Weekend Update

Freezer

As you may recall back in June we donated our upright freezer to a local charity for their summer feeding program. At the time they were asking for a freezer, our freezer had been mostly empty for a few months because of the price of food and I was struggling to keep it full and knew in my heart that it would serve a better purpose with them. 

Fast forward eight months and things have eased up here a bit financially, we have found several free sources of food and there have been several times that I've had to take the ice cube trays out of the small freezer on top of our refrigerator just to hold the bargains I had found that day. After doing without ice cubes at least twice in the last month, I decided to take the plunge and buy a small freezer just for the overflow. So yesterday we went to Lowe's and found one for $159 and it will be delivered today. I already have plans to put it to good use. 

Snow in the Forecast

The weatherman is calling for snow here this week. I have a little bit of rock salt on hand, but did pick up some ice melt while I was at Lowe's yesterday. If it does storm, I hope we do not lose electricity. That is one of the reasons I wanted to donate our large freezer. I had lost a lot of food at least three times for power loss in the last few years, and I was tired of it. The new freezer is much smaller and the if it happens again, the lose won't be as hard to take. 

Anyway, the snow is forecast for Monday through Wednesday. I am really hoping we don't get any snow. We have Monday & Tuesday off for Winter Break and then I am scheduled to work Wednesday through Friday. Any snow will put a kink in my plans as everything stops when it snows in the south. 

Valentine's Day

According to Len Penzo, $17,000,000,000 was the amount of money spent on Valentine's day in 2014. Now that is a lot of money! On Thursday, I saw all sorts of Valentine's Day gifts being delivered to students at school. I even saw two students receive one dozen long stemmed roses in the white boxes. As I recall, those are very expensive. 

Total spent on Valentine's day at the Frugal Workshop: $0

Life Lesson

One of the lessons my daughter has learned growing up is that money does not grow on trees. As a result, she is pretty frugal in her own right and has learned not to expect gifts on days like Valentine's Day and since she doesn't expect anything, she is not disappointed. 

She was with her friend shopping at Staples the other day and she was using a coupon for $1.12 off a purchase and her friend laughed at her for it. This is the same friend who overspends on things on a regular basis. I'm so glad that my daughter sees this at an early age because those lessons can be, for some people, painfully hard to learn and can sometimes take a lifetime to learn. 

Amy Dacyczyn always said that Americans need to spend less than they earn and by maintaining a consistent lifestyle, they will build the financial stability to withstand downturns while, it's likely, re-setting lifestyle expectations to what an income can support. 

Belinda

Live simply by not spending money you don't have.

© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011 - 2015.

No Power

Thursday evening a severe thunderstorm came through our area and as a result of the damage left behind we've had no electric power since seven o'clock Thursday evening. All three electric companies in this area have been working around the clock to repair the damage and restore power to everyone. Unfortunately, the damage was so widespread that it is taking a long time. According to one news source, there were over 900 damaged lines and poles to repair.

Right now we've been without power for almost forty hours, but still we have many things to be grateful for because I know it could have been worse. I'm grateful that I have been in "use it up" mode and we've have been eating out of our freezer for the last month. As a result, we did not have as much food in our freezers as we did when the tornadoes came through here last year in April of 2011 and we lost power for days.     

This time around we made the decision to not spend money on gas for the generator. Last year we did run the generator and the amount of money we spent on gas was astronomical and even then we suffered losses. This year we decided that the money spent on gas to run the generator would go to replace the groceries we've lost. Last year I was heartsick over what we lost, but this year I'm counting my blessings.

This time of year is especially hard to be without power because of the high temperatures we've been experiencing this summer. Thursday and Friday afternoons the temperature rose to well over 100 degrees, so you can imagine how unbearable the inside of our house was. 

The first night we took a bowl of ice and water and wet washcloths to keep cool.   We had the windows in the house open and the doors inside so we could take advantage of the cross ventilation. I have plans now to purchase a battery powered fan to have on hand in case of emergencies like this in the future. 

That's the update from here. I'll continue to make updates as to our progress on the cleanup. 

I hope everyone has an enjoyable weekend and stays safe. 

Belinda
© Belinda Richardson and Frugal Workshop, 2012.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”