Today I signed a lease to rent a farm house. It is on two acres of land I can use and I am more than ecstatic about it. I can't wait to get out there. Moving at this time of year doesn't seem like a good idea to most people, but because it isn't planting season yet, it is the best for me. I have a month to look over the land and plot out where things can go on the property. I also can see how much of my time can be allotted to actually running some farm like stuff.
I am so happy to finally be able to have a garden, an area to store my jars, and the landlord showed me where to put the chicken coop! Fresh eggs, gardening so I don't have to spend $40 a year alone in tomatoes from the farmer's market (I will still need to go to friend's farms for pears and apples since I can't plant trees on a rental place), and I am thinking of maybe getting rabbits to raise for more meat purposes.
Stay tuned everyone for pictures!
Sunday, March 8, 2015
Friday, March 6, 2015
Saving Emergency Water Without Going Broke
Down in a numerous parts of the United States we have been having unusual weather. How many could have ever predicted seeing snow in Florida or Louisiana? I am up in the area that usually has that type of weather. The storms brought about outages of power and supply chains all over. Without power a lot of people lose water supply. Not many know this fact, and it can come as surprise to those who don't have weather like this often.
So, this made me think about things here. How much water do I have stored if we lost power and couldn't get a fresh supply? I am bad at this, unfortunately. I live in a small apartment. I had only one gallon per person in my house for a day, which means I had only five gallons of water stored. Sadly this isn't enough. According to most sources, like FEMA and other agencies, they recommend having a gallon of water for every person per day. This means my family of five needs five gallons per day. They also say we should have enough stored for three days of not receiving services. In my house that is at least 15 gallons of stored water.
I don't use a lot of water in jugs on a daily basis, so I needed to figure a way of storing water that wouldn't spoil. In plastic jugs the water needs to be rotated every 6 months. From everything that I have read about this, it is mainly because plastic leeches into the water. I didn't want to do this due to money of buying water purified and sealed, and because I didn't have a need of water in this form to be able to rotate it every six months.
I needed to do something that didn't need rotation like this.
My solution came to me while restocking my shelves after my daughter was released from the hospital last month. My sister had used up a lot of my food to feed my other kids and her own while she watched my sons. I moved around my home canned foods and took stock of what had been used. I have quart and pint jars sitting empty now. Could I put water and seal them like with food?
The answer is: yes. Sealing water in canning jars is actually what I needed to do. Glass doesn't leech into the water, they can be purified tap water (filtered through a BRITA if you feel like it), and they don't need to be rotated as long as they stay sealed and stored correctly. The only other problem I encountered was "stale" water. This is easily fixed at the time of use by pouring quickly between two glasses a few times to add air back into the taste. This was my solution to every problem I could come up with.
So, taking my jars that had been emptied I boiled BRITA filtered tap water on my stove for ten minutes and then poured it into my canning jars. I then processed in a water bath for twenty minutes to seal them. After they popped and cooled on my table top over night (in the dark) I stored them on my shelves in a cool and dark space.
Now I have my first three days of water stored. I know that in a real emergency I could actually end up with more than my five immediate family members. This is bringing me to the goal of storing as much water as I can for my family, my sister's family, and some extras for possible friends stranded at my place. I also know that some of my friends don't believe in being prepared and will end up at my door for help.
So, a new problem has developed itself in my prepping. Can I store enough for my new calculations of expected "guests" in an emergency? Probably not. That is a lot of gallons of water and if the problem goes for longer than three days then we have a lot of people suffering. Up here it is possible to go up to a week or longer without power due to ice storms or constant blizzards. Back to the drawing board for me, then.
I am continuing to find jars on sale, for free or giveaway. I will continue to store water into them for now. First harvest isn't until June here, so I don't need any jars for any food at this moment and I have to store them even empty. I feel they are being put to wonderful use sitting on my shelves with water for emergencies.
