I know it's the Holiday's and I'm so excited to celebrate them with my growing family, but I can't help thinking about money. It's such an awful thing that we have to worry about money. How nice would it be to just enjoy everything in life and not have to worry about bills and payments.
I've been EXTREMELY lucky that I can work from home and take care of Olivia. I can make money and spend time with my beautiful daughter. In that sense I am spoiled. My job is great and I really do like it. I work part-time about 10-15 hours a week and make about as much if not more than I would teaching Theology full-time at a Catholic high school. (Sad I know) My schedule is super flexible and as long as I get my work in by Saturday at 11:59 pm it doesn't matter what days I work or for how long. I also have the ability to increase the amount of pages I do to make more money. The only downside is I get "graded" and depending on how many errors I make my pay scale goes down.
Lately Luke and I have been, not struggling, but trying to be conscience of our spending habits. With the new found glory of a mortgage and home repairs, it's been tough and a little bit of a shock. I wish we were able to save more every month and I know it has a lot to do with how we spend money. We've been trying to not go out to eat as much, which we love to do and just watching where our money goes. I've been thinking about taking on more work, 500 more pages, I already do 1000 a week. This would increase my time to about 15-20 hours a week and I would make about 350 dollars extra every week. That's one way we're going to try and make more. I also was thinking about doing more wholesale food shopping and trying to plan out meals for the whole month and sticking to that schedule. I don't know if that's really feasible but I think I might try.
My question is what do you do, if anything, to save a little each month? What makes it easier?
This makes me feel better because I literally have anxiety at this time of year about money too! We hardly ever, as in pretty much never eat out. If we eat out it's with a gift card or because someone else is treating. Same goes for morning coffee/tea trips. It's hard. It's harder on me than Chris too because I'm the one that cooks! :0 We also don't have cable or credit cards. No things that require monthly payments like lawn services, house cleaning, etc. Last year we didn't buy each other gifts for Christmas which was a little depressing, we got things for the house instead. I cut down our Christmas list to just to our parents and our kids. I only got the boys two things each (so many people end up giving them toys at Christmas anyway). Chris has picked up extra work this weekend at his part-time job. I'm just so grateful though that we have jobs. In this economy I think about that every day.
ReplyDeleteI'm guessing you're a proofreader? That's a great job to have with kids! Do you enjoy it?
If you are a proofreader, how did you get that job?!? It sounds perfect to me.
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to money being tight, I can't realte 100%, but I haven't worked the past 15 months because I've been in grad school(expensive) and I feel extremely guilty for not making money, so I have been couponing. I never pay more than $0.25 for toothpaste, toothbrushes, floss, dishsoap, shampoo, conditioner. Some weeks I can get a lot for free. When something goes on sale, I purchase multiples. Also, I have found that paying for everything in cash is a HUGE saver. Planning meals for a few weeks is completely possible! I do it all the time, but mainly because I make double of a meal and freeze half of it to have the following week. If you do pick up more pages, making one large dinner and freezing some for the following week, gives you more free time.
If you want to know more about couponing, let me know. Good luck! Saving money is hard, especially this time of year.
Money is something I think everyone stresses about, I know we do. I think it helps me a little that I deal with money and finances for a career so I bring alot of the concepts into my personal life. My computer has at least 3 spreadsheets with our finances on it, breaking down our bills and what we have left over for "play money" and how much of that on average we spend a month and to analyze if we could do better (I know im a total accounting geek) but having it all in front of me to read eases my mind.
ReplyDeleteI do alot of couponing for non-produce items and I also plan out our meals. I shop at the farmers market which everyone thinks is more expensive but it's healthier and cheaper when cooking for 2. I get just enough for the week so that we don't waste leftovers. I like being able to go to the butcher and asking for just 2 porkchops. I also go to the same stands every weeks so now they give me discounts.
I really try to cut back on things I don't care that much about so that I don't have to feel guilty about getting or doing things we do really like to do.
All of these tips are really helpful! Marjorie I give you so much credit for not having cable! I'm a major tv watcher when I have the time and I don't know if I could do without. I think what really kills us is our student loans. Just a price to pay for college!
ReplyDeleteI am a proofreader but not in the way you might think. I don't need to know proper English or anything like that. I proofread patents, like for inventions. I took a 3 week full-time course on how to do it. I look for things like numbers to bold and make sure things are in the proper format.
Sarah I would love to learn more about couponing and I found out about the job through my mom. She used to do it. It's for a company called Reed Technology.
This month was rough with it though I made a lot of errors and every week I'm scared to open up my email to see how many I've made. Hopefully things get better.
Steph I'll have to check out the farmers market for fruits and veggies I would love to be more organized maybe you can show me how!
That's neat! I might look into that because there is a good chance that I will have a hard time getting a job when I graduate.
ReplyDeleteAs for the couponing, here is a blurb I wrote in my blog back in June: "I organize my binder by general food categories and by the way the stores are set up, so that if I see a good deal while I am shopping, I am able to find the coupon rather quickly. This last trip, I made an excel spreadsheet to keep track of everything (quantity, original price, sale price, coupon value, amount I would pay after coupon) so that I knew going in what my bill should be and sure enough, I was within $1 of what I calculated!"
All I do is get the Sunday paper, clip the coupons from the inserts (Smart Source (SS), Red Plum (RP), and Proctor & Gamble (P&G)), organize them and then look at blogs that have my local stores for matchups.
Google "couponing blogs for (insert your foodstores, walmart, target, etc,)" There is a link for Target coupons at the bottom of their webpage. Target coupons can be stacked with a manufacturing coupon.
Also, I thrift store shop a lot! Holiday decorates, housing decorations, childrens clothing, etc. are great at most thrift stores! And pinterest has a lot of great ideas for making old things new for really cheap!
I'm sorry this month was rough.
Hey! I gave you the Liebster Blog Award! Please check out my blog for more information: http://bettynolan.blogspot.com/2011/12/liebster-blog-award.html
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