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Costco stock up shopping: this is what $606 looks like

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Fuuuuuu…..

Before I show you what I did get, I’ll show you what I didn’t get!

Beef. I did not get beef. Not even ground beef.

The strip loin grilling steak was $47.89/kg. One kilogram is 2.2 pounds. For those of you in the US, that’s US$15.99 per pound, as of today’s exchange rate.

The whole strip sirloin in the second picture is actually cheaper at “only” $41.99/kg or US$14/pound.

These weren’t even the highest prices/kg for beef. They are some of the largest cuts of beef, which made for a savings/kg compared to buying them in smaller, more prepared packages.

Even ground beef was off the menu on this trip.

So this is what we got for our $606.14, after taxes. I got a lot of stuff on sale, too.

Yeah. That’s it.

We ended up getting six 9.1kg bags of dry kibble. Normally, I like to get at least a couple of 11kg bags, but the price per kg was better with the Kirkland brand. At $27.99 each, or $167.94 in total, I think these have actually gone down in price. At the very least, they haven’t changed. There are two cases of wet cat food at $37.99 each, which is about the same, too. The puppy pads were $20.99 which I don’t think has changed, either.

The Kirkland brand toilet paper was $23.99, which is high, but unchanged from the last couple of shopping trips – they used to be under $20.

Also on the non-food list, we stocked up on a double pack of large Head and Shoulders at $22.99. This has been working well for my daughter as a anti-fungal wash. My husband has similar issues, particularly in this heat, so he will be using it as a body wash, too. We picked up the Kirkland brand of laundry detergent at $19.99 The cold water detergent was cheaper but my daughter is having to wash all her clothing and bedding with hot water (anti-fungal), so we aren’t doing cold water washes anymore.

The flat of Coke Zero, at $16.99, is the same. The flat of Monster (which my older daughter paid for) is normally $44.99, but were on sale for $9 off. We ended up getting two containers of iced tea mix because they were on sale for only $9.99 each. The regular Costco price was $12.99, which is still a good price. At local grocery stores, I’ve seen them as much as $26. We also got a three pack of 2L oat milk for my daughters, at $11.99

For breads, we finally found the tortilla wraps; the last couple of times, they were out. We picked up two packs of 36 wraps for $9.99 each. We also got two 2 packs of rye bread for $6.99 each.

We still had some butter in the freezer, so we got only four pounds today, at $5.45 each. That was it for dairy.

For protein, we got our double flat of eggs (60 eggs) for $20.39, and a pork loin for $24.15. We got two panini packs this time. Normally, they are $14.99 each, but they were $3.50 off today. The biggest sale price, however, was for wild caught salmon. They were normally about $49.99/kg, but were on sale for $24.99/kg, so I got two fillets for the girls; one at $10.05 and the other at $8.45. Both were on the smaller size of what was available.

Then we stopped, because we’d reached my budget for this trip.

*sigh*

The gas prices, at least, were a huge savings. While everywhere else was at $1.349 or $1.359 per liter for regular gas, Costco was at $1.099/L It still cost me $72.05 to fill the tank.

We did have other purchases today. When we got to the city, the first thing we did was have lunch for breakfast. We went to a nearby mall’s food court and got food and bubble teas from different places, which totaled over $40. I ate only half of my Chinese food meal. The other half was supper.

We also made a quick stop at the Dollarama, where I got a few things for the garden, including supports for that black currant bush. I also found a broom for outside with plastic bristles, so it’ll last longer than the straw broom we have for outside, now, which is ready for the trash. I got more plant clips, and my one splurge was for some solar powered LED string lights. I’m torn between using it in the garden, or replacing the string of lights on the fence by the gate, which are getting old and starting to dim quite a bit. The total was just under $30 for everything.

We also stopped at the Canadian Tire to get a metal replacement winch for the clothes line. The one that came with the kit for the new line was slipping. There were several options available, but we went with the one that turned out to be exactly the same as what’s on the older clothes line. We also got four more line separators; the kind with the wheels on them. Now, each line has three of these.

While there, we found more clothes line kits that got us rather excited. The kit I got, locally, was the only option available, and had a medium duty line. Canadian Tire had kits for heavy duty and super heavy duty lines. The super heavy duty kit was about $90. Looking at the contents of the kit, sold separately, and it’s actually a huge savings. The 150′ of heavy duty line alone cost more than half what the kit cost. So when we’re ready to set up a third line, we’ll definitely be getting one of these sturdier kits. That way we can have an extra strong line for things that are very heavy when wet, like towels or blankets, while light stuff can go on the medium duty lines.

The winch and four line separators cost just over $40.

So, everything together today cost about $788, give or take a few dollars.

About $265 of that, before taxes, was just cat stuff. Closer to $244, if we don’t count the puppy pads.

Actual food and beverages for us humans came out to about $225.

There is something wrong with that picture. Especially considering the prices of cat food hasn’t gone up in quite a while.

Hey, did you know there’s a Ko-fi donation button at the top? All proceeds go directly to the care and feeding of cats!

