So buying them in bulk is totally the way to go.  And it makes a huge difference in price.  For example, at My Spicer a 4oz container of basil is $1.35 an oz but a 32 oz container is only $.82 an oz.   Or at Spice Barn a 4 oz container of cinnamon is $1.20 an oz where an 8 oz container is only $.76 an oz.  And if it doesn’t go bad, then why not buy the cheaper version?  You can get bigger than just 8 oz.  But I was trying to be reasonable.  I don’t expect anyone to really buy a 5 pound bag of Oregano.  But hey, maybe you make a lot of spaghetti.

I like to try new recipes and sometimes I find one that calls for a spice I’ve never heard of.  I won’t be buying those in large quantity for two reasons.  One, maybe I hate it and will never use it again. (Caraway seeds anyone?)  Two, even if I do like it I probably won’t use it much.  After all, I have gone my entire life thus far and haven’t used it.  But I do plan to buy the common spices in bulk.  Cinnamon, Onion Powder, Salt, Pepper, Basil, Oregano, Parsley, Garlic Powder… you know, the ones that always seem to make their way to the front of the cabinet.

Here are some tips to get the most out of your spices:

• Store them in an airtight container.
  
• Store them in a cool, dry, dark place.  Like, say, the cabinet.
  
• Don’t sprinkle the spice directly into a steaming pan.  The steam will get into the container and age the spices quicker.  This is a new one to me.  I do that all the time!  I should say, I used to do that.
  
• If the spice has smell then it’s good to go.  If you crush it in your hand and it has no smell, then toss it.  The flavor is about as potent as the smell.

I mentioned two spice sites, I have no idea if either of those places are good places to shop.  They just came up first in a Google search.  So if anyone knows of a good place to buy spices please let everyone in on your secret.

pic by: Frenkieb

The poorest time in my life was when my daughter, now 7, was a baby.   I went to school and worked part time at a fast food restaurant.  Her father worked at a printing press for $9.00 an hour.  And don’t forget… we had a new baby.

So how did we survive?  First off, we lived in Section 8 housing.  For those that don’t know:  Section 8 housing is housing based on your income, and the rest of your rent is subsidized by the state.  Which is a blast, I’m tellin’ ya.  But we paid $175 a month for a two bedroom apartment, and utilities were included.  So hey, you can’t beat it.  It was worth putting up with the neighbors.  Me and my daughter both had insurance through the state, which was free.  I don’t specifically remember but I think my ex had insurance though his job.  Either that or he didn’t have insurance at all.

Of course, we couldn’t afford daycare so we worked opposite shifts.   My ex worked 7:00 to 3:00, and I worked 6:00 to 10:00.  Which worked out nice, since we only had one car anyways. I drove him to work and picked him up.   I also took all my classes online to avoid daycare costs.  So I spent my days taking care of our daughter and doing school work.

We didn’t have cable, or a car payment, or cell phones.  A friend of mine had a little girl about a year older than my daughter and she gave me all her outgrown clothes.  So my daughter was clothed for free until she was about 2 years old.  Which was nice.

The key to our survival was the budget.  Knowing how much you have to spend in each category, and knowing, for fact, that if you follow the plan all your bills will be paid is a huge stress relief.  I wish I still had those budgets, I would be very interested in seeing them.  I don’t remember how much we paid for gas, car insurance, or groceries.  But I’m sure it wasn’t a lot.

What strikes me the most when I think back on that time was that I didn’t feel poor.   I felt lucky to only work part time, and go to school.  I was so glad that my daughter didn’t have to go to daycare (not that there is anything wrong with daycare, I was just glad to be home with her).  I liked my job well enough and I knew we could pay our bills.  Sure, we didn’t have a lot extra but we had everything we needed.

But that doesn’t mean I was happy.  I wasn’t, and it had nothing to do with money.  It had to do with love.  I was living with a man out of obligation.  Not out of love.  We fought constantly.  If I had to be poor now with my husband, a man I love immensely, I could still be happy.  Even if it meant living in the worst part of town, and driving him to and from work every day.  I could do it.  I would be happy to. (ok, maybe that last part is overstating it a bit.)

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It started innocently enough.  My husband was watching football and I was sitting next to him on my laptop.  I was bored and Stumbling site after site.  Then I found this site that has all the Amazon markdown stuff laid out so nicely.   Might as well see what they have for 90% off, right?  I mean, Christmas is coming.   Oddly enough I didn’t browse anything that would make good gifts.  Only stuff for myself.

