Rayen

With the ever-increasing and pretty unreasonable prices at the market I've had to alter my shopping strategies, so I thought I'd share what's working for me. Today I'd like to show you why I'm making regular trips to our local dollar store. Technically it's $1.25 store now that they've raised their prices, but you can still find some low-cost alternatives to pricier products you use all the time. Here are two lighters we use around the house and out at the fire pit in the yard. The Scripto lighter on the right is one I paid $2.99 for at Publix; the unbranded lighter on the left was $1.25 at Dollar Tree (difference: $1.74). There is no difference between them except that the unbranded lighter doesn't have a safety lock on it. Since it's becoming hard for me to use locking lighters with my arthrits the unbranded is the superior product for me. I've been making our hand soap for 2+ years because it was impossible to find anywhere, but no...

The one gardenia bush we had that survived the hard freezes over winter has decided to bloom, which reminded me of one of my mother's old tricks. Gardenia flowers are beautifully (and heavily) scented. A bouquet of them can knock your socks off. We've probably got forty or more buds on this bush. Anyway, here's the thing my mom would do whenever our gardenias would bloom: she'd snip off a single flower, put it in a cup of water, and leave it in the bathroom to act as a natural air freshener/deodorizer. If you change the water they last three or four days.

Our favorite local farm just reopened their market, so we took a trip out there to do some shopping. Lots of potatoes; three of the sweet variety came home with me. I also found celery for a dollar cheaper than the grocery store (we ate the last bunch of ours from the garden last week.) We're trying to grow watermelon so I stopped myself from buying one of these. Also, I only really like watermelon when it's summer. Here's my little haul. I like the locally-produced raw honey a lot; it's super fragrant and a little goes a long way.

At the time I'm writing this post (April 20th, the 2nd anniversary of my mother's death) I'm on the third day of recovery after quitting my last bad habit. I now do absolutely nothing that is unhealthy for my body. Quitting this last thing won't make much difference; it's not about living longer, or being healthier, really. It's about shedding the final toxic influence of my past, and finding peace. It's taken me a very long time to get to a place where I could let go of my last bad habit. My physical issues, some of which will never heal, were the main problem, I think, although I've had plenty of emotional issues, too, including severe depression. Most of the things we do that are bad for us are a form of self-medication. I define it as the weight of existence. By the time you get toward the end of your life, you may carry a lot of burdens and secrets and trauma that you can't comfortably share with anyone. Those are really hard...

We've begun regularly shopping at Ollie's, which is a closeout liquidator chain that buys up unwanted stock from other retailers and sells them at a discount. This includes print editions like this slow cooker cookbook for $2.99. I bought it because it had a lot of recipes I thought would appeal to my guy that I could also tweak to be safe for me. I needed some new large jar candles for hurricane season, but the prices the stores want for them (lately, $28.00 for a big jar candle) are too much. Ollie's sells an offbrand in the size I want for $4.99, and they smell just as nice. I don't usually endorse a store chain, but I think Ollie's is worth a look if you have one near you. For food items do remember to check the expiration dates, as liquidators often get food lots close to expiring. Also, look at sizes and weights and compare them to the unit price of what you're buying at other stores. Ollie's had a smaller jug of clothes detergent th...

Signs of spring: my guy came in to tell me there was a snake in the garage, and I went out to take some pics and see if I could encourage it to leave. We are a snake-friendly household, and never try to kill them unless they are lethal-to-humans venomous and pose a threat to us and the kids in the neighborhood, who often run through our yard. It hid behind some boxes and buckets we keep under my guy's work bench. From the color and head shape I'm pretty sure it was a young black rat snake, and probably came in exploring to hunt for prey. Most snakes become aggressive when they feel cornered, so in the end we decided to leave the doors open so it could leave on its own. If it's a female looking for a place to nest we need to keep checking for it. Luckily my guy is cleaning out the garage this week.

Because I had a work deadline and my income tax return to finish while my guy was very sick, I didn't get a mountain of things finished in April. I was happy to turn these two Dresden Plate feedsack blocks from my gifted UFOs bin into spring pillows for my home office. This slow-stitched art quilt made me so happy, which is odd because I usually avoid working with red. It got me through a lot of angst this month, too. I made this simple cover to fancy up a plain cardboard box in which I stored some specialty embroidery threads. For my clothes maketh the quilt project (more on this in an upcoming post in May) I turned a pound of thrifted clothing fabric into a quilt top, which I'm working on hand quilting now now. Finally I kept up with my embroidered calendar scroll project. Let's see what I can get done in May. :)