Budget

A word that strikes fear into the soul of many a consumer.

Take a deep breath and relax. We are going to take a few minutes to talk about this useful tool.

That’s right, I said a tool! Remember folks, the budget doesn’t exist to impose some sort of dictatorship over you, but rather as a TOOL that you use to further your own aims.

A budget, at its most basic, is simply a list of the amount of money going in and out during a set time period. Most people use a month as their basic time frame.

Think of a budget as a plan. Without a plan, we just spend willy nilly. With a plan, we can make thoughtful decisions based on our priorities.

Most people really don’t have any idea of how much money is really coming in and out. They don’t have priorities, they don’t have goals,and they don’t have a plan. This is a problem when you are trying to curb your spending, pay off debt and save money.

We are going to fix that for you in 5 simple steps.

Let’s start with a few things you DO know.

Once you have it all listed out, add it up and see how far “off” you are. Then it’s time to “get real”.

Nothing is perfect! With all the best intentions in the world you still probably forgot to include some expenses, or were unrealistic about your spending.

After the first month, review your budgeted expenses against the actual expenses. Where did they fail to match up?

Sit down and think about it for a while. Was the failure due to unrealistic goals or loose spending on your part? Can you rearrange the money from categories within the budget, or do you need to cut down on your spending somewhere?

There you have it, 5 simple steps to setting up a budget.

Recently I had a reader and fellow blogger mention me in a post they wrote. They said that I have “quirky” frugal ideas.

To be honest, I was a bit floored. I don’t TRY to be quirky-the things I do seem pretty common sense to me! But I guess this is like me and being funny-folks always think I’m the most humorous when I am being serious. Yeah, that’s me, a misunderstood genius.

So now I’m totally curious-what ideas have I suggested or things have I told you all about that you think are quirky!

Oh, and for the record, I’m not offended. Actually I’m rather flattered. I used to have a pin in High school that said “Why Be Normal?”-which, of course, I wore upside down.

And here is the last installment of the “Best of: Baby Stuff”.

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In answer to a readers question, lately I’ve talked about breastfeeding/bottlefeeding, and also about feeding a toddler, but I promised to talk about “Everything Else”.

So here we go!

Opinions highly vary on what is “necessary” gear when you have a baby. A lot depends on your lifestyle, your individual child, and how much room you have. That full travel system stroller that is imperative as a mode of transportation for a city dweller may almost never be used by a rural mom who has to drive everywhere-and uses a shopping cart when she gets here. The variables are so great that it is difficult to generalize to what the frugal necessities are for “everyone”.

When it comes down to it, a baby simply needs to be loved, safe, warm and fed. You could add clean and entertained into that.

The loved is the easiest part. I just dare you not to love a newborn. All that soft skin and tiny fingers.

And the rest? Lets face it. A baby could care less what their room looks like, or how stylish their clothing is. The requirement is to be warm and safe! For clothing this means that if budget and space are tight (as they are for Allysmonami-the original question asker) then you can do fine with used clothes, hand me downs etc. Actually, anyone can do fine with used clothes-but if you are simply concerned with warmth and not style you can get things for practically (or actually) free. Buddy wore “free” pink blanket sleepers for the first year of his life. Buying less clothing costs less and takes up less space, but means you have to do laundry more frequently. With a newborn, I would suggest keeping your laundry days to a minimum and having a few more clothes. Baby clothing is small-it doesn’t take up much space. and with spitup and the infamous “blowouts” you’ll need a bit of extra anyway.

For sleep needs, all you need is a firm soft surface when they are small. Honestly, as hokey as it sounds a drawer or a rectangular laundry basket with a thin blanket in the bottom really is fine when they are small. I would prefer that over the one-use-wonder of a basinette.

Personally, I found one of those port-a-cribs with a combination basinette/changing table to be useful. We used it as a basinett when they were small (with the handy changing table right there for middle of the night changes) and then when they got a bit older and were moved into their own cribs we moved it downstairs for changing and for a safe place to lay them down for a nap. Later on we used it as a playpen to contain them when they were mobile and we needed to be somewhere (like the bathroom or shower) for a few minutes. It was also used as a travel crib when we visited Nana etc until each of them was about 3. The cons are of course that it takes up quite a bit of room and can be pricey new (although you may be able to borrow or buy one used)

Eventually you will want some sort of crib. If you decide to go used, you need to do your research on crib safety recommendations. The matching bedding thing really is a crock – one that I freely admit that I fell for it with Princess. Crib bumpers are somewhat useful for a time, but not absolutely necessary. I frequently see them widowed at thriftstores. And don’t even get me started on those crib quilts! They are useless-too small and ornamental to be used. Trust me, you’ll get more use out of receiving blankets etc.

