Saving Families Money Since 2007
Now this is really creative! Kanelstrand Organic Living shows you how to turn old pants into a bowl. Yes, a bowl. Go check out the tutorial.
Do you have a fun and frugal DIY idea to share? I’d love to hear about it! Read the submission guidelines and submit it here.
Missed the first posts in this series? Read them here.
To intentionally cultivate discipline in your life, you must have goals. Not just dreams, not just lofty ambitions, but specific, realistic, achievable goals. If you don’t know where you’re aiming, you’ll lack direction and purpose.
I love how Dave Ramsey encourages people to put their financial goals “on paper, on purpose”. When you write down your goals, instead of just keeping them floating around in your brain, it puts more weight to them. Plus, if you write your goals down, you’re able to track your progress and be encouraged at the momentum you’re gaining in the right direction.
There are some very helpful goal-setting worksheets available from Project Management Skills and from Cigna Behavioral Health. However, please don’t be overwhelmed by these more in-depth worksheets. A simple sticky-note taped to your mirror or refrigerator will work just as well. The objective is not to have a fancy paper filled out, but to actually follow through with your goals.
Once you’ve written down the goal or two you are focusing on implementing in your life, develop an incremental plan of action for accomplishing that goal. Some goals lend themselves more to babysteps than others. For instance, if you want to lose five pounds in six weeks, you can create a six-week plan to achieve this goal that could look something like this:
Week 1: Track your calorie intake through SparkPeople. Exercise for 2 hours total.
Week 2: Find an accountability partner. Continue to track calorie intake, adjust if needed. Exercise for 2.5 hours total.
Week 3: Check-in with accountability partner. Continue to track calorie intake, adjust if needed. Exercise for 3 hours total. Drink more water.
Week 4: Check-in with accountability partner. Continue to track calorie intake, adjust if needed. Exercise for 3 hours total. Drink at least 8-10 glasses of water daily. Cut out fast food, sugar, or soda pop.
Week 5: Maintain all habits from previous weeks, re-evaluate anything that isn’t working.
Week 6: Reward yourself for losing five pounds and developing some good habits that will hopefully stick around for a long time.
Now, I’m not saying that the above plan is guaranteed to make you lose five pounds in six weeks, but it gives you an idea of how to take a bigger goal and break it down into smaller pieces. Instead of being overwhelmed by looking at the big picture, think what small steps you can slowly take to get where you want to go. Map them out and then follow them!
Post your goal(s) in a conspicuous place and review them often. I’d suggest reviewing them at least daily, if not more often. Remind yourself of where you’re headed and how you’re planning to get there.
If you are struggling and feeling overwhelmed in the goal(s) you have set for yourself, step back and re-evaluate. Do you need to give yourself more time? Do you need tweak your goal(s) a little to be more realistic?
Practical Application
1) Write down your current habit/goal and put it in a conspicuous location.
2) If you’ve chosen a larger goal, break it down into bite-sized pieces and create a plan of action for the next few weeks or months.
3) Set up a weekly “appointment” with yourself to review and re-evaluate your goal(s) and how things are going.
How are you doing on your current habit? So far, I’ve stuck with my resolve to get up before 5 a.m. Monday through Thursday and before 7 a.m. Friday through Sunday. I’ve been amazed at how much more I’m getting done when I get up earlier!
Breakfasts
Granola bars
Toasted bagels, scrambled eggs
Steel Cut Oats with dried cranberries
Cookie Dough Baked Oatmeal
Granola
Carrot Cake Waffles, scrambled eggs
OatmealLunches
Lunch out at Cracker Barrel
Cheese quesadillas, apples
PB&J, carrot sticks, apple slices
Annie’s macaroni & cheese, peas
Tossed salad with hard-boiled eggs, feta cheese, and dried cranberries
Leftovers x 2
Dinners
Cheesy Chicken and Rice Bake, tossed salad
Burritos, corn, apple slices
Cheesy Vegetable Chowder, Bread Machine Buttery Rolls, apple slices
Baked tilapia, sweet potatoes, steamed broccoli
Lime Chicken Tacos, Mexican Rice, steamed veggies
Dinner with extended family x 2Snacks
Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars
Fruit/veggies
Cheese/crackers
What’s on your menu this week? Share details and/or your link to your menu plan in the comments.
