Budgeting

I love giving gifts.  There are a lot of things that are hard to do on a budget, and buying gifts is is one of them. I wanted to share a few things I’ve learned with you today so that giving wedding, birthday, and shower gifts doesn’t break the bank for you. I’m hoping to start a series that will will give tips on how to do the inevitable things on life on a budget. There are some things that human…

This past week I bought 10 pounds of strawberries. My purpose? DIY jam!  Some people get scared of making their own jam because they imagine standing over a huge pot, pulling jars out and waiting for the *pop* that tells you that your jars are officially sealed. Today I want to share with you one of life’s greatest secrets: freezer jam. My mother-in-law introduced me to freezer jam a few years ago (thanks, Lea!) and it has honestly been one…

Last weekend we said goodbye to our home of 4 (5 for me) years, packed up our stuff, and brought it to our new home. (Click here to read about our decision to move)  Seems simple, right? Well… We had our share of adventures on that day, and I want to share a few of them with you, along with a few thoughts about our new pad. First of all, renting a moving truck was not as easy as it…

It’s official – we’re moving.  We have been working towards paying off our debt (officially) for about 2 years, but we’ve felt that we don’t have enough traction, and that our expected debt pay-off would be 4 or so more years. That wasn’t good enough for us. We want to be out of debt NOW.  So, we decided that we’ll move to another city 20 minutes away, which is closer to Fred’s work and offers us a place that is…

If you are trying to live a frugal life, dating can be the worst. Especially when you’re married and want to keep the magic alive, it’s hard to have a limited amount of funds to spend with your sweetie. I’ve (recently) taken this as another chance to get creative and find ways to save money and still have fun. Before I share some of our date night ideas, I will admit that Fred and I are still working on this.…

Rain is inevitable. For those of us in the Pacific Northwest, we know this all too well. However, today I’m not talking about weather, I’m talking about life. In life, there will eventually be some kind of “rain” (rough patch, emergency, whatever you want to call it). The older generation talks about having a “rainy day fund” for such occasions and most people would call this an “emergency fund.” As advised by Dave Ramsey, we personally keep $1,000 in the bank…