I didn't think that it would be this long . . .

that Mr. Simple was unemployed. On the other hand, Mr. Simple has been quite busy most weeks. He had a friend ask him to do a bunch of painting at his house in late June and from word of mouth, he has had a painting job most weeks since then.

I have done some changes with daycare/preschool around here too. I now have two children that are full time - one little boy is 3 and has been here since he was 6 weeks, and the other is a little girl who is almost 2 and has also been here since she was 6 weeks. Then I have a set of sisters who come on MWF. The older sister is almost 4 and the younger sister is 2. On MWF, I also have a 3 year old who comes just in the mornings. On MWF, we do preschool activities in the mornings as well as go outside for at least a half hour, unless there is thunder and lightning. The schedule is working well for everyone, I think and now the amount of money that I make is consistent from week and that really helps with our budgeting.

Speaking of budgeting, since we no longer have credit card and car debt, we have much less in expenses. The mortgage and utilties is about it. Well, and swimming lessons for Super and swim team for Jelly Bean. Oh, and of course food, but we are trying to be frugal as possible with that and the garden certainly has helped with those expenses. The one expense that has been the most challenging is fuel for the cars. It, of course, doesn't help that gas prices are well above 3 dollars these days, but the fact that we regularly need to use both cars and the girls are both involved in things like drama club and girl scouts as well as the swimming stuff, well, I do quite a bit of running around. I know, I should probably cut down on their activities to save gas, and to save money. But they are things that the kids have done for awhile, and we are trying to keep some things consistent while we have had to say "No" or "Not now" on other things.

So all in all, this period of unemployment has been less stressful than I thought it might be. And I really think that all of this learning to be frugal and trying to be more self-reliant has helped too. Of course, that isn't to say that I wouldn't be thrilled if Mr. Simple got a great job that he loved and paid really well. :)

Dug Out

No, I'm not talking about snow. Or baseball. I'm talking about debt.

I know. Most people don't like to talk about money. Me either. But I'm going to go ahead and confess here that we used to have a lot of debt. (Notice that Used To. I'll get to that a bit later.)

Anyway, Mr. Simple and I got married in 1995. Our joint tax return for 1995 listed $12,000 in gross income. That puts a whole new meaning to living on love, doesn't it? But yea, we were not making much money. Shortly after that, we both got jobs in Chicago. Full time jobs. And we had no kids. And no mortgage. And just one car. So in theory, we should have been fine, right?

Of course, that wasn't what happened. We had full time jobs, but we weren't making that much money. And I was working in downtown Chicago and eating out for lunch at least 3 times a week. Not big lunches, but even 6 dollars a day, 3 days a week, adds up to quite a bit a month. And there was train fare. And work clothes. Same for Mr. Simple, minus the train fare. And rent was expensive, well, much more expensive than we were used to anyway.

So after 2.5 years of living in Chicago, we had already managed to start some credit card debt. But we paid the minimum every month. Sometimes more. It would be fine, right?

Then we moved to Decatur. Mr. Simple was working in radio. Do you know what the pay is like in radio? Well, let's just say, not high paying. I wasn't making much more. And I had to travel 45 minutes to work for much of that time, and of course, more lunches out. And another car. And we were trying to get pregnant, and we had discovered that there were some problems. So lots of dr. visits. But we were still young. There was time. One of these days, we would both get high paying jobs and it would be fine, right?

We moved to Normal. Mr. Simple was still working in radio. I was pregnant by now with Flower, but working full time at the university. We sometimes had trouble making the minimum payments and by now, the overall credit card amount was getting really high. We had a mortgage now. But it would be o.k., right?

Mr. Simple lost his job. But quickly got another job. I had Flower and we had to pay for daycare. The amount got larger.

Then I got pregnant with Jelly Bean. She was in daycare too. The amount got larger.

Then I went to part time at the university.

And then, in 2003, I was laid off.

We tried different things over the years. Paying a bunch from our tax return. Using the money that we got in a refi on our house. Using some of student loan money towards the debt when I was going to school. Because the interest rate on student loans was less than credit cards. It seemed to make sense at the time.

But we also had to do things like get appliances over the years and those went on the card. Sometimes, we had no money and we did cash advances. We never seemed to make any progress.

I had Super in 2004. By 2007, things were at the breaking point. I started doing full time daycare for a couple children to bring in more money, but we were still just barely getting by, and only making the minimum on credit card payments.

