Painless Ways To Save Money

There are many ways to save money that will not cause anyone in your family any pain. You can still have a life.

1. This is a great time of year for this tip - go to yard sales! Yeah, you can save a ton of money buying your families clothing at yard sales. I always find name-brand clothing for my kids and spend next to nothing in it. No one knows that you got them at a yard sale. Yard sales are also a great way to get new furniture and household items. Books are my number one thing to get at yard sales. 25 cents for an 8.00 book!! YEP that is for me. Toys are a great thing to buy at yard sales. My little man has all of that Little Tykes stuff , tractor, turtle with lid he uses for a pool, a huge boat that has to be used as a sand box because the other owners for some reason cut a small hole in the bottom to drain the water out even though there is a plug, he has the picnic table , and more Little Tykes stuff that I bet I haven't paid more than $10.00 for all of it. The boat and tractor were free!! You can also get a lot of home schooling items at yard sales. Plus going to yard sales can be a lot of fun.

2. Hang your clothes out to dry. Or at least most of them. My oldest son has to have his t-shirts done in the dryer, but since I am hanging everything else, it is still saving me a ton of money. His t-shirts only take a few minutes to get wrinkle free, then I take them out and dry them the rest of the way outside. He never has complained.

3. Take your lunch to work and make your own coffee to take with you in the morning. You will save so much money if you don't eat out at lunch and don't stop to get that expensive fancy coffee.

4. Make pizza, cookies, bread, etc at home by hand. It is fun doing this and it saves money. I can make my own pizza at home for a fraction of what it cost to order from a pizza place. Also it is better for your family than a frozen pizza. You can bake your own cookies and breads for pennies on the dollar.

5. This one took my family a while to do - STOP DRINKING SODA! The reason we really stopped was for health issues. Never even thought of money. It took about 3 months to totally get it out of the house, but now that it is totally gone and we don't drink it anymore, I realized we saved a ton of money. We now drink a lot of water, homemade juice, and sun tea. None of us miss the soda and it has saved our health and our bank account.

6. If you have to have a birthday party for your little one or any type of party - make your own decorations and food for it. Fun and does not cost a lot. My daughter is already starting on some stuff for her wedding stuff. It really does save a lot of money to make your own decorations.

7. This one needs no explanation and benefits your health and your pocket book - GIVE UP SMOKING.

8. It actually saves a bit to substitute dry milk in your cooking. Just buy a bit of milk for cereal and use dry milk in your cooking. With how much milk is anymore this can really save you a lot of money.

9. Block the hot summer sun out of your house. This is one that we have to do anyway because we do not have one tree in our yard. I hate that so much. Next house is going to nothing but trees. I wouldn't even hate living in a tree house after living in this house. LOL.

10. Plant a garden. No matter how small it is or if you just have room for one thing, like tomatoes, DO IT!! Not too much work and you do save some money.

11. Have a STAYCATION. Do a search on this blog and you will find a whole blog posts on ideas for a staycation. Fun and low cost.

12. Just starting out with food storage, start small. Maybe each week when something is on sale that your family uses , like cans of beef stew, buy 3 cans instead of 1 and stick the 2 extra back. You will be surprised at how fast your stockpile will grow if you do this every week. It does not have to take a lot of money to get a food storage. I have had to do it this way. I do not have the money to go and buy 100 cans of tuna or whatever. I have had to do it small.

These are just a few ideas. I am sure that you can think of more to do to save money at home. 

 

 

Add Variety To Your Food Storage

There are many ways to add variety to your food storage. Ways to make it more lively and not boring at all. Ways that do not have to cost a lot of money. It does not have to be too expensive to even have a stockpile of food and items!

Have plenty of seasonings and spices. They are a must have when it comes to cooking really good food and ways to liven up things. Having the right seasoning on hand could be all of the difference between eating good meals and boring meals. Chili powder and taco seasoning are 2 things that I try to add to my food storage every week. I use a lot of it. A good idea is to go through the recipes that you use a lot or think of meals that your family loves and then stock up on those seasonings and spices that you need to make that. Also stockpile the other items.

Keep a huge supply of different flavors of bouillon. You can get them in beef, chicken, ham, and other flavors. Great to cook rice and noodles in and also great addition to soups.

Keep an assortment of condiments in your stockpile also. Soy sauce, ketchup, A-1, mustard, BBQ sauce, and the list goes on. Having these items in your food storage could be a life saver.

