You can’t escape it. It’s all over the news. And even if it weren’t, your pocketbook is telling you. The cost of many things is going up, most notably food and gas. And of course, these are the things we need to buy on a regular basis. What’s a consumer to do? Well, if there were ever a time to adopt a frugal lifestyle, it might as well be now. Let’s go over some things that you can be doing to counteract this purchasing inflation. Food is the number one culprit, and luckily there are many things you can be doing to lower your food bill. You can start with how you approach food buying in the first place. What you should not be doing is planning your meals and then shopping for the ingredients. To save money on your food bill, you should be doing exactly the opposite. The most frugal approach to food shopping is to buy what’s on sale. Every supermarket advertises a few “loss leaders” in their circular to get you in the door. Buy these sale items. Stock up on them if they are perishable. Also keep your pantry well stocked with cheap meal ingredients. Pasta, rice (and other grains), oatmeal, beans, lentils, split peas, barley, canned tomatoes, etc.) Keep your freezer stocked with frozen veggies and fruits (bought when on sale). I buy them or grow my own and freeze them during the summer months when they are in season. But you can still buy them cheaply throughout the year, especially when there is a sale or in bulk size. If you eat meat, buy it when it is on sale, and then either freeze it or make your meal out of it and freeze (the whole meal, or a portion of it) to eat another time. Also stick to more reasonable products, like chicken, or ground beef. The less meat you can get by with, the better off you will be when it comes to food costs (not to mention your health!). This same concept goes for dairy products as well (another costly part of your food budget). The more you can stay away from pre-made, prepackaged, and processed food the better off you will be. The more you can plan your meals and snacks based on simple whole ingredients the less you will spend. Better for your wallet and your waistline! Try to stay away from these kind of boxed, highly processed foods as much as you can Your shopping cart should look more like this! As for drinks, the less you can buy of these the better too. Drink water! (From the tap). Sugary drinks are expensive and not good for your teeth anyway. This would be the perfect time to try and wean your family off them if you can. And least try to reduce the amount that you buy and drink. (This includes “100% fruit juice drinks”, just as unhealthy, unfortunately, and even more expensive!) When you approach food shopping this way, you will always have the “fixin’s” for an affordable and healthy meal at home, and you will notice an immediate drop in your weekly grocery bill. And hopefully, this will keep you out of restaurants and from picking up a quick (but expensive) take out meal on the way home. For more tips on grocery savings see: money-saving-grocery-tips-from-your-auntie-victoria.html The other quicky rising cost is gas (and this includes heating gas and oil). To combat this, try to eliminate unnecessary driving. Consolidate your errands as much as possible. Carpool if you can. Stay home when you can. When you do stay home, do not overheat your house. Stop drafts as much as you can. Wear sweaters. Use blankets. Use your wood burning stove if you have one. Don’t heat rooms you are not using. Maybe (safely!) use a space heater if you are only going to be in one room for a while. I always turn my heat completely off at night when we are sleeping. We just wear warm PJ’s and socks and cuddle under lots of blankets. It’s cozy. And I think probably better for your health. None of this is rocket science, of course. It’s just frugal. It’s the way people lived back in “the day”. It worked back then, and it can work for you through these expensive times too. Give it a try. You might like it! You may even decide to adopt this way of life permanently. Why live more expensively than you have to, right? I love this frugal life and I can’t help but spouting its virtues to anyone and everyone who will listen. I hope you will come to like it as much as I do! Wishing you all a bright and frugal future! ☀️
