Is it Spring Yet??

According to the calendar it's spring... According to the weather it's not. Regardless of that, we are pushing forward and trying to do "spring-like things" around here. It just feels natural to be tilling, trimming, planting, feeding... All of those things that need to be done to start all kinds of new plant/animal life.

The boys are starting a new project--a 4H project to be exact. They are raising pigs! This is completely new for all of is, so it's a learning experience all around. But with the help from our neighbor, Hobie, who does this every year, I'm sure we'll do just fine. Randy built a great pen for them out in the existing stalls and brought in some straw to make them comfortable. I'll keep you posted as things progress...

Another thing we're working on is a garden. My sister is a total inspiration to me because of the big beautiful garden she has out on her farm in West Virginia. I've always loved gardens and thankfully Randy loves them just as much as I do. So much in fact that he's planning a HUGE garden for us this year. He and Trevor have been out there tilling for weeks now, going over and over it to make the ground nice & soft. They're getting very close to the end of it and I can't wait until we get to start planting! Randy wanted to do a really big garden so that whatever we don't use, we can give to friends and one of the local food banks.

P.S.A. of the Day...

When one tries to put others down by saying spiteful things about them to their friends, it only makes one look like a real ass and shows others one's true colors.



You know who you are.....

"Free" Weekend...

In light of the recent economy, I've been trying to come up with ways to have fun without spending a lot of money. So this weekend I tried to have a relatively "free" weekend. Here's what I managed for free:

Saturday

1. I had offered to record the work at my job on Saturday because the owner, who usually does it, was out of town. It only took me about 10 - 15 minutes but I was being paid an hour of overtime...so it was kind of like free pay for part of my time...
2. I stopped by the dealership where I bought my car and picked up my free car wash coupon. You can pick one up every Saturday and it's good for the week. I went and got my car washed.
3. The place that has the car wash offered me a free bag of popcorn when I went in to turn my coupon in. Free snack! (Which was good because I hadn't had breakfast & my stomach was starting to growl a little.)
4. Went to the mall because I had a coupon for a free Victoria's Secret lotion through Deal Seeking Mom. It's a pretty damn awesome website, if you've never checked it out. Sure, it was only a 1 oz. sample of lotion, but just knowing you walked out of Victoria's Secret with something for free can make you feel pretty smug.
   
5. I swung by R.C. Willey to check out what they had there because I got a $50 gift card in the mail a little while ago as part of a rebate program for the washer & dryer I had bought. I didn't find anything that I just had to have (for $50 or less) that would have been free because of the gift card. But they were doing some promotion where if you turned on your phone's bluetooth capability to discovery mode you would get a message about a special. I tried it and was offered either golf balls or a pink umbrella. I'm not a golfer so I opted for the pink umbrella. It was actually a very large one that looked pretty sturdy. Randy said I definitely won't get lost in a crowd with it. :)
6. I stopped by the car dealer a second time because I had forgotten to ask about a problem with my car. I had the oil changed previously by someone other than the dealer & they couldn't get my little "service" light to reset. The guy in the service department said they don't normally reset those unless you get your car serviced there. But he said he would do it "this time". Okay, not a big deal, but sort of a free service, right?
7. On the way home I stopped by the library because really what is a library but a place to get free books? Granted, you don't get to keep them, but still being able to read a newly released book without paying an ungodly amount for it is pretty cool.
8. Stopped at the McDonald's before finally coming home because Collin had gotten a large soda that had a coupon on it for a free Redbox rental. Used the code, picked out the movie the boys wanted to see & drove home, content with myself for getting a free movie. Take that Netflix!

Sunday

1. Decided that despite the slight drop in temperature from the day before and the wind blowing, I would take Randy & Trevor to the M.K. Nature Center because they'd never been before. This is a pretty awesome place to visit and doesn't cost anything to get in (although there is a place at the counter inside the learning center where you can make a donation if you want to.) Lots of fish, ducks, pretty scenery and even a beaver (although we didn't see him in person, but we did see his handiwork around the are with the fallen trees.)
2. After a brief trip over to Powell's Sweet Shoppe (okay, TOTALLY not free because we bought some candy, but damn, that place has the most awesome array of candy EVER), we decided to stop & get some late lunch at Friday's. Semi-free because I had a coupon that I got through email for a "buy one get one free entree". So not completely free, but still feels good knowing we didn't pay full price for all the food.

So that's my "free weekend" in a nutshell. I'm sure some people have had much more frugal weekends or got more stuff for free, but I've been kind of inspired by the Deal Seeking Moms website and I'm determined to do more/get more free stuff. Here's to frugality! :)

I'm baaaaack....

Well, I didn't have as much time for blogging here during my wedding planning as I though. Damn, that crap takes up a lot of time (not to mention sucking the life out of you!) But now I'm back and hope to blog more often again. I wanted to post some pictures, although a lot of my friends who read this also check out my Facebook or Myspace pages and have seen some of these already. But for any of you random people out there who even care what some of my wedding moments looked like, these are for you:

Me getting ready in the upstairs room at Mona Lisa

Me all ready, getting ready to go downstairs to ceremony

Amanda & me outside upstairs room at Mona Lisa
Collin walking me into ceremony

During the ceremony, not sure which part
The kiss...you can't see it in this picture, but Trevor & Collin were bumping knuckles when we kissed

The Peen Park

In my links, I have a list of other blogs & web sites that I frequent. One of my favorites is the web site Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. Today when I checked the site there was a story that had me giggling like a 12 year old school girl. Behold, the Peen Park in South Korea. Make sure you click on the link to the Flickr pages that have all the pictures of the park. You'll thank me later.... I can't help but think this would be the most awesome place to take pictures. (I base this on the silly pictures my cruising friends and I have taken around the various ships and islands we've visited.) Now we just have to find a cruise to South Korea...