Thrift finds and freebie economics

Church sales have been plentiful this Spring and early Summer and we have found good, useful items. We stopped at one on the way home from the library a couple of Saturdays ago and did quite well. 

This particular sale was held in the Church parking lot and we rummaged and rummaged. We found some used garden picket fence pieces, a new unopened Scrabble game, a Smurf mug and a bundle of used candles to melt down. Along with our finds at this sale were 30 canning jars of various sizes. We got this total package for $2.10. Yes, $2.10. It should have been more, but the young man returned the wrong change and after we realized what had happened we were well down the road. Probably not a good thing for us to do, but we did not go back and make it good. We may pay for it later.

We visited a Goodwill store and found a few items including some t-shirt style tops for my daughter, a religious figure of Mary, a brass unicorn, coffee cup stand, egg slicer and a wonderful daisy print in a frame. the red candle plate was in the bottom of the box used to get these items home. No bag, a box. We have been a bit selective of what we buy and how much we pay and most of these items were 50% off with the color tag sale.

The week before last I scored what the grocery store claimed were free items if you purchased a family pack of meat, however they manage to raise the price per pound of the meat to cover the price of the free items. I know I probably wouldn't have purchased several of these items, but when money is tight and you need to stretch the budget it was worth it to me and I canned the meat I didn't need right away. 

I used a gift card to purchase the two bags of chicken breasts and the one pound of ground turkey. Final price to me was a few cents. As close to free as I could get. I made bourbon barbecued pulled chicken and ate some and canned some for future meals. Total servings for two pounds of chicken was 12 and I could not have been happier. I've stretched two other chicken breast into a wok full of chicken, broccoli and carrot stir fry and another into chicken wraps. Slowly learning to make it all count. The pound of ground turkey will yield 6 servings. Three beef, bean and cheese burritos and three servings of goulash. 

I think for this summers growing season I have acquired all the canning jars I need in quite a variety of sizes. Any more now would be used, but as far as purchasing they will all go to a friend who needs them and we will concentrate on purchasing lids so we have a good supply on hand. Here at the townhouse we are doing what we can to stretch the budget and do the best we can with what we have. We wish everyone a happy 4th of July and please stay safe.