Saving Families Money Since 2007
Amy from MomAdvice shows you how to dye a faded pair of jeans. Has anyone else tried this before? I’d love to hear how it worked for you!
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.
In this last video with Chris Seay (see all of our previous videos here, if you missed them), I ask him for practical advice and suggestions for teaching your children to become givers and to teach them to be grateful for what they have.
Teaching our children to be givers is something that my husband and I so much for our own three children. And we’ve been encouraged to see that our oldest is definitely “getting it”.
However, there are still many times when our children complain about having to give things up in order to give to others. And there are also other times when the entitlement mentality rears it’s head and, instead of being grateful, they are discontent.
I asked Chris if his children complained throughout the 40-day fast from excess. He has a great answer for that question and some practical ideas that inspired me as I continue to try to instill a servant’s heart in my children.
If you are a parent or are someone who works with children, I think you’ll be especially blessed by this short video clip:
Interview w. Money Saving Mom Part 4 from Chris Seay on Vimeo.
Have you been inspired by this video series with Chris Seay? Be sure to check out his website and read more information on his book here. And come back tomorrow because I’ll be hosting a giveaway for 10 copies of his book!
Did you enjoy this video series? If so, would you be interested in me interviewing other authors from time to time? As this was my first time to do something like this, I’d love to hear your suggestions for future video interviews. Feel free to email me or leave your thoughts in the comments
Gluten-Free, Dairy-Free Waffles
Breakfasts
Gluten-Free, Dairy-Free Waffles, fresh carrot/orange Juice
Green Monster Smoothie
Fresh orange juice, cereal
Gluten-free toast, scrambled eggs, fruit
Oatmeal with brown sugar and raisins
Cereal
Breakfast cookies, fruitLunches
Refried beans with salsa and corn chips, salad
Hard boiled eggs, sweet potato chips, applesauce, gluten-free cookies
Gluten-free pasta, hamburgers, steamed broccoli, apple slices
PB&J on rice cakes, carrot sticks, apple slices
Beans, rice, carrot sticks
Tuna salad, carrot sticks
LeftoversSnacks
Fruit/veggies
Granola Bars
Breakfast cookies
German Fudge BitesDinners
Meatloaf, potatoes, steamed broccoli
Baked chicken, tossed salad, mashed potatoes, fruit
Frito Chili Pie, fruit, brown rice
Goulash, tossed salad
Sweet Potato Chili, apple slices, carrot sticks
Dinner with extended family x 2Freezer Cooking
What’s on your menu this week? Share details and/or your link to your menu plan in the comments.
Last week we had a guest post from a couple who has ditched their washer and dryer in favor of using the laundry mat. Today, I wanted to follow up with this great post on a family who has ditched their dryer and chosen to hang-dry all their clothes. What works for them might not work for you, but I hope this post will challenge you to think outside the box!
Guest post from Kendra of New Life Homestead
Over the past few years, I have been on a money-saving quest that has taken me beyond the coupon game and into a whole new arena — homesteading. We homestead for many reasons, but one of the biggest factors that got us on this journey was the realization that we could save a lot of money by learning to produce the things we need, and to be content to do without those things which we don’t truly need.
In an effort to keep our hard earned money in our own pockets, we’ve steadily worked toward a goal of self-sufficiency (or more appropriately, God-sufficiency, for in all things we depend on Him).
Although my husband and I are city kids and have no idea what we are doing trying to live off the land, we’ve continued to fumble our way through learning to garden, keeping chickens, milking goats, canning food, making soap, sewing, and everything else that comes with this homesteading, back-to-basics lifestyle!
The ultimate goal is to live off-grid. But we still depend on electricity for so many things! As I’ve thought about what it would take to attain this dream of ours there have been many times I’ve looked around our home and made a mental checklist of things that we can either use less often, replace with something non-electric, or even do completely without.
One of the power suckers I just knew I had to get rid of was our clothes dryer. I just couldn’t justify continuing to pay to have my clothes tumble dried when the sunshine and a gentle breeze are free for the asking!
