Here's an example of the creative cooking- when an employer charges a GLH heroine with making a 'clear soup' for some dinner guests, and tells her she will have to figure out how to make it from what she can find in the icebox, young Joyce rummages through the icebox and pulls out some chicken bones, a small piece of boiled beef, a leftover lamb chop, a bowl of chicken gravy, a few lima beans, and a cup of mashed potatoes. She skims the grease from the gravy, cut the fat from the meat and put it all on to simmer. She finds a carrot or two and onion, which she dices and adds to the pot on the stove. Later she will add some diced celery and a couple of sprigs of parsley, simmer them briefly. Then she will skim the mixture and serve the nourishing broth to the guests.

When we were first married and incredibly poor, I am sure that my misspent college days when I read a batch of my room-mates Grace Livingston Hill books instead of studying as I should have been contributed toward some of my frugal adventures in the kitchen. We often had a cup of soup with our meal of beans, rice, and/or potatoes, and the soup would be made by saving the broth and liquid from any can of vegetables and from other cooking.

I have, for instance a recipe for spinach lasagna which calls for defrosting a package of frozen spinach, squeezing the liquid out. I always squeezed the liquid into a measuring cup and made a light 'cream' of spinach soup with the liquid and a white sauce, or a sauce for crepes.

For the dinner meal above, Joyce also makes a salad by scalding and skinning some tomatoes, setting them on ice to get firm, scooping out a small bit from the center, filling it with a bit of diced celery, nuts, and home-made mayonnaise, and setting this on a bed of lettuce.

For another meal, she stuffs the chilled tomatoes with chicken salad made from a few bits of leftover chicken in the ice-box, including the gizzard, her home-made mayonnaise, and a stalk of celery (saving the leaves for flavoring soup).

And then there's this:

Then she made a game of getting an interesting supper out of the odds and ends she had in her little tin box out the window, which she called her refrigerator. A stalk of celery, too tough to enjoy raw, nearly a cup of stewed tomatoes left over from yesterday, a lump of baked beans, the last of a can she had opened a week ago, a scrap of hamburg.
She put them all in her little tin saucepan, and watched over them carefully, till there came out a very tasty dish of soup- was it bean or beef? At any rate, it had a delicious flavor.
There was also a lettuce leaf, two leaves of spinach, one radish, and a half a tiny onion, besides the little white leaf top of the celery stalk. Minced fine they made a very attractive salad with the last cracker from the box and a tiny wedge of cheese. It was a good dinner and she really enjoyed it. And then as she nibbled at a single chocolate peppermint left over from some that had been passed around in the office that day, and now serving as desert, she got to thinking that she really ought to go out somewhere and get a brighter outlook on life.

Partners, by Grace Livingston Hill..

Make it a game.   Probably thanks to my reading of those silly, frivolous books in my college days, from the beginning of our marriage, at a time when we were sorely lacking in any spare cash (I looked for change on the sidewalk in order to do a load of laundry) I have imagined the grocery store as one giant board game, and the object of the game on my part is to keep as much money as I can, or make the most of the funds I have, while the object of my opponents is to get me to spend more of my money with less to show for it.

When cooking, I made a game of using as much as I could as wisely as I could, using the last shred of celery leaf, or putting a bit of milk in a bottle of seemingly empty salad dressing and shaking it up to mix into a bit of mayo or into a drier than it should be chicken salad.

These, and other reasons I have posted on before, are why it simply is incomprehensible to me when people read frugal blog posts here or elsewhere and make criticisms about somehow missing out on something  by frugal living.  Where is this special joy and blessing in waste?  In material things that have a lifespan far more limited than the pinch of debt?

In the biblical story in the gospel account of Luke, when Jesus miraculously took two fish and five small loaves of bread and turned them into enough food to feed five thousand people- even though he had created this bounty with a word and could do it again and all day long without cost- he instructed his disciples to 'gather the fragments.'

I love that story, and I find joy in gathering the fragments and putting together ways to bless my family and friends with them.   I like that part of my life is a treasure hunt for those fragments.

