Our favorite frugal place for breakfast

Oh, IKEA, how do I love thee?  Let me count the ways.

My husband has had IKEA in close proximity to him for most of his life; I, on the other hand, had never been to one until I was 19 years old.  So he thinks I am fascinated with the place because it is still somewhat of a novelty for me.  Regardless, there are so many things I love about this store.

There's the endless inspiration attained from walking through the perfectly styled showroom.  There's the classic fresh/modern/functional/simple Swedish design.  There's the affordable furniture, which is why about 75% of the furniture we have purchased came from there.  There's the inexpensive housewares which are much cooler than other big box stores, and cost way less (49 cents for a coffee mug!  $3.99 for a kitchen rug! just about any frame you'd want for under $10!)

And then, there's the restaurant.  It's not fine dining, but it's cheap, good, not terribly unhealthy, and European.  It's basically a cafeteria, but that's what keeps the cost down.  They have specials every day of the week, and a Swedish food section should you want to take home a bag of Swedish meatballs, lingonberry preserves, muesli, caviar, or salmon paste in a tube (cue vomit sounds).

Lucky for us, Monday is Rob's day off, and it's also free breakfast day.  From 9:30 to 11:00 you can simply show up and get a plate of scrambled eggs, bacon, and potatoes.  For us, we get 2 regular plates, ask for a smaller third plate for Liam, then I get a free cup of coffee with my Ikea family card, so we only pay $1.61 for Rob's lingonberry juice.  It's not the most gourmet breakfast ever (powdered eggs, thin bacon, frozen potatoes), but it's tasty and most important, free. Also, the same breakfast is only 99 cents any other day of the week.

If you live near an Ikea, check out their restaurant specials for a cheap meal out!

A special treat: Cheese fondue!

So, I turned 27 yesterday.  I am still trying to get over the fact that I am ALMOST 30.  I can't complain about this to my husband because he is over 30 and has no sympathy, so I will complain instead on here.  :)  Anyway, it was a lovely day spend having breakfast with my little boy, shopping in Pittsburgh's Strip District, having a special dinner at home, followed by a coffee and Scrabble date with my husband at one of our favorite coffeeshops.  Perfect!

Speaking of dinner, we decided to eat at home instead of going out because this was a fairly expensive month for us, plus we are saving up for Liam's first birthday party in a little over a month (sob!).  I still wanted to do something fun, so I made cheese fondue.  We love fondue, but haven't had it in a long time.  I'm also very happy to say that I kind of invented the recipe.  I looked at lots of recipes but had a specific taste in mind, which I successfully ended up creating.  Yay!  Here's my recipe:

Cheese Fondue
8 oz. (1/2 pound) each of Emmentaler and Sharp White Cheddar cheese, shredded
2 Tablespoons cornstarch
1 garlic clove, peeled
1 cup dry white wine
1 Tablespoon lemon juice
Pinch of nutmeg

Toss the shredded cheeses with the cornstarch.  Rub the inside of the fondue pot (or a saucepan) with the garlic, then discard.  Bring lemon juice and wine to a simmer, reduce heat and slowly stir in the cheese a little at a time, stirring until smooth with each addition.  Before serving, top with nutmeg if desired.  Serve with your choice of dippers (we had fresh baguette pieces, mini sausages, peppers, and carrots) and enjoy!

Note: Emmentaler is an imported Swiss cheese which I got in the Strip district but I'm guessing it isn't widely available.  It was also $5 for half a pound.  You could probably use any Swiss cheese. 

My $9.56 Fall Mantle

I can NOT even believe this summer is almost over!  Or that I'm about to have another birthday, or that my little boy is almost ONE.  The past few months (more like the past year) have seemingly disappeared.

I am not particularly excited about the end of the summer because it seems like we didn't get the chance to do many fun summery things due to a busy schedule and the infernal temperatures for most of the past 3 months.  HOWEVER, the end of summer means the beginning of fall, which I am definitely excited about.

