Dollar Store

I have been in the dollar store in the next town over once. I remember thinking that it was a good place to go, but have not returned.
Today I went over and wow! I love that store. Everything is $1 and they have a teaching section. I have decided to go through with homeschooling big rugrat in the fall and have been doing a lot of reading over the past few days. I had originally planned to get things going now since I am out of work for a few months, but I may wait until she would actually start school to do "formal," well as formals as you can get, homsechooling in the fall. I found ABC Jesus loves me, a website that has some great ideas! I don't know that I will follow a strict Christian curriculum but I love the way she has set hers up for three year olds. I have also found several other websites that I will be using as I build my curriculum.
Jon expressed his only big concern as big rugrat sees me as mom, not as a teacher that she would see in a classroom. I said I think that will be a small hurdle, getting her to do things she wouldn't necessarily choose to do. But that is something we go through on a daily basis since she is three. I think if I get a structured schedule to our day, and have certain times where we do "school" type activities and others where we do "play" type activities we will be alright. Plus I think learning honestly should be as fun as it can be and plan to make our lessons as interseting to her as I can.
So that is what is going on over here. In addition little rugrat will be 1! tomorrow. WOW! We are having his party next Saturday due to the fact he shares his day with Mother's day this year. That is what I will be working on this week. I also found some great goodie bag goodies in the dollar store for his party next weekend. I have a few more things to buy, as well as all the food I will need, but the budget for his party is looking pretty good. I will make his cake (always do), we are doing hot dogs and hamburgers, a salad and probably a watermelon. Juice, soda and water (from the tap) will pretty much round out the menu. Always fancy at our house!

Happy Mother's Day!

Sunday

Yesterday was big rugrats birthday party. She turned 3 (how did that happen?!?!) We had a lot of extra food becuase I overplanned, however better to much than too little. And it cuts back on our grocery bill this week. We had cold cut grinders which we will eat for lunch all week and I froze some for later down the road (and because we had THAT much left over!) At least most of the cake (made by yours truly with the help of good old Betty Crocker) was eaten.

Today we went to the grocery story and I spent $22. I will need to buy milk later this week, and a few produce items but I should be able to keep the next bill at or under $20 as well. That makes two weeks in a row of coming in under budget which will balance out what we spent on the b-day party.

Today we went and bought our parking pass to the city park. It is normally $2 or $3 to park depending on what day of the week you go, but if you buy a pass and are a city resident it is only $10 for the year. And we are at this park weekly! They have swings, a duck pond, a sprinkler park and pool (pool passes are available for city residents as well) fields to run in, tennis courts (not that we play, but a great contained place to ride a tricycle) and some great walking trails. Today we had a picnic and fed the ducks at big rugrats request. The birthday girl gets to plan the day!
I am off work this week (college spring break) so I will be working on our budget and cleaning out some closets to get ready for the spring weather that seems to be finally arriving. Now I live in New England so I am planning on at least one more blast of winter, but I can still enjoy the nice weather while we have it. I am working really hard to cut back our electric bill which is steadily climbing the past few months. We are turning off our pellet stove more and more during the day, being more careful to turn off lights and using the dryer less as the weather gets warmer. Our water bill is also getting higher, but we do give the kids baths daily and I do more laundry with two kids than I did with one. I am washing less diapers since little rugrat goes through them slower now and big rugrat is out of diapers (yeay!) except for bedtime and naptime.

Our budget is okay, but we have a weekend trip planned for June and a week long trip planned for this summer so if I can cut a little here and there now, we will have more for these times later. Plus with todays economy I just feel like I should spend less (although we are lucky that husband has a secure job right now, and mine is fairly secure as well).

Tomorrow we are going to make handprint leprechauns that I found at the Crafty Crow. Homemade crafts are a great way to entertain big rugrat inexpensively. And we will be learning how to use our easel correctly. She got an easel from her daddy and I and friends gave her paints, paintrbrushes, paper and other assorted goodies to use on it. We will be having some lessons on the correct way to use our easel tomorrow so we don't have too many incidents.

We will also make use of our museum pass this week, I am watching the weather for a rainy day to make the best use of it. Soon we will get our zoo pass (a little bit of extra money up front but sooooooo worth in the long run) which I have mentioend before and spend a LOT of time at the parks. Spring and summer are full of free things to do which is very nice for my budget!