Ahhh, sitting down in the morning with a cup of hot coffee (half bargain basement decaf and half Folgers bought on sale) with a fresh Festival of Frugality to read. What could be better? Claire over at Tired But Happy (doesn’t that describe a lot of us?) hosted the 24th weekly festival of 2006. This week there are 20 entries, including “Disasters in Cheesemaking” by yours truly.
As always, I encourage you to check out all the entries, but here are a few (OK, seven-it really was a great festival this week) of my favorites for those of you who just need a quick peruse with your cuppa joe.
Penny over at “Money and Values” has a timely post (tis the season to pack the family into the minivan and all) on how to save money on vacation. The tip that really hit home with me was “Be a tourist in your own back yard”. My mom was a big advocate of this approach. She would actually call it “Playing Tourist”, and growing up in Maine we got to see a lot of neat things. Some of them were the big ones you’d expect-the coast, the oceanarium (we got to pick up live horseshoe crabs! And listen to whale song, and put together a replica of a whales backbone-can you tell I still remember?), museums, visiting Andre the Seal (I know they made a cheesy movie in the 90’s, but yes he was real, and we used to see him almost every year-he died when I was in highschool)-but some of them were the less well known things, neat stuff that the locals themselves didn’t always frequent: The Victoria House, a mansion in Portland, the Bird Sanctuary and mansion in Freeport, The Black House (another restored mansion-although I don’t remember where), the “Scottish Irish” Festivals (oops, called the “Maine Highland Games“), wherever they were being held that year. Ah, good memories.
Do any of you golf? DH has a golf cart (gasoline driven * grunt grunt *) even though he doesn’t play golf 🙂 Even if you don’t purchase the cart, it seems to be a hobby where you can rack up some debt. PMOA net has some great tips specific to golfers. I especially like the idea of checking out the price of equipment at “Play it Again Sports”, a national used sports equipment chain (the website has a store locator). Whoever thought that idea up is making a mint!
MomAdvice has bath time tips, to include a recipe for bath crayons and a recipe for bath finger paint. I know that last summer when it was so hot (our house doesn’t have AC) I would stick Buddy and Princess in the tub together and give them each a paintbrush, and a piece of egg carton with baby shampoo (to keep it tear free) that had been died with a couple of drops of food coloring. They had a ball! The addition of some flour to turn it into a fingerpaint paste sounds like a GREAT idea. I’ll be socking that one into my Mama’s rainy day/sweltering day file.
Free Money Finance offers up the radical suggestion to “Cancel Cable TV”. Actually, I wouldn’t mind doing this (although some mornings having Disney Channel for Princess and Buddy to watch is a godsend). Ever since I got Netflix, I prefer to watch my old episodes of “Little House on the Prairie” in the evenings. However I think DH might go into shock at the loss of Fox News. . . .
The Family CEO has a quick rundown on some savings and rebate sites. She didn’t mention my favorite, Mypoints.com but Claire did and I seconded it in the comments. (need a referral? Email me-there is a link at the bottom of this article right near the comments link)
Tender Age Investing over at Queercents is very interesting, and includes a link to the article in the LA times about a program by AG Edwards aimed at 3rd graders to teach about money and savings. This is one place where I can say “Way to go corporate America!”.
I know I listed some freebies earlier this week, but you can pick up a bunch of different freebie offers over at “Getting Out of Debt”.
See, I told you there was a lot of great stuff!
I’m glad that you found the freebies useful! I’m also a proud owner of the Tightwad Gazette! When you have 7 kids, you have to be creative with not only your money, but all your resources!!! They have many great ideas. I always use the book for reference when I need to think of ways to stretch my last dollar or save money on expenses.
Thanks for the compliment!
Tourist in your back yard is a great tip. We take our own area for granted. There things where I grew up that people come from all over the country for but that I have never seen. Funny huh?
Stephanie-that’s why I feel so lucky that my mom took us to so many places-otherwise I would be exactly the same! I intend on dragging my kids everywhere, just as soon as they get a bit older 🙂
My sister and her husband promised each other they’d visit every single attraction in their AAA guide before they moved out of state.
Hey, there’s another frugal travel tip. If you’re a member of AAA, don’t forget that in addition to maps they publish travel guides (free for members) to the states and they also have regional camping guides.
And I’m glad you get my blog name. Usually male bloggers either think of the sexual connotations right off the bat, or they just simply don’t get it. The mamas get it right away.
I love the home town tourist thing. We’ve done that with our family some. It’s really fun!