The Frugal Lifestyle

[freyja]

i find it very easy to not eat out at lunch.
Thank goodness for the good skills my mother instilled in us kids.
i have a delightful purple lunch carrying case that goes with me to work and on weekends.
i make sure to pack it if i know i will be out past meal time (say Saturday morning errands that might run longer than expected).

i keep water, a drinkin box, homemade banana bread and sometimes cheese and crackers as stand by snacks to keep me okay til i get home to real food.
First, the thought of eating garbage at a drive thru place (pick any of them) does not do my health any good. Second, it's expensive!

i keep my coffee shop spending to a minimum, perhaps twice a week, sometimes not at all.

It's not hard at all once you get into the habit of it.

[Andrea]

I take my breakfast and lunch to work every day. I am just not ready to eat breakfast before I leave for work and if I eat too early, I am hungry before lunch.

I like non-breakfast type stuff for breakfast so during the colder months Rene will make me a pot of pinto beans and a pot of bulgar wheat, which I combine with a dollop of smart butter. In the warmer months, I take rice milk and fruit, and add cereal from the box I keep at work.

Lunch is usually leftovers from dinner then night before. I make up a bowl as I clean up the kitchen so it is all ready when I pack my lunchbox in the morning.

I also take snacks such as an apple, cut up celery or pita bread and hummus, almonds, yogurt, etc., so I don't hit the junk food machines.

There is an 8 pack of diet Pepsi in the office fridge. I actually sell more than I drink, but it pays for the soda.

I used to treat myself to designer coffees now and then but there isn't any place near the building I am working in now so Rene bought me a one cup coffee maker for my desk and I love it. The Brita water filter pitcher saves me from buying bottled water too.

I get all squeamish when I think about putting my food in the smelly office fridge so I carry an ice pack in an insulated lunchbox (the soda doesn't bother me).

Andrea

[Bit]

I make lunch for Gryph and pack it along with a couple of drinks in his backpack for work. He prefers his Gatorade watered down a little, and his tea boiled strong; also takes a cup of coffee to work with him. The Gatorade is $1.50 a day at work and I only pay at most $2 for a week's worth at the grocery store, so there's $5.50 a week right there.

Days when I just cannot get it together enough to cook in time, he spends anywhere from $5 to $8 on lunch, so I make a pretty big effort to cook ahead and make sure there's always something lunch-worthy in the fridge. I normally get three lunches out of $4 worth of ingredients, so a conservative estimate would be that we spend $8 a week and that saves us approximately $17 a week--or more.
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A very kind soul *kisses to you!* sent me a gift card to Dollar General and I got a ride over there today. Wow, I found Crest Prohealth in the big tube for a dollar less than the grocery store and it came with a freebie sample of the rinse. I also got Glucosamine Chondroiten--Gryph says it really does make a difference with his knees--for half price. Then I found some hair squinchies for me (mine have finally all given up the elastic ghost) and some eeensy rubber bands for his braids (he wears braids to honor his Native American heritage) for a dollar apiece!! It was great!
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So, Gryph and I splurged and had a fast food dinner the other evening. I would tell you it was our anniversary dinner, but lol!! We FORGOT!!! (can we count it in retrospect?) Ah well. Anyhow, I asked to go out because we needed to talk away from distractions, interruptions, and tension. It was kinda hard to get the conversation started... how strange to have an attack of shyness after being together for three years, eh? and over such a prosaic and mundane topic, too.

We needed to talk about money.

Gryph thought I was nuts. He said we do fine, that he's good with how I handle the budget. I think he was pretty concerned until he realized I just needed input. There were things we hadn't talked about, yanno? So we spent a couple hours talking about the priorities of life.

What sparked it might seem silly or even inconsequential to others. Two magazines are up for renewal. They're more expensive than most of our magazines--and they're Native American magazines. So instead of just deciding to let them go, I needed to know what kind of priority they have in his life, whether the content makes a difference (yep, it sure does!). That led us to a discussion about what's important and in which ways.

I discovered things which surprised me, like a museum membership would be a really bad birthday gift because he really doesn't care about museums (what threw me on that one was the one N.A. magazine, since it's from the National Museum of the American Indian)... but on the other hand, he wants to decorate That House to be respectful of the Craftsman era, so if I find copper Craftsman-style lamps or mailboxes or furniture that we can afford, I should get them. And while landscaping the yard is a low priority for him, making me happy is a high priority, so it's okay with him if I spend money on a food garden even when the budget is squeaking. (He wins, I bought a raspberry vine today!)