So, this made me think about things here. How much water do I have stored if we lost power and couldn't get a fresh supply? I am bad at this, unfortunately. I live in a small apartment. I had only one gallon per person in my house for a day, which means I had only five gallons of water stored. Sadly this isn't enough. According to most sources, like FEMA and other agencies, they recommend having a gallon of water for every person per day. This means my family of five needs five gallons per day. They also say we should have enough stored for three days of not receiving services. In my house that is at least 15 gallons of stored water.
I don't use a lot of water in jugs on a daily basis, so I needed to figure a way of storing water that wouldn't spoil. In plastic jugs the water needs to be rotated every 6 months. From everything that I have read about this, it is mainly because plastic leeches into the water. I didn't want to do this due to money of buying water purified and sealed, and because I didn't have a need of water in this form to be able to rotate it every six months.
I needed to do something that didn't need rotation like this.
My solution came to me while restocking my shelves after my daughter was released from the hospital last month. My sister had used up a lot of my food to feed my other kids and her own while she watched my sons. I moved around my home canned foods and took stock of what had been used. I have quart and pint jars sitting empty now. Could I put water and seal them like with food?
The answer is: yes. Sealing water in canning jars is actually what I needed to do. Glass doesn't leech into the water, they can be purified tap water (filtered through a BRITA if you feel like it), and they don't need to be rotated as long as they stay sealed and stored correctly. The only other problem I encountered was "stale" water. This is easily fixed at the time of use by pouring quickly between two glasses a few times to add air back into the taste. This was my solution to every problem I could come up with.
So, taking my jars that had been emptied I boiled BRITA filtered tap water on my stove for ten minutes and then poured it into my canning jars. I then processed in a water bath for twenty minutes to seal them. After they popped and cooled on my table top over night (in the dark) I stored them on my shelves in a cool and dark space.
Now I have my first three days of water stored. I know that in a real emergency I could actually end up with more than my five immediate family members. This is bringing me to the goal of storing as much water as I can for my family, my sister's family, and some extras for possible friends stranded at my place. I also know that some of my friends don't believe in being prepared and will end up at my door for help.
So, a new problem has developed itself in my prepping. Can I store enough for my new calculations of expected "guests" in an emergency? Probably not. That is a lot of gallons of water and if the problem goes for longer than three days then we have a lot of people suffering. Up here it is possible to go up to a week or longer without power due to ice storms or constant blizzards. Back to the drawing board for me, then.
I am continuing to find jars on sale, for free or giveaway. I will continue to store water into them for now. First harvest isn't until June here, so I don't need any jars for any food at this moment and I have to store them even empty. I feel they are being put to wonderful use sitting on my shelves with water for emergencies.
Saturday, October 4, 2014
Prepping? I didn't think so...
I was telling a coworker today about my free pears I went and collected from a friend last weekend (make friends with farmers as they usually have an over abundance of food they want used by winter). He started asking me questions on stuff that I do and after about two hours he came to this conclusion: I am a prepper.
If you don't know what a "prepper" is then let me give a quick explanation - it is a person who prepares for an end of the modern world scenario or disaster.
My own family has called me this, but I always just giggle. I do think we should be ready for ice storms, tornadoes or the possibility of a major homeland war. But, I do not seek to stock pile tons of ammo and food for such reasons.
A SOLAR CHARGING LANTERN THAT LASTS FOR 8 HOURS ON HIGH:
I think that living frugal or paycheck to paycheck has just caused me to buy when deals happen, learn to store my food long term, and gather what I always thought could be useful knowledge to save a dollar.
He did get me to think, though. What if a storm came in today and knocked out our power and water for 48 hours? I live in a small town and in an apartment. I decided to shut off the lights, look around and figure if the five of us could survive stuck for 2 days (worse case for a natural disaster is longer, but they say FEMA should be in by that point).
