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Home is where the heart is. And since our hearts want to be thrifty and green, that’s what we work toward with these posts. Read about home projects, cleaning and organizing, and food (meal plans and recipes).

I Fixed Our Fridge’s Ice Dispenser for $20.14

June 26, 2024

Joni Smith

Home Projects, Saving on Shopping

About 4 months ago, our refrigerator stopped dispensing ice. It would still provide nice cold water, but whenever we switched to the ice setting, the fridge would just make a clicking noise. I immediately assumed that it would be an expensive fix (which turned out to be wrong). I’m embarrassed to say that I didn’t really look into it much at the time and just started emptying the ice into a bucket that we kept in the freezer. I just…

Easy Leftover Ham Soup

April 11, 2023

Joni Smith

Food

If you bought ham on sale for Easter like we did, you may be finding yourself with a lot of leftovers right about now! We bought a big spiral sliced ham for $1.49/lb at Aldi last week- a great deal on meat! I like to eat it in 4 main ways. One, obviously eaten as slices of ham with sides. Two, as ham sandwiches. Three, in cheesy ham and egg casserole. And fourth, ham soup! In this post, I’m sharing…

Heirloom Traditions Paint Pros and Cons – Kitchen Makeover

March 22, 2023

Joni Smith

Budgeting, Home Projects

I finally painted my kitchen in February – and I picked Heirloom Traditions Paint. Read on to learn Heirloom Traditions Paint pros and cons. Spoiler alert: I want to use it on everything now!

Switch to 100% wind power and save on your electric bill

February 8, 2021

Joni Smith

Home, Money Saving Apps

This post is about how my family switched our electric bill to 100% wind power and actually saved money every month on our bill.

Simple 6-Ingredient Slow Cooker Chili for when your food supply is running low

March 31, 2020

Joni Smith

Food

There’s a good chance you have the ingredients you need to make this simple chili– even if you’re running low on food at home.
It only requires 6 ingredients!

Stuck at Home? Take the “Food On Hand” Mega Meal Plan Challenge

March 22, 2020

Joni Smith

Food, Saving on Shopping

Inspired by current events and the need for my family to self-isolate, I decided to do the “Food On Hand” Mega Meal Plan Challenge. After inventorying all of our food, we were able to make a meal plan that should last us at least 3 more weeks – without going grocery shopping!

Save BIG Money by Shopping Online: Real Life Scenario Refrigerator Edition

February 28, 2020

Joni Smith

Home, Money Saving Apps, Saving on Shopping

In this post, I share how you can save money on a refrigerator. Our family bought our refrigerator for half off the retail price simply by shopping online. We literally saved more than $1,600 on a brand new refrigerator!!!

What happened when I decluttered for a month – week 2

March 11, 2019

Joni Smith

Cleaning & Organizing

Decluttering our entire home is one of my new year’s resolutions (again). To help me reach my decluttering goal, I’m reading “31 days to a clutter-free life.” This post is about what I did to declutter the kitchen during week 2 of reading.

Lessons I learned from a DIY Fail: Microwave

February 27, 2019

Joni Smith

Home Projects, Saving on Shopping

Sometimes, DIY projects don’t go as planned. But that doesn’t mean that they can’t provide plenty of lessons and still work out in the end. Find out what happened when our Microwave broke and we tried to fix it.

What happened when I decluttered for a month – Week 1

February 22, 2019

Joni Smith

Cleaning & Organizing

Decluttering is happening at the Smith house this month. If that’s one of your goals for this year too, please join me as I concentrate on decluttering for a month. Check out how week 1 went and see before/after photos.