Last Week's Thrifty Moves

Sunday proved to be an awesome day!  We began with my oldest driving me to the grocery store to pick up items on my list for Thanksgiving and both birthday dinners for the girls as well as to fill in a few gaps in my pantry.  Along the way we stopped and dropped off a library book in the book return bin for my youngest saving us an extra trip.

When we got home I hurried and put everything away and didn't bother to take a picture because I was anxious to get to my next project.  As you know from Friday's post I was finally able to get the carpet completed and finish up our hallway updates.  I am so happy with how it turned out.  So pretty!

This mama is one happy camper!

I worked a short three day work week and the girls were off of school altogether.  I had absolutely nowhere I needed to be and nowhere I needed to go after work.  It felt amazing!  What a nice break for all of us.

Monday afternoon I did pick up the oldest after I got off work so she could go to the bank and make a deposit into her savings account.  It also worked out so she could get a little driving lesson in and learn how to merge into traffic.  She did great.  Then we went home and I taught her how to make stuffed manicotti.  It's an important skill to have I think so I'll be working on getting that recipe posted.

Tuesday was my oldest's 18th birthday.  We baked the manicotti we had prepared the night before for her birthday supper.  She had a friend over for dinner and then we had more friends join us for cake.

On Wednesday I stopped in at the post office on my way home from work and picked up a book of Christmas stamps.  Then the oldest and I went to JoAnn Fabrics for their pre-Black Friday sale.  All I needed was some white thread and it was on sale for 40% OFF, but my oldest daughter wanted to get a couple items for gifts for her friends so off we went.  Their Christmas fabrics were 70% OFF so I decided to get a piece of pretty holiday fabric to make a pillow cover for the living room.

Thursday made for a delightful day in the kitchen.  I did a formal table setting and we enjoyed some amazing food.  Loads of leftovers to see us through the weekend, which I absolutely love. My oldest daughter's boyfriend drove up from Salt Lake City that morning to join us for dinner and stay the weekend.  That made my daughter extremely happy.

Friday was my youngest's birthday and she turned 15.  We had friends over once again for cake and played games that evening.  It was a lot of fun.

Saturday I sewed!  I made a couple quick items for Christmas gifts and two new pillow covers for the living room with the fabric I bought on sale at JoAnn's on Wednesday.  I made the girls some new flannel pillowcases for their travel size pillows using up some cute leftover fabric from pajama bottoms I'd made them several years ago.  They were pretty excited about those pillowcases.

I reused gift bags and tissue paper I already had on hand to wrap the girl's birthday presents.  I got all of the Christmas gifts I've completed so far wrapped up.  I used gift wrap I already had (purchased on clearance at 70% OFF two years ago), gift boxes I picked up at Goodwill last spring, as well as gift bags, bows and tissue paper I'd collected from previous holidays to reuse.

I pulled out some leftover Christmas stationery I'd purchased at least ten years ago, maybe more, and printed out our annual letter that I always tuck into our Christmas cards.  I wanted to get that used up this year.  I also got out the Christmas cards I made this past January and got them all addressed and ready to send.

I did not do any Black Friday shopping!

We watched movies from our home DVD collection.  The kids had a Harry Potter-a-thon on Friday.

We listened to a lot of music on our Alexa (family Christmas present last year that I bought on cyber Monday for $28!), mostly old jazz and swing that reminded me of being at my grandparent's for Thanksgiving.  My kids loved it.

I made turkey broth for soup with the turkey bones, celery, carrots and an onion.  I put one container of broth in the freezer to use later on.

How was your Thanksgiving?  How was your thrifty week?