What you really need is a few good crib sheets (trust me, one is not enough) and something waterproof to put between the sheet and the mattress (I loved the ultimate crib sheet because it was flat-I still use it in Buddy’s twin bed as a layer between his sheet and matress-just in case. You can’t do that with a contoured fitted sheet.)

For diapering I chose to have a changing table-mostly to put the kiddos at a comfortable height. However, there is nothing special needed for changing. A towel on the floor or a bed does fine. You do want to put something down under the child though, just in case of leakage. A small box or basket with all your diapering supplies (wipes, diapers, ointment or whatnot) is nice-you can carry it to wherever you are going to do the job. You can have one set upstairs and one down if you want! There are plenty of containers at your local dollar store that work for this-or you could literally use an old shoebox for free.

For entertainment the jury is out. Both of mine loved the swing-but I have friends whose children hated them. If you can, borrow a swing. That way you can see if your child likes it or not-if they like it, it can be a lifesaver! Plus, since it is big and bulky, it is nice to be able to give it back when you are done.

Ditto on the whole “exersaucer” thing. I liked being able to put them in there watching TV while I took a super quick shower. But they are really, really big. And pretty darn expensive. So you may want to borrow or do without. A bouncy seat is also a limited use item (since they outgrow it) but it is a great way to keep them contained in a sitting position (which offers them more to look at). A carseat carrier could be used inside in the same way though.

Another entertainment thing that mine really liked were the baby Einstein videos. Not the animated series on Disney Channel-but the originals that play classical music and show various toys. Those things were like tranquilizers, or maybe hypnotists for my kids. I could pop them in front of that for almost 20 minutes and they would be enthralled. Again, before you think about buying them, borrow them from a friend or the library to see if your baby likes them.

With the family Christmas in July party planned for today, I have been thinking a lot about Christmas*. I think that it is a good reminder to us all, especially in this time of rising prices and extremely high projected winter heating costs, to start considering our Christmas gift and travel plans early.

Maybe this is the year to start a name draw for extended family-they may be secretly relieved to not have the extra financial strain of 32 nieces and nephews to shop for. Or maybe those of you who feel Christmas shopping only belongs in the month of December may seriously want to consider buying gifts throughout the year as they are on sale-spreading the cost of the season over the next 6 months or so and avoiding that huge “what have I done!” credit card bill in January. If that isn’t your style you could at least look at starting a Christmas savings fund to have the money on hand when the holiday season hits.

A couple of other bloggers have been talking about this lately: Amy at the Motherload and Frugal Dad come immediately to mind (I’m sure there are more).

My husband’s family has hosted a “Christmas in July” party for the last 3 years.

Why Christmas in July? Well, for two reasons.

#1: Weather is often nasty in Upstate New York and New England (where most of Yankee Bill’s family lives) so travel is very uncertain in December.

#2: The pre-Christmas season is usually packed! There are only a limited number of weekends between Thanksgiving and Christmas-and between church events, holiday office parties, neighborhood gatherings, and 2 sides of the family to visit (more if you’ve got any parental divorces to take into account). . . .well lets just say that removing one Christmas party and sticking it in relatively open July is a blessing.

Celebrating Christmas in the middle of the summer got me thinking-for a frugalite, this is actually a good time to start thinking about Christmas.

Now don’t get me wrong-I’m one of those people who hate rushing the holidays. I refuse to listen to Christmas carols or do any type of decorating until after Thanksgiving. Yet a big part of being frugal and saving money is planning ahead and buying things on sale. If I waited until after Thanksgiving to do my Christmas shopping I’d be paying top dollar for most of my gifts. It can really pay off to start thinking about the holidays early, as in 6 MONTHS early.