*sigh*

So our stock up shopping was a bit short on the “stock up” part, but we did get a few really good prices in there. We’re supposed to be buying extra for the pantry, though, so that we have at least an extra month’s supplies for the winter, in case we can’t get out again. We can’t count on having another mild winter, or on not having spring flooding washing out the roads again.

We are actually very fortunate in our situation, too. I’m counting my blessings here. If we were still living in the city, we’d be in far worse shape, that’s for sure!

So I give thanks for what we have, and ma grateful for it.

The Re-Farmer

First stock up shop: this is what $598 total looks like

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I am so…

…so…

…tired.

We got the first shop done, though, were able to get some good deals today, and got home early enough to be here for when the door guy comes out.

The first issue was a very unfortunate awakening shortly after 3:30am. Two cats started fighting, basically on my head. As if that weren’t bad enough, while flinging whatever cat was there at the time, I found myself with a very wet hand.

It took a while to figure things out. Butterscotch was sleeping next to my head, as she usually does. In the wall shelf that is my headboard, right at pillow height, I have my “leaning sheep”. A large stuffed sheep my daughters got for me for a laugh that has turned out to be an incredibly comfortable back support while sitting in bed, so I keep is stuffed into the shelf near my head to keep it handy.

Leyendecker, for some reason, sprays. Yes, he’s neutered. We have not been able to stop him, and have resorted to setting puppy pads out at areas that are the most commonly targeted.

It seems that last night, he decided to spray my leaning sheep. After the altercation was done, I was looking all over for the wet spot I knew had to be somewhere, and it was only on the sheep, and the edge of the mattress that was directly in front of it.

My older daughter, sweetheart that she is, helped me change my bedding and got the laundry going during the night, as I went back to bed.

Not for long.

At about 5:30, I started hearing a commotion, and it was Ghosty at my computer desk. She was trying to dig into a container of small items she likes to steal, trying to get under the cover. She stopped and ran off when I brought out the spray bottle, but she was soon back, trying to steal the trail cam memory cards.

I have up trying to sleep and got up to do my morning rounds.

As usual, the first thing on the to-do list is feed the outside cats. This time, I just went ahead and put several kitten food bowls on the old kitchen floor before heading out with the dry kibble. I soon had all 7 of them enjoying their special cat soup, without having to fight off any big cats.

My morning rounds were typical, with no extra jobs added on, since we had to head out early. I immediately noticed that, aside from the scratches on my right wrist, the cat altercation caused issues with my injured left arm. Any healing was definitely set back.

We ended up leaving just before 7am. Along the way, we made a stop at a gas station convenience store in two to grab some drinks and snacks to tide us over until we got to the city. Which is when I realized I would need my daughter to let me out of the truck, due to the broken handle on this inside. There was no way I was going to twist my arm over and over, by opening the truck door through the window.

My daughter ended up doing all the even more moderate lifting and carrying for me, today!

Our first stop in the city was the Canadian Tire. We needed more stove pellets for the litter boxes, but we also did some looking around. I ended up getting a very sturdy 25′ tape measure on clearance. We keep either losing or breaking ours, and it was more than half price, so I snagged it. That, with the litter pellets, cost under $20, so I didn’t bother taking my usual picture. My daughter, sweetheart that she is, got the 40 pound bags into the box of the truck for me.

Our next stop was the Walmart, with a quick side trip to Domo gas station along the way, since today is Thursday, and that’s one of their 4¢ off per liter days. We just got $40 in gas. We’ll do a fill at Costco, when I’ll reset my trip meter.

The main things we needed to get at the Walmart was cat food to last us until we do the Costco shop. Aside from that, my older daughter requested some energy drinks, and we were thinking to grab things that were quick to cook, as we’ll be doing a lot of running around in the next while.

This is what $266.47 looks like.

We got some Fresca for my husband and energy drinks (2 for $6) for the girls and I. I decided to get paper towel here instead of Costco, for space reasons. They were on sale, but not as good a sale as the facial tissues. My daughter remembered that we were getting low on spray cleaner, so we grabbed one of those. There are also three 9.1kg backs of dry kibble and two 32pack boxes of wet cat food. My daughter chose some frozen popcorn chicken and pizza bites for the quick eats. There was also a really good price on Sea Bass steaks for my daughters, so I grabbed two of those. The bag of potatoes was also on sale.

The cat food is heavy enough to put in the back of the truck without risk of it being blown away, along with the canned drinks. My daughter just put a bag of cat food over the drink box to keep it from sliding around.

That packed up, we were off to our last stop of the day at the international grocery store. We ended up getting quite a bit more than expected today, as there were some really good sales on.

This is what $324.15 looks like.

There were some really good deals on cheeses today, so we ended up getting the makings of a charcuterie. We got a blue triple cream brie, plus a small regular brie, as my daughter isn’t a big fan of the blue version, a “Pure Perfection” (the brand, I think) gouda, as well as a small jar of clotted cream (we haven’t had that since before we moved out here!), a red wine salami, some Prosciutto and a charcuterie trio of meats, plus a couple of loaves of French bread.