How do you make frugal living a joy and a pleasure? And if you don't- maybe it's time to start, because joy begins and ends not with what we have, but with who we are and an attitude that recognizes that the best things in life don't put you in debt.=)

You can read other posts about GLH books with similar domestic details at my regular blog:

Here
here
here
here
here
and here

Also here

here

and here

Grace Livingston Hill Books from Amazon

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The Senior Citizen discount has been a topic of conversation in our house from time to time.  Last year, Husband took on this eligibility, although not with the same enthusiasm as I!  Actually, Husband was rather adamant that he was not about to take such a discount.  Hale and hearty with a heart to work for many years to come, he does not see himself as a senior by any stretch of the imagination. (His almost white hair just offers “distinction.”)  Husband sees this discount as a benefit to those retired and perhaps facing decreased incomes.

I, on the other hand, see this Senior Citizen discount as a marketing tool and a way to encourage more shopping. A discount is a discount and if my graying hair and advancing years make me more  marketable, I’ll bite!  Of course being the frugal mother that I am, and perhaps to the disappointment to store owners, I will do so within my budget parameters.

Although a subject of  disagreement, Husband has no problem with my choosing to wear the title of Senior Citizen at the checkout counter.  So, if you see a smiling, somewhat frosted with gray hair woman shopping on Tuesdays, it just might be me!

Any fellow Senior Citizens out there?  What and where are your favorite Senior Citizen discounts?

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2. 12 Must-Have iPhone Apps for Serious Bargain Shoppers - Think this doesn't apply to the frugal?  My husband inherited an old iPhone that is no longer connected to a phone plan.  Instead, it works as an iPod with wireless capability and no monthly charges!
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• Tightwad Gazette - promoting deals and coupon match-ups for Metro Detroit area stores, along with online, deals, freebies, samples and money saving strategies.
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• The Family Saver - Helping families save on everyday items through coupons, matchups, steals & deals!

And here are two more new members that I'd like to highlight.  The first is full of helpful lists and beautiful photos:

Tightwad - a blog about being frugal, being green being a mom and just generally about stuff that interests me. It's for people who are smart, sassy and thrifty.

The second looks very helpful for those of us who want to make a little money for blogging.  Don't we all?

The Frugal Freelancer - Are you a freelance writer or photographer looking for upfront pay and residual earnings? Would you like to know how other freelancers' rate a particular site? What affiliate programs earn the most? How to monetize your blog or articles? Want to know how others are able to make ends meet on a freelancers salary? Then you have to check out The Frugal Freelancer!

What new frugal blogs have you discovered lately?

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Her collection began years ago when she was quite a small thing- she fell in love with a particular Christmas Angel at a home party of some sort (I think she was about 7 years old).  It came in a diaphanous green gown layered like so many petals, and there were some plastic pearls around it. It wasn't chic or significantly well crafted, but green was her favorite color, and the shimmering mermaid-like greens in that dress were very pretty.  So we bought it for her for her birthday, which falls near Christmas.

When the Equuschick was about 8 or 9 years old Jenny and The Cherub joined the family, just before Christmas.  Sometime after that (I no longer remember exactly when), Jenny, who was always interested in clothes and how they were made, attempted to undress that angel figurine, and when she couldn't, she got a pair of scissors and cut the clothes off.  Things are always easier to take apart than to put together, yes?

She left the pieces on the floor next to the Equuschick's bed and hid.  So the Equuschick awoke to see the remains of her favorite physical possession that wasn't a book scattered on the floor like so many dead leaves.  Jenny was just old enough to realize she'd been naughty after the fact, but not quite old enough to realize it <span style="font-style:italic;">before</span> she started and couldn't fix it again.  She was also so young that she does not remember it (Jenny doesn't remember much of her childhood before ten, though).  However, the Equuschick has long remembered- she has forgiven, but she really cherished that doll.

And that is how the Equuschick's collection began- we have been trying to make it up to her ever since. I have looked and looked for one in a diaphanous green, shimmering dress of petaled layers ever since, and I have never found one.

However,  I have finished with buying Christmas Angels (Christmas Fairies, I think they are in England) for the Equuschick, and I suspect she might be through with adding to her collection.

Last week at a yard sale across the street from the park where we took the Dread Pirate Grasshopper and the FYB, a yard sale I almost did not go to because it was miserably hot and humid out, I found the <span style="font-style:italic;">exact same</span> angel figurine as the one Jenny had cut the clothes off of all those many years ago.  It was only a dollar, and I was so excited I took it out of the box (yes, it was still in the box) and showed it to the Equuschick there on the spot, even though she cannot have it until Christmas.