So, I did really well with keeping to my goal of getting up early all of last week. But by the weekend, I was quite tired. In fact, I came home from church on Sunday and took a two-hour nap–something I rarely ever do!
But I began this week feeling refreshed and ready to hit the ground running, even if things weren’t in as neat and organized of shape as I was hoping! Getting up early helped me to gain a lot of traction last week and I hope the momentum continues and I can get even further ahead this week. Just remind me to do better about going to bed before 10 p.m. 🙂
And here are this week’s goals:
Family/Mothering Goals
1. Read Little Town On the Prairie aloud to the children.
2. Take pictures of the children with our just-hatched chicks every day for the photo book I’m doing of our chick-hatching experience.
3. Put together Operation Christmas Child boxes with the children.Personal Goals
4. Finish reading EntreLeadership, He Heard Hannah, Kisses from Katie, Getting Things Done, and Becoming a Woman of Influence. {So, ahem, I totally skipped out on reading what I was supposed to read and got engrossed in two other books instead.}
5. Go to bed early and get up early, as part of my 21 Days to a More Disciplined Life Challenge (more on that in a few hours).6. Run 10 miles. {I ran 4 miles, so that’s progress, at least!}
Home Management Goals
7. Do at least one load of laundry from start to finish every week day.
8. Make homemade Shower Cleaner.Business Goals
9. Email all bloggers who are reviewing my book when it releases.
10. Write daily posts for the 21 Days to a More Disciplined Life series.
And here are this week’s goals:
Family/Mothering Goals
1. Finish reading Little Town On the Prairie aloud to the children.
2. Do some Thanksgiving crafts together.
3. Wrap and drop off Operation Christmas Child boxes.
Personal Goals
4. Finish reading EntreLeadership, He Heard Hannah, Kisses from Katie, Getting Things Done, and Becoming a Woman of Influence. (I’m really and truly going to try and finish at least a few of these books this week!)
5. Go to bed early and get up early, as part of my 21 Days to a More Disciplined Life Challenge.
6. Run 6 miles. (I’m aiming “low” so that maybe, just maybe, I’ll actually get to cross this off next week!)
Home Management Goals
7. Do at least one load of laundry from start to finish every week day.
8. Plan out all my freezer cooking for the holidays.
Business Goals
9. Run a special promotion/freebie offer for my book (more details tomorrow morning; I think you’re going to like it! :))
10. Write daily posts for the 21 Days to a More Disciplined Life series.
How did you do on last week’s goals? What are your goals for this week? I’d love to have you share your progress on last week’s goals and your goals for this coming week in the comments. Of, if you’ve blogged about it, leave your direct link below. Let’s cheer each other on to live purposeful and productive lives!
You can download a free customizable weekly goal-planning sheet here.
Guest Post by Kimberlee from The Peaceful Mom
The holiday season is just around the corner. Here are three reasons why you should declutter now in order to have a happier Thanksgiving and Christmas:
Keeping disorganized piles of stuff lying around your home is a mental and emotional drain. Seeing those piles reminds you of things you need to do, but drains your energy and motivation to do them. Clutter makes it difficult to focus and makes it difficult to find the items you need to complete tasks.
Perhaps you want to make some DIY gifts this Christmas season. When your house is cluttered you may start a project only to find that you are missing an item. While looking for the item, you may get distracted by the piles of other stuff. Rather than finish your original project, you spend the rest of the afternoon dealing with those piles. So much for the handmade gifts!
2. Clutter Costs MoneyClutter not only prevents you from being productive, it also costs you money. When you are constantly distracted and wearied by the disorganized chaos in your home, you don’t have the energy to cook, plan or do other time and money saving activities. You may also spend extra money on gas and purchases because you “lose” items in your home or you forget that you have them.
When the clutter really begins to pile up, you may choose to spend time away from home to avoid it. Being “busy” away from home costs money: eating out because you’re too busy to cook, buying unnecessary items because you’re in the stores too often, and gas money driving to all the places you go to avoid being at home.