I also found a container of 7 Layer Dip, which my husband has been craving but, for some reason, no one has had in stock for months. So we got one of those, plus a couple of bags of tortilla chips to go with it.

For non-charcuterie protein, there’s a frozen Coho salmon filet for my daughters, a smoked bacon piece and an applewood smoked bacon piece, and a large package of chicken drumsticks. The drumsticks were one of the best deals we saw today, at more than half off. We also picked up an 18 count of eggs to tide us over until we get our usual double flat at Costco. They had an unusually good sale on Pizza Pops, so we got a box of those, too.

In fresh produce, we took advantage of more sales. Black plums, nectarines and plumcots, plus four bags each of two different types of salad mixes.

We also got some plain vanilla ice cream, which my daughters like to add to their coffees. We got some Katsuo Furikaka seasoning, pearl couscous, red rooibos and instant milk tea. In the non-food stuff, we got some argan oil for my hair, and Dabur hair oil for my daughter.

Then, for lunch at home, my daughter picked a couple of sushi for herself and her sister, we got a giant Lumberjack sandwich for my husband, and a teriyaki bento box for me. For the drive home, I got a lime Jarritos soft drink, my daughter got a green tea for herself and a jasmine green tea for her sister.

With all the sales, we got $55.12 in loyalty card discounts, though that doesn’t include sales on items sold by weight. There were deals on loyalty points, too. Normally, it’s $1 gets 1 point. Today, that was double, plus I had an accumulative offer available for spending over $200, resulting in over 10,600 points for our purchase. Come Christmas time, I should be able to get at couple of free turkeys, at least.

So that was our first stock up shopping trip done, and I’m happy with how much we were able to get, with our still limited use of the box until the new cover is installed.

Meanwhile, I’ve had plenty of distractions while writing this!

The door guy has come and gone. He thinks they can save the storm door! That would be good. As for the new exterior door, they do have the style with the window that opens that I was wanting. The need to replace the frame, not just the door, was quite obvious. They will be able to put the arm bar back. There is a hand rail outside that will need to be removed, and that will be put back, too. The only thing that might be an issue is that the frame is partially under the stucco outside, and there’s no way to know what’s under there until the start taking things out. He figures there is a stucco on stucco situation.

Then I got a call from home care.

Not for tonight, thankfully.

Tomorrow morning. So I’ll be going to my mother’s to take care of that. When I called to let her know, though, she told me she had a shopping list for me… that way, I don’t have to come back next week.

I told her, you’re going to need another shopping trip next week, too! 😄

On the plus side, I’ve been chatting with my SIL. They are coming out to stay at their trailer this weekend, but she is coming out tonight. My brother will be able to meet me at my mother’s, tomorrow, and help me out with the med assist, and the shopping. That will be less stress on my arm, and greatly appreciated.

Oh, and on top of all that, I’ve been in contact with the large animal rescue about Poirot’s babies. They will have a cat cage set up for the kittens tonight, and we’re just working out whether we’re taking the kittens to them tomorrow, or if they’re coming to us to get the kittens. My daughter wants to meet them and chat with them about animal care, so I’ve suggested we go to them. Plus, we’ll need to go into town anyhow, to refill our water bottles.

I hope to be done with my mother’s shopping before her Meals on Wheels gets delivered, so we’ll be able to get the kittens delivered in the afternoon.

Tomorrow had started out as an open day, where I could focus on work outside again.

Ha! That didn’t last long!

Meanwhile, we will most likely be doing our Costco shopping in the city on Saturday. If all goes well, we’ll be able to do a proper shop, and not end up making so many extra runs to get things throughout the month. We’ve put in more than twice the usual mileage in June than is typical for us, and the extra cost in fuel is painful on the budget.

July is going to have a lot of driving, too, including for medical reasons.

At least all this extra driving is happening now, and not during the winter months!

I’d love to just crawl into bed right now and hopefully not be awakened by fighting cats landing on my head.

Butterscotch is still hiding under the armchair, poor thing.

The Re-Farmer

What an awesome day!

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One that started way too early, but still an awesome day!

I had my alarm set for 6am. Unfortunately, the furry alarm clocks had other plans. It was light out, anyhow, so I got up and did my morning rounds.

It turned 6am as I was getting back into the house!

My daughters didn’t fair much better, and one of them was up working all night.

My younger daughter and I made sure to grab breakfast before we left, but did make a stop at a gas station convenience store along the way to make sure she had a couple of large water bottles to keep with her during her workshop. I’m glad we left nice and early, because we drove right past the place and had to turn around. 😁

When we got there, others had arrived even earlier than we did. My daughter had a standard waiver to sign as we made our introductions with one of the instructors/owners, then my daughter headed over to their “classroom” to pick an individual forge for the workshop, while I headed out.

The road the forge was on turned out to go almost directly to where the small Walmart we tend to go to is. Very convenient! My new shoes, while fitting where they need to, are still size 11 men’s, so they are too long, and my heels were popping out. So I went searching and found some insoles and heel thingies – I can’t remember what they are called – to reduce the problem. Once I got those into my shoes, I set a timer for myself, settled into the truck and went for a nap in the Walmart parking lot! It was much needed.

