On Saturday night one of my 17 year old daughter’s friends was killed in a solo crash. He crashed head on into an oak tree and died instantly. I can’t imagine the heartbreak that his poor parents must be feeling. My heart goes out to them.

Its so sad how life can change in an instant and the things that seemed so important right now really aren’t anything in the big scheme of life. The only things that really matter are the relationships we have with family and friends.

I think old Newt has some good points here.

Last week I was reading Blogging Away Debt, the topic was kitchen gadgets.  She got me thinking about all the kitchen gadgets I have that I don’t use and there’s a lot.  Honestly I don’t know what I was thinking when I bought half of them.

The other day while doing some grocery shopping I came across this banana slicer and it cracked me up for some reason.  Prior to my blogging and trying to payoff this mountain of  debt, I bet I would have been a sucker and bought this little gadget.  It’s priced at an unbelievably expensive $3.99!  I can just hear the “old me” thinking what a great idea this would be for the kids to use…. Like the kids ever slice bananas and even if they did what’s wrong with using a butter knife?

I hope I’m evolving into someone that knows to avoid a dumb purchase when I see it.

I don’t get paid to post any of this free stuff.  I just like to share.

Free Stuff from Walmart - American Greetings card

Free pack of Stride Gum

Free pair of Heavy Putter boxers

Free tee shirts:
from Gusto
from Get Clerk’d

GOJO - hand cleaner.  This stuff is really good especially for grease

Lancaster Free Sample of anti aging skin product

Wild flower seeds from Burts Bees

Free magazine subscriptions: Seed magazine, Women’s Day, and Home magazine

Okay, I may be a little late to discover this sweet little tool you can use from your cell phone.  It’s called Google SMS and it’s free, provided you have a text messaging plan.  You can text Google at 466453 (it’s Google spelled out) and get weather reports, sports scores, movie information in your city, stock prices, postal codes, driving directions, flight information, area codes, translations, etc.

Example #1:  I want to know what the weather is like in Houston, TX so I texted “weather Houston, TX” to Google.  I got back the temp for the next 3 days and found out there is a chance of a storm all three days.  It also told me the humidity and wind.

Example #2:  I want to know where I can get pizza in Atwater, CA, so I texted “pizza Atwater CA” and got 2 text messages from Google and found out three different places I can buy pizza in Atwater.

Example #3:  I want to find out what times the movie Get Smart is playing in movie theaters in Santa Rosa, CA, so I texted “get smart santa rosa ca”.  There are a bunch of theaters there so Google sent me four text messages with the movie times for five different theaters.

How cool is that???  If you decide to use Google SMS check with your cell phone provider and make sure you have a text messaging plan, I’d hate to see anyone get an unexpectedly high bill at the end of the month.

I’m sure it’s all over the news everywhere, California has 800+ fires that were started by lighting.  I live in Northern California and the is air thick with smoke, we haven’t been able to see the sun since Saturday.  Last night when it cooled off we opened our front door to let the cool night air in and the air that blew in the house set off the smoke detector!  We ended up having to shut the door.

All this smoky air is doing a number on my already dried out nose.  My nose got so dried out, cracked and bleeding that on Tuesday out of desperation, I went to the feed store and bought bag balm - the stuff they put on the teets of dairy cows and shoved some of that up my nose.  It worked like a charm!  (I’m not a doctor so if you use bag balm use it at your own risk.)

I’ve been super busy on Monday we went and dropped off two of my girls at 4-H camp.  I’ve been down to just two kids this week, my house is extremely quiet and I’m not liking it one bit.  I really miss the girls.  Tomorrow my husband and I are picking them up and I can’t wait to hear all about camp.

My husband has been working from home all this week.  His cell phone is basically his job.  While I LOVE having him home 24/7 I’m also missing the time I used to have alone.  I guess I want it all - him home and my time alone.  Maybe this is what happens after 13 years of marriage?

I got another website/store up and running.  I’m hoping to build another in the next week or so and then submit them both to directories and search engines at the same time.  Including this blog I have 4 sites up and running and about 20 more I’d like to get going, it’s just a matter of finding the time.  So far my online earnings total about $70 and all if it was from completing surveys.

I found this cool list of 100 things you can make yourself at Simply Thrifty. She has links to make all sorts of things you can make yourself including, crayons, a guitar, a lava lamp, cheese, a hula hoop, potato chips, socks, donuts, peanut butter, pudding pops, beer , chocolate kisses, pancake mix, dog treats, etc…  Check it out!

I need to make some pudding pops!

I don’t get paid to post any of this free stuff.  I just like to share.

Free Stuff from Walmart:
Cheerios Multigrain Cereal
Pup Peroni - Dog Treats
Nutritioniste Skin Renew Lotion
Serenity Tena Underwear
Playtex Personal Cleansing Cloths

Own a piece of American - Free land!  I’m not sure if this is a real offer or not but it’s interesting

Free sample Odor B Gone - removes the smell of cat urine

Free Magazines:
CBS Watch!Women’s Day - 1 FREE year
WakeBoarding - 12 FREE issues
Sport Fishing
MacWorld - Digital
On Target - Digital hunters & shooters magazine
True Confessions

A niche website that I built and launched about two weeks ago was taking forever for Google to cache.  I’m new to all this webmaster stuff and really don’t know what I’m doing.  I’ve taken some time to  submit that particular website to a bunch of Web Directories and search engines.  Last night I Googled the web site’s keywords and to my HUGE surprise it not only showed up on Google but it was the first listing!

I have a popshops store on that site, I’m mostly using merchants from commision junction.  Popshops allows a website owner to set up stores easily, using multiple merchants.  If you have a website and want to set up a store I high recommend popshops - it’s free!

As many of you know, she graduated high school last week.  Now she thinks that since she has a high school diploma she deserves more than minimum wage.  I’ve tried to talk her out of quitting, she has seniority and her employers are willing to schedule her to work around HER schedule.  She doesn’t understand how valuable her employer being flexible with her hours will be to her when she starts college in the fall.

She’s been working as a “courtesy clerk” at our local grocery store for over a year and a half and her employers have only had good things to say about her yet they play the broke card and tell her they can’t afford to give her a 10 cent an hour raise.  With her working 30 hours a week the raise would cost them $3.00 a week.  With their inflated prices, they can more than afford to give her a raise but since we live in such a tiny town (less than 1,500) people, they know if she quits there will be at least 20 other kids lined up to take her job.

Now I’ll tell you another reason why I think she wants to quit.  I got her a job waitressing at a local breakfast - lunch type of restaurant on weekends, the place only has 10 indoor tables and about 6 outdoor tables, it’s tiny but really popular.  She started on Father’s Day.  The waitresses pool their tips and split them evenly since they all help each other out.  The owner ended up paying my daughter in CASH $51 for 3 hours of work… that’s $17 an hour!  Now I’m afraid she’s thinking she’s always going to make tips like that and get paid that much money.

I laid down rules when she printed out her two week notice, for the grocery store, last night.  If she doesn’t have the money for car insurance & gas, she won’t be driving, PERIOD!  She doesn’t turn 18 until the fall and I don’t plan on financing her driving, hell I can’t afford to finance her driving even if I wanted to.