Ok, but here they are… my new shoes.  I got the “desert” colored ones.  They are half off.  In my defense they really are a good deal and I was afraid if I waited til next month my size would be sold out.  I was kinda nervous about buying shoes online.  A picture might be worth a thousand words… but it doesn’t tell you if those shoes look nice with your favorite jeans.  You know what I’m sayin’?  So I went to the store to try on similar ones, just too see if the size was right and if I really do like that style.  And guess what?  They had the exact shoe at the store.  Same color and everything.  So that was cool.  And they were $60 in person.  So I came straight home and ordered them.

But that’s it for a while!  Nothing new until January at least.  Pinky swear.

Capitalism.org writes:

Capitalism is a social system based on the recognition of individual rights, including property rights, in which all property is privately owned.  Under capitalism the state is separated from economics (production and trade), just like the state is separated from  religion. Capitalism is the  system of of laissez faire. It is the system of political freedom.

Sounds good to me.  I’m all for individual rights and private property.

Walmart is often protrayed as evil.  Why?  I just don’t get it.  They are profitable, wildly profitable.   We should celebrate in thier ingenuity and efficiency.  Walmart goes to great lengths to keep costs down and therefore keep prices down.  They are now being rewarded with growth while poorly run companies are looking for bailouts.  Walmart should be rewarded with profits and growth.  They earned it.

I know there are complaints against Walmart.  Dozens of complaints.  I can’t possibly be up on each and every one, but as the world’s largest empolyer it only stands to reason that they would also have the most employee complaints.

People and companies shouldn’t be punished for their creativity and profits.  They should be rewarded!  They should get rich, very very rich.  Apparently people disagree with this idea, but I believe everyone benefits when it’s easy to make money.  Risk should equal reward.  Take big risks, get big rewards.  Take small risks, get small rewards.  When we take away the big rewards from those who take big risks we hurt everyone.  Those who take small risks should not get big rewards.

But on the other hand, when the big risk takers fail, we should not mitigate their losses.  Their losses are theirs and theirs alone.  The people who took small risks should not be subject to the risk takers losses, just as they do not have claim to the risk takers gains.

Pic by: dawvon

I found a place online that seemed ok, for as much as you can tell online. I walk in and there is a tiny lady hunched over a sewing machine and just buried in fabric.  The whole store is just one big pile of fabric, clothes, and string.  I walk up to her and tell her I need my pants hemmed.  She barely speaks English but I figure out she wants me to put them on so she can measure them.  When I immerge from the rickety cardboard dressing room she points to a plywood platform in front of a mirror.  I stand on it and she pins up the bottom of my pants with lighting speed.

When I left I couldn’t help but feel incredibly wealthy.  Not only can I afford a brand new pair of pants, but I can also afford to have them customized.  Getting these pants hemmed only cost $12, but the fact that I can spend money on something like that made me feel so grateful.  I don’t know if this makes sense.  I’ve certainly spent more than $12 before.  It’s not the dollar amount, it’s the luxury, I guess.

There are 4 different plans, and we have the cheapest one.  Right now we pay $62 a paycheck (biweekly), which I don’t think is bad at all.  $124 a month for health insurance for 4 people is pretty good.   Our coverage is basically a $20 copay and 100% coverage for all the basic everyday stuff.  Like check ups, immunizations, urgent care visits, office visits, ect.  Then 60% of everything else.  Two things really caught my eye here.  A trip to the ER has a $50 copay and then only 60% coverage.  And for maternity care they only pay 60% of the delivery.  Prenatal and postnatal care is 100% covered, but the actual pushing the baby out is only covered 60%.  Which I’m pretty sure both those things have changed for this year.  They certainly paid for my delivery and ER trip when I was pregnant.  Anyways, it has a 2 million lifetime maximum and $5,500 max out of pocket per person.  The deductible is $1,000 per person/ $3,000 for the family.

There are 3 plans above this one, each one costing about $40 more a month than the previous one.  They are basically the same but the more you pay the higher percentage is covered.  We get 60% coverage, if we wanted to go up a step, we could get 70%.  Two steps up, would get us 80%.  Each step up also has a lower deductible and max out of pocket.

The best plan that is offered would cost us $179 a paycheck.  We would have a $20 copay when we went to the dr, but everything that they cover is covered 100%, basically.  It has a 2 million lifetime maximum benefit, $1,500 max out of pocket per person, and no deductible.  Nice, I wish we could afford that.