They had a 1 hour lunch break scheduled to start at noon, so after a lovely little snooze, I went to a downtown grocery store to hunt down a lunch for us. I asked during the drive in, and my daughter requested something cold for lunch, since she was going to be working with fire all morning. I knew this grocery store would have some good options. I ended up getting some fresh made sushi, a lovely little charcuterie board, cut vegetables and hummus for us to share.

When I got back, it was too early for lunch break yet, but my daughter showed me some of the hooks she had made, using various techniques. She finished one last hook before break was called.

This place has a really good set up – one with extra care taken, since they’re under a fire ban, too. All the forges had new hoods put on them, and everything was set up under a roof. The walls were open, but several sections were covered with a particular sort of cloth/netting. I’d thought it was to prevent sparks from blowing out, but it turns out it was to keep flammable cottonwood puffs from blowing into the fire zone!

The entire grounds were fascinating, with all sorts of equipment – some modern, some antique – around. Even the house was amazing, built out of huge logs. It may have had a modern metal roof but, from the aging of the logs, I wouldn’t be surprised if the house itself is probably close to 100 years old.

The grounds were also very open and spread out, and they had a picnic table available in the shade of some trees for those who wanted to have lunch on site. The instructor/owner that has met us when we came in soon joined us, along with her husband, and some of the other students had brought their own camp chairs and settled in the shade nearby, too. We all had some grand conversation; the other attendees were very interesting people!

Then my daughter’s cell phone rang, which is always a surprise. She uses her phone as a phone even less than I do with mine! 😄

It was from her doctor’s office.

She quickly got up and went aside to take the call until she needed to come back and clear some dates for me.

Her surgery to remove her ganglion is going to happen in July – about 3 weeks from now – and she’s got a consultation appointment to go over the details, tomorrow, late afternoon.

The hospital is in the same small city we frequent in between stock up trips, and it basically across the street from the vet clinic that’s been doing our spays and neuters, so it’s all familiar territory for us.

Of course, other people heard us as we put the appointments into my calendar. Afterwards, we learned that one of the guys that joined us at the picnic table had had a massive ganglion removed some 25 years ago – large enough that he still has a scar! So he and my daughter commiserated about how painful those things can be, for a while. 😁

When the scheduled lunch was done and everyone went back to the workshop, I went back to the city and spent some time actually looking for stuff this time. We need at least one more garden hose, but the only ones that were affordable were the ones that keep breaking on us. In the end, I ended up picking up some replacement couplings, instead. Hopefully, higher quality ones. They also have a built in shut off valve, so you can switch attachments and not have to turned the water off at the tap or, like I usually do, kink the hose to stop the flow – which is part of why they end up breaking so quickly. Oddly, the one that’s leaking on me right now developed a pin hole in the metal of the female coupling. How that happened, I have no idea, but it’s enough to send a tiny, barely visible stream of water shooting out at least a foot!

I also picked up some water soluble fertilizer for the vegetable garden, and some potting soil. Our massive jade trees need repotting. We need to find a new home for them. We have to keep them in the cat free zone/living room, and there just isn’t enough light for them in there. Maybe rehoming plants will be easier than rehoming cats!

That done, I took my time checking out a couple more stores, just to pass the time until I headed back to the forge.

This time, I hung out in a seating area they had in the “classroom”, where my daughter was conveniently set up. They were working on long implements at the time, with a twist in the handle.

My daughter was in absolute heaven.

It was an interesting group to watch. There was about 10 people there, each at their own forge (there were a couple of “spares” that weren’t being used). Most were men that looked to be about my age, give or take a decade. There was one other woman there, who looked to be in her 60s. My daughter was clearly the youngest person there. Everyone seemed to be really enjoying the workshop, too.

Talking about it later, my daughter said she was 99% sure she would love blacksmithing, but there was still that 1% she wasn’t sure of. After today, she is 100% she is in love with blacksmithing! She’s really looking forward to building her own forge and smithy here at the farm. It will take time to acquire the materials, and set up a safe area to work in. Particularly since the area that makes the most sense to build it in is where the fire pit currently is, and there are several dead or partially dead trees with branches overhanging the area that we need to clear out! I plan to make our outdoor kitchen in a different area, so the fire pit area will be available to her. Thanks to this workshop, she also knows which things she prefers to have, such as a hand operated blower instead of an electric one. We do already have some of the tools, since my late father had done some blacksmithing here, though his forge got scavenged at some point. One pair of tongs I found were broken, but another is fine. My daughter says she has seen other tools that are suitable, laying around, including ball peen hammers of the appropriate size and weight. There is a tiny anvil, made from a piece of railroad tie. When I was growing up here, I remember we had a full size blacksmithing anvil in the pump shack, but that is another of the things that grew legs and walked away over the years before we moved in. So it really wouldn’t take much for my daughter to be able to set up her own smithy!

Here are the things my daughter made, by the end of the workshop.

The first image is a series of hooks including one that is meant to be hammered in like a nail. The others have different shaped flat parts, including one leaf shape, with screw holes in them. The screw holes were added towards the very end, using a special hole punch. Then there is the handle; getting the swoop shape it was supposed to be was not easy!

