Keep on Saving

Keep on keeping on - One year gluten free

2013-03-24T13:10:00.000-07:00

Wow, it seems so long since I have posted here. Since going gluten and dairy free, boosting our nutrition and trying to create a safer home environment, I've had to make some changes in the way that I shop for things and what I shop for. Gone are the days I can just go to the grocery store and pick up whatever I want whenever I want.

Yes, I am still couponing and I subscribe to the Sunday paper so I can have my coupons delivered to my door. I clip and file them in a 5 x 7 binder that fits easily into a shopping cart and I still try to plan my shopping around sales and consult with some of my favorite websites such as moneysavingmom.com, couponmom.com and stockpiling moms (which is also a bit of a gluten free blog too). I am finding, however, that I am not clipping nearly as many coupons as I used to as I am buying less from grocery and drug stores and I move around more from Trader Joes, GFS, Aldi, Marianos and mail order places such as Vitacost and Melaleuca. In other words I only buy certain things from certain stores. I am so loving Marianos, a new grocer in the Chicago area that has more gluten free and health foods than stores like Jewel and Dominicks. There is one by my work and also near my mom's house. I hope they make one closer to my house.

When my son went gluten free a year ago, it pretty much turned our life upside down. I went to Whole Foods (aka whole paycheck) and bought 2 bags of groceries and spent $100. Yep, that was dumb. I joined my son in the GFCF world last summer after getting the blood test done and finding that I had 28 food sensitivities myself. I have also developed environmental sensitivities over the past couple of years and I cannot walk through the detergent aisle of a grocery store without my eyes and nose pitching a fit.

With an autistic kid and my own emerging allergies, I thought it was best to go green and lighten the toxic load, at least in our home environment. A couple of months ago I joined Melaleuca - the Wellness Company to buy supplements, toiletries and safer products for my home and body. I'm so happy I did. I am feeling a hundred times better, eat healthier, don't have a 2:00 crash and I have lost nearly 40 pounds since going gluten free. Melaleuca is a manufacturer of top quality green (and mostly gluten-free) products and is only available to customers who have been referred by other customers. If you would like an invite, please drop me a line at katdaddy5 (at) gmail dotcom and put mela in the subject line and leave a phone number and good time to call and I will give you the skinny. Membership is only $1 until March 31, 2013 so hurry.

So although going on the gluten free casein free diet has been limiting, it has also been liberating. I used to feel awful and trapped in a body I hated. I know just what I can have and when I'm feeling ambitious, I kick the GF/CF diet up a notch to Body Ecology, which is really healthy. Social events revolving around food are still a bit awkward, but as long as there is meat, veggies or salad around, I make the best of it. I see my son recovering in ways I never would have imagined before attending the AutismOne conference last year and although skeptical at first, I'm glad I've made the choice to become the groovy earth mom I was always meant to be.

When it rains, it pours (right through the roof!)

2012-05-19T16:39:00.001-07:00

Murphy strikes again. Just when I thought I was gaining traction with my debt reduction plan, sh*t happens. The car went kaput, water comes pouring through the roof, and I have to get my kid from an out of state college weeks before I expected. The emergency fund is pretty much gone now and I will have to rebuild it some way, some how. Wish me luck.

Going Gluten Free

2012-04-16T04:43:00.000-07:00

Well, we got the news back a couple of weeks ago, my son has all kinds of food sensitivities. He is also autistic so we put him on the gluten free casein free diet (aka GFCF diet or the autism diet).

Roughly half the kids on the spectrum have GI problems where they cannot break down the proteins in wheat and milk, gluten and casein and it affects their brain and behavior. Anyway, we had bloodwork done and it confirmed that he was allergic to gluten, eggs, wheat, bananas, cows milk, cheese, yogurt, and swordfish. I'm not too worried about the swordfish as we would never eat that in a million years, yuck! But the rest is a major drag, especially the eggs and bananas.

The doctor referred us to a nutritionist who we met with and she was wonderful and gave us some pointers. She recommended a local market and Trader Joes. I loved Trader Joes but it is kind of far for us. This weekend I went to Whole Foods, and boy was that a mistake. Whole Foods is awful, in fact I would put them in the sucks the big green weenie category. It was laid out like a maze and took forever to get through it, the aisles are too narrow, and they are not coupon friendly. I even was charged twice for an item because a coupon did not scan. The lady behind me left the checkout lane in a huff because I gave the checker a bunch of coupons. Actually, I wouldn't even call it a bunch, only $12.50 worth, which is nothing for me. I spent close to $100 for two bags of groceries!!!

Un-freaking believable!

It wasn't like I bought a whole weeks worth of groceries. I bought stuff at Aldi on Saturday. I just shopped the sales at Whole Foods and tried to match with coupons. I bought a 3 lb pkg of grass fed ground beef, 8 Gluten Free Pantry mixes (on sale), some mangoes, organic peanut butter, GF frozen waffles, 2 frozen entrees, cereal, dream bites, and a few other Gluten free, dairy free or organic pantry staples. Two paper bags of stuff. Needless to say, I am not going back there unless I really need something I can't find elsewhere. I simply did not like the place, the prices or the people there, although there was one young girl working there who was helpful and tried to find some Dairyfree for me. I think she was new or it was a fluke. They did not have it and she recommended I go to the health food store up the street.

In better gluten free news, I baked my first loaf of Gluten free bread. Actually, it was the first time I have ever made bread. It was quite tasty and moist. My son said it was much better than Udi's or stuff from the store. I will need to do it more often. Here is the video from Pamela, who makes the mix I used. I only wish I had watched this first. I think if I used warmer water it would have been fluffier.

You are invited: Watch my Autism Speaks video message

2012-04-04T17:56:00.001-07:00

You are invited: Watch my Autism Speaks video message

My son is autistic and so I walk to raise funds for Autism Speaks. This will be our 5th year. Please help.

I recently put my son on the gluten free casein free diet and boy is that busting up my budget. I may post recipes up occasionally as I find stuff. He actually liked the pizza I made yesterday with GF Bisquick and soy cheese. So many autism moms claim a tremendous improvement in their kids with this diet and so I'm trying it. Wish me luck.

Oh, and contribute to my autism walk page too if you can. I'd really appreciate that.

