Our Frugal Journey

It’s March! Which means our No-Spend Challenge is over. Which means I’ll be headed to the grocery to do a full-fledged shopping trip. I’ll be spending my usual $50 per week budget, scouting for extra-good deals to restock my seriously depleted pantry, freezer and fridge.
But, you may be surprised to hear, I won’t be headed [...]

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This week is our final week in our Month of No Spending. The pantry has gaping holes. The freezer has an empty shelf. But, amazingly, we still have plenty of food, which speaks volumes about the wisdom of using coupons to shop, matching coupons with sales and stockpiling those items you use the most when [...]

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Our pantry and freezer are still well-stocked but I’m beginning to see a few empty spots as we eat our way through our stockpile while staying out of the grocery store during February, our second annual Month of No Spending.
So far, I really haven’t noticed much difference in my cooking or meal planning, other than [...]

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You’ve probably noticed the blog is looking a little different this morning. That’s because I have begun to accept advertising.
While the addition of ads is a big change in the look of the blog, I wanted to assure you that nothing else has changed.
My main focus remains the same – to help others while sharing my family’s successes and [...]

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I’ll be headed to the beach this Friday with a friend for a weekend of scrapbooking. Weather permitting, I’m hoping to do a little walking along the shoreline and relaxing, too. The entire weekend is a gift from my DH for my 50th birthday last month.
On weeks such as this one, when I’m headed out of town, [...]

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I haven’t been to the grocery in who knows when (with the exception of quick milk-and-produce runs) so this week we’ll be eating meals made with items I have stashed in the pantry and freezer.
This is a great way to clear out the pantry and freezer as well as save money. While those are two [...]

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When all our Christmas presents were unwrapped this year, this is what was left:
*one stack of handmade drawstring cloth gift bags.
*one small grocery bag full of wrapping paper for the trash.
It was the perfect intersection of frugal and green.
Throughout the year, a dear friend and I sewed our cloth bags using fabric remnants, Christmas towels and garage [...]

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Oops. Monday totally passed me by and I never posted our meal plan for this week. A little too much decking the halls and fa-la-la-la-ing to even log onto the computer. So much for keeping things simple!
Not to worry, though. We most definitely did NOT veer off into the drive-through of the closest fast-food joint, [...]

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In anticipation of all the work and all the calories associated with our Thanksgiving Day feast, we’ll be eating light and eating simple — as in very little prep work or clean up.
Monday: Southwest Roll-ups, which I made a couple of weeks ago and stashed in the freezer. After thawing, it’s a quick thirty minutes [...]

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Downloading music to your iPod can be pricey. As a result, cheapie me listens to my same old tunes over and over again. They are the songs I downloaded via the CDs I already owned — before I stopped buying those!
So I always love it when I stumble across a free MP3 song download that [...]

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