Anyhow it was an interesting discussion, as much for the things we forgot to talk about as for all the things we did talk about. We started with a given: That House must be repaired, and all the bills must be paid. After that we ranked things low, medium, and high priority in terms of spending money--there were a few things that are high priority in terms of time and energy that are medium or even low in terms of money--and while we talked about ways to improve our lives, we completely forgot to talk about things like a new computer or cell phone service.

Like I said, it was interesting! And now I have a much clearer idea where our money should go, and what is most important in our lives.

[Medusa]

You all inspired me to do a little math this morning

So Jack and I have some goals about things we want to do for the house.
We need a new roof and hot water heater but also want to put new flooring throughout our house, paint for most of the inside, and new fixtures and faucets. That's a nice chunk of dough.
It kinda made me think about all the impulse buying that we do (which, dont get me wrong is probably significantly less than a lot of folks) and I started thinking about the lunches out as "impulse buys".

So here's a math comparison:

We went to Wal-Mart the other day to get some good stuff for lunch:
2 loaves of very good honey-wheat bread = $5
2 packs of very good ham and roast beef = $7
2 packages of higher end swiss cheese = $8
Head of lettuce = $1
Nice big bottle of gourmet-style mustard = $2
Huge Bag of Sunchips = $3
2 Boxes of granola bars = $5
12-pack Diet Coke = $3
6-pack Mott's Applesauce = $2

Total= $36.

Combined with a few things we already have at the house like dry-roasted peanuts and banana chips as snacks and wheat-toast for breakfast, the list above will get us through almost 2 weeks of breakfasts and lunches at work FOR TWO.

That comes out to $18 each per week or about $3.50 a day.

The reason I talked specifically about "very good" ham and specific chips is because Jack and I both are such cheapasses that we have made the mistake before of buying really cheap, crappy stuff for lunch and then by the time it's lunchtime, that soggy-ass sandwich and off-brand BADLY-flavored chips are WAY less than appetizing. We finally figured out that if you actually ENJOY your lunch, you probably would be less prone to throwing it away and buying something...thus costing money for the lunch you threw away AND the lunch you bought.

If we were to have eaten out on the above model, here's the math:

Sack of crap for lunch for two = $12 per day
Coffee or sausage biscuit bullshit from McDonals for 2 = $6 per day

That would be $18 PER DAY, or $90 a week for two versus $36 for a MUCH healthier meal.
Savings would be about $54, or over $200 a month.

and dont even get me started on trying to ween myself off of my $5 a coffee habit at Starbucks

Needless to say, like Bit, we kinda talked about our priorities and how we could translate that into our budget.
We concluded that we would much rather have the extra $200 a month for paint or tile, new landscaping a bit at a time, or some yard furniture.

[christie]

'Dusa -

Sounds like you have really gotten off to a good start - I, too, once had a $5 Starbucks habit THREE times a DAY! The habit was brought to a screeching halt when I moved to VA and Jess informed me the nearest Starbucks was TWENTY THREE miles away from the house!

Even though now there is one about a half mile from my office, I only indulge about once a month.

In talking about frugality and home improvement, I'm not sure if you know about Habitat's ReStore. Its basically a thrift shop with home improvement items and the proceeds go to Habitat. Here is the link for the AR locations:
http://www.habitat.org/cd/env/restor....aspx?place=51

Its kinda like most thrift shops - hit and miss. The one closest to us now is in Mt. Airy and while they don't have the selection that Richmond's location does, we have managed to snag a couple of deals there. Bathroom sink - $20. The lovely cast iron/almond enamel kitchen sink was $50, but with a new faucet set from Lowe's and it looks perfectly fine.

I must admit that I am quite an impulsive shopper and that I have been looking lately at the retail therapy I do in replacement for eating therapy. It didn't stop me from the Wii and the Wii Fit last week, but I am becoming more aware of how I need to slow down and find a different habit - maybe it will be using the Wii Fit!

[Medusa]

Originally Posted by christie0918

'Dusa -

Sounds like you have really gotten off to a good start - I, too, once had a $5 Starbucks habit THREE times a DAY! The habit was brought to a screeching halt when I moved to VA and Jess informed me the nearest Starbucks was TWENTY THREE miles away from the house!

Even though now there is one about a half mile from my office, I only indulge about once a month.

In talking about frugality and home improvement, I'm not sure if you know about Habitat's ReStore. Its basically a thrift shop with home improvement items and the proceeds go to Habitat. Here is the link for the AR locations:
http://www.habitat.org/cd/env/restor....aspx?place=51

Its kinda like most thrift shops - hit and miss. The one closest to us now is in Mt. Airy and while they don't have the selection that Richmond's location does, we have managed to snag a couple of deals there. Bathroom sink - $20. The lovely cast iron/almond enamel kitchen sink was $50, but with a new faucet set from Lowe's and it looks perfectly fine.