Spring break

2012-03-18T12:56:00.002-07:00

My daughter came home for a week for spring break. She goes to an out of state college and I miss her so much when she's gone. She caught her bus from Union Station this morning and is on her long ride to college. We did a little shopping at Walmart because she needs some camping stuff for next semester's class that includes a camping trip to Minnesota. She's so excited. I don't go to Walmart very much but they are supposed to be good for that sort of stuff so that's where we went. She also needed some clothing that wasn't cotton so she bought some wicking shirts and socks there.

I had my coupon book with me and let her get some toiletries. The deal there was a Schick hydro silk razor with free shaving gel for $5.97 that I had a $4.00 off coupon, bringing the price down to $1.97 for a 5-blade razor and goo. When we got home we got a nice surprise. Inside the package was another $4.00 off coupon for refills and one for $.55 for Skintimate shave gel. Not bad. We only bought one so go grab them while they're hot.

I went to Walgreens yesterday to pick up some things. Saturday is the last day of their sales cycle and I have found that my neighborhood store really sucks on Saturdays because the shelf tags are all screwed up. What is on sale is not marked and what is going on sale may just be marked. It was pretty confusing. Luckily I had paid a visit to couponmom.com before going so I had a notion as to what was a good deal. I knew there was a BOGO sale on Dial bar soap and Scotchbrite sponges I wanted to take advantage of and had coupons for. These are also the preferred brands in my house so when I can save 50% or more on the brands we like, I try to take advantage of the sale. I also saw I had a $3 off vitamin coupon that was expiring soon so I thought I'd pick up some for my daughter. That was something I could take or leave it. Even before I got into the coupon craze, I would never pay full price for vitamins because they are almost always on sale. Same with makeup. Buy one get one half off sales at least once a month.

While I was at Walgreens approaching the checkout, I saw that store brand batteries were marked BOGO so I picked up a couple of packs. I also saw a coupon in their March book so ripped it out. I was also Jonesing for some mint Milanos which were supposed to be on sale, but they were out of them. I did get a decent deal on hair color on sale for $4.99 and a $3 coupon and also saved a bit on Splenda, Progresso, Glad kitchen bags and No nonsense hose with their sales and/or in-ad coupons. For the Splenda, garbage bags and soup, I also had manufacturers coupons.

Checkout was a disaster. Three bottles of vitamins had to go back. For some reason the Nature made sale was only for certain ones and the shelf tags were off. The $5 centrum specialty vitamin coupon did not include the vision formula that I picked up because it was on closeout. The batteries were not on sale until the next day and the $3 coupon required a 24 pack for AA not an I pack like for the 9V. An easy misread. There was a list of batteries and I just skimmed the coupon and the last thing it said was 8 pack...but apparently that was only one kind of battery. I tell ya, they get you coming and going. I almost fainted when the amount was approaching $100, but then the coupons came and things started going back. I ended up spending a little under $40, which is what I expected.

I am sure the checker was annoyed that I was putting these items back, but he was pretty cool. I told him that if it doesn't work, I don't buy. The way I am working my program, is that the coupon has to work and the item needs to be on sale, and I don't mean a nickel off either. Now that my per trip savings are getting up to around 50% and up, I want it to stay that way, and the way to the bigger savings is to match the coupons with the sales and buy things before you need them. Why pay over $10 for detergent or garbage bags? Those are a couple of items that I won't buy from Aldi because their brand for those particular items is crap. Get quality items when they go on sale and add a coupon. Buy multiples if you have the money and space. (I sure wish I did.) Save the Aldi runs for canned goods, string cheese, snacks and bread. Knowing what to buy where is important. A penny saved is a penny earned, but a penny wasted is still a penny wasted.

I didn't go grocery shopping this weekend, just ran into Dominicks for bread, milk and Doritos to feed my Jones. Just that and I blew about $7 and saved 47%. Not too shabby. I would have paid roughly the same at Aldi and got lower quality. Real Doritos are my friend and I also love the $1.97 milk deal.

Coupon Queen

2012-03-05T04:47:00.000-08:00

Oh yes! Now I am a coupon queen. Getting there anyway. I went shopping this weekend after working on my mini coupon binder for a couple of weeks and it made a difference. With all the BOGO sales I sure did buy a lot of stuff though....

After getting a load of coupons from friends and buying extra papers, I had a lot of work to do, clipping, sorting and filing. My son helped me sort them this time. I made a PowerPoint deck with the number and categories as the title and products as bullet points and printed them as two on a page handouts. I laid these 8 sheets of paper across the foot of the bed and laid the coupons on top of each category so I had a stack on each before I started stuffing them into the binder.

I have 15 categories in my book and because the sheet protectors are wider than the dividers, I put numbered post-it flags at the top of each divider and also printed out and taped an index to the inside of the front cover so I can always see it whenever the binder is open. That is tremendously helpful.

My binder pages are the homemade 3-pocket and also 2 and 4 pocket. Martha Stewart introduced a new Avery product line at Staples and they have 5 x 8 mini-binder sheet protectors divided into 4 pockets. Awesome timing and I got a 20% discount because they had a coupon on this new line (that I had to chase around Chicago to find BTW) These 4-pocket sheet protectors are the perfect size for most coupons. Business card pages also hold tiny ones 4 to a page. I'll admit, it probably did cost a little bit more to set up a small binder vs a big one, but it is so much easier to handle while shopping... and having it really makes the difference between pulling out $5 worth or coupons or pulling $50 worth of coupons. How cool is that!!!

OK, I bet you're wondering how much I saved. At Food4Less I'm not quite sure because the receipt doesn't tell you.

At Dominicks, the receipt calculated 43% ($129.30)but with the catalinas for $10 + $3 next shopping trip, $5 off next purchase of frozen food and free milk, in addition to other coupons, I'm sure it is closer to 50%. I'm not quite a super couponer like Jill Cataldo yet, but I'm getting there. I was stocking up on groceries, not stockpiling BOGO body wash, so I did quite well actually. When you are stocked up and just buy the sales, that is when you get to 70% savings by matching coupons with sales and buying things before you need them. I did buy 3 Secret deodorants at Food4Less though. They were on sale for $1.98 and I had three $1 off coupons making them $0.98 each. That's how you do it, baby.

