A Very Merry Christmas (In Pictures)

I hope you all had a wonderful holiday!  Ours was filled with good old family time and laughter.  We even had a white Christmas!

My sister somehow found the Clark Griswold moose mugs from National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and got a set for da boyfriend and I - aren't they hilarious?  Best Christmas movie ever.  "Are you still in the Navy Clark?"  "PLAY BALL!"

My mom, "the quiltin' bitch" as we've aptly nicknamed her created this beautiful Christmas themed quilt.  I love the semi-abstract Santa's.  My uncle stared at it for a good thirty minutes before he saw them, but I expect you will do much better!

That just about says it all...

Minnie's Grinch feet

"Watch it with the comments lady, I'm mighty close to your ankles and I've been known to nip"

The ever-so-shy Freckles emerging from downstairs to see what's going on.

Looking so demure...

Rocky loves to hang out on top of the stairs and keep his eye on all of us.

And his mom, who was down the hall.

Deliciousness on a pretzel!  My sister melted Hershey Kisses over the pretzels and topped each with an M&M.  The salt of the pretzel, plus the white chocolate, plus the chocolate, plus the peppermint?  Boy howdy!

I picked up this rustic looking clock for my dad.  I thought it would be nice if I put in a battery and set the time for him so it would be ready to go.  After finishing my present wrapping, I heard a ticking noise and realized you could hear the clock ticking through the wrapping paper.  Then laughed myself silly for creating a veritable bomb present.

"Mommmmmm, put me down!"

As usual, before the wrapping paper had even hit the floor, Bootz was all over, in, around and on top of the boxes.

Shadow and what's left of her circle rawhide bone. It only took a couple hours for the other half to disappear.

Do the hustle! 

Woo!  Looks like Freckles got into the spiked eggnog this year!

Merry Christmas everyone!

The Mist

Earlier in the week, we had our first snowstorm of the season.  At least, I think it was the first?  Anyway, I woke the following morning to this bizarre weather.  It was cooooold, foggy and sunny all at the same time.   

 Doesn't that look so odd?  It almost looks like someone superimposed some fog over a nice sunny morning.

Shadow was perplexed as to why I'd be bothering to take pictures that didn't involve her.  She was nudging my leg as I snapped this one.  Either that or I was just blocking her path outside.

So, just a quick note about the blog.  I figure I'll keep it loosey-goosey and post when I feel like it.  I'm not going to set limits on myself about when/what to post because then I'll just end up feeling burnt out like I did before.  Thanks again for all your kind words.  Here we go!

On Top of the World!

Another gorgeous day today, so we took a drive to Sam's Point Preserve in Craigsmoor, NY. The drive up was amazing and I knew as we drove up and up and up to get to the park that we'd be in for a treat.

The view was just spectacular.  This was as close as I got to the edge, but DBF isn't a loser and walked out much further, assuring me that the view was "so much" better there.  Yeah, that's ok, I'm good right here.

This was the trail we had just been on!  Although some parts of the trail are steep, its all on a trail.  No rock climbing involved.

I love this shot.  Doesn't it seem like I'm looking out on an ocean?  Nope, just more beautiful wooded landscapes out there.

At the top of the climb is a gorgeous lake.  The wind was kicking up really good at this elevation and waves were chopping up the surface of the lake.  There's something so serene about being by water.  If it weren't so cold up there, I could have spent the entire day soaking up the sun and listening to the water.

If you're in the area, I definitely recommend taking a couple hours to explore this park.  We were there about two hours and saw a good chunk of it, and there's a waterfall and a whole other 2+ mile trail that we didn't attempt.

A Beautiful Fall Day (and some shopping)

Stop & Shop - another week of fantastic gas deals!

• S&S Paper Towel Roll $1, used $1 S&S paper product coupon (with additional $15 purchase) = FREE 
• S&S Swiss Cheese $2.69
• 4 1/2 pounds Gala Apples $0.77/lb with in-circular coupon = $2.47

Now for the gas promo items - these are all part of the same promo (buy 7, get $0.20 off gas)

• 12 Contadina Tomatoes $1.25 each, used six $1 off 2 coupons (9/16 RP) = $9 or $0.75 each
• 9 Campbell's Slow Kettle Style Soups $2.50 each, used nine $0.75 coupons (9/16 or 10/14 SS) = $9 or $1 each
• 2 Campbell's Skillet Sauces $2 each, used two $0.75 coupons = $1 or $0.50 each
• 4 Dannon Light 'n Fit Yogurts $2 each
• Cabot Creamery Cheese $2.50, used $1 coupon (sign up for the newsletter and they'll email you the coupon) and will get back $0.75 Savingstar credit = $0.75
• Total was $32.74 - will get back $0.75 for the Cabot and earned $28 discount on gas ($0.20 off a gallon x 35 gallons x 4 promos)

That makes the total cost of all these items only $3.99!  