Many times we hold on to stuff rather than dealing with our true feelings of fear or loss. We fear that we won’t have enough in the future or we fear that we will need the item we are holding onto, but we won’t be able to replace it.
The truth is that most items can easily be replaced for very little money. Is it worth the emotional drain of keeping the item rather than risking the money you may have to pay later if you actually need it? The freedom gained by dealing directly with fear and grief is far superior to the bondage of trying to keep those feelings buried.
If you assess your situation and realize that you need to get rid of some things, don’t be overwhelmed. Instead:
::Grab a box for give-away items, a trashcan for throw-away items and set a timer for ten minutes. Clean one area until the timer goes off.
::If you declutter one area a day for only ten minutes, you’ll be amazed at how much you can accomplish in the next few weeks. The clean spaces in your home will fuel your motivation to continue and before you know it, you’ll have a clean house ready for the holidays!
Kimberlee is the creative (and sometimes cluttered) mind behind ThePeacefulMom.com where you can find more great organizing, money-saving and stress-free holiday ideas!
As we talked about earlier, discipline is a choice. But you can’t just say “I’m going to be more disciplined” and then sit back and see your life change.
No, it will take work, effort, and much perseverance. There will be days when you do not want to follow through with your commitment. There will be many temptations to veer off course or throw up your hands in defeat.
Here are three suggestions to help you stay on track:
I love how Michael Hyatt talks about the importance of preparing for obstacles before you encounter them in his recent post on discipline. He says:
As soon as you start swimming against the current, you will start feeling resistance. It’s as if the universe conspires to keep you from succeeding. That’s why you have to anticipate these obstacles and build strategies to overcome them.
::If you’re trying to lose five pounds this month, plan what you’re going to eat ahead of time before you go to the holiday party so that your hard work doesn’t go out the window.
::If you’re trying to go to bed earlier every night, set your alarm on your watch or phone to remind you to leave the evening gathering early in order to get home and go to bed.
::If you’re making an effort to get places on time, plan to leave 30 minutes earlier than you need to so that an unexpected phone call or diaper blowout doesn’t derail you from being on time.
Don’t set yourself up for guaranteed failure by aiming for unrealistic goals. As I mentioned yesterday, I’m focusing on re-developing the habit of getting up early. I know that on the weekends, it’s impossible to go to bed before 9:30 p.m. with the usual activities we have going on. So I intentionally decided ahead of time that for the next 21 days I would get up before 5 a.m. Monday through Thursday only. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday I’m aiming to be up by 7 a.m.
Sure, I’d like to get up by 4:30 a.m. every single morning. But, I just can’t realistically commit to that and follow-through with it. Otherwise, I’d be getting less than six hours of sleep some nights. I can function on less than six hours of sleep once every few weeks, but realistically I need to get seven to eight hours of sleep on a regular basis to feel energetic and function effectively.
Remove the words, “I can’t” from your vocabulary. Stop dwelling on the fact that you’ll probably fail at this challenge since you never seem to follow through with anything. Surround yourself with people who inspire and motivate you.
And remember that falling down is not failing–unless you don’t get back up again. Keep going, even when it feels like it’s an uphill battle that’s going nowhere, and your persistence will eventually pay off.
Practical Application
1. Read Michael Hyatt’s article on 5 Steps to Developing Discipline.
2. Consider what obstacles lie in your path as you seek to implement your chosen habit over the next 18 days. Create strategies to help you be prepared for them.
3. Step back and make sure you’re being realistic about your discipline goals. Do you need to tweak anything to help set you up for better success?
4. What negative thought patterns do you need to squelch? When they arise, how will you replace them with positive, inspirational thoughts?
Yesterday’s project update: Did you make a list of habits you want to develop over the next few years? I have an ongoing list for myself and my children. I doubt I’ll ever make it through the whole list (wait, what was that I just said about negative thinking in point number 3?!?), but at least I’m never going to run out of areas in my life to work on and improve in! 🙂
Note: I’m taking the weekend off from posting this daily series, but will be back with the next installment on Monday. Enjoy a little breather–but keep on with your discipline goals and projects. 🙂
So, I have to tell you something: these waffles were totally concocted as a fluke. You see, I was in the middle of a crazy and chaotic freezer cooking in an hour session with Silas and Kaitlynn “helping”.
