Lessons Learned From “The Tightwad Gazette”

I read The Complete Tightwad Gazette by Amy Dacyczyn over two years ago and it really changed my mind about money and frugality.  The Tightwad Gazette is a compilation of newsletters written over many years by Amy and bound into one book. It’s a thick book that is completely fascinating. I would like to own it one day but for now I try to check it out from the library and re-read it once a year. Here are a few things I have learned through my readings.

There is nothing wrong with leftovers and substitutions in the kitchen. Amy encourages her readers to use up what they have and be creative in the kitchen. I learned that you can save the juice from canned fruits and use it in sweet muffins in place of water or milk. Now I often put juice from canned peaches in my banana muffins and reduce the amount of sugar the recipe calls for. I also learned that you can make various soups, quiches and muffins using leftovers from previous meals.

Setting up a price book can save you money at the grocery store. When we moved to our current area over two years ago, I diligently created a price book to be familiar with products and stores in our area. I have since relaxed on my price book, as I can list most of the prices at Aldis, but it would be helpful to re-create one so that I know a stock-up price for couponing.

When you need to solve a problem first look at what you have before running to the store to buy something. One example that she listed was creating birthday decorations from leftover colored school papers. She also had a lot of tricks for remodeling your home using what you have. Lately I have made homemade toys by using things from around the house.

Perhaps cloth diapers aren’t so bad after all. I had never considered utilizing cloth diapers until I read this book. At the time our apartment didn’t have its own washer/dryer so the laundromat bill would have canceled out any savings from using cloth. But when we moved to our current apartment I started researching cloth diapers and bought a few supplies for my kids. I have to admit we only cloth diaper half of the time, but my diaper bill is a lot lower than it could be. Simplemom has a wonderful series on the mechanics of cloth diapering.

These are just a few of the lessons I’ve learned from this book. I would be interested to know if others have read this, and if so, what did you learn?

Read more ways to save at Life As Mom’s Frugal Friday.

Great Links to Check Out

Here are some posts that I have found this week that I thought you might enjoy.

For the Mommas has a great post on stock up prices for toiletries. She lists both a buy price and a stock-up price. This a great place to start in making your own price book.

Simple Kids has compiled a list of favorite children’s literature from their readers. This would be a great resource when buying gifts or building up your home library.  I’m going to print out a copy and bring it with me to the library.

Get Rich Slowly has a comprehensive article on Planning a (Debt-Free) Dream Vacation. We are currently setting aside a specific amount for our family reunion this summer and that certainly keeps us from putting a vacation on a credit card.

Mama’ s Laundry Talk discusses Frugal Laundry Necessities. We have similar shelves in one of our closets and I love them.

Saving for the Expected: The Baby Fund

I often hear the old adage, “Save for a rainy day”, in reference to unexpected occurrences such as unemployment, health issues, and accidents. But I rarely hear people express the need to save for major expected expenses that can just as easily derail your budget and potentially lead to unwanted debt.

Last year we were fortunate enough to bring baby Sweet Pea into our home. Although we have great health insurance, we still knew that we had to make room in our budget for medical expenses  associated with her birth.

Shortly after we found out we were pregnant, I started doing my research on the estimated costs for a routine delivery in our area. I looked into various doctors, hospitals, etc. and after extensive online research and numerous phone calls I felt confident estimating the cost to deliver our baby.

We put our emergency fund savings on hold for a few months and funneled all of our savings into “The Baby Fund”. After this was fully funded we returned to building up our emergency fund.

My estimation for the cost of her birth, was roughly accurate. The only reason we had to dip a little into savings was an extra day in the NICU.

Knowing that our baby was paid for without going into debt, allowed us to fully enjoy her without worrying about finances.

Saving Money by Using What You Have

I can freely admit that the creative part of my brain is often underused and perhaps even undervalued. I am used to routines, schedules and deviating from the normal can be hard for me. Yet this year I’ve been more determined to be a wise steward and make do with what I have.