And so Mr. Simple made a call one day in June 2007. To a Credit Counseling Agency in town. They said that they could help us. They would manage our debt by negotiating lower interest rates, and by having us pay a set amount to them and they would distribute it to the credit card companies. (It wasn't exactly a smallish amount of money each month either. Like "more than a typical monthly car payment" amount.) But if we paid it every month for 48 months, we would have it paid off. Oh, and we had to cancel all of our credit cards too. Which sounds like a biggish deal, except it really wasn't. We had maxed all of them out and we hadn't used them in at least a year by that point anyway in an effort to try and gain some level of control over our credit card spending.

48 months. 4 years. It seemed like short time in some ways and it gave us a date when we would be DONE with it. For so long, it had seemed like we would be paying on credit card debt until we died.

On the other hand, 4 years. And 4 years of not using credit, but having to come up with that amount Every. Single. Month. That not exactly smallish amount. Every. Single. Month.

And I have increased my daycare over the past four years, worked some additional part time job over the years, but have never had a full time job during the last 4 years. Mr. Simple, over the past four years, increased his salary, then got a new job where he had an even higher salary, and then lost his job.

And we had things happen in the last four years. Floods. Appliances break. Needing New Appliances. Needing a different car. Christmas. Birthdays. Teeth breaking. Needing to fly to funerals.

And since 2007, I've tried to save money wherever I could. I try to be self reliant. We had one car for most of that time AND we managed to pay it off during that time. We make gifts when we can.

And then, it was June 2011. It had been 48 months. And our balance was $0.

$0. We have no credit card debt. We have no car payments on either of our cars. And during this time, we also managed to pay off dental debt of $15,000 (I had to have 7 crowns/root canals on most of my top front teeth. I seriously have the worst teeth EVER.) We do have a mortgage payment. We have some student loan debt.

But I don't have 29% interest on a Christmas present that I bought in 1997 hanging over my head anymore.

Will I get another credit card someday? Maybe. Not now. I don't know that even after all this time of NOT using one, that I trust myself. And I've learned to live without one. We pay save and pay cash if we need something. (What a concept, huh?)

All I know is that seeing the daylight after being buried for so long, well, it is AMAZING.

How do I hate money? Oh, let me count the ways . . .

Ugh. I've been struggling to have "enough" money for years. Some years were downright painful - 2004 was one and 2008, well, as I've said before, EVERYTHING was awful about 2008. Including our lack of money.

Things have been better in the last year. I've got a new daycare child and Mr. Simple got a different job. But yet, despite the extra money, we still aren't exactly rolling in it. I'm still frugal because I want to be AND because we have to be.

And despite wanting to be simple and despite trying to eat healthy, I'm just getting worn out from feeling like we can never go out to eat. Or go to a movie. Or get something that I want/need, something that is even less than $50, just on a whim.

We just got our tax return. Great, right? Ugh. I swear, it just makes me more depressed sometimes because it looks great sitting in the account, but then when I sit down and write all the checks for all of the medical and dental bills (and we even had health and dental insurance for the whole family last year!) that we owe, the return gets A LOT smaller. Then, we desperately need to finish the carpet job that we started last year. And I did get the kids a small thing that they wanted, and I got myself some workout clothes. And poof! It is gone.

And the REALLY depressing thing? Even after writing a bunch of checks for medical and dental bills, we STILL won't be able to pay it all off. Hopefully we will finish paying them all off completely in the next six months, but UGH.

I know I'm not alone in all of this. And as I was talking to my mom the other day, I know that in some ways, we are doing really well. We aren't upside-down in our house or anything. If we sold it right now, we would make a profit. We pay cash for everything. We are basically out of debt except for the mortgage. We have a place to live, we have transportation, we have clothes, we have food.

But sometimes, it would be nice to go out and buy something. And not have to worry about it.

Resource Management: Staying Out Of Debt

This quote comes out of the February Ensign by Joseph B. Wirthlin (I recently posted about an article I read of his where he talked about learning how to be happy. This person was a very wise man.) It is very good advice, not just for members of the church that I attend, but for everyone.

“May I suggest five key steps to financial freedom. …
“First, pay your tithing. … (or if you do not attend a church, contribute to a charitable organization)
“Second, spend less than you earn. …
“Third, learn to save. …
“Fourth, honor your financial obligations. …
“Fifth, teach your children to follow your example.”