Today was absolutely gorgeous.  Bright sunny skies and leaves turning beautiful colors everywhere you look.  Da boyfriend and I (and Shadow) went for a drive around town, stopping to snap some pictures along the way.

Saved the best for last - the view from my very own backyard!  I love living in such a beautiful and peaceful part of the country.

Its a Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

The weather this weekend was absolutely gorgeous so da boyfriend and I went for a nice long walk.  

This park was so beautiful and relaxing, until DBF pointed out the pile of bear scat and casually remarked that the bear that made it was probably 200-300 pounds.  Yeah ok, I'm ready to head out.  :)

The park was a lot smaller than we originally thought, so we decided to continue our walk on a nearby trail.  It took us past several local farms and under a set of railroad tracks.  

We saw a squirrel a ways past this field who was chowing down on an ear of corn. Wonder how he got it down?

Such a beautiful day!

Price Chopper - very frustrating trip today.  Here's the issue with the store I usually go to - they only have one or two cashiers open at a time.  So the lines build up, they call over other cashiers who furiously work to clear the lines.  They're in a rush and guess who suffers?  Me.  This store's registers don't work well so they have to manually input EVERY coupon.  They miss coupons nine times out of ten and I've just about had it. Honestly, what store in this day and age can't scan coupons?  Today the cashier totally missed my doublers, so she input all my coupons but shorted me $2 by not putting through the doublers.  The screen doesn't list what coupons have been used, so I never know if there's a problem until I get the receipt.  I also had a bunch of bottle deposit slips and I'm pretty sure she missed a couple of those.  Unfortunately, I didn't count up the value of the slips before I checked out so I have no way of verifying if they all went through.  I asked her how many slips I had (12) thinking I'd count them up on the receipt, but the receipt just lists a total amount of the deposits, not the number of slips used.  I'll never make that mistake again.  

To add insult to injury, I get home and put out all my groceries, take my pictures and put everything away.  It occurs to me later that my cookie mix is missing.  It wasn't in any of the bags so I checked the car, thinking maybe it slipped out.  Its nowhere to be found. I guess it was somehow not bagged or left in a bag that didn't make its way into the cart.  There was a second cashier in my aisle who bagged my stuff and put it all into my cart. I was trying to watch the register to check that my coupons were entered so I wasn't paying attention to her.  So very frustrating!  I think I'm going to write a note to PC about installing registers that will allow scanning of coupons.  That would eliminate SO many problems.  I never have these issues at other PC locations because they can scan coupons rather than having to manually type in each and every one, but those stores are pretty far from the house.

Anyway, here is what did make it home - 

• 6 Jolly Time Popcorn $1.66 each, used three $1 off 2 coupons (9/16 SS) and will send away for two $5 rebates/prepaid gift cards (rebate form found in circular, Limit 2) = $3.04 profit
• PC Cream Cheese $0.80 with coupon 
• 8 Goya Beans $0.79 each, used two $1 off 4 coupons (9/16 RP) plus two doublers = $2.32 or $0.29 each
• Betty Crocker Cookie Mix $2, used $0.50 coupon (from coupons.com, still there?) and will get back $0.50 Savingstar rebate = $0.50
• 8 Banquet Sausages $1 each
• Milk $2.44
• Total was $21.52

CVS

• Dermasilk Skin Perfect $29.99, used $5 coupon (9/16 RP), $5 CRT (got last week) and got back $10 EB (Limit 1) = $9.99
• 2 Popcorn Indiana Chip In's $2.50 each, used $1.50 off 2 coupon (8/19 SS) = $3.50 or $1.75 each
• Pretzel Crisps $2.50
• Used 20% off coupon (took off $5.20), $0.67 EB, $5 Beauty Club EB (reduced the amount of my 20% off coupon but I wanted to get everything all at once) and $10 EB, total was $2.89

Rite Aid

• 2 Doritos $3 each, got back $2 UP (WYB 2, Limit 2) = $4 or $2 each
• 3 DiGiorno Pizzas $5 each, used $1 off 2 coupon (9/9 RP) and got back $5 UP (WYB $15 of qualifying items, Limit 3) = $9 or $3 each
• Total was $20 - paid with UP's