Share a link monday April 30th 2012

Todays link is less about saving and more about giving. It is for something called the birthday project. Just read it and you will see.

http://mixmingleglow.com/blog/?p=1358



http://www.thebdayproject.com/



Happy Saving,
Lynden

My KIND of saving

About a year ago my husband bought a vacuum sealer for food and such. At the time we were getting ready to pack up well over 20 chickens that we had raised. The machine ran us about $100 but was a great investment in the long run because our food has lasted us so much longer then in simple freezer bags. I pull it out every few weeks too separate and vacuum seal large packages of meat, among other things. Then about two months ago my mom asked to barrow it in order to separate and seal up a very nice cut of meat she had purchased. She look it home and called me about a half hour later telling me it was not working right. It was just turning on by itself and going crazy. So I took it back home with the intention of taking it back the next day. Two months later I realized, as we are prepping to raise our next round of chickens to package up, I never took back the sealer. So I went to the basement to bring it up stairs and set it on the counter in anticipation of going to the store in the morning. As I start to pull everything out of the bag I notice two things. One, I never sent in the warranty information card. Two, it says right in front, in big bold letters, DO NOT RETURN TO STORE. Great.

So, I call the 800 number on the front of the machine and expect to have to wait on hold for an hour only to be told “sorry you didn't send in the warranty” with an evil laugh as they hung up the phone. You can imagine my surprise when ,after I pushed a few buttons and in under 2 minutes, I was talking to a real person. I started the conversation with a “hello, how are you?” This was followed by an explanation of what had happened to the machine. While telling her what was going on I tried to shift the blame on myself just a little. I also explained how much we LOVED the product and tell all kinds of people about it. When I was done telling the problem I ended by giving the women a personal complement (Thank you so much for listening that is hard to come by, or You are so sweet, or add in a joke about being a mom). After I was done talking, we both had a giggle about the kids yelling in the back ground. She told me just a sentence or two about her kids. Then, she asked me a few questions about the machine. In about 45 seconds she was explaining to me that I would receive a new upgraded machine in the mail in about 7 days and she would bypass making me send in the old one before the new one shipped. We ended with a few more giggles, me telling her how great she was, and how very thankful we are to her for doing that. In just a few days we received the new, much better, model.

What is the point you ask? BE NICE TO PEOPLE!!! It will save you tons and not just money. When you go through the drive through, ask the order taker how they are doing, and make a joke about being that person that doesn't know what they want to eat, he will make sure you get the fries that are full. When you smile and hold the door for the women that has an arm full of groceries and two kids, she will make sure  she picks up and gives back the $10 bill you dropped. When you brake your food saver and have not sent in your warranty, the costumer service person will make sure she sends out a new one for you. You get the point. Even if they don't respond with kindness back, I know I left the situation being the best I can be. This to me is better then any amout of money. This does not just go for people who are nice to you first. The person that is the meanest may just be the one who needs the most kindness. I don't mean a faked forced kindness. I mean a genuine kindness because you genuinely care. So go! Be nice! See if it not only changes your day but other peoples day as well.

Happy Savings,

Lynden

Share a link Monday

So I have decided that I am declaring Mondays as share a link (or tip, or idea)  Monday. I will use Mondays as a day to share with you a link that I have found to be wonderful. In return I would love for you guys to use Mondays to share with us any great websites that you find really helpful to you.

My first link is form Real Simple's Surprising Cleaning New Uses. I think it is great.

http://www.realsimple.com/new-uses-for-old-things/new-uses-cleaning/print-index.html

So lets get to sharing!

Happy Savings,
Lynden

Penny Pinching Pizza

My mother and father-in-law got the wonderful opportunity to live in Sicily for 3 years do to my father-in-law's job. Among the spectacular things they brought back when they come home to live in the states was an authentic Italian pizza oven and a true Italian pizza recipe to go with it. Every time we get to visit them along the eastern sea board, we get to partake in this great process of making our own, one of a kind, pizzas in the great pizza oven. Delicious is only the tip of the iceberg of how these pizzas taste. Then, we come back home to reality where the closest thing we get to these pizzas is a dream. This process, among other things, has instilled in us a love for our Friday pizza night.

