Just curious who else is living super frugal

[EweSheep]

Heather, go and buy a hunting rifle, bag a deer, bring back to butcher shop to be processed, a win win for both businesses LOL!

 

[HeatherLynn]

Yea hubby has to do the bagging the deer part. I get woozy just from seeing a needle. A tiny pin prick of blood about puts me on the floor. I cannot imagine what shooting something would do. I only only killed one animal. It was a dying roo and by the time my husband got home the deed was done and I was a puddle of a mess at the base of a pine tree. I really deal badly with blood.

As is when I go pick up the meet and I see a guy in back with blood on his apron I have to do lots of deep breathing.

 

[Beekissed]

Facing fears can help one become desensitized to them with repeated exposure to the thing you fear. Could be that you might have many areas of your life improve by facing this one fear!

 

[HeatherLynn]

LoL not too sure about that one. 4 c sections, lots of needles and I still get woozy. I can handle just about anything else. A kid can vomit all over me. Animals or kids with the runs, no biggie. Heck even infections aren't too bad as long as there is no blood. My husband thinks its funny. I am not too amused by it. Its embarassing. I can be so matter of fact about the rest and you face me with a pin prick and I go down. sigh

I am working on writing up my grocery lists and recipes I have used to cut our food budget. I get asked about these a lot so I have been doing a good bit of writing as of late. I am trying to work out a curriculum for my kids to teach them basics of finances and household planned. Boy or girl its a good skill to learn.

 

[HeatherLynn]

Oh man guys I forever feel discouraged about our finances. I try and try but it feels like I can never have us really prepared. We are still facing job issues. they seem to resolve and then its back again. Now there is talk of a maybe move to columbus ohio which is not going to happen with this company. I don't move for flaky companies and i don't care how big they are. They are flaky flaky flaky. So looks like this will happen at Christmas. i am so so tired of always being broke and I strive toward debt free and the 6 months expenses. I am tired and out of ideas. I just don't know where I can cut anymore. We are running lean. We cut much more we are running skeleton. I'll be the pile of bones running down the road in my goodwill or bagsale outfit.

It just feels like if I can't accomplish more I have failed the family. I have stretched, saved, scrimped, done without and its not good enough. I am frugal discouraged. When it gets like this I so badly want to just say the heck with it and go nuts on a shopping spree. I know not the answer but it is still my first instinct. Now that was a dirty little secret. ( sigh)

 

[Beekissed]

Oh man guys I forever feel discouraged about our finances. I try and try but it feels like I can never have us really prepared. We are still facing job issues. they seem to resolve and then its back again. Now there is talk of a maybe move to columbus ohio which is not going to happen with this company. I don't move for flaky companies and i don't care how big they are. They are flaky flaky flaky. So looks like this will happen at Christmas. i am so so tired of always being broke and I strive toward debt free and the 6 months expenses. I am tired and out of ideas. I just don't know where I can cut anymore. We are running lean. We cut much more we are running skeleton. I'll be the pile of bones running down the road in my goodwill or bagsale outfit.

It just feels like if I can't accomplish more I have failed the family. I have stretched, saved, scrimped, done without and its not good enough. I am frugal discouraged. When it gets like this I so badly want to just say the heck with it and go nuts on a shopping spree. I know not the answer but it is still my first instinct. Now that was a dirty little secret. ( sigh)

Just reading a few posts back you said you bought $70 worth of beef from the butcher. How many pounds of meat did you get for that money? I don't know that I've ever bought $70 worth of beef in my entire life collectively, let alone at one time. Maybe you think you are scrimping and saving but it's a relative thing? To you it may seem like you are doing without or really scrimping but from the outside looking in, I can't imagine being wealthy enough to buy meat from a butcher in order to feed the family.

Actually, when one is really poor one doesn't include much meat in the diet unless you can get it from hunting or growing your own on the cheap...so maybe it's all relative to your perspective?

It may help you to put your own troubles into a new perspective if you can look around you and befriend someone who survives on much less than your family manages to do and see if you can pick up some pointers on just how they do it.

For instance, in your siggy line you state you have too many animals. Maybe that is where you can cut costs....animals require food and food costs money. Unless you are raising these animals for enough food to defray all the cost of raising them, it doesn't make much sense to have the animals...even the pets. In reality, pets cost money, so having more than one or two pets is probably placing a real strain on finances you could otherwise use for more needful things.

Just offering a few things to ponder...

 

[HeatherLynn]

Animals we should cut, probably can't. We end up with pets more from people dumping them here than anything else. The other animals are all family farm livestock which belong to us and my parents. Animal feed each month that I pay for is about 50. Granted right now I have 30 extra chickens that need to go and 6 extra ducks. it will go down a tad when they are sold.