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Here's a good article on savings by Mary Hunt that is very spot on. I am not quite to baby step 3 yet and have debt to pay off first, but I think that Dave's baby emergency fund should have at least 1 month's expenses rather than $1,000, at least in my case being a single mom. I'm living lean and trying to both save and pay down debt. As long as nothing stupid happens, I will be out of debt (except the house) within a year.

Making a mini coupon binder

2012-02-16T17:51:00.000-08:00

Today I found a mini 2.5 inch thick binder that holds half sheets of paper and decided that since I am starting to outgrow my Couponizer already, I'd like to try to make a coupon binder out of this. So off to google I went searching for ideas on how to do this. I am not an extreme couponer and don't want to do baseball card sleeves in a full sized binder. I did find a good instructional video and here it is.

Happy Couponing!

Customer Satisfaction

2012-02-14T06:00:00.000-08:00

I went to Jewel this weekend to take advantage of some of their BOGO specials and to cash in my coupons from the game. Of course, I spent more than I wanted to. To punish myself for that I skipped the BOGO special on those yummy Diana Bananas that I love so much and haven't had in years.

I spent just over $100 and I had planned to spend $75. I took cash and a bunch of coupons in my handy dandy couponizer book. I got the donut and free jar of gravy from the game pieces and cheap cookies too. Some of the deals I got were Italian sausage, olive oil, fish oil, peanut butter, jelly, dishwashing thingys and soup. The one BOGO I thought I was getting was on pork chops. Turned out that the deal required an in-store coupon and there were none there. I called the store and talked to the manager and he said bring in the receipt and get a refund. That was nice. Got about $6 back.

I feel that now I am pretty stocked up for awhile on most things and even though I bought a couple things not on the list such as the fish oil (BOGO big bottles) and the Finish dishwashing tabs, which were on preferred card special in a buy 2 get one free bonus pack for $10.99 (just over a penny each with no coupon). I knew we would be needing these within a week or two anyway so I jumped on the deals. How much are dishwashing packs or pellets worth anyway. Seems like a small pack of cascade are about $7 or so.

BTW - I want to do a price book but don't know how to start. Can anyone direct me to one for Chicago stores such as Jewel, Dominicks, Aldi and Food 4 Less. Thanks!

Six at Sam's

2012-02-09T05:45:00.000-08:00

Yesterday we went to Sam's Club to buy a few items. These are things that we almost always buy there so I wanted to give you a glimpse of a typical Sam's run. Here are the items and prices:

2.5 lbs Eight o'clock Columbian Coffee $14.24
2 lbs Kraft Mexican Shredded Cheese $6.78
1 gal Skim Milk $2.39
1 bucket Cole Slaw $3.88
2 1.5 doz eggs $3.58
1 delicious rotisserie chicken $5.99

The bill came out to be $38.10 after tax this time and the coffee price has been stable for a few months, but the chicken went up $1.00 recently. We generally go to Sam's about twice a month. Other things we buy there are chewing gum, printer paper and big cans of pinto beans, my favorite flax seed tortilla chips and hamburger. Any other bargains to be found at Sam's? Let me know.

Going like a Gazelle!

2012-02-03T06:02:00.000-08:00

Right now I'm squeezing every penny to become debt free. In FPU we call that Gazelle Intensity. At the beginning of the year I had about $4,500 in credit card debt which was kicking my ass. I also have a mortgage which I pay an extra $40/month towards principal.

I have my baby emergency fund of $1000 and have reduced my 401k to free up cash... about $70/month. I am couponing and following sales more at the grocery stores, using envelopes and eating out much less. Yesterday my brother met me for lunch at work and he brought some pulled pork he made in the crockpot and a couple cans of soda. I bought two fries and it was lunch out for two for $3. Normally, we would go out and spend about $15 for lunch and go out once a week. He is now on medical leave, battling cancer and cooking more so this was a special treat.

For my turnaround since the beginning of the year the total is $1631... $1041 paid and $590 saved. Yes it is painful but I paid off the last $161 from Macy's (my winter coat and accessories) and about $600 is mortgage principal reduction. I still have over 25 years left so the principal is not going down very fast. When I added it up and saw $1631, I was amazed. Yes, I am still saving for college for my boy who is a high school senior and because I am pushing 50, I don't want to cut retirement savings completely. This does deviate slightly from the Ramsey plan, which is perfect when you are 30. I hope to be out of the credit card hole by next fall and am watching my accounts closely.

In other news, I caught an automatic charge to my checking account for $67 from Angie's list to automatically renew my subscription. No warning... just boom! Snatched it out of my bank. I saw red. I got on chat and had them reverse it. I subscribed a couple years ago for, I think, $30 because I was doing some work on the house. I don't like these automatic renewing things and will be more watchful in the future. BEWARE: You touch my money and you will be pimp-slapped on my blog!

Back to school at Dave Ramsey's FPU

2012-01-29T17:56:00.000-08:00

Well it's back to the Dave Ramsey plan for me. I think I really fell off the wagon when I moved my kid to an out of state college and attended back to back McCartney shows last summer. I broke open that credit card dam and now I feel like I flooded myself with debt. I had started listening to Dave Ramsey's show over the internet over the last couple of years and he is the personal finance guru I like the most. I had read The Total Money Makeover and started a debt snowball back in 2010 and somehow lost momentum.

I was on his website about a month ago and on a fluke checked where he was going to have his 13 week financial peace university classes and found that they were starting that weekend near my house so I contacted them and signed up... at about a 25% discount, of course. So far I have attended four weeks, sometime solo and sometimes with my guy. I am trying to do the budget and stay within certain limits such as $600 a month for groceries. I've dusted off my ynab program and am using envelopes for the first time ever. A month into the program and it's looking pretty good. I am on baby step 2, trying to pay off credit cards. I don't have a big income so finding that $260 a month to pay on those cards is hard. I just put them both on autopay to pay weekly, sending card 1 $50/week and card 2 $15/week. When the first one is paid off, the other will get paid $65/week and whatever else I can add to get it paid off faster. I am charged up and gazelle intense and ready to become debt free!

