My Bath & Body Works Haul!!

Eeeek!!! I'm so happy right now!! Okay, so...part of how I'm able to afford to stay home with my kids is by taking surveys. I'm an active member of somewhere between 6-10 panels. Over time, I've received "Recruit" surveys, which are surveys that recruit you to online discussion communities where you have the chance to earn additional incentives for actively participating. Well, last week I won a $50 gift card from one of these communities for being named the September Expert of the Month. I chose the Bath & Body Works gift card because it's not often that I get to splurge on myself (I have this bad habit of always shopping for the kids, and never for myself).

In true frugal fashion, I actively made a point to make that $50 stretch, and to get the most for my money. I really scored!!! 😊 My goodies just showed up today, and I couldn't be happier!

I knew before I even got to the Bath & Bod Works website that I was ready to stock up on some delicious Fall fragrances. It's been a while since I've actually bought anything from them, so I wasn't exactly up to date on the different scents that they offer now. I was very pleasantly surprised!!

First, the mists and body creams were on sale for Buy 3, Get 2 FREE. For the body creams, I chose Salted Caramel Apricot, and Marshmallow Pumpkin Latte (I've already applied some Marshmallow Pumpkin Latte, and it smells truly DELICIOUS!!). For the body mists, I chose the Marshmallow Pumpkin Latte, Pumpkin Cupcake, and Warm Vanilla Sugar (This last one has always been my favorite).

Second, the lotions [Retired scents] were on sale for $5 each. I chose Brown Sugar & Fig, and French Lavender & Honey.

On top of the already great deals up above, there was a code for $10 off $30 on the day I placed my order. This brought my total down to $51.89 before I used my gift card. I only paid $1.89 out of pocket, plus I used Ebates to earn an additional $0.42 cash back on my purchase, so I really only spent $1.47!!

Great Deals Still Happening Right Now!!

• All 3-Wick candles are $10 off
• All Body Care is Buy 3, Get 3 FREE
• Hand Soaps are 6 for $25 or 4 for $20
• Retired Fragrances are Buy 3, Get 3 FREE
• Aromatherapy Body Care is Buy 3, Get 3 FREE
• Travel Body Care is 3 for $12.50
• Wallflowers Fragrance Refills are 5 for $23
• Scentportable Refills are 4 for $10
• Fragrance Melts are 5 for $15 or 3 for $12
• Concentrated Room Spray is 2 for $12
• Specialty Hand Soaps are 2 for $10
• PocketBac Bundles are $6 and up

Whether you need to restock on your own collection, or are ready to start on the Christmas shopping (My mail carrier told me she's using the sale for the Christmas shopping), now is the perfect time to catch some really great deals at Bath & Body Works!!

Our Most Recent Gardening Adventures!

Gardening is a hobby that my husband and I started when we first bought our home almost 5 years ago. There are many reasons why we initially started this hobby!

For starters, gardening provides a way to cut down costs at the grocery store! This is why we try to keep it going year-round with fall/winter crops, and spring/summer crops. Additionally, it's nice to know what's used (and what isn't) in the process of growing our food!







So what's currently growing in our garden? Well, we've got as follows below:

• Broccoli
• Cauliflower
• Peas
• Cabbage
• Tomatoes
• Onions
• Radishes

We had black eyed peas as well, but the frost got those a few weeks ago... We also had accidental cantaloupe (no joke) that started growing from our compost pile, but I'm pretty sure the frost squashed those out too!

I'm very happy with the last two weeks though because we got our first pickings for broccoli and cauliflower! 

 We used the broccoli to make a chicken broccoli cheese & rice bake in the oven, and it was delicious!

We haven't used the cauliflower yet, being as it was just picked today, but I'm actively browsing Pinterest for ideas! Probably the BEST part about gardening is the reward you get in the end, and being able to create anything you want with it!

If you have a garden of your own, what do you like to grow in yours!?

Homemade Orange Jelly (My Happy Week of Canning)

I've been very busy in my kitchen since last weekend!! To give a little background info, I absolutely LOVE orange jelly! I'd found a recipe a little over a year ago that I tried, and was very pleased with the results...I actually almost cried when I used up my last jar of jelly!

Never Fear....ORANGES are Here!!!!!

One of my husband's friends has orange and lemon trees on his property. It came up in conversation one day that I'd made orange jelly last year. Well, on Thanksgiving morning, he brought a big basket full of oranges to our house! 

I immediately hopped on over to Farm Girl Tails, which is where I'd originally found the recipe that follows below.

Ingredients:

3 and 1/2 cups of fresh squeezed orange juice (I personally use my Hamilton Juicer)

1 box of pectin (1 and 3/4 oz.)

5 cups of sugar

1. Juice the oranges (around 8-10 medium to large oranges)
2. Pour the juice into a large pot, and then add the pectin and 1/4 cup of sugar. Bring to a rolling boil, and then add the remaining sugar. Return to a rolling boil again, stirring constantly for 1 minute (I usually do mine for between 3-5 minutes).
3. Ladle the jelly into sterilized jars. Clean the rims, and place the sterilized lids on the jars, followed by the rings.
4. Process the cans in boiling water for 5 minutes. 
5. Remove the jelly from the boiling water and let it set on a towel or wire rack for 24 hours to allow the jelly to set.

Below are pictures of the finished product from round 1 of my canning this week!

 

I ended up with 18 jars total from the oranges that were brought to us!!

A few days later, we were brought MORE oranges!!

I got a good 20 jars out of the 2nd batch of oranges! Not all of them are pictured, however, being as we've given some away to different friends and family.

The basket pictured above was only HALF oranges. The bottom half of the basket was filled with lemons. I've found a few recipes for THOSE that I'm super excited about, and hope to be able to share some canning adventures for those very soon!

A Week of Yummy Creations

I usually try to post about weekly adventures every Sunday, and yesterday I did not. The truth is, I just couldn't get out of my kitchen last week! Part of learning to live a frugal lifestyle means never letting food go to waste. Last week, we had an ABUNDANCE of food that would have gone to waste if my husband and I hadn't gotten creative!

~~~ HELLO SUMMER VACATION!! ~~~

It's officially summer vacation at our house, YAY!!! I cannot tell you how excited this makes me!! I'm happy to finally be able to spend good quality time with my girls!! It was a long week to get here though!!

Tuesday, Gail had her appointment with the cardiologist after it had been rescheduled due to flooding the previous week. It went GREAT!! Sort of. My sweet, sweet, child who is always the best baby you could ever imagine while getting an echo done? She was NOT so sweet this go-round. In fact? She screamed bloody murder the entire time that the tech was trying to get the needed images. At one point, they actually had to call in a SECOND tech, and the two worked together to keep her distracted and still long enough to get the pics that they needed.