food prices

Costco stock up: This is what $635 looks like

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I am so glad to be home.

I forgot. We’re coming up on a long weekend. Even though today is Thursday, Costco was insanely busy! When I was done, it took several minutes going further and further to the back of the store before I found the end of the line I needed. The self check out line was almost as long!

Thankfully, everything went quickly.

Before going to Costco, though, I made a stop at the mall nearby for breakfast, then made a quick run through the Dollarama. I found a few things for both kitchen and garden, totaling just over $35 – including a couple of boxes of McKenzie Seeds wildflower mix. I’m considering trying again in the same spot I tried winter sowing last year, only this time, I want to find some way to keep the cats from digging and rolling all over it, even though I never removed the leaf litter mulch. We really need more wildflowers for the pollinators. I’ve left the sections of the old garden area uncut because they were pretty much the only things blooming right now. Once they start dying back, I’ll start working on taming the jungle. I’m not seeing as many pollinators lately, though. The constant smoke from the wildflowers is causing them problems.

I also got a couple of metal pinwheels that are weather vanes, so they will turn with the direction of the wind to spin. I plan to set one beside the peas that are trying to recover, and another near the plum and apple saplings. The plastic pinwheels I have now don’t seem to catch the wind very well, but something that moves with the wind should work better to distract the deer.

I’m glad I didn’t stop to get a bit of gas on the way into the city. I normally put in just a few bucks if I’m expecting to drop below half a tank. I did stop at the gas station in my mother’s town along the way, but that’s because the truck informed me that I was low on washer fluid. The only fluid I have in the truck right now is for winter. Gas prices there were $1.349/L At Costco, it was $1.199/L!! There rest of the city was $1.339/L It cost me $67.15 to fill my tank.

When it comes to shopping at Costco, this is where we bulk buy most of our non-food items, so that took up a significant portion of the budget. This is what $636.55 looks like.

There were two things on my list I didn’t get, because Costco doesn’t carry them. Those are for the next Walmart trip. I lost count somewhere along the line, as I ended up going a bit over my budget for this shop, when I thought I was still under budget. Ah, well.

With the long receipt, I ended up taking two pictures of it.

Unfortunately WP messes one of them up, due to the different dimensions. You should be able to see it properly if you click on the image.

For the non-food stuff, we got:

  • scent free laundry detergent
  • puppy pads
  • four 9kg bags of dry kibble
  • one case of canned cat food
  • toilet paper
  • Shake ‘n’ Feed fertilizer (on sale)
  • a 2 pack of parchment paper

All of that cost $250 and change before taxes.

*sigh*

For beverages, there is a flat of Monster energy drink, which I will be paid back for, and a 3 pack of oat milk for the girls.

Then there’s the actual food:

  • spaghetti
  • Ramen noodles
  • 2 pack of Honey Nut Cheerios (on sale)
  • 2 jars of Hellman’s Mayo (the sale price made them cheaper than the Kirkland brand)
  • double flat of eggs (5 dozen)
  • 4 pounds butter
  • Old Cheddar, 1 block
  • Mozzarella, 1 block
  • pork tenderlion
  • pork sausage (on sale)
  • two packs of drumsticks (on sale)
  • two rotisserie chickens (cheaper than raw, whole chickens)
  • two 2 packs of salad mix
  • Basmati rice
  • two 2 packs of rye bread
  • two 2 packs of wraps
  • 1 bag hazelnuts

The food and drink part of the shop came to about $348 and change, before taxes.

What I didn’t get was beef. I checked out a fairly small flank steak, and it was over $88! A family pack of stew meat was over $43. They had a sale on ground beef, but they came in long chubs that all cost in the $60 range, before discount. Then there were the larger cuts of beef that were in the $200 plus, range. *choke* Even the pork is starting to creep up in price again.

We aren’t even going to be able to buy a beef share this year. Normally, we would have made payments throughout the year until they butchered in the fall. We already dropped from a quarter beef to an eighth, the last time we got a beef share, because of how tight our budget got once we had truck payments. We talked when I met to pick up the meat in January, and she said they weren’t sure what they were going to be doing, nor what price/pound they’d have to charge yet. All they knew for sure was that they were going to have to increase the price. So we didn’t start making payments at the beginning of the year, like I planned. Which, I suppose, worked out for the best, because we’ve had so many things needing to be replaced or repaired – and we’re still not done with that – that we couldn’t have made monthly payments this year, anyhow. They haven’t updated their website, nor have they announced anything on their social media pages, so I have no idea if they were even still selling beef shares.

I wonder if we can buy a steer from the farmer that rents most of this property? We have enough pasture in the outer yard to sustain 1 or 2 calves. Then butcher in the fall.

Oh, dear Lord. I just looked up the average prices for feeder steers and heifers, per hundredweight, in Canada right now.

*choke*

Never mind that idea! Yeah, we’d save money in the long run, but yikes! No wonder beef prices are so high right now!

Okay, so beef is going to be a rare treat for the next while.

😢😢

Anyhow.

That’s our Costco stock up shop for this month. It won’t last us the month, either.

*sigh*

Oh, that reminds me. Our federal overlords graciously “gave” people on CPP and CPP Disability a 2.7% raise that kicked in for July’s payment, which was a couple of days ago. My husband gets both CPP Disability, plus Disability through his private insurance with SunLife. With private insurance he was “allowed” to make a certain amount above the payments, then everything else gets deducted. The CPP Disability uses up all that “allowance”, which is why I can’t get a job. Anything I earn would be deducted from his SunLife disability payments.

He recently got a letter from SunLife telling him what his payments will be, starting at the end of July, meaning today.

Yup. While the CPP Disability payments went up by a few bucks, his SunLife payments went down by a few bucks.

They cancelled each other out.

🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Honestly, I thank God that the company my husband worked for had such a good insurance plan. It’s keeping us afloat. I also thank God that we have the arrangement with my brother to live here and take care of the place in exchange for rent. We still have to be creative in making ends meet – like making these trips to the city to buy in bulk and stock up where we can. Especially in years like this, where we have next to nothing to harvest from the garden, never mind preserve for winter. Like my SIL said about their own garden, years ago: if we had to rely on our garden, we’d starve!

Well, it is what it is, and we do what we can with what we have.

What other choice is there?

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden: still kicking! Plus, bonus kittens and insane prices

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First, the cuteness!

When I went out this morning to feed the yard cats, I had an adorable little surprise. Fluffy Colby was with some other cats INSIDE the sun room! I found the other three kittens around the cat shelters and they did run off, but Colby stayed close.

When it was time to bring out the kitten soup bowls, I found him sharing a tray with Havarti. He ran off a bit when I put the kitten soup bowl down, but he was soon back, sharing with with his cousin.

I want to pet that kitten so much!!

The garage kittens, sadly, still won’t come closer.

Today, my plan was to focus on finally giving the garden, and the food forest additions, a deep watering. Particularly since tomorrow will be hotter again, and I will be doing my Costco shop in the city. Tomorrow is supposed to reach 25C/77F. Today reached a comparatively cool high of 23C/73F. I didn’t need to go anywhere today, so I hoped to get some progress outside.