If this isn’t the way you normally plan your holiday purchases (and/or your holiday savings, oh by the way) then I would highly suggest that you try it this year. Sit down sometime in the next few weeks and take a good look at your regular Christmas shopping list. Ask yourself some of the following questions:

#1: Who do I know I need to shop for? (Don’t forget to list folks like school teachers etc if you normally buy for them, or a few “just in case” hostess type gifts if you have that sort of lifestyle. I’ve found that personally I really don’t NEED any “just in case” gifts.)

#2: How much money do I want to spend, approximately, on each gift (or in the case of direct family members, how much do you want to spend total. I know, I know. With the kids there will always be some new “gotta have” closer to Christmas itself for the kiddos on your list. If you want to be sure, you can wait-but just compensate in your budget for the fact that you’ll probably have to pay full price)

#3: What are some ideas for gifts, or some things that I know they like?

Once you’ve got a list, you can keep it in your purse or wallet. Then the next time you see something at a fantastic sale price, you can whip out your list and see if the item would work for anyone on your list. If so, buy it and make a note (so you don’t buy two gifts for the same person-believe me, when you start shopping early it is easy to forget what you’ve already gotten).

Another great thing about starting early is you have time to think about and implement some changes.

Are you spending too much money on gifts for friends or extended family? Well maybe it’s time to start a campaign for a change. Maybe your friends would be happy to either drop the gift exchange or agree to a $5 limit-they all may just be waiting for someone else to bring it up. Or your extended family may be happy to start picking names out of a hat instead of buying each and every of the 47 Aunts, Uncles and Cousins a gift.

In Yankee Bill’s family, we’ve been doing a “Yankee Gift Exchange” (also known as a Chinese Auction) for years. We place a $10 limit on gifts, with each of the kids getting their Christmas present then as well. We do, admittedly, buy Nana (YB’s mom) and Cousin Dom presents for the REAL Christmas, but otherwise our entire cost for his side of the family-all 25 of them, is less than $30. That’s $10 for the gift I bring to the swap, $10 for YB’s, and 2 gifts for the cousins bought at a deep discount earlier in the year. Quite the savings in money, time and energy compared to buying each person a gift.

And lastly, if you are a crafty type, you may need some time to actually MAKE all those awesome gifts you are contemplating for family and friends. Or else feel the need to hand-stamp all of your 369 Christmas cards that you send out annually. Here’s a piece of advice: Start now, trust me. If you wait until November rolls around, you’ll be a stressed out, unhappy mess before Advent is over! (unless you are one of those people who can whip out a sweater in 3 days-then by all means, wait until the last minute)

*Note: To those non Christians out there-no offense intended, as a Christian my focus is obviously on the holidays that I celebrate. The same sort of philosophy can be used to plan ahead for any gift giving occasions that you have coming up in the year-be it Chanukah, Samhain/Winter Solstice, Kwanzaa, Birthdays or any other holiday that I am unaware of.

You know, a lot of frugal living is not “glamorous”.

Shocking eh?

I don’t mean that frugal living is dreary (I don’t think it is) or that living a frugal life is confining or ugly or any of those things. What I mean is that a lot of frugal living is about what you don’t do, or changing your mindset about what you are doing, rather than doing something active.

It’s just dealing with the hand you are dealt rather than paying extra to change that hand.

In the not so distant past, there really wasn’t the option of “changing your hand”. For the most part our grandparents and great grandparents just had to deal with it. If you wanted strawberries in North America in January, well you were just out of luck. There wasn’t the option of paying a ridiculously inflated price for berries shipped in from Mexico. People ate more or less what was in season, or what they could can or preserve and left it at that.

I’m not saying that I’m adverse to someone buying strawberries if they love them and can afford them. That’s a personal choice and one of the wonders of our modern world. But I do think it is a waste of money to buy them regularly the entire time they are out of season-just because you want them and haven’t really considered the cost. There are other fruits that you could eat, or you could buy canned or frozen fruit etc. I won’t even go into the argument that eating seasonally brings more joy into the experience when things are in season.

The weather is another “hand we are dealt”. Although Upstate NY is not known for it’s soaring summertime temperatures, it does get quite hot here in mid summer. Many of the houses here, including both our current lovely 1890 abode and our previous 1976 ranch, are not equipped with air conditioning. When hot weather comes instead of trying to change the enviroment I change our habits.