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Well, it’s been quite a year to say the least. And I think that how much it affected us and how we came through it had a lot to do with how we had been going about our lives before this year. How prepared were you for something like this? I think this year many people have come face to face with this age-old question: Are you a grasshopper or an ant? The grasshopper will ignore the future and just live for today only to be surprised when winter comes and he has nothing put aside to get him through the cold snowy months. Meanwhile, the ant has been working throughout the summer to build up a stash to sustain her throughout those food-barren months. There was no way to foresee this odd turn of events this year and to anticipate how it might affect your family’s finances. But good financial planning does not require a crystal ball. Your money management style should not change based on the threat of a world event. That is to say, you should always be “preparing” for an impending disaster. If you have not been budgeting in such a manner, then now is the time to do so. You just never can tell when financial hardship will hit, be it worldwide or personal. The only way to grow your savings during this pandemic or any other time is to spend less and save more. Now is a very good time to examine where your money is going and make some cuts if you are looking to save more money. There are certainly a few things that you are spending money on that are not really necessary. You should have a nice comfortable savings account set up for your emergency fund (with at least 3–6 months of your living expenses in it) I recommend an online account for this. Any other savings that you will need within the next 5 years or so, should also be in a regular (online) savings account. For longer-term savings (to grow your savings) open up a discount brokerage account and buy some mutual funds. An S&P 500 fund is the best way to start. As your money grows you can explore other options to diversify your portfolio. If you have the option of signing up for a 401k (or other retirement account) at work you should do so right away. The bottom line is if you want to grow your savings to be prepared for the future, you have to save (and invest) your money. There is no magic bullet. Save and invest. If you are always doing this, even (especially) through the good times, then you will be able to weather through the not-so-good times such as these, just fine. Don’t be the silly grasshopper from Aesop’s fable, just living paycheck to paycheck, without a thought for tomorrow. Be the little ant saving up for the future Wishing you all a bright and prosperous future!
Drinks: 1. Coffee. It is so much cheaper to brew it at home 1. Water. After drinking water from a tap for much of my formative years, I was gobsmacked when the beverage companies convinced a whole society of people that they should pay for it in a bottle. That was quite a feat of marketing as far as I’m concerned. Guess what folks, it’s still available from your kitchen sink! Get a reusable bottle for when you go out. 1. Soft drinks. Terrible for your teeth and your health and your waistline. 1. Fruit drinks. Might seem like they are healthier than soda but they really aren’t. It is still a sugary liquid. Even the ones made from “100% fruit juice” are just the sugar of the fruit without the benefits of all the fiber that you would be getting from eating that actual fruit. Eat the fruit! 1. Tea. I do drink tea on a daily basis, but made from my own tea bags at home, or sometimes even from herbs (lemon herb) from my garden. And (don’t get all judgy now) I reuse the teabags several times before I am done with them. Alcoholic beverages. Rather than going to happy hour and spending upwards of $5 per drink (often way upwards), buy the ingredients and have a cocktail hour at each other’s houses. It is way cheaper and just as fun. When you go out to dinner if you must have a drink, at least limit yourself to one.I only drink water (and tea)… from my kitchen tap. It’s free and it’s much healthier. Oh, well, full disclosure (I am human), I do enjoy an occasional cocktail… at home, or at a friend's house. And, yes I do often order a drink on the (rare) occasion that I go out to dinner (but never more than one). I have never really added it up, but I’m sure I’ve saved a ton of money just by not buying drinks over the course of my lifetime. And I don’t feel like I “missed out” on a thing by living this way. Try it. You may be surprised by how much money you can save with just this one change in your spending habits! Here's to a bright future!