Dave Ramsey has an awesome 7 baby-step plans for getting out of debt and building wealth. I'm on #2, paying off consumer debt. Here are the baby steps. It is very important that they are done in order or at least be well into baby step 3 before doing the later ones, which can happen concurrently. The main thing is that you have credit cards, car loans and school loans out of the way to free up the money to invest.

Baby Step 1
$1,000 to start an Emergency Fund (check)

Baby Step 2
Pay off all debt using the Debt Snowball (working it)

Baby Step 3
3 to 6 months of expenses in savings (haven't started)

Baby Step 4
Invest 15% of household income into Roth IRAs and pre-tax retirement (cut 401k from 7% to 4%, I'm nearly 50 so didn't stop completely)

Baby Step 5
College funding for children (thank goodness for scholarships cuz I ain't there yet)

Baby Step 6
Pay off home early (ooooh, that would be sooo nice)

Baby Step 7
Build wealth and give! (Financial freedom!!)

I am really enjoying my 2 hour classes on Saturday mornings. There are about 8-10 couples and we watch Dave on video giving a class and then have a discussion period. It's sort of like being in a support group like weight watchers and it really does help when you have the others going through the program too. Dave has a solid program and is very entertaining. Listen to his show live on weekdays from 1-4 through daveramsey.com. I hope to someday be one of his callers on a Friday afternoon screaming, "I'm debt freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!""

Me underwater? No way BoA!

2011-10-22T15:30:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I called Bank of America to see whether it was worth my while to look at refinancing my current mortgage. I had refinanced a couple of years ago to a 5% mortgage and it seems like rates being advertised around have been around 4% for quite some time, but with closing costs and fees I wasn't sure it would be worth refinancing.

I was transferred to a guy and he said he would check it out. He put me on hold and said that my loan was more than my house was worth by about $6000 and 5% is a good rate and rates were actually more like 4.5% now. He also told me that if I refinanced my house and wanted to avoid a PMI payment, I would have to come up with $37,000 additional.... like another down payment to make my loan to value less than 80%! Un-freaking-believable!!

When I purchased my townhouse in 2002 I put down 15% and eliminated the PMI even before refinancing in mid 2009. I'm no idiot so I do know that home prices have gone down some, but there is no way this house is worth nearly $30,000 less than I paid for it nearly 10 years ago. My neighbors bought their unit a year or so ago for more than I paid, so I assumed we had a lost decade of real estate value and I'd just have to wait for the market to rebound in a couple of years. So much for rebounding.

Then I remembered that I had read or heard something about Bank of America and other big banks using their own appraisers who low-ball the appraisals and people weren't getting home loans. I think this is what is going on. Apparently, they purchased an appraisal company which they use exclusively and the BoA guy I talked to on the phone gave me a number almost instantly. After I was off the phone I checked Zillow and the value they had posted for my house was much more realistic (about $36,000 more than the estimate BoA had given me). That was a relief. I know I have very little, if any equity in my home at this point and will probably have to wait before selling or else I'll end up paying or short selling, which I certainly don't want to do.

I do like owning my own place and it would cost just as much to rent a 3 bedroom in my town or the northside of Chicago. As much as I don't want to spend another winter in Chicago, it looks like I'm going to have to. bbbrrrrrrrrrr

The Spending-Cut Myth

2011-08-04T05:32:00.000-07:00

Hot aired politicians have been blowing a lot of hot air recently about the debt ceiling. If they ran this country more like a business, or even a household for that matter, we would be in much better shape. Unfortunately, they spend like drunken congressmen trying to gain favors and votes. Budgeting is something that needs to be specific, not spineless like Robert Ringer's article says very well. Enjoy! ~kat

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by Robert Ringer

As we move toward a business-as-usual finish to the phony debt-ceiling drama that has been playing out in Washington, history will record that not one of the key participants in the debate ever got around to talking about specific, major spending cuts (other than defense spending). Isn’t that weird?

Everyone who was involved claims to be in agreement that the U.S. has to cut spending, but not one person in a leadership role has been willing to name a specific program or bureaucracy that should be completely eliminated. Even if Republicans had gotten their cut, cap, and balance proposal accepted, it wouldn’t have mattered, because “cut, cap, and balance” are nothing more than hollow words.

Cut and cap what? Which programs and agencies are you going to cut and cap, and by how much? In any event, the purported major cuts are always years down the road, while increasing the debt ceiling is immediate — meaning that out-of-control government spending continues on.

And, of course, balance simply guarantees American taxpayers that if Congress doesn’t make the necessary cuts — which it never does, and never will — their taxes will be raised in order to “balance the budget.” In fact, a cynic might say that balancing the budget is just a euphemism for raising taxes.

Again, back to my original point: No one in a leadership role wants to talk about making specific cuts. After all, when you cut a program or agency, you’re going to make the beneficiaries of that program or agency very angry. And since the main objective of the vast majority of Congresspersons is to get reelected, mad is bad. Thus, the reality is that cutting any program or government agency is unthinkable.

For example, as the debt-ceiling circus has worn on, I’ve repeatedly heard media pundits say things like, “What happens to the guy who’s planned a camping trip to Yellowstone National Park with his son, only to find that the park has been closed because Congress failed to raise the debt ceiling?” The answer you never hear is: He takes his son somewhere else!

I don’t know how much you and I pay to keep Yellowstone National Park operating, but I do know that neither I nor any of my family or immediate circle of friends has ever visited Yellowstone National Park, nor do any of us have any plans to do so.

That being the case, why are we required to pay for the guy who wants to take his son camping? Is he willing to pay for my family’s outing to an Orioles or Redskins game? The latter are operated by private corporations that charge customers enough to cover their overhead and, hopefully, make a profit. But government doesn’t have to worry about such mundane matters.

Just like all the other land it lays claim to, the United States government should sell Yellowstone National Park to a company like Disney or Universal Studios and use the proceeds to pay down the national debt. I’m talking about principal, not interest. Ditto all of the other national parks, which would cut billions from our bread-and-circus budget.

Speaking of Yellowstone National Park, what about the Department of the Interior? Do we really need it? On its website, it proudly states:

Our Mission: Protecting America’s Great Outdoors and Powering Our Future

Question: Why does a bankrupt nation need a bunch of bureaucrats to protect its “great outdoors?” The government is supposed to protect people and private property, not the “outdoors.” I won’t even comment on “powering our future,” since it has no discernable meaning.