There is a new epic time-waster in my life (Pinterest) which I'll write more about later, but the upside to the countless hours I've spent on that dang website is lots and lots of inspiration for all kind of things, including fall decor and recipes.  I've been wanting to change up our mantle for awhile now, as it has been the same since we moved a year ago and it's not really anything to write home about; just a smattering of some random vases, candles, and so forth.  I got a lot of ideas on Pinterest for a fall mantle, but I really didn't want to spend a lot of money.  So here's what I came up with:

Things I already had: mason jars (they seem to be all the rage these days, good thing I have lots!), coffee beans (used to fill a couple of the jars), yellow vase, votive and pillar candles and jar candle (I seem to hoard candles, I forgot I had all these), candlesticks, and frame.

Things I bought on sale at JoAnn: garland ($4.79), berry sprigs (2 @ $1.79), and a package of leaves ($1.19) one which I put in the frame, and the rest I'll also use for a centerpiece.

I would be prouder if I had done it for less, but 10 bucks isn't bad, right?

Easy Summer Skirts

I saw this online awhile ago, and it is just BRILLIANT.  Luckily I already had some elastic thread in my sewing stash, so I quickly set out to make one of these. 

It turns out, they are so easy and fun that I've made 3 so far and have material and supplies to make even more!  I bought some men's 2XL shirts on a super-cheap clearance rack and made a couple following the directions (although, I found out I had to take in the sides of the top of the skirt about 4 inches BEFORE shirring). 

I also had some cute fabric that I wasn't sure quite what to do with, so I whipped up another skirt using plain old fabric.  I took a skirt I already had to use as a pattern, cut 2 pieces of fabric the width of the bottom of my pattern skirt, and cut a slight A-line to the top (but made the top much wider because the shirring takes in several inches).  Then I sewed the sides together and hemmed the bottom, and did a very simple hem on the top before shirring.  At first it was a little loose around the waist, but I was thankful later because washing and drying the skirt shrunk it to a perfect fit.  It took less than an hour, and the ones I made using t-shirts took even less--about 20-30 minutes!  So fun!

Excuse the bad picture--It's a self-timed shot!

ZUCCHINI!

Wow, my last post was a long time ago.  I'm still here!  This summer has been wayyy more busy than I ever anticipated it to be.  Anyway, we had a WONDERFUL time at my brother's wedding last weekend...it was so special and the wedding, along with all the details involved, was beautiful. 

While we had been harvesting a couple zucchini, green beans, green onions, and lettuce from our garden before we left, we came back to the LAND OF THE GIANT ZUCCHINI.  I'm estimating that, in total, we've picked over a dozen zucchini that are all the size of a burly man's forearm.  That's a lot of squash!  I've been working really hard to use it all up or give it away, and have tried some wonderful recipes in the process.  Here are some of them, for those of you who are in the same boat as us...and if you don't have a garden, zucchini are really cheap in the grocery stores right now, so try some of these out!

-Zucchini Quiche.  I discovered this last summer when I was pregnant, and made a couple to put in the freezer for postpartum meals.  It's definitely a keeper!

-Zucchini Bread.  I've tried a lot of zucchini bread recipes, and this is by far the yummiest.

-Stuffed Zucchini Boats.  I didn't follow this recipe exactly, but this is the general idea.  The other day I made it Mexican-style with taco meat, beans, salsa, and cheddar....also good.  A tasty low-carb meal!

-Zucchini Carpaccio Salad.  (Side note: if you haven't discovered the Smitten Kitchen blog yet, you can thank me now.)  I haven't made this yet, but plan to this week!

-Whole Wheat Zucchini Chocolate Cake.  I actually made this for a birthday cake a couple years ago.  It is (perhaps surprisingly) delicious!

-Vegetable Lasagna.  Yum!

A List. And a dinner plan.

1.)  Forgive my absence since my last post; due to the nature of my last post, you might have guessed that I was trying to regain peace and balance and sanity.  If you guessed this, you were right!

2.)  I did a non-frugal thing and bought some Vibram FiveFingers.  They were more expensive than probably the past 3 pairs of shoes I've bought combined, but they are AWESOME!

3.)  Our garden is really flourishing and I love it.  We've already harvested lettuce, green beans, a few zucchini, basil, green onions, and spinach.  There are lots of little green tomatoes out there too!

4.)  In my last post I wrote about Liam now crawling and getting into EVERYTHING.  We went out and bought one of those baby gate play yards, and it's possibly one of the greatest inventions ever.

