Monday Message

Making marmalade!

“We all need to build a personal ark . . . And we shouldn’t wait until it starts raining, but prepare in advance. This has been the message of all the prophets in this dispensation . . . as well as the prophets of old.

“Unfortunately we don’t always heed the clear warnings of our prophets. We coast complacently along until calamity strikes, and then we panic.

“When it starts raining, it is too late to begin building the ark. However, we do need to listen to the Lord’s spokesmen. We need to calmly continue to move ahead and prepare for what will surely come. We need not panic or fear, for if we are prepared, spiritually and temporally, we and our families will survive any flood. Our arks will float on a sea of faith if our works have been steadily and surely preparing for the future.” (W. Don Ladd, October 1994 General Conference)

It is a great thing to be prepared. At the time I am writing we are to get a snow storm tomorrow earlier in the week. I was thinking we should get done all we need to do before then. So with that in my mind we got all things tended and just as we finished them the car had issues and is going in today to be fixed. We have only that car but no stress as we can hunker down. No place do we need to be, nothing needs to be done as it was all done in my preparations for the storm. If I had put it all off we would be in difficulty now.  I know this is a tiny example of being prepared but if you work at being prepared, little or big, you will be better off.

I think we all are seeing no one is in a stable job. It makes me sad that so many were not getting paid with government shutdown.  You never know what the emergency will be, there is no way to know but being as prepared as you can be will help tremendously  to weather the emergency.

The frugal things I have done this week...

We had a loaf of bread that we could not eat fast enough and leftover ham that needed to be used so I made up ham and cheese sandwiches, wrapped them in plastic wrap and then tinfoil and froze them. Either they can be taken as is or I can butter and toast them like grilled cheese.

The other thing is we were gifted two bags of oranges, we could not eat them fast enough to use them before they would go bad so I made marmalade...

The recipe I used is the one inside the Sure Jell box but it is the best I have ever had.

The last was I wanted to make pillows for the living room. We noted how high the price was on toss pillows at Walmart - $12.95 for little ugly ones. So we thought I could do better. It has been eye opening though. I got filling for pillows at Hobby Lobby for $2.99 a bag. At Walmart the same bag was $8.98. We automatically think things are cheaper at Walmart but we need to shop wisely.

I ran into this roll of fabric at Salvation Army for $5.99 as you can see the tag in the picture.

After we bought it we were in Hobby Lobby and in the mark down remnant bin there was similar fabric, not even a yard of it was $11.40 so huge savings not to mention I have lots left for other projects.

I had a birthday, another year older...

My sister gave me a sock machine, something I always wanted but never thought I would ever have one.

So I have been learning how to use it, another skill building project for me.

How are you coming on building your skills? Continue to work on your storage and your skill building and living frugally.