The second image has a fire poke, with a twisted handle. The other thing is a steak flipper. Not something either of us is familiar with!

The owners/instructors welcomed people to stay as long as they needed to put on any finishing touches on their projects before leaving, and most of them did stay longer. My daughter just needed to use the hole punch before she was done, so we had a chance to chat with the other owner/instructor.

My daughter still wants to clean up the stuff she made with a wire brush to give them a more finished look. She plans to give some to my brother and his wife, as a thank you for their birthday gift of this workshop. The steak flipper and fire poker are both going to get use when we do outdoor cooking again – which might be a while. With the current fire bans, some fires are allowed, but with our own fire pit area we aren’t going to chance it for some time.

With staying longer to finish things off and chat for a bit, it was getting pretty late, so we went into the city again, and I made sure my daughter got fed! She ended up choosing to go to a Subway, but she was so tired – especially her hands, from all that hammering! – she could barely hold her sandwich! My husband messaged me to see of I could find something at Walmart for him, and she stayed in the truck while I popped in. She was so tired this morning, was absolutely fine during the workshop, but once it was over, she was basically crashing!

It was absolutely worth it for her, though!

By the time we got home, it was well past time to feed the outside cats, so I took care of that while the girls took care of bringing stuff inside. I ended up bring out a bowl of warm water to wash leaky eyes, assembly line style. Kale and Zipper are still the worst for it, and I’m afraid that Kale might lose an eye. She has missed some eye washing, simply because we couldn’t reach her, or she wasn’t around at the time. Most of the other kittens look like they are recovering quite well.

When I go out to take care of the cats, I’m always on the lookout for more kittens. So far, nothing. I am seeing Sprout more often and, this evening, I could just make out as she ran passed me, that she has at least two active teats, but we can’t get close enough to really see. With others, I just can’t tell. Not even with Slick, who will jump up onto the roof of the cat house to eat. She doesn’t give us a chance to see her belly!

Today turned out to be a really lovely day in the weather sense, too. The high of the day was supposed to be 18C/64F, but we did end up reaching 20C/68F, but with a lovely breeze to keep things from feeing too hot. We’re supposed to get warmer over the next few days, but nothing excessive.

I am very glad I got the garden in when I did, that’s for sure. If I hadn’t, I probably be dealing with dead transplants right now!

Mostly, though, I’m just so happy my daughter enjoyed the workshop, and is now sure that blacksmithing is something she really wants to continue with.

The Re-Farmer

We got rain!

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Before heading to bed last night, I noticed the forecast was starting to suggest rain by this morning. Just a bit, and a fairly low chance of it.

By morning, my weather app was telling me things like, “rain expected to end in 30 minutes” or the like. When I headed out to do my morning rounds, though, it was barely even spitting.

With today expected to be much cooler, I didn’t water everything this morning, so my rounds were done a lot faster. Then my daughter came by to let me know that she had called in a prescription that she needed to bring to her doctor’s appointment, tomorrow. I didn’t realize just how much faster I was done my rounds until we had left and I was thinking to stop at the post office and realized they had only just opened!

By the time we left, though, it was actually raining. A gorgeous, solid rain!

It was still insanely smoky, though, and the smoke got thicker, the closer we got to town. There’s a large fire on the other side of the lake, so they were getting hit by the smoke a lot more than we were.

Both my daughters were not feeling well all last night, and no one was up to cooking, so they decided to treat us with burgers. When we finished at the pharmacy, they still weren’t open, so we drove around to take a look at the lake.

Which we could barely see! It was still pouring rain when I too the above photo.

It was no longer raining when we got home, and the smoke was far less. The good news was in checking the weather radar. The rain we got was being pushed straight towards the biggest fire across the lake. There’s rain up north, too. As welcome as it is, there isn’t anywhere near enough to do much for all the fires. From the looks of it, we won’t be getting more for almost a week.

My goal for today is still to get more transplants in, but delay due to rain is not a bad thing!

The Re-Farmer

We got a bit of rain, plus this is what $586 looks like

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With another trip to the city planned for today, I got my older daughter to help we water the garden and trees this morning, while things were still cooler. Much to my surprise, things actually looked damper than with just the morning dew. Then I spotted the turnip leaves in the high raised bed. It looks like we got a touch of rain last night!

All of these larger leaves had drops of water around their edges. Nothing else. I guess these ones had just the right “pockets” for it!

My younger daughter and I headed out later in the morning, making a stop at a gas station just outside of town, about 15 minutes away, to pick up some energy drinks for the road. While there, we decided to get a car wash, too. I figured, it was a good time to do it, while there’s no box cover.

The car wash couldn’t quite get all the gravel dust out of the corners of the box. 😄

By the time we got to the city, it was lunch time, so our first stop was at a mall near the Costco for food, then a stop at the Dollarama. I was looking for more buckets or watering cans to replace the ones we’ve been using. The buckets with plastic handles I’ve been using to water the walnut tree/seeds all have broken handles now. I had one small bucket with a metal handle that I’ve been using in the food forest area, and the bucket itself is breaking apart. These are all buckets I found around the property, so they predate us living here, and are either so old, or so exposed to the elements, that the plastic has become brittle and is breaking up.