I did have a clothesline, but it wasn’t nearly big enough for all of the laundry that comes with being a mom to four small children, including a newborn and a toddler. As I worked my way toward hang-drying all of our clothing, my husband was kind enough to build a new clothesline for me, with five lines about 25 ft. long each. And I loved it.
There is something so peaceful and satisfactory in hanging your clothes out to dry in the warm sun. Maybe it’s the fresh air, or the rejuvenation that comes from those glorious rays working their magic, or perhaps it’s just the simple joy of knowing that what I am doing is saving my family money?
Whatever it is that makes line-drying so enjoyable, it made it much easier for me to make the ultimate plunge and get rid of the clothes dryer for good. And when I re-modeled our laundry room (a $0.00 makeover), I jumped on the opportunity to make a little money by selling the dryer once and for all.
It has been a year now since I’ve been hang-drying every single article of clothing we own. And if I could go back and do it over again, I wouldn’t change a thing.
Is it always easy? No. Especially when it rains for a week straight!
Is it convenient? Nope. Not having a dryer right there to toss your wet laundry into really forces you to do some planning ahead in the wardrobe department.
But there is something so freeing about not depending on this appliance anymore! And it forces me to slow down and enjoy the task at hand, instead of a constant rush, rush, rush.
Another benefit I have enjoyed with being dryer-free is smaller piles of clean clothing to tackle. Before, I would wait to do all of my laundry in one day, and by the end of the night I’d have a massive pile of clean clothes taking over my couch, and no energy to put it all away!
But now, since my clothesline is only large enough to hold two to three loads of laundry, I am limited in how much I can do in a day. Instead of trying to get it all done at once, I now wash a couple of loads daily, and only have a couple of laundry baskets of clothing to put away when I’m done. This system has worked out quite nicely for me, and keeps me from becoming overwhelmed.
I do have a backup plan for bad weather. In the kids’ bathroom, hanging over the tub, is a five-line retractable clothesline. This handy helper has been a real lifesaver during the rainy season, and when temperatures dip below freezing. It’s enough to hold a large load of laundry, it’s easily hidden behind a pretty shower curtain, and can be retracted for overnight guests.
I also have an accordion style floor rack for heavier items, such as jeans and thick towels, (or a bunch of cloth diapers!) that can also hold a full load of clothing. The great thing about an indoor drying system such as this is that it’s something that anybody, anywhere can do!
Hang drying not only saves money on electricity, but your clothing will last longer as well. Have you ever wondered where all of that dryer lint comes from? Yep, that would be your favorite pair of jeans, slowly disintegrating with each round of high heat.
My point in sharing all of this is simply to encourage every one of you to consider taking a step back in time and at least give line drying a shot. I’m willing to bet you might be surprised at how therapeutic it can be! And your wallet will surely thank you.
So, what about you? Do you already line-dry your clothing? If not, what’s holding you back?!
Kendra is a 20-something year old, Southern California girl trying to learn her way around in the country. She is married to a wonderful Christian man, and has four beautiful children. She blogs about her homesteading journey over at New Life Homestead.
Guest post from Andrea of Simple Organized Living.
As the name of my website suggests, I’m all about keeping things as SIMPLE as possible — especially when it comes to getting organized.
Getting {and staying} organized might not be “easy” but it is relatively “simple”. However if you are still feeling overwhelmed and don’t know where to start, I have a few SIMPLE tips that might just help!
Even if your entire house is in disarray, there is still hope… I promise! Just pick one small area in your home {one cabinet, one drawer, one basket, one file of papers, etc} and start there.
Set a timer for 15-20 minutes and don’t do anything else except work on organizing that one small area. When the timer goes off, you can quit. Then do the same thing again tomorrow.
Almost everyone I know has an extra 15 minutes each day, and if you apply that time towards an organizing goal, your home and life will be organized in no time.
Stop procrastinating and just get started. Keep striving for progress {not perfection} and do something today.
