Frugal Friday with Marsha --Preparing for Vacation

Who knew that preparing for vacation was so hard? Well, it is for me. LOL
My daughter and her boyfriend are going to stay at the house to house and pet sit for us. Even though they are over here all the time, I feel the need to do a bunch of extra cleaning.
Yesterday I steam cleaned the carpets. Speaking of that, buying the steam cleaner is what I feel was a good investment. Just using it a few times more than covered what we would have paid to rent a machine. It was something we chose to buy 2 years ago with part of our income tax refund.

Today I am preparing for a yard sale tomorrow. I am going over to the little town where my middle daughter lives for their 'city wide' sales. City wide is a population of 1,100 people, but tons come in to town for the sales too. Cheap cost of just $5 donated to the 4-H to be on the map with an ad of what we have at our sale. So, minus the small amount of gas, a lot cheaper than trying to host and advertise one from home (it's just a 24 minutes drive from my driveway to theirs), plus I get the added plus of spending time with my daughter and grandchildren too.
Do wish me luck of actually selling some things though.

We will be gone next week on vacation, and I am also taking a vacation from blogging. I have a plan to do a Wordless Wednesday post with some pictures, but that's it.
And back to speaking of vacation----I have managed to earn $22 in Target gift cards that will help us take some of meal foods with us on the trip to avoid always paying to eat somewhere. Plus I also have a $5 Walmart card as well. With that we will stop and get some macaroni and potato salad from the deli. Yum!

Until then, I can't wait to see what posts you share this week to inspire and motivate us all to keep living frugally, saving money, do it ourselves etc!

An InLinkz Link-up

Writer's Unite 4/30/15

I can't believe it's already the last day of April!  Where did the month go?

As you already know, I am not writing anywhere except my blog and bubblews.  I've only been writing once a day on bubblews, with the exception this past weekend where I wrote twice about my nephew's wedding.  In fact, one of the posts that I am sharing in the linky includes 2 short videos that I took at their reception.

Are you still writing heavily, or have you backed down too?  Either way, I can't wait to see what is shared this week.

p.s.  We are on vacation next week so I will not be blogging next week except possibly Wordless Wednesday to share some pictures from our trip.

An InLinkz Link-up

WIP Wednesday 4/29/15

Sewing....what sewing have I done this past week?
I sewed up the apron for my son's birthday yesterday.  Unfortunately, I had too many things on my mind and spaced off taking a picture of him wearing it while he grilled his birthday dinner on the new grill that he bought himself for his birthday.

I did finish my challenge quilt enough for it to be pinned up at guild on Monday.  I do still have to put the hanger on the back of it before the quilt show in July.  I can do that right?

I have 2 quilts that I want finished before the quilt show.  We are going to Branson on vacation next week so no sewing, and no posting either while we are gone.  I do actually have my box with yo-yo's and hexagons to take along.  I'm hoping to at least be working on those while hubby is driving. 

In the meantime, I am heading to the little town where my daughter lives this weekend for their city wide yard sales.  Well, not sure you call population around 1200 a city, but I'm setting up with her.
I'm taking all of my crafts, so this week I am working on making dish scrubbies as they generally sell well for me.

Before I thought of getting scrubbies made, I had pulled out t-shirt strips and started on a rug.  I needed something that I could work on rather than just sitting here.  I will take it this weekend to work on while we have our sale.

UFO's:

Rectangle quilt
challenge wall hanging
GoodNight Irene quilt/wall hanging
Emerald Island Fusique table runner
Five and Dime quilt
Fractured Pineapple quilt
Charming Stars quilt
Brown half square triangle quilt
5 sets of doll blanket, pillows and rug
Hexagon flower table runner
Wall hanging for quilt guild
Challenge quilt for quilt guild


2015 Finishes:

Locker Hook Rug
re-do binding on blue and peach patchwork
9 lined fabric bags
yellow crazy quilt lined bag
Pink hexagon table topper

I am linking up with the following blogs today:

Earning Experiment Results

If you recall my post last Monday, I said that I was going to try to keep track of all of my earnings 'online' for the week, not just the traffic exchanges.
I think I did keep track pretty well, but it was such a super busy week!  One day I was sick.  Another day I spent 5 hours at church.  One day I spent time at the doctor and then out of town for a concert.  Another day was 9 hours away for my nephews wedding.

All in all though, I tend to have these busy weeks about every week.  Always something taking me away from home where I would rather be.  Take today---all morning at quilt guild, then some time at my mom's before coming home to finally get started.

Anyway, I was not able to make my surfing goal on the traffic exchanges each day of the week.  I have come to the conclusion that they were taking up too much of my life though.  I'm no longer going to stress over them.  I will eventually reach pay out without stressing over how many surfs I think I need to do on each one each day.

I only earned $3.84 this past week with the traffic exchanges.  I earned just $2.69 with websites that I stopped to work a bit on while surfing in the traffic exchanges.  I earned $16.09 with some apps and websites that aren't seen while I am surfing, for a grand total of $22.62 for the week. 
There was some other earning that I didn't keep track of like the zubees and stickers that I earn while surfing Traffic Royal, but it was too much thinking for me to figure out what each point is worth on those.