Yes, we could buy air conditioners, install them in a bunch of the windows (or purchase a full house and have it connected in to the forced air heating sytem ducts), but why? We typically have about a month and a half where it would really be pleasant to have air conditioning. Why spend the expense of purchasing, installing and running it?*

Instead, we change our habits. Typically in the fall, winter and spring mornings are a lazier time (or as lazy as they can be while getting ready for school etc). This is the time of day when the kids are allowed to veg out on the couch for a while and watch some tv etc. I try to bake or cook when we are going to be in the house to enjoy the heat afterwards, and I’ll leave the oven door open to send that residual heat into the house. Meals are warm and filling, drinks are hot (cocoa, coffee, tea etc).

In the summer that changes. Sure-I could buy a AC and crank it up, making the house comfortable for whatever activities I wanted at whatever time I wanted. We choose not to do that because of financial and environmental repercussions.

The TV goes off in the morning and the kids are sent outside to play in the coolest part of the day-the morning. After lunch when the temperatures usually peak is the time that we might sit on the sofa and read, or watch some tv, letting our bodies rest and our temperatures drop as much as possible. We might even choose that time to spend at the library or local stores that are air conditioned.

Meals are frequently lighter and cooler, and drinks (with the exception of the obligatory coffee) are cold. Popsicles are made, the blender comes out for smoothies.

Cooking in the summer is done as much as possible in the crockpot (plugged in via extension cord and set up in the garage or basement to avoid heating the kitchen) or on the grill. In the past as much of my baking as possible was done in the evening after the kids were in bed when the temp had dropped. This year in our new house Yankee Bill took our old stove** and installed it down in the basement, so I can bake or can down there without adding heat to the rest of the house.

Laundry is hung on the line to dry as much as possible, using air for free rather than paying for the dryer. Since we live in the village now, we walk as much as possible, or ride our bike to local events rather than starting up the car and burning gas just to go 2 blocks. I was even lucky enough to be able to borrow a bike trailer from a friend so I can tote the kids around (at 7 and 5 I think this is the last year that will be a viable option).

The kids bedtime swings a little bit later, and they are encouraged to play outside in the evenings (when it is again cool) rather than parking themselves in front of the TV for the 45 min or so of watching that they are allowed in the winter. YB and I use that time to work on outside projects-mowing, weeding and otherwise caring for the exterior of our home and yard.

So am I telling you that you shouldn’t run your AC or buy strawberries? No, of course not. What works and makes sense for my family is not necessarily a “one size fits all” proposition. Each person needs to look at their own life, their own “hand” and decide what is the best way to play it.

Photo is by Shockwave via Flickr.com


*Note: obviously there are portions of the country where air conditioners are necessary. I lived in Huntsville Alabama for 3 years-you NEEDED AC. I used to wonder how folks lived down there, working fields and such, before it was invented.

**OK, here’s the story on the stove. When we bought our previous house it came with a stove. About a year later our girlfriend was selling her glass top stove for $150-the almond color didn’t match her kitchen so she got a new one. I prefer the glass tops because #1-I’m a messy cook and they are easier to clean and #2 I can use it as additional counter space when I’m not cooking. So we bought it from her and put the regular stove in the shed. When we bought our current house it had an older glass top stove already in it. So we took the glass top stove from the old house and put it in the new house, then we took the glass top that was their and installed it in the basement (which was my dear sweet hubby’s idea), and back at the old house we took the regular stove out of the shed and reinstalled it in the kitchen for the folks who were buying the place. There-clear as mud?

This is my absolute favorite wedding picture.

Yankee Bill and I have been married 9 years, as I mentioned yesterday!

We were married here (although we were stationed in Alabama at the time) in a lovely Episcopal Church service. Yankee Bill wore his dress uniform, and I wore a dress (purchased at Davids Bridal for $369). My veil was borrowed from a girlfriend.

My sisters and YB’s sister were our Bridesmaids-I chose a green fabric and sent them each about 6 yards, and they had whatever dress they wanted made up from it. My only request was that they all be long dresses. My sister Manda was my maid of honor-I purchased her a velvet that coordinated with the green that everone else wore so that she could have a different top on hers. The groomsmen were mostly Army friends in Uniform-my brother and one of YB’s buddies rented a tux.