Both the buckets and watering cans we found were too small, but we did find some other things. For the garden, I picked up 10 wire tomato cages that will go over the pepper and eggplant transplants – I’ll need at least 8 more. My daughter found another sparkly baseball cap that she got for my collection. 😄 Then we ended up spending some time choosing artificial flowers and a heavy vase for my MIL’s grave. The last time we tried to visit her grave, we never found it. We did eventually find a sign saying that, due to the spring flooding, a number of stones were damaged and removed for repair, and that they would eventually be returned. We haven’t been able to make it back, since. We want to fix that!

Once we were done there, we headed to the Costco, filling the gas tank, first. Gas was at $1.219/L, while elsewhere was about $1.309 in the city. In town, it had dropped from $1.359 yesterday, to $1.329 today.

That done, we finally were able to grab a flat cart and start shopping.

We did a much smaller trip this time.

This is what $586.66 looks like.

*sigh*

This time, I got a picture of the receipt.

We got two 9kg and two 11.6kg bags of dry kibble and two cases of 48 cats of wet cat food. We got more puppy pads as well.

This trip, we got a large bag of flour for under $10, which is a really good price right now. Everywhere else, I’ve been seeing the same size bag with sale prices of about $12. I get the cheap stuff. Going with the brand name stuff, a big bag of flour is closer to $20.

There’s a case of Monster energy drinks, which I will be paid back for, and we ended up getting a bulk sized box of instant oatmeal.

We got a couple of Kirkland brand jars of mayonnaise, plus a couple of jars of Peanut Butter, some brown sugar, and a large cannister type container of peppercorns, and a large container of ground pink salt. I prefer course, to use in our salt drinker, but this is what they had. My husband prefers the pink salt over regular table salt.

We still have butter in the freezer, so I only got two more, a block of Old cheddar cheese, plus we got a 3 pack of orange juice for the girls. I would have gotten oat milk for them, but my daughter told me they still have. There’s a 3 pack of all beef wieners and a pack of Spam – the only meat we got today. There’s a 9 pack of pasta, and my husband requested some tortilla chips, olives and dip. They didn’t have the 7 layer dip he wanted, so we got him roasted red pepper hummus instead.

They had a fundraiser thing going on. I could tell by the sudden bell ringing and cheering. When my items were all scanned and the cashier asked if I wanted to donate, I first made sure: no bells and yells! She just laughed and said yes. I think they get that a lot! So I donated a bit, too. That brought the sub total to $549.34, and we paid another $37.32 in taxes, for a total of 31 items.

[Edit: I completely forgot about the Pizza Pops! Which is what we’re having for supper tonight.]

We got almost no meat, there’s no eggs, no milk or cream, no breads or wraps.

And it still came to almost $600! A little over $250 (after taxes) of that is all cat supplies.

Part of the reason we did a smaller trip is because we had to squeeze so much of it into the back of the truck cab. The other reason is, we need to empty out the chest freezer and defrost it, so I didn’t want to get anything that would need to go into the chest freezer, other than the ice packs we brought to put with the cold stuff.

By the time we got home, it was about 4pm, so once everything was unloaded and put away, I fed the outside cats. The ice packs around Poirot and her babies needed to be changed out, though when I picked up one water bottle, I found it was still cold, if no longer frozen, so I tucked it right into the cat bed. Before long, I came over and found the kittens all but hugging it! There’s a large ice pack under their bed that probably needs to be changed out, but I didn’t want to disturb the kittens too much. Instead, I changed out the ice pack that’s on the floor of the cube above the bed. The second level cubes have pieces of rigid insulation over the wire to create floors they can walk on, which I set on top of the ice pack. This way, the cook air will flow downwards, and the bit of insulation will slow down the thaw a little bit.

All their water bowls needed to be refilled, but the water in the hose was so hot, I used it to refill the garbage can “heat sink” in the portable greenhouse. I still haven’t found the leak in that thing, but at this time of day, filling it will actually help cool the greenhouse down. The only plants in there are the pots with luffa, and they seem to be quite liking the heat! The thermometer in there was reading about 55C/131F.

Filling the can in the greenhouse also gave me time to scrub the water bowls as best I could. With this heat, algae starts to grow very quickly. The plastic water bowls get pretty stained, too. When refilling the bowls in the sun room, I also wet down the floor mats, so the evaporation could help cool things down, too.

As I write this, at almost 6pm, we’ve cooled down to 26C/79F, with the humidex putting us at 29C/84F – which is the high we hit a couple of hours ago. Tomorrow is supposed to be at least as hot, and the day ever, we’re supposed to hit 32C/90F.

Heat or no heat, things need to get done. Tomorrow morning, I’m hoping to get some of the winter squash transplanted, as they are growing out of their pots, and my daughter is planning on mowing the lawn. With going to the city three days in a row, we’re pretty behind on things! It’ll be good to catch up.

