Easy 10 Minute French Bread

So, I've been looking to make some easy bread recipes. White, wheat, french, italian, etc. I suck at making bread. I have no idea what the yeast does, I don't know what it's suppose to look like when it's "active." I have no idea how to knead bread, or for how long, or how it's suppose to "feel" when it's ready. So because of all my fear, I haven't really tried any bread recipes.

But this weekend, I conquered my fear and found a really easy french bread recipe. Even those who have never made bread before can do this! I found a video online. I did a quick search for french bread recipes and came across this video.

I followed everything step-by-step and my bread came out AWESOME! And I thought I'd share it with you.



Happy Monday!

Free Blockbuster Kiosk Codes

Got a blockbuster kiosk near you?? Get a free movie tonight when you enter in these codes at the kiosk.

38JEAH9
43PBCG5
36TTDR9
62PGAR5
24KRVF9

Expires September 2!

Find a Kiosk near you!

Free Target Beauty Bag!!

The free Target Beauty Bag is back! Get your free make-up bag packed with free samples!

http://samples.target.com/#44

Just answer a few questions plus your mailing address and get your sample bag mailed to you.

PS: after sending your info the page may load for a while. Just refresh and try inputting your info again and you will get a pop-up saying you've already submitted for a sample. This means they got your info!!

Ways to Save at Chuck E. Cheese

It’s inevitable. We all find ourselves at Chuck E. Cheeses with the half-eaten pizza, soda cups strewn around the table in every flavor, including the infamous suicide soda cup, pockets empty, and kids begging you to take them to the ticket counter so they can buy the same toys they got in Susie Q’s birthday gift bag a month ago. And you are now out about $40 some dollars. Makes you want to curse that stupid rat and buy a chain so you can rake in all those tokens!

All is not lost! I have some tips for you to use when visiting the fat rat, to help save you money and some of your sanity.

1. Sign up for the Chuck E. Cheese mailing list. You get an email about every month with new coupons for tokens, food, and drinks.
2. Check the website for the reward calendars. Have your child complete one of the rewards and turn it in for 10 free tokens! http://www.chuckecheese.com/promotions/rewards-calendars.php
3. Eat before you go. The pizza is expensive, at about $10 for a medium cheese pizza. Little Ceasars cost $5 for carry out!
4. Play Skee Ball online and win up to 40 tickets! http://www.chuckecheese.com/chuck-e-games/games/skeeball.php
5. Turn in those $25 coupons you get in the emails and you get around 165 tokens (.15 cents a token depending on the deal for the month), but don’t use them all up in one visit. Give each kid about 20 tokens and let them run loose and when they are done, they are done!
6. My fav, turn in those pizza and drink coupons every once in a while and upgrade to the plastic cups for 99 cents each. Bring those cups back with you and get some free soda!
7. Go early in the morning and go Monday through Thursday. This way you avoid the crowds and large birthday parties. You can also catch the employees who are there early testing out all the machines and they leave the tickets they win on the games. Great way to get a get at least free tickets!!

I hope that helps! Let me know if you guys can think of any more money saving tips!

Easy Peasy Banana Bread

Have some mushy, old bananas sitting in a bowl that no one will eat? Well, don't throw it out!! Make some banana bread!!

I have an easy recipe that will get rid of them and make a yummy dessert or quick breakfast.

Ingredients:

3 overripe mashed bananas (brown spots make them extra yummy)

1/2 cup (or one stick) of butter, softened

3/4 cup brown sugar

2 eggs

2 cups flour

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 to 1 cup walnuts (optional)



How to make:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degress F, spray some non stick spray onto a bread loaf pan

2. Mix the softened butter and brown sugar until well incorporated and fluffy. About 5 minutes on a medium-low speed

Almost! Not quite as fluffy and mixed.                                       

 Just like this! Light and mixed!

3. Add the eggs and mashed bananas

Looking kinda runny now.

4. Pour in flour, salt, and baking soda, mix until it's just moistened. Then add the optional walnuts. Pour into the baking pan and bake for about 55-60 minutes.

This recipes makes a heavy, dense loaf. It will not be light and fluffy like angel food cake, but it tastes awesome! Just store in a ziploc bag right on the counter. Add a nice light dusting of powdered sugar and *drool* it's a yummy dessert!



Make Your Own Laundry Detergent

Laundry detergent is expensive! Especially with kids, who can dirty 5 shirts in a single day. You can easily go through a bottle a month. So, to make things cheaper I make my own detergent. I've used it for months now and I cannot tell the difference in cleaning between the brand names and my own. Although I always keep a bottle of Shout nearby, just in case! ;)

You can find many recipes online for powdered and even liquid laundry soap, but I find using the powered much easier since I don't have room to store a 5 gallon bucket anywhere for the amount the recipes call for. This is the recipe I use to make my detergent. You can find all these items in the same laundry aisle as the big boys!

1 bar of Fels Naptha
1 1/2 cup of Borax
1 1/2 cups of Washing Soda



Grate the bar of Fels Naptha, it should look like the picture below (although you will get much more out of the bar, I just took this picture after I started the batch)

Now you can do 1 of two things here. I like to grind everything together to make a fine powder, but if you don't feel like dirtying anymore appliances you can leave the the Fels Naptha as is and just add the Borax and Washing Soda and POOF! You're done!

