Saturday, September 6, 2008

Odds and Ends

*Has anyone noticed the price of cooking oil lately? I went to both stores in town only to discover to my horror that a 48 oz. bottle was $4-$6!!! I decided we would look at the stores in the other town we shop in. We haven't been there in a while and my hubby needed some work pants so the 5 of us went together last night. I was used to buying cooking oil at $1.80 at Wal-Mart there. It's now $3.50 a bottle! It's a good thing there was also a Smith's in that town and they are having case lot sales. We not only got tons of fruit at about 1/3 the price it is in our town, but we also got a case lot of vegetable oil, 9 bottles for $20! Only $2.22 a bottle. If you live in our area, head over to Smith's and stock up on all kinds of things for the winter! I figure that though we spent $10 in gas to get to the bigger town, we saved $30 on the oil alone by not buying it in our town! And we bought tons of other things at a few different stores too!

*Is there anything more wonderful than finding huge Ghiardelli dark chocolate bars on clearance and then using an Easy Saver coupon on them to make them a mere 50 cents each? Chocolate is my life's blood at this stage of life (and no, it has never bothered my nursing babies).

*With neighbors like these..........
One of Ali's little croc-type shoes disappeared about a month ago. The little neighbor girls told me that the girl who lives in the house behind our apartments, Kailee, took it. Well, on and off, throughout the last few weeks, whenever I see little Kailee, I ask her if she knows where the pink croc is. She's always said no, she doesn't know where it is, or who took it. We finally bought Ali a new pair of those shoes at Wal-Mart since she didn't have a good pair of play shoes and haven't found any in her size at the thrift store. Yesterday, I was out in the yard supervising the kids and Kailee came over again. This time after I asked her about the pink croc, I said, "I'm going to give $1 to any kid who can find Ali's croc." Lo, and behold, the pink croc appeared within about 2 minutes! Kailee came running back with it and said, "My brother took it. It was by our tree."
Then I was in a quandry. I wanted to honor my word and give her the $1 but I didn't want to reward her lying and teach her that she could steal things from us to get money out of us. So, I gave her a very stern lecture about how I'm disappointed in her and lying and stealing are wrong, but I'm still going to give her a dollar because the croc was worth that to me and I would honor my word, etc. etc.
After this incident, I concluded that living with neighbors around has never been so hard! I've had many neighbors in my day, but haven't had these issues because it's easy to keep to yourself when you have no children. Having kids adds a whole new dimension to neighbors! Between the little girls who I've posted about before, and the neighbors behind us, to the leering used car salesman neighbor who gives me creepy smiles, to the cranky, single guy who didn't like kids, and my Dungeons-and-Dragons-playing extreme Hippie neighbor, to the neighbors to the left of us who practice reverse racism and won't talk to us because of our skin color, I now understand why Jesus spoke so much about loving your neighbor. It's easy to love our friends, and most often if they are our friends, they aren't our neighbors, right? *s* It's easy to love lovable people. Loving your neighbors takes the power of the Holy Spirit.

*Our internet and phone was down for an entire day so I didn't get to post some good Frugal Friday things but I'll save them for next week!

3 comments:

Mrs. Taft said...

I've noticed that cooking oil has gone up in price, too. :( Glad you were able to find a good deal, though!

Lesley said...

I've noticed that absolutely everything seems to have gone up in price lately!

Anyway, I loved your long comment a little while back and please give me as much boy wisdom as you can! I've been laughing to myself about the "peepee teepee's" ever since you told me about them! That sure sounds like a good idea, though. I'm so scared of getting peed on at each diaper change!
Sam has been doing most of the diaper changes since he was born because I was so scared after his circumcision and didn't want to hurt the poor little guy.

I'm getting better though now that Sam is back to work and I don't have a choice but to change him. And thankfully his circ is almost completely healed so that's a relief.

One problem I continue to have, though is him peeing straight up and soaking his side and clothes. I've been told about "pointing him downward" during diaper changes and I try to do that, but it doesn't always work! Some nights, I'm changing his outfits three times and it stinks when I'm so tired! Any tips on that?

I'm still learning this whole boy thing! :)

Anyway, I've been thinking about you and hoping you're doing great with your three little ones. I'm loving it but am also super tired and overwhelmed at times. Give me any wisdom you have since you're three weeks ahead of me in this game. :) Take care!

Anonymous said...

I usually have major chocolate urges after I have a baby too! First, however, I have to have my fried egg sandwich w/ cheese (on toast) for breakfast for the first week.

We had 4 girls before we had our two boys & I heard all kinds of stories about the whole weeing all over thing. My boys decided to have mercy on me I guess, because neither one of them has proven those stories to be true (thank goodness!).

It does seem as though we don't quite get our money's worth out of our diapers, though, with the soaking of just the front (even with pointing it down). I found that Huggies Overnights do work pretty good for my 2yr old. I don't think they have them in newborn size though. :(

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