Unless I end up doing grocery shopping for my mother tomorrow.

We shall see.

The Re-Farmer

addendum: yes, I’m doing my mothers grocery shopping tomorrow!

Small stock up trip: this is what $209 looks like

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With yesterday’s stock up shopping getting cut short, with virtually no actual food purchased, my daughter and I headed in today to hit the international grocery store we had skipped yesterday.

We had a slight detour into town first, so by the time we got to the city, our first order of business was lunch, which we had in the dining area of the grocery store. Dim sum and sushi!

Driving to the city for our stock up shopping does have its perks!

My daughters had their own shopping list, so after lunch my daughter and I split up and met at the truck later. Without a cover on the box, we had to keep in mind that anything we got had to fit into the back of the cab. We already have a fair bit of stuff back there, from our supply of hard sided grocery bags to our emergency kit, etc. We did take out the bin of winter supplies, though, so that freed up a bit of space, but we are still limited. Basically, we used the space that’s kept open specifically to fit my husband’s walker.

We might have to split our Costco shopping up into two trips, because that’s where we get the most of our supplies for the month.

Anyhow.

This is what $209.20 after taxes looks like.

That’s… not a lot.

In the non-food category, I finally found a nail brush to replace the kitchen one that fell apart. We use it for scrubbing vegetables.

The only vegetable I got today was celery, which was on sale, and the only fruit, grapes, which was also on sale. I picked up some cheese wedges; Irish Whiskey cheddar, Porter Beer cheddar and Maasdam. The Maasdam is a new one for us. It looks much like a Swiss. There was a sale on antipasto sliced meats, so I got two packages of those, plus three garlic baguettes that were on sale. The girls and I might have a charcuterie movie night soon!

There was a good sale on New England Clam Chowder, which I usually get at Walmart, so I picked up a bunch for my daughters and I. My husband no longer likes it. I also got a couple of cans of clams. We like to add some to the chowder, but I haven’t seen any in ages. Not something I would have expected to be hard to find! That they were on sale, too, was bonus. Oh, and I got a bottle of my husband’s favourite Filipino soy sauce.

There was a sale on sirloin tip beef, plus I got an extra discount through my loyalty card, which was nice. There are also some locally produced smoked, and applewood smoked, slabs of bacon, both on sale. For the girls, I got some frozen cooked white shrimp, which was both on sale, plus extra off with my loyalty card, and basa fillets that were on sale.

Since no one is up to doing dishes and cooking in this heat, we picked up food for quick eating. For my husband, I got a huge Lumberjack sandwich; it’s big enough to be lunch for him tomorrow, too! I’m glad he likes those. It’s getting harder to find foods he can eat, these days! I picked a bento box for myself, and my daughter picked a couple of boxes of steak taquitos for herself and her sister. They’ve been looking for that flavour in that brand for years, but they just disappeared for some reason. Now they’re back, so she was really happy to find them. They are not fond of the other flavour options. There were some Verka cream rolls on sale, so I picked up a pack of 4 for desert.

That’s it. That’s all I got. All those sales, and it still cost over $200. Even my daughter’s purchases cost over $130, and their list was mostly jars of Asian seasonings we can’t get locally.

At least I got extra points on top of the extra sale prices, too. I’ve already got enough to get at least one free turkey when those promotions come up in the fall.

I’m dreading going to Costco tomorrow.

The Re-Farmer

First stock up shop: this is what $252 looks like

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My daughter and I went in to the city for our first stock up shop today. In the end, we didn’t make it to all the placed intended, so we’ll have to go back tomorrow.

Our first stop was actually a mall next to the Canadian Tire for lunch. In the end, neither of us was hungry enough to finish, so we brought our leftovers home for supper.

We had a short list for Canadian Tire. A couple of 40 pound bags of stove pellets for the cat litters, plus I found replacement cord for our weed trimmer. I got two of those. Grand total of $48.12 With the pellet bags in the truck box and no cover for the box anymore, we weren’t worried that anyone would walk off with 40 pounds of compressed sawdust while we did our next stop!

Which was Walmart.

This is what $252.98 looks like.

There isn’t a lot in there.

There are two bags of dry kibble for both the inside and outside cats. We’ll be stocking up on that a lot more at Costco and, later on, one of the feed stores for 40 pound bags. The 32 packs of canned cat food is one for the inside cats, one for the outside kittens. The kittens have been getting sticky eyes, so I’ve been mixing up a couple of cans with water and a powdered mix of lysine and pumpkin seeds. The lysine seems to be doing the trick, as their eyes have gotten much better already. The pumpkin seeds should help with worms and poops, so we probably won’t actually see if that’s working or not. 😄

There is a case of giant freezies for my husband, for the hot days ahead. There are the XXL side puppy pads; I’ll be getting the Costco puppy pads, too, which are smaller. There’s a package of toilet paper under the cart, though we’ll be getting more of that at Costco, too. We grabbed a package of paper towels, too. We won’t need to get more of those at Costco.