Well, of course, that changed.

My husband called in refills for his injections, so a trip to the pharmacy was in order. Of course, I combined errands as much as possible, grabbing our big water bottles to refill at the grocery store after getting the meds. Then, since I was there anyhow, I checked out the sales and picked up a few things.

There were also a few things I did NOT pick up.

Like Necterines.

$5.49/lb, or $12.10/kg

*gasp*

*choke*

Nectarines always tended to be more expensive, but they still were usually under $2/lb in season.

The next image is of a beef tomahawk steak. This is a cut I almost never see. I know people on carnivore that prize these as having an excellent protein to fat ratio. I just can’t imaging spending $84.95 ($55.09/kg) for about 3 pounds of bone-in meat (1kg=2.2lbs) that would be just one meal. Sure, that might be enough for the entire day on carnivore, but… yikes!

I did pick up a family pack of stew meat, though, which was in the $20 range.

Once back at home, I was soon outside doing the watering. When I got to the high raised bed, though, I also did some harvesting. In this bed, I had left one Purple Prince turnip to go to seed. Which it did.

Then the deer at the seed stalk.

So, I harvested the turnip.

Look at the size of that thing!

It’s probably past its best stage for eating, but it wasn’t regrowing a new seed stalk, so I figured it was harvest it, or it would start rotting.

In the next photo, you can find the fuzzy friend I found on one of the leaves. I broke off that section of leaf and set it aside, so as not to disturb the caterpillar. I have no idea what type of caterpillar it is. Hopefully, not something I will regret saving!

In the last image, you can see the turnip with the Uzbek golden carrots I also harvested. I was careful to pull the biggest ones. I’m leaving the smaller ones to give them a change to get bigger, instead of just harvesting the entire bed as I was considering doing. I found a single orange Napoli carrot large enough to harvest. I see hints of orange on some of the other carrots, but for the most part, it’s the Uzbek Golden carrots that have been growing. The Napoli carrot seeds were a couple of years older, and I finished off the last of what was left in the packet. I didn’t expect many of those to germinate.

For all the garden struggles this year, things are still kicking! In both winter sown beds, the radish seed stalks that the deer ate are trying to recover.

They’re blooming again, and sending out more leaves in some of them.

While watering the Spoon tomatoes, I noticed something. When they were being transplanted, I pruned off the bottom leaves before planting them inside the protective collars. One transplant had a larger branch that I pruned off. It was so nice and strong, I decided to just stick it into the ground between two other tomatoes and giving it a chance to grow.

It’s still tiny but, as you can see in the next image above, it’s producing tomatoes!!! The entire plant is maybe 8 inches high, if that. Just one little branch, and it’s producing!

As for those Royal Burgundy beans in front of the Spoon tomatoes – the whole three plants that emerged – one of them has a tiny bean starting to grow! I didn’t get a picture, but one of the yellow Custard beans planted with the tomatoes in the East yard had a whole bunch of tiny bean pods forming. It’s really late in the season, but we might actually have beans to harvest before summer is over!

Even the sugar snap peas are trying to make a come back! Some of them are dying back – they are well past their season – but after the deer munched away at them, some of the plants are pushing out new growth, and blooming! I’ve got one Super Sugar Snap pea plant that I’m leaving (and the deer have left alone) to fully mature so I can save the seeds, but it looks like we might have a few more fresh pods to enjoy, too.

If the deer don’t get to them, first!

It’s encouraging to see some signs of the garden trying to recover and grow. The tiny summer squash are getting a bit bigger, and blooming, though still just male flowers. The winter squash seem to be recovering a bit, too, and some are blooming. The melons are still tiny, but some of them are blooming. The pumpkins are doing quite well, and one of them even has a female flower bud showing!

Whether or not any of this will have time to recover, grow and produce before our season runs out is questionable. With some things, unlikely. Looking at the monthly forecast, it’s possible we’ll have all of September with no frost, though we would probably still need to cover things on colder nights. August, at least, looks like it’ll stay pretty warm. Of course, such long term forecasts are completely unreliable. I’m still going to assume our average Sept. 10 first frost date.

After finished up in the garden and bring the little harvest in, I used some of the carrots, onions from last year – yes, we still have a few! – and an entire head of fresh garlic in a beef and barley dish for my husband and I. The girls hate barley, but my husband and I love it, so they get to make their own supper using some of the fresh fish I picked up for them, yesterday. There will be enough of the beef and barely for my husband to have tomorrow, as well, while I am in the city. My younger daughter is having some PCOS issues right now, so she won’t be able to come with me this time. Which is fine; I don’t actually need the help, but I do like her company. I’ve been doing so much better myself, since I’ve been on the anti-inflammatories, I’ve actually been able to handle these outings better, too. I’m only taking them at the end of the day, instead of twice a day, before with my last meal before bed. I can take them up to 3 times a day, as needed. I just haven’t needed to take that many!

I haven’t taken any pain killers at all since I started on the anti-inflammatories. I do still have pain. Particularly if I lie on my left hip for too long, and I still have issues with my injured left arm. The pain, however is now more specific, and really not all that bad. Nothing worth taking more meds over. I should probably take some painkillers before I leave for the city, though, since I’ll be doing a lot of walking on concrete, and these shopping trips really take a lot out of me.

Stocking up: this is what $263 looks like

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Plus another $137 I don’t have a picture of.

This morning, I headed into the city to do our first stock up shopping trip. Usually, on this first trip of the month, I would visit a Canadian Tire, a Walmart and an international grocery store, which are all along one street. This time, I did the Walmart trip, but then went to a Superstore, instead.

At the Walmart, I got only cat supplies. Two 9kg size bags of dry kibble and two 32 count boxes of canned cat food. I did the “round up to the next dollar” donation option, so the total was exactly $137 for the whole thing.

It’s been a long time since I’ve gone to Superstore. It’s also been a long time since I did a shop that was just groceries. Not cat supplies or paper products or cleaners, etc. Just groceries.

Weird, right? 😂

This is what $263.49 looks like.

I got some good deals, too. It’s all packed pretty thoroughly, and you can’t see everything, so I took a picture of the receipt this time, too.

I must admit, I really like how organized their receipts are!

Under “groceries”, there’s a big bag of pasta, then some water flavours for my husband. I picked up some sunflower cooking oil, and a big bag of pretzels for my husband. The Monster energy drink was one of the things I got for the drive home.

There’s the soy sauce my husband prefers and some Basmati rice. We usually get a specific brand at Costco, but we were out, so I got a different brand today. I hope it’s good. We’ve tried other brands and not liked them at all.

In Dairy, there’s 3% milk, Old Cheddar and Mozza, plus a flat of eggs. I also got oat milk for the girls, but that’s under “Natural foods”. In Frozen, there are two bags of perogies. Odd that they only that that under “frozen” when I got frozen meats, too.