One of my husband’s best friend’s mother used to be a florist. I purchased silk flowers in the colors I wanted an she made my bouquets. I was prepared to pay her for the work, but she gave that to us as our wedding gift. This included the boutineers for the men, corsages for mothers and grandmothers etc. I was able to rent white floral arrangements from the local florist (silk) and she spruce them up a bit with some of the leftover silk flowers to make it more coordinated.

The church itself is beautiful, so I didn’t do much decorating. I bought several rolls of wide white satin ribbon (wire edged) and I made some big pew bows. I only had enough ribbon to make 8, so I did every other row for the first 8 rows and called it good.

I made the programs myself, using regular microsoft programs. The Episcopal service has a lot of standing, sitting, and saying things in unison (we like to say it is aerobic worship)-although the entire thing is in our Book of Common Prayer, I wanted to make it easier for the non-Episcopals to keep up-so the entire thing was printed out in a program. I used a color photograph of flowers on the front, sort of blurred, with our names in white over it. Since that entire sheet had to be color I created a collage of pictures of YB and I on the back cover. Then I took the entire thing to kinkos-the single page that folded made up the front an back was photocopied in (one sided) color, then the other side of that sheet and the rest of the internal pages for the program were photocopied in black and white.

Other Army buddies (male and female) formed a nice saber arch for us when we exited the church. That’s a long standing military tradition. I got the customary swat on the backside, but I had secretly coordinated with one of my friends who was the only female member of the arch to swat Yankee Bill on the backside as well. That’s why we are laughing in the photo-it’s immediately after he’s been swatted . Our transportation was one of my FIL’s antique cars.

We had the reception at a local restaurant. Sit down, only one menu choice (chicken cordon bleu). Open bar for 2 hours of beer, wine and soda (mixed drinks were cash bar). I made the centerpieces for the tables-terracotta pots painted either white or green and then dry brushed with gold. The flowers were silk “dried” roses sticking straight up and tied round with a ribbon. “favors” were a few of those jordan almonds tied in tulle (bought, cut and tied up by me and family). We did purchase disposable cameras for each table.

The cake topper was one of the large white bows like I placed on the pews. Honestly, I couldn’t find a topper that I liked ANYWHERE. We cut the cake with one of the sabers-another military tradition-and there was none of that shoving cake up each other’s noses business. Yankee Bill had been forewarned that if any such thing happened he’d be spending his wedding night sleeping on the couch.

Other obvious purchases/costs: Honorarium for priest and organist, DJ, Photographer (local “professional” amateur) , cake, and catering costs.

Total spent was approximately $7,000. It was a great party and everyone had a wonderful time.

Coming on Monday-a review and giveaway of the book “Tie the Knot on a Shoestring” by Leah Ingram (who now posts on The Lean Green Family). Be thinking of your best wedding cost savings tip to enter.

NOTE: Apparently all my wedding photos are ON DISK somewhere. How archaic is that? I totally searched both of our hard-drives and only came up with a couple of shots. I’ll update this post with some more picture when I get a chance. . .

This afternoon is an errand afternoon. With gas prices up to $3.75 a gallon (EEEKKK!) I’ve been trying to combine my trips and head out of town with the car as infrequently as possible.

Thus comes the dilemma. When is it worthwhile to drive out of your way to pick up a bargain, and when is it better to buy the more expensive option locally, but save on the gas money.

Sigh.

I don’t think there is any easy answer to this one. We have a small, locally owned grocery store here in town. I mean literally 1 block from the house. They do run the occasional worthwhile meat sale etc, but usually their merchandise is almost 3X as expensive as driving the 30 minutes to Save a Lot or Aldi’s (depending on if I’m heading East or West).

My plan thus far has been to limit my errand days to 1X a week and head in one or the other direction. Then I spend a tiring afternoon of trying to hit 5 or so different places for various reasons.* I also drive a 5 mile trip daily to drop off and pick up Buddy from preschool. And then there are dance lessons once a week. . .

For the summer I’m going to try to use the car as little as possible. There won’t be any trips to nursery school or dance. The summer recreation program is held less than a block from my house-plus they provide busing. I’ll try to cut my “town” trips down to once every two weeks-as much to avoid dragging both kiddos with me as to save the gas.