My husband made a delicious dinner for New Years and I was in charge of dessert. I have always been a fan of pudding parfaits and wanted to make them in fancy, festive glasses. The only problem is we don’t have any fancy, festive glasses. So I looked through my cupboards and this is what I found. Festive canning jars. They may not have been fancy glasses, but they were better than our usual plastic ware.

One bad habit that I’ve picked up is spending hours skimming through various tot school blogs looking for ideas for creative play for my son. I often think if I had this cool toy, or these expensive art supplies my son will be happier in his play. I don’t take into consideration the fun stuff I have just lying around the house. While I was cleaning up the kitchen I ran into an empty cinnamon jar. It was going to find an immediate new home in the trash, but I decided to give it to my son with some shortened spaghetti so he could do this.

Both of these ideas were quick, easy substitutions that didn’t cost a cent but still fulfilled their functions.

See more ways to save at Lifeasmom’s Frugal Friday.

Spending Money to Save Money

Part of living on one income is protecting your assets and investments, and sometimes that takes cash. For example, we have a nice computer that we bought a few years ago and have used extensively for both household and business tasks, including working with intensive movie software. Lately the computer has been slowing down and we decided that the best thing to do was to buy an external hard drive to free up some space so the computer won’t have to work as hard.

We waited for a good deal on the hard drive but still spent about $75. In addition we also need to purchase more RAM. All in all we will spend about $100 on our computer. Hopefully this investment will take some strain off of our computer and prolong its life, so that we don’t need to buy a computer in the next couple of years while we are working so hard at saving money.

A sound part of any budget is including maintenance money for assets such as your house, car or in our case, computer. I have written about the book America’s Cheapest Family and one of the successes to their sound financial status is preparing for maintenance and emergencies. Yes, at times it hurts to spend money when you’re trying so hard to save, but in the end sometimes the best thing for your financial bottomline is to spend money where it will count and prevent hardships down the road.

The Simple Life: Continuing Education-Using the Local Library

My husband and I are both students at heart, even though we’ve been out of college for over a year. My parents taught me the value of an education and books from a young age. My husband and myself might go back to school one day for additional degrees but right now we don’t have the time or money to enroll in classes. So the next best step is utilizing our local library.

For me there has always been something special about libraries. Last night, I went to the library to pick up some books on hold and when I walked in I just felt like I was at home. I think the feeling stems from a deep respect for all of the knowledge contained within those brick walls.

One of the main reasons I go to the library is to educate myself on current issues our family is facing. I have checked out multiple books on personal finance, fitness, investing, cooking, childcare, indoor gardening and many other areas. When my husband showed me our options for hte 401(k) plan I didn’t feel intimidate voicing my opinions because I had spent the time to learn about the basics of investing and the different vehicles you can use.

Currently I am researching safe home and natural remedies for common ailments to hopefully save a few trips to the doctor and prescribed antibiotics unless absolutely necessary. I am also looking at investing in a few basic essential oils to add to homemade gifts, cleaning solutions and basic first aid. With all the products out there I want to make sure that our family is getting the best use of our time and money in the solutions that we find. And that is where books are so helpful.

I have to admit that going to the library now with a 1 1/2 year old in tow is a bit of a challenge. I’ve found that reserving books online and picking them up is a lifesaver. Before my son was mobile I would usually take my time to browse through the different selections, but now by the time I’ve given the books an adequate lookover my son has either destroyed the bottom shelf or has run to the next aisle in order to play peek-a-boo.

Even though trips to the library may be a challenge now, I’m trying to instill the same love of learning and books to our son, so I try to make the library fun. I think it’s working because when we go to the library he knows exactly where the kid section is and starts playing with the blocks while I pick out some books for him. And at home he loves to read books.

Even though I am not currently in school I find great satisfaction out of utilizing our local library to keep informed and current in my life and the world around us. Using the library improves our lives by allowing us to improve our minds—all for free.

Hulu

Hulu.com is a website where you can watch television shows and movies for free. We don’t own a tv and have been using Hulu for quite a few months to watch many of our favorite shows without costing us a penny.

In addition, we frequently use Hulu movies for our date nights. They add movies each week and during the past few months their selection has grown to include such movies as My Best Friend’s Wedding, The Karate Kid, Men in Black and many others.

