Giving Time, Not Stuff

By Joanna of Keeping Feet

I’ve got 4 nephews, all stair-stepped 2 years apart, between 9 and 3 years old. I adore them, and they are the primary reason we’re making it a priority to live near family. I wouldn’t miss their growing-up years for the world.

With 4 nephews nearby, we’re invited to all the birthday parties, of course. Picking up a $15 plastic toy at the store would be easy, but when I see their overflowing toy rooms at their houses, I can’t bear to add to the mess (and the consumption!) Last year, we found a new gift-giving solution.

For each of the boys’ birthdays, instead of wrapping a gift, we’ve chosen an experience for them. We talk to their parents before the party, and set a date to take our nephew out to go do something fun with his aunt and uncle. We wrap a symbolic gift to give a clue as to what the outing will be- this gives them something physical to hold on to to remember what’s coming up, and serves the practical purpose of having something to unwrap at the party.

So far, we’ve taken a 5-year-old to a corn maze & pumpkin patch, a 7-year-old putt-putting, 2 nephews to basketball games, and, this Saturday, we’re taking our dog-crazy 9-year-old nephew to his first dog show. These gifts aren’t usually any cheaper than making a Toys-R-Us trip, but they give us one-on-one time with these boys, without their parents or siblings in tow. I know the time we give means a lot to them- and, we are delighted to spend time with these awesome boys!

Putting My Soul At Ease

by Kathie of Two Frog Home

Like most of us, I wear many hats and I try to put the people in my life before anything else.  Relationships are important to me and I like to make sure that the people I love know that.  However, I tend to neglect a few important relationships now and then, much to my regret.

This morning I had an appointment for which I was purposely early so that I could allow myself a little time in Glacier National Park.  I hadn’t been into the park in a while for a number of reasons, but it always remains one of my most favorite places on earth and I just live 20 minutes away.  As I was leaving the park, I felt so at ease.  In fact, I thought to myself, “my soul is at ease here.”  See I neglect my soul more often than I should.  I neglect my relationship with that which is most important to the goals I have in life.

I hope I can change, I’d like to say that I had a little wake-up call this morning and I won’t be repeating my soul-neglecting ways.  I’d like to say that, but I also have to admit that I’m human and I’m likely to forget.  I hope that won’t happen, but should it; I hope my soul reminds me how good it feels to be one with it and myself.

How do you keep from neglecting your soul?  How do you allow time to speak to your innermost self?

Wifely Duties: Football?

By Stacy of Squirrel Chatter in Indiana

Being married for going on six years now I thought I would pick up a thing or two about sports. Never having been “into” sports in school and not having an interest in general – I figured that at least I would glean some enthusiasm off my husband.

Well, no such luck.

As today marks the day of the Super Bowl, the one thing I’m looking forward to is the good company (we’re  watching the game at our friend’s house) and the food. The thing I’m not looking forward too – the actual watching of the game. LOL!

Yeah, yeah I realize that I am a Hoosier and should be all crazy, happy about the Colts being in the Superbowl and I am happy because at least that ups the interest level for me a tad bit. But I’m that girl at work who forgets to where blue on Blue Friday and who doesn’t have a clue as to the actual time of the game…details schmetails.

Yet, when it comes to a happy marriage it helps to be at least vaguely intrigued by what interests your spouse – right?

Maybe it will be different when we have kids who are interested in the sport…but for now I am a stifling my yawns.

I do get involved in the areas that excite me though – like the food/party planning that surrounds the game watching. I love to entertain – so any excuse is a good excuse to cook, clean and have people over.

Anyone else relate? How do you stay into the game without falling asleep?

Putting Yourself First

Written by Heather of Heather’s Eden

While the homemaker is taking care of the home, who’s taking care of the homemaker? One thing that working homemakers may have an especially difficult time doing is finding time to take care of themselves. Diet and exercise can take a backseat to family and home and friends and pets and…well…just about everything else!

I am trying extra hard to get into shape. See, I had this goal that I would be in better shape at 40 than at 20. Well, I just had my 40th, and while I am better in some ways I still have a long way to go. So I still have about 9 months before my 40th year is over, and I am taking those 9 months to really concentrate on me and getting my mind and body in tip-top shape.

