Rhonda Jean from Down To Earth shares some common sense about Christmas spending, while Patty from Morning Ramble offers her simple thoughts for de-stressing Christmas.
Next, a fashion show, with Andrew sporting a wig and Elise draping strands of color all over her shoulders, running to the mirror, giggling.
We're delivering an early Christmas to family heading out of town for the month.
Yesterday a fellow Frugal Hacker was passing through town. I was lucky to have her stop by my house for lunch. Gina blogs at Six In The Country, where she writes about everyday life from a frugal perspective. 
I was never so excited about salad servers than the day I found this blue-and-white handled pair at Thrift Smart! I won't be shocked if you put the bottles on the table. I just want to know the logistics!
While I've given away most of Andrew's outgrown clothing, I saved the quality toddler snow clothes.
We don't start hanging the greens until after the Army-Navy Game, but my mind's been hard at work.
I'm too afraid to use glass near bathtubs, so I substituted a plastic peanut butter container for Jeana's mason jar.
The only problem? Skippy's imprinted top, unlike the plain Kroger variety. Darn coupons!
I wiped the cap with the only paint I had and cut a magazine photo to cover the logo.
I am usually too cheap to follow recipes the way they are written. I didn't have baby oil, so I substituted vegetable oil. I omitted the aloe altogether:If you bought sugar, vegetable oil, and imitation vanilla at Walmart, $6 would make about 10 cups (at sixty cents a cup). Holiday-sale-priced baking goods would cut your expenses even further.
The sugar scrub works just as well as Jeana says and smells even better. I dressed the container with a 25-cent spoon for stirring and a recycled ribbon. Gold looks beautiful with this light brown scrub.
A nice gift on its own, this sugar scrub would be even more special when paired with a few plush facecloths from Big Lots or an inexpensive magazine subscription from Ebay.
I think you could also alter the fragrance by adding lemon or almond extract or even leftover coffee grounds.
The peanut butter jar is a little too big and a little too unshapely for my eye, though. Does anyone have suggestions for a smaller plastic container and lid to recycle?
I packed a small cheese ball as a token gift for my uncle's birthday. Like I always say, cheese and nuts are perfect for the man who has everything, particularly if there is a football game on television later that afternoon.
Sorry! Didn't mean to be gone so long. I developed bronchitis the same week I eased Elise out of nursing (and you know what that feels like).
, which cooked a 12-lb. bird in 2-1/2 hours at 400 degrees. Moist, flavorful, golden-crispy skin--with leftovers so good, I don't even want to reincarnate them as a casserole.
I packaged half of the homemade pumpkin pie play dough in the leftover pie tin (click link for detailed instructions). I was out of plastic wrap, so I used the cellophane from a cracker box instead. I think we'll deliver it to the family next door.
Today we enjoyed a more authentic Thanksgiving meal, one without all the Victorian-era trimmings of dressing, potatoes, and cranberry sauce
In checking my baking supplies for the holiday sales, I found an very old bottle of pumpkin pie spice and some cream of tartar leftover from my trip to the Mennonite market.
This was my first successful attempt at cooked playdough, and I was very pleased with its smooth feel. And the smell? Heavenly! Make sure you have some real pumpkin pie for later.
Unfold your shopping bag or square of paper and roll it around the pot.
This naturally makes a cone shape at the end, which you can bend and twist for a more basket-like texture. You may find it easier to wrinkle a brown paper bag if you scrunch it before wrapping.
Gather all your materials. How I wish I hadn't thrown away those miniature gourds! I had to raid the refrigerator for a few apples, an orange, and a handful of old limes.
The kids gathered clusters of fall leaves in red, yellow, and brown. I may add a few roses from Aldi, so I jammed two blocks of wet floral foam in the pot. Dollar General sells 3 bricks for $1.
If you're using only leaves and produce, substitute styrofoam or twist a "nest" of twigs and branches for framework.
The fun part! Insert branches, making a lion's mane of leaves around the opening. Add some long trailing pieces on the bottom.
You don't need floral picks or wire to add fruit or vegetables to an arrangement. Have the kids bring you a few sticks, break in half for a sharp point, then push into the bottom of the fruit.