In my experience, just crossing one thing off my to-do list motivates me to keep going… and before I know it, half my list is crossed off and I’m making tons of progress, all because I took immediate action.
If you don’t have a designated space for something, it’s going to sit out. If it sits out, it becomes clutter. And if you don’t have space for specific items in your home, then you should get rid of a few things to make room.
Also, the next time you are trying to decide whether to buy something or not, first ask yourself if you do or do not have a space for it. If not, are you willing to get rid of another item to make room for the new item?
Chances are that by pausing to ask yourself those questions, you’ll probably decide you don’t really need it and you’ll save yourself the space and the money!
I think it goes without saying that anything you can do now to plan ahead for later will benefit you in your attempts to be more organized.
Pack lunches and pick out your clothes the night before. Plan your meals for the week, plan your grocery shopping list, make tomorrow’s to-do list, and so on. Planning ahead not only helps you to be more organized, it also alleviates so much stress from your life.
One of the biggest causes of clutter is our emotions. We are emotionally attached to so much of our stuff — the wedding gift from our best friend that we never use, the baby clothes we no longer need, our “skinny clothes” from before we had kids, every art project our children made us, pictures, pictures, and more pictures. It’s all emotional clutter!
I’m definitely not saying you need to get rid of it all; however I am encouraging you to be honest with yourself and leave your emotions out of your next organizing project. {Yes, this will be difficult to do!}
If organizing is a challenge for you, consider asking a friend, neighbor, coworker, or relative to help keep you accountable.
I guarantee the whole process will be faster and easier if you have a “partner in crime” who is willing to walk with you every step of the way, keep you accountable, ask you the tough questions, and force you to be honest with yourself. Plus it will just be a lot more fun!
Getting more organized is something we can all improve on… and hopefully these SIMPLE tips will motivate you to do something today!
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Andrea Dekker is a professional organizer, motivational speaker, and the founder of Simple Organized Living. Her goal is to motivate and encourage others to “create their best life” through simplicity and organization. |
I skipped posting goals last week since I took the week “off” so here’s my progress from my goals for two weeks ago:
Family/Mothering Goals
1. Read at least 5 chapters each from In Grandma’s Attic and Corrie Ten Boom aloud to the children.
2. Write letters to one of our Compassion children.
3. Write a love note to Jesse.Personal Goals
4. Finish reading 7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess,
A Symphony in the Dark, An Organized Heart, and Thunder Dog.
5. Complete week 5 of the Couch to 5K program.
6. Write two handwritten notes.Home Management
7. Go through house from top to bottom and clear out clutter {I didn’t get through the whole house, but I did make some good progress.}
8. Start Andalutheean Knitted Dishcloth.
9. Make Homemade Rice Milk.Business Goals
10. Finish writing article for MomLifeToday.com.
This week’s goals:
Family/Mothering Goals
1. Finish reading In Grandma’s Attic and read at least 3 chapters of Corrie Ten Boom aloud to the children.
2. Begin our Countdown to Easter study as a family.
3. Write a love note to Jesse.
Personal Goals
4. Finish reading 7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess and Rekindling the Romance: Loving the Love of Your Life.
5. Complete week 6 of the Couch to 5K program.
6. Start listening to The 10 Habits of Happy Mothers.
Home Management
7. Finish going through house from top to bottom and clear out clutter {I’ll be blogging some of this and encouraging you to join me!}.
8. Finish Andalutheean Knitted Dishcloth.
9. Make Homemade Naan.
Business Goals
10. Finish writing article for MomLifeToday.com and RooMag.com.
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.
Thank you all for letting me take this past week “off” from blogging.
My husband and I were on the Love Like You Mean It Cruise almost the entire week this week. It was good to have a break and to spend most of the week unplugged (if you didn’t realize I was gone, that was because my fantastic team did such a great job of running the blog in my stead!).
