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One Hundred Dollars a Month

I am your typical housewife living in high maintenance suburbia. I have a handsome husband, 2 kids and a flock of pet chickens. I try and feed my family with $100 a month. With the help of coupons, gardening and bartering I am able to squeeze the most out of our grocery budget and still manage to have a little fun along the way.


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Free Candy Bar, Deals on Winter Coats, Online Deals, Cat Toys and More

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Quote of the Day  “We shape our dwellings, and afterwards our dwellings shape us.” ~ Sir Winston Churchill

Hello and HAPPY FRIDAY! This weekend is going to rock! 😉 I hope you have a great one.

♥ Mavis & Lucy Puggle

*This deal post will be updated throughout the morning so be sure and check back for deals. * Amazon prices can change without notice. Please verify price before ordering. Amazon offers Free Shipping with a $49 purchase or Amazon Prime. {Sign up for a free Amazon Prime 30 day trial!}

Amazon Deal of the Day for 2/16/18 – Save 25% on Wantdo Outdoor Jackets

Available Kindle Books I think look interesting…

The prices on Kindle Books can change quickly, so grab them while you can. Don’t have a Kindle? Download the kindle app on your other devices. It’s easy! 🙂

Broccoli, Bacon and Cheddar Quiche – Make this ahead of time for Sunday brunch.

Subscribe and Save Deals

Subscribe and Save prices reflect a 15% discount for ordering 5 or more items in 1 month.

Attention Fred Meyer and Kroger Shoppers … Today only you can download an ecoupon for one FREE Hershey’s Gold Peanuts and Pretzel Bar Simply load the ecoupon to you Fred Meyer card and claim your freebie by 3/4/18. It’s that easy!

Home and Kitchen Deals

My hands-down favorite place to grow lettuce! I love being able to line up the vegetables like little soldiers in my Wood Pallet Lettuce Garden.

Add on Items

*These are all Amazon Add-on Items and they will ship with qualifying orders over $25 and are eligible for free shipping on $25 orders with Amazon Prime {or will ship FREE on $35 orders without Prime}. 

Kid’s Stuff

This post may contain affiliate links. These affiliate links help support this site. For more information, please see my disclosure policy. Thank you for supporting One Hundred Dollars a Month.

Bits and Bobs For the Middle of February

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It’s 3:19 am on Thursday morning as I type this. I woke up to the sound of the freezer door closing. Which can only mean one thing… The Girl was taking {or putting back} one of the 2 pints of ice cream the HH brought home to his Valentine’s last night. I tossed and turned in bed for a good 5 minutes before getting up to make sure it wasn’t the Chunky Monkey.

Luckily, she went for the Java Chip. Which of course means I am now sitting here at 3 in the morning eating ice cream and writing to you. In other news, I think I may have just noticed my first grey hair. And I’m not sure how I feel about that.

Would you feel comfortable buying exposed bars of soap from a display in a well trafficked grocery store? Don’t get me wrong, the soap is beautiful, but there is something about thousands of people walking by the soap on a daily basis, coughing, sneezing, and touching the soap that gives me the heebie jeebies. Also, the fact that the amount of soap displayed never seems to change makes me wonder how much of it they are actually selling.

The mobile order pick up station at Starbucks. There are just so many unanswered questions.

  • How long has the drink been sitting there?
  • What if two different people named Betty order a similar drink and you accidentally grabbed the wrong one?
  • What if you go to all the trouble in your busy life to order a drink from the Starbucks app while you are sitting in traffic and then you get out of your car to go claim your beverage and someone has stolen it?
  • WHAT IF SOMEONE ELSE TOUCHES YOUR DRINK?
  • Doesn’t it bother you that people are judging you for being too inconvenienced to stand in line?
  • Remember when the only time someone would stop to get a hot beverage was when they had time to walk into an establishment, sit down, order a cuppa and enjoy it for 10-15 minutes while reading the newspaper? When did that all stop? Where did all the waitress named Flo go? Why are we always in such a hurry?

Speaking of Starbucks… Did you know you can get a pupapachino for your pooch at the drive thru?

I think it’s pretty safe to say that if you find yourself in a restroom with giant cut outs in the bathroom stall doors…. You are probably not in a good neighborhood and you should leave immediately.

{Clearly, this picture was not in the same town as the half bathroom door restroom}.

Someone explain the toilet paper stand to me. Is toilet paper such a valued commodity these days we must appreciate it with it’s own stand? Is the toilet paper stand a sign of affluence? Are we supposed to appreciate the toilet paper more because of the way it’s displayed? What percentage of people are toilet paper stand people vs toilet paper dispenser in the wall people? And other than being a dust magnet, what’s up with fake plants in bathrooms?

Some people’s bathrooms have like 3 things in them… Others, it’s like walking into a hospital gift shop filled with knick knacks.

And last but not least, when was the last time you went to the mall?

  1. Did you see anyone else there?
  2. What were you there for?

Curious minds want to know…

Have an AWESOME Thursday everyone,

~Mavis

This post may contain affiliate links. These affiliate links help support this site. For more information, please see my disclosure policy. Thank you for supporting One Hundred Dollars a Month.

