I've always loved Dollar Tree. They always have a really good selection of products and a lot of name brand items all for $1.00 or less. Just last year our Dollar Tree put in a freezer section and expanded their food aisles.

They have Campbells & Progresso soups now. Tons of canned vegetables, noodles, tortillas. I already discount grocery shop at Bottom Dollar & Food Basics. But wow my Dollar Tree has really stepped up it's game! I wanted to share some of my awesome Dollar Tree grocery finds!

Frozen Fruit! My dollar store now has frozen fruit! Even Aldi & Walmart charge $3+ for frozen fruit. I can now get frozen strawberries & blackberries for $1! I love making smoothies so these come in handy. Plus I sometimes take Crystal Light lemonade powder & frozen strawberries and blend with ice for strawberry lemonade! Yum! 


This isn't even half of the frozen vegetables Dollar Tree now offers. These are just some of my favorites!


This has to be the craziest dollar store find ever. Real frozen baby shrimp at the dollar store! They even had the full shell shrimp, (but I don't like their little heads, lol. They creep me out). Think I'm going to make a Thai stir fry with these baby shrimp & some veggies one night!

Frozen stuffed cheese ravioli & name brand tomato sauce. So neat! Hoping these Ravioli were worth $1! :-)


We also got these amazing skins on, garlic & onion fries last week. But this week they were out of stock, so I don't have a picture of the package. They reminded me of KFC's wedge fries. They were really amazing & only $1!


And no; I'm not getting paid to advertise Dollar Tree! I just really really love them!

I'm guest blogging at A Day in my NYC today! Please check out Patty's blog, she is one of my long time blog readers & one of my good blogging friends! My guest post is about long distance relationships, something I am very familiar with! :-)

Here is the post I wrote:

Hello! I'm Sarah Lynn from the blog 'Tunay Na Mahal' (which translates to "true love" in Tagalog, the Philippines national language). Patty asked me to do a guest post and I wanted to speak from something I have a lot of experience with. Long distance relationships!

If anyone is the queen of long distance relationships... I am probably it. My husband and I dated for 5 years long distance before getting married in December 2009. We even spent the first year of our marriage apart due to immigration.

And when I say long distance... I mean it! My husband is from the Philippines. A whole day ahead from Philadelphia. 12 hours apart- (13 hours during daylight saving time). Somehow during our 6 years apart, we made it work. And now we are finally together in the same time zone! Long distance relationships are not easy but they can work if you put enough time and commitment into them. My husband and I are proof of that. We have been together seven years now and married almost two.

How did we do it? LOT'S of communication and trust. Unfortunately it's pretty expensive to call the Philippines ($1.99 a minute!) My husband and I only talked on the phone for special occasions (birthday's, anniversaries, etc). I kept a phone card handy for those times because the rates were cheaper.

We made time to have a "date" every weekend. This took some commitment from both of us. We would meet online every weekend on Yahoo messenger. We would meet on my lunch break at work; while in the Philippines it was 12am and my husband's day was ending.

We texted. A lot. We emailed each other several times a week. We wrote letters and sent packages for special occasions. My husband didn't have a webcam because he had dial up internet, but I'm sure if we had both had a fast internet connection that would have been another way for us to connect. We were able to chat sometimes through headsets on Yahoo messenger, if the connection behaved.

I traveled to the Philippines almost yearly. And yes; it was very expensive. I worked all year long to save up enough money. I would get 0% APR credit cards and buy my plane ticket and then work hard the rest of the year to pay off that $1,200.

Sometimes it sucked and we really missed each other. Going out with friends and seeing them with their significant others, while yours was hundreds and hundreds of miles away was not easy. Sometimes we just wanted to be a normal couple, to be together in the same place; but it wasn't the right time yet. We persevered. Patience is huge thing in long distance relationships.

When we did get to spend time with each other in person it was exhilarating. They say to live every day of your life like it's your last, and the times we were together, we definitely did that. We would have to cram so much into a small amount of time.

One book that really helped us both during our time apart was The Long-Distance Relationship Survival Guide, by Chris Bell & Kate Brauer-Bell. We each had a copy.

Long distance relationships require 100% commitment & trust from each partner. They require loads of communication. Sometimes, years of patience and perseverance. But they do work. And if anything sometimes they are even richer when you finally are together, because you've put so much work & communication into your relationship.

*~Sarah Lynn~*

Tunay Na Mahal

http://www.tunaynamahal.com

I didn't even know these existed! After reading the review on the Foodette Reviews, I had to find these Pumpkin Spice Hershey Kisses!


Last's year big search for Pumpkin Pie Pop-Tarts exhausted me, so I decided to check Ebay for the Hershey Kisses instead of running around to different stores! Luckily I found a seller who's price wasn't too inflated. :-p I paid about $4 a bag, (about $2 more per bag from reading about them online). They arrived today and as one of my Facebook friends said; "They are sinfully delicious!". They have a very strong spice taste, I think nutmeg & allspice stood out the most, but they are sooo good! But then again... I love Pumpkin anything! :-)

When I got home from work today Barley was not doing so well. He was cold to the touch and struggling to breathe. He passed away in my arms a little after I got home. Barley was well over a year old and he had a lot of health issues in his old age.

He was always such a friendly rat. He only liked to be scratched on his head because he was hairless. But he always "talked" when you scratched his head, (moved his mouth). And he always came running to the cage bars when you would call his name. He used to have a furry face when he was younger, but as he got older he lost it. He was my first hairless rattie and probably my last...

I've finally done it! After nearly 4 years of blogging, I have finally taken the plunge and bought my own domain! Whoo hoo! :-)

Please update your blog readers and bookmarks. The new address for this blog will be: www.tunaynamahal.com 

Today was F.B.'s 32nd birthday and his first birthday celebration in the USA!