We soaked up the sun, read some great books, talked and dreamed and planned for the future, ate interesting food, got a sunburn, heard inspiring messages, met some wonderful new friends, and went to bed before 8:30 p.m. almost every single night.
It was exhilarating and refreshing, but it’s good to be home and back to our three precious children. We missed them so much! And truthfully, we also really missed good coffee (there was not a decent batch of coffee to be found on the entire cruise ship–I wished I had brought my French Press so I could have made my own!) and solid ground (thankfully, the motion sickness pills helped soothe my queasy stomach!).
And I missed you all, too, and have so many post ideas my head is about ready to explode! 🙂 But for now, I’m getting ready to enjoy a quiet, media-free Sunday and I’ll be back to blogging as usual on Monday. I promise I’ll share a mini recap of our trip & some pictures, too!
Here were some of the best posts from this past week, in case you missed them:
Freebies and Deals:
100 Photo Prints from Snapfish for $7 Shipped
140 Free Swagbucks for New Sign-Ups
Kid’s Eat Free at Cici’s Pizza
Free Printable Vintage Paper Dolls
Free ebook: 21 Days to a More Disciplined Life
Four Posts You Should Read:
3 Steps to Simplifying Laundry
How We Manage Without a Washer and Dryer
Guest post from Deborah
My husband and I own a smaller home — around 1000 square feet with two bedrooms and two bathrooms. We don’t have children or hobbies that contribute to owning a great amount of stuff, but somehow the stuff seems to accumulate on its own!
I know we are blessed to receive so many free items from different people — but quite often, these items just sit around the house, gathering dust. It never seems to be enough stuff to have a yard sale, and nothing is usually worth enough to sell through Craigslist.
So once a year, and sometimes twice if I feel the house is getting cluttered, I do a “100 Things” project on a weekend.
It’s quite simple: I must find 100 things to get rid of in some way.
It might be a book I know I’ll never read. It might be a pair of holey socks tucked deep in a drawer that simply needs to be re-purposed as a dust rag or thrown away. It might be a stack of papers waiting to be filed. It might be a bunch of clothes I box up and take to Goodwill, or a box of magazines that I give away on Freecycle.
The bottom line is that 100 things need to leave my home or be put to some other use.
The last time I did this was in December of 2011. I gave away a box of 30 magazines to someone on Freecycle. I boxed up 20 books and donated them to a local organization hosting a book sale in order to raise money. I bagged up some clothing that we hadn’t worn in ages and sent them to Goodwill. When I pulled out the Christmas decorations, I went through everything and found broken items to throw away and other items to be sent to the local Goodwill store. And I always have a box in the garage ready to fill with random items to donate.
We are not big stuff collectors — but I’m always amazed at the amount of stuff I can get rid of once a year when I really try. And I always feel that my home is a little less cluttered at the end of a “100 things” weekend!
Have you ever tried decluttering 100 things?
I’ve been so blessed by the comments and emails from you all about how this series of videos I’m doing with Chris Seay is impacting you (you can watch the first two videos here if you missed them).
Here’s a comment that Kelly posted today:
My husband and I have decided that during Lent, we’ll do two weeks of eating from three different countries – so six weeks total. We chose one from each continent that houses the largest number of poor people – Honduras (Feb 22 – March 6), Kenya (March 7-20), and Thailand (March 21 – April 8).
We got the list of staple foods from Chris Seay’s website and are designating a limited amount of foods to eat during each two-week period (mostly just the ones from that list, but a few others to round out some food groups plus account for our CSA subscription which we can’t back out of). I’m five months pregnant, so we were a bit limited in what we could do – I didn’t feel very comfortable doing any literal fasting (skipping meals) or having an exceptionally limited diet, so I think this will be a good way to connect with some particular countries, get a little “bored” with eating the same staple foods over and over again, etc.
During the two weeks that we’re focusing on each country, we’re going to pray for that country (using guides from the book Operation World) and research that country (using the internet, books from the library, plus a few books we already own, and maybe watch documentaries on Netflix, if available). In addition, we’re going to designate some money to charities that work in each of those three respective countries.