In Bulk Foods, I got more raw pumpkin seeds to supplement the cat food. Produce included a 6 count bag of avocados. I also got 8 ears of corn, cherries and blueberries. All were at much better prices than anywhere else.

Under Meats, there’s a frozen bag of chicken nuggets for quick eats, a pack of ground turkey consisting of 4 plastic chubs of meat. There’s a bag of cheese hoagie style sausages, and a pack of ground beef. The price of beef is insane, and that was the only beef I could justify picking up.

The boneless pork loin was frozen, and a very good price.

Under Seafood, I got a package of frozen Pollock fillets, a package with two fresh pink salmon, whole except for no heads, and a package with two salmon fillets.

It’s really saying something when salmon is cheaper than beef these days.

At the bakery, I was really looking forward to picking up their torpedo buns, but the bakery was mostly empty. Too early in the day, perhaps. All I was able to get there were three $1 baguettes.

Under Deli, I got a little package of fig goat cheese and a Camembert that was discounted 30%, and needs to be eaten quickly. I got an antipasto mix of meats and a dry salami. We have the makings of a charcutier! The “euro pepprini” on the list is a package of small “European Style” dry sausages I got to snack on, on the way home. I don’t know what “European Style” is supposed to mean, but they were a dry sausage with zero heat in them, so I knew I could safely eat them. They were oddly sweet, but quite tasty.

There was have it. A grocery shopping trip that is basically all just food for humans, totaling $263.49 after taxes.

On the way home, I put in $30 in gas and that was it.

There we have it. Our first, smaller, stock up shopping trip. The next one will be Costco, and that one will include more cat food and other sundries, like paper products.

That will be on the last day of the month, which means tomorrow, I get to stay home!

Yay!

The Re-Farmer

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

Stock up shopping, and future food forest! This is what $666 in total looks like.

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$666.59, to be exact!

Plus some extras not pictured.

It was a long day today, that’s for sure.

My daughter and I left rather early to take in a homesteading event near the city. We stopped for gas on the way out and picked up some sandwiches (made by the one restaurant in our little hamlet) and drinks for breakfast, and some pastries (from a very popular bakery in the town to the north of us) for later on. I picked up some lotto tickets, too, so that totaled about $76 and change.

I’m glad we gave ourselves extra time, because the entrance to the location was really hard to see! We drove right past it – then had to find someplace we could turn around!

It was held in a building that was on grounds that included a church and cemetery, and was surrounded by trees. The few parking spots were full, plus there were the vendor vehicles parked closer to the building, rushing to finish unloading. We found a spot to park, though I’m not entirely sure it was actually part of the parking area! We were early enough that we stayed in the truck for a while before going in. Things hadn’t started yet, but it was already full. The room was not particularly large, but it wasn’t small, either.

One vendor caught my attention very quickly; someone local had saplings for sale. He was talking to a customer while frantically trying to put labels and signs up before he had to dash away, so I heard him talking about a few things he had. His was the first talk of the day, though, and he soon had to disappear. I had to ask one of the other vendors where the talks were happening, as I thought it was in another room, but I couldn’t see any other rooms. It turned out to be behind a curtained off area at the far end of the room. When we got there, all the seating was full, and more people were crowded against the far wall, blocking off the canteen! Unfortunately, with all the people talking in the market area, I could hardly hear anything he was saying, though I could make out some of it. My daughter tried going to the opposite corner of the curtained off area to see if she could hear better. She couldn’t, but she did end up talking to the vendor that was there. She had a display of skin care products next to a display of honey products her husband was covering. It turned out they were the organizers for the event! With my daughter discovering she’s allergic to ingredients in a lot of shampoos, deodorants, etc., she was very interested in the skin care display. After I finally gave up trying to hear, I joined them. The vendor not only made all of the products, but grew all of the plants, berries and herbs used in them, plus honey from their own bees. We ended up getting a sample pack of their products, plus a tube of hand lotion made with sea buckthorn, among other things, for the scraggly skin on my hands. Both together cost about $45. I didn’t bother getting a receipt for it.

The vendor with the skin care products was also doing the next talk, which was on regenerative farming. My daughter and I snagged a couple of seats right in the front. It was a very enjoyable talk. It was a lot of stuff I was already familiar with (what is now called regenerative farming was what used to be called subsistence farming, when I was growing up here), but with her, it was all from the perspective of planting for their bees, so heavy on successive flowering plants to provide pollen and nectar from when the bees first emerge in the spring to when they settle in for the winter.

After each talk, there was 10 minutes scheduled for Q&A. I left my daughter to that while I went to hunt down the tree guy. He was busy with customers, so my daughter caught up to me before it was my turn. We ended up looking at another vendor nearby that had soaps, bath bombs and other related products. We ended up getting a bar of herbal soap there that cost about $12. I would normally never spend that much on a bar of soap, but I’m willing to do it once in a rare while!

Then it was my turn with the tree guy. Quite a few of the things he had, we already have, but what really caught my attention was the walnut. I’ve been looking at getting walnut for years, but while they will grow in our zone 3, our growing season isn’t long enough for the nuts to fully ripe.

Well, he not only had year old saplings, but walnut seeds, already cold stratified. He grows them himself, in a smaller city a few hours drive to the west of us. If he can grow walnut to the seed stage there, that means we can, too!

This is what I ended up getting from him.

Bundled together is a gooseberry and a zone 3 variety of eating apple; he showed me so many different ones, I forget the name of the variety I chose. I’ll be able to see the tag when it’s unwrapped. In the pot in a year old walnut, and the bag has 8 walnut seeds in it. He said the trees grow pretty fast, too, and can get up to 40 feet high. He recommended planting them about 20 feet apart. I already know where I intend to plant those. The gooseberry, which already have leaf buds, and the apple tree will go into our food forest area, where we already have highbush cranberry, silver buffaloberry, sea buckthorn and mulberry.

All of these together cost $73.50 after taxes – the total before taxes was actually higher, but he gave me a discount, simply because the mental math was easier! 😄

While there were many other talks my daughter and I were interested in, it was too busy and too noisy, and we were already reaching our limit. They definitely need a larger venue, and a separate room for the speakers. Which is a good problem to have! As we were trying to leave, I ended up having to exit through the entrance simply because parked cars were blocking my way to the exit. When we got to the highway, we found more cars parked on the shoulders!

From there, we headed to another area of the city to do our non-Costco stock up shopping. By then, it was almost noon, so we went to the international grocery store, first, where we could have some dim sum and sushi for lunch. I honestly can’t remember how much that cost, but it was under $30.

There wasn’t a lot that we needed at this store, this time. This is what $175.36 looks like.