While I was trying to make Pumpkin Ginger Waffles, Silas dumped flour all over the waffle maker.
And then I turned my back to get something out of the fridge and came back to see that Silas had poured yeast into all the dry ingredients. I couldn’t get the yeast all out, so I had to start the batter over again.
At this point, needless to say, I was a little flustered. When I went to pull out the pureed pumpkin from the freezer, I accidentally pulled out pureed carrots instead.
I didn’t even realize it until I saw carrot pieces in the batter. By that time, there was really nothing I could do to fix my mistake, so I just decided to go ahead and finish making the waffles and see how they turned out with carrots.
The result? A winning recipe that our whole family loves! In fact, I’ve already made it again and we all decided we may like it better with carrots than with the pumpkin it was supposed to have.
1 1/4 cup flour (I used all whole-wheat.)
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
2 eggs
1/4 cup buttermilk (I just used regular milk and added some lemon juice to it.)
1/2 cup pureed carrots
1/2 cup raw sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
3 Tablespoons butter, melted
Stir together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, ground ginger, and cinnamon. Beat together eggs, butter milk, pureed carrots, sugar, vanilla, and melted butter. Mix wet and dry ingredients together until well blended. Cook on waffle iron.
Serve hot with vanilla whipped cream (beat 1/2 cup whipping cream, 1-2 teaspoons vanilla, and powdered sugar or honey to taste until peaks form.) and/or maple syrup.
I had the privilege of briefly meeting Renee Swope at The Relevant Conference. What a dear woman she is! And I was so excited about her brand-new book, A Confident Heart: How to Stop Doubting Yourself & Live in the Security of God’s Promises.
If you struggle with feelings of insecurity or worthlessness, you must read this book. It is packed with powerful encouragement to help you stop believing lies and start walking in the truth.
Unmeasured Strength recounts Lauren Manning’s recovery from horrific burns she received when the twin towers were attacked on 9/11. Some of her backstory seemed to drag on a little and I disagreed with much of her personal outlook and theology since she isn’t a Christian, but the book was overall an interesting read and I was very inspired by her determination and perseverance through unimaginable pain.
We’re studying the states right now, so we read Chocolate By Hershey as part of our study of Pennsylvania. It was fascinating to read of Milton Hershey’s rise and fall and rise again. It was also interesting how much things changed with modern industry over his lifetime.
And yes, I know, I ended up reading books that were totally not on my reading list this past week. I promise I’ll try to actually finish a few of these this next week! Maybe that needs to be one of my upcoming habits to develop?! 🙂
Currently reading: EntreLeadership, He Heard Hannah, Kisses from Katie, Becoming a Woman of Influence, and listening to Purple Cow audiobook. You can see all of the books I’ve read in 2011 so far here. Read all of my book reviews here.
Have you read any good books recently?
(Note: The Amazon.com links in this post are affiliate links. Read our disclosure policy here.)
Guest post by Katie who blogs at The Haney’s
With the upcoming holiday season, we all will be pulled in so many directions. Whether with church, school, or community service groups, sometimes it is hard to determine what to invest our extra time or resources into.
There is one group of people that none of us should neglect especially during this holiday season—our military. Being away from the comforts and joys of home can be difficult for a deployed member of our military especially during the holidays.
As a wife to an active duty Marine who is currently serving in the Middle East, I can personally say how humbling it is to have people all across the United States praying for and supporting my husband and those like him deployed all over the world. There is so much that those of us here at home can do to support the thousands of men and women who sacrifice so much day in and day out to protect the freedoms (including the freedom to celebrate our holidays!) we enjoy every moment we have here in the United States.
Here are three practical (and budget-friendly) ways you and your family can show gratitude to the men and women serving our country:
This is the most inexpensive, yet one of the most appreciated and heartfelt gifts, our servicemen and women overseas can receive. Organizations like Operation Gratitude accept letters that they include in their care packages. If you know a family in your community with a son or daughter in the military, be sure to ask for their address. By the way, letters to our military only take one stamp to mail overseas.
