Saving Money, What Have U Done Away With?

[farmerlor]

We've basically cut out the luxuries like date night, eating out, extra cable, etc.... We're working on re-prioritizing to ask ourselves before we make a purchase "is this something we NEED?"

 

[Black Feather]

Quote:
is having a bread making machine really cheaper on you? i so love bread, but am afaid to make home made, i will have a hard time not over indulging! which one do you have and does it come with reciepes?

I got my bread maker for free when a friend moved and didn't want it anymore. I believe it will help save money and the options on how you want to make your bread are limitless...no more being confined to the grocery store selections. I made pesto bread with parmesan and cheddar cheese last night.....now if that doesn't sound good I don't know what does

UC

 

[ksacres]

I would LOVE a bread machine. I do make bread by hand from time to time.

 

[Black Feather]

Oh yeah, I totally forgot, I also have a fully automatic, energy efficient, horizontally oriented, solar powered clothes dryer. Works great, hardly cost anything to buy, easy to install and saves a TON on electricity.

Some other things I do are use the wood stove to save on heating, and will soon have the electric thermostat on a timer. I only have a tiny hot water heater (10 gallons I believe), so showers are short but takes less energy to heat up a small amount of water than a large.

I'm also trying to eat less. I try to eat what my body needs, not what I want. I should save a lot in junk food and unnecessary snacks. Mind you as much as I try my mind and body both feel that chocolate is a 'need' not a 'want'.

UC

 

[coffeemama]

I would love a breadmaker too-maybe I'll post about that on Freecycle.

I did cut our cable way back, but got HBO back to watch Big Love

.

I have been cooking at home a lot more-need to cut back eating out even more.

If I get the urge to go shopping I go to thrift stores instead of the mall. Got a big bag of cool stuff for me and dd yesterday at Goodwill for $12-score.

 

[coffeemama]

Quote:

 

[farmerlor]

You can find breadmakers, dehydrators and crockpots all day long on Craigslist or Freecycle. So many people get them, think they'll be cool and then never use them. I love my breadmaker but never actually make bread in it. I just use it to mix the dough and give me my first rise.

 

[erthymom2]

"I made pesto bread with parmesan and cheddar cheese last night.....now if that doesn't sound good I don't know what does

"

YUMMY........It sounds really good - would you share here the receipe.
I am always "up" for trying new things in my bread makers.

 

[HennysMom]

hmm.. well - we dont go out to dinner - as everything is just too far away LOL! Even McD's is 13 miles one way - and its not good for you anyways *shrugs*.

Entertainment: We have a Wii we got for Xmas - takes care of bowling and golf IMO LOL. Movies - we use Netflix because we dont go to movies. Chickens are free entertainment too

Utilities/etc: Our TV is DISH and its the only thing we have out here in the boonies (only satellite - no cable). Phone is only Verizon (no other provider in our area) as are cells. Need to have landlines as our cells are sporadic at best at home (stand on one leg turn to the left sort of thing

). To get rid of the home phone wouldnt work and would cause our DISH to go up $15.00, we pay $57.00 for home phone unlimited calling - everyone I know is long distance, so its worth it to keep the home phone.

I buy on sale - use coupons and try to wait for Buy One Get One Free deals to use the best coupons.

I buy all clothes on clearance - as many times I can get these cheaper this way new than I can at a Thrift Store - and shipped for free so no spending gas money there.

I dont go anywhere so - again, no gas money there - unless its to the grocery store, but thats usually once a week and I try to have hubby catch it on his way home from work since he goes right by it on his way here.

All compact flurecents in the house, including spot lights - so the entire house runs on those - BIG energy savers. We put 2 20 oz. deerpark water bottles in the toilet tank to help save water; use low flow shower head as well. I dry the clothes outside when it gets warmer - otherwise, I try to limit laundry to twice a week and reuse towels (assigned to each person) - as well as everyone can wear their jeans/slacks more than once if not dirty.

Chickens get scraps and their regular feed - they cost us about $25.00 a month (grit, feed, oyster, goodies and heat) - so nothing there to cut back on - I think thats pretty cheap for 6 birds.

Will be learning to can this year - so I'm excited to do that!

 

[BrahmaMama]

We have cut our dining out, by quite a bit, and have been eating healthier meals at home. Another big thing, was our Mountain Dew-my husband and I went through a case every few days

After our whole family got the flu, it never tasted the same for him, and without him drinking it, it gave me the motivation to cut it. With being pregnant, it's definitely for the better, the only thing is, I'm now drinking Iced Tea-but I had picked up the kind with caffeine. So the decaf will be on my next list

When light bulbs burn out, we change them over to the clf bulbs, as long as they are on hand, lol!

We have a corn stove, that heats quite a bit of our house. We still have our regular furnace (propane), and another, smaller furnace that was put in when Gabe's addition was added, but they do not run near as much as they would normally.

The big thing we just did, was call our internet provider/Directv company, and have them put us on an extended "vacation." We are in a contract, so we can't cancel, but we are having both (

) shut off starting February 1st) So I just wandered my way back to BYC, and I'm leaving again.

It's going to save us $124 a month though, and we can use all we can get right now. I'll still be able to get online over at the in-laws house though, so not all is lost. And we'll be getting back online in 6 months. It's actually free to shut the internet off for that time, but it costs $9.99 for Directv...not as bad as $124 a month I guess.

My husband also went down to Verizon, and shut off our spare (home) cell phone-we don't have landline, so just had an extra line to keep at home, for when someone was over with the boys, and we were gone, etc. Most everyone now has their own cell phone, and it saved us $30, between that phone, and going down on minutes, since everyone we talk to is also on Verizon.

Our tax return will pay off two credit cards, and that just leaves two more for us to work towards paying off-what has been our big issue of debt lately. I'm sad about the internet, but it feels good to have it seem like we are seeing the light at the end of the debt fog tunnel

Oh yeah, definitely planning on doing the gardening, and canning this year-even though I'm probably going to be fat and uncomfortable by then, lol! We are still working on our applesauce, and peach jam from my last canning session.