Of course there will be other types of trips that come up-going to the swimming area at the state park 2o min away, spending the day berry picking at my friends wood property, etc. But the goal will be to spend much more time at home enjoying the things that can be had for free. Free swim at the town pool. Library programs. Redbox movies for free on Mon nights (thanks Amy). The town playground. Picnics at Nana’s. Playing in the backyard with friends. The sprinkler. Free vacation bible school offered at the Methodist Church right down the street.

I could even cut down on my trips to town more if I asked Yankee Bill to do some of the grocery shopping on his way home from work. After all-he’s already in town most days. The problem is that YB is more of an impulse shopper, an is less likely to do a unit price check on the items. I guess if he just went to Aldi’s that would work, but he’s more likely to run in to Wally World. I’ll have to think more on that.

What are all of you doing to combat the high price of gas, and deal with the “driving dilemma”?

*on today’s calendar-Wally World, Lowes, Chiropractor, Save-A-Lot, 2 Dollar Stores, and a hardware store that was willing to order the spray paint I need to finish up my wicker. Oh-and I may stop at other places to put up posters for the Blessing of the Bikes I’ve organized at church.

We all know that eating at home can save you money! Even if you buy expensive ingredients and cook gourmet meals, in most cases you will save money over eating the exact same meal at a restaurant. But what frugalite worth their salt would want to purchase expensive ingredients (save for a very special occasion)? Keeping our grocery bill down is the name of the game.

There are really 3 ways #1-saving money buying the same things, #2-saving money by buying something different.* This week we are looking at #1.

So here we go, heading out to the grocery store for a week’s worth (or more!) of shopping. We get in and we are instantly bombarded by colors, shapes, advertising, specials. . . all cleverly created by people who make their money figuring out how to separate you from yours! 10 for 10! By one get one free! Different prices on different brands and different sizes. It is all quite confusing. How do you make it all make sense?

Enter the all important Price Book! I’ve written about this before, back in March of 06 to be exact. But it is important enough to rehash-especially since prices on groceries have been increasing and are likely to continue to increase dramatically this summer. Knowing what is really a good price on each item, and saving as much money as possible will be even more critical.

A price book is simply a list-a list of items that you normally buy, and what their lowest prices are at the stores you typically shop at. With this list, when you happen upon a possible “deal”, you will be able to quickly and simply tell if it will actually save you money.

But there is a tiny bit more too it than that. Since items come in different size cans/bags etc, it is difficult to compare. To truly get to the bottom of an item’s cost, you need to know the unit price.

Picture by me-I don’t actually buy these, it wouldn’t be frugal! I buy the
24 oz can of peaches and divide it up into reuseable plastic containers.

Here we have a picture of a typical store shelf. You can see that the price of the item is listed in yellow-$1.48. Then there is a little orange box on the right-this is the unit price. In this particular case it is $1.48 a lb. So the unit price is $1.48 a lb.

While that is true, it is also unhelpful, unless you happen to run into another can/box/bag that is also in lbs. And in the case of peaches, most cans are measured in oz. The best thing to do is to break this unit price down to the smallest unit size possible-an oz.

This is where the math comes in. There are 16 oz in a lb, so you divide $1.48 by 16 to get a unit price of $.0925 per oz. I usually round up to 3 decimal places-so I would consider it $.093.

Can you see how doing this math each and every time you go shopping would be tedious? Not many of us would keep it up. Hence the price book!

Each person has to find the format that is comfortable and works for them. Some folks use a spreadsheet in excel and then print it out, others keep a notebook of some sort, or even index cards (which is my current choice). But the information contained on each one is the same: Name of item (specific) across the top, columns for store, brand, size, price, unit price. (Don’t worry, there are pictures further on) Why the size, price AND unit price? Well because typically I jot down the brand, size and price in the store, and do the math for the unit price at home.

To keep it simple, use abreviations for the stores. In my area I use the ones below. I also like to distinguish between a price that is the sale price and the everyday price. Personally I highlight any sale prices by putting a start next to it.

I can see you out there, shaking your head and thinking of all the work involved in compiling all this information for all those stores! Well-it doesn’t have to be that hard. Right now you probably don’t even have a price book, and are just doing your shopping willy nilly. So anything you do for the book, even in stages, is an improvement for you. Let’s do this in pieces and not kill ourselves with the process.

