back to my point – I’m a few days into my tidying journey and I’m selling things like a crazy woman!  It’s nice!  We are saving for a car, so the extra money I make on discarded items around the house all go into a jar sitting on my counter – the official “Car Fund” – hey, you have to start somewhere right?!   I used to be a big fan of having a garage sale, so all year long I would designate a space in my storage room and/or the guest room and collect items we could sell.  Once garage sale season would hit, usually late April, I would drag all my stuff out to the driveway and sell it all.  Whatever was left after 2 days I would donate to Goodwill.  Normally, we would save all that money for something big – one year we used it for a vacation to Legoland!  Now, I’m a more sophisticated seller – I like to use online selling apps to move my stuff and reach a bigger audience, and for some stuff I can charge a higher price than I would get for the item at a garage sale, which is awesome!  My favorite selling app is VarageSale and I also use a few smaller local community Facebook groups.  These groups are great because the seller comes to you to buy your item and for smaller items, I usually leave them outside my front porch with a nice note and the buyer just leaves money under my doormat.  It’s very convenient and easy!  If you get to know me well enough you know that I really love things that make my life easier.  My kids have a snow day today – which means all 3 will be home, but I’m hoping that gives me a good excuse to get more tidying done since I don’t have to run them around.

So, who’s used the KonMari Method?  How did you discard items that were hard to get rid of?  Any advice for me and my tidying journey?

Have a great day!  I’m off to try to tidy….

LetSellingBegin

 

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January 5, 20170 commentsRead More
Why We Didn’t Take Out A Loan For A Car

Why We Didn’t Take Out A Loan For A Car

GreenCarBeing an adult is hard.  So hard.  Here is what happened yesterday – are you ready for this? Here goes:

We need a new car in a bad way.  Check this baby out - this is my Dave Ramsey-mobile.  It’s a 1993 Honda Del Sol convertible- lime green with lime green wheels too, it was a beauty when I got it 20 (gasp) years ago!  Who’s heard of Dave Ramsey?  Love him!  Consider him my uncle – for real.  Around our house we call him ‘Uncle Dave’.  Well, when we first got married someone gifted us with his Total Money Makeover class and our newly married lives were completely changed – in a good way.  We had $90,000 of debt when we got married and after taking his class we were able to pay off ALL of that debt in just over a year.  We got extra jobs, worked out butts off and lived on beans and rice.  Boy was I glad the day we payed the last debt off!  I was so proud of us.  Now, we are 14 years down the road, still living debt-free and we never fight about money – which his a huge plus!  BUT, we really need a new car – this lovely Dave Ramsey-mobile is on it’s last leg.  In fact, this was the first car I ever had – I was given this car when I turned 16 and that was a long time ago.  My poor husband drives it to work every day and has for years and years.  It’s reliable, paid for, and does the job, BUT, we are ready to move on to another vehicle that we can fit our kids in.  As you can see, this car is on a 2-seater, and that’s hard when you have 3 kids.  :)

My husband would like to get a truck.  I would too.  Who knew that trucks hold their value so well?!  Not us.  We know that now.  We have been saving for a few years, anything extra at the end of the month and we have managed to save $10,000 – which is not going to buy much of a truck – we’d need double that to get something that will last us a few years.  The little green car will need some work put into it this fall – and honestly, the repairs are not worth it if we plan to sell it.  Which means, we are in the market for a newer vehicle.  Although my husband would really like a truck, we have decided the ‘adult’ decision would be to get a car instead, as they are cheaper, and we can pass it to our son who will be driving (gasp) in 6 years (ohmygosh, I can’t believe he will be driving soon….ahhh!!!).

With new resolve, we began looking on Craigslist for a 4WD car with lower miles, and only a few years old.  Imagine my luck when not an hour earlier someone had posted a gorgeous sedan, a few years old, with only 30,000 miles on it – asking only $13,800, claiming he was a very motivated seller.  The blue book on this car was mid $14,000′s.  My bargain hunting ears were fully listening.  Just what I like to hear – someone who took really good care of his car and was motivated to sell and offering a deal.  Of course we had to go check it out.  We were the first people to call him and went to go look at it last night.  It was beautiful.  Really – just like his Craigslist post said.  We talked him down to $13,400 – even better deal.  Then we shook hands and said we needed to talk about it first and he said he would hold our place in line, but he did have a handful of others interested.  We talked about it the whole way home.  What would you have done?

