Quick & Easy Garlic Bread

I know I said that the next recipe coming from The Farmhouse Skillet was going to be fried chicken, and it still is coming up soon.  I took the pictures yesterday and hope to have it posted next week. BUT...in the mean time I just wanted to share this quick and easy idea with you.

A New Addition to the Kitchen

Something new has been added to the kitchen. 

 Can you spot it?

Remember, below is what it looked like before. 

 (This is on top of the fridge by the way.)

Repurposed Ribbon Spool

Sometime in the weeks before Christmas I saw a picture in one magazine or another that inspired this project.  In one of the scenes there were little decorative boxes in a vignette that looked like they used to be ribbon spools.  I wondered if I could use a similar idea only turn them into gift boxes.

Well, I never got around to trying it out at Christmas, so instead I gave them a Valentine's twist.

Boneless Skinless Chicken Breast for .99/lb

This is the first of many planned cooking posts in the newest section of my blog, "The Farmhouse Skillet."  Thank you to Jodi M. for coming up with the name, and to all the other Facebook fans for the creative suggestions you gave me.  I liked several of them, but in the end chose this one for more reasons than you probably care about so I'll spare ya the details and get straight to today's post.

Now, this isn't a recipe or even an actual "cooking" post, but we use a lot of chicken around The Farmhouse and I'll be sharing lots of chicken recipes.  So, I thought I'd share with you the cheapest, most frugal way to buy chicken and then what to do with it.

Boneless skinless chicken breast (will refer to this as BLSL chicken from here on out) is great for SO many recipes, but let's face it, convenience can be down right expensive.  The cheapest I've ever found BLSL chicken is on a mark down at Walmart for 1.38/lb.  That's a pretty good price and when I find it that low I stock up.  Otherwise, the absolute cheapest way to get BLSL chicken breast is to wait for split breasts to go on sale for .99/lb. (I price matched mine at Walmart.)  It requires a little more work from you, but in the end you'll have meat for at least 3 different kinds of meals.  It really is worth it.  So, watch your sale papers and when you find it for .99/lb, stock up.  Not just with what you'll need for that week, but if you have the freezer space stock up on what you think your family will eat over the next 4-6 weeks.  That's usually about the length of the sales cycles and you'll have plenty on hand until the next time it goes on sale again.

An Unexpected Adventure

Earlier in the week I told you about an unexpected junkin' adventure I had.  Last weekend we had some business/errands to do about an hour away from where we live, so we packed the family in the car and made a day trip of it.  I knew there was a large Goodwill retail store there and I was secretly hoping I could sweet talk Hubby into letting me stop in.

Well...our errands took us to a part of town we had never been to and before I could even make my wishes known, what did we just happen to drive past?  A Goodwill OUTLET store!!  Thankfully my sweet Hubs was willing to keep the kiddos in the car and let me run in.  I had heard of these outlet stores before, on other people's blogs and also from my junkin' buddy.  She had actually been to this one and told me all about it, but I had completely forgotten it was there.  So, I had heard the "tales" and just had to experience this for myself.

I took these pictures with my phone while I was on the go, so they're a bit blurry.

It was HUGE in there and everywhere you looked were these large rolling bins that were just piled with stuff.  I did a quick survey around the store to assess the layout.  Clothes in the left corner (no interest there at the time), shoes and purses in the back left (no interest there either), large furniture in the back right.  Everything else was lumped together smack dab in the middle.  I grabbed a cart and headed in.

Winter Coffee Table Vignette

Over the weekend I had an unexpected junkin' adventure that I can't wait to share you with you.  I found some great treasures and I'm excited to give you the full scoop.  My Facebook fans got a little taste of it when I shared snippets of it with them.  If you haven't already, be sure to stop by and "like" the page.  You're missing out on half the fun if you don't!   So stayed tuned for that adventure later in the week.

But for today, I'm sharing my winter coffee table vignette.

Last week I shared the winter mantel with you, and promised some more to go with it. 

 I hope you enjoy what I came up with.

Keeping with the white and silver palette I had going on with the mantel, I shopped my house for some more items to create this gathering.

And the Winner Is.....

The winner of the $25 Hobby Lobby gift card has been picked by Rafflecopter.com.

Congratulations to

a Rafflecopter giveaway

An email has already been sent, so if you're the winner check your inbox and get back to me right away with your mailing info!

Thank you SO very much to everyone who joined in the fun and for following along on my thrifty adventures!