Mom is Just a Nickname

Hard financial times lead us to thinking of what luxuries, pleasures, and possibly necessities would we give up if we had to.  It’s been on my mind lately.

I realize that I’ve been slowly letting go of a number of things which previously I would have thought of as necessity.  Yet there are other luxuries which I keep buying. I rationalize that they are things that would be useful to have, should the need arise, but the flat out fact of the matter is that at this point, they really are luxuries.

Here are some things I’ve let go of in the last few months and years:

• Cable/Satellite TV.  Toph and I have let this go a number of times since we got married.  For one reason or another, we sometimes decide it’s worth the cost, but at the moment we are without…and functioning just fine without it.  We have a digital converter, so when need be, we can watch the news and such.  Otherwise, we get movies from the library or from the Red Box, or *gasp* we do things which are not TV related.  (Oh, the horror! heh.)

• Shaving.  What? Shaving?  Well, I haven’t shaved in almost two months. Not my legs, anyhow.  This was less a matter of ‘letting go’ for the sake of our financial security and more a matter of me rebelling against the establishment, I think.  I kept asking myself, “Why am I shaving? Who am I making happy by doing it?”  I decided that I’d let my legs go furry and see what I actually thought of it.  So far, I like the freedom of not having to shave every other day or every day. I like not having little razor burn bumps on my legs. And I feel like my legs are finally getting a chance to heal all the old shaving wounds they have received in the past.  And in the meantime, I’m saving money by not going through razorheads.

• Shampoo and Conditioner.  Another case of doing it for something other than money matters, but it is saving us money.  I began to investigate going ‘No ‘Poo’ years ago, but never got up the nerve to do it.  Then my head began rebelling. No matter what brand, formula or frequency I used, my head was itchy and flaky. Yes, I even tried dandruff shampoos.  Almost six months ago, in my last fit of frustration, I began to reduce how often I shampoo until I was down to only once a week.  Then about a month ago, I began to use baking soda, apple cider vinegar and if I really need some deeper conditioning, olive oil.  I’ve heard that you can use lemon juice instead of apple cider vinegar, especially if you have or want more blonde highlights.  I’m happy with my head of reddish highlights at the moment, so I haven’t tried it.  The bottom line of the switch is that I’m not buying shampoo, conditioner or any of the other miscellaneous hair products that were previously so necessary to me to have a nice head of hair.  And, after an initial period of frizziness, my hair is settling down and looking fine.  Happy head, less money spent. It works for me.

• Meat. Could you go vegetarian?  We are working on reducing our meat consumption, for our health and wallets, as much as any environmental reason.  We have been discovering quite a number of delicious and filling meals with our experimenting…and they are cheaper!

• Paper Products such as paper towels, napkins, plates, tissues, feminine products.  We have reduced our paper towel usage by using (and reusing) cloth rags for most things.  We use cloth napkins most of the time, and, with rare exceptions, we use our regular dishes and cutlery instead of paper dishes and plastic flatware.  The tissues we haven’t given up.  I’m still wrestling with the sanitary issues of handkerchiefs.  I did give up most disposable feminine products almost 8 years ago, though. I use cloth pads most of the time now. (Sorry if that’s TMI, but it falls in with this category and it’s an important, money saving, switch that I made.) I also used cloth diapers on X when he was little, for the most part.  X hasn’t reached nighttime dryness yet, so sadly we do spend money on pull-ups, but part of that is my own reluctance to invest the time and energy into finding a good overnight cloth diaper that doesn’t seem like a diaper for him…only to have him give them up a week later.  I have hopes he’ll nighttime train soon.

• Newspapers.  Instead of getting a newspaper delivered, read it online.  The downside of this is that you don’t get the coupons without a Sunday paper.  Most of the sales flyers are available online or can be sent in email, though.

Anyhow, the point of all of this is just to point out how many things we use which have less expensive alternatives that have all but been forgotten about in this age of convenience and disposables and expectations.  We have options, if we but take the time to look around and commit the energy to changing our ways.

What have you or would you give up in order to live on less money?

I feel like I’m at a junction right now. I have to decide whether I want to make money with my blog(s) or focus in on my writing. Long term, I suspect the writing will benefit me more. Short term, I feel compelled to monetize the blogs.

Monetizing the blogs feels like selling out in some ways. And really, I don’t have that much traffic on my blogs so the monetary benefits of selling adspace and all that might not be all that big. I worry that I will alienate what loyal readers I do have if I do paid reviews and that sort of thing. I worry that all of my time will be spent searching out new ways to make “quick money” rather than concentrating on the writing.

And that brings me to another hard point. It’s been very hard to concentrate on my writing lately. Where the months of November and December seemed to rattle my muse awake, the holidays and the month and a half since have lulled her to sleep once more. I’m trying to edit my Nano-novel and have made it into Chapter 4, which will actually be Chapter 3 since I’ve decided to start with Chapter 2 instead of Chapter 1. Did that make sense? heh. Well, no matter. Even harder to decipher is that the new Chapter 1 is actually about 14 or 15 chapters in to the stuff I wrote in November! How does that phrase go: A rough draft is 70% trash and 30% usable? I would have to say that’s very true.

Butt-In-Chair and write is all well and good, but how do I convince my butt to stay in the chair? How do I convince my fingers to write? Just start writing whatever and then go from there, I’ve heard, but so far it’s not working for me.

I’m wrangling with a mental lethargy and it’s killing me. I did brush up something I wrote years ago in order to submit it to an anthology. I have been knitting, too. I actually finished a scarf with the idea to give it to my niece (shh, don’t tell her about it, Lanie!) and I am working on another scarf for X (who insisted I should make him a blue one). J has several projects she’d like me to do for her, although I think it would make her day more to have me teach her to knit.

