Save a Penny Sunday

Have you ever heard the old expression "He's so tight he squeaks when he walk"?  I'm not quite that bad, but I do try to make economical meals that my family enjoys. 

I thought I would share a few of my favorite penny saver recipes.



Crockpot chicken


Place 3 balls of aluminum foil in bottom of crock pot. This lets the juices drain from the chicken.

Place a whole 3-4lb. chicken on the foil after washing it.

Slice an onion and place on and around the chicken for flavor.

Drop 12 - 15 drops of Texas Pete or hot sauce on the chicken or more for desired taste.

Cook on high 4-6 hrs.

This chicken taste very similar to rotisserie chicken. It is not a bit hot from the hot sauce.




Hamburger Roll


Mix up enough biscuit mix to roll out into a large rectangle.

Brown one pound ground beef (deer), season with salt and pepper.  Lay down the middle of the dough lengthwise and sprinkle with shredded cheese.

Roll up and bake at 350 until golden brown.
*This can be customized many ways to suit your family's tastes.




Pickled Dilled Eggs


12 hard boiled eggs, shelled

1 medium onion, sliced thin

¾ cup water

1 ¼ cup white vinegar

2 tsp salt

1 tsp dill weed

1 clove garlic, halved



2-3 tbsp sugar – optional



Firmly pack eggs and onions alternately in glass jar(s). Boil remaining ingredients. Reduce heat to low and simmer 5-7 minutes. Pour over eggs and cover completely. Any remaining vinegar mixture may be used to cover cucumbers. Seal jars. Chill 3 days. Keeps 2-3 weeks in refrigerator.


Now I admit, the eggs are for hubby, I can't get the boys to even try them, but Ranger loves hardboiled eggs and can eat 5 or 6 at a time! 

Oh yes, my boys like to eat.  There are very few things that either one just won't eat.  What about you?  What are your go to budget meals? 

 

Best of 2010

I admit it.  I am a thief.  I'm stealing Betsy's idea of posting my favorite pictures from 2010.  Thanks for letting me "borrow" your idea Betsy!  Just click on her name to see her blog.


I don't know if it's so much that these pictures are some of my favorites or if it is the memories associated with each picture.

Thank you for letting me share my favorites from 2010 with you.

Papa Pat on the ranger

The little one's first day of school

Aaaah, summer

Snow angels

Nanny Ann

My three sons

Silly mom and dad

Ranger's b-day

I love my flutterbys

Ruby red

Dusty pink

He teased me all summer

Another flutterby on lantana

Night bloom

Rainy dill

One is the loneliest number

Floating leaf

Corny toes

Christmas orange

Mummy cakes for Mav's b-day

Milk and pickles

Getting ready

Mom, Paula, Bobbi, Grandmom

Thank you for indulging my love of photography.

Lazy Day

Today was a very lazy day for me.  I've recuperated from surgery, the house was clean, laundry was done, so I did a lot of nothing.  I did a bit of reading and ordered a new magazine, Mary Jane's Farm.  I'm excited to get it.  I'm already thinking about what to plant in the garden this spring.  Usually by mid February my hands are itching to get dirty and feel the soil.

If you garden, do you start planning early?  Do you have a favorite vegetable that you grow?  Do you start everything from seed?  Is there something you've always wanted to plant but haven't yet?

My favorite vegetable to grow is tomatoes.  They're so versatile and I am able to can them many ways - juice, salsa, spaghetti sauce, catsup....

And cucumbers.  I have to pick them small and can them quickly.  The boys love whole dill pickles, not quartered, not sliced, but whole.

Some things I do start from seed, others I don't.  I did try purple hull peas for the first time last year and I will definitely be growing them again.

Sasquatch Surprise Using Leftovers

Every now and then I attempt to create a dish that our whole family will eat.  Tonight I used up some of the leftover Christmas turkey. 


Ingredients

1 medium onion

olive oil

2 cups leftover, coarsely chopped turkey

2 cups cooked rice

1 cup mixed vegetables

1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese

1 cup Velveeta cheese

1/2 cup milk

1 Tbsp butter

Salt and pepper to taste

Directions
Saute onion in oil until tender, add turkey and cook until heated through. Add velveeta and cook on low until melted. Stir in cooked rice and mixed vegetables. Stir in milk and butter. Top with shredded cheese and bake at 375 degrees until cheese is melted.


I did forget to snap a quick picture, but take my word for it, it was tasty!

Can you guess who named tonight's dish?



When we have leftover veggies, I dump them all into a baggie and keep in the freezer until I have enough to make a big pot of soup. 

What do you do with your leftovers?

Likes to mix all his food together on his plate

Likes everything separate

Back to the salt mines

Christmas has come and gone and the new year has begun.  The boys are back in school and I'm counting down the days until I begin my first semester as a  . . . wait a minute, yes..... A SENIOR.  Oh my gosh.  I remember way back in 2006 when I nervously took my very first college class - English 101.  I was hooked.  I was working full time, single mom with 3 boys, and realized that I actually could do it.  And now - I AM doing it.  I'm taking 16 hours this semester.  Cognitive psych, counseling psych, probability and statistics and lab(yuck), psychological testing, and advanced child psych.  I get nervous thinking about the staggering student loans I'm taking out and praying it's worth it.