Thanks for the inspiration! We’ve been wanting to do something like this, but things have gotten in the way a few times before (we just stocked up on tons of groceries, we’ll have house guests for a lot of the time, etc.), so now we’re just going to make it happen!
Looking forward to seeing how God works in our hearts AND how we’re able to help others through this experience. -Kelly
In today’s video, Chris talks about how taking a 40-day fast from excess from has impacted their family. He also answers my question of, “Can our feeble, small efforts really make a difference or are the needs so great that it’s not really even worth it?”
If you only have time to watch one of the videos from Chris Seay, I’d heartily encourage you to take two minutes and watch today’s video. I think you’ll be inspired and motivated by it–at least I know I was!
Interview w. Money Saving Mom Part 3 from Chris Seay on Vimeo.
Make It and Love it shows you how to make homemade Magnetic Paper Dolls.
Guest post from Jenae of I Can Teach My Child
Doing the laundry is one of my most loathed household tasks. Actually, I don’t really mind doing the laundry… it’s the folding and putting away that I especially dislike!
Laundry is also an ongoing task that never has a definite ending. By the time you have all your loads folded and put away, there will inevitably be another few garments waiting for you in the hamper.
However, laundry doesn’t have to be as complicated and time-consuming as we make it out to be. Here are three simple tips that have helped me streamline the laundry process in our home.
I do laundry one day each week. I’ve found this works much better for our family to get it all done in one day rather than doing multiple loads throughout the week. Plus, since I need the dryer to do the next load and get it all done in one day, this holds me accountable to putting the laundry away immediately instead of letting the loads sit in the dryer for a few days!
I know many people who prefer to do a load of laundry once a day. If that works for you, great!
More than any laundry-related task, I dislike pairing and folding little-kid socks! I began using mesh wash bags this fall with the advent of sock weather and it has revolutionized my laundry-doing life!
Now, I hang a mesh bag for each child close to his hamper. Instead of throwing the socks in the hamper with everything else, I put them in their mesh bag. When laundry day arrives, I secure the drawstring, throw it in with the laundry, and dump it into the sock drawer when clean. No pairing or folding needed!
When you remove clean laundry from your dryer and put it into a laundry basket, you are creating one more potential place for laundry to sit before it gets folded and put away.
Instead of using a laundry basket, grab the load with both arms and move it immediately to either your bed or the children’s beds. That way, the laundry must get folded before bedtime. Obviously, if you have to climb a flight of stairs to put laundry away, you’ll need to use a basket. Just make sure to dump it onto a bed once you get up (or down) the stairs.
These small, simple changes have made a huge impact towards my productivity when it comes to laundry.
Jenae is a Master-degree holding former first grade teacher turned stay-at-home Momma. She loves finding creative ways to save money, spending time with her family, and sharing fun activities on her website I Can Teach My Child.
A testimony from Abby who blogs at Oregon Mom on a Mission
My husband and I recently celebrated our third wedding anniversary. While those three years have seen my college graduation, a cross-country move, five months spent living with my family (all seven members), and the birth of our first child, we haven’t had any time away for just the two of us since our first anniversary.
Because we have conflicting work schedules, time together at home is also much rarer than either of us would like. In light of all of that, we decided to make it a priority to save money for a two-night getaway to the Oregon coast. Our goal was to have the money, $400, saved by the end of the summer so that we could take our vacation in the fall, when hotels would be offering off-season mid-week specials.
We didn’t want to take money from any of the areas in our budget, so I knew we would have to get creative.
In the middle of June we decided that any “extra” that came our way would be saved in a newly-made Vacation Jar. With our empty jar waiting, we developed a plan of action:
I began cashing the checks I receive for taking online surveys. In addition, we cashed in the spare change we’d been accumulating for several months. All of that together earned us $123.
