this wasn't in the plan |but life is still pretty good

I love reading the lists other bloggers make of their favorite posts from around the blogosphere, so I've decided to start that myself. First up are my carnival picks from this week:

The Make it From Scratch Carnival is up at Mrs. Micah. My post on reusing old Christmas cards to make placemats is included. I encourage you to check it out yourself. Here are my two favorites:

• Surround Yourself With Art from There But For The Grace of God. She has some terrific ideas for low cost artwork to decorate your home with.
• Verb shows how she reused tissue boxes. Such a good idea!

The Carnival of Money Stories is up at Time to Budget. There you'll find my post about my emergency fund along with these articles as well:

• How Christmas Cost Your Life Savings at Digerati Life. It discusses ways other than spending money on gifts that Christmas can cost a lot of money
• My Lack of Organization Costs Me Money at I've Paid Twice for this Already. I can relate. Though it usually seems that the things I buy duplicate of are things that I'll need another one of eventually
• Customer Service at its Best - Thanks SmugMug at My Two Dollars. It's so nice to see that some companies still have some great customer service.

And some other posts I encourage you to check out:

• An Easy (and frugal) Christmas Breakfast at Being Frugal. I may try the strata to go along with the Orange Rolls I usually serve
• The Computer in our Hands at Frugal Hacks. This article highlights some great printables and other internet resources. I'm anxious to check out the free sheet music sites.
• Making Gingerbread at Frugal Upstate. This post is from a few weeks ago, but I just recently had a chance to try this recipe, it's a good one!