We got the short grain rice my daughters prefer (and it does very well, cooked in the Instant Pot), plus some salmon, frozen cooked and frozen raw shrimp for them. I got a bunch of teas that were on sale, including something called Breakfast in Paris. There is also a bag of instant milk tea. We picked up a goat gouda with honey to try, regular milk plus oat milk for my lactose intolerant daughters. There’s the oyster sauce they prefer, plus the soy sauce my husband prefers. We two pieces of slab bacon, one applewood smokes, one regular smoked, a flat of eggs to tide us over until we get our usual double flat at Costco, plus I got myself a Cherry Coke Zero, since I neglected to get myself something to drink with our lunch. Our loyalty card savings came out to $23.54, which was nice.

After we were finished here, our next stop was the Walmart. That turned out to be a much larger trip. This is what $417.73 looks like.

The main things we needed to get was cat food to last us until Costco and feed store trips. There are three 7kg bags of kibble, plus two 32 packs of canned cat food buried in there. My husband requested some sours, but they didn’t have the kind he prefers in stock, so we got two packs of mixed sours that hopefully will still work. There’s a case of Coke Zero and a package of facial tissues under the basket, plus a small package of paper towel buried in the cart.

We went a bit nuts on the frozen heat and eats. These are all things that my husband can cook himself in the multifunction air frier/toaster oven we got to replace the broken microwave. With his medications, his hunger cues and appetite are pretty messed up, so having something he can cook for himself when he does feel able to eat comes in handy. So there are a whole bunch of $10 bags of different types of stuffed chicken, popcorn chicken, meatballs and even corn dogs. Plus, some Pizza Pops to be our heat and eat supper when we got home.

There is a bag of carrots in there, two clamshells of strawberries, four different types of cheese, frozen Basa fillets, three different flavour packs of bouillon cubes, a couple of loaves of bread that my daughter chose and, completely hidden in the cart, a dozen cans of Monster energy drinks, to be split three ways. Last of all is a cold Gatorade my daughter got for the drive home.

So, including the items not pictured, we spent around $830 in gas, groceries, etc., though the food forest items did come out of a completely separate budget.

By the time we got home, it was late enough to feed the outside cats for the evening, but our day wasn’t over yet! My brother and his wife had come here to the farm while we were gone. They had a few things to do around their trailers and stored items, but they also did a huge job that I was able to help out with – which I will cover in my next post!

The Re-Farmer

Additional stocking up: this is what $319 looks like

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After getting as much as I ended up getting yesterday, today’s stock up shopping was mostly cat food. There wasn’t much else on my non-Costco list that I needed to pick up.

I did the shopping while the cats were at the vet, but that will be for another post.

For now, this is what $319.49 looks like.

Not much actual food in there – at least, not for humans!

From the top of the receipt, I picked up some fish fillets for the girls. Hopefully, I’ll find more that’s affordable at Costco, but just in case, I got these. They like their seafood.

The bananas are a good price at Walmart; 79¢/pound. Cherry season is starting, and they were only $3.99/pound, which is almost half of what they normally are.

I picked up some raw, unsalted pumpkin seeds to grind up for the cats. Usually, I include that with their lysine, but my order of lysine hasn’t come in for some reason. I did still have some at home, but I’ve been eating them myself, so I got more for the cats. 😄 I also got walnuts and sunflowers to add to our pantry ingredients.

There are a couple of large bottles of shampoo and conditioner, some Q-tips, hand lotion, plus a package of ankle socks at my daughter’s request. In the multi-discount, there are some sours for my husband.

I just realize. She charged me for 8. I got six. Crud. I should have double checked! I put one on the belt and told her I had 8, but then double counted and corrected to say six. I don’t know when I’ll be at that Walmart again. I’ll need to keep the receipt in my phone case (it’s a wallet type) until then.

Then there is the cat food. I got four 8kg bags of kibble in different flavours, plus two 32 packs of wet cat food. I chose a pate variety pack for both, as we find the cats seem to prefer the cat soup made with pate rather than shredded or chunks. Last of all was a small donation to the food bank.

Aside from that, I also went to the Canadian Tire to pick up a couple more bags of litter pellets. That totaled $16.78 after taxes.

In between things, I noticed one of my tires was low, so I went to a gas station. The prices had gone down from 155.9/L to 143.9/L, so I did get $20 in gas (I’ll fill at Costco), before topping up my tire. The cost of using the air compressor has gone up from $2 to $2.50 since I last used one. Some places are still only $1, and I know of at least one place where it’s free.

Oh, I just remembered. I was going to pick up distilled water for my husband’s CPAP humidifier. I didn’t even see it!

Ah, well. I’ll do that on another trip.

I will do the Costco shopping either tomorrow or Saturday. Preferably tomorrow, with a visit to my mother at the hospital, first. Since I was driving around with cats in the truck, I couldn’t stop to visit while I was out and about today. There are still ongoing tests with her, and they want to send her to the city for more diagnostic imaging soon, but they may not be able to get an ambulance to transport her. Normally, they would get family to do the transport (like I did for my husband when he was in the hospital), but that’s not really an option for her in her condition.

As for our stocking up and cat supplies, we got much more than what I picked up today, but I will cover that in my next post about the kitties! 😊

The Re-Farmer

Not a stock up trip: this is what $262 looks like, ER visit and nasty road conditions (unrelated!)

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My goodness, how things can change in a short time!

Today was supposed to be my day to do our first stock up shopping trip in the city. There’s one major street with several stores I go to that are all conveniently in a row. I save the Costco shopping for another trip.

Then I got a phone call yesterday, late afternoon.

Against our advice, my mother had made an appointment with the doctor in the hospital clinic near her place. They have one doctor that comes in one day a week. That appointment was yesterday afternoon, and a friend from church was driving her. We’ve advised against it as we’ve started the process to try and get her into long term care, and switching doctors could slow that down, but we can’t stop her if she decides otherwise. When she told me about the appointment, I just asked her to call me after and let me know if she had officially switched doctors, so I could call home care and let them know. The only reason she’d told me about it was because I’d called her to pass on a message from the home care coordinator! She had just gotten home from the walk in clinic when I called. She was having issues with her breathing again, which she says has been getting worse. From what I’ve seen the last couple of times I’ve been with her, it definitely has, though she still says it’s the worst when she’s lying down in bed. Apparently, they didn’t actually see her, but made an appointment for the next day.

I didn’t get a call from my mother.

I got a call from the ER in the hospital in her town, instead.

She’d gone to the clinic, but it turned out the appointment was with a nurse practitioner, because the doctor wasn’t there that day. After checking on her and hearing her complaints, he sent her to the ER. They were treating her on the assumption of heart failure, based on the symptoms she described, which she told them she’d had for only a couple of weeks.

She’s been complaining about these symptoms for longer than we’ve been back in this province.

I spoke to the nurse for a while, as my mother was having difficulties remembering her medical history. She asked about the contact numbers they had on file, so I also let them know that I was the nearest of my siblings and to call me first but, if things got to such a point, my brother is PoA, so he would be the one to call for decision making authority. Since this hospital doesn’t have a doctor, they were in the process of doing an EKG, and where then going to transfer her to the nearest ER.

An ER with a doctor.

