5 Things I Did That Were Frugal This Week

1. I bought a few groceries for the first time since 12/30. I spent $47.99. I am hoping this will last us the rest of the month. We will see :) 

2. We have been using the library a ton lately. I request dvd's of Mike & Molly and we have been making our way through the seasons. I have also been reading a lot. My current read: 

3. We have been eating a lot from our pantry.

4. I made a batch of granola to eat for breakfast. 

5. I had 5 stay at home days this week. It has been cold and this seems like a lot but it helps to not spend money :)

Planning For The Year...

It has really become apparent to me that we have not planned well at all for medical and dental bills.  In years past we have all been pretty healthy and these bills have been at a minimum.

Right before the end of 2015 my husband hurt his back and started going to the chiropractor. While most of the costs are covered by our health insurance, the co-pays for two, three and four times weekly visits are not.  Today he also had a dental cleaning and was told he needs to have a crown.  While again most of the cost of that is covered through our dental insurance thankfully, about $350 is not.

We also have a $155 office visit for Kid # 5 from December who ended up sick for a few days and had to make a trip to the Dr.  We haven't found a Dr yet in our new area so we just went to the closest prompt care.  Turns out our insurance does not cover quick strep tests. Ugh!

 I am not prepared for these large bills at all.  So I will be sitting down and reworking the budget to accommodate them. I know we can easily make this work but it may prolong how fast we get out of Baby Step 3.  I was really hoping to be done by June :(

5 Things I Did That Were Frugal This Week

1. I have had 4 "no spend" days this week

2. I have not done any grocery shopping. We have a ton of food leftover from all our holiday celebrations. We are eating it up! 

3. The only spending that I did do was for $10. Not to shabby I don't think :)

4. I ran out of my regular face lotion and instead of buying new I am using up some I already had but am just not overly fond of.

5. Kid # 5 took her lunch to school 2 days this week which saved me $5 

2016 Goals

I really only have one major goal this year.

Complete our fully funded emergency fund and stay out of debt.

Ok I guess that is 2 goals.  Seems like those would be easy huh? 

Lets hope so.

 My plan is to write here more and document my frugal living more often here also.

It seems that a lot of my favorite blogs stop writing once they get out of debt. But I think it is equally as hard to save money and stay out of debt. So I hope to continue to document my journey through this process.

Here's to completing our goals in 2016

One Year Of Being Debt Free

December 31,2015 was our 1 year anniversary of completing Dave Ramsey's Baby Step 2.

 It really has been an awesome year.

It is amazing when you own no one but your mortgage how freeing it is when a unplanned expense or life event happens and you don't have to worry about how to pay for it.

 We relocated to a different city and manage to not rack up anymore debt.  We bought a few new pieces of furniture and did some things to our new house, all funded with cash. 

We also had over $2000 in car repairs for my car which were totally unplanned but also paid for in cash.

We have even managed to save 3 months living expenses for Baby Step 3.  We are planning to do at least 6 months.

Even though we have paid off our consumer debt I do not see our lifestyle changing ever.  I love being frugal and it is a challenge to me to save money.

I tell my husband all the time his job is to make the money and mine is to save the money :)

Lets hope 2016 is as nice to us as the last year has been!

10 Things We Have Purchased To Save Us Money

A few months ago some of my favorite YouTube Vloggers did some videos on "10 Things They Purchased In Order To Save Money". I loved these videos and watching all of them. I am not a vlogger but I do have this here ole blog so I thought I would use it to play along :)

Here goes: 

1. We own 3 of these box fans and 3 other types of fans. These help keep it cooler in our house and help prolong the use of our air conditioning. Which in turn helps keep our cooling costs down

2. Several years go when our toaster died we decided to purchase a toaster oven instead. Ours fits and 8x8 pan, a small cookie sheet which came with it and a bread pan. So not only have I made toast with it but I used it often in place of our oven. This keeps our kitchen cooler in the warm months. It also saves us from heating up the big oven when it really isn't needed.

3. These are our coffee makers. One is just a regular one. The other is a fancy machine my husband found last summer at a yard sale for $10. Turns out it is an expensive machine that cost over $200 new. He loves fancy coffee so this machine has easily paid for itself by keeping him out of Starbucks. ( We are in the process of turning our " wet bar area" into the " coffee bar" instead. More on that and the new house to come)

4. I bought this big drying rack at Costco before we moved. I have used it like crazy since we have been in the new house since I don't have a clothes line here. I also own 3 other smaller racks and this hanging rack too. I love them. These help me keep from using the dryer as much which keeps our house cooler and our electric/gas bills down. 

  

5. Until about a 7 months ago my husband was commuting 3 hrs a day, 5 days a week for work. Buying our Prius was a godsend as far as savings on gas. Before we bought it we were spending our house payment in gas. It is really a nice car and we enjoy having it.

6. I didn't really purchase this item but I did ask for it as a Christmas gift from my parents. I use this Rice Cooker at least once a week, sometimes more. It ís easy to use and makes my dinner prep so easy.

7.  The Roku is one of the best and most used purchases that save us money we gave made! I actually just purchased another one for our second TV. We use this device to watch tv every single day. Plus I use it to watch the YouTube Vloggers I love too :)  Sorry the pic is not the best but hey it works :)

8. This is my sewing machine. I use it all the time. I make gifts and household items with it. It was well worth the money spent!

9. 

Our Amazon Prime membership. I hate to go shopping and this keeps me from buying other items. We get free shipping on most items. Many times we will pick the slower shipping so we can get $1 promotional credits to use for movie rentals. We also use it for some of our tv viewing that isn't found on Netflix. We definitely get our money's worth out of it.

10. 

My IPad. My husband purchased this for me as a 40th birthday present. I use this item for many many different things to save money. I research prices and the best places to purchase things. I use it to watch tv sometimes. I read blogs and other free things on it. I use it to run Perktv and Swagbucks Videos to earn gift cards. I write my own blog on it. 

 

So there you have it my 10 items :)

5 Things I Did That Were Frugal This Week

1. We went out for our anniversary dinner with a gift card we received as a thank you from our realtor. It covered our whole dinner. 

2. I got a good deal on coffee beans for my husband at Target. I received a $5 gift card for purchasing 3 bags and a $5 egift card to Starbucks with the purchase. 

3. I put the $5 Target gift card in my 2016 Christmas envelope to use for next year.

4. I used a 40% off coupon for my husband's anniversary gift. Saved me a few dollars :)

5. I made some homemade "Clorox" wipes for one of my bathrooms. Put them in a upcycled coffee container too.