First problem I came across was bathroom. Shutting off the water to the toilet would mean no flushing. If you have a few gallons of water to pour down (assuming the sewers aren't backed up like in a flooding situation) then you are fine. I do not have a place to store this and it is supposed to have happened suddenly. So, I thought of the nasty thing: I would drain the water from the basin and duct tape a garbage bag into the toilet. Could also turn our large sealable boxes of kitty litter into a makeshift loo (then be able to shut the lid to keep the stink down better). A hand sprinkle of litter to help hold the smell at bay. Okay, bathroom issue complete. Hand sanitizer for hand washing and a scented candle for light and minimize the stink.
Second issue then came up: fridge and freezer have no power. Crap! Then I remembered something I read once about an African soil fridge! Taking the soil left over from my potted plant garden and huge pot I had my tree die in this year, a smaller pot to fit inside, surround with soil, wet the soil and use my son's Captain America shield as a lid. Voila! Poured what was left of my milk into jars, took my eggs into wash cloths carefully, and decided we would eat the lunch meat ASAP. I don't keep much in my fridge anyway that has to stay cold or be kept in a power outage. The freezer was just a matter of hoping for power again in 48 hours. I took large and small blankets and finished filling the freezer fast with them, shoving the food into the bottom. The blankets store the cold and hopefully would keep things frozen for a while.
Lights was easy since I love my oil lanterns and candles. Sometimes I turn off all of the lights in my place and just go by the flicker of a flame. The ambient light always has helped keep my migraines at bay and the softer light helps sooth me before bed.
In the summer we would be fine, but I live in freezing Minnesota. We would not survive some days here for three hours without a heat source, let alone 48. Last winter my sister's heater went out and we scrambled to heat one room sufficient enough with two small base heaters plugged in. Our first winter here we hung blankets up to isolate the rooms, the living room and the kitchen from each other. I also already stuff and plastic cover my "window" air conditioners that are shoved into the walls in the living room and the back bedroom. These things leak horribly. I also am lucky to have a grandma who sewed some thick curtains that I double tape to the walls to seal the windows (which every winter never fails to have ice seeping into my apartment through due to the insulation and installation being horrible). We would freeze quickly in January when our highs are usually negative 20. I have decided that we would seal up the bedrooms the best we could and just have to heat our main rooms. I found this nifty heating trick a while ago where people make small heaters out of planting pots (clay and not plastic). I have some on hand already, but I don't want to kill my herbs for some heat (I will if it happened right now and today). I have decided that this week instead of buying my Hello Kitty Halloween shirt I want (yes, I save for frivolous things like that) I am going to buy enough supplies for a terracotta planter heater. I will make it and test it out next weekend to see if it works. If it does I will make two or three more for emergency or even supplement heating this winter. Last winter we reached a lovely negative 46 degrees and my electric heaters the apartment has didn't keep us comfortable at all. I had to bundle my kids up and use heating pads to keep them warm all day. We were miserable. Maybe these planter heaters will help a lot with that.
Now I started to think we would get bored or hungry. It is after harvest so I have a ton of food on hand. I also happen to have cast iron pot and flat pan. They would work lovely sitting on the terracotta heater, I think. I would have to let them heat up well to cook in them, but it is an idea. I wonder if I could heat my oven well enough with a plant heater to bake bread? It's another thing I might try for fun when the kids are gone one weekend.
Water should always be on hand for every household. Even during everyday living your water can be shut off by the city for sudden repairs or breaks. General rule is a gallon a day per person. Rotate out your water often (use water from your stores every day to cook and drink instead of straight from the tap). If you keep even more than that, then you will have enough for a wash cloth bath or washing soiled clothes.
So, we have food, are warm and dry, bathroom working, light, and water. Now we are just bored. If you are alone you could read a book or nap. If you're like me, then you suddenly have four kids stuck in a small space beside dangerous candles. What do we do? Games, playing with sit down toys, and even school work will hopefully help.
Now that I have it all planned out, I think I might even try this. One full weekend where I turn off the water to the apartment and hit the main breaker for my place. First I am going to see if those plant heaters work and could they heat my oven sufficiently for baking a loaf of bread? I will let everyone know.
Maybe I am a bit of a prepper? Or, at least, I am not far from it. Does this make me upset? Nope! I am prepared and that is fine. I am also not fanatical about it, which is also good.