Online Grocery Deals, Freezer Meal Idea, Magazine Deals, My Favorite Garden Tool and More

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Quote of the Day  “You need to have faith in yourself. Be brave and take risks. You don’t have to have it all figured out to move forward.” ~ Roy T. Bennett

Today is going to be a great day. And that’s all I have to say about that! 😉

Make it a good one,

♥ Mavis

*This deal post will be updated throughout the morning so be sure and check back for deals. * Amazon prices can change without notice. Please verify price before ordering. Amazon offers Free Shipping with a $49 purchase or Amazon Prime. {Sign up for a free Amazon Prime 30 day trial!}

Amazon Deal of the Day for 2/15/18 – Sweet Deals on Magazine Subscriptions

Available Kindle Books I think look interesting…

The prices on Kindle Books can change quickly, so grab them while you can. Don’t have a Kindle? Download the kindle app on your other devices. It’s easy! 🙂

Subscribe and Save Deals

Subscribe and Save prices reflect a 15% discount for ordering 5 or more items in 1 month.

Home and Kitchen Deals

Simple Freezer Meal Meatloaf – Meatloaf is hands down one of the easiest freezer meals to make.

Add on Items

*These are all Amazon Add-on Items and they will ship with qualifying orders over $25 and are eligible for free shipping on $25 orders with Amazon Prime {or will ship FREE on $35 orders without Prime}. 

dig-for-your-dinner-1

If you’d like to map out your next few months of garden chores, grab a few Dig For Your Dinner eBooks. That way, you can read about gardening, even when the weather is not nice enough to be outside gardening.

Kid’s Stuff

This post may contain affiliate links. These affiliate links help support this site. For more information, please see my disclosure policy. Thank you for supporting One Hundred Dollars a Month.

How to Choose the Right Tomato Seed For Your Garden

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It’s freezing outside. Some parts of the country are covered in snow. Everything is frost-covered. The ground is solid as a rock. Buuuttt, here I am dreaming about a vegetable garden in the depths of winter. Those visions help me get through this frigid time of year. So let’s have some warm thoughts and turn our focus to spring-ish things, like planting seeds. Specifically let’s talk about tomato seeds and which ones are right for your garden. With a seemingly endless amount of tomato types, how do you know which ones you should be planting?

Here are the seeds I ordered and will plant this year in my own garden:

Sun Gold Cherry {57 days} Our favorite cherry tomato
Artisan Bumble Bee Blend Cherry {70 days}
Red and Yellow Pear {75 days}

Glacier Tomatoes {55 days}
Green Zebra {75 days}
Black Krim {70 days}
Red Pear Piriform {78 days}

Cherokee Purple {80 days}
Oxheart {85 days}
Pineapple {90 days}

And that’s just a fraction of the hundreds of tomato seed types available in most catalogues! Tomato varieties can be overwhelming but I’m here to help. Here are some questions you should ask yourself when picking your tomato seeds:

To Heirloom or Not to Heirloom?

Heirlooms are better, hands down!!! No question. There’s a reason your local farmer’s market or grocery store sells heirloom tomatoes for double, if not triple, the price of those blahtitty, blah Roma tomatoes with the fake shiny glow. In my opinion, heirloom tomatoes have always tasted better than the hybrid varieties many seed companies and most stores sell. Sure, some varieties of heirloom tomatoes might look a little funny, but you can taste the difference, trust me. So. Much. Better.

Fresh or Canning?

If I’m growing them to eat them fresh, my all-time favorite heirloom tomato is the Cherokee purple, followed closely by the green zebra tomato, beefsteak and Brandywine tomatoes for their unique flavor and amazing colors. Cherry tomatoes are a favorite for salads and snacking, too.

If I’m growing them to can or turn into salsa or sauce or even gift to friends around the holidays, then you’ll need a variety that holds up when canned. My favorite canning tomatoes are Ace, Roma, and San Marzano. The meaty textures of the tomatoes and their fairly uniform size make them great candidates for canning.

How Much Space Do You Have?

If you are limited on growing space, you’ll need to know whether your tomato seeds are determinate or indeterminate. When you are ordering your seeds, you can typically find DET or INDET on the packet somewhere, letting you know what variety you are dealing with.

Basically determinate tomato plants are smaller {3 to 4 feet tall} and typically ripen over a period of a few weeks. Romas, most paste tomatoes, Better Bush, Ace and Silvery Fir are all examples of determinate tomatoes.

Indeterminate tomato plants are super large {reaching as tall as 6-12 feet!} and bear fruit all summer long. They require a lot more space and support than a determinate. Cherry tomatoes, Red & Yellow Pear, Brandywine, Beefstake, Sun Gold, and most Heirloom varieties are indeterminate.

Hope this helps you choose the right seeds for you! Already have your tomato plan? Let me know what variety you’ll be growing this year!

The more you know, the more you can grow.

~Mavis

This post may contain affiliate links. These affiliate links help support this site. For more information, please see my disclosure policy. Thank you for supporting One Hundred Dollars a Month.

Mavis Butterfield Etsy