I’ve seen or heard this question posted in many different ways throughout the years, the gist of it being that one needs to make a fundamental decision between enjoying their life or saving for the future. I’ve heard the argument that you must “live” for today because you could be hit by a bus tomorrow. Young people have screamed YOYO! (Did I just coin that?), as in, “You’re Only Young Once”. They maintain that they must spend and “live” for today while they are young enough to enjoy it. But I don’t see it as a black and white, either/or situation: Save OR have fun. I believe that if you are wise with your money you can do both. Saving your money does not mean that you have to be a miserly scrooge sitting in your lonely attic counting your money and never having any fun. In fact, with a little planning and wise money management you can easily have a very pleasurable life and also save for your future at the same time. The one equation that people need to let go of is “Spending Money = Fun.” There may be some correlation to that sometimes, but it is certainly not a given. You can spend lots of money on something and have a terrible time, and even more importantly it is very possible to have a great time spending no money at all. I’m sure you can think of several examples of both these facts in your own life. Let’s start with the young (my newly coined YOYO philosophy). Yes, they can certainly save and also have fun. First of all, they have one huge advantage in their favor… the magic of compound interest. The fact is if you start saving (investing) early you will only need to save a fraction of your own money in order to build up a very tidy nest egg for retirement. Most of the money in your IRA at retirement will be growth on the returns you accrued through the years (not the money you actually put in). Pretty neat trick, huh? With a little prioritizing and forethought young folks can also be saving for their other more near-future needs/wants (a car, a house, a wedding, et.) by putting those savings on automatic pilot and just living on what’s left. The prioritizing comes in as you make the conscious decision to forego (instant pleasure X) which is not really adding a great deal of joy to your life in order to save up for that something that will bring you great pleasure indeed. The one joy that seems to be mentioned a lot is traveling. And here is where the young have another distinct advantage. They can travel for practically nothing, staying in youth hostels, or other low cost accommodations. There are even many temporary internship/job opportunities overseas that can allow them to see the world while sometimes even making a little money. The possibilities of low-cost travel are only limited by the imagination for the young (or young at heart). Google “traveling on next to nothing” and see what you come up with. I read a great memoir on the subject a while back called “No Baggage – A Minimalist Tale of Love and Wandering” by Clara Bensen. What about if you are not young? I see people of all ages squandering their money on daily instant gratification pleasures without even realizing that they are doing it. Once, when I was telling some friends about a trip to Singapore that I had just returned from, somebody asked me “I don’t understand. You can’t afford cable TV, but you can afford a trip to Singapore?” My answer to that is you can afford anything (within reason, of course), but you can’t afford everything. I chose to forgo all those channels at $150/month in order to save my money for something better. I even found a way to get TV for free (an old fashioned roof antenna). I also put my frugal skills to use to make the trip possible without breaking the piggybank. If fun is your priority, then go ahead and have it! Have as much as you want. Live! Take advantage of all that free fun that is out there for the taking. If there is some kind of fun that you must have money for, then just look at your spending habits and give something up that does not bring as much joy and save up for what you want. I see absolutely no reason why you can’t do both. Save and have fun! After all, you only live once! Wishing you a happy life today and a bright future tomorrow!
It’s May Flowers month, so I would like to take this month’s blog to look on the brighter side. We began this quarantine journey during the raw March winds when we too were raw and reeling from the shock of what was happening. Many people experienced a job loss or at least a reduction in pay. We could barely wrap our brains around what was happening. All we could do was retreat to our homes, as we were told to do, and try to make sense of it all. We remained hunkered down through the rains of April, for the most part even unable to get outside much in the soggy world out there. As the temperatures plummeted out there so did our investments, and often our spirits. Things looked pretty bleak. All we could do was take stock of where we were financially and in every other way. For those of us who still had jobs it was just a matter of staying afloat and ignoring the stock market plunge (as we are always told to do), and stay the course. For those struggling with income loss it was a matter of prioritizing and taking care of the most pressing needs (shelter and food). The rest would have to be figured out eventually. “But Victoria”, I can hear you saying now, “I thought this was going to be a silver linings message?” Ok, well now it’s May. The month of flowers. We are still home, but the initial shock has worn off a little. Those that have lost income have hopefully figured out a way to get their most important needs met. Maybe they are getting unemployment, SNAP benefits, food from a food bank, their stimulus check, or help from other sources. The rest of us are learning to live at home, creating new routines, keeping ourselves busy and occupied. But the real May flowers are going to be what we take away for having gone through this. For many this time has given us somewhat