Baby products- what you need and don't need

I recently found out that a friend is expecting her first baby. It got me thinking about what items I couldn't have done without for the first few months and which I could live without...

NEED

• Gilligan and O'Malley Nursing Tanktops- I have three of these, in pink, black, and white and basically rotated between them 24 x7  for the first three months of our baby's life. They are comfortable and convenient.
• Boppy or other nursing pillow
• Swaddles with Velcro- We swaddled the lower half of our baby's body, always leaving her arms out, most of the time for the first few weeks. After that we swaddled for sleep only for about another month.
• Breast pump- I love my Lansinoh but I know many who swear by Medela.
• Mam brand pacifiers- they look cute and are the right shape
• The First Years Breastflow bottles- the only ones we have used, are supposed to be more like breastfeeding.
• Kimono style onesies- Babies, especially newborns, don't like having things put over their heads and generally don't like being dressed and undressed. Our friends gave us a pack of these in newborn size and they were our go-to outfits for the first few weeks.
• Diaper Champ- Can be used with disposable or cloth diapers. You can use regular plastic bags with them so you don't have to buy expensive refills.

DON'T NEED

• Wipe warmer or bottle warmer
• Baby lotion, baby oil, baby powder
• Crib bumpers and thick blankets
• Bumbo

Also, as I have mentioned in several past posts, we are using cloth diapers (BumGenius brand) which are awesome! I would call them a "need" too.

Any items that you want to add/delete from these lists?

Fall Book Season

I love to read and am looking forward to the new crop of fall books that are about to be published. Here's an article from the New York Times about some of the biggest ones. Personally, I plan to read Freedom and Fall of Giants. I've already requested Freedom from the library and need to get online to request the other one as well.

Beach Reads Finished, It's Time for the Big Books
New York Times

Meals for the week based on grocery ads- Part One

OK, here it is. A week of meals based on today's newspaper ads for the three biggest grocery stores in our market- Target, Cub, and Rainbow. There are five entrees and three side dishes. I included links to three of the five entree recipes, the other two will be coming in a future post as I have to find the recipes my mom always made.

Entree One: Boneless Country Style Ribs I've made this one a few times and it's really good. I don't usually add too much store-bought sauce at the end, sometimes I just put a little on when we eat.
Entree Two: Ground Beef Tacos Just a basic ground beef taco recipe. We always have tortillas instead of hard shells. Make sure to get some lettuce, tomato, and other fixings to top them.
Entree Three: Slow Cooker Chipotle Chicken Thighs Note this makes a lot of leftovers. I don't make the rice recipe included on the webpage, just some white rice is great.
Entree Four: Scalloped Potatoes and Ham (recipe coming later this week)
Entree Five: Baked Turkey Breast with Rosemary (recipe coming later this week)
Side Dish One: Frozen vegetable
Side Dish Two: Corn on the Cob
Side Dish Three: Baked Potatoes

Sale Items to Buy (you'll need other ingredients for the recipes but these are the items from the ad)
Cub
Hormel Fresh Boneless Country Style Ribs $1.89 per pound
Corn on the Cob buy 6 get 6 free with coupon

Rainbow
Meal Deal- Buy one Cook's Portion Ham for $2.29 per pound, get one 3 pound Butterball boneless turkey breast and one bag of Roundy's frozen vegetables free
Roundy's Fresh Chicken Thighs Jumbo Pack $0.98 per pound
Roundy's Fresh Russet Potatoes 10lb for $1.99
Mission Tortillas two packs for $4

Target
One pound ground beef- not on sale this week but they usually have the best price
I love Target and do most of my shopping there, but they didn't have any wow factor sale items in food this week. I would recommend buying all of your staples there, as they have an "every day low price" strategy.

DIY Project- Bean Bag Toss (Cornhole) Set

When we lived in California, we learned of a super fun yard game called cornhole (or bean bags, bags, corn toss...). You set the two boards across from each other and take turns attempting to toss the beanbags either on the board (one point) or in the hole (three points). You play to 21. The game is best played with a beer in one hand. You can play on grass, concrete, or even at the beach! It's fun for any skill level, you can move the boards closer together for kids or less-skilled players.

It's a fun project to make the boards yourself. My husband made a set, it took a few hours to make the boards and then he painted them over a couple days. The hardest part is cutting the circle. As you can see, our set has one Wisconsin Badger board and one Minnesota Vikings board. We also made a set of beanbags with our sewing machine and some heavy cloth, but they self-destructed after one season. After that, we got a set of beanbags as a gift.

Making your own set has several advantages: first, you know the quality of the boards is good- storebought sets are often made of cheap particleboard or an almost-cardboard like product. Also, you can choose your teams and combine teams from different sports or leagues, like we did with Badger/Vikings. If you already have the tools, it's very thrifty to make a set, you just have to buy a few pieces of lumber, some bolts, and paint. Finally, your friends will be impressed that you are handy enough to make your own!

Here's a link to the official American Cornhole Association site: http://www.playcornhole.org/. On the site you can find the official rules which includes plans to make your own boards and beanbags.

Anyone out there like to play?

Future post preview- meal plans

Last month, I mentioned a woman who makes money by bloging meal plans and recipes based on the weekly grocery ads. I'm going to give it a try this week. On Sunday, I'm going to take the Target, Cub, and Rainbow Foods ads along with the manufacturer's coupons from the Sunday paper and put together meals using as many on-sale items as possible. My mom is going to be in town so hopefully she can help me with some great ideas!

Stay tuned...

Home Mortgages- Shop around before you lock in

Did you shop around for your home mortgage or did you go with the first rate you found? If you don't get the lowest rate possible on your mortgage, the single largest financial outlay for most families, it doesn't matter how thrifty you are with coupons and travel because you could be spending thousands extra!

A recent article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune showed that rates can vary greatly. It pays to ask several banks for their rates before you lock in.

Mortgage shopping results in big savings

Did anyone out there get a great rate by shopping around?

Splurge- Worthy Wednesday- Working out?!

As you may recall, I posted here about the fact that it's OK to quit the gym if you aren't using it enough to justify the price. But what I didn't say is that for some people, working out is their favorite splurge and one that brings them joy. I have friends who are into marathons, triathlons, yoga, pilates, kickboxing, you name it. And they spend a good amount of money on bikes, shoes, mats, trainers, entry fees, etc. It's great, they get a lot of satisfaction, motivation, and positive health effects from their chosen workouts and the money they spend.

I, in fact, just got back from my first ever fitness yoga class at a local studio. They were offering a deal so I bought five sessions for $40. I'm going to give a few different classes a try. Who knows, maybe I will enjoy it so much that yoga and pilates will move to my personal splurge-worthy list! I'll keep you posted