Five under $5.00: In the Kitchen

I'm spending lots of time in the kitchen lately, so here are some kitchen inspired trinkets for this week. 

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Menu Plan Monday: 9.26.2011

I can't believe this is the last week in September, can you? Time is flying by! It's already time for this week's menu plan. We hardly did any grilling this summer because it was so hot, but now that it's finally nice outside, we're going to fire it up this week. Hope it's a great week for you!

Fruit and Cheese Plate
Parmesan Crusted Chicken
Grilled Steaks and Campfire Potatoes
Sloppy Joes

Have a great week and check out more delicious menu plans right here!

The Drugstore Game: Breakfast of Champions

Here are my drugstore game scores from earlier this week. Sorry the picture is blurry, I was in a hurry! I know I don't do as well as some people who are able to buy 84 items for a dollar, but I really try to only buy things we actually use!

Kellogg's Special K Red Berries Cereal on sale 2/$5
Gain Dish Detergent on sale for .99 each
Used one MQ for $1.00 off 2 cereals, used $.50 MQ off each Gain, and used $1 Register Reward. I also had to get a caramel as a filler item (not in the pic because I ate it!)

Out of pocket: $4.34

Not super cheap, but I eat this and one other cereal, and it's usually $2.99 for one box, so I think I did ok!

Five Under $5.00: Feeling Fall

Here are some things I'm eyeing this week.

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Menu Plan Monday: 9.19.2011

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This week will be a little less busy than the previous weeks, so we'll be mostly eating at home. I'm trying a few new recipes this week that I'm excited about. I'll let you know how they turn out! Here's what we have planned.

Taco Soup
Chicken and Cheese sliders
Herbed Balsamic Chicken with Bleu Cheese
Steaks with Balsamic Mustard Sauce

Have a great week and check out more delicious menu plans right here!

Finance Fridays: Opening a Roth

Well, I did it! I talked about my reasons for opening a Roth IRA in this post. Well, I went ahead and did it, and now I'm wondering what I waited so long for! After researching our different options, we decided to go with USAA, who we have our homeowner's and car insurance with, and we also have a credit card with (that we don't use! I promise!). The fees seemed to be lower than opening with an independent brokerage firm or with T. Rowe Price, who my husband's retirement plan is with, and we also wanted to to try to streamline the number of accounts we have at different places. Plus, we've always been happy with the customer service at USAA. And it was super easy – it took less than 5 minutes online. Now, I'm just tweaking our budget to actually fund it.

Have a great weekend!

Missoni for Target Scores

Instead of Five under $5 today, I'm showing you what I've been saving my Blow Money up for for a couple of months! I was super excited when I heard about the latest designer collaboration with Target, Missoni for Target. They are a legendary Italian brand, and I've always thought their bright patterns and color combinations were beautiful. But obviously, an $800 sweater is not in my price range right now (nor would I ever pay that much even if I had the money!) So when the lookbooks came out a while back, I figured out what I wanted to get my hands on. Little did I know there would be a line outside my store yesterday morning before it opened, and it was a stampede to get in! The debut even brought down the Target website. I'm glad I got there early, and was able to get almost everything I had been hoping for!

Menu Plan Monday: 9.12.2011

Another busy week. My husband is out of town for work for a few days, so I'll just scrounge up something for myself those nights. And I'm hitting a swanky event one night with a friend, so he'll be on his own as well! Here's what we'll be having the nights we're home:

Scrambled Egg Toast We love to have breakfast for dinner every once in a while, and this new recipe I found looks like a fun twist on what we usually make.

Chicken Tacos with Salsa Fresca

Baked Potato Bar I usually just wash a potato, rub it with some olive oil and sea salt, and throw it in the oven for an hour or so. Then we can top it with whatever we want. I like to do this when we have chili or barbecue leftovers because they make a yummy topping.

Have a great week and check out more delicious menu plans right here!

Surprise Find

I've been stalking this pillow for over a year, and had made up my mind just to buy it at full price since we're refreshing our master bedroom a bit and I thought the color would be perfect. So when I pushed my cart around the corner of the aisle at Target, and spotted my beloved pillow on sale for 50% off, my heart jumped! How sad is that? What can I say? I love a bargain!

See how cute the pillow looks here.

Five Under $5.00: Cooling Off

We've had a little cold front move in, so I'm even more excited about the coming fall. I'm ready to be able to turn the oven on again and do a little baking! See all the Five Under $5's here.

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Menu Plan Monday: 9.5.2011

Hope you are having a relaxing Labor Day! This weekend, a "cold front" blew in and temperatures will only be in the 90s (!), so I'm hoping fall is on its way. We'll also be celebrating Labor Day at a cookout at the pool, and celebrating my birthday with dinner out, so I'll only be cooking a few times this week. Here's what's on the menu:

Sloppy Joes I cooked several pounds of ground turkey last week and froze it, so I'll be throwing this in for the sloppy joes. This is the most delicious sloppy joe recipe there is. Hands down.
Bowtie Lasagna
Apple, Cheese and Arugula Paninis

Have a great week and check out more delicious menu plans right here!

Finance Fridays: Net Worth for August

Since this Finance Friday finds us at the beginning of a new month, I thought I’d share something we keep track of ourselves at the end of every month. I calculate our net worth each month, both as a way to track our assets and liabilities, but also to help us set goals for ourselves. And it’s a whole lot of fun to watch that number climb each month, which is what usually happens. But, that’s not what happened this month. Even though we saved a little into our savings account, and paid a little more off on our mortgage, we were still down this month because of that darn stock market!

There are lots of different ways to keep track of your net worth. Some people include cars or other assets, but since our cars are paid off, I just keep them out of net worth calculations for simplicity’s sake.  Here's hoping that next month, we'll be in the positive! Have a great weekend!

Monthly Goal: Grocery Budget

image found here

I've talked about goal setting before, and since it's the beginning of the month, I thought maybe I'd start something new on the blog where I set one small goal at the beginning of the month, and update my progress at the end of the month. This month, I'm tackling our grocery budget.

We budget $300 a month for groceries, which is a pretty substantial amount, especially for just two people and a baby. I've seen other families get by on less. But we love food. What can I say? It's been difficult for me to stick to this amount, and I often find myself reworking the budget in the middle of the month to let us eat out more, or head to Whole Foods for one more trip. So this month, I'm challenging myself to only spend this amount. I'll let you know how I do!