of a wake-up call. We were hurrying along through life without even thinking about where all our money and time were going. This has given us time to pause, and think, and live a different way, whether we wanted to or not. Many are surprised to see how little they are spending now that they are forced to stay home, unable to go to restaurants, coffee shops, stores, bars, movies, concerts, etc., etc. Some never paid attention to how much all that was really costing them. And some are finding that they actually can lead a pretty good life without all that spending. Perhaps they will rethink it when life returns to normal. So that’s a silver lining. Forced savings helps you discover a different way. Some people were caught short with no savings to help get them through a time of no income. It’s a hard lesson to learn for sure, but a lesson learned nonetheless. In either case being at home gives you the time to step back and examine the way you have been living, where your money has been going and to make some changes moving forward. What was once an abstract notion “I know I should be saving up for an emergency fund” becomes stark reality, and hopefully, brings about positive change for the future. A silver lining! The silver linings go beyond all that though. As usual when we go through tough times, it brings out the goodness in people. Acts of kindness and generosity abound. It is heartwarming to hear the stories of people going above and beyond for their neighbors, friends and people they don’t even know. And staying at home has given us a chance to live at a different pace, to stop all the rushing about and really spend time with each other in ways we rarely do when life is going full tilt. We have been playing board games, making meals and baking together, even just talking and going for long walks together. Some people have reconnected with old hobbies that they never had time for when life was in full swing. Knitting, gardening, painting, playing an instrument... All that is the best silver lining of all as far as I am concerned. If you know me at all, in person or from my writing, you know that I have long championed the slower, simpler, frugal lifestyle that has now become a forced reality for many. I would like to think that some of this will stick, that at least some people will come away from all this with a new perspective. Priorities will shift. People will slow down just a little. Spend more time home with their families and less money on needless frivolities. I think that would be the biggest silver lining of all. A beautiful May flower indeed! Now if only something would come along to force us to reduce our screen time…
Wishing you all a bright and beautiful flowery future! There is panic all around us. What should we be doing to keep ourselves and our loved ones safe? How long will this last? What supplies do we need? Do we have enough toilet paper? Sometimes we can be blindsided by what life throws at us. The best way to be prepared for the unexpected is to, well, be prepared. In the case of a new disease coming your way, you are in a much better position to deal with it if you have been living a good healthy life up until that point, eating good fresh whole foods, getting proper rest and exercise, maintaining a healthy weight, etc.. If you have been living this way, chances are you have a much better immune system to fight off the infection. But if you have been eating a poor diet, are out of shape and overweight, leading to possible chronic conditions, can you suddenly start living a healthy lifestyle and expect to have the same healthy immunity as the infection invades your community? Obviously you would have had to been building up that immunity and living a healthy lifestyle for quite some time for it to be effective for you now. I guess you are getting the idea of where this is leading to. The way we live our everyday financial lives also has a big impact on how well we are prepared for whatever life may throw our way. Perhaps this coronavirus has directly (or even indirectly) affected your income. Are you financially prepared to weather the storm? Times like this bring home just how important it is to live below your means (when you have means) and constantly be putting money away for the lean times (or that big “lean time” in your future, otherwise known as retirement). If your ordinary life includes having no debt, having a good emergency fund put aside, and saving on a regular basis, then you are much less likely to feel panic and upheaval when you come to a bump in the road. The more “padding” you have the less you will feel those bumps. Things that are a (financial) crisis to the ill prepared are merely blips to those that have the money to deal with them and move on. If you see the sense in this and would like to shift from a living-on-the-edge (paycheck to paycheck) lifestyle there are many actions that you can begin to take to shift to a saving way of life. If you don’t know where to start I have many blogs on various aspects of money saving strategies that you can implement. Right now, while you are likely sequestered at home, might be the best time to finally sit down and take a good look at your financial situation and take control. Here are just a few that you might find particularly helpful: New Year Savings Resolutions Would You Love to Save More Money? Spring Clean Your Finances Strengthen Your Frugal Muscle, Lighten Your Stress Easy Peasy Savings, Make it Automatic Saving Money Every Day The Perks, Pluses, and Payoffs of Prioritizing My Message to Millennials Ready, Set, Goal! Money Saving Grocery tips from your “Auntie” Victoria And if you scroll through the rest of the blogs, you may find some more that apply to your particular situation and needs. If you need further individual help feel free to contact me at (845) 758-0250, or brightfuture2budgt4.gmail.com for a personal appointment. Wishing you all the best for staying healthy now and moving toward a healthy financial future.