A LARGE STORM BROUGHT LIMBS DOWN AND IN SOME PARTS OF TOWN BROUGHT DOWN TREES IN THE SUMMER OF 2014:
If you don't know what a "prepper" is then let me give a quick explanation - it is a person who prepares for an end of the modern world scenario or disaster.
My own family has called me this, but I always just giggle. I do think we should be ready for ice storms, tornadoes or the possibility of a major homeland war. But, I do not seek to stock pile tons of ammo and food for such reasons.
A SOLAR CHARGING LANTERN THAT LASTS FOR 8 HOURS ON HIGH:
I think that living frugal or paycheck to paycheck has just caused me to buy when deals happen, learn to store my food long term, and gather what I always thought could be useful knowledge to save a dollar.
He did get me to think, though. What if a storm came in today and knocked out our power and water for 48 hours? I live in a small town and in an apartment. I decided to shut off the lights, look around and figure if the five of us could survive stuck for 2 days (worse case for a natural disaster is longer, but they say FEMA should be in by that point).
First problem I came across was bathroom. Shutting off the water to the toilet would mean no flushing. If you have a few gallons of water to pour down (assuming the sewers aren't backed up like in a flooding situation) then you are fine. I do not have a place to store this and it is supposed to have happened suddenly. So, I thought of the nasty thing: I would drain the water from the basin and duct tape a garbage bag into the toilet. Could also turn our large sealable boxes of kitty litter into a makeshift loo (then be able to shut the lid to keep the stink down better). A hand sprinkle of litter to help hold the smell at bay. Okay, bathroom issue complete. Hand sanitizer for hand washing and a scented candle for light and minimize the stink.
Second issue then came up: fridge and freezer have no power. Crap! Then I remembered something I read once about an African soil fridge! Taking the soil left over from my potted plant garden and huge pot I had my tree die in this year, a smaller pot to fit inside, surround with soil, wet the soil and use my son's Captain America shield as a lid. Voila! Poured what was left of my milk into jars, took my eggs into wash cloths carefully, and decided we would eat the lunch meat ASAP. I don't keep much in my fridge anyway that has to stay cold or be kept in a power outage. The freezer was just a matter of hoping for power again in 48 hours. I took large and small blankets and finished filling the freezer fast with them, shoving the food into the bottom. The blankets store the cold and hopefully would keep things frozen for a while.
Lights was easy since I love my oil lanterns and candles. Sometimes I turn off all of the lights in my place and just go by the flicker of a flame. The ambient light always has helped keep my migraines at bay and the softer light helps sooth me before bed.
In the summer we would be fine, but I live in freezing Minnesota. We would not survive some days here for three hours without a heat source, let alone 48. Last winter my sister's heater went out and we scrambled to heat one room sufficient enough with two small base heaters plugged in. Our first winter here we hung blankets up to isolate the rooms, the living room and the kitchen from each other. I also already stuff and plastic cover my "window" air conditioners that are shoved into the walls in the living room and the back bedroom. These things leak horribly. I also am lucky to have a grandma who sewed some thick curtains that I double tape to the walls to seal the windows (which every winter never fails to have ice seeping into my apartment through due to the insulation and installation being horrible). We would freeze quickly in January when our highs are usually negative 20. I have decided that we would seal up the bedrooms the best we could and just have to heat our main rooms. I found this nifty heating trick a while ago where people make small heaters out of planting pots (clay and not plastic). I have some on hand already, but I don't want to kill my herbs for some heat (I will if it happened right now and today). I have decided that this week instead of buying my Hello Kitty Halloween shirt I want (yes, I save for frivolous things like that) I am going to buy enough supplies for a terracotta planter heater. I will make it and test it out next weekend to see if it works. If it does I will make two or three more for emergency or even supplement heating this winter. Last winter we reached a lovely negative 46 degrees and my electric heaters the apartment has didn't keep us comfortable at all. I had to bundle my kids up and use heating pads to keep them warm all day. We were miserable. Maybe these planter heaters will help a lot with that.
