Works for Me Wednesday

Yet another week of simple works for me Wednesdays! Today's work...crock pot cooking!

This is my crock pot...ie my life saver! I love making soups, stews, slow cooked meats in this buddy. I figured I would share my favorite crock pot recipe with you today since it's worked for me many times. Share your favorite crock pot recipes in the comments!

Easy Crock Pot Lasagna

1 lb ground beef, browned and drained
32 oz jar pasta sauce of choice
8 oz bag egg noodles, cooked and drained
16 oz cottage cheese
8 oz shredded mozzarella cheese
Parmesan cheese
Mix beef and pasta sauce. Mix noodles, cottage cheese and mozzarella cheese. Layer 1/3 of the beef mixture, follow with 1/2 the noodle mixture in crock pot. Repeat layers, ending with beef mixture. Sprinkle as much parmesan as you want. Cover crock pot and cook on low for 4 hours. This tastes great with a green salad and garlic bread!

I also want to wish a very happy birthday to my mom! I'm lucky to have such a wonderful woman in my life! Happy birthday Mom!

Works for Me Wednesday

Ok I'll admit it, I've been lacking inspiration lately. I haven't been shopping much because we've got 3 weeks in between paychecks so I need to skimp a bit. Today is my shopping day so I'll have some deals to post about this afternoon. As it is Wednesday, I need to share what works for me this week.
1. Recycling-I am all about being green so it was only fitting that I got into our city's recycling program wholeheartedly. I am lucky enough to live in a place that picks up my recycling at my curb every other week. There are many things that can be recycled (particularly in the bathroom) that many people don't think about! Here is just a quick list of things to consider.
-toilet paper rolls
-makeup containers
-lotion or product containers
-boxes from products (toothpaste, lotions, ect)
-any sort of plastics

I have extra space in my master bath to have 2 trash bins. I use one for recycling and one for trash. My trash container normally has hardly anything in it when trash day comes! Find ways to reduce your environmental impact and recycle things you previously threw away!

2. Recycling bins-Ok so this is my second ditty on recycling. As I'm sure you know, I use coupons to help with my weekly grocery budget. One of my tips is to look in newspaper recycling bins for newspapers with coupons! I have one that I regularly check that is very clean and normally very full. I tend to go after the brown paper bags of newspaper that I can pull out and go through fairly quickly in my search for unused coupons. Yesterday, when stopping by I hit GOLD!!! Sunday newspapers still in the PLASTIC!!!! Plus some Coke rewards points that put me over the top for a new magazine subscription :) I brought the newspapers home, went through and found TONS of coupons and put the papers in my own recycling bin.

What works for you this Wednesday?

Works for Me Wednesday...a little late

Sorry I'm a bit late on this one...
My works for me Wednesday this week is more of a confession and a plea for other people to confess in a sense as well.
There are some people who would like to live their lives like that of the movies...I am not one of them. I much prefer to live my life through songs. I have songs associated with almost every important event in my life, every day to day thing, and most cities I've visited. For example, Walking in Memphis reminds me of my club soccer team from high school. I listen to Take Me or Leave Me from Rent after a bad breakup. Lessons Learned puts things into perspective for me when I have major decisions to make. I'm sure I could essentially make a sound track of my life. So that is my challenge to you all, my lovely blog readers....I know you're out there somewhere!!!! Comment what the soundtrack of your life would be with these 10 stages. Feel free to share what song goes with which or leave us guessing. See mine below!
1. Childhood
2. Teens
3. College/Young Adulthood
4. Adulthood
5. Most important life decision
6. Biggest regret
7. Greatest love story
8. Best day of your life
9. Worst day of your life
10. Future

1. Born to Fly-Sara Evans
2. Wide Open Spaces-Dixie Chicks
3. I Gotta Feeling-Black Eyed Peas
4. No Such Thing-John Mayer
5. You're Gonna Miss This-Trace Adkins
6. Settlin-Sugarland
7. Haven't Met You Yet-Michael Buble
8. Don't Worry Bout a Thing-SheDaisy
9. Stand-Rascal Flatts
10. Have a Little Faith in Me-Joe Cocker

Works for Me Wednesday

A few things that work for me...
1. A cleaning schedule. Since I am off of work for the summer, I find that messes accumulate much quicker than they did during the school year. I created a cleaning schedule so everything gets done. I use a dry erase board in my laundry room to manage and remind me what needs to be done. Here is just a little tid bit of how I have things scheduled.
Monday-Kitchen/Bathrooms
Tuesday-Mow the grass/outside work
Wednesday-Shopping Day
Thursday-Laundry/living room
Friday-Vacuum and bedrooms

2. Getting freebies in the mail! Just this week, I've gotten about 8 samples in the mail. My favorites have been the dog food samples I got from Walmart.com. They are perfect for traveling with my puppy. I cannot believe how much money I am saving by using freebies and the high value coupons that often come with them.

3. Menu planning. I have attempted to do this since moving into my house as a means to save money. I'm really seeing the money saving effects now that it is summer though! Check out this link for some awesome menu planning worksheets! Thanks Money Saving Mom!

Works for Me Wednesday

I figured I would try a little something new for Wednesdays! Since my blog is titled Sounds Good....I'm going to share a few things that sound good to me each week in Works for Me Wednesday!

1. The USA beating Algeria with a goal in the 91st minute! This house has been hoping all morning in celebration for USA moving on to the round of 16 in the World Cup! Here is Landon Donovan celebrating the goal.

2. Brillo pads. This is my cleaning secret for all things stainless steel. I use them to clean my sink once a week, the tea pot, and those pesky spill savers on the stove that are always getting dirty. I cleaned these today and although they aren't immaculately shiny, they are certainly substantially shinier than they were.

Before

After 3. Playing the Drugstore Game. I'm finally getting good at this. I'm doing both Walgreens and CVS right now and last night I had a semi unplanned trip that worked out perfectly while I was waiting for my sushi take out. I got all of these items between the two stores for $1.64 which was mostly tax. I had $6 RR at Walgreens from last week that I used and $4 of my $7 of ECB at CVS. I earned $6.50 in RR at Walgreens and $4 in ECB from CVS. This means that if I factor in my RR and ECB, I got all of this stuff for $1.14! I am not sure if I can beat it, but Walgreens has some other awesome deals I will be going back for later in the week once I have a chance to go through coupons and plan it out. I really want to get the conditioner to match up with this shampoo so I need to plan out the deal since I cannot use the $2 RR I got on the shampoo for the conditioner or it won't print out another one.

What works for you this Wednesday? Feel free to share any tips that you've discovered that make your life a little easier!