Anyway, I am going to keep plugging away.

I am going to work more on getting crafts made and listed in my Etsy, Zibbet, and Shophandmade shops.  I will be promoting my crafts more often.  This is firstly because I have sponsored a child in Peru.   I need to sell enough crafts to cover my monthly sponsorship.   I will write a whole other post about my sponsored child at a later date.

I chose not to put in any referral links with this post, but if you would like more information on websites that I earn with, please don't hesitate to ask.  A lot of them are on my Earning Money page here on my blog, but I do need to spend a day updating that page.

Thanks so much for reading and keeping up with me and all that I do!!

Super Sunday Reviews Link Up 4/26/15

An InLinkz Link-up

Frugal Friday with Marsha -- It's My Birthday

Yay for the Lord giving me another year of life and for surrounding me with family and friends who love me.

I don't have much to say about this past week.  I didn't spend much money, but then again I didn't have much to spend.
I had $10 in Walmart cards and used those to get cat food--using $2 coupons, as well as get the savingstar Friday freebie and healthy choice item of the week as well as some bananas with a rebate from checkout51.

Here it is Friday again.  I don't have to go to Walmart since I no longer have that merchandising job.  Will I go?  I don't know.  I will check on the Friday Freebies both on savingstar and Dillon's.  Oh yes, I remember seeing last night that salt is the Friday freebie for savingstar.  I will plan on just picking it up at Dillon's as well.

All of my children have already called or messaged to wish me a Happy Birthday.  My son called early, waking me up wanting to be the first one to tell me happy birthday.
My oldest daughter treated me to a Matthew West with Colton Dixon and Mr. Talkhead concert last night.
Just for fun I will share a few of the pictures that I took last night.

An InLinkz Link-up

Writer's Unite 4/23/15

How has your writing week been?
I'm actually caught up on all book and products that I had in for review.   I was a little overwhelmed for a bit, now I have nothing.
I have a write up that I want to do about alternatives to Etsy since their announcement to go public.

Right now, I will be honest though.  I'm not feeling well and need to find a way to get to the doctor.  Wish me luck please or say a prayer that it's something simple that is wrong.  I don't like feeling out of sorts like this!

Share on though and I will love, as usual, to see what all you share.

An InLinkz Link-up

WIP Wednesday 4/22/15

Busy off and on with my sewing, but I did get some things worked on.

We had an afternoon movie at church on Sunday.  I always take something to work on while watching the movie.  This time I worked on yo-yo's.    This is what I got made in that time:

I got my challenge quilt done to the point of cutting away edge and sewing down the binding.  This has to be done to take to quilt guild Monday morning.

My son's birthday is next week and I've decided to make him an apron.  Last year I gave him BBQ tools so an apron is logical.  I only got all of the pieces cut out so far, but again, this has to be done this week.

UFO's:

Rectangle quilt
challenge wall hanging
GoodNight Irene quilt/wall hanging
Emerald Island Fusique table runner
Five and Dime quilt
Fractured Pineapple quilt
Charming Stars quilt
Brown half square triangle quilt
5 sets of doll blanket, pillows and rug
Hexagon flower table runner
Wall hanging for quilt guild
Challenge quilt for quilt guild


2015 Finishes:

Locker Hook Rug
re-do binding on blue and peach patchwork
9 lined fabric bags
yellow crazy quilt lined bag
Pink hexagon table topper
Blue hexagon table topper
Yo-Yo Table runner

I am linking up with the following blogs:

This Is Going To Be An Interesting Week

License: CC0 Public Domain / FAQ Free for commercial use / No attribution required


For those of you who are following me also on bubblews you know that one of my merchandising jobs ended as of last Friday.
Hubby asked me how much I was making a month there.  The answer was $96.  He then commented that I will just have to do more clicking on the computer.

If you have been following my blog, especially on Monday's then you know that I've been working in several traffic exchanges.
After last week's post I knew that most of you were thinking to yourself--Why is she doing this for just $4.50 a week?
That got me to thinking.

As I surf the traffic exchanges, of course every website that I do to earn is in rotation between all of them.   As I surf, when I run across one of the other sites that I do either in rotation or as a banner or text ad, I click over and work that site a bit too.
This has gotten me back to doing some that I have been a member of for years, but rarely gotten to on a regular basis again.

My challenge for myself this week is to keep track of all money that I earn this week and see what my total is.
I got some of my current amounts written in my notebook last night.  I have spent this morning getting the rest of them

I say it's going to be an interesting week because I've never broken down what I earn in this way.  I'm both anxious and nervous to see just what my totals are this time next week.

Have you ever done anything like this--broke your earnings down?

Until next Monday---keep on earning!!

p.s.  I need to work this week also on getting my earning online page updated as well.

Super Sunday Reviews Link Up

An InLinkz Link-up