Hello everyone. After a month of coming and going, I'm finally at home faced with tons of work to do before winter. This past weekend we finally painted a weatherproof coating on our cedar shingles, only three years past the recommended time :)! We built a two story house because all the how-to books said how much cheaper it is to build up, rather than out. That's fine for the construction, but sometimes the maintenance two stories up is a major nuisance, especially when we no longer have the scaffolding we borrowed when we were building.

Frost has yet to hit the garden although we had nearly 8 inches of rain while I was away which means it's water-logged, much too wet to do much work. This past week I worked on the 35 pounds of tomatoes I brought back from my dad's. Canned green tomato salsa as well as red tomato sauce. Hope to finish up with sauce this week. Planted garlic and pickled more cloves using the recipe that appeared here in August. Opened one jar I'd pickled then; they're really good, not at all like eating fresh garlic, just a hint of garlic taste.

We went to Lowes a couple of days ago, and they had reduced all their 1- and 2-gallon perennials to $.75-$1.00. They also had mums for $.25. I couldn't resist and came home with about a dozen plants which need to get in the ground. Check out your garden stores for similar bargains; if you plant right away and mulch well, off-season sales are a great way to save money in the garden. Happy week, everyone!

-- Katherine in KY (KyKatherine@Yahoo.com), October 22, 2001

Answers

Tagged along on one of hubby's work trips to take the kids sightseeing and museum going. Packed oatmeal for breakfast in the room and PB&J for lunches. Enjoyed a nice evening meal out. Makes it possible to have a vacation--although Hubby didn't have as much of one.

Have a stubborn hen who insists on laying out in the run where the eggs get muddy. Need to find some more buyers for fresh eggs.

Picking up chestnuts and walnuts today.

Picked the last of green peppers today--guess it's fajitas for dinner tomorrow! Making some bread. Busy day with kids activities and homework. Our school expects us to check all homework and have child correct before they get to school--keeps us all busy and helps mom and dad remember how to do fractions and times tables!

I'd like to pick up some of those .25 mum deals and plant them at school. I can never make those clean up days and frankly--would rather clean up in short increments than 8 hours straight-as happens when you are the only couple to show up to clean up a huge area!

My frugal goal this week:Going to try to make a home made swiffer with an old mop, and recycled fleece and recycled underwear elastic this week. Is washable. Earth friendly. Saves $$.

Can you tell I'm on a very strict budget? AS a SAHM, I must mine every idea, save every penny!!

-- Ann Markson (tngreenacres@hotmail.com), October 22, 2001.

This is a great week despite the spray war with a skunk I got into on the Country Families forum (oopsy). Our kitten was spayed last week and doing great. Saturday I went and got some laying hens at another farm. They are a tad past their prime but I am still happy to have them pecking around. the turkeys aren't so glad though. They are bullying the hens but funnily enough accept the white hens with less bother (maybe because they were raised when I had white meat birds too?). Anyhoo, we are getting a couple eggs now and then and I am thrilled to pieces! the kids are tickled too...Ben gets to go looking for eggs everyday now and loves his job!! Have a great week all!

-- Alison in N.S. (aproteau@istar.ca), October 23, 2001.