Now I started to think we would get bored or hungry. It is after harvest so I have a ton of food on hand. I also happen to have cast iron pot and flat pan. They would work lovely sitting on the terracotta heater, I think. I would have to let them heat up well to cook in them, but it is an idea. I wonder if I could heat my oven well enough with a plant heater to bake bread? It's another thing I might try for fun when the kids are gone one weekend.
Water should always be on hand for every household. Even during everyday living your water can be shut off by the city for sudden repairs or breaks. General rule is a gallon a day per person. Rotate out your water often (use water from your stores every day to cook and drink instead of straight from the tap). If you keep even more than that, then you will have enough for a wash cloth bath or washing soiled clothes.
So, we have food, are warm and dry, bathroom working, light, and water. Now we are just bored. If you are alone you could read a book or nap. If you're like me, then you suddenly have four kids stuck in a small space beside dangerous candles. What do we do? Games, playing with sit down toys, and even school work will hopefully help.
Now that I have it all planned out, I think I might even try this. One full weekend where I turn off the water to the apartment and hit the main breaker for my place. First I am going to see if those plant heaters work and could they heat my oven sufficiently for baking a loaf of bread? I will let everyone know.
Maybe I am a bit of a prepper? Or, at least, I am not far from it. Does this make me upset? Nope! I am prepared and that is fine. I am also not fanatical about it, which is also good.
A LARGE STORM BROUGHT LIMBS DOWN AND IN SOME PARTS OF TOWN BROUGHT DOWN TREES IN THE SUMMER OF 2014:
Saturday, September 27, 2014
Harvest 2014
So, it is once again harvest season up here in Mini-Soda. Farmer's market is in full swing and the Facebook sale page for my area is blowing up with "come pick this and get it off our hands" posts.
During the delay between posts this time I have been setting up with things we need before harvest next year. My poor tomatoes did not make it in my containers this year due to an untimely freeze that happened at the beginning of September and the almost freeze back in July. (Yes, I know I live in Hell. It usually allows me to grow my own food here without the problems of earth quakes and tornadoes.) So, this year it was to my benefit that in ground tomatoes didn't die from the weather. I was able to buy two boxes full of beef steak tomatoes at the farmer's market for 30$ and then a friend called to tell me that her in-laws farm had too many tomatoes and too many apples. If I came with her to pick then I could have.
I then harvested the chives we, my neighbors and myself, planted four years ago in one of the complexes flower (in ground) beds. Since they grow a lovely purple flower and they keep those orange fake lady bugs (Japanese beetles) away my landlord hasn't removed them. We had a wonderful year on chives and I have more than enough to feed my army. Of course, always remember to leave a bit of plant left to make more again next year.
My parsley, sage and mint have been brought inside. I bought them in July when they were half dead and on sale at WalMart. They will all need another year before they are ready for a large harvest, but a bit here and there taste lovely. I also transferred my struggling mint into the large container that held my poor frozen tomato plant.
BEFORE I TRANSFERRED THE MINT:
We went out today to two farms. We gathered pears for 20$ to fill a 5 gallon bucket and grabbed ourselves a free black kitten (no name yet) and then went to another farm for raspberries (2 store size containers full of organic grown at 4$) and a snack of apples (the kids were told they can have an apple each for the ride home by the nice farmers).
I love harvest time. The world is getting colder, dying and we are getting ready for cold dark days. Even though I should be sad as this all happens I cannot be as I hear the pop of the jars sealing and smell the sweat aroma of herbs drying on my walls.
Next year I have a plan to grow on my porch/patio as much as possible for my own organic harvest. I am so excited and I think I am finally ready.
During the delay between posts this time I have been setting up with things we need before harvest next year. My poor tomatoes did not make it in my containers this year due to an untimely freeze that happened at the beginning of September and the almost freeze back in July. (Yes, I know I live in Hell. It usually allows me to grow my own food here without the problems of earth quakes and tornadoes.) So, this year it was to my benefit that in ground tomatoes didn't die from the weather. I was able to buy two boxes full of beef steak tomatoes at the farmer's market for 30$ and then a friend called to tell me that her in-laws farm had too many tomatoes and too many apples. If I came with her to pick then I could have.