Beneath the Department of the Interior’s mission statement are the words:

The U.S. Department of the Interior protects America’s natural resources and heritage, honors our cultures and tribal communities, and supplies the energy to power our future.

Again I ask, why does a bankrupt nation need a bunch of bureaucrats to protect its “natural resources and heritage?” And how in the world does the government protect our heritage anyway? Again, no discernable meaning.

“Honors our cultures and tribal communities?” Why does a bankrupt nation need to honor American cultures and tribal communities? Sounds like an interesting thing to do if you’re rich. But we aren’t. Psst … we’re broke!

Finally, “supplies the energy to power our future?” Government doesn’t know beans about supplying energy. In fact, it does everything within its power to prevent the U.S. from exploiting its energy resources.

A bankrupt nation that fails at everything it attempts to do should get out of the way so private industry can tap our natural resources, beginning with oil, natural gas, and coal deposits. The government has never produced a drop of oil, a cubic foot of natural gas, or a single chunk of coal — and never will.

Trees, of course, are a natural resource that present no problem whatsoever, because, thanks to capitalistic forestry corporations, we have more trees today than we had fifty years ago.

You can go right down the list of government agencies and draw the same conclusion: They should all be shut down!

Do we really need a National Labor Relations Board to prevent Boeing from creating 1,000 jobs in South Carolina?

Do we really need a Securities and Exchange Commission to give a guy like Bernie Madoff a stamp of approval for twenty-five years while he bilks gullible investors out of billions of dollars?

Do we really need an Environmental Protection Agency to stifle economic growth in America and create ever-increasing unemployment? Closing down the EPA not only would save billions of dollars a year in operating costs, but would explode the economy and send the DJIA soaring. Who knows, we might even be able to compete with China some day.

The same goes for the Department of Labor, the Commerce Department, Amtrak, the Department of Education, the Department of Energy, the Department of Health and Human Services (which runs 400 separate subsidy programs!) … the list is endless.

Message to the government: Stop protecting our resources, stop redistributing our hard-earned income, and start focusing on protecting, not violating the liberty of, the people you work for.

The truth is that, with few exceptions, no one — whether Democrat or Republican — will propose legislation to reduce, let alone close down, any of these government agencies. They will keep growing until their employees are paid in worthless dollars — or not paid at all. And there is a 100 percent certainty that when government employees don’t get paid, it will lead to protests … followed by “civil unrest” … followed by violence … followed by a government crackdown on civil liberties. Madison, Wisconsin was a prelude of things to come.

As everyone now knows, the government has plenty of money coming in each month to pay interest on the national debt, Social Security, Medicare, and our current military obligations (all of which total about 70 percent of current revenues). It’s the other 30 percent or so of “scheduled expenditures” that need to be “prioritized” — meaning that some of them have to be cut.

But when you ask a politician which ones he would cut, he unfailingly skirts the question. That’s why the debt ceiling will continue to be raised — again and again and again (seventy-five times since 1962!) — and the U.S. debt will continue to spin out of control until the only thing left of the U.S. economy is a (hopefully) thriving black market.

Russian historians can tell you all about the robustness of the black market when the government shuts down the free market. It’s the only thing that kept even more people from starving to death in the Soviet Union during the heyday of communism.

Of course, if you’re the adventuresome type, you’ve got to be excited thinking about what living in an anything-goes, runaway-inflation society might be like. Hint: Sieg Heil!

You have permission to reprint this article so long as you place the following wording at the end of the article:

Copyright © 2011 Robert Ringer
ROBERT RINGER is the author of three #1 bestsellers and host of the highly acclaimed Liberty Education Interview Series, which features interviews with top political, economic, and social leaders. Ringer has appeared on numerous national talk shows and has been the subject of feature articles in such major publications as Time, People, The Wall Street Journal, Fortune, Barron's, and The New York Times.

To sign up for his one-of-a-kind, pro-liberty e-letter, A Voice of Sanity, visit: www.robertringer.com

Making Your Own Homemade Oatmeal Packets: A Visual Guide and Cost Analysis

2011-07-30T07:58:00.000-07:00

by Trent Hamm - The Simple Dollar

The Basic Recipe
All you really need to make your own basic oatmeal packets at home are instant (ready to eat in one minute) oatmeal, salt, and sealable baggies to store them in – you might also want sugar or another sweetener if you wish to pre-sweeten the oatmeal.

Core ingredients
The procedure is really easy. Just add 1/4 of a cup of the oats and a pinch of salt (1/8 of a teaspoon if you must measure it) to each baggie. Out of that container there, you’d get about 48 bags. I also like to pre-add a bit of sugar to it – about 1/2 of a teaspoon. You can choose to add none at all or add another sweetener like Splenda at your own discretion.

These will result in basic oatmeal packets very similar to the “regular” oatmeal packets sold by Quaker Oats. If you like the basic oatmeal with no changes, this is a very cheap route to go – since you can re-use the baggies, the only recurring cost over a realistic timeframe is the oatmeal itself – a bag of sugar and a canister of salt will last you effectively forever with this recipe.

Flavoring It Up
Of course, I like to flavor it up.

On the left are the ingredients for cinnamon-raisin packets. On the right are ingredients for blueberries & cream packets – dried blueberries and fat-free non-dairy creamer. Why not powdered milk? It tends to potentially mold and have other bad effects if left in baggies for too long – Coffee Mate is an excellent substitute.

For my cinnamon-raisin packets, I just add about 1/4 of a teaspoon of cinnamon and about two dozen raisins to each bag. For the blueberry packets, I add a tablespoon of the creamer and about a dozen and a half blueberries. Perfect.

The nice part is you can basically make anything you want if you’re making your own packets. You can experiment as your heart desires – any dried fruit pieces, any seasonings you can find – anything. I’ve actually made batches of cranberry oatmeal using dried cranberries in the past – I love it, but it’s not something you see sold on store shelves.

Adding the ingredients yourself make for tastier packets. The pre-mixed packets that Quaker sells seem to use low-quality versions of the added ingredients. For example, the dried blueberries in this packet are way better than the blueberries used in the Quaker Oats packets, resulting in a much tastier blueberry oatmeal.

