One Hundred Dollars a Month - Page 1699 of 2143 - 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.

Use Bread Tabs to Hold Your Spot on a Roll of Tape

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By Mavis Butterfield on February 8, 2013 · 5 Comments

Hang on to those bread tabs people. The next time you use a roll of tape, stick one of those babies on the end of the roll when you are finished and the next time you go to use tape, you won’t have to stand there for 5 minutes trying to get your roll of tape started.

Sweet mother of all things good in this world, I love simple ideas!

Carry On,

Mavis

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Mavis Garden Blog – Weekend Plans

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By Mavis Butterfield on February 8, 2013 · 26 Comments

This morning the Handsome Husband mentioned there is a big winter storm headed towards the New England states. 2 feet of snow is predicted. Yikes! It hasn’t snow here in my neck of the woods in almost a year, which in my opinion totally stinks. I love the snow. But then again I love my garden too, and I’m not quite sure what I would do if the ground was covered in a thick blanket of snow and I was stuck inside staring out the window unable to get any gardening done.

The Seattle/Tacoma area forecast is calling for 5 days of clear weather. And I’m going to need it. Still left on my to-do list is to finish laying down the landscape fabric. I pretty much just have to place some in front of the chicken coop and alongside the greenhouse and then I’m be done.

I also need to finish building the last rock border that will outline this years potato patch.

Plant 6 trees.

Pull the Swiss chard that over wintered in the front window box out to the backyard garden so the flower bulbs we planted have room to grow.

Find a perennial flower to plant behind the tulip bulbs for the flower pot that sits in front of our house. The wheel the pot around to the back of the house because if I leave it up front the neighborhood deer will eat my tulips. What was I thinking? I should have planted daffodils instead.

And last but not least, figure out where I’m going to stick the bright orange {future} rain barrel I scored the other day, plus ~~hide~~ move those 3 soon to be gorgeous metal drums around back so the Handsome Husband doesn’t freak out when he sees I’ve brought home a bunch more trash for our backyard {again}.

That’s what is on my weekend to-do list, how about you?

~Mavis

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Roasted Purple Sweet Potato Wedges with Rosemary and Thyme

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By Mavis Butterfield on February 7, 2013 · 7 Comments

Frieda’s Specialty Produce Company has declared 2013 The Year of Purple, and guess what Frieda’s sent me? Stoke’s purple sweet potatoes! Saweeeeet!

Have you ever had a purple sweet potato before? This was my first time and holy canolies people, talk about delicious. Frieda’s actually sent me sent me an entire box of purple specialty goodness and I can’t wait to share some new recipes with you.

In case you didn’t know, purple sweet potatoes originated in Stokes County, North Carolina, are NON GMO, and are high in antioxidants. But most of all, they are super yummy. Lets just hope there are a few roasted vegetables left for the Handsome Husband when he gets home.

Here is my recipe:

Ingredients

2 medium purple sweet potatoes sliced into 1 x 2 inch pieces
3 large carrots, sliced in to 1 x 2 inch pieces
4 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary or 2 teaspoons dried
1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme or 2 teaspoons dried
1 teaspoon coarse salt
1/2 teaspoon fresh ground pepper

Directions

Fire up the oven to 400 degrees.

Toss all the ingredients together in a large bowl. In an artistic fashion spread the purple sweet potatoes and carrots on a silpat or cookie sheet and roast until tender {about 45 minutes}.

Serve warm all by themselves or as a side dish.

Want to know where YOU can find some purple sweet potatoes? Head on over HERE to search by state or if you are in Washington, Frieda’s products are sold at Fred Meyer, Albertsons, Trader Joe’s, Rosauers.

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Mavis Garden Blog – Landscape Fabric and Gladiolus

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By Mavis Butterfield on February 7, 2013 · 16 Comments

About a week and a half ago Helen from Meridian mentioned her Costco store was stocked with landscape fabric. So when I called my store to see if they had it, they told me the landscape fabric hadn’t come in yet, but that was that it was on it’s way.

So basically everyday since then I have been Calling Costco at 9 am to see if my store had received any landscape fabric in their overnight shipment. Yesterday, I got the good news.

As soon as I heard the words YES {you crazy lady now you can stop calling} I jumped in my car and drove to the store, loaded 6 fat rolls into my cart and made b-line for the registers.

And then out of the corner of my eye I spotted a package of pink, purple and lime green gladiolus. What a gorgeous color combination! So I snagged those too. You would be proud of me though, I did pass the calla lilies, clay pots and pruning shears without looking back, so there is some hope for me yet.

I don’t know about you, but this time of year is so hard for me. I want to swoop every single bit of color up and plant it in my yard. It makes me crazy. Not to mention the Handsome Husband, because he knows I’ll inevitably ask him to help me with some sort of project.

Now I know a bunch of you think I am a total loon for covering my backyard with landscape fabric only to cover it with mulch and garden soil, but I’m telling you, the stuff works like you would not believe. The main reason I use it is to squelch out the pesky salal roots from popping up in my garden paths.

As soon as I get the landscape fabric down {just beyond the white arrows} I’ll start mapping out where the new garden spaces will go. I’ll add some dirt and then some mulch to go around the garden spaces. After that is done, it will finally be time to plant some vegetables. Yee-Haw!

I want to get the landscape fabric installed today. This weekend is suppose to be clear {cold, but clear} so I’m hoping to knock a few projects off my list. But first, I’ve got to go out there and lay down that fabric.

Peace Out Girl Scouts, make it a great day.

~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.