Have sweet items in your stockpile. Sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, ginger, chocolate chips, etc. Anything you might need to make some cookies or sweets. I always have on hand lots of cinnamon-sugar that I get at the Dollar Tree. My kids love cinnamon toast. They will eat that for a snack and when I am out of the cinnamon sugar they let me know! LOL So, that is one thing that I buy even when we don't need it.

My daughter made me think of this one. She will drink hot chocolate all year around. 110 degrees outside and she will have a mug of hot chocolate in her hand. Have tons of cocoa, breakfast drink mixes, vanilla, syrup, and other items like that. Breakfast drink mixes add well to powdered milk. They make it much more enjoyable to drink. Plus it is very healthy.

Adding variety to your food storage does not have to cost a lot of money and it could be a life saver. Having good tasting food in an emergency will be a great moral booster. Giving your family a satisfying meal in lean times will make everyone feel so much better and make it easier to deal with other things that are going on. Having comfort food will have a calming effect on everyone I would think. Make it easier to sleep knowing that your family is well fed.
 

Food Storage Recipe - Coffee Cake

This is an easy recipe and taste VERY good with a cup of coffee in the morning. 

 
Coffee Cake

The Cake -

2 cups Bisquick Baking Mix

2 tablespoon sugar

2/3 cup milk

1 egg

The Topping -

1/2 cup of baking mix

1/3 cup of brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

2 tablespoon margarine

Preheat you oven and grease a 9 inch round pan.

Mix all of the ingredients for the Cake , beat it well and spread into cake pan. Mix the topping items with the margarine until crumbly and sprinkle this over the cake.

Bake this for about 20 - 25 minutes.

Disaster Kit For Babies!

72 Hour Kits and Disaster Kits For Babies

If you have an infant or a toddler at home, consider including these items as you put together your disaster and 72 hour kits for your family:

Instant formula. Make sure to buy the kind you do not need to mix with water. Also, track expiration dates and rotate through them frequently.

5 small bottles for the formula. You can fill them with purified water to provide extra drinking water in your kit.

Refrigerated bottle bag. This is helpful in case you get the chance to warm up or cool down the formula you can keep it at that temperature for around 4 hours.

Plenty of diapers. The exact number needed depends on the age of your child. I recommend including about 20 disposables and also 3 cloth ones that can be washed, dried and reused in case you run out.

A travel package of wipes. These are great for washing as well. If you have space I'd recommend just storing a full box of wet wipes.

Pacifiers. Put in two just in case. If you're stressed the baby will probably be stressed and it's a comfort for them.

3 cotton/flannel wraps, and 2 muslin wraps.

Baby food. Depending on the age of your child you will probably want to include some jars of baby food. Once your baby can eat mostly regular foods just pop these out of your kit.

Washcloths. Stored around 10 small ones, it's an eventuality, you'll require them at some point.

Small comfort toy/s. If you child has a specific toy or blanket that he/she really loves, try to grab that in an emergency. But if you can't, then try to have a usable substitute that will help comfort the child in lieu of their favorite item.

Clothes - and plenty of them! This is a tough one as babies grow so fast. One trick I recommend is that as you swap out their closets to put in the next size of clothes to remember to do that in the disaster kit at the same time. Make sure to include clothes for all types of weather and include lots of spares.

Ziplock bags. These work great for storing used diapers or anything else that is dirty, or clean for that matter.

Bulb nose syringe and saline. Saline loosens mucous and syringe sucks water/mucous/misc out of ears, nose, mouth etc. You never know if you'll need one so it's great to keep in your kit.

Infant tylenol/motrin. It never fails that kids get sick as soon as you are somewhere WITHOUT your medicine. So this is a definite requirement for any child disaster kit.

Desatin or other diaper rash cream and travel-sized baby powder. The last thing you'd want in an emergency situation is a sore bum and nothing to treat it with. This will be especially useful if you have to resort to using cloth diapers.

The most important thing to remember is to always be thinking about what is appropriate for your child's age and stage of development. For example, if your child is no longer drinking bottles then there is no reason to keep formula in your disaster kit.

Food Storage Recipe - Rocky Road Fudge

You have to have snacks and feel-good food factored into your food storage! Things would get pretty bad if you could not have a treat every once in a while.

Rocky Road Fudge

In a saucepan combine:

1 cup semi-sweet chocolate morsels
1 cup of butterscotch morsels
a half a cup of peanut butter

Place this over low heat and melt it until it is well blended and smooth.

Add to it:

3 cups of miniature marshmallows
1 cup of salted peanuts

Mix this well and spread it into a foil lined 8 inch square pan. Chill in the fridge until firm.

YUMMY!!