Frugal Friday

 We've been working on eating things out of the freezer, as ours became overly full very quickly! Progress is being made. We also had a bunch of late nights with work this week, & easy meals were a requirement. 

Saving on things we buy

• I picked up a few items I needed for a holiday bread I make, and earned an iBotta reward for the yeast. Planned the purchase around the 3x points offer that the grocery store had going, and while I was there, picked up the Friday Freebie. 

Earning money

• Found $.15 on the ground, at various kids sporting events. ;-) 
• Earned a bit back from Rakuten, for online purchases over the quarter. It wasn't much, but will go towards offsetting a holiday purchase. 

Avoiding spending

• It's hard to find the right items to fit the boys, at this current phase. I picked up some winter wear, and not everything fit. I returned it right away, although, I just discovered they charge a shipping return fee. Moving forward, I'll suck it up & go to *shivers*, the mall to return the items. 

Eating what we have

• I made M a cauliflower crust pizza (base purchased at Trader Joes), & used a bunch of fridge/freezer remnants to make the pizza (marinara sauce, cheese leftover from Philly cheese steaks, pepperoni from the freezer). He reports that the pizza was fantastic.
• Remembered that we still had a bit of fancy cheese leftover from my parents visit, so got that out for a Friday night "happy hour", and served it with the last of a package of crackers.
• M took all of the arils out of the pomegranate I picked. I need to bring more in. 
• I finished off the last of the chicken pesto pasta for lunch
• Made Saturday's dinner out of items on hand (burger patties + buns in the freezer)
• Remembered to defrost naan bread, for our chicken shawarma dinner. 
• Used a few freezer items for dinner one night: Trader Joes orange chicken, fried rice & edamame. It cleared out quite a bit of freezer space.

For others

• Showed Sam how to sign up for a volunteer opportunity at a food bank. Teaching the teens life skills often takes some work, the first go 'round. :)
• I am also volunteering at a food bank for four hours this week.
• Offered to take a box of corporate swag that was going to the garbage. Parsed it out, and found a charity excited to take mens dress socks, hats & all of the new tshirts. Gave away the wipe board & pen packs on Buy Nothing. Recycled the giant boxes. 

What about you? Any wins to share?