A while back when my niece was moving out on her own, I made this guide for her to help her save on grocery shopping. And now I thought it would be a good idea to share it with the rest of you. So just consider me your "Auntie" Victoria, as I present you with some of my sage tips on getting the most from your food shopping dollar. #1 – Do not start with a menu list for the week! #2 – Look at the circulars every week, and make your list from the sale items (you have to know your prices, just because it says it’s “on sale” doesn’t mean it’s a good price). Learn your prices. You can keep a book/ list of them if you want to. #3 – Then plan your meals for the week, based on what you have. #4 – Stock up on items when the sale is super good. #5 – Buy store brand / generic. It is almost always just as good (and, in fact, the same exact product) as the name brand. And you will pay much less. #6 – Keep a running list of what you are getting low on (to replenish), and keep a well stocked pantry. This eliminates the need to go out shopping for a few needed items between (weekly) shopping trips. # 7 – Which brings us to: Shop only once a week! (In fact, some savvy shoppers shop only once every other week), This saves time, gas, and the temptation to impulse buy! #8 – Plan meals based on inexpensive ingredients! Rice, pasta, eggs, etc. Eat less expensive meat. Chicken, ground beef, stew meat, things like that. Eat meatless as much as possible, See my blog on how eating healthy (vegan) is cheaper. #9 – Don’t buy prepackaged food (i.e. boxed “mixes”, frozen “meals”) Make things from scratch. It's cheaper and healthier too! #10– Don’t buy things in single portion sizes. Portion out your individual size snacks yourself into baggies, little containers, etc. #11 – Use reusable containers as much as possible. Not “throwaways” (such as tin foil and plastic wrap,) Always ask yourself if a reusable container would do for this purpose. (Baggies can be washed out and reused, but even better to use an actual reusable container). #12 – This goes for cleaning products too. Use rags instead of paper towels (you can wash them, and reuse). #13 - Don’t buy bottled water! Tap water is fine. In fact most bottled water comes from a tap somewhere! If you are worried about your tap water, you can buy a filter for your tap, or a filtered pitcher for your fridge. Buy reusable water bottles to fill yourself when going out. If you absolutely must buy bottled water (which you don’t), buy the gallon size (of store brand), and fill your water bottles (or glasses) from that. This also saves the environment from all that plastic! #14 – In fact don’t buy drinks! They are a super expensive, and unnecessary product, and usually just glorified sugar water. Not good for your budget or your health! Stick to water, or non-dairy milk drinks, or maybe orange juice (which you can buy from frozen concentrate, and make yourself). I know they sell “100% juice drinks”, but they are even more expensive, and even though it is “fruit” sugar, it is still just sugar. If you must buy juice (which you don’t), then at least water them down (a lot!) when you drink (serve) them. And don’t even get me started on soda! #15 – Use the smallest amount of product necessary to get the job done. Experiment to to see what this would be (by using smaller and smaller amounts – or starting with a tiny amount, and working your way up. For instance, shampoo, conditioner, lotion, toothpaste, laundry detergent, dish soap, cleaning products, and also expensive ingredients in recipes (if you can’t eliminate them altogether). Make a game out of it. “Waste not want not!” Does anybody even know what this expression means anymore? (#16– And now for the subject of coupons. I know you would think being frugal, I would be one of those crazy coupon ladies, but actually I’m not. The problem is they are mostly for expensive, prepackaged, processed junk food. And it is way too expensive (and unhealthy) to buy that crap anyway. If you do come across a coupon for something other than that (usually for health and beauty products), it is still usually cheaper to just buy the store brand. The only time it is usually worthwhile, is if the store is having a sale, and you have a coupon (especially if the store has a double coupon policy). But, of course you have to know your prices (what that item usually sells for, and if store brand is cheaper). #17– You also have to know your prices, when it comes to Bulk Buying. I often find that the prices on those giant bulk packages (i.e. Sam’s Club) are not better than you can get when that item goes on sale in the grocery store. So, if you are going to bulk buy, make sure you check the unit price (you should always be comparing unit prices anyway!) and know what it typically goes on sale for. And make sure you will be using that item up, before, say, 2 years past the expiration date or (if it is