Small children who do not know how to write yet can draw pictures. Often, whoever receives the letter or picture will write back to you. This is a great way to start a penpal relationship!
If you are a savvy couponer, donating items like magazines, food, and toiletries won’t be something that busts your budget! You can donate these items to organizations like Operation Gratitude or AnySoldier.com. Or, you can pick up a flat rate box from your local post office and pack it full of special treats and letters and send it to a soldier you know or someone listed on the AnySolder website. These boxes cost from $10-16 to ship.
Write a note or email, or drop by a small gift to brighten a military spouse’s day while their loved one is deployed. Separation is hard during deployment and a little bit of encouragement goes a long way!
We are so blessed to live in a country where we are free. That freedom has come at a very high cost and the least we can do is show our men and women in uniform that we care and support them, even from thousands of miles away.
Katie is a young newlywed living in Southern California with her husband. She is a teacher and is passionate about working with kids. She loves blogging about life as a Marine wife and shares recipes, money-saving ideas, and encouragement to young women and wives on her blog.
The Baby Sleep Site has two part-time work-from-home positions open for live computer chat customer service agents. This is a part-time position starting at 16 hours per week. For this position, we are looking for people who can work Monday through Friday during daytime business hours (time zone flexible).
Primary Responsibilities
1. Be available via computer to (online) chat live with site visitors (no phone required).2. Provide helpful direction to visitors to articles or resources that best suit their needs, and answer questions.
Knowledge and Skills Needed
1. The ideal candidate for this position is someone with a customer service background, with knowledge of the resources available on The Baby Sleep Site. Experience in sales is a plus. Article writing skills also a plus.2. Candidate must be able to empathize and communicate with a wide variety of personalities and parenting philosophies.
3. Candidate must:
- Possess excellent verbal and written communication skills,
- Be kind and focused toward the solution,
- Have good computer skills and be proficient in using the internet,
- Type fast.
Work Requirements
- Must be able to work remotely from home or own office.
- Must have dedicated time available to work up to 4 continuous hours per day (or broken up in two chunks), Monday through Friday during daytime business hours.
- Needs to have a reliable internet connection and computer in good working condition.
Compensation: Based on experience.
For more information or to submit your application, visit the Career page on The Baby Sleep Site.
So many of you mentioned yesterday that it was really hard to choose just one bad habit to focus on for the next 20 days. I know the feeling! At any given time, it can seem like there are a hundred and one areas that I need to improve in. In fact, when I start dwelling on all the bad habits I want to reverse or the good habits I want to implement, I can become overwhelmed!
Over the summer, I attended a workshop at our local homeschool conference by Susan Christman. She was encouraging moms to making habit-training a priority in their children’s lives. (You can see her hand-out here. If you’re unfamiliar with the term “habit-training”, be sure to check out this free ebook for more helpful information.)
The one thing that she emphasized was not only important habits are to develop in our own lives and the lives of our children, but how important it is to focus on one new habit at a time. I left the conference with this nugget of wisdom forever lodged in my brain.
In fact, it was the answer to my lifelong quest for more discipline. You see, for as long as I can remember, every few months, I’d realize that my life was in serious need of more order and discipline. In a flurry of resolve, I’d make this huge list of new habits I was going to begin implementing immediately.
I’d do really well at my new resolutions for about two days. And then I’d crash and burn from exhaustion, or something unexpected would come up and catapult me off course. When this happened, I’d throw up my hands in despair and defeat, feeling like a failure.
Instead of trying to implement two dozen habits at once, pace yourself and just focus on one habit at a time. Yes, it will take longer to actually see big changes, but those changes will be much more long-lasting.
In the long run, it’s better to only focus on and master three habits each year that actually stick, than to try repeatedly to develop 30 different habits at a time and end up overwhelmed, frustrated, and back to where you started from.