Storing the packets is easy, too. Just stuff the baggies into the oat canister. That’ll hold 80% of the baggies – just sit the rest next to them and eat those first. Problem solved.

I Like It Thicker
One thing I don’t like about the Quaker Oats packet in the stores is that the oatmeal is almost always too thin. Personally, I like thick oatmeal, the kind that reminds me of the stuff my great grandma used to make at her house.

Since you’re making your own baggies, you can make it nice and thick, too. All you have to do is puree some of the dry oatmeal in your handy-dandy blender.

Put in about a quarter of a cup at a time and put it on puree for about ten seconds. You end up with oatmeal powder.

Then, just add a tablespoon of this powder to each baggie to make it thicker. I actually add two tablespoons to each baggie – that makes it really, really thick – just how I like it!

I just dumped the baggie into the bowl (saving the baggie for reuse, of course), added about a quarter of a cup of skim milk, and microwaved it for about sixty seconds. Nice and thick and warm and delicious.

Cost Analysis
I wound up making 42 baggies with this batch. Normally, one would make 48 baggies out of a normal-sized canister of instant oatmeal, but I pureed enough of the oatmeal to make only 42.

15 of the baggies were blueberries and cream and 27 were cinnamon-raisin.

Unsurprisingly, there were a lot of ingredients left over:

I used all of the oatmeal and all of the blueberries, but I still had almost a full container of salt, an almost full container of cinnamon, an almost full container of sugar, a 2/3 full container of Coffee Mate, half a box of raisins, and 58 Glad baggies.

This means that if I were to make a second batch, I’d only need to replace the oatmeal and the blueberries. Since I can reuse the baggies and I have enough salt and sugar to last effectively forever, those are sunk startup costs – after that, you just need to replace oatmeal and the flavorings when you need to – and most of the flavorings will last for multiple batches.

Batch 1 – More Expensive
Of course, the first batch was a bit more expensive per packet than just buying the Quaker Oats packet. Here’s my receipt from Fareway for the stuff for 42 homemade packets:

The cost
The cost per homemade packet during the first run is $0.46 per packet. The cost would have been $0.43 per packet had I not ground up some of the packets to thicken some of the others. We’ll figure up costs for future runs in a minute.

What about the time cost? It took me about thirty minutes of mindless work to make these packets. I spent the entire time making them on the phone with my mother – I just conversed with her while my hands were busy with… well, busywork. Thus, I don’t consider the time sink to be significant.

How about the Quaker Oats packet? To control for location and store differences, I bought a box of packets at Fareway to compare the price:

A box of Quaker Oats packets?
The cost per packet for Quaker Oats is $0.30 per packet. Yep, the prepackaged ones are cheaper at first. But let’s keep looking.

Batch 2 and Future Batches – Less Expensive
The kicker with making your own packets is that they get cheaper on future runs. You don’t have to buy the sugar, the salt, or the baggies any more. Let’s say I made another identical batch to the one above – 42 packets. Using what I have on hand, I only have to repurchase the oats – $2.99 – and the blueberries – $3.29. The second homemade batch has a cost per packet of $0.15 – way cheaper than the prepared packets. In fact, averaging the two costs ends up with an average cost per homemade packet after two runs being almost identical to the cost of buying prepared packets – $0.30. If I had not ground up some of the oatmeal to make thicker packets, it would have been cheaper – $0.28 per packet.

Runs beyond the second further reduce the cost. And when you consider the flexibility of your homemade packets – and the fact that they taste far better – it becomes a pretty clear bargain after a while.

Reducing the Costs
Even more important, I didn’t optimize my ingredient purchases very well. A bit of optimization shaves off a lot of the cost.

The biggest way to save more money is to buy a giant canister of the oatmeal rather than a fairly small canister. Buying the oatmeal in bulk cuts down on the cost per packet significantly. Similar logic applies to some of the ingredients – if you particularly like blueberries in your oatmeal, for instance, buying them in bulk cuts down on costs, too.

Also, re-use the baggies. There’s no reason not to here – you’re only storing dry ingredients in them. Use them again.

Another tip – buy snack-sized baggies instead of sandwich baggies. I bought sandwich baggies in the example above because the store’s baggie selection was small – snack baggies are cheaper, easier to store, and hold an oatmeal packet easily.

All of these tips can trim the cost significantly, particularly on future batches.

Conclusion
If you or your family eat a lot of oatmeal, making your own packets is a cost-saver over the long haul – plus they make for tastier packets. In our house, I eat oatmeal four to five times a week, plus my son eats it twice a week and my wife perhaps once a week. That makes eight packets a week. In ten weeks, homemade packets become cheaper per packet. In twenty weeks, we’re now saving, on average, a dime for every packet we’ve eaten – $16. After that, it’s just gravy – another $1 or so each week saved while eating better oatmeal packets.

The key, though, is that your family eats a lot of oatmeal. If they don’t, then making your own packets probably won’t be cost-effective for you.

Making homemade laundry Detergent

2011-07-24T08:09:00.000-07:00

Here is a laundry detergent recipe to try. http://www.livingonadime.com/homemade-laundry-detergent-2/

See more laundry detergent recipes here: You will need Fels Naptha bar soap, borax and washing soda for most recipes.

50 Ways Retirees Can Cut Their Investment, Insurance, and Banking Costs

2011-04-17T07:50:00.000-07:00

50 Ways Retirees Can Cut Their Investment, Insurance, and Banking Costs
Taking a closer look at fees and expenses that can add up to a lot if you're not watching.

25 Frugal Changes You Can Make Today

2011-03-30T05:05:00.000-07:00

25 Frugal Changes You Can Make Today
Here are some great tips for frugal living from wisebread. If you're not living frugally, you are leaving money on the table!

You are invited: Watch my Autism Speaks video message

2011-03-22T17:57:00.000-07:00

You are invited: Watch my Autism Speaks video message

Please join me in my fight to make a difference in the lives of the more than 1 million Americans living with autism today.

I am participating in Walk Now for Autism Speaks to help change the future for all those affected by autism, including my 17 year old son, Sean who has PDD-NOS, an autistic spectrum disorder.