She mentioned the two most likely ER location possibilities, one of which my mother would probably refuse to go back to, so I filled in about that, too, and why. After we spoke, she told me she would call back once they knew where she would be going.

Which turned out to be the hospital we are closest to.

So much of my evening was spent keeping on top of things and updating my siblings. By the final call I made to the hospital my mother was transferred to, it was concluded that my mother had pulmonary edema.

I had remembered and made sure to call them earlier about the kidney function issues my mother had, some time ago, and this was why she was no longer on water pills. By then, they’d already figured it out.

Pulmonary edema certainly explain her breathing problems!

So my plans changed for today. I was originally going to go to the post office for some packages that came in yesterday, then head towards town to take a particular highway straight into the city and the street with the stores I meant to go to. Instead, I would go to into town to see my mother at the hospital (after phoning to confirm where she was and what room she was assigned to), then go to the city.

After our very warm day, followed by a colder one yesterday, I started seeing all sorts of reports for poor highway conditions, today. All that melting resulted in roads that were icy and snow packed. Today was supposed to be a bit warmer again, but the high winds were back, so now there was blowing snow on top of everything else.

At that point, I was going to decide whether I would go to the city or not, based on what the conditions were like when I got to the hospital to see my mother.

The east-west road to town was not too bad; there were icy patches. Enough to drive below the speed limit, but nothing too excessive – until I got closer to town, when it was all ice.

Then I got to the junction for the highway I would have been taking to go to the city.

It was barricaded in one direction with vehicles, warning cones, people in high viz vests, and a sign saying “emergency scene ahead”. Wherever the emergency scene was, though, it was too far away to see from this intersection. The cross roads are every mile, so that’s not surprising.

My brother was talking about visiting my mother after work, if the roads were safe, so once I parked at the hospital, I updated my siblings on road conditions, as well as posting on the highway conditions group I’m on.

As for my mother, though she has been admitted, she was still in their ER and not yet transferred to her room. They had just finished doing another series of tests on her.

She’s actually doing really well.

She was still wired for EKG; they just need to plug her in for the next test. She had an IV port, but no IV. They’d given her the IV version of her old water pills, and she was already feeling a difference. They’re going to do bloodwork repeatedly to figure out what’s going on with her. She expects to be there for just a few days, though typically, someone admitted with her symptoms would be there for a week.

We had a good visit, and I told her I’ve been keeping my siblings up to day. I also told her about my brother hoping to visit this evening, if road conditions are safe, but they didn’t seem to be. I even checked again while she went to the washroom and found more recent updates from people saying how icy the conditions were on the highways.

As for that accident scene, it turned out a couple of miles of highway was shut down, and the medical helicopter from the city had to be brought in!

My mother said she was just fine without any visits!!

I had already decided by then that I would NOT be going to the city. I’m going to be in the nearer city tomorrow, after dropping the cats off at the vet, anyhow, so I can do most of the stock up shopping there.

After having a good visit with my rather indestructible mother (seriously. She’s amazing), I headed to the local grocery store, instead. I was just going to pick up a few things to tide us over and then head home.

Well, I ended up going an almost stock up trip. I took advantage of a lot of sales.

This is what $262.32 looks like.

Quite a lot of stuff is buried and can’t be seen in the photo.

Because of all the sales, I found myself with a ridiculously long receipt, and had to take two pictures to make it manageable. Here’s the top half.

The cat food was one necessity. We’ve still got feed store kibble, but the inside cats will not eat it! Even the outside cats don’t like this particular brand of feed store kibble, though they do like the other brand this feed store carries. So I got two 8kg bags of house brand kibble, which was a lot more affordable. Hopefully, the cats will actually eat it!

The Basmati rice is for my husband, as we’re low and that’s usually a Costco item. He does love his rice!

My daughter requested and sent funds for energy drinks. The cases of 4 were on sale, so I got two. At Costco, I will pick up a flat for her. The Coke Zero is for my husband and I.

My husband requested nacho fixings and there were sales on, so I got four bags of nacho chips, in hopes to have enough unbroken chips to make a decent sized batch of nachos! The salsa dip is for him as well.

I even remembered to grab garlic powder, as we ran out.

The pre-sliced olives were for the nachos. The canned fruit cocktail was a good sale, so I picked those up as a pantry treat.

I don’t normally buy cereal, but do pick it up as a treat when it’s on sale. Two boxes are in flavours my daughters like, two for my husband and I.

I got a flat of eggs, because we always need eggs. The blocks of cheese were on sale, so I got one regular and one lactose free. We still had cheese at home, but since we’re making nachos, we’ll be using up a lot more than usual in a short time.

I got only 1 pound of butter because it was on sale. I’ll pick up the month’s supply at Costco.

Since we got cereal, I got more regular milk and oat milk. The frozen perogies were another sale item that also got me extra points on my Scene card. The rice crackers were for my husband. It doesn’t show, but those were on sale, as was the bag of McIntosh apples and the baby spinach.

The bacon was also on sale, plus there was a points bonus, so I got two packages. Same with the hot dog wieners. Which means I had to get hot dog buns, which were not on sale. It amazes me that the buns cost more than the wieners! I picked up a couple of loaves of Texas Toast bread, so I got some sliced meats for sandwiches. They are “pizza” meats, but they’ll make good sandwiches, too.

I also picked up more dips for the nachos that my daughters and I like; a 6 layer dip and an artichoke asiago dip.

That made my bill a total of $262.32 after taxes for 43 items, while my total discounts and savings was $57.66, for a 19% savings. I also earned 1230 points with just this trip, which more than doubled my balance. I save the points for times when getting cash off my groceries will be an extra help. As of right now, I could get $20 off, but I’ll save that for a tighter month.

So I ended up getting more than planned, with a lot of things I don’t get very often. We could easily go for some time without a full stock up trip, but after I drop off the cats at the vet tomorrow, I will be close to both a Walmart and a Canadian Tire, which is where I will get specific stock up items without the big city trip. I had been looking forward to going to the international grocery store in the city, as today is the last day for some promotions and sales, but I’ll just have to miss them this time. The Costco trip might be on Friday, or on the weekend.

As for tomorrow, I’m really hoping the roads improve, because there is no way I’m skipping getting the cats to the vet. The rescue set this up for us, and I’d hate to be a no-show. The Cat Lady would understand, but the vet gets so many no-shows, they’ve had to start banning people from their cheap spay days for it. I don’t want to get the Cat Lady in trouble with one of the few vets that gives her such decent discounts! Plus, I will be meeting the Cat Lady, then later on will meet with someone from a feral and stray cats group that has some donated cat food for us.

I would normally live an hour before drop off time, even though it typically takes 45-55 minutes to get to the nearer city, but with potentially bad road conditions, I will plan on leaving even earlier.

I just really hope we can catch either Brussel or the fluffy lady – the ones I am sure are pregnant right now. Sprout has shown up again and had the boys following her around. The last time I saw her, the boys were no longer following her, so she probably is, too. No possibility of catching her without a trap, though. The fluffy lady is our best bet to catch, I think. We’re booked for one male and one female, and we will bring in whichever ones we can snag!

