Last Week's Thrifty Moves

We finally got to go on a real vacation!  I'll be talking about that more tomorrow, and although we weren’t at home we still managed to be thrifty.

For instance, Sunday morning, at the hotel, I trimmed my bangs.  I've needed to trim them for several weeks, however finding the time to squeeze this little chore in just didn't seem to happen.  While packing for our trip I grabbed my scissors and tossed them in my toiletry bag.  Having them trimmed is a great relief.  I look much better and they aren't in my eyes anymore.

I had booked our hotel stays back in August and made sure they were ones that included breakfast in the morning.  Our first stay was at a Quality Inn and they provide a nice breakfast for their guests.  It was surprisingly good too.

I took our small slow cooker with us and reheated spaghetti I brought along for our supper the night before.  I'm not one that can handle a steady diet of eating out so I needed to sprinkle in a few home cooked meals wherever I could.

These mess kits from our Go Bags were so awesome to have with us

I also packed a box full of snacks, most of them purchased at the dollar store, for the trip down.  We put a frozen fruit juice bottle in the cooler to chill drinks we brought from home as well.

Monday evening we used coupons my aunt had to go out for hamburgers.

Tuesday we dined in.  My aunt made frozen pizzas and a big salad.  She doesn't cook, she heats up frozen things in the oven.  Now that she is retired she has no desire to cook anymore.  I think I will always enjoy cooking.  That is my hope, anyway.

Wednesday I treated all of us to lunch out.  Not so thrifty but much less expensive than dinner would have been.

Thursday was Thanksgiving and we were treated to dinner out at Black Angus.  The prime rib was fantastic.

We went to the public library twice to use their free WiFi while we were gone so I could pay a couple bills, check my bank statement and answer emails.  My oldest needed to do homework on her laptop also so that worked out pretty well since the library is close to my aunt's house.

We went to the dollar store to re-stock snacks for the drive home.

Friday we stayed in another hotel on the way home.  It too included breakfast in the morning, which we took full advantage of Saturday before we packed up to make the rest of our drive home.

After checking into the hotel on Friday we went to the grocery store and I picked up a sandwich at the deli, a couple cans of soup, and some fresh watermelon for our supper.  I heated the soup in our slow cooker while we all took turns showering.  By the time we were ready to eat the soup was hot and dinner was served.

Whenever we drove anywhere I used the Eco mode on our car which allowed us to get some pretty decent gas mileage on the car.  38 mpg is nothing to sneeze at and it really helped us keep the fuel expense low.  I spent just over half what I had budgeted on fuel.

How was your thrifty week?