So much delight, and all for only a dollar.  This is a joy that I cannot describe to those who are not happily frugal. It is the thrill of the successful hunt, the fruition of years of looking, it is the joy of bagging two birds with one stone (the lovely angel lost so many years ago, a frugal purchase), and the glee of something long lost now found).

And yes, the fact that it was finally found for a dollar only heightens the delight, it's a thrill.  It's like a bird-watcher finding a bird long missing from his list.  It's like a gardener finally managing to get a finicky plant to bloom.  It's like a baker mastering a complicated souffle that has never worked for him before.

I am Keats, first looking into Chapman's Homer.  I am Cortez, silent on a peak in Darien.

I get a lot of joy and delight from these frugal finds, from this frugal lifestyle.  And I submit that a certain way of thinking is required for deep satisfaction in frugalities- a creative and imaginative approach to the frugal life adds zest and patience is required as well. Developing and honing these qualities does not just benefit your pocket book, either.  When money is not required to bring you joy,  when saving money is not seen as a burden but a blessing, life can bring a hundred new little pleasures every day.

Actually, life doesn't bring them, God does, but He does ask that we open our eyes.  Frugality is a way of opening your eyes.

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Early morning light previously enjoyed, now seemed to accentuate all that needed to be accomplished. Little did I know four years ago when moving in, my plans for this area still would not have found success.

Walls could use fresh paint, carpet now even more worn, dressers in need of some repair. My enthusiasm for this day was waning. Mind began to race as I contemplated a myriad of decorating ideas. Reality soon surfaced, however, as I remembered no budget for these projects and other priorities reigned.

Choosing to recall how grateful I had been that old quilt had matched curtains already here, rugs made to cover carpet spots still worked well and lovely pictures of precious family graced my walls, I made no allowance for this temptation. Having a budget helps to keep my emotions in check. No longer being ruled by feelings that so easily change from day to day, living with a plan keeps me from being ruled by momentary desires. Some day this room would get a chance to sparkle anew, but it was not to be for now.

Smiling, I chose to delight in fresh air blowing curtains with gusto. Reminding myself this room had comfortably housed many a guest and served my family well, I found victory! No more temptation for me. (At least for today!)

How do you wrestle with such temptations?

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One day last week I surprised my daughter with a trip to the mall so she could run around the children’s play area. All of a sudden, I saw lots of stuff that I didn’t even realize I needed until I saw them on sale. Especially sales for children’s clothes.

These are the stores I have been to in the last 30 days:
1. Thrift shop, once, because the Boy and the Husband needed new slacks and the FYG needed new shoes. The guys found pants, our daughter didn't find the shoes.
2. Grocery Store with a department store (not a Wal-mart, but similar to that or a Target, just a local version)- we bought needed groceries and I bought my daughter the shoes.
3. A drug-store because my 12 year old cut a pretty deep gash in his thumb with a friend's hunting knife, and we were out of bandaids and peroxide. We stopped at a drugstore instead of a grocery store, because that was on our way home, and a grocery store was pretty far out of our way.
4. I did buy something online, a math textbook for the 14 year old. I used Amazon Affiliate links and Swagbucks purchased Amazon gift certificates to buy it.

I didn't set foot inside a mall, coffee shop, restaurant, bookstore, or any other place to spend money. I didn't go anywhere where you have to pay an entrance fee to get in, not that there's anything wrong with that, it's just those things are not the only or even the best way to have a good time.  I had a good time anyway.

