Swim poncho and succulents update

As promised,  one of the towel ponchos modeled by a very cute 4 year old.  

And of the 75 or so succulents I hope will grow,  at least 2 of them are showing real signs of new growth.  It takes patience the experts say.  But I’m very pleased with this bit of quick progress

We will see!

Second hand chairs, sewing, CVS deals

 Hello blog readers.  I hope you’re all having a good summer.  

I wanted some rolling chairs for my sewing room.  

I didn’t like the retail prices of new chairs.

So we looked at a local thrift store ran by Habitat.  

We bought these 2 for $10 and $2.  

The green one was in great shape but the other one doesn’t match and was missing the back rest cover.  

  

So I looked in my fabric and found some linen like fabric that is a very close green.  

I sewed a simple slip cover for the back rest and stapled on a seat cover.  

There the chairs are in my sewing room.  

I do use both sewing machines.  

One sews knits really well.

I prefer sewing so the older machine and it sews woven fabric just fine so both machines get used.  

I've been the "new" chairs for a week or 2 and really like them

 can you see the pink fuzz on the chair? 

It's from 2 wraparound towels I made for a granddaughter to take to camp.  

and from 3 towel ponchos I sewed at the request of my daughter.  

they were just beach towels with a hole cut in the center that I finished with bias tape and the sides partially sewn so the towels stay in place when wearing. 

blogging problems-

here is supposed to be a very cute little guy modeling a poncho towel-

 I'll add the photo to my next post.  

CVS this week 

not a huge haul but big enough I think the savings add up-

I spent less than a dollar cash for the above and got money for my next weeks trip too.  

If you can't tell from the photo,  I bought a bag of laundry pods, 3 packs mens razors, 2 lipsticks and 2 toothpaste for $0.92. 

if your looking for ways to spend less on home and personal care products,  I really recommend CVS or Walgreens or RiteAid  or whatever store is available to you.  They are all have good deals if you don't mind spending a little effort to work out the best deals for yourself and then use your store earnings to mostly pay for the next deal and so on.  

Gardening - but I’m no expert

Hello
Some of our outdoor plants have really thrived this summer.
One is succulents

We have several pots of succulents and they all started this year  as little 2 inch or so plants

They’ve grown and multiplied in their pots.  

But this one grew the wrong way, according the online succulent experts. 

It has fallen and that can’t be corrected.  

However the leaves can be removed and may grow into more plants. 

After reading some online advice, we got some succulent-cactus potting soil and I started pruning.

The method I’m trying is to lay the leaves on a shallow bed of soil and keep them moist with a spray bottle. 

With patience,  some the ends will harden or change then they can be planted and should grown into their own plant.  

We will see!

Below are our zinnias, that I grew from seeds I saved from last years zinnias.  

So, i deadheaded a few of the tall zinnias and some short zinnias that were growing in one of those .50 Lowe’s pots and imhabe those spent flower heads drying.  

I’ll label them short and tall before I bag them up.  

I also cut off the dead tops of some other flowers in hopes their seeds will grow and bloom next year too.  

If anyone is wanting to try these methods,  I hope you’ll do online research and not just take my advice.  

Happy gardening everyone 🌱🌸🌻

Still doing CVS deals, reading and sewing

Hello 

I’m still shopping at CVS, usually once a week but sometimes I skip a week if I’m busy or the deals don’t work for me.

I went yesterday bought these on sale items using ExtraCareBucks, CVS coupons and newspaper coupons. 

It takes a bit of planning but I save so much, it’s worth it to me. 

I opted to get Email receipts so it’s easy to show them here. 

I spent $9.78 cash on all the products in the photo and got back $20 in ExtraCareBucks for my next transaction.  

I rarely buy food with coupon deals but I do get great deals on household and personal care items.

There are many coupon experts on YouTube and Facebook and instagram.  I usually view a few of their posts to see all the details on deals and then I plan my shopping around their advice.  

Reading

I just finished this series of books and I enjoyed them so much! 

I bought all my books used from ThriftBooks.com  

I’m happy with their quality, prices and rewards.  

Sewing- son Bobby got a super deal on an older camper for his family and he’s redoing the inside.  

He used some of this cork-looking vinyl fabric to change out inserts in the cabinets.  Then he asked me to sew some pillows with his leftover fabric. 

The 2 bolster shaped ones are for armrests on a bench seat and the oblong one is because that’s exactly how much fabric was left after I made the first 2.  

I like the way the fabric looks and it looks so nice in the camper.

My sewing machine sewed it all just fine.

The difficult part was handsewing the first 2 pillows closed.  I used a thimble and pliers to pull and push that needle. 

For the rectangle one,  I added a zipper closure and that was somewhat easier.  




I’m still fiddling, trying to get my posts to look like I want them to. 

I’m hoping this one publishes right..........

But whatever, I’m done today and need to go put the fresh sheets on the bed, vacuum and prepare a meal or too.  And maybe sew and continue reading the first book in another series.  

Have a great day everyone ❤️ 

Finally doing a new post

Hello friends

I’m fine,  just been busy over the summer and doing some relaxing over the summer.

I hope you all have had some relaxing time too.  

Last month we were in Lowe’s and my husband asked the garden center cashier what was on sale today.
The manager heard him and came over and said, kind of quiet, “anything with a clearance tag is .50 for you at the checkout”.
There were so much clearance and we bought lots!
It pays to be friendly to the workers at stores you frequent.

All the plants piled on this picnic table were .50 each!

I’m still meal prepping and I guess I was doing this way before it was so cool/ 

This is pretty typical food prep at our home _ a big salad, hard cooked eggs, orange juice made from frozen concentrate because it’s much cheaper that way and a frozen berry sorbet.  

Below is just a funny
And I’m afraid I’m guilty of saying this and meaning the same thing 😂

We have a Goodwill near our home.  We went there one morning looking for a water bottle  for my husband.  They didn’t have any bottles but I did buy this heavy duty Pampered Chef cookie sheet for $3.93 and a band new muffin pan for $1.

Below are just some flowers bought much earlier this summer - on sale but not .50.

The caladiums are growing from bulbs that I got for Mother’s Day.  They are much bigger now and have been so much fun to watch grow.
All the yellow plants were .50

I have a new device that so far, is making blogging much smoother.  

So, I hope to get back to regular posts.