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One Hundred Dollars a Month

I am your typical housewife living in high maintenance suburbia. I have a handsome husband, 2 kids and a flock of pet chickens. I try and feed my family with $100 a month. With the help of coupons, gardening and bartering I am able to squeeze the most out of our grocery budget and still manage to have a little fun along the way.


one hundred dollars a month

One Hundred Dollars a Month – Mavis’ Weekly Highlights 6/20/20

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By Mavis Butterfield on · 1 Comment

Hello and Happy Saturday!

On the agenda for today:

  • Give Lucy a bath {she’s had one too many rolls in the seaweed}
  • Try a new recipe
  • Dye sea glass wool and add it to my Etsy shop
  • Draw out Halloween patterns
  • Go to bed early so I can get up early {the sun is up around 4:30 am these days}

How about YOU? What are your plans for today? Anything exciting?

Have a great one,

♥ Mavis & Lucy

Stories, Recipes and General Nonsense From this Past Week

Small Business Saturday – 3 Things I Found on Etsy I Think Are Pretty Cool

Hey, a free ebook. Cool beans.

Here is a recipe for my Fast and Easy Strawberry Freezer Jam. It’s the bomb diggity {and so simple to make, too!}. Hope you like it as much as we do.

A Few Amazon Deals

Subscribe and Save Deals

A Few Magazine Deals

Summertime means digging deep to find ways to keep the kids busy.  Keep their little fingers occupied with these DIY Pinwheels.

Don’t forget, you can stay up to date with the latest news by signing up for my newsletter HERE, or by following One Hundred Dollars a Month on Facebook, or Instagram.

This post may contain affiliate links. These affiliate links help support this site. For more information, please see my disclosure policy. Thank you for supporting One Hundred Dollars a Month.

Where to Find Free Containers for Your Garden

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By Mavis Butterfield on · 14 Comments

I was at The Home Depot the other day picking up some more stain for the fence when I noticed a HUGE rack of empty plastic planting containers over in the garden center. I know I’ve mentioned this on the blog before, but for those of you that may have missed it, there is NO REASON WHATSOEVER to buy plastic planting containers. Like ever.

And really, with there being so many free ones out there in the universe, these days buying a plastic container is basically like lighting your money on fire. Gaaa. Who wants to do that? Save your money for ice cream!

Even if you don’t have a big box garden center near you, there are oodles of places to snag free containers for seed starting, or container gardening in general. My neighbors are using old Tidy Cat buckets to grow cucumbers in for Pete’s sake. 😉 Another neighbor is using old fishing buckets to grow tomatoes in alongside his house.  Apparently it’s a thing here in Maine, and let me tell you Bob, these people know a thing or two about being thrifty. I LOVE it!

6 Places to Find Free Gardening Containers

  • Garden Centers
  • Craigslist, Freecycle, Local Facebook Groups
  • Bakeries {hello 5 gallon buckets!}
  • Recycling Centers
  • Restaurants {another great source for 2.5 and 5 gallon buckets}
  • Don’t forget milk jugs, coffee cans, egg shells and 2 liter bottles all work great as plant containers

And if you are into starting your seeds indoors during the late winter/early spring months, one of my all time favorite containers to find for free are the long flats you often see “pony packs” of flowers in.

Not only are those trays easy to handle and will fit on a bench or folding table nicely, but they’re perfect for starting seedlings in. Especially if you use soil blocks or those cute little Jiffy pellets I love so much.

Anyway, it always seems like everyone and their brother is throwing out plastic containers this time of year but come early spring, they are always scrambling for them. So plan ahead, grab what you think you’ll need now and tuck them away for next spring. You’ll be so glad you did. 🙂

Have a great day everyone, stay cool.

~Mavis

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Beech Hill Farm and Ice Cream Barn in Hopkinton, New Hampshire

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By Mavis Butterfield on · 6 Comments

Last week we met up with my buddy Heather and her husband for ice cream at Beech Hill Farm in Hopkinton, New Hampshire. Ice cream is BIG here in New England and just about every town has an ice cream stand. Not all of them have farm animals and a garden center though, which is what made Beech Hill Farm extra special in my book.

Check out all those flavors!! I had two scoops; banana and chocolate, and both were fantastic.

The petting zoo was roped off while we were there so I wasn’t able to get up close and snap pictures of the little piggies and other animals in the stalls, but Heather and I did check out one of the barns that was open {there are several} filled with hanging baskets and potted flowers.

I think if I was going to have a seasonal business here in New England, an ice cream shop and a barn filled with flowers and garden art would be the way to go. Heather and I could make garden art all winter, arrange the hanging baskets and flower displays all summer and the husbands could water the plants and scoop ice cream. Sounds like a solid plan, don’t you think? 😉

Check out all those vintage garden tools!

Have you ever painted a gourd before? I still have the two birdhouse gourds I grew last summer at our old house and all those spinner gourds I need to do something with.

Note to self: Find pink poppies for the side garden.

Check out this bird bath made will upcycled dishes and pots. It reminded me of the ones Heather made and shared on the blog a few months ago.

Got a few hollowed out stumps laying around? Use them as a planter and fill them with flowers.

 

What is it with New England and barns… they are everywhere. And I LOVE them all so much.

Our trip to Beech Hill Farm was a good one, and I can’t wait to go back again. The ice cream was excellent, the flowers were beautiful and we went home happy. 🙂 So if you ever find yourself near Concord, New Hampshire, head a few miles west to Beech Hill Farm, you’ll be so glad you did.

Have a great one, I’m off to walk Lucy on the beach, and then hunker down in the basement to paint ornaments and dye wool today while the temps soar to a high of 84 outside. Gaaa.

Peace Out Girl Scouts,

~Mavis

Beech Hill Farm and Ice Cream Barn
107 Beech Hill Road
Hopkinton, New Hampshire 03229

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Grape-Nuts Baked Custard Recipe

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By Mavis Butterfield on · 13 Comments

Okay, so Grape Nuts in custard? It sounds weird, I know. And that’s what I thought when someone first suggested I give it a try. But apparently it’s a thing here in New England, so I decided to give it a try.

And well, what do you know… the custard was fantastic! The HH, The Girl and even my neighbor raved about it. And now I have a new dessert recipe to add to my collection. Sweet diggity!  🙂

So if you are a big fan of rich and creamy egg custards, give this recipe a try, I bet you’ll like it as much as we do.

Have a wonderful day everyone, enjoy the sunshine.

~Mavis

 

Ingredients

1 cup Post Grape-Nuts cereal
1 cup boiling water
4 cups milk {I used 2%}
3/4 cup sugar
4 large eggs {beaten}
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 tablespoon unsalted butter, melted
1/4 teaspoon salt

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Butter a 1 1/2 quart casserole dish {cooking spray will work too} and set aside {I used a 9″ baking dish, but using a 9″ x 13″ pan would have worked better}.

Soak Grape-Nuts in boiling water for 1 minute. Strain and remove excess liquid.

Line the bottom of the buttered casserole dish with Grape-Nuts and set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the milk, sugar, eggs, vanilla, melted butter and salt. Pour the mixture over the Grape-Nuts into a 9″ x 13″ casserole dish. Place the casserole dish in a large roasting pan and fill the pan with enough water to reach about 1 inch from the top of the casserole dish.

Bake for about 45 minutes or until the custard is set and the top of the custard is a nice golden brown color. Be careful not to over cook.

Cool completely before serving.

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Mavis Butterfield Etsy