Well, that’s where things stand today. I’ll be calling the hospital again later today to see if there are any updates on my mother. I don’t expect my brother or sister to make the drive out to visit, but there is another highway they could take that is supposed to be in better condition, so we’ll see. Unfortunately, since I’ll be having cats in the truck with me, I won’t be able to visit my mother tomorrow. We’ll see how things go over the next few days.

What would be ideal is for the home care panel to see what’s going on with my mother and this will be enough to get her into the nursing home she wants to be in! That would make her so happy.

We shall see!

The Re-Farmer

A much more effective shop, plus updates

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Yesterday, while in a much larger town, I did a bit of grocery stopping. Just a few things to tide us over until we do our first big stock up shop in the city next week. The grocery store I went to has a really good inventory, and I would have loved to get more, but everything was too expensive.

What I forgot to do was bring our water jugs for refilling, so I needed to do that today. Being a much warmer day, I called my mother to see if she needed any errands done, or if she were up to going to the bank.

Thanks go her Meals on Wheels three times a week, her groceries stretch quite a lot further, so all she needed was milk. The only other thing she wanted were some croissants to go with her tea. She discovered croissants only recently and just loves them, and sometimes the grocery store in her town has some excellent prices on them.

So I decided I would get my water refills at her local grocery store, then maybe pick up the sandwich meats they have that are prices better than I’ve seen anywhere else, including the city, on top of my mother’s two items. She was getting her Meals on Wheels today, so I was going to pick up my own lunch of fried chicken at the gas station before going to her place.

Once at the grocery store, I had time to spare before I knew the gas station’s fried chicken would be ready, so I took my time and looked around.

What a difference from yesterday! This grocery store not only had better regular prices, but there were sale prices that were just awesome. Where, yesterday, I didn’t get the extras I would have wanted to, today I got extras I never expected to pick up!

I didn’t get a chance to get a photo before everything was packed up, so here’s just a picture of the reciept.

From the top, the first item is a jar of sliced pickles for sandwiches. The Dawn Ultra is for our basement, to clean the septic pump’s filter basket.

The “bakery reduced” is three bags of croissants for my mother, that cost only $1.75 each. This is even better than Superstore in the city, where they have clamshells of croissants available for $5, which is a great price, but far fewer croissants for the price compared to the tree bags I got. The 2L of milk was hers, too.

The boneless pork was one of the amazing sale prices; you can see on the receipt that the sale price discounted over $17 – more than half price for a very good sized roast! It was the thing with the fresh chicken legs and thighs. I ended up getting two packages of those. If I’d had the budget for it, I would have gotten more!

I got around 500 grams each of the sliced deli meats; the maple ham was a touch under, while the two chicken breasts were a touch over. That is their regular price, which is about $2/100g lower than most places.

The instant pudding was a spur of the moment thing. Four boxes for $5 is a really excellent price, as you can see by the amount discounted. While I just got a flat of 30 eggs yesterday, when I saw that the 18’s of house brand eggs were priced lower than a dozen, I just had to grab one. We can never have too many eggs! The rye breads are regular price; the same brand and price that we get at Walmart.

The water refills were the one thing that is more expensive, both the new caps and the water itself.

So of all this, $9.44 was for my mother. Which means that, of the $106.60 total, after taxes, we paid only $97.16 for our own stuff.

Which was a heck of a lot more than what we paid almost $130 for, yesterday! Particularly since I ended up getting so much meat on this trip!

After I finished the shopping, making sure to bag my mother’s stuff separately, I had time to spare before I would go to the gas station to pick up some fried chicken and wedges for lunch, so I went to a small department store to see what they had. I remembered there were a couple of things my mother wanted from there. One was a candle, for when she says her prayers. The other were slipper socks of some kind. Her feet get cold at night, so she wanted something she could sleep with. I actually found both, though I’m not sure if the slipper socks will work for her. They are supposed to be one size fits all, but my mother has massive bunions, and that might be a problem. We shall see.

I still had extra time, so I parked at the gas station and messaged with my brother for a bit. When I did my morning rounds, I checked the ejector, as he asked, but the pump hadn’t gone off during the night, so there was just fresh snow in front of it. I did feel the heat tape and it was warm, so that’s still working. Before I left home, I made sure to top up the filter on the septic pump and asked my family to keep an ear out for it, as it would probably go off while someone was taking a shower.

After updating my brother on things, I went inside, only to find all the chafing dishes were completely empty. Not even the potato wedges or deep fried perogies and pizza pops that get cooked first were there.

It turns out their frier was on the fritz. The food was being cooked, but it would be a while before anything would be ready.

Thankfully, they had a bank machine, so I took some cash out and went to the Chinese restaurant next to my mother. They are cash only. It’s been a few months since I’ve gotten anything there, so I was far from unhappy with having to change plans.

From there, I finally went to my mother’s. Today was warm enough that I didn’t need to worry about my groceries and the water jugs freezing in the truck cab.

Since I was able to get what my mother needed along with my own stuff, after we had lunch, I did other errands for her. It was her day to do laundry, so I changed her bedding for her, which was enough to make two loads for her. Once those were started, I did some light housework for her, and all those little things that she now finds difficult to do. The one unusual thing was trying to figure out why her TV wasn’t working After trying various things, it just kept reverting to a message saying to check the network connections. I checked everything I could think of before I finally took a picture of the message on the screen and sent it to my brother; he bought her this TV and did all the setting up, so he knows it a lot better than I do. A quick message back from him, and I found the setting that my mother somehow accidentally turned off. She has a habit of button mashing her remote control when things don’t work the way she expects, but when things go wrong, she has no idea what she did that caused it!

All in all, we were able to have a pretty good visit today, which is really unusual for the length of time that I was there. I really appreciate days like today. No personal attacks. No attacks on my family. Only mild attempts to attack my brother that I could easily address. No racist rants or bizarrely conflated topics she likes to rage about, even though she has no idea that she’s talking about completely different things. She still can’t figure out why she’s getting fundraising mail from a political party she is no longer a member of. I’ve told her, she’s on a mailing list and would need to ask to be removed. She things that “the government” (meaning, the federal government) is spending all this money to mail things out using taxpayer dollars. I’ve tried to explain to her that party mail is paid for by party members and party donations. They cannot use federal funds for stuff like this. I can tell she simply does not understand what I’m trying to explain.

One thing she did bring up is that she is noticing her own cognitive decline. She’s still convinced that she is dying, and told me she’s feeling all sort of pains, but it’s different now. How is it different? All she could do was vaguely gesture at her chest and stomach. She just doesn’t have the vocabulary, or understanding of anatomy, to explain what she is feeling and where. Aside from that, though, she’s finding it harder to remember words she uses regularly.

She’s still doing pretty darn good for being 93 years old! She does acknowledge that and is grateful for it. But she does need to be in assisted living of some kind!