Practical Application
Sometime in the next 24 hours, find 15 minutes to sit down and make a list of all the good habits you want to develop in your own life and the bad habits you want to reverse. This is not an exercise to overwhelm you; it’s an exercise to just get it all written down on paper so it’s not sitting in your brain nagging at you. 🙂
Once you’ve made an exhaustive list, prioritize the top three habits that will make the most difference were you to implement them tomorrow. Then, take a deep breath, set your paper aside in a safe place (if you’re prone to lose things, consider emailing yourself the list or saving it as a file on your computer!), and keep working on the habit you’ve already committed to make your focus for the next 19 days.
When you feel like the current habit you’re working on has truly become a habit, you can then pull out your exhaustive list and start making the next thing a priority. Remember to take it slowly–even if you’re tempted to accelerate onto the next habit.
Yesterday’s project update: The habit I chose to focus on is to get up early every single day for this whole 21 day challenge. I’m three days in and already dragging, but I know that it takes awhile to “reset” my clock again. So I’m pushing through the tiredness, making early bedtime a priority, and not allowing myself to find an excuse for sleeping in in the morning, even when my warm bed feels so nice. 🙂 How’s your daily habit going?
I think the Chicken Lime Taco recipe is going to be a keeper. It’s so easy to make and very yummy.
I took the recipe times two and it made enough for two dinners for us (we’ll probably have some leftovers, depending upon how generous I am in doling out the filling on tacos. :))
When I was making these, I realized that I had forgotten to pick up salsa at Aldi this week, so I just left it out and decided we’ll serve it with the tacos when we make them up. That might actually end up working better anyway.
Next time, I think I might mix in some black beans. This would give it more flavor and stretch it a bit, too.
By the way, I thought that you’d like to know that I also made chocolate chip cookie bars this afternoon, seeing as I’m not sure we’ve had enough chocolate yet this week. Ahem. Let’s hope I don’t someday find out I’m allergic to chocolate or something. 😉
Guest post by Nony from A Slob Comes Clean
We pay for Christmas gifts with cash. It’s the only method we’ve found that keeps us within our budget.
You see, I’m scatterbrained. I choose to view this as an endearing quality, but also have to find ways to compensate for it. If I try to remember how much I’ve spent on a credit (or even debit) card, I’ll invariably forget something. Sometimes something big. If I write down each gift and its cost, I lose the list.
Using cash solves both of these problems, and I actually enjoy shopping this way. I start out feeling rich with an envelope full of money, and I end up feeling not-poor because I haven’t overspent.
In the age of online shopping, it can be difficult to work with cash only. A few years ago, I got the bright idea to buy a digital camera for my computers-are-for-solitaire in-laws. Family members warned me that it was a bad idea, but I was sure that if I could find one with a viewfinder, they would use it.
Turns out, there aren’t many point-and-shoot digital cameras with viewfinders. I searched and searched until I finally found one on Walmart.com. They didn’t sell them in stores, and I had to pay online.
I went through the checkout process, figured out exactly how much it was going to cost, and drove to my local Walmart. I bought a gift card for the exact amount–using cash from my Christmas envelope!
Yes, it was a bit more effort, but it disproves the theory that you can’t shop online with cash. You just have to turn that cash into a gift card first! I’ve now done this multiple times and it’s worked well for me.
Not every online store will have a brick-and-mortar counterpart where you can buy a gift card, but you can also purchase a re-loadable Visa gift card with cash from your cash envelope. There may be a fee, but a fee that you pay in cash up front is definitely preferable to an unexpectedly high credit card bill in January.
Is it easier to pay online with a credit card? Yes.
It is much more satisfying to know that you stayed within your budget? Definitely!
By the way, my in-laws loved the camera, though I don’t think they’ve ever yet actually used it. Maybe my next post should be on how to save money by not buying people gifts they won’t use…
Nony is a full-time mom who is forever coming up with practical solutions that work for her unique, creative (but very scattered) brain. She focuses on ways to keep her home in order at A Slob Comes Clean, where she shares her personal deslobification journey with complete honesty.
April from Frugal Homemaking shows you how to make your own Kettle Corn–in the microwave. I can’t wait to try this!
Clay In His Hands shows you how to make ruffle pants for that special little girl in your life.
