My Tireless Retirement - Week 20

 

I have been steadily working on my quarterly housekeeping checklist and ticking off the boxes as I go, which I find oddly satisfying, I must say.  Lately I've been doing some more decluttering and reorganizing as I am sprawling out in my larger spaces now that all of the kiddos are gone.  I went through everything under the bathroom sinks as well as under the kitchen sink and purged more items I do not want or need.  Then I cleaned the cabinets and reorganized what I kept.

 

I made two broccoli & cheese quiches - one for now & one to freeze for later

My Sunday last week was a busy one.  I spent the morning meal prepping my meals for the week ahead with my main focus on using up a lot of odds and ends I had hanging out in my refrigerator.  I made a potato salad, pan fried jalapeno angus burgers, BBQ pork in the slow cooker and two broccoli and cheese quiches, one for to bake and one for the freezer to enjoy later.  I used up two dill pickles, an extra dozen eggs, the last of a bottle of BBQ sauce and the last of two bags of shredded cheese that were in the fridge.  I also used up two burger patties, a package of pork chunks, both of which I got on markdown, and a bag of broccoli florets I had in the freezer.  I ate all of these things as well as two leftover slices of veggie pizza from the week prior with green salads made from items I already had on hand.

 

Potato salad

Along with spending some quality time in my kitchen I did some computer maintenance on my laptops as well as an old desktop I had sitting collecting dust in the downstairs bedroom.  I will talk more about what I did later in an upcoming post as it is fairly involved.  More big decisions need to be made in the not too distant future with where I want to go with my home technology.

Our mornings were nice and cool so I was able to get back outside in the backyard and do some more work out there.  Primarily I wanted to work on the lower deck and get it cleared off swept and make some big decisions regarding the project woodpile.  I'm not going to do a lot of the original projects I had planned to do so I've been letting a lot of this wood go for FREE on the Facebook Buy Nothing Group page.

 

Before

It feels so good to have less stuff and have the decks clear and usable once again.  I was able to move the BBQ back to the spot I like to have it.  I'll also be getting rid of the grilling station I made for my daughter's graduation party as I really don't need it anymore.  Next, I plan to work on the other pile of stuff near the firepit woodpile.  I just collected too much stuff with grandiose ideas.  It needs to go now.

 

After

Tuesday was my errand day and I got a lot accomplished.  I dropped off an Amazon return at the UPS store, went to the dollar store, exchanged a defective item, went to the carwash, went to the library to check out a couple books and some DVDs, dropped off my glass recycling and went to the grocery store.

 

A small grocery haul

I also started doing e-rewards surveys for money spending a small amount of time each day as it does become a bit tedious.  You are paid per survey you complete and I am pleasantly surprised at quickly it adds up in my account.  I try to do at least two or three each day until I have enough to redeem for a Home Depot gift card for a project I have in mind to do this fall.  You don't make a huge amount per hour, more like just above the minimum wage, but I figure if I have the time, why not?  I probably only spend an hour to an hour and a half each time doing the surveys.  I had heard of people doing this for extra cash or gift cards so I'm glad to have the opportunity to try it out for myself.

 

BBQ pork, green beans & potato salad

An angus beef patty with potato salad

Broccoli & cheese quiche

I hope you are all doing well and enjoying your summer.  Did any of you take a trip or go on a vacation this year?