At least she does live in town, and has home care coming in three times a day for medical assist with her prescriptions. The help she needs, though, home care out here cannot provide, nor can my siblings and I.

So we do the best we can. In the end, my mother really is doing amazingly well to still be living independently! I would not be at all surprised if she outlives us all. 😄

Anyhow.

Once done at my mothers, I got home while it was still light out (I am SO loving the longer days!). After the truck was unloaded, I made sure to check the ejector. The pump had gone off while my daughter was showering, and I could see by the melted splash area that the ejector still has a decent amount of pressure behind it.

On checking the pump, I saw the water level in the filter was getting low, so I topped it up again. After putting the lid back on, I could see air bubbling in from the intake opening as it started to drain. It has to be the back valve again. I took some video of the bubbling and updated my brother about it. He’s not saying much but, knowing him, he’ll probably find a way to come out this weekend to look at it again.

Tomorrow, though, we have to do a much needed trip to the dump, since we didn’t do it during our recent deep freeze. The dump is open longer hours on Saturdays, and I hope to get that done as early as possible. We’re supposed to be colder tomorrow, but nothing extreme. For the next while, it’s going to feel like spring!

I’m quite looking forward to it.

The Re-Farmer

An unplanned stock up trip

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Normally, I’d be saying “this is what $X looks like, but I don’t have the photos, this time!

Today, my daughter and I were going to make a trip into town and then, if the truck was behaving, a trip to the nearer city to go to Walmart and Canadian Tire.

My daughter needed to go to town first, and take care of some paperwork at the pharmacy. It was coming up on noon by the time she was done, and neither of us had had breakfast, so we had lunch in town, too.

As our shopping lists had grown, my daughter suggested we just go to the larger city, instead. The nearer Walmart is pretty small and the selection isn’t as good. We decided it was worth the extra drive and did that, instead.

Our first stop in the city was the Canadian Tire, where I picked up a couple of bags of litter pellets.

It was a very dangerous trip for me.

The seed displays are up, and the garden supplies are being set up!

Including a portable greenhouse I’ve been eyeballing for a while now, that was at 52% off. I really didn’t have the budget for it yet, though. I did find a replacement snow brush for the one I broke trying to knock ice away from the tires on the truck a while back. It was on clearance, so I was able to get a much better quality one this time.

Total spent at Canadian Tire, after taxes, was $29.09

From there, we went to the Walmart. I wanted to pick up a bit more cat food and some fresh produce, plus my husband had his own shopping list on a different budget. I didn’t get a picture of the cart, as his stuff was in there, plus I shared the cart with my daughter and her own shopping. Here is the receipt, though.

I got a 32 pack of wet cat food, plus a large back of kibble, which was on my list. The inside cats don’t like the feed store kibble, so I got them this, and the feed store kibble will be for the outside cats.

I remembered to grab a package of regular facial tissues, plus a couple of square packages for the truck that fit in the console between the front seats.

Not on the list was a 24 pack of Cream of Mushroom soup that was on sale for 77¢ each. They are usually almost double that price.

We were almost out of Basmati rice, which is what my husband likes. Normally, we get that at Costco, but I picked up an 8lb bag here. Hopefully, it is a good brand.

There are carrots, which were on sales, a 2L of 3% milk, a couple of pounds of salted butter, mushrooms and bananas. I also picked up some bouillon cubes – vegetable, chicken and mushroom – and a cannister of beef bouillon powder.

I grabbed a couple of bags of pasta that was on sale, and a package of frozen fish filets for the girls. I also got a couple of blocks of cheese that are 2/$12, plus a block of lactose free cheese for the girls.

Aside from a donation, that was it. $200.25 after taxes.

I had intended to get more fresh produce and maybe some meat, but most of it just didn’t look all that good. My daughter was also not able to find some of what was on her list, so we decided to hit the international grocery store for the rest.

Which turned out to be much more productive, with a lot of sales, plus loyalty card bonuses.

Thankfully, I was able to take advantage of it.

This is what $203.03 after taxes looks like.

Along with the sale prices, this week had an extra 20% off all produce as a loyalty card bonus.

Oops. I just realized the top item is cropped off. That’s avocados. Also on the produce bonus sale were blueberries – I got 4 clamshells of those – celery, bagged salads (I got 4 bags each of 3 different types), both red and green grapes, a 10 lb bag of Russet potatoes and a couple of yams.

I got chicken legs and thighs, plus two packages of ground turkey, which were all 25% off. I also got some pork chops and locally produced smoked bacon slab. I also remembered to get some onion soup mix that I forgot to get at Walmart.

Among the non-food items, my daughter found some hair oil for me to try, as the oil I usually use it getting way too expensive. We also remembered to grab some wet wipes for the truck, on finding ourselves finishing off the container we had, just today. I like to keep wet wipes in our vehicles. They come in very handy!

As the day was getting long, I decided to pick up food for supper. For the girls, I could a couple of trays of sushi, and a couple of Chinese food dinners for my husband and I. Then I spotted a display of Bento meals, so I got one of those for myself, so that my husband could have the other two meals. Last of all, I got a drink for the drive home, as I was feeling pretty dehydrated.

In the end, I ended up saving $74.41 with the double sale prices, and instead of what would have been 200 points, I got 4,900 points. I like to save these up for around Christmas, as I can usually get a free turkey or two with them.

Aside from that, we got $30 in fuel before we left town for the city. While in the city, I saw the gas prices were quite a bit better, so I got a fill that ended up costing $28 and change.

So, altogether, this stock up trip ended up costing $432.37, plus about $58 in fuel.

The fridge is very full right now!

We definitely got a lot more for our money at the international grocery store than the Walmart, so I’m glad we ended up making the trip into the city. It was pure chance that we got these double sales, and today was the last day for them, too.

My daughter had her own shopping list for herself and her sister. One of the things they picked up was their favourite sushi rice.

Which they now use the Instant Pot to cook, regularly!

I’m so glad they are enjoying their early Christmas present, and actually finding it useful! 😊

Today has definitely been a good day. With all the bad days we’ve been having lately, with things breaking down or freezing or flooding or… I am extra grateful for the good ones we get!

The Re-Farmer

Costco extra stocking up: this is what $899 looks like

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I am exhausted.

It was a good trip. The actual shopping wasn’t too bad, considering the time of year. I’m just getting drained, and it’s starting to have an effect on me.

With Christmas and New Year’s coming up, which changes when my husband’s disability payments come in, I decided to go into next month’s budget and get as much as I could on this trip. So this shopping trip included larger packages or extra items to stock us up into January. Plus, I’ve started to get things that we will be having for New Year’s in particular. We have decided to make our Christmas and New Year’s celebratory meals to be as stress free as possible. So there will be a lot of frozen appetizers as finger foods, heat and eats, etc. We will likely do some charcuterie as well, so some items, plus any fresh foods, will be picked up locally, closer to Christmas.