perishable) it turns into a science project. It’s not a bargain if you end up throwing half of it away. #18 – Speaking of Expiration Dates, they are not that magical. The item is not made to self destruct, or go suddenly bad, on that very date on the packaging. And the companies give themselves plenty of leeway on that (better to be safe than sorry on their end) – it also keeps you buying more of their product as the one in your pantry “expires” and you have to replace it. Take them with a grain of salt (so to speak). I have eaten things long past the expiration date, and am still here to tell about it. #19 – Don’t throw any food away!! Save even the tiniest amounts. You can use them for your lunch the next day, or incorporate them into dinner, or whatever. Learn to be creative with leftovers! #20 – Always start your dinner plans with “What has to be used up first?” (vegetables or meat “on their way out”, leftovers that have been in there a while, etc.). (Things in your pantry past the expiration date!). In other words: Don’t waste food!! You should never be throwing out food that you spent good money on! #21– You can also take advantage of this concept at the supermarket. They will usually have a ‘bargain rack” of bread, etc., just at it’s expiration date, or fruits veggies that have to be used up in the next day or two, at very reduced prices. Take advantage of this. Buy them and use them right away. Well I guess 21 tips are good to start with. LOL!! I could go on and on . . . . Not only with food shopping tips, but ways to save money on everything!! If you ever want help on budgeting to raise a family and “get by on less”, you know who to come to! Your “Auntie” Victoria, of course! Happy Saving! Bonus tip! (Since you read all the way to the end)... If you really want to save money go Vegan! Meats and dairy are the most expensive items in your shopping cart. If you eliminate them from your diet you will save even more. It's cheaper AND healthier to eat this way. I did it! It's easier then you think! And you will feel great too!
Many people tend to view the holidays as a time of abundance and exuberant gift giving. They equate the season with bountiful shopping and lavish piles of gifts. And while I understand the spirit of generosity and kindness that this custom represents and originates from I can’t help but feel that it has lost something through the years as it has been taken to the extreme. Of course, being the frugalista that I am, I first must note that, for one thing, it “inspires” (forces?) people to spend beyond their means. So many people today are going into debt for the sake of (the societal pressure to create) a lavish holiday. Do you regret the bills in your mailbox come January? Are you able to pay them off? You can read more in my December 2018 blog about how to have a festive holiday without the debt hangover. But it goes even beyond the new year regrets. How does this excessive holiday feel to you? Most people report feeling frazzled and stressed out and overwhelmed trying to pull it off. So then, what is the point of it all? Is it for the children? Well, I can tell you right now that children’s happiness not only is not dependent on how many gifts they receive, but is, in fact, negatively impacted by over abundance. They are actually more appreciative of a few well thought-out gifts than a mountain of “stuff." And what message are you sending them with all this “generosity?" Does the word “spoiled” have any meaning to you? So, if you are currently wrung out by all the stress and overindulgence of the past month, and you are dreading facing those bills in the mailbox come January, it may be time to consider another way next year. Just try it. I think you will be pleasantly surprised. Wishing you all joy, peace, and contentment at the holidays and always
I know I am dating myself here, but back when I was a wee lass, Halloween was a simple holiday, simply for kids. And when I say simple I mean that a few weeks before October 31st, we kids, (not our parents) would start thinking about what we wanted to dress up as for Halloween. Then we would scrounge our closets and other parts of the house for things we could use to accomplish our goal. There were usually things like cardboard boxes, tin foil, old clothes of our parents, yarn, fabric scraps and other such items involved. If our parents went all out and bought us a costume, it would be this thing that came in a 12” x 12” box consisting of a flimsy cover-up with a picture on it to represent what we were supposed to be and a cheap mask with a rubber band in the back to hold it on, like this: These are way more ambitious homemade costumes than we ever came up with. LOL! Very clever! On Halloween day itself we would rush home from school, put our costume on and head out with an old sheet or grocery bag to go around the neighborhood trick or treating. We would be