Sunny days, sweepin' the clouds away....

I am a firm believer that sunshine is good for the soul! The past two days have been soooo pretty, especially after all the cold and the rain. I have taken full advantage of them and spent as much time outside as I could. Yesterday we worked on some yard stuff, did another compost bin and I mulched a few of the flower beds with the wood chips from our wood pile. Today Kelin and I went out and played, then picked up Alyx and went to the park. Kelin has officially mastered riding without his training wheels. Pretty impressive given that he is only 3! Talk about motivation to run, I had to jog along side him for about a mile and a half! Then he walked with me for another mile while sissy rode her bike some more. It felt good to get my workout in, listen to some music and enjoy my time with the kids all at one time! It was wonderful ... just missed the rest of our crew :( 

I sat down today and looked at my overall grocery savings so far for the month. We are less than a week away from the end of the month, and still have a fully stocked fridge, freezer and pantry so I felt like I could get a pretty good idea of what I have saved. I have a budget of $350/month for a family of six. So I HAVE to make sure I do the sales and coupons! As of right now I still have $79 to spend, and I have saved $275 between coupons and store sales. Yup, I am pretty dang proud of myself!  Plus I have got three 12 packs of toilet paper this month for free. Overall, I can't complain in the least.

I was in the grocery store the other day, getting ready to check out with my big binder of coupons and the lady behind me started to ask if it was really worth it. I showed her some of the things in my cart that I was either paying less than .50 for or getting for free and she asked how to get started. I gave her a list of sites off the top of my head that I used to match up coupons and store deals, and some of the sites that I print coupons off of. She was a grandmother, on a fixed income raising her grand kids. Made my day knowing that maybe I just gave her a way to not stress over putting food on the table.

Here are a few pics from today ... Enjoy!!



And away he goes with no training wheels!!! Go Ke!!!




My little tough girl Alyx did the monkey bars and the monkey rings about five times each with no help! I couldn't have made it past the first bar.



All four kids can officially ride! I see lotsa bike trails in our future!