We already have a turkey in the freezer, plus we are getting our 1/8 beef next week. We’d been making monthly payments against that until the ranch told us they thought there was enough. The beef has been butchered and is being cut and frozen now, so they got the final weight, and it turned out we overpaid for our share. We will be getting a credit on that. I would have preferred extra beef, but they don’t butcher for general sales anymore; just pre-ordered beef shares, so there was no extra available. So we didn’t need to get a lot of meat this trip, not did we need to get as much cat food.

On the way out, the truck’s tank was below half, so I did stop at a gas station in my mother’s town along the way. I got $30 of gas, at $1.309.

As had been my plan when I tried to do this trip last week, I stopped at a shopping mall, first. It was past 11 by then, and I hadn’t had breakfast yet. This time, the food court was all open, though, and I ended up getting some Chinese food. That cost about $18 and change.

Once at the Costco, my first stop was to fill the tank. The Costco price for regular gas was $1.119 and it cost me $47 and change to fill the tank. So before I even started shopping, I already spent $77 in gas and $18 on food.

This is what $899.82 at Costco looks like.

I got a shot from each side, because so much was hidden from view.

So what did I get for almost $900

For the cats, I got two 9kg bags of kibble and a box of puppy pads. There is a case of Coke Zero for my husband and I, plus a case of energy drinks, which my daughter paid for. Also among the drinks list was a large box of Earl Grey tea and some iced tea mix. I also got some Eggnog, which was on sale, mostly for the girls, and a case of oat milk, completely for the girls.

Paper produces included toilet paper and paper towels. I probably should have got more facial tissues, but I didn’t want to take up too much space on the flat cart. I needed room for the big bag of sugar and the case of vinegar.

Also among the non-food items is some dish detergent, toothbrushes and a package of pens. I was out of normal coloured pens.

In the pharmacy section, I got both acetaminophen and ibuprofen, plus adult gummie multivitamins for my daughters.

For bread products, I got a couple of 2 pks of rye bread, four packages of tortilla warps and a 3 pack of sunflower and pumpkin seed, multigrain sliced bread.

For protein, I got a package of chicken breasts that was on sale, plus some tilapia fillets for the girls. I also got a panini pack for sandwiches, with canned chicken and pack of Spam for the pantry. There’s also a double flat of eggs (5 dozen).

In dairy, I got 5 pounds of butter, whipping cream, a 3 pack of cream cheese, mozza, Old cheddar, marble cheddar, goat cheese and a wheel of brie.

There’s also a bag of spinach and mini portabellas (aka: cremini mushrooms).

Among the jarred items, there are two big jars of mayo, olives and pickled asparagus, which was on sale. The pickled asparagus will be used, along with tortilla warps and cream cheese, to make appetizer pinwheels for our celebratory dinners.

There is a bag of Basmati rice and some hazelnuts. Oh, and a 3 pack of 4 cheese, rainbow tortellini, which was on sale.

For snacks, I got my husband a big back of Munchies Mix, and two boxes of Sweet and Salty granola bars for the four of us.

Then there are the frozen items. Along with a box of perogies and a box of Pizza Pops for quick heat and heats, we have the appetizers for our celebratory dinners. There are Mac n Cheese bites – something we’ve never tried before – mozza sticks, bacon wrapped scallops and mini quiche.

And that’s everything.

Hopefully, I won’t need to go another Costco trip until February! Or at least not until mid-January.

So it was a very productive trip, though part way through the shopping, I realized I was not doing well. I was over heating, but also getting very dehydrated. I did use their public water fountain about half way through my shopping, which helped a lot, but by the time I was standing in line to pay for the stuff, I was starting to feel dizzy and getting the shakes. I was at least getting a breeze from the giant fan above, while half taking off my coat and removing my hat, which helped.

While my items were being rung through and they were doing the stuff still on the flat cart, I dashed over to a water bottle vending machine and got one to start hydrating once back at the till. It wasn’t a large bottle, so by the time I loaded everything into the truck, I’d finished it off. I also keep water in the truck, and still had half my drink from my lunch, so I was able to continue hydrating for the ride home, and was feeling much better.

My back was also starting to give out, well before I reached the till, but that was also much better by the time I got home. An hour or so of sitting instead of walking around, wrestling the flat cart, helped a lot.

I was able to back the truck up quite close to the house, making it easier to unload. My daughter’s knee was still hurting her from her fall yesterday, but she was no longer using a cane. Once the truck was empty, I had to feed the outside cats to get them away from the truck – by then, it was starting to get dark and time to feed them, anyhow – so I could park it. Once I got back to the house, I also got some warm water to top up their bowls. The big water bowl in the sun room just had sheets of ice left in it, and the working heated water bowl in the shelter was almost dry!

The babies in the isolation shelter still had plenty of water. They got canned cat food with their morning feeding, along with the kibble. There was still kibble left in their bowl, but the wet food was long gone!

Unfortunately, as I was unloading bags to the door, I spotted Kohl digging around on the cat bed on the lower level. The little bugger had just pooped on the cat bed, instead of the littler box, right next to her!

Both of them seem much calmer now, but Kohl would not let me touch her, never mind pet her, or check her incision. I’m not too concerned about her, though. I’m more relieved the male it no longer panicking and trying to bash his way out through the wire mesh walls. They were both watching us closely, as we unloaded the truck, right near them.

When I topped up their kibble, neither tried to escape or anything like that. When I reached in to try to pet Kohl, I could feel it is nice and warm in there. I’ve been keeping the Cat Lady up to date on how they are doing, and she was very relieved to hear they are doing well. For all the effort we’re making to provide them with a safe, warm shelter during their recovery, the isolation shelter is still basically just a small box outside in the winter. She would really like to find homes for them. I told her to go ahead and share the photos I’d been sending her, and to tell people these two will be released to the yard again, after their recovery period. Hopefully, that will encourage someone to want to adopt and rescue them from the outdoors and give them an indoor forever home. It doesn’t hurt that they are both so incredibly adorable!

So, that’s my running around for today. Tomorrow, the dump is oven longer hours, and we are overdue for a trip, so I am hoping to get our garbage and recycling finally out. From there, I should be able to continue on to the feed store with the brand of kibble in 40 pound bags that the cats like better. As of right now, the high for tomorrow is expected to be 3C/37F, which makes it the ideal time to repair the wind torn vinyl around the catio. Plus, there are some tears in the vinyl around the bottom of the isolation shelter, where other cats were trying to get in. We should be able to patch those up with the extra vinyl table protectors I picked up while I was waiting for the vet to finish with the spay and neuter, yesterday.

Which means tomorrow will be another day of running around. Thankfully, I will be able to stay home on Sunday. I’ll be going to my mother’s on Monday. She has a telephone doctor’s appointment, and she wants me with her, since I help her remember things, and can understand what the doctor tells her and can spend the time to explain it to her later.

Meanwhile, I really, really glad to get this stock up shop done, even if it did get pretty expensive. This is meant to last us longer than usual, and will hopefully result in a quieter time over the holidays.

I’ve reached that stage in life where quite and boring is all I want! 😄😄

The Re-Farmer