I am trying to remember how much beef we got for that 70 and I think it was 33lbs. Almost positive. We tend to stock up when prices are good. There are 8 of us here and another sibling who eats almost all her meals here also. So when meat prices are low, I buy. Like today I bought really nice ground beef for 1.89 a pound. Its a great price and its lean beef. Our groceries for the 8 of us is under 400 each month. The times I buy meat like I mentioned we use up a bit of our stock on other foods to compensate. I think thats pretty fair. We do produce some fruit and veggies for our own use. Its a slow process working toward providing more for ourselves so we are still stuck giving the grocery a fair amount of money. You cannot imagine our budget just for milk uggg. My jersey cannot grow up soon enough.

I am just having a hard time looking at our finances and saying we will be ok if this job ends before he finds something decent. Right now the only jobs he is coming across pay less, are contract only, and no insurance. So we stick with the company he is at now till we find something actually comparable or until he gets laid off. Just, short of winning the lottery, I can't say positively that we have done enough to prepare. Can you do enough to prepare for stuff like this? I hate the thought of depending on unemployment for any amount of time. Just discouraging,.

 

[Beekissed]

Quote:
Yes...you really can! I've been laid off, unemployed, on strike, etc. all down the years and raising 3 boys without the benefit of child support. It all comes down to priorities. Heck, we didn't even get a dog until I was in my 30s...or a computer either. Dogs cost money, so one has to decide if they need that money for survival or do you want to apportion it out to having pets for entertainment purposes.

When one of my companies went on strike I was the only employee that was a single parent..and I was the only one that could live on reduced income during the strike. The strike ended before the employees got what they wanted because no one could hold out for long due to bills they had created. I owned my vehicle, didn't have credit card debt and had low mortgage payments, as well as low utility costs~through planning and my own efforts. I had learned to do without the extras and still live a fulfilled life...and so I could weather the hard times.

All the little things count....$50 may not seem like much in the broad scheme of things, but that $50 can help pay off a debt/bill each month.

Chickens, for instance...I have spent years getting feed costs down to a minimum and I'm always on the lookout for new and better ways to do that. That reaching for knowledge and adjusting things as you go is essential if you want to save money. Saving money is more helpful in lean times than is making money. I'd rather have a cheaper lifestyle every day than win the lottery one day. Money comes and it goes...mostly it goes. If you can prevent that bleeding from every small area, you can keep more of your money for the important things.

It just takes changing the way you think, sometimes. Those who wish they would win the lottery are those who are thinking that, if they just had more money, life would be easier. Everyone who decides to control their spending and regulate their wants in life knows that money only buys breathing room...it doesn't buy life or happiness. Life and happiness is happening around us every day and we can control the little things we do to save money....very often we can't control the big things that happen to us like unemployment or low wages.

If you could stop thinking of saving on money and living frugal as a punishment or restriction, you can have fun with it and make it a challenge...and ultimately a triumph. It gets addictive after awhile because you feel so much at peace in a world gone crazy....and you can sit on your oasis of calm and grin with slow satisfaction because your lifestyle has paid off way more than a lottery ticket.

 

[HeatherLynn]

I guess it is a matter of perspective. I work really hard juggling and stretching so no one else in the family has to feel the pinch. Usually I do enjoy it and almost find it a game. The job thing has me freaking out i guess. I have this fear that I might fail the family. Momentary freak out I guess. I just have to keep pushing.

Please don't get me wrong. I don't think we are poor. By government standards we are but I have never ever felt that way. We have managed to be pretty self sufficient so far. I know others struggle more than I do and I do hang out with some that are struggling. That might be part of the freak out because if we struggle then I can't help them out either. so it feels like maybe I will fail them too. ya know. My nerves just got to me a bit. I am reading some Rob Roy again tonight. Mortgage free always makes me feel better.

 

[yakibert]

"Watching gas traps bubble on the wine buckets"


So far, we have made all these different kinds of wine (but not at the same time)
Orange
Pear/Cranberry
Rhubarb
Pineapple
Peach
Plum
Fig (figs a gift from brother in law)
Watermelon (gift from supermarket)
Nectarine
Apricot
Apple (sparkling)
Strawberry Mead (honey wine)
Blueberry
Rose Petal Mead
Blood Orange
Parsnip (yes, even vegetables make good wine - this tasted a bit like chardonnay)
Kiwi (this was one I didn't really care for though)
Elderberry (gift from a friend)

I make my own beer. The ingredients are food items, so it's all tax free ( here in WA state).

I've made:

Raspberry Wine (local U-pick raspberries)
Blackberry Wine (local blackberries)
Blueberry Wine (local blueberry farm, drank some last night with pasta!)
Salal Wine (from county public property - too afraid to drink that one but I made it)
Riesling Wine (from Yakima grapes, hand processed)
Merlot Wine (from Yakima grapes, hand processed)

Wine is so easy and so cheap to make, and such a wonderful compliment to a home cooked dinner.