I then harvested the chives we, my neighbors and myself, planted four years ago in one of the complexes flower (in ground) beds. Since they grow a lovely purple flower and they keep those orange fake lady bugs (Japanese beetles) away my landlord hasn't removed them. We had a wonderful year on chives and I have more than enough to feed my army. Of course, always remember to leave a bit of plant left to make more again next year.
My parsley, sage and mint have been brought inside. I bought them in July when they were half dead and on sale at WalMart. They will all need another year before they are ready for a large harvest, but a bit here and there taste lovely. I also transferred my struggling mint into the large container that held my poor frozen tomato plant.
BEFORE I TRANSFERRED THE MINT:
We went out today to two farms. We gathered pears for 20$ to fill a 5 gallon bucket and grabbed ourselves a free black kitten (no name yet) and then went to another farm for raspberries (2 store size containers full of organic grown at 4$) and a snack of apples (the kids were told they can have an apple each for the ride home by the nice farmers).
I love harvest time. The world is getting colder, dying and we are getting ready for cold dark days. Even though I should be sad as this all happens I cannot be as I hear the pop of the jars sealing and smell the sweat aroma of herbs drying on my walls.
Next year I have a plan to grow on my porch/patio as much as possible for my own organic harvest. I am so excited and I think I am finally ready.
Saturday, June 14, 2014
Sun burn treatment
Well, I was stupid and ended up with a very painful sun burn on my lower legs. Instead of bemoaning my fate at this painful discovery, I thought I would try two remedies I found online. I just so happened to have apple cider vinegar and Earl grey tea. Following the instructions I found online on how to use both of these things to treat sun burns, I did my best on my legs last night. Here is the results:
My legs very red
My legs very red
So I put my tea and my vinegar in separate bowls and applied the rags to both legs for thirty minutes each.
My legs still very much red and still very hurt. This morning I woke up in so much pain I couldn't even walk. The skin was tight and pulled on the nerves.
I went back to my go to for burns in general. Every half hour I have been rubbing my legs with pure aloe. It is moisturizing the skin and the pain is slowly going away. This is my legs now after five applications of aloe (I am not treating my feet as you can see).
So, for this summer I suggest sun screen and aloe as a good investment.
Maybe next I will test which sun screen is cheap but still effective. Let's just hope I don't burn like this again, though.
Friday, June 6, 2014
Faithful Religious Supplies
This post won't be about cooking or getting a bargain on clothing. I will continue to cover those at a different date. Nope, today's post is about being Pagan and saving on that.
First let me define what I view a Pagan is: it is someone who is not generally viewed as Christian, Jewish or Muslim. I cannot speak for everyone who claims to be Pagan, but my faith has many gods to worship and we even have our own holidays and "rules".
That out of the way let me continue with the post.
For anyone who follows any set beliefs can tell you that there are many things we can convince ourselves we need to worship. Over the years I have acquired, been gifted, or even finally been able to buy a few things we use to worship our gods and celebrate our faith.
I remember, though, the first time my oldest saw a Harry Potter wand at one of our local large book stores. He "needed" it and continued to complain that was the reasoning for not wanting to put it back onto the shelf. I knew his feelings about it. I had pushed myself away from going toward the New Age section because I felt a calling to the Tarot cards and possibly a new book. I lowered myself to his level and smiled at him. He did feel he needed that wand. He argued that it called to him and we could use it in our rituals. I agreed we needed a new wand at home, one of my other children had broken the one we were using, but we didn't have the money for it at that current time. I put the boxed overly priced piece of wood (or plastic - I didn't look at it much) back onto the display shelf and walked a tantrum throwing five year old back to my car.