I like to start with the stores that I know are almost always cheaper-in my case Aldi’s and Save a Lot. Non sale price to non sale price these guys usually win hands down. So I record all the prices for my most commonly purchased items at those stores first. You can either do this by wandering around the store looking like some sort of espionage agent scribbling things furiously in a notebook, or you can do it the easy way and just go shopping and save your receipts.

As you can see, a can of corn at Aldi’s is $.39. The receipt doesn’t have a unit size, so I go to the cupboard and pull out a can and see that it is 15.25 oz. Doing the math ($.39 divided by 15.25) you find that the Aldi’s brand of corn is $.026 an oz. I do this for each item on the receipt. Each shopping trip I can do a quick check to see if I have bought any new items to add to my list.

Next I keep an eye on my sales fliers for the next few weeks. I see that corn goes on sale at both the Price Chopper and the Great American for the same price. 5 cans for $3. Doing the math that comes to $.60 a can or $.039 and oz.

With that information I can fill out my price book page. These two prices are the sale prices so I put a star next to them.

But I’ll let you in on another little secret. Even that is too much work for me. I’ve gotten to the point where I only record the price if it is LESS than what I pay for it full price at Aldi’s/Save a Lot. After all, if it is more expensive, who cares? I don’t plan on buying it there!

I simply scan the sales fliers, do the math if necessary (in this case, they were all 15.25 oz cans, so as long as the per can price was over $.39, then I didn’t worry about even figuring out the per oz price) and then only write it in if it is less. So my price book page actually looks like this:

Now you may find it necessary to go into a store to research a few specific items-or to check out a store that doesn’t send out fliers. Once you’ve built the bones of your price book, this is just a stroll down aisles marking down the brand, size, etc. Sometimes the store actually has the unit price already listed in oz or whatnot on the shelf. In those cases I mark down the size of the can, skip listing the price and just copy the unit price from the sticker.

And there you go, a price book! Once you have one, you won’t have to wonder if that 60 can of corn you found at the discount grocers is really a bargain or not!**

So what about sales and coupons? Well, I would only consider using either if the unit price winds up cheaper than the lowest price in your price book. Otherwise you aren’t really saving any money!

For more on Starting Frugality, read about discerning between wants and needs, and eating at home/eating out less!

*Note: Really there is a #3-not buying it. But we sort of covered that when we discussed discerning between wants and needs back in the initial article in the Starting Frugality series.
**Another Note: Please be cautious with huge sizes. If you can’t use up all of it or store it correctly you may wind up throwing it out. That is not frugal at all! A smaller, but more usable size may actually wind up cheaper for you in those cases.

A couple of weeks ago I got a letter from Alan. He had made a New Years resolution to become frugal-and was looking for a push in the right direction.

Of course there are many ways to be frugal, depending on your personal situation. I started out discussing how to tracking your spending and saving money by distinguishing between wants and needs. But there is so much more to say!

The next big area I would like to tackle is the grocery/food bill! Food seems to be one of those areas where it is easy (and impressive) to trim your bill.

The two main ways a person can save money on their food bill are:

#1-By eating out less. The other way to say this is “cooking at home”
#2-By paying less for what you are buying foodwise.

Today we will cover #1.

Do you eat out? Yankee Bill and I really enjoy eating a nice dinner or lunch out together. That is one of the things we do that make life enjoyable. But when we both worked we got in the habit of eating lunch out every day.

Have you ever added up how much that can cost? Lets assume you get a cheap lunch for $5. (and honestly, other than fast food where can you do that these days?) 5 days a week, 50 weeks a year (lets assume 2 weeks of annual vacation). That would come out to $1250 a year spent on lunch. Holy cow! Even without running specific numbers I can tell that making and bringing a lunch would be a savings.

Photo by keuynish’s via Flickr.com

Now there are different levels of frugality you can go for in making a lunch. Even if you buy expensive luncheon meats and cheese, small prepackaged bags of chips, premade pudding cups and soda you will still save money over purchased lunches. If you do more “make your own” (and after all, how much effort is it to make instant pudding and put it in little containers in the fridge?) you can save even more. The cheapest lunch is of course leftovers from dinner the night before!