I had been reading a lot about selling items on eBay, so I tried that, too. I sold my husband’s PlayStation 3 (with his permission, of course) along with several video games, DVDs, an iPod, and clothes. That netted us a total of $355, after we paid to ship everything.
Oregon offers a refund of $.05 each on aluminum cans and water bottles that you return to the store, so we finally turned in the cans we’d been hanging onto for quite some time. That alone earned us just over $23. I’ve already done the math; we redeemed 470 cans! Yes, my husband has a soda addiction, and yes, we’re working on that.
By the middle of July the Jar held $501.
The goal that we thought would take us two and a half months to reach was exceeded in less than a month, and my husband and I are both shocked that most of that money was just sitting around our house.
We’ve deposited the contents of the Vacation Jar in a special savings account, where it will sit while I browse the internet, searching for an amazing deal. Wherever we end up staying, my husband and I will both be able to completely relax while we’re away, knowing that we won’t be coming home to the added stress of paying off a new debt!
Abby lives in Oregon with her husband, Jonathan; son, Griffin; and pony-size black lab, Tucker. She blogs about saving money and simplifying life at Oregon Mom on a Mission.
Have you saved up and paid cash for something — large or small? Submit your story for possible publication here.
Whisk Together shows you how to make homemade Baked Doughnuts.
Guest post from Carrie of Wholesome Womanhood
Menu planning and figuring out the best grocery deal scenarios has always been one of my favorite things to do. On Tuesdays, my grocery ads come in the mail and my husband always comes in, holding the ads, with a smile on his face, knowing that I’m about to do one of my favorite weekly activities: peruse the ads looking for good deals.
Last October, I posted one of my weekly meal plans on our blog and a friend commented asking some questions, including how much I spent on groceries. We emailed back and forth a couple of times and during the conversation, something she said sparked an idea in my mind.
Why did I have to plan so much variety in my menus?
We already had weekly pizza night. Sunday mornings we make pancakes and Fridays are waffle mornings. My family loved knowing they would be eating their favorite meals every week. I realized that the variety wasn’t for my family–it was for me. And when I really stopped to think about it, I realized that making a different meal every single night was actually adding a lot of stress in my life. So in November I decided to try an experiment.
We spend $250 a month on groceries, but in the month of November, I focused on planning meals that were meatless or used chicken, since chicken is regularly on sale for $0.99/pound or less. I planned one week’s worth of meals and repeated those same seven meals throughout the month.
My goal? Spend $100 on our monthly meal plan. That left me $150 for our Thanksgiving meal and some wiggle room to stock up on any good deals that might come up during the month.
November was a tough month! My family isn’t big on meatless meals and they do like an occasional dinner with ground beef; but we stuck with it. I kept our monthly expenses around $100, spent $75 on our Thanksgiving dinner and stocked up on good deals with the rest. I was able to stock up on ground beef when it was $1.99 a pound, alfredo sauce when it was $1a jar, and canned beans.
In December I decided to do it again, only this time I was able to actually plan meals I knew my family would enjoy, using the items I had stocked up on in November. Ground beef and pasta. Chili, Pork Loin and Chicken Alfredo. I was able to once again keep the cost of our monthly meals down and pay for our Christmas dinner and stock up on items for our January meals all while staying within our $250 budget.
It worked out so well, that I decided to do it again in January, although at the beginning of the month I realized my freezer and pantry were full! So I’m planning simple meals using what I have in the cupboard.
A weekly rotating menu simplifies my life and allows me to buy good deals each week, which will in turn give us some variety in next’s month rotating meal plan.
Carrie is a stay at home wife and mother. She loves to learn new ways to take care of her family while spending less money. She blogs with her twin sister at Wholesome Womanhood.
Head over to Amy’s Finer Things to discuss chapter two of The Money Saving Mom®’s Budget and how chaos and clutter in your life can directly impact your finances.
Amy’s going to host a Q&A with me on her blog in a few weeks, so if you have questions about clutter, time budgeting, or anything else else related to chapter two of my book, head on over to her blog and leave your questions there.