I must admit that I am quite an impulsive shopper and that I have been looking lately at the retail therapy I do in replacement for eating therapy. It didn't stop me from the Wii and the Wii Fit last week, but I am becoming more aware of how I need to slow down and find a different habit - maybe it will be using the Wii Fit!

We LOVE Re-Store!!!!

When we were in California, we lived about 4 miles from one of the best Re-Stores I have ever been to. It was HUGE and had tons of older fixtures from craftsman homes and churches. Even had furniture and lottttttts of decorative stuff. We scored a bunch of good stuff there to fix up our old place and right before we left, we scored a brand new Neptune dryer still in the box for like $100.

We discovered a Re-Store not too far from where we lived and the Manager asked Jack to take on a Project Manager position for an all-female build that is coming up this summer (schedule permitting). The store itself is tiny and not very well-stocked but still, we check it when we can for caulk and nails and other bits.

I will say that Jack scored 2 huge boxes of nails that were normally in the $40 range for $3 each at the old store right before we moved. Between the cases of nails, the dryer, and all the canned "survival" food, our poor Penske was sitting on FLAT leaf-springs the whole way to Arkansas.
Ai. Yi. YI!

[Jess]

I used to get up and make the girl's lunch everyday. When we moved and she has to stay away from home part of the week I wasn't able to do this any longer and it actually makes me sad.

When we have a good weekend ( meaning no family chaos or projects haven't over taken all of our time), we do some shopping and I make her several lunch and dinner type things and pack them in a cooler for her to take with. I HATE that she has to rely so much on food cooked by other people.. grrrr... so I want to make it a priority to make sure to send her off with good healthy food that she likes and will eat.

This time of year is great for eating well cheaply. Gardening certainly supplements (and if I were further along it would replace need for the produce section), but there are quite a few good produce stands/ farmers markets to pick up fresh stuff from.

We have lots of home projects ahead of us also. I soooo feel you guys Medusa on the new roof. We need one and want to do the no maint. metal roof so we'll be getting estimates soon. There are no leaks, however we have lost a lot of shingles, so we are trying to knock out some other projects before that, as it is a pretty major expense. One of our fall projects will be insulating under the house. If possible we are going to run pipes under the house that will come off the water stove and create radiant heat, then insulate around it all. This old place is cold as heck downstairs in the winter, last winter surely taught us that insulation is truly the gift that keeps on giving!

Good thread folks! Love the couponmom!

[christie]

Originally Posted by Jess

I used to get up and make the girl's lunch everyday. When we moved and she has to stay away from home part of the week I wasn't able to do this any longer and it actually makes me sad.

When we have a good weekend ( meaning no family chaos or projects haven't over taken all of our time), we do some shopping and I make her several lunch and dinner type things and pack them in a cooler for her to take with. I HATE that she has to rely so much on food cooked by other people.. grrrr... so I want to make it a priority to make sure to send her off with good healthy food that she likes and will eat.

This time of year is great for eating well cheaply. Gardening certainly supplements (and if I were further along it would replace need for the produce section), but there are quite a few good produce stands/ farmers markets to pick up fresh stuff from.

We have lots of home projects ahead of us also. I soooo feel you guys Medusa on the new roof. We need one and want to do the no maint. metal roof so we'll be getting estimates soon. There are no leaks, however we have lost a lot of shingles, so we are trying to knock out some other projects before that, as it is a pretty major expense. One of our fall projects will be insulating under the house. If possible we are going to run pipes under the house that will come off the water stove and create radiant heat, then insulate around it all. This old place is cold as heck downstairs in the winter, last winter surely taught us that insulation is truly the gift that keeps on giving!

Good thread folks! Love the couponmom!

Wha??? You saying that WaWa can't cook??? LOL LOL

I MISS my lunches. I swear, you are the ONLY person I know that can make a salad and it weigh 10lbs!!

I can't WAIT for fried baloney sammiches with fresh 'maters!

[Bit]

Originally Posted by Jess

I used to get up and make the girl's lunch everyday. When we moved and she has to stay away from home part of the week I wasn't able to do this any longer and it actually makes me sad.

I hear you on that, Jess! I think I would be pretty sad if I couldn't cook for Gryph; I don't always consciously think about the cooking being a way of showing my love, but it is, all the same.

Hey Dusa, I didn't do the multiquote thang but I did want to say, I've learned the same lesson about the really cheap food being so unappetizing and then costing more because you have to replace it. Good point!