5.)  If you like to sew like me and have a little boy, check this out: 25 things to make for a baby boy.  It's refreshing to see this after seeing countless dress/frilly/girly tutorials on the web!

6.)  I've also written about doing the Supreme 90 Day workout before.  Overall, I'm very pleased with this system, and for only 20 bucks, you really can't go wrong.  I'm on day 21, and it really does produce results.  However, I'm looking to really lose weight, and thought I've lost inches, the scale hasn't budged. at. all.  Frustrating, given how hard I'm working, but I do feel stronger and more in shape.  So I decided to do another fairly non-frugal thing, and I ordered Insanity.  I actually did get a pretty good deal though...I bought it used on Amazon and had about $45 in Amazon gift cards from using Swagbucks, so I only paid about $40.  (Compared to almost $150 brand-new).  It's going to be hard, but I'm excited to put forth the effort to see results!

7.)  Is anyone else a little angry with Netflix for raising their prices?!?  We now pay $9.99 per month for unlimited streaming of TV shows/movies on the Wii and unlimited DVD rental (1 disc at a time).  In order to keep it that way, we'd now have to pay $15.98.  Still cheaper than cable, but irritating.

8.)  Happy Bastille Day!

9.)  Here's our dinner menu this week (week of 7/10):

Monday: Pasta with red sauce, steamed peas
Tuesday:  Beef with Peppers, rice
Wednesday:  BBQ chicken in the crock pot (easiest thing ever.  Put chicken in the crock pot, cover with BBQ sauce.  Cook on low for 5-6 hours.), corn on the cob, baked potatoes
Thursday:  Swedish meatballs (from the freezer), mashed potatoes, sauteed zucchini and onions
Friday:  Homemade pizza
Saturday:  leftovers
Sunday:  Shredded Chicken Sandwiches (a NW Ohio specialty!)

Overwhelmed.

So, today was just one of those days.  Actually, this WEEK is just one of those days...er, weeks.  I picked up a lot of extra hours at work this week, which is a mixed blessing-good because we have some additional expenses this month, and not so good because I've hardly seen my husband since Sunday, and I'm completely exhausted.  Not to mention I haven't had any 'me' time (other than exercising), which I value not for selfish reasons, but because it refuels and recharges me. 

Plus, Liam is now very much on the move!  We are so excited for him and it's the greatest thing ever to see him get his motivated 'game face' on right before he charges across the room to get something.  Or more accurately, get INTO something.  So, in a nutshell the past week or so has consisted of me doing the following: working, chasing Liam, cleaning, doing laundry, cooking, chasing Liam, exercising, cleaning, picking up things Liam has scattered, doing laundry, chasing Liam, etc.  You get the picture!  You also notice that things like relaxing, writing blog posts, and watching a movie with Rob weren't in the list. 

I think that, as a stay-at-home-mom (-ish, give or take a 15 hr/wk part time job) it's so very easy to get to the point of becoming overwhelmed.  Maybe even more now than ever before.  Overwhelmed at the thought of all the laundry that's not being done at any given time, overwhelmed at all the areas of the house that aren't orderly and organized, overwhelmed at all the things that still need to be cleaned, overwhelmed thinking about whether or not I am growing spiritually/becoming a better wife and mom, and overwhelmed at the thought of whether or not the baby/children are getting the right attention/discipline/stimulation/guidance/nutrition/nap time.  Yeeesh.

Maybe the biggest thing I've learned so far in my 9 short months of being a mom is to just (cliche alert) take things one day at a time, and not let myself get wrapped up in yesterday or tomorrow.  That's really, REALLY hard to do.  But at least I can now recognize when I need to step back and assess the situation and realize that, in fact, the house is not a pig sty (even thought there may be clutter or a week's worth of dust lying about), and though my kid might be screaming he in fact is a happy baby who has all his needs met, and though there's perpetually at least one load of dirty laundry we still have clean clothes in the drawers and towels in the closet. 

I've learned to be satisfied (most days) with accomplishing just one or two things, even though my list usually has at least a half dozen more to be done.  And even if I don't get one or two things done, I'm still ALWAYS thankful to be spending my time with my precious little boy.  And in the long run, that is far more important than fretting about the dust collecting on the mantle.  :)

I'm tired...dinner menu tomorrow!