I didn't drive home. I drove to the state park. He was still going on and on with the tears falling from his eyes as I made him walk with me into the trees. We followed the path until he stopped crying and sat down on the ground. As I waited something caught his eye and he reached over to bring a straight stick up from the ground. We got a wand that day for free and he learned a lesson as well from nature.
As Pagans the temptation draws us to stones, sticks, cards, books, charms, and other things found in New Age shops or even "hippie" shops. Being a broke Pagan is difficult in today's consumerism culture. We want the prettiest spell books or do the most elaborate of rituals we find in our largest most expensive reading materials. The biggest names of authors and founders of the biggest groups makes being a broke Pagan difficult. Too many rituals or spells call on certain things such as a special knife or a certain color candle.
I see it when I look at my Christian friends, too. Recently my niece had her first communion in the Catholic Church. I spent over a hundred dollars on her gifts for the occasion. My sister spent more for her big day. She needed a special dress, shoes, veil, gloves, cross, rosary, and then there was the celebrations afterwards. Being any religion can come at a steep price. Did it need to? Probably not. I am sure we could have found a dress second hand or even borrowed one from a girl who had her's last year. There are always ways to save the money. My sister didn't want to, though.
The day we received our new wand was the day I didn't want to spend money on something from a store. I did buy our family book which is made from real leather and hand crafted paper (it holds all of our rules, stories of our path, rituals, and information. Kind of like a hand written family bible). I hand wrote and transferred everything into it as fast as I could. It's beautiful and at the time I followed my instincts when I felt the tug to it. It is my version of buying the communion dress instead of borrowing. I could have continued to use my five subject spiral notebook that held everything before the bound book called me. My children will copy it (if they stay Pagan) probably into a spiral notebook before leaving my house for good as adults, or they could possibly find the money for a bound book.
Everything in your faith or religion can probably be done cheaper, though. Make your own wand or borrow the dress. Times are difficult and we need to teach our kids now how to view faith is not needing the money, but rather the intent.
Monday, February 17, 2014
Savings 101
I know that everyone always goes on and on about needing a savings. If you live on a fixed budget or check to check than you are like me and don't think you can have a savings.
There are a few tips I have learned to create a savings.
One of the things is to find your biggest frivolous buying problem and when you go to spend that money put it instead into a jar, coffee can, or move it over into your savings account. Don't buy those cookies this week. Resist the urge to go through the drive thru fast food.
If you get a tax return back, a bonus check, or come across some gift money make it a habit to save 10% on the side. I know it won't seem like much now, but it does add up.
Set 20 to 50 dollars a paycheck into savings. I know this is difficult when every penny counts. I am doing 10$ per child on this one. My father just puts 50$ to the side every two weeks. This does add up. If you're paid biweekly than it is 520$ saved just setting aside 20$ on your paychecks. Get paid every week and you saved 1,040$.
The hard part with savings is not spending it and also getting into the habit of putting the money into it. It is easy to say don't drive thru the fast food joint on paper but when the kids are crying they are hungry, your back and feet hurt from working a long shift, and I you just don't feel like cooking... Well, this is where will power comes in. Whether you are Pagan, Christian, or something else, we all know what will power is and how we easily can lose a battle against fatigue when we don't utilize our will. Right now think of things in your house that is easily made or can be easily prepped to be made.
The thing about a savings is the mentality that struggles now will pay off later. You can first save up four months of bills, then save up for that vacation to Mt. Rushmore you wanted to bring the kids on! Don't forget, once you start the savings to always keep enough in there for if you lose your job or an emergency arrives (like my sudden 2,000$ van fix-it bill that came about last month during a weather emergency).
Get creative with your savings, too. If shutting off the extra channels on the cable, lowering your internet speed or changing your phone plan is feaseable, then put the extra you would have spent into your savings.
Now sit down and recalculate what you have spent your money on in the last few days to the month. Could you have skipped buying the dollar stick on nails last week? Maybe you don't need to drink two sodas a day? Did Mikey really need the big bag of chicken nuggets? Once you figure out what you can save you might be surprised.
Good luck!
-Cyra
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