Autism is the second most common developmental disorder in the United States affecting one in every 110 children born today. Despite some promising discoveries, the cause of autism is unknown and a cure does not exist. Research is crucial. Every 15 minutes another child is diagnosed with autism. Not only must we find ways to improve the quality of life for children and adults with autism, but we also must find a cure, and soon.

Walk Now for Autism Speaks is our chance to make a difference in the fight against autism by raising money for autism research and heightening public awareness. Please join me in my fight as I raise money to help fund essential research.

I know many organizations are asking for your help right now, particularly with the current situation in Japan. I understand and I'm giving to the Red Cross too. If you could donate something to sponsor me for the walk, I would greatly appreciate it. Autism affects my family 24/7 and I want to see a brighter future for people like my son Sean.

You can donate to Walk Now for Autism Speaks and/or join my team online using the link. Donations can also be mailed to Autism Speaks using the donation form located on my page or send me a check made out to Autism Speaks.

Thank you for taking an important step in the fight against autism.

Donations are tax deductible to the fullest extent allowed by law.
Autism Speaks 501 (C)(3) Tax Id #: 20-2329938

Life Support inflation

2011-03-14T04:36:00.000-07:00

Well, it happened again, my beloved big bag of 8 O'clock Colombian in the 40 oz bag (2.5 lbs) went up in price at Sam's Club. It seems like it was $11.65 last month and now it is $12.47 a bag. When I started watching this coffee price around the beginning of the year it was $11.22 a bag. This is like a 10% jump in the first quarter. I predict that it will be $15 by the end of 2011.

I know coffee is considered a commodity, but to some people... namely me ... it is life support. A bag this size only lasts a little over a week in my house. I expect food prices and other prices to increase about 10% this year. We are already seeing it with food and gas prices. Maybe its not hyperinflation, but its bad enough. As governments try to inflate away their debts, we pay for it.

Brace yourself.

Paid off the student loan - Kicked Aunt Sallie out!

2011-03-13T09:59:00.000-07:00

After my divorce nearly 15 years ago I went back to college. I was working full time, struggling to get a diagnosis for my autistic son and just trying to get by as a single mom. It took me nearly six years to get an associates and then a bachelors degree. I graduated with honors close to ten years ago and yesterday I made my final payment of about $200 on my school loans and paid it off. WOOT!

I really thought I would have paid these loans off long ago. I borrowed roughly $6,000 and my payments were only about $50 a month. When you take out these loans in college, the expectation is that you will be a professional making booocooo bucks and repayment will be a breeze. Well, it's not. I was in deferment for over a year after a layoff and did not go into a high paying profession. I have a BFA.

Many students borrow ten times as much as I did and I don't know how on earth they can possibly make those $600 payments. Maybe its because I was an older student with more responsibilities and being house poor, etc. that made it such a struggle.... but at least I knew what I wanted to go for a degree in when I started. I pretty much needed to go back to school in order to work in the same field I did before mommy-tracking. Unfortunately, now many jobs like mine are going to India and I may need to return to school in my 50s for who knows what. I sure hope not.

Now my daughter is in her second year of college and has no debt thanks to going to junior college entirely on scholarships. She did not get a Pell grant this year, but was able to get a job at school and is trying to save up for next year when she will be going to an out of state university for her third and fourth year. The field she is going into is very small and requires a masters degree. She will be able to get the masters in state, thankfully. We've got the FAFSA in and some scholarship applications. Unfortunately, we won't know the results until about June. She will probably end up taking loans to get through school as I have no savings for that and her father is totally out of the picture.

I wish I could help her, but my limited funds are tied up in this house and my retirement fund. It is better for her to take responsibility for her own future and borrow for school as needed than for me to have to live on Alpo during my retirement. She's known for years that I will not take out loans for her college so has no expectations for me to pay for her college. I will send her care packages and money when I can though. She will always be my princess.

Yes, sometimes I feel a bit guilty because I can't give my kids what their friends have but then I get over it pretty quickly. My life is complicated and expensive. I live frugally, and I'm still broke. I am trying hard to save in my 401k my measly 529 for my son. I don't expect him to have the same scholarship opportunities as his sister, and he will most likely need vocational training after high school. Also, you can't borrow money to retire on and I won't be anywhere near saving the half million dollars I will need to retire on... I'm not even one-tenth of the way there and you can't borrow money for living expenses during retirement... and Kats don't eat Alpo!

The best I can hope for is that I pay off my home and avoid a mortgage when I'm retired and that my kids will both be self-supporting. Unfortunately, my son will probably always be dependent on me and his sister to some degree. We'll all make it through fine though, I'm sure.

Saving to Travel

2011-03-11T05:02:00.000-08:00

Here's a nice post at Solo Friendly, a travel blog by Gray Cargill that I think is pretty cool. It puts saving into a different perspective. When you are saving for travel or fun stuff, make it a game rather than a chore or diet. I've been reading this blog for awhile and it helped me when I decided to take a solo trip to Vegas last year to see a bunch of Beatles shows.

"Do you wish you could travel more, but your paycheck seems to be gone at the end of every month? You’re not alone. Especially in the past couple of years, most of us consider ourselves lucky if we even have a job, let alone have seen a raise that has kept us even with the cost of inflation. If the only thing standing between you and more travel is money, then you’ll want to read on. Because if there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s the Saving Game." [read more]

My 2010 Tax Refund

2011-03-06T07:27:00.000-08:00

Woo hoo! I just got my tax refund. I know I should strive to owe nothing and not get a refund, but...whatever. It still feels like free money although I know it is not. I also realize that this may be my last four-figure refund as I expect to have less to deduct next year, my youngest will be over 17 and I plan to have my student loan paid off.

I planned carefully on paper where the refund money would go and then Murphy came for a visit and busted my car again, my kid ran up the cell phone bill and my department at work decided to have a big fancy party. This was a slight detour from paying off my school loan in full with the refund money and socking away more in my emergency fund, but it didn't totally derail me. I am so tired of paying for for my past and want to catch up and put more money toward the future. If you are wondering why I put more into my curve ball account instead of my longer term emergency fund, it is because the mechanic said the old car will need a brake job within two months.