I’m drifting off topic. I like to do that, don’t I? In any case, I want to make money. I want to write. I’m trying to reconcile the two, but unfortunately I think I keep searching for the quick outs rather than investing the time and effort in a process that scares the pants off of me. At some point, I will have to buckle down and do the time. I hope I’ll be able to keep myself pulled together until that times comes.

We try to sit down every week or two to make a menu. A list of meals we plan to make in the specified time period and when we plan to make them. We always plan a couple of extra meals which are quick and easy to make in case some of the others fall through.

I write my menu on my my daily planner. I clip my grocery list to the page I’m using right then (the planner is arranged by weeks). Then I take it all with me when I grocery shop. That works well when I shop alone, but not so well when X is with me. Last week, I had my planner, coupons, grocery list and a calculator. They fell so many times, my list got all bent up, and my calculator was broken by the end of the trip. Luckily, my planner remained intact! I may have to rethink my strategy for grocery shopping with X along!

There are several benefits to menu planning. One is that it keeps us out of the grocery store for unplanned shopping. Another is that it helps me know what needs to be done ahead of time to serve dinner at a decent hour. And the biggest way it helps our family, in the budget sense of things, is it keeps us from eating out too much. It’s expensive to eat out!

Here’s what our menu looks like this past week from 1/20-1/26.

1/20- frozen pizza (obviously cooked!)
1/21- crockpot chili with mashed potatoes
1/22- baked lentils
1/23- chicken cordon bleu/broccoli and cheese
1/24- ribs
1/25- split pea soup
1/26- spaghetti and meatballs
1/27- stuffed cabbage rolls

Here’s what we have actually eaten so far this week:

1/20- frozen pizza
1/21- crockpot chili with mashed potatoes
1/22- kids and I had mac and cheese, Toph had black bean and ham soup leftovers
1/23- chicken cordon bleu/broccoli and cheese
1/24- baked lentils
1/25- ribs and mashed potatoes

Tuesday, Toph came home late from work, so we altered the meal plans accordingly. This was an unusual week because three out of six of those meals were new to us. I normally try to keep it to one new recipe every week or two. We are in the process of eating things in our freezer which are older, though, so the ribs and the chicken were put on the menu. We’ve been putting off making those for various reasons. The lentils was a vegetarian dish I’ve been wanting to try.

Although I tend to plan only the main dish, we always have side dishes on the table. I keep staples such as potatoes (baking and flaked), rice, and pasta on hand as well as supplies for making bread. Then I keep the freezer stocked with frozen veggies like peas, corn, green beans and mixed veggie packages. We always have salad and baby carrots on the table at dinner time. Right now, we also have celery available.

I used my crockpot twice this week: for chili and ribs. I consider a good week if at least one of my meals can be made in the crockpot! It takes pressure off at dinner time, which tends to be a crazy time in the house.

I’ve done the shopping without a list, I’ve done the cooking without a menu…it takes time to get used to doing it this way, but it really does save me time in the long run. It saves me the decision at 5pm…what do I cook? Do I suggest we go out? If we go out, where do we eat?

I get stressed out with too many choices, just like a toddler given too many options for lunch! Eventually, I’ll just choose the path of least resistance…which is usually eating out wherever the kids want to go. That, to me, is not a way to live well!

So, a couple of weeks ago, I checked out a book called America’s Cheapest Family because I’d read something about it when looking up ‘frugal’ or ‘thrifty’ or something on Amazon. (I do that occasionally: look up keywords that appeal to whatever is interesting me at the time, then I see if the library has the books so I can read them.) After reading the first couple of chapters, I asked Toph to give them a glance because I really thought they were interesting. They were about grocery shopping and budgeting, which are both things Toph and I have said we need to do a better job of.

Now we’re starting the adventure of better managing our finances. My personal hope, and one that Toph has agreed with, is that we’ll get things to where I don’t HAVE to get a job outside the home in order to stop the slow leak out of our accounts. If we can eke out an existence on what we have and let me concentrate on ways to earn money with my writing, I’d be happy. So, it’s become a goal. And what am I doing with goals this year? FiNiSHiNG them!

Truthfully, a lot of what the Economides say in their book is nothing new. We’ve heard it often all of our lives. We both come from thrifty families, so it’s not in our nature to be exceptionally extravagant. We haven’t always made the wisest choices with our money though. The book was helpful in reminding of us of all the ways to save money, all the little ways that spending adds up.

The budget section has been especially helpful. It had several ideas that were fairly new to us (or at least that we’d never tried) and so we’ve chosen one to work with. An adventure! I think the best reminder, in my mind, was that a budget is not something you set up and forget about…it takes reviewing and revising as time goes on, which requires sticking with it! heh. Sticking with it….didn’t I mention in the past how terrible I am about staying the course to goals?

Along with making better choices when grocery shopping for money’s sake, we know we need to make better dietary choices. We both have weight to lose. So, today’s shopping trip will be focusing on saving money and eating better. Go Go Gadget New Year’s Resolutions, right?!

We’re also working on exercising more, of course. The other day was fun…we dragged the kids on a walk in the neighborhood and then played ‘soccer’ in the backyard.

I guess our family has made some resolutions, whether we meant to or not. They are, again, ones we’ve made every year! This is my 30th year though, and it’s my finishing year, reach my goals year, so I’d say we have a better than average shot of succeeding this year! (Gotta give myself a pep talk, you know… before grocery shopping.)