Hulu programs have small advertisements throughout the show to pay for the service, but these are much shorter than television commercials. In addition parents should be aware that Hulu has some racy programs not suitable for children.

My sister just sold her tv and cancelled cable after trying Hulu for a week because of the money it would save her with her limited tv watching. We recommend Hulu to others who are looking for free entertainment to help them save and get out of debt.

A Little Joke With a Lot of Wisdom

I’m paraphrasing this joke as I can’t find the original source.

A man arrives home sweating and out of breath.
His wife asks “What took you so long to get home?”
“I ran behind the bus the whole way home. I saved $2.00 in bus fares.”
“That’s nothing”, his wife replied. “Last week I saved $15.00 by running behind the cab.”

The moral of the lesson is that it’s really not how much you saved, but how much you spent or didn’t spend. That’s why I don’t pay too much attention to my receipts when they say what percentage I’ve saved. The only numbers I care about is the total amount and that it fit within my budget.

Moneysavingmom has a similar guest post about this topic.

Dollar Tree Early Sunday Edition Saves Money

A few months ago I started a simple experiment. I wanted to see how much money I would save by using coupons. My local newspaper was running a special promotion where I got three months of the Thursday and Sunday paper for $10, or about $3/month.

By taking the price of the paper into account I estimated that based on my normal shopping habits I saved about $10-$12/month on groceries and household items using coupons. Since I was only receiving one paper I didn’t have access to multiple coupons to combine with store sales and stock up on rock bottom prices.

I could easily justify spending $3/month on a paper when I saved $10-$12/month using the coupons. However when the promotion ended and I would pay around $10/month for the subscription I couldn’t justify keeping the subscription. So I started looking into other options.

First I called the paper to ask for an extension of the discount, which they weren’t able to do. I then asked if I could only order the Sunday paper or just buy the ads. They said that service wasn’t available in my zip code.

So I then went on a local discussion board where someone mentioned buying the early Saturday edition of the Sunday paper for $1.00 at the Dollar Tree. I decided to give that a try and have been very happy. For less than  the price I was paying for a subscription I am able to buy two newspapers and get twice the amount of coupons. If I know that a certain week doesn’t have great coupons I will buy only one paper. Hint: This Sunday’s paper has 5 coupon inserts now that the holidays are over.

The only hang-up with this arrangement is making sure that I make it to the Dollar Tree on Saturday before the papers are gone. Most weeks this shouldn’t be a problem unless we are traveling or have other engagements.

If you are hesitant to try coupons I would give yourself a few months to see if it’s worth the time and energy needed for clipping coupons. Call around and find the best deal on the paper in your area. If you’re intimidated by matching coupons with sales there are many great online resources and blogs like couponmom.com, mypennypile, dealseekingmom, and moneysavingmom that match out the store deals and coupons each week to make clipping coupons a little easier.

Little Things to Earn Extra Cash

Since we’ve had a little extra time during the holidays we found a few things around the house that could help us get extra cash to put into savings.

1. Fill out rebates from the holidays
Many larger purchases may be eligible for rebates. They take some time and effort but can be well worth the hassle. This year we bought a Remington from Dick’s Sporting Goods for our family Christmas present. The night that we brought it home we made sure to fill out the rebates for a $20 gift card from Dick’s and a $30 rebate from Remington.

2. Sell items on either Ebay or Craigslist
We sold many of our unnecessary household items before we moved across the country last winter. But we still have a modem that we no longer use yet we kept putting off selling it. We finally decided to post a listing on Craigslist and see if we can get $20-$30 for it.

3. Close an account we no longer use
Last year we got a toll pass for a close major city when Tim was hunting for jobs. Since we haven’t visited that city in over a year we decided to close the account and return the toll device. We should get back the $10 deposit and about $35 that we still have in our account.

These specific rebates, items to sell and returns are unique to our situation but there should be something that you could get a little bit of money for by just spending a few minutes filling our paperwork or posting a listing online. In some of these cases, a little bit of effort goes a long way.

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