August 2, 2012

It’s Not Your Money, Is It?

Crying baby

Written by Stacy Myers, Contributing Writer A while back, there was this strangely annoying commercial on television for JG Wentworth. It’s a bunch of adults yelling out their windows about THEIR money. While the normal person would just find this commercial extremely dumb, I found it very bothersome. When I heard my pastor mention the commercial in one of his sermons about stewardship and giving, I really started thinking. The sad thing is this MY MONEY mindset is very prevalent today. Most of us consider [...]

Filed Under: Budgeting, Faith and encouragement, Good stewardship Tagged With: , , , , 53 Comments
January 26, 2012

How I Would Improve my $250 Grocery Budget Even More

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If you haven't yet read my initial post, What I Would Feed my Family on a Monthly Budget of $250, I would suggest going there first, and then coming back to this post. First, Some Answers to Your Questions 1. No, this isn't how we regularly eat. I did mention that in the other post, but I want to say it again for clarity. This is make-believe. Our usual grocery budget (which includes about $30-40 of household and toiletries) is $450, NOT $250. The point [...]

Filed Under: Budgeting, Frugality, In the kitchen, Real, whole food Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , 31 Comments
January 19, 2012

Yes, You Can Stop Using Credit Cards!

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Written by Kate Tietje, Contributing Writer In the new year, one of the major resolutions a lot of people make (after losing weight) is getting out of debt.  A lot of families are reeling from their Christmas expenses -- I think I've read the average family spends over $2000 on Christmas each year! Much of that goes onto credit cards.  When you think about taking several months to pay that off at 18% (or more) interest, that's a lot of extra money that you're spending just [...]

Filed Under: Budgeting, Frugality, Good stewardship Tagged With: , , , 54 Comments
January 10, 2012

Book Review: The Money Saving Mom’s Budget (5 Copies to Win!)

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If you want to learn something, one of the best ways is to learn from someone who has actually done it. Do you want to learn to get your budget under control, cut your expenses drastically, simplify your life, and live both frugally and generously? My dear friend, Crystal Paine, is just the person to ask. Her story speaks for itself. She and her husband began their marriage on a penny-pinching, rice and beans budget of as little as $650-900 (total!) some months, while he went through law school, [...]

Filed Under: Books, Budgeting, Frugality, Giveaways, Reviews Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , 1,133 Comments
October 12, 2011

3 Tips That Will Truly Help You to Manage Your Grocery Budget Better

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Once upon a time, there was this girl who was very careful with her budget. So careful that her husband trusted her implicitly, and she carefully maintained her grocery budget with cash each month, so as not to overspend. She was so insistent that this method worked, she even wrote profusely on the topic. This worked well for several years. Then this girl discovered that upon returning home from an overseas trip, she was pregnant with her 4th child. Then two homestay students arrived, fatigue and nausea [...]

Filed Under: Budgeting, Frugality, Good stewardship, Menu Planning Tagged With: , , , , , , , 70 Comments
May 4, 2010

Real Food on a Real Budget: Using Cash

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This week I will be running some excerpts from my new book, Real Food on a Real Budget: How to Eat Healthy for Less. They will be short selections from a few different chapters, just to give you an idea of some of the contents. Using  Cash Taken from Chapter 1: Working With a Budget Once  you  have  determined  what  your  monthly  budget  ought   to  be,  or  how  much  you  have  to  work  with,  here  is  my  biggest piece  of  advice  in  sticking  to [...]

Filed Under: Books, Budgeting, Frugality Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , 30 Comments
May 3, 2010

Introducing My New Book: Real Food on a Real Budget

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I am so excited to introduce my newest book to you! Real Food on a Real Budget has been a bit like having two babies in one year... first, we welcomed Johanna into our family this August. Within a week of her birth, while being told "sit down, rest, stop getting up!" by my loving hubby and midwife, I launched into writing this book. Just about 9 months later, after much brainstorming, countless hours spent writing (and deleting and then writing again), many late nights [...]

Filed Under: Books, Budgeting, Frugality, Living healthy, Nutrition Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , 20 Comments
March 23, 2010

Our Favorite Budget Management Tool

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Image by Bohman My wonderful hubby, Ryan, is as busy as he can be, working on our new business, Resound School of Music. Nonetheless, he agreed to write this short review post of our favorite budgeting software, You Need a Budget, which keeps us in line each and every month. Since he's the the one that runs a mean budget around here, I'm going to let him tell you all about it... ******* Some of you may remember my past review of YNAB (short for [...]

Filed Under: Budgeting, Frugality, Reviews Tagged With: , , , , , , , , 13 Comments