Here are some things I did instead:
Went to church
Taught a lady's Bible class.
Went to visit a friend
Went to a big family volleyball tournament and watched my husband, son-in-law, two youngest children and several friends play volleyball all day while I sat in the shade and visited with my eldest daughter and friends.
Cooked with the kids
Cooked with the kids again, and again.
Had friends over for dinner (lots of times)
Went to three different libraries (this is fun for me) on three different days, one of them all by myself, and picked up four excellent old books for free at one of them.
Took the kids and kidlets to the park- an old fashioned park in an old fashioned town where I used to come to visit my great-grandmother and my late uncle and one of the slides and the merry go round spinning thingy are the same exact ones I played on forty years ago. That connection and continuity is so funny to me because I am 48 years old and the longest time I have ever lived in one state is nine years, and I was 17 when we left that state. I haven't lived in a single house longer than five years since I was 8 years old- but here I am in a place where the family connections and roots go back nearly two centuries. Weird.
Took the kids and kidlets joy-riding in the golf cart. Sang at the top of my lungs while doing so. Drove it along the grassy verge near enough to a highway that we could wave and be waved at. Yes, we live in the country and I love it.
Took the kids and kidlets to a free movie in town (our theater shows a free kids' movie once a week all summer long. We saw Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs). Did not buy popcorn, candy, or 'even soda,' which shocked my young foster/godsons, but they had a grand time anyway. It was a truly free movie.
Read books.
Watched a movie at home on my laptop with my two youngest children.
Read aloud to the youngest two and my two foster/godsons, who live with us Saturday night through Wednesday night.
Admired my flowers- they fill my soul with a rich sense of quiet joy.
Spent precious time with different members of my family who fill me with even more joy.
Played a couple of word games.
Tried out a few new recipes.
Started a rearranging project in my bedroom.
Ate cherry tomatoes fresh from my garden
Played with my grandson
Organized my freezers
taught a child pig latin

I know there are other things- this is just off the top of my head in five minutes at 2 in the morning. Why 2? Well, besides being a procrastinating night owl, one of the other things I did this month, this week, in fact, is have a tooth out and it's keeping me up.

The point is- look at that long list of fun stuff- most of it was free. Some of it required some extra gas or groceries, but mostly I tried using what I had in my hand for the cooking.

So how did I save 100%?  All those things I did not buy because I wasn't at the store to see them and discover suddenly that I needed them- I saved 100% on them.    Instead of investing money in junk, I invested time in people, in relationships, and in my mind (the book-reading).

It's a much better return for the money, as the resulting joy is longer lasting, deeper, and more meaningful than the superficial pleasure over a new dress (that's going to go out of style), a fancy restaurant meal (that you will flush a day later and it will look just like every other meal you've flushed), or a nifty gew-gaw for the home that you will have to dust and shift for years (it would be less embarrassing for both of us if you didn't ask how I know that).

Save your money.  Stay out of the stores and go do something simple, free,  and fun with your family.

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No matter how many coupons I cut or deals I found, my real estate taxes and car insurance were so high in my area that they kept me from making the much desired headway.  Yes, it was a bit defeating, but it also helped me  recognize that some circumstances are beyond my control and I would need to be more patient in my quest to be debt free.

Flash forward years later, and now I do live in a more economical area.  My real estate taxes and car insurance are much more reasonable.  Although not the main reasons for our move, these facts have contributed greatly to our ability to live within our means. In thinking about this change in our lives, I was wondering where might some of the most economical places to live be?

With this question, I am assuming that having a job, of course, would be first priority. When we moved, a job had already been procured.  Husband and I would then set the following priorities:

Living close to our married children, in order to continue our multigenerational vision and build into the lives of their children.

Like-minded church fellowship.  Worshipping with others with similar convictions and lifestyles is very important to our family

Economical housing.  We chose to live in a doublewide mobile home in order to make a debt free purchase.

Musing on these things, I’ve been wondering where others think the best place to relocate would be according to their priorities.  Where would you go given the opportunity, and why?

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Gleaning- this time of year you may find wild berry bushes which are free for the picking (huckleberry, elderberry, blackberry, red raspberry, cloudberry, and currants are a few we've picked wild in different places) or fruit trees whose owners no longer eat the fruit. When you see a fruit tree dropping its fruit to the ground to rot, be brave, knock on a door, and ask if you can pick any of the fruit that is falling off the tree in the front yard. You may be doing somebody a favor. The first time we tried this, it was somebody we knew- our girls' piano teacher had an apple tree in the front yard and the driveway was covered in fallen apples. We asked if we could pick up the windfalls to feed our chickens. She said we could have those, and pick the apples in the trees as well. We've found apples good enough to eat on the ground and used them for apple sauce, apple butter, and apple crisp. We've picked pears this way as well. We've also composted fruit that was too far gone to eat. If you know somebody with pigs or chickens, maybe you could trade fruit you've gleaned for pork or eggs. Often when the fruit is on the ground it's because the owners have grown too old to pick their fruit and their family members live too far, or are not interested. They might just be thrilled to have you clear up the fruit and use it.