Here's the the breakdown of where the money went. The first chart is where the money went to... and boy did it go fast! For the second pie chart, ideally, it should be allocated at least half to the future. Once my debts are gone, that should become a reality. OK, here's my pie charts showing where this windfall (a bit over a grand) went...

This year, for the first time, I opted to take part of my income tax refund in savings bonds. I had never noticed that option before and have never owned savings bonds. I didn't know how it worked or what the bonds were paying. I found out that it wasn't that easy to find out information on bonds quickly and before TurboTax timed out. I figured I will try it for fifty bucks just to check it out and it would force me to save at least $50 of the refund I had coming.

I just found this article online today that explains it better than what I read on the Treasury site. Read a little more about how this works at wisebread.com Receiving Your Tax Refund in Savings Bonds

Home Salon Savings

2011-02-21T04:56:00.000-08:00

I was supposed to get a haircut and color a couple of weeks ago but injured my back when I slipped on some ice and didn't reschedule my appointment. I was looking (and feeling) pretty ragged, but didn't want to spend $80 to $100 for a cut and color at this point and my daughter needed her hair done too. That would double the cost so we decided to do it at home this time around.

Both of us have long naturally mousy brown hair, mine is over 50% gray and my college aged daughter looks great as a redhead. Yesterday I did one of my couponing trips to the local Dominicks store and got nearly $200 worth of stuff for $106.77. Of course there were hair color coupons in there. I picked up Garnier for me because it was cheap and Feria for the girl because of the color (and coupon).

We broke out the old red towels, 2 timers and put on old t-shirts and got busy. This was actually the first time we did this together. Occasionally, I would dye her hair or she would do mine, but never both at the same day... with dinner cooking, too.

It actually worked out perfectly. We started with mine because of the gray it had to cook longer. While mine was "cooking" I started hers. Thank goodness for 2 timers. I don't know if I could stay on top without those. Talk about a bloodbath... when I finally rinsed her hair in the bathtub with the shower wand, it was like something out of a horror movie and looked like blood in the bathtub and she commented that maybe when she has her own place she'll do a psycho themed bath. That's my little spook!

After we were all rinsed and conditioned the haircuts began. Neither one of us are expert cutters and just cut an inch or two from the bottom and did a bangs trim. It worked out fine and we both have a basic long hair with bangs haircut. My hair was very stringy from the last kid at the salon who layered it all funky and I was happy to have some of that taken off. I still have some of the layering but its not all stringy like the step-child anymore. It really aggravates me that haircuts are so expensive, even at the so-called discount places like Haircuttery and everyone is so inexperienced. Ideally, I would want my hair done by someone over 35 and for about $50 for cut and color, but that ain't happening in the area where I live.

Now we look and feel so much better and saved about $200 ($300 if you count groceries savings that day). Just as we were finishing the stove timer went off. Dinnertime... and not a moment too soon.

The Tri-level Emergency Fund

2011-02-19T07:43:00.000-08:00

Here's something I've been doing for some time and just saw an article on the Frugal Dad blog that showed me that a lot of others are doing it too. It is called the tri-level emergency fund and its a great idea.

Basically, you have three emergency funds. One within arms reach, the second fairly close by and the third one for the long-term.

The first would be a cash stash at home for when you need money on the spot and can't run to an ATM, power is out, etc. I've been doing this for years just for piece of mind. Frugal Dad suggests stashing about $500 or so. I generally like to keep $200-$500 in what I call my piggy bank account...my secret cash stash. And, no, I'm not telling you where it is!

The second is a local checking account where you can write checks for those things that happen that aren't always budgeted for such as busticated something or another or some kind of budget busting situation. This is the curve-ball or Murphy fund for when shit happens and things that pop up once or twice a year that would blow your normal monthly budget, such as car repairs, home repairs, speeding tickets... that type of thing. Dave Ramsey would probably call this the baby emergency fund so let's put about $1,000 there ($500 if your income is under $20K). The way I personally work this account is that I have a savings account at the same bank where I have my checking account. I transfer a set amount from my checking account every month to take it out of my normal spending allowance. Since they are both at the same bank, I can transfer money back and forth as needed online to take care of life's little emergencies. Ideally, I would like to see about $2-3k here as a more liquid account. Murphy seems to visit my house often, you see.

The third emergency fund is that real one people talk about where you have several thousand dollars socked away. That's my money market account over at the credit union which I will fund to 3-6 months of expenses after I dig myself out of debt. (I'm still only on baby step 2). Suze Orman says 8 months expenses is the correct amount. Personally, that is really a stretch goal for my situation and I'm sure many others feel that way. It's one of the reasons I can relate more to Dave than Suze. She's more for the yuppy crowd.

Many people put this main emergency fund (#3) into a higher paying online savings account at ING or Ally or a money market account or CD. This is the emergency fund for the big emergencies such as job loss or major illness when you are literally living off your savings so don't touch it for anything less. Life's little curveballs are paid from account #2. Unfortunately, right now I am nowhere near fully-funded in the main emergency fund, but I'm making direct deposits from my paycheck to get it going. I think that when I get it up to $8-10K I will be happy and start investing and working more on college and retirement goals.

I hope this idea of a tri-level emergency fund helps you also. I think it is the one thing that I am personally doing that will help me avoid credit card debt.

Helping pay down the National Debt

2011-02-13T14:02:00.000-08:00

Hey, guess what I discovered today while working on my taxes. Turbo tax gave me an opportunity to get back part of my refund in savings bonds and gave a link to treasury direct. While surfing the site I noticed that one of the options is to make a payment to the treasury to help pay down the debt. I don't know if you've noticed, but there is a national debt counter on the site here and it is $14 gagillion and something and counting. I think I read somewhere recently that it adds up to over $40,000 per person in America. Now isn't that just dandy the way they spend our money?

Just in case you are looking to help reduce the national debt, here's the link You can pay online with credit card (that is, if you have not had your plasectomy yet) or you can mail them a check.

In a way I'm tempted to help because I love this country and am concerned about my kids future, but it is not a tax deductible donation, so I will continue giving my financial support to organizations that help people with autism or other charities. When our country can balance their budget and act halfway responsible with taxpayer money and make a good faith effort in getting America out of the hole, maybe I'll reconsider. Right now, I don't care to be an enabler.