Now, the problem with pizza night is that to go to the closest pizza joint is, most nights, in the range of $25-$30 and, now that we live in the country, a 40 minute drive round trip (if I am really fast) . So what do we do you ask? We make our own. Not only do we save money, but we have SOOO much fun and make memories that will last forever in the process. While I love that Italian recipe from my mother-in-law, the truth is it takes a while to make. So I have come up with the best and fastest way that works for us.

I start with Fleischmann's Pizza Crust Yeast strips and simply follow the instructions on the back. Another great thing to use are the prepackaged pizza crust mixes. They are fast and easy. The Fleischmann's will make three pizzas or bread sticks for us. When we make the pizza I use two packs. This will make one large pizza and 8 bread sticks for our family. I make both batches all together at the same time then divide it up in thirds (ish). Two thirds are for the pizza and one third is for the sticks. This makes enough for the 4 of us with extra for lunch on Saturday. Once you roll it out then you can top it how ever you want. Think beyond pepperoni and cheese. This is a great way to use the weeks left over. Leftover taco stuff? Make a taco pizza. Leftover BBQ chicken? Make a BBQ Chicken pizza using BBQ sauce as the sauce. Leftover ham from Easter or need to use up the weeks lunch meat? Make a Hawaiian pizza with ham and pineapple. Your options are endless. There are also times when we have ran out of pizza sauce and I have subbed traditional spaghetti sauce and it tasted just fine. For the bread sticks, I just roll the third into a ball, divide it into eight pieces, roll each piece into a stick and bake. When they are done, I brush them with melted garlic butter and sprinkle with parmesan cheese. We have also made stuffed crust and stuffed bread sticks using mozzarella sticks. It is so very good! Not only is it much healthier but this whole process never costs us more then $5-$8 to make and we all love it.

I encourage you to start a new Friday night tradition that will last a life time and save some money in the process. Everyone involved will enjoy it and it is a great way to spend some old fashion quality time with your kids and hubby (or wife).

Happy Savings,

Lynden

Cash from Clutter

WOW, yesterday got a little heavy. Thank you all for reading and responding. I love starting conversations on how to save money, time, my mind...ect.

As I have talked about before my husband and I have two beautiful little girls. They are 2 and 4 and they have stolen our hearts. Not only are they wonderful but they are also the youngest girls in both sides of our family. As a result, we get a TON of hand me downs. I LOVE this!!! My girls are always dressed like a million bucks but we only spent $3 to get there (BIGGEST thanks to my sister-in-law). While this is great, there is also a down side. You get every ones hand me downs. We get all the things that are cluttering up other peoples houses to clutter up ours. For the most part everything is very nice. People don't give us junk or anything like that. It is just that you can only have so much in one house. This is all on top of the normal birthday, Christmas, you were supper good at the store you can pick out a $5 toy, stuff. I think you see where I am going here. Our house gets cluttered up quick and clutter makes me VERY anxious. When I am anxious, we will just say I am NO fun.

My remedy for this overabundance problem is that 4-5 times a year we uncluttered and resell. I get a laundry basket from the basement and we start to sift through all the toys and clothes. Any thing that has been played with less then twice in the past 6 months is going!!! We take the barbie number from 20 to 10. We separate all the doubles of My Little Pony. We dwindle the baby dolls from 12 mediocre ones to 5 really good ones. We take the play food from 100 cheap pieces to 20 really good quality ones. You get the point. Then I take all these toys and clothes to the best resale shops in town.

The resale shops only take the best stuff so here is my reselling process. First off I only take the best stuff to the shops. I learned if you put not so good stuff in with great stuff they will most likely write off all of it as not so great. I know where all the good shops are around town, how they pay (some shops give credits others cash), and the amount they pay for things. If you don't know this about your area it is worth looking into. Then I start with the store that pays the most and takes the most. Then I go down my list of shops until I reach the end. This, most of the time, will take all day and I DO NOT recommend taking the kids with you. Every time I do I end up spending all the money. Most of the time each buyer takes 1-2 hours to look through the baskets. I use this time as mommy alone time (get a coffee and read a great book). By the time I am done with the 3 shops I go to, I have only a few things left and $100-$150 in my pocket.