We went to Hibachi Grill & Supreme Buffet near Franklin Mills Mall in Philadelphia. It was the first time we went there. It used to be a computer store years ago. hehehe. But they have renovated everything and it's really pretty inside with chandeliers and stained glass and a fountain up front.

In the car:

F.B. getting ready to chow down, lol.

F.B. with his gifts from me: Star Wars Trilogy,Asher's Chocolates, Herr's Chips.

The Herr's Chips came in a Herr's Snack Truck box and there were 42 mini bags of chips. You could pick your flavors when you ordered. I ordered it from the Herr's website. :-)


For dessert we had cheesecake from Giant, that we shared with the family. Mmmm.

F.B. with his McDonald's gift cards from my family.

I made Swedish Meatballs last night with this recipe I found on Yahoo Shine.

They were AMAZING! I did alter the recipe a bit, we only had beef in the house. I added noodles. I added chopped onions & mushrooms to the sauce. And I added a splash of Worcestershire sauce, a tablespoon of brown sugar & a dash of rosemary to the meatballs and sauce. I also made the meatballs a bit larger so I cooked them for 30 minutes. But otherwise, I followed the recipe! The meatballs tasted like they had slow cooked for hours. Sooo good!

Since it's October 1st today I decided to put on the Sally Hansen Salon Effects in Spun For You. They are hard to find in stores so you might have better luck getting the Halloween designs on Ulta! (I just ordered 1 more of the spiderwebs & also the red/black design).


(And thanks Shannon for letting me know they had Halloween Designs out!)

I found the Coffee-Mate Pumpkin Spice creamers on Friday, so I broke one of those out today! (and froze the other.) Yum! It's definitely fall now! :-)

 

Honey got bit by Olive a few weeks ago. It turned into an abscess (which I've dealt with many abscesses over the years with my pet rats & never saw one like this). It started off marble sized, but did swell to quarter size. We were treating Honey with antibiotics (Baytril) and the abscess was drying up into a scab.

Monday when I got home from work, either her abscess had burst on it's own, or she chewed at the wound. She had a hole in her leg a little bigger than a quarter. It looked really really bad & it was really deep. She also kept licking and chewing at the wound, which was making it bleed worse.

Tuesday I called the vet at 9am, and we took Honey to the vet in the afternoon for an exam. Her abscess was badly infected and her chewing on it did not help the infection.

We had to leave Honey overnight at the vet for surgery so the vet could remove the infected tissue and stitch her up. He used metal sutures so she won't chew out her stitches. She also got a Baytril injection & will be on Cipro for 2 weeks. She has a check up next Wednesday evening.

She was doing really well when we picked her up, they had done the surgery late last night. She is pretty active, but will be staying in a smaller "hospital" cage while she heals up. She was boggling on the car ride home, I had the carrier on my lap and was petting her, while my husband was driving home.

Honey after surgery: (click to enlarge photo)


Thank God for Mastercard though... ugh... her surgery was a couple hundred dollars and since I just started back at work on the 12th, (after a 6 week furlough) I don't get my first paycheck until October 3rd. I didn't have enough in checking to cover her surgery. Like I've said many times before, people that think rats are just pocket pets or disposable pets... they require the same care as a cat or dog. And the vet prices are about the same.

(Blog Article: Why Rats!?) 

In other rattie news... Iris' tail has healed up from her infection & her back injury seems to be healed. But I don't think she will regain use in the lower part of her tail. She can move the base to about the middle. She's still pretty active though and doesn't seem to realize her tail is paralyzed.

And Violet moved in with my 5 girls downstairs in the Ferret Nation cage this past weekend. There was some wrestling & a bit of fighting. But she is all settled in now. She is about 3x's the size she was when we got her in August. She's not a little baby anymore. :-)


And just a quick update. You might have heard about the recent Typhoon in the Philippines. Manila was hit really hard, and the photos are just crazy to look at. Like the US Embassy! Places I've been... They are saying Manila has not been flooded like this in decades. My husband's family is okay and they did not get flooded, thank God! We were really worried, since there was a devastating typhoon & flood there just 2 years ago that did effect my husband's family.

Yesterday was the 1st day of fall, one of my favorite seasons. Unfortunately it did not feel like fall AT ALL. There was 94% humidity and it was sticky, humid and rainy. I'm very much over hot and humid weather. It's been an unusually HOT spring/summer this year. I'm ready for cooler weather, hoodies, jackets. Hot pumpkin spice latte's!

At least the stores are stocking with fall and halloween items already! Picked up some baby pumpkins yesterday at Giant Supermarket. I love baby pumpkins! I got 2 orange and 1 white one this year. For some reason though it turned into a real hassle during check out... it took 2 clerks & a manager (who all appeared annoyed) to ring up my 3 for $2 baby pumpkins?! Really?! Sheesh...

I use Retro Camera for Android

I also found one of the new seasonal creamers from Coffee-Mate! Brown Sugar Maple Latte. I had some this morning, it's good. I love maple syrup and it has that flavor.


Shannon posted on my Facebook the other day because she found Halloween Sally Hansen Salon Effects designs! They are too cool looking! She found hers at CVS, so I checked 2 CVS's on Friday. I got the skull ones & there was only 1 silver spiderweb one left! I had a $1 off coupon, but CVS must double coupons because I got $2.00 off my purchase and $5 in coupons for my next visit! (The clerk at CVS was checking out my nails too- hahaha. I had Sally Hansen Insta Dri: Lightning with OPI  black shatter over it. She had never seen the crackle polish in person!)

Photo Credit

So excited to wear them in October! If you haven't tried the Salon Effects- do try. They last 2-3 weeks without chipping! And when they do chip, they start chipping at the base of the nail, not the tip. They are awesome!