Joseph B. Wirthlin (1917–2008)

Five easy steps. Well, easy if that is how you start out. Not as easy if you try and use these steps when you are already in debt, but they still work. I wish that I would have followed these steps from the beginning of my adulthood. It was so easy to rationalize things and then one day - it seemed so sudden, but it wasn't, it happened over many years - I was in debt. A lot of debt. It has taken years to get out, and I'm not quite there yet, but I can now see the light at the end of the tunnel. I hope to never get that far in the tunnel again.

Resource Management: Tracking Your Money

Down To Earth has a post today about managing your money. It is really good post, and my goal for the year is to basically do what she says in her post - which is: track your money, see what you could give up, make a budget, divide your expenses by 12, label Ziploc bags with your main categories, and put the cash into those items for the amount budgeted for that month.

But my goal for February is just to track my money. I wish I could find something like SparkPeople, but for money, where I could track my money, but I could also post about it, and have people respond and encourage me, and read people's blogs about their money journey, but for now, I'm just going to track it in Excel, although I'll have a small notebook in my purse for recording purchases. I will record EVERY purchase.

Rhonda says this about tracking your expenses:

"Most people know what they earn but very few can tell you, with accuracy, how much they spend each week. To work that out for yourself, you need to track your money. This is a real eye-opener. Get yourself a little notebook and pencil and take it with you every time you go out. EVERY TIME you spend something, write it and the price down in your notebook. If you buy an apple, groceries, a cup of coffee, a magazine - whatever, write it down. If you cheat on this, you're cheating yourself so please be accurate so you gain a genuine understanding of where your money is
going. You'll have a bit of an idea after a week, after a month your spending patterns will start to emerge. Who knew that having a cup of coffee five days a week would cost you about $750 a year. That's an extra mortgage payment. Tracking your money will clearly show you that all those tiny amounts add up to a lot of wasted chances to be debt-free. I'm not saying that you give up all your pleasures, but there are sacrifices to be made, you decide what you will sacrifice. And always keep in mind your long term goals - to be debt-free, to be able to work if and when you feel like it, to travel, to help your children, or whatever your goals are."

I always think I am so frugal, but the truth is that I probably buy at least 4 Diet Pepsi's a week. That is $6 a week, $24 a month, and almost $300 a year. Not a mortgage payment, but it is more than enough to pay for the car registration fees and home owner association fees that come due every year at the end of December. I'd love to be able to have money saved up to just be able to pay it instead of doing what I usually do, which is get all annoyed that I have to pay these things on top of Christmas gifts and other holiday expenses. Now, I'm not certain that I could ACTUALLY cut out Diet Pepsi completely, but maybe cut it in half to start out with? And then down to one a week? And then none? Maybe.

Or by tracking I may find another expense that would be slightly less painful to give up. I'll let you know what I find out . . .

OK, Wednesday came and went and

I didn't get my post up about coupons/deals. It is a little bit more work than I had anticipated getting things set up. I'm working on it, and I might get it up sometime today, but I will get it up by next Wednesday. Once I get things set up, doing it week to week should be much easier.

Until then, I'm going to update my blog links to include some of the blogs and coupon sites that I use, so if you want to put it together on your own until I get it up, you can.

Frugal Friday: Resource Management - Buy Used

Today's tip is:

1. Buy used whenever possible.

I buy almost all of mine and the children's clothes used, primarily at local thrift stores. We bought our vehicle used. I try to get my furniture used. I swap things with friends. I borrow things that I will only need for a short time.

If I can't buy something used, I try and ask myself if I can make it. I try to make buying new not be my first choice.

Frugal Fridays - Resource Management

Today's tip is to buy less processed/boxed food. Start with just two or three less items, and work towards as few as possible.

The trade-off with buying less processed food is that you have to spend more time cooking it yourself.

Some of the easier things to start with -

1. Cake, etc. mixes. It is easy to create a cake from scratch. It doesn't take much more time than adding the ingredients to the mix.