But like I've said before, I have very important reasons for doing what I do . . .

Ringing in 2011

My three sons

Bear-bear

Mav-daddy

Dark and handsome

I love my country friends and neighbors

I would much rather have something homemade than store bought, something with a story behind it.


  My neighbor brought this over . . .

1 quart of homemade V8 juice, one pint of hot salsa, one pint of canned pears, and 2 jars of pear preserves

and

still warm chocolate cake with chocolate icing -- needless to say there's much less of this left today!

and my dear friend Kris could not have made the boys any happier than slab bacon!

There is nothing like being a country girl!

Christmas Letter from the Stateline

Dad's weekly article was published last week and I had to share it with you.  For those of you who don't know Dad, if he could do half the stuff he talks about and Mom allow him to get away with it, we'd live in a different world - A world of giant concrete yard statues shaped like chickens.


From the State Line

Here's this year's Christmas card


By DAN PATTERSON


Published: Wednesday, December 15, 2010 11:03 AM CST


I enjoy receiving Christmas cards.


Ann does all the hard work addressing them, and I reap the pleasure of slogging to the mailbox to retrieve those that are arriving. In years past, the mantle and door facing were adorned with cards celebrating the holiday.

The past few years, we’ve seen a slight decline in the number of cards we get. Logical thinking tells me our friends don’t like us anymore, most of our friends are deceased or postage is too expensive.


I did get a Christmas card from a relative who studied and prepared for a very prosperous and honorable career. My relative has recently retired, and deserves all the comforts of a leisurely existence.


I would like to share with all of you the very nice card I received in the mail, and I’ll relate the special card I am formulating to mail to our many distant friends and relatives.


My relatives recently retired and sold their property in a distant state. They purchased a home in East Tennessee, and then took a Mediterranean cruise.


Their new home’s property line goes to the center of the Little River, which has its source in the Smokey Mountains. This is a popular kayaking and tubing site, and they spend quite a bit of time enjoying this activity.


They are about 15 minutes from Maryville, a nice college town with a brand-new performing arts center and other amenities that would usually be found in a larger place. Also, Knoxville is only 30 minutes away. They also have a cabin only 40 minutes away.


Their cat is slowly adjusting to their move. Since then, my relatives have traveled to Colorado, Michigan and Texas.


I was very impressed with their correspondence and immediately decided to work up my own Christmas greeting:






Merry Christmas to y’all,


2010 has been a good year for the Patterson family. The Japanese beetles ate most of our flowers and destroyed my Big Boy tomato plants and Kentucky Wonder pole beans.


My red Neon blew the head gasket, but I sold it for scrap metal. Also, my ’85 GMC caught on fire and burned. I was fortunate enough to retrieve my .38-caliber revolver, Russian Mauser, a can of cashews and two Moon Pies.


Luckily for me, scrap metal is up and I’ve got a trailer load of aluminum cans.


Between the GMC, Neon and cans, Ann and I will harvest a nice Christmas. We went to Metropolis to the boat — not a cruise ship — and enjoyed foot-long chili dogs, but lost $93 in the slots.


I enjoy floating Obion River and shooting bottles with my Ruger. I’ve got a 50-round drum that adapts to my clip chamber and it’s really enjoyable to machine gun it.


We are only eight minutes from Rainey’s Store in Jones Mill, and the best bologna sandwiches in West Tennessee can be had there.


This summer, we visited friends in Bruceton and Brownsville. This fall, we drove to Tiptonville and enjoyed all the autumn greenery.


I finally got around to doing some remodeling on our house. Ann has never liked the commode being in the living room. I relocated the “throne” to a large closet used to store my long guns.


I even purchased a high-rise soft commode seat autographed by Harry Reid. Now one has a certain sense of security when answering nature’s call.


I found a really good buy on an oversized double stainless-steel sink when one of our local morticians went out of business. This double-doozy can be used for dressing big game, washing dishes or taking a bath.


We splurged and bought a 65-inch flat-screen TV and hung it on the wall behind where the commode had been located. I nailed a piece of plywood over the hole in the floor.

My health is good for a 65-year-old man. When the temperature dips below freezing, both my artificial knees stiffen up, so I usually ride the Polaris. Ann doesn’t really like it in the house, but she is a real trooper and doesn’t complain much.


I recently got a new C-PAP machine to assist in breathing when I’m asleep. It’s the first Cammo C-PAP in Henry County.


Recently, I was trying out my neat new nose, ear and hair trimmer, and forgot I had my hearing aid in. I accidentally clipped off the sensor on my $2,500 hearing aid, so now I’m able to pick up the closest AM radio station until sundown.

My favorite cat, Paragon, lost a battle with our neighbor’s pit bull, Chum Chum. We have seven other cats that stay in the house, so we’ll just find another favorite.
 I’m worried my hernia has popped out again. Last week, I was honored to be a pallbearer carrying Mike “Overload” Morehead to his final earthly resting place, and now a strange protrusion has erupted around the initial ruptured area.


Merry Christmas,

Dan & Ann





Dan Patterson, who’s retired from the Paris Parks and Recreation Department, grew up near the state line and now lives in the Hico community in northwest Henry County. He can be reached by e-mail at jdanpat@yahoo.com.