Want lots of ideas for lunches you can make? Hillbilly Housewife has a great article on how to safely pack lunch, and also suggestions for what to put inside. Also check out some of these neat Tips for Bringing Lunch to Work.

Photo by Massdistraction via flickr.com

Lunch isn’t the only place to save. Many of us grab takeout or eat dinner out much too frequently. Just to run some more numbers-let’s assume you eat take out for a family of 3 once a week (guesstimate a low $20), and eat out (for two-leave the kiddo at home) one night a week ( guesstimate two $16 entrees for $32) for 52 weeks a year. That comes to $2704.

There are many ways to trim this-and they all start at the grocery store! From smallest savings to greatest:

#1 Buy lovely gourmet produce and create meals that are equal to what we would have eaten out. This might take a while. . .
#2 Buy pre-made frozen food at the grocery store to eat for dinner (pizza, “meals” etc). This is quick and easy, but could be nutritionally deficient.
#3 Buy some pre-made items, but “fill it out” with homemade/canned/cheap starches, veggies and sides. A little cheaper, and a little healthier.
#4 Make everything from scratch. Takes longer, but is frequently much healthier and cheaper.
#5 Make everything from scratch from ingredients purchased on sale/inexpensively. This is like #4, but on steroids.

Most people do some combination of the above. For example, I like to cook most of my stuff from scratch-but then again I also keep pre-made frozen food (such as a spare frozen pizza and some fish sticks) in the freezer to use when I run out of time and the urge to buy takeout overcomes me.

The point is that unless you are buying gourmet ingredients every single time, eating at home winds up cheaper than eating out-no matter how you accomplish it. The only difference is how much you save. This is one of those occasions where doing ANYTHING is better than doing NOTHING. Of course, if you really want (or need) to save money then go whole hog. But start doing something.

Next Friday-Starting Frugality-Saving on Food Part II (grocery shopping). And after that look for a new Friday series on “Frugal Food” covering one frugal food each Friday, starting in two weeks with Tuna fish.

Readers, what are your thoughts on this? Do you have any great tips or tricks to avoid eating out?

Sometimes the best frugal ideas are not about what you plan to do, but rather what you do to use what you have in an unexpected way.

Last night I made homemade Mac ‘n Cheese for dinner. Although it was already loaded with carbs (albeit whole wheat ones-I used ww noodles), I really felt that it needed something bread-like to compliment the veggies I had chosen as a side. Of course I decided this barely 2 hours before dinner needed to be on the table, so there wasn’t enough time to make a loaf of regular bread in the breadmaker. I didn’t feel like having biscuits-I wanted something with a bit of a crust. Why, I don’t know, I just did. I’m the cook, I get to decided these things.

So I pulled out my trusty “Beer Bread” recipe. This (and biscuits) is my standby when I have failed to plan ahead and need a bread for dinner. Beer Bread isn’t a yeast bread, it’s a quick bread with a somewhat heavy texture that is between a biscuit and a muffin in texture-savory not sweet. Baking powder and the carbonation from beer (or a soda) to make it rise. You mix it, let it rise for 20 min and then bake for about 40. It’s a very flexible recipe-you can add different herbs, cheese, or even bacon bits to fancy it up.

Now we get to the creative part of this endeavor. We have beer downstairs-Yankee Bill enjoys one now and again. But in the fridge we had a bottle of Cranberry Champagne that we had opened on New Years and hadn’t finished (the regular bottle got drunk, the cranberry wasn’t as popular). I am not drinking any alcohol for a while-part of the weight loss plan you know-and Yankee Bill confirmed that he wasn’t too jazzed with the flavor and wouldn’t be drinking any. So why not use the champagne that was going to go to waste instead of the beer that would eventually be drunk?

So I decided to try it in the bread. I figured if it was icky then I could throw it out. I mixed it up, and it looked decidedly PINK. Sigh. Oh well, I was willing to give it a chance.

I’m glad I did, because the finished bread turned out delicious! Now, I would never recommend that going out and buying a bottle of Cranberry Champagne to make beer bread as a frugal idea. However using Cranberry Champagne that you have already paid for and no-one in the house is going to drink to make bread instead of pouring it down the drain. . . well that IS frugal!

The moral of the story-take a risk occasionally in your pursuit of frugality~ and think outside the box!