It’s now the next day and we don’t have the car.  I’m super sad, but feel like it was the right decision.  I had this crazy dream last night about Dave Ramsey shaking his head at me and saying “When will you learn?” and then right after that the roof was blown off our house.  For those of you who are familiar with Dave Ramsey, he teaches about this thing called ‘Murphy’s Law’ and buying a car that we can’t afford is like asking ‘Murphy’ to move into our spare bedroom.  You see, the only way we could’ve purchased that car with CASH was to take the $10,000 we had saved for it and then dip into our Emergency Fund for the rest.  I don’t care who you ask, buying this car is not an emergency.  Both of us feared that if we did take money from our Emergency Fund that a real emergency would take place and we wouldn’t be able to pay for it because we just bought a new car with the emergency money.  We also had the option of taking out a small loan to pay for the extra, but by the time we paid off the interest this car that was such a ‘great deal’, was not as good of deal anymore.

I’m sad that we missed out on this car and am hoping that when the time is right, we will find another great deal.  BUT, I’m still bummed and hate having to make ‘adult’ decisions.

So, do you drive a Dave Ramsey-mobile?  I’d love to see a photo of it!  You can upload a photo of it on my Katrina’s World Facebook Page  - just tag #DaveRamseyMobile and tell me all about it!

I’d also love to know what you would do in our situation?!  Tell me all about it – whether you agree or not!

GreenCar

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August 25, 20160 commentsRead More
How To Make Dehydrated Apples

How To Make Dehydrated Apples

HowToMakeDehydratedApplesYes, I know it’s summer, but my house smells like Fall!  What’s better in fall you say?  Apple Pie!  Yes!  My house smells like Apple Pie and here’s why – I’m dehydrating a bunch of apples today!  Yummy!!  A neighbor came over and when I opened the door she told me my house smelled amazing and she wondered what candle I had burning!  I told her I didn’t have a candle lit, but was making dehydrated apples – she was impressed!

I’m not kidding, it really smells awesome and I can’t wait to make them this fall!  They are so easy too – and I think they are even easier than the dehydrated bananas.  I sort of feel like I’m a pro now at this (ya know, because I have dehydrated one batch of bananas and one batch of apples – :) – yep just pass me my pro status ribbon right now!) – so I have a few extra tips on how to make dehydrated apples quick and easy.

For starters, my dehydrator only has 4 trays – so I can’t do a lot at the same time, but I did realize you can prep a whole bunch at once and save half the batch for later.  If you have fewer trays like I do, then peel/slice/core your apples and place all the extra apples in a big bowl filled with a bit of water and lemon juice.  Cover and store in your refrigerator until you are ready to dehydrate.  I did one batch during the day (about 8 medium to large sized apples), and then cooked the second batch overnight.  This totally happened by accident, I really had no idea how many apples my trays would fit so I ended up buying a 5 bags of 3 apples each on clearance at the grocery store and prepped all of them at once.  :) Silly me!  But I was happy to prep and save all the extras.  It worked out great!

One other tip, if you plan to do this a lot, then make sure you get an Apple Peeler/Slicer/Corer machine – I know Pampered Chef sells one, so does Williams and Sonoma (which is the brand I have – I’m lucky though, I found mine at Goodwill for $5).  I tend to use mine a lot and it makes the whole process so much faster and super fun for your kids to help with!  It’s messy and sticky, but a lot of fun!

How To Make Dehydrated Apples

You will need:

  • Food dehydrator
  • Small spray bottle
  • 15 medium size apples
  • Juice from one lemon or 2 Tbs of bottled lemon juice
  • Cinnamon
  • PAM or Misto filled with Olive Oil
  1. Peel, core, and slice the apples the same thickness so they dry evenly – 1/4″ is perfect.  I used an Apple Peeler/Slicer/Corer.  I picked mine up at Goodwill for $5 and I LOVE it!  Makes peeling super fast and my kids love to help with it.  Also, apples are sliced the same thickness which is helpful for drying.  If you don’t have a Peeler/Slicer/Corer, you can do it manually.
  2. Lightly srapy your dehydrator trays with olive oil or PAM to help with sticking.
  3. Place apples in single layer on dehydrator trays.
  4. Spray apples with lemon juice from your small spray bottle to keep the apples from turning a yucky brown color.
  5. Lightly sprinkle cinnamon on the apples.
  6. Turn on the dehydrator and set to 135 degrees.
  7. Check apples in 5 hours and consider flipping over (again depends on the design of your dehydrator).
  8. Cook for a total of 10 hours until apples are no longer mushy to the touch.
  9. Store in an air-tight bag or container.

Trust me, you will love how these make your house smell!! Yummy!  Making these apples yourself is super healthy and such a great way to help stretch your grocery budget!  My kids LOVE them and they are a super healthy snack for school!  Win win!

If you try them, let me know what you think!

HowToMakeDehydratedApples

 

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August 2, 20160 commentsRead More