One important aspect of health is having a variety in the diet. Eat seasonal foods (that link is for the Western Hemisphere, and mostly the States), and watch sales. To do this, you need your family not to put limits on what they will eat. One thing we did to encourage our children to see new foods as an adventure and a treat was to reward them from time to time with a treat from the grocery store- but rather than the treat being a package of cookies or a ride on the mechanical pony, I would buy a single fruit that we'd never tried before. As any economist will tell you, scarcity increases value, and when 9 people are dicing up and sharing one starfruit, that makes the starfruit seem very precious, even mysterious and exotic. Our single starfruit, 3 kiwi split 9 ways, or the 2 pomegranates divided amongst 9 of us made our treat all the more intimate and special. These seemingly small treats have brought us an abundance of joy, delight, family fun, and laughter- so much so that I feel sorry for those who would look down their noses at such small pleasures. They have no idea what a precious joy it is to bring home a single Asian Pear, cut it up carefully, sit down together and each eat our bite, carefully savoring every molecule while sharing the experience with those we love.

I watch sales and have a target price for most fruits and vegetables. I don't pay more than .99 a pound for grapes, for instance. This means last year we never bought a single grape. We ate other fruits. I thought I would have to raise the target prices this year, but this month grapes are on sale for .99 a pound and we are gorging.

Watch for sales, stock your pantry and freezer with things on sale, and when you grocery shop try to replenish the pantry with sale items rather than shop just for what you feel like this week. Our family prefers butter to margarine, for both taste and health reasons. Butter is, of course, vastly more expensive than margarine, and we are very blessed to be at a place in our lives when we can afford it. For years we could not, and I bought margarine because that was all we could afford. I can afford it now, but even now, I can afford it not just because we make more money now than we did ten years ago, but because I buy butter on sale and from places like Aldi or Save-A-Lot, and this way I don't pay over 2.00 a pound. Butter keeps in the freezer very well.

If you do a lot of baking from scratch, have a large family, wish you could afford some organic foods, or have other special dietary needs, consider joining a buying club or food co-op. Some people think these are a lot of work, but really, it depends on the co-op or buying club. Mine is easy (for me, not for our coordinator). I order online once a month, and on the day the truck delivers I take a couple Progeny and meet the other members of the co-op at the friend's house who runs our co-op. We help unload the truck. I pay for my order when I pick it up. Ours requires no dues and has no surcharges. There are two other co-ops I know of in our vicinity that charge dues and require a surcharge as well as a commitment to put in a certain amount of time taking care of co-op jobs. Ours is very low-key.
The catalogs and ordering can be confusing. It will really help to get a friend to help you work through it the first couple of times. Things I find particularly frugal to order from a co-op:
Organic oats and other grains- cheaper than at the grocery store by far
Organic spices, also cheaper than at the grocery store
Frozen organic fruits and vegetables- not always, but periodically they are on sale and then I buy a case. Not cheaper than the grocery store, but ever so much more delicious.
Organic whole coffee beans- I know, so not a necessity, but we really prefer our coffee freshly ground in our own kitchen, and I have found that when I watch for sales, I get these even less than conventionally grown at the grocery store
Essential oils- usually a couple dollars less than any local resource, and I watch for sales.
Legumes- I buy 20-40 pounds of dried beans at a time. beans keep well and I use lentils for sprouts as well as for lentil soups, stews, and casseroles.
Tofu- it depends on where you live whether this is cheaper through a co-op or not. For me, it's nearly half the cost through the co-op as it is at my grocery store.

Here are some websites that might help you get started:
There are some co-ops listed here.
This co-op directory service is impressive. It also has information explaining what a co-op or buying club is and how you could start one yourself.
United Warehouse will put you touch with buying clubs in your area.
More resources and information here.

If, unlike us, you don't think your family can use 50 pounds of organic oats and 20 pounds of organic coffee beans within a couple of months, at best, you can talk to friends and share an order.

Here are some other sources for healthy food options, although these are not usually affordable for those living from paycheck to paycheck:
Local Harvest- find farms, CSAs, and more in your area.
Eat Well Guide: plug in your zip code and find local farms, farmer's markets, grocery stores, CSA programs and more
Eat Wild has links to sources for grass fed and organic meat, eggs, and dairy products.

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