I picked up a couple of Lavender scented air freshener cones. One is for the truck; I like these better than the scented dandling things. The other is for my bedroom. Lavender is supposed to be calming for cats, so I’m hoping it’ll help!

There are 4 cans of Monster energy drinks for my daughters and I; we’ll be picking up a case at Costco, so this is just for the next few days.

While making our way to the tills, we passed a display of instant oatmeal at 2 for $5, so I grabbed a couple of variety packs. Sometimes, we just want something really quick for breakfast, and I didn’t want to get boxed cereal. I also picked up a couple of cold drinks for the road. The only other item that can’t be seen is a small donation to the children’s hospital.

Normally, after this, we would have gone to the international grocery store. We even remembered to grab ice packs to add to the insulated bags so things wouldn’t thaw out on the way home. My husband, however, requested we bring home some McDonald’s for him. Since there was one in the Walmart, and I didn’t want to run around trying to get to a different one later, we got a meal for him and for my other daughter (my younger daughter and I still had our leftovers from lunch), and we headed home.

Not much of a stock up trip, at all. We didn’t even get any food, really. My daughters have their own shopping list for the international grocery store, so we’ll be making another trip tomorrow. The day after will be our Costco trip.

Part way home, I pulled over and my daughter took over driving, because I found myself feeling like I was falling asleep. So I got to close my eyes for most of the rest of the drive home.

I did get a text message from the autobody shop about the truck, just before we got home. I had to wait until my phone could connect to our Wi-Fi before I could respond. She’d included a photo of the truck box cover they thought was closest to what we had, and the total of what we would be paying for, asking me to call her about it. The “betterment” charge would be $225. Add in the deductible and extra charge for painting because rust damage is not included, we’d be looking at over $860.

I had found a cover almost identical to what we had, though, so I sent her an image of it, which included the price, then called the shop. I got her just as she was looking at the image I’d sent. It was a lot less expensive than what they were looking at, so she asked me to send her a link, which I emailed to her. She wasn’t sure if they could get the one I found – they’re not able to order things online, oddly enough – but she wanted to find out if they could. If they can get this one, or an equivalent, it’ll save us quite a bit of money. She’ll get back to me as soon as she can. We might be able to get this done next week, if all goes smoothly.

Then, I got very different phone call. It was the home care aide. She was at my mother’s place for her supper time med assist, but my mother’s walker wasn’t outside the door, and the door was locked. This is very unusual. She did check the usual places, like the common room or other areas my mother might be sitting and enjoying some fresh air. After we talked for a bit, she said she would do her next med assist, then come back, while I contacted my family to see if anyone knew where my mother might be. I thought maybe my sister might have come out on her day off and taken my mother somewhere, but I think yesterday was her day off. The other possibility that came to mind, which was more worrisome, was if our vandal had shown up and persuaded her to go with him somewhere. Neither possibility seemed likely, though.

I messaged my family but only my brother got it and responded. He had no knowledge of any appointments or anything she might have had. We were wondering if the Life Line people could find where she is, but I think to find out, I’d have to use the home base machine at her place to contact them. I was already prepared to go to my mother’s, since I have a spare key to her apartment, so that was a possibility.

Eventually, I got a call back from the home care worker. My mother’s walker was still gone, the door still locked. She was walking around the building as we spoke, looking for her. We were just about to say our goodbyes and I was going to head over, when she found my mother.

She was behind the fence in the garden area.

Hoeing.

I need to figure that out, because the garden area is on the side of the building outside my mother’s apartment. The fence is on the far side of the garden area. So if she were behind the fence, she would be off the property, where there are a number of trees and an empty lot. No wonder my mother was hard to find back there! But why would she be hoeing behind the fence? Or hoeing at all? My mother doesn’t have a garden plot anymore, though she does have some perennials against the fence, just outside her window. She wouldn’t need to go behind the fence to hoe anything there! With her mobility decreasing, it wouldn’t be safe for her to be hoeing anywhere, never mind going around to the other side of the fence. !!!

I’m just glad she was found!

I’ll be calling her to check in on her, very soon. Just in case…

The Re-Farmer

No internet

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I have just enough data signal while out in the yard to, hopefully, post this.

While I was at my mother’s, the electric company came by, saying they would shut off our power for about half an hour.  My daughter chatted with them, and they told her they were replacing the parts needed to handle the upcoming increased voltage on our grid.

The power was back on long before I came home, but the internet is still out.  All the usual steps were tried before I got home.  I even managed to get a number for the electric company through their app – I had to go outside to log in – and find a number to call them.  There is nothing wrong at their end.  We will have to contact Starlink somehow.

Which seems to only be possible through the app.

Which I can’t log into.  My husband has the log in info.  My upgraded phone doesn’t have it anywhere, and my husband uses an app that generates insane passwords that can’t be easily cracked.

After fighting with it, my husband reached his tolerance levels, medicated and went to bed.  Until he is functional again, we have to wait.

We might have to find a way to log in to try and connect remotely.  Hopefully, my husband will just need to go outdoors to get enough signal. Otherwise, we will have to drive somewhere.

Now to see if I can publish this with my barely-there signal strength.

The Re-Farmer