The only thing that would make me consider switching plans would be to get more coverage for prescriptions.  But all 4 options have the same coverage.  We pay $10 for a month’s supply of generic meds and 25% of brand name drugs.  Which for us we spend $30 a month on prescriptions.  So I would be willing to up our premium if we were going to save money at the pharmacy and get some additional coverage.  But since they don’t offer a better prescription plan, we won’t be switching.

So everyone… keep your fingers crossed that no one ends up in the ER.

I’m curious to know what everyone else is paying and the coverage you get.

But I’ve seen NFL.com gift cards, tickets to the movies, all kinds of restaurants, Itunes, gym memberships, car washes, vacation packages, ect.  I could go on and on.  You have to poke around on the website to find stuff, and some things I know I’ve seen in the store I couldn’t find online.  So check in store too.

But such a good deal!  Either to give as a gift or to save some money while shopping.  It’s definately something worth checking out.

pic by: greenwenvy08

I’m a natural born saver. It’s always something that has been important to me. From those first few paper route dollars, to the over time at a call center, I saved. As a result of that by the time I was 22 I had no debt of any kind and had saved up about $15,000. This is when I met my daughter’s father. He is a natural born spender. If it weren’t for getting pregnant our relationship would be nothing more than a distant memory. But I did get pregnant so I tried very hard to make this doomed relationship work. I didn’t stand up for myself. I kept quiet to avoid fights. I agreed to things I knew were wrong. I convinced myself that everything was fine.

The first thing to go was any new savings. He wanted to spend every dollar we made. It was always just one more thing. He didn’t value saving so to him it just seemed like a waste of money. He would argue with me about putting money aside. We just need a new DVD player and then we will save some money. Just one weekend getaway, just one more toy. It was never worth the fight, so I would agree. Closing my eyes to what I knew was on the horizon.

But if you live spending every dollar, eventually you need even more. First my ex lost his job. Since he was unwilling to make lifestyle adjustments, I dipped into savings to keep the stress level down. Then we moved, which cost money. Then the car broke down. More money. We moved again. More money. We took the baby to see family out of state. More money. During this whole time I knew we were on a road to destruction, but I pushed it out of my mind. I was lying to myself that this is what was best for my daughter.

Eventually the savings ran out. But the spending didn’t. We needed a new couch. And a new this, and a new that. With my savings account drained I turned to a credit card. Before I realized it the balance was over $3,000.

I couldn’t take it anymore. That’s it! No more! I lost it. We had the fight that had been building up for the past three years. He moved out shortly after. I was a new person. No more relenting. No more thoughtless spending. I was focused only on paying off this debt and rebuilding my savings. I didn’t care about the fights it caused.

We were both happier once we separated. It should have happened long before it did. I know that it’s not ideal for my daughter. But it’s the lesser of two evils. This way we can both be true to ourselves. I don’t know what his financial situation is like, but once I started doing what is right for me my life turned around. I paid off that credit card debt in record time, and started to rebuild my savings. I felt free again.

But speaking of hemming… that seems like a killer home business.  If anyone out there can sew and wants to make some extra cash there’s an idea for you.  Charge $10 for something that I assume would take less than 30 minutes.

Anyways,  my daughter did take money to school yesterday.  She took $5.00 and bought a book and another pencil.  Not a $3.00 pencil, a different one.  I was pleased.  Then this morning she wanted to take more money to school because she still wanted another one of those $3.00 pencils.  I explained that she has to unload the dishwasher 12 times in order to earn $3.00.  She was surprised, but undeterred.  The worst part is that all she had left of her allowance was a $20 bill.  So she took that.  I told her she doesn’t have to spend the whole $20.  She said she knows… but I bet she still will.  Grrr.  It’s so hard to sit back and let them make mistakes.

Then this morning she wanted another $3.00 so she could buy another pencil.  I tried to explain that $3.00 for one pencil is a lot of money.   That I could take her to Walmart and she could buy 10 pencils for $3.00.  She didn’t care.  I don’t know what she decided to do.  The money is right there she doesn’t need to ask my permission.  So maybe she took some, I don’t know.  I try only to guide her, but let her make her own choices with her allowance.  That was kinda the point in giving it to her.  To let her make her own mistakes.

So I’m curious to know what she did.  I plan to take her to walmart and show her exactly what a pencil should cost.  Maybe even show her what toys of that particular character cost so she can see what her options were.  Instead of spending $6.00 to get that character she could have bought an actual toy.  Lord knows she doesn’t need any more pencils.

Does anyone have any tips?  How did you drive home the point of value vs cost to your kids?

pic by Ralphbijker