2. Spaghetti sauce. I haven't bought spaghetti sauce from a jar in probably two years. It is really easy to make it yourself - two bigger cans of tomato sauce, 1 can diced tomatoes, 1/3 cup brown sugar, 2 T. olive oil, spices (garlic, oregano, basil, etc.), and dried onions. Bring to a boil and then simmer for 15 minutes. If you want ground meat in your sauce, brown it and then add it to the sauce after it boils. This makes up enough for about 10 servings, so I usually freeze the leftover sauce.

3. Chicken Nuggets. Cut chicken into nugget sized pieces. Put bread crumbs and any spices you want in a bag. Shake and then bake them for about 15 minutes (depending on how many you want to cook.) You could probably put flour and spices on the chicken chunks and fry them instead, but I never do that.

Frugal Friday

My tip for today is to use coupons*. Do you see that asterisk after the word "coupons?" It should be a REALLY big asterick. I do use coupons, but I only use coupons for brands that I MUST use. I buy all of my canned goods at Aldi's and anything else that I know that I can't get cheaper anywhere else. I try and cut down on using brand names as much as I can, but we do have some "have to" things like Angel Soft toilet paper, Cascade dishwasher soap, and Secret antiperspirant. I also use my manufacturer coupons to Kroger because they will double coupons up to 50 cents. (Check with your local stores to see what the store policy is on coupons.)

I will also use coupons if I can use the manufacturer coupon in conjuction with a sale or store coupon so that I'm spending less than I would if I got the store brand. I do this type of couponing the most at Walgreens. I use the website Money Saving Mom (it is in my Simple Blog list too) because she will show you what the deals are at Walgreens, CVS, Rite-Aid, and sometimes Costco and Wal-Mart, as well as some other random deals. Again, I really try to buy the things that we USE, not just get stuff because it is cheap/free. So I don't always get some of the deals that I see on coupon blogs because it just isn't worth it to me to make 10 trips to buy stuff so I can get coupons so that I can get the stuff I need for free.

I also use the coupons that Kroger sends me. I shop at Kroger for 3 main reasons - One, it is pretty close to my house. Two, they do double coupons. Three, they track the items you purchase, and then about every couple months, they send you pack of 10ish coupons for items that you buy regularly. I've got coupons on 3 separate occassions for a 24 pack of drinking water for FREE. Most of the time, the coupons are for at least a $1.00 off the item.

Oh, I forgot another reason I shop at Kroger. They have a store discount card, and I try to not buy anything that isn't discounted by using the discount card, or I have a manufactur or store coupon for it. Most of the time, I save equal to what I spent (so say I spend $75, it means I got $75 off in coupons and discounts.)

Oh, yea, another reason I shop at Kroger is that you can load coupons from Shortcuts.com and Proctor and Gamble right on to your card. That way, you don't have to print it out or cut it out, etc. I think I went to the Kroger website to set it up.

Maybe I should have labelled this tip - Shop at Kroger instead of Use Coupons, LOL. But if you live in an area that doesn't have a Kroger, you may have one of their affiliates (check on at Kroger.com). You also may find that it is cheaper for you, and the type of shopping that you do, to shop at another grocery store. I went to all of the main grocery stores in my area (Schnucks, Meier, Wal-Mart, Kroger, and Jewel-Osco.) and priced out the items that I would generally buy at a grocery store (as opposed to a drug store, discount store, or Aldi's). I took my grocery list and wrote down the prices of the items and compared it. It took me AWHILE, but I learned that for my family, Kroger was the winner, especially when you added in the coupons that they send and the double coupons, etc. But you may find that another store works best for the type of items you buy and the stores that are available, etc. I also will look at the sale papers and I will be willing to go to another grocery store if they have something on sale that that is a very good deal, particularly if it is an item that I am trying to use to build up for my 3 month/one year supply/once a month cooking.

So use coupons, but don't get too caught up in it, and it is easy to get caught up in it once you start. My goal is to buy the things that are on my master list as cheaply as possible, and using coupons can sometimes help me spend even less than normal.

Frugal Fridays

I'm pretty frugal. Most of the time, I look at it as a fun challenge, but there also is the fact that we sort of NEED to be frugal too.

So I'll be posting a frugal tip every Friday. Until I don't, LOL, since I tend to get started on stuff like this, and then drop off after awhile. Not every frugal tip will work for every family, and that's o.k.

So the first frugal tip is: Stay At Home. We only have one car (this will probably be my next frugal tip) and so most days, I am here without a car. It is easier to not spend money if you have to walk to the store.