Leave the sticks longer if you want the fruit to stick out farther, for instance, at the base. See the brown stick from the apple poking into the foam?
I prefer a large scale arrangement, since we serve food from a buffet. Careful not too make your centerpiece taller than the eye level of a sitting guest.
I was going to have Andrew sponge paint the wrapping paper brown, but now I like the contrast of the gold paper against the table.
Those of you in Florida will have to cut paper leaves, unless you do a tropical cornucopia with beautiful citrus and palm fronds! You might also enjoy Home Ec 101's paper pumpkin centerpiece--it's filled with dinner mints.
Readers make their own:
The fabric is near perfect, color-wise; the stripe and flowers have more of an orange tone than pure pink. Her crib has a green toile skirt.
The valances have tiny metal rings sewn at intervals, perhaps to run along a thin dowel. I didn't want to buy any hardware, so I tacked white finish nails under the molding instead.
--admiring this .65 cent handpainted boutique dress (all baby clothes half price at a local thrift)
--getting to "meet" Apron Thrift Girl in her YouTube debut, Debunking 7 Thrift Myths (The embedding code disrupted my layout, so you'll have to click to her site to watch.)
I re-purposed a beige king-size coverlet for the tablecloth. Then I layered a remnant of upholstery fabric on top, with a red and yellow tapestry runner twisted between the baskets.
My husband knew I wouldn't be able to stand the giant blue Pepsi coolers, so he found a piece of red butcher paper to camoflage the logo.
I lined two handmade baskets (50-cents each) with oversize squares of batik, trimmed with those trusty pinking shears.
My sand-in-a-summer-pot centerpiece came along. I gathered some roadside red-leaved branches and chartreuse leaves on the way there.
Karla is hosting Gobble, Gobble The Good Stuff to collect those special holiday recipes.
As you can see, a little "mouse" couldn't help but nibble some of the crust when my back was turned. Oh, well. He reports that it was very, very good.
My neighborhood Walmart has bakery pies priced only $2.50 apiece this week. That makes a home-baked version using kid-friendly canned ingredients about the same, provided you use generic ingredients. The 69-cent pumpkin at Aldi made my total cost less than I expected.
Ingredients from Aldi:
can of pumpkin $.69
evaporated milk $.69
2 eggs .25
frozen pie crust .60
sugar plus spices .25 (?)
or about $2.50 for each pie, plus electricity and cleanup. (This cost would be almost doubled if using Libby pumpkin, Carnation milk and Pillsbury pie crust.)
Amy Dacyzyn's The Tightwad Gazette includes an in-depth study of pumpkin pies. She freezes cooked pumpkin for all kinds of uses, including pre-made mini pumpkin pies for lunchboxes. True tightwads will look there first.
Of course, I could have easily make our two pies cheaper by:
Don't worry--I'm not going to go wild and buy the brand name ingredients! In case Aldi's canned pumpkin didn't have the recipe on its label, I double-checked Libby's Pumpkin Pie online.
Q: How do you store wrapped packages so they don't get wrinkled and crushed?
Sometimes it's difficult to explain poverty--or the importance of charity--to children. Good books can bridge that gap of understanding. by Lauren Mills.
Don't you just love those little old lady thrift stores, where every scrap of ribbon is carefully folded and tagged .05? or the blue Woolworth bag the clerk slipped it in.
If an unappreciated gift falls into a spare closet, does it make a sound?
At 59-cents for each box of Marcel Schurman cards, I can hardly justify making my own. Again.
We toured our first Christmas display this weekend! Time for me to compile the season's checklist. I'm not much of a listmaker, but details forgotten can dash the holiday budget. Peek at my to-do's, and let me know what's left on yours.
Let's take our cups outside today--too beautiful to blog indoors.
First the kids were sick, now I am. As you can see, they've been left to their own devices. I hate to think how many dustpans of paper scraps we'll empty when this is all over! 
Yawn! Anyone like a cup of decaf before bed? How 'bout a butter wafer on the side? No? 
I was running low on energy and funds before last week's coffee. I just couldn't get my winter pots planted in time.
Sign held over the head as the bus empties.