So my latest attempt at this is my purchase of this book:

This book really appealed to me. Aside from the colors and the very simple yet bold layout, I like the idea of simplifying the objective. I’m the type of person that gets overwhelmed by “things” easily. I need lists to break it down for me. If I walk into a room that needs to be cleaned, I can’t begin without a list, because my mind can’t process what needs to be done first. I get overwhelmed by the details.

This book is good at breaking it down to the basics, and helping me set easily attainable goals. Well, okay. Maybe not “easily attainable”. In fact, last night I told my boyfriend that some of the “bad habits” they wanted me to break were practically impossible to give up!

The concept is simple: Spend two weeks establishing five new habits, breaking five bad habits, and adopting five bonus habits.

The good habits include things like eating a good breakfast, eating vegetables and fruits and whole grains and exercising. They’re pretty basic and well-known habits for a healthy lifestyle.

The toughie is the bad habits that I’m supposed to give up. No added sugar. Ugh. OK. That one’s like a sucker-punch to the gut, but it’s expected. No snacks except fruits and vegetables. Ditto. But reducing “screen time” (e.g. TV, blogging) to the point of not allowing yourself more screen time than exercise time?

An example of a treadmill workstation

What? Are you nuts? How can any human being live up that? Well, okay. Maybe I’m a techie. Maybe I spend all day sitting at a desk in front of a computer, and then go home and sit with a laptop in my lap for the rest of the evening. Maybe I’ve put on 35 pounds since I took my current stationary job in a small office that only has a 20-foot walk from car to my desk chair, when my last job required me to walk through expansive parking lots and up and down stairs all day. What’s your point?

I love the Mayo Clinic. I mean, they are the ones that came up with the treadmill workstation. Our office of sedentary techies were inspired and considered pushing the boss to allow us to create one of stations for us to share. But we are techies after all, which means that we did NOT push for a treadmill station. I mean, that would entail having to get up and walk to the other side of the office to convince the boss of it.

So here are my steps to a healthier lifestyle that I will work on adopting and incorporating over the upcoming weeks:

• Buy a pedometer and use it. I know from my previous pedometer that I move alarmingly little. They say that you need to get in 10,000 steps per day in order to have a healthy impact. I think I generally get in perhaps 1,500 steps per day.
• Use housework and yardwork to reach my daily goal of 10,000 steps. After all, house/yard work is exercise! If I see that I’m coming up short on my 10,000 steps, I can get up and vacuum or sweep or something to help make up the deficit.
• Cut out refined sugar, and cut out my weaknesses: candy and dessert.
• Snack on fruits and vegetables and nuts.
• Eat mostly vegetarian and whole grains, with occasional additions of grilled chicken and fish.
• Get exercise. Go for walks, hikes in parks, kayaking. Exercise to videos. Get up from my desk at work and run in place, walk around while I talk on the phone. Whatever it takes to get me up.
• Eat at home more. You too often give in to the evil little voices in your ear when you eat out and have creamy sauces and decadent desserts tempting you.
• Cut down on my TV time, unless it is playing in the background while I am up and moving.
• Start logging what I eat and when I exercise. This is what worked for me before.
• Get to sleep earlier. Turn off the TV and computer by 10:00-11:00 PM, and read to tire myself.

Additionally I need to just have more “me” time. Time to do my nails and moisturize. Time to go get my hair done. Time to feel better about myself.

So how good are you at finding time for yourself? How often do you put yourself first, so that you can then be a better wife/mom/friend to those around you? How good of a job are you doing at taking care of your future self today?

the three Rs

by Stacy from Little Blue Hen

As is probably apparent to anyone who has read any of my previous posts or my blog, I veer a bit towards the crunchy-hippie-granola category. Don’t get me wrong, I love my hot showers, but I also think that people should try to tread lightly on the earth when possible. Right now the term “green” is everywhere. Green jobs, green energy, and green-washing.

Note: This is not meant to be judgmental by any means, and I am often guilty of buying stuff I don’t need, but I’m working on it! I just love when environmentally-friendly and frugal collide.

Because where I am somewhat crunchy-hippie-granola, I am also cheap. Green-washing drives me crazy. Green-washing is the term for companies who use eco-friendly language to market new products which may or may not even be eco-friendly. While the term “organic” is a regulated certification, the term “natural” is just an advertising buzz word.