home by dinner to review, organize, and trade our loot and that was it. Halloween over. As for decorations, maybe we would have a few cardboard cutouts of pumpkins, or bats, or ghosts, that we would tape on to our door or windows. And these we saved and used year after year. Oh, and the adults did not celebrate at all. They were not really involved other than to help us with our costume, if we asked, and buy and give out the candy for the trick-or-treaters. Fast forward to today and it (like almost every other holiday, and so many things in our society) has become a multibillion dollar industry that goes on for an entire season. Now I know I am sounding rather curmudgeonly here and don’t get me wrong I am not against people having fun for Halloween, adults included. I am just saying that if you are in debt, or not saving enough, it would be prudent on your part to reign in the holiday spending. Even my own (frugal) family has gotten into the spirit. When my kids were little we began hosting a spooky bonfire party each year at this time, adults included, which even though my kids are all adults now, we still often continue to this day. As I said we held our annual Halloween event, but I never went crazy with the spending. Since I knew it would be happening I kept it in mind all year long when I was shopping at yard sales and thrift shops. And I would take a look for clearance sales in the stores in the days after Halloween. And, of course, I would save things and use them year after year. I would also pad the decorations with things I had around the house, such as many candles in jars. Even Christmas lights can work for a spooky effect. I would recycle old halloween costumes into creepy scarecrows strategically placed around the yard. My kids would often put together a haunted house or trail, also cleverly using whatever household things they could find. For instance, one year “Dr. Ner’do well’s” lab contained body parts in jars, A cauliflower for the brain, grapes for eyeballs, chicken bones for fingers, etc. We also invited everyone to come prepared with their favorite scary story to tell as we sat around the fire. Free frights and chills for everyone! So I think you can see what I’m getting at here. I don’t think we will ever be getting back to that simple sweet Halloween of my childhood years but there are still many ways to get into the spirit and have tons of spooky holiday fun, adults included, without giving up your hard earned money. A little imagination can go a long way towards making your piggy bank happy and still making your Halloween spooktacular! The author and a friend in our homemade costumes at last years bonfire party. Happy Frugal Halloween!
You’ve all heard the expression “April flowers bring May Flowers” I’m sure. But what does it mean? Well in its literal sense of course, we need the rains of early spring to give us those beautiful flowers to enjoy in May. But what is the deeper meaning of the phrase beyond that? When we say it we are talking about how we are willing to put up with some less desirable weather in April because we know it is necessary so that we may delight in the lovely blooms that follow. But we can also apply the phrase to other situations in life. Very often it is easier to endure a less than pleasant circumstance because we know it is essential for something better to come. The financial guru Dave Ramsey has a great saying “Live like no one else so you can live (and give) like no one else later on.” In other words, if you have a future financial goal in mind you will be willing to make the sacrifices that it takes right now in order to attain them. You appreciate the showers because you know they will result in a richness of flowers. Are you a grasshopper or an ant? The grasshopper will ignore the future and just live for today only to be surprised when winter comes and he has nothing put aside to get him through the cold snowy months. Meanwhile, the ant has been working throughout the summer to build up a stash to sustain her throughout those food barren months. Does this mean that the ant has no fun while he is preparing for the future? Absolutely not! There are a great many ways that that little ant can have fun while also taking the time to put those resources away for that rainy day. But the wise little ant always keeps in mind that winter is coming and does what she needs to do to be prepared. So, yes, enjoy yourself for today. There are any number of ways that you can enjoy life for very little cost or for free. But if you are a wise little ant you will always be stocking up for the future so that (unlike that silly irresponsible grasshopper) when the future comes you will have an abundance to enjoy and your winter will be more like a gorgeous phantasmagorical riot of spring blossoms. Because you, my little friend, prepared for it.
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