But if you are feeling up to it or just OCD like me, then lets GRIND!

Mix the Borax and Fels Naptha together in your grinder. I find mixing the fels naptha with the boarx while grinding makes less mess and the soap grinds up more finely instead of becoming a big goop.

Once you're happy with the powder, just add the Washing Soda and you're finished!

The end result of the grinding should look something like this. 

For the laundry, use 1 Tablespoon for a small load and 2 Tablespoons for a large load. You can always mess around with the amounts of each ingredient depending on how you like the mix.

So what is the cost break down of this cheap soap??

1 bar Fels Naptha - .99 cents

1 box 55oz washing soda - $2.50 

1 box 76oz Borax - $4.00 

With my math it breaks down to less than $2 a batch. Depending on the prices you find the items at. Remember this is a homemade recipe and it is low sudsing, but your clothes will still come out clean!

Happy Laundry day!

JCPenny early morning shopping brag

Ok, I should have known about this and posted about it earlier so more people could have know, but luck just so happen to shine down on me this morning I thought I needed to brag about it!

JCPenny was having a door busting sale until 1pm today. I received 2 coupons in the mail last week for $10 off a purchase of $10 or more and a $10 off a purchase of $25 or more. I've been beating around the bush all week with these coupons and wanting to go buy some more maternity shorts. Well, I had to leave early this morning to go walk a friend's dog and on the way back home I thought, "Ok, it's the last day I can use these stupid coupons and I really need some more shorts, I'll just stop by real quick pick some up and get home." Well, as luck shown down on me they had a red tag clearance up to 80% off! YAY!! So, it turns out it was not just a quick trip, not that is was a bad thing. :)

Lets get the run down on the savings, I need a drum roll here:

Denim Bermuda Shorts     Reg. $36.00
Black Cami                      Reg. $16.00
Pink Cupcake shirt           Reg. 12.99
3/6m onesie                       Reg. 9.99

Total without discounts: $ 76.45 (with tax)
Total Paid: $26.04  Savings of 66%!!
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Second Transaction ( I used both coupons)
Sterling Silver Chain   Reg. $30.00

Total paid: $2.12  Savings of 93%!!!

Ahhh, I feel much better today. Shopping does the body good.

Do you know the muffin man?

It's BERRY SEASON!
Many grocery chains are selling the last of the blueberries from the growing season. You can still find great deals at Publix and the local farmers market. I picked up a couple pints and thought I might try out this muffin recipe.
I plan on making some more batches, freezing them, and take them out as needed for breakfasts, snacks, etc.
I must say, to pat myself on the back, these came out delicious! I think what made it was the cinnamon crumb topping. The mix is super simple and uses everything you would normally have on hand. I hate going out to buy one little expensive ingredient just to use it in one recipe. This also took just as much time mixing and cooking as a bag of pre made muffin mix does. And you know exactly what is going into your food!

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/3 cup vegetable oil
• 1 egg
• 1/3 cup milk
• 1 cup fresh blueberries

Crumb Topping

• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup butter, cubed
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Grease muffin cups or line with muffin liners.
2. Combine 1 1/2 cups flour, 3/4 cup sugar, salt and baking powder in medium bowl
3. Pour in 1/3 cup vegetable oil, the egg and 1/3 cup milk to the dry mixture
4. Mix it all up. 
5. Fold in blueberries.
6. Fill muffin cups right to the top.
7. To Make Crumb Topping: Mix together 1/2 cup sugar, 1/3 cup flour, 1/4 cup butter, and 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon. Mix with fork (or hands, those work much better) and sprinkle over muffins before baking.
8. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes in the preheated oven, or until done.

This recipe made 12 regular sized muffins. Yes, one is missing from the picture. Yes, I did eat it.

The Quality of Life

I decided to start this blog in hopes of inspiring others to spend less and to maybe bring us back to the simple things in life. Growing our own food, making food from scratch, and becoming more thrifty as all of us are falling on hard times. I coupon and am always on the hunt for the best deals! Especially for foods you can stock up on. I also try to make as many of our meals from scratch as I can. I don't like to spend all day making one meal, with my 3 year old daughter and being 7 months pregnant, I am way too tired to even turn on the microwave by the end of the day. Hopefully some of my recipes and tricks will help others low on time, energy, and money.

I was inspired to do all this by my great-grandparents (may they rest in peace) watching them as I grew up and listening to the stories my dad told us. They worked hard their entire lives, ate food fried in Crisco, smoked packs of cigarettes, chewed tobacco and lived well into their 90s! Must be something to it! My husband always says it was because of "the quality of life." The lived on some 50 plus acres in the middle of nowhere in north Tennessee. They were surrounded by beautiful trees, a fresh spring meters from the house, and many types of wildlife. Some of my fondest memories are as a kid were waking up early and walking into the dining room to see my papaw sitting near the window watching the deer as they came up into view from the woods. He'd grab his binoculars he kept nearby and let me watch them. We'd sit and watch the fog roll away and he would tell me about all the animals he saw sitting from that very spot. I cherish these memories so, and hope that I can provide the same "quality of life" for my children.

While our family may not be in the best living situation now, we do try to make the best out of what we have. I hope this blog becomes hope for some, maybe a stepping stone for those looking for more out of the rat race, and those who want more of that "quality of life."