Frugal Tradition

I'm not very good at sewing either. I took sewing in 4-H and my mom was the sewing leader. She asked me not to sign up the next year. I was that bad. I'd like to take lessons and learn enough to hem pants. my daughter always needs her jeans shortenend. I do more baking now and I've learned to read coupons.

We make most of our meals from scratch, as I've gotten older I've done more and more of that myself. I'm usually pretty OK at sewing, though I'm a bit rusty now. I've made things with pieces of woods with a hammer and nails before. I'm going to try to learn more crochet before christmas (aaahhh I need to make a little bag for a friend's presents for christmas). I tend to re-use/repurpose stuff too. Making pots out of old bottles, milk jugs, etc. I'm trying to learn my Mom's green thumb to grow food.... Frugal's a way of life for my family, going back a couple generations. On my Mom's side anyway. So I've alot yet to learn, and I grew up with alot of this too.

I am not that domestic! I do try to cook more rather then eating out all the time. Tonight dinner was a big flop, but for dessert, I made muffins and they were yum!

This year I'm being more frugal then ever because money is more tight then last year. I stop using body wash and now use 3 bars for a $1 soap, We never eat out as much as we use to & more of our meals are cooked by scratch. I'm sewing more and I'm buying more items from thrift stores now. I use more coupons then ever now . I'm always looking for freebies and free samples online because they really do come in handy ( life free samples of toothpaste and coffee). If I can't find what I'm needing at the dollar store then I probably don't need it..LOL..I'll probably make some homemade Christmas gifts also for a few people .. It's strange, me and my husband are watching money and being more frugal then ever now but we make sure we can afford our digital cable and it's premium channels and our broadband internet..LoL..I guess we cut corners so we can afford other things we really enjoy. And my husband refuses to give up cable t.v. because he's a sci-fi channel addict.

I do a lot of scratch cooking, grow my own garden, quilt & knit things (i also sell the things i knit and quilt). I'm not too big on making my own clothing i can never get them to fit quite right. I've started doing things like only buy things on sale (love the grocery stores warehouse sale).I'm trying to make gifts for Christmas as well as i started with buying them back in august as things i wanted to get people came on sale. That way it doesn't all pile up in December.

I am much less likely to throw something away that I think I could use again. I hem my own pants to save money. My wife and I are trying to cook more meals from scratch and have changed the way we shop. We buy more bulk items rather than prepared foods. I have always enjoyed making things and this weekend I made a DVD holder from two old wooden shutters and some barn wood. My wife loved it.

Hi DCMerkle, it is really sad that nowadays economic is bad and almost all the prices of commodity go hike, so the consumers, of course including me have to be much thriftier in order to face this difficult period. All the members of my family have to work harder to increase some income. One of our practical ways is to plant some easily grown and maintained vegetables in our house compound, and we use self made compost as manure for the plants. My mother in law prefers to plant sweet potatoes as we could eat both the baby leaves as well as the tubers. We plant yam, tapioca, long bean, chili, lady fingers and etc. This is a practical way to save a little daily expense. We try as far as possible to prepare our homemade foods for the 3 meals daily. We do shopping only when there is sale at the hypermarket so that we can save a little money by buying goods at lower price. Happy posting and have a nice day.

We're not doing anything differently than we have for years - but I know I'm an exception, especially for my age. :) I'm a 29-year-old homemaker. The vast majority of our meals and baking are from scratch, including yeast breads (not as much work a folks think, once you learn!). I shop sales and always comb the reduced produce carts, as well as using coupons when possible - unfortunately, coupons are not (in my experience) as ubiquitous here in Canada as they are in the U.S. We buy in bulk when the sale price is 'that good.' We reuse zip-type bags, as well a clean aluminum foil or plastic wrap - those foil and plastic wrap are not items we use often to begin with. We shop secondhand for nearly everything - furniture, appliances, books, clothing - you name it! We don't eat out much, go to movies, etc. We don't feel 'deprived' at all - we've just chosen to live within our means and enjoy it. Besides, I feel much better driving our 7-year-old, paid-for car than I would with a new car and a payment every month! ...and that's just one example. My DSS says our homemade General Tso Chicken is better than take-out - and finding ways to create those kinds of things at home (for probably 1/10 of the price!) is much more satisfying to me, for the most part. Don't get me wrong - I enjoy the meal out once in a while! As my MIL says, "It always tastes even better when you didn't cook it!" LOL. I can't think of other specific or different things we do to stay within our means, but the bottom line for us is that frugal living is a choice we have made - and we live more contentedly and abundantly because of it. ~Sara

I've been knitting for many years and I will relying on that skill both for keeping warm and for gifts this holiday season. I'm horrible at sewing so I'll be sticking with knitting for sure! I will also be relying on some more "natural" gifts. In fact many people will be getting plants from me. I have soome very prolific spider plants and I will be making cuttings from them, rooting them, and then giving people little baby potted spider plants for the holidays. I figure it's a gift that keeps on giving becuase they can then do the same after the plants grow. Spider plants are also pretty easy to keep alive and are really tolorant.

Actually I am doing the homemade baking, cooking, and sewing, and the Coupon Saving too. I'm not very good at crocheting or knitting but the price for yarn isn't as cheap anymore as you can buy things except maybe blankets. I even tried saving money on veggies by making a garden. But the different types of bugs made it really hard to keep them organic. But mostly I'm doing the coupon thing.

One thing my Mom & Grand Mom did to save money was to reuse Zip Lock bags. They washed them with soapy hot water & then hang them over something to keep them open until they dried. Mom NEVER used a bag ONLY once!!! We NEVER got sick either!!! Mom crocheted a lot too. She'd use the gallon zip lock bags to hold her yarn so it didn't get dirty when it fell on the floor. Great for traveling too. She always had the right crochet needle with the right yarn.