i've been agonizing over a decision which changes this month's experiment a bit. my lovely sister and her lovely husband have offered me free buddy passes to fly down with the kids to dallas for a visit. the timing of the trip (leaving this thursday) conflicts a bit with what i'd planned to achieve this month, but at the same time, i feel i can't in my right mind deny myself or my kids a chance to see our favorite peeps. plus this is called scarcity AND abundance right? so i've made the decision to go, and in hopes that i don't let myself -and any dear readers- down, i've decided to maintain the weekly $15 budget while i'm there.
i'm very lucky that my sister, amy, is one of my personal inspirations for frugality and good home management. she balances being a very gifted cook and a talented crafter with a busy home life managing 3 kids and lots of responsibilities in her community and church. she makes it all look nearly effortless, a trait i definitely envy. amy's got an impressive pantry of her own and has generously agreed to share/stick with me for the most part during my week's stay. whenever i go there, we generally just stay home and gab and let ourselves and the kids enjoy each other's company, so i'm hoping my house arrest routine can remain pretty much intact as well. i'm also going to extend the project by 1 week when i get back so i can really assess my food store for the full 31 days. we are starting to really get down and dirty in the depths of the canned goods (case in point: flynn actually ate beanie weenies today!) so i feel strongly that i need to complete the actual amount of time with what i have. i plan to continue posting while i'm gone so hopefully you will stick with me through the "dallas" chapter of scarcity and abundance!
one of the things i'm super excited to do while down in dallas is to organize my over-flowing recipe binder once and for all. amy has an amazing and well organized system with a trial recipe binder for recipes she's cut out from a mag or gotten from a friend and wants to try out, and then her actual master recipe binder that contains all the tried and true keepers. my system pretty much consists of me putting my chicken scratch notes on tiny scraps of paper into the front pocket of the binder without ever filing it away, and half the time without ever even cooking the recipe, since i can't find it in the first place! we've also got big plans to do some inexpensive crafting for ourselves and with the kids. so hopefully the week away will stay "on point" and give me a wonderful dose of familial abundance.
another random tidbit...i got some great feedback about falling off the wagon and buying those damn hair clips. several people commented about the power of making returns after you've "transgressed" and bought something you wish you hadn't or spent too much on, whatever the case may be. i know we've all felt that sick buyer's remorse feeling and i'm sure it would be such a liberating thing to turn back around and return the offending item. maybe it's the same day or weeks later but it is a nice reminder that sometimes you can fix the initial mistake. next time maybe i won't be so quick to tear into the package and throw away the receipt.
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