Depending on my mood at the time I do two different things with the left overs (the stuff the stores didn't take and the stuff that was not good enough for me to take and sell). Option one, my aunt has 3 yard sales a year, and if I feel like it I will hold on to it and put it in our “Aunt Mary's yard sale” box. My second option, and I have been doing this more lately, take it to the salvation army.

There you have it. A great way to declutter, save money, and make money all in one.

Happy Savings,

Lynden

We can't get no satisfaction

Last night, while sitting on the couch during mommy wind down time, a commercial for a very popular luxury car came on. In the span of this 30 second commercial I went from mindlessly watching TV to being completely dissatisfied with my mini van. I wanted to go for a ride in this sleek, pearly white, mp3 playing, hands free calling, not kids friendly , luxury car (sigh). Then I got to thinking why? Why do I long to drive this car. It does not even fit my life. There is nothing wrong with my super sweet mini van. Who says what luxury is? Truth be told I feel beyond luxurious in the van we have, and it has nothing to do with the van itself. It has EVERYTHING to do with the two blond bomb shells sitting in the back seat and/or the smokin' hot man sitting in the drivers seat!

When did satisfaction become a dirty word in our lives? I think we have become a nation of unsatisfied consumers that are always starving for something bigger and better. We really want to be satisfied, we just can't quite get there. But who told us what is better? What is wrong with what we have, or don't have for that matter? We have 5 chef knives. Why do we need 5 chef knives? Why do I feel the need to have a better one when the ones I have do the job well enough? Or even worse, why don't we get rid of three of them and take it down the the two best? Some how, without even realizing it, we are consuming so much that it is controlling who we are. It is controlling the home we live in, the car we drive, the stores we shop at, the jobs we work at...everything. We are becoming mall shopping, big box store buying, $6 cup of coffee drinking, over worked, mindlessly consuming drones. There is a great line from the poem Two Coats (Simplicity) by David Bowden that says “We would rather buy a sign that says 'live simply' then simply live without.” Jesus didn't tell the fishermen to drop their nets and he would make then super cool, latte drinking, tech savvy, hipsters. He told them they would be fishers of men, and it is super hard to love people when we are so consumed with all our stuff and how we can get even more.

With all this being said, my tip for today is be satisfied with what you have and you will save a ton more then just money. Maybe even push the mold and be satisfied with less then what you have. Close the magazine, turn off the TV, and stop buying in to all the hype. Because the truth is, in contrast to what the marketing companies tell us, no one has it all or has it all together.

Happy Savings,

Lynden

P.S. Please leave your comments below. Lets start a discussion about this. Also, feel free to share it.

Lets save some dough

Today we are talking dough. Play dough that it. The term play dough is used daily in our house and some days hourly. I love letting the kids play with play dough. It encourages creativity, it is simple, and when my two year old takes a bite of it when I turn my head I don't have to call poison control. So while we have cookie cutter, spaghetti string makers, and rolling pins galore, often when it comes time to play it is all dried out or yucky. Someone left the lid off, forgot to put it away, squished it all together and made brown, or worse ate it. After our first 20 packages of play dough, I thought to myself “Self...there has to be a better way.”. A better way there is. So I Googled and found a ton of recipes. Then, found the right one for us.

Here is what you need:

1 cup of flour

1 cup of water

¼ cup of salt

2 teaspoons of cream of tartar

1 tablespoon of oil

food coloring (as much as you want for the color you want)

Here is how to make it:

Step 1 Dump it all in a pot

Step 2 Turn the heat on a medium- high temperature. Then start stirring. Don't stop.

Step 3 Keep stirring. It will start to come together after a few minutes.

Step 4 Once it all comes together with no “wet” spots get it out of the pot.

Step 5 Kneed it for a few minutes (this is really fun because it is warm.)

Step 6 PLAY!!!

That is it and way cheaper then the stuff you buy at the store. I think this also a great homemade gift or gift for party guests. This is also a great rainy day activity for little ones. Some how things are SOOO much more fun when we make them ourselves. Please leave comments on this or any other great way to save money below!

Happy Savings,

Lynden