What really annoys me about green-washing, however, is that the whole point is to encourage people to buy more stuff. I think many people are confused by a misunderstanding of the three Rs:

Image by calypso dragon 13

Reduce, Re-use, Recycle.

They go in order. And usually, it will save you money.

First, reduce. Consume less. It’s cheaper, and it’s better for the environment. Or, if you do need something, reduce packaging by buying in bulk, or reduce gas usage by running all your nearby errands on one day. Throwing away a bunch of half-full bottles of cleaners already in your closet to replace them with new “green” options isn’t necessarily better.

Second, re-use. So you got thirsty and bought a bottle of water. Refill it. If you buy sports drinks, buy the powder and mix it in the bottle. Instead of tossing something, see if it has a second life in your home or in someone else’s. A newer term sometimes used is “upcycling,” re-using items for purposes not originally intended.

Last, recycle. If you had to buy it and you can’t re-use it anymore, then recycle it. Recycling still takes energy, which is why the first two steps are preferable, but it’s better than throwing recyclable items away.

A few simple ideas to start you off, and because I love lists so much:

• Use worn-out t-shirts and towels as cleaning rags in lieu of buying new rags or going through paper towels. Easy!
• You probably have a travel mug somewhere that was a gift. Use it! Put your home-brewed coffee or tea in it, or take it to the coffee shop to reduce paper cup use — most places will give you a discount.
• Re-usable bags — people always say they forget them. We used to, too. Take them out to the car when you leave for work and leave them in the backseat or somewhere visible so you already have them when you stop at the store. Many stores (like Target) will give you a nickel off your purchase, too. Don’t just use them for groceries!
• The library! Free books! What else could you want!
• Check secondhand and thrift shops and CraigsList for furniture or other items. Freecycle is also great!
• Buy items in bulk when possible to reduce packaging waste. Re-use glass jars to store grains or dried beans.
• If you buy two apples at the store, they don’t HAVE to be in a plastic bag to keep them together. (This is directed at my spouse.)
• Instead of buying “green” cleaners, try using vinegar and baking soda for most household cleaning.

Those are just a few examples. Obviously there are times when a little investment can save you money in the long run (insulating your house saves on energy costs, energy-efficient light bulbs are more expensive but last longer, spending more on non-disposable items, etc.), but instead of getting sucked in by green-washing, think about it first.

Having recently moved to an area in a level two drought, one new focus for us is water consumption. Not only is it earth-friendly to reduce our water use, but I almost had a heart attack when we got our first water bill.

Are you motivated by “green” ideas? Or are you being more environmentally-friendly as a side effect of saving money?

A Simple Idea

by Willow

Minimalism is a word that is being used quite frequently these days.  As sources and supplies diminish, people’s thoughts turn, not to how to spend their money, but how to save their resources and lower their expenses.  Minimalists are those who follow a philosophy of extreme simplicity.  It’s not a new concept.

While minimalists encourage you to get rid of most of your possessions, even limiting the number of items you own to 100, simplicity advocates focus less on how much or little you have and more on how to wisely balance living well with less. For many years, I have tried to follow the ‘more with less’ philosophy of simplicity.  Even if I owned twenty cookbooks, I usually only used two or three regularly.  So I gave away all but a few of my favorites.  How many bath towels does a family of six need?  Not more than twelve!  At one point, I had several boxes of fabric and I realized that I didn’t even remember what material I had in each box.  So I decluttered them and ended up with just one box of fabrics I loved and knew what I could make with each piece.  What a relief that was!  I regularly go through my yarn stash and pull out the skeins of yarn I haven’t used and realize I probably never will.

I have no desire to get rid of everything I own and limit myself to 100 or even 500 items.  But I do want balance in my possessions and my home.  When my possessions start overwhelming my space and my attention, I know it’s time to declutter again!  In the autumn, I purged my kitchen cabinets of unused food and extra dishes. In January, I decluttered my wardrobe.  This month? Hmmmm…  any suggestions?

To coupon or not to coupon

By Judy at My Freezer is Full

That is the question…

I used to be a coupon clipper, reveling in the thrill of the really good deal.  Not so much any more.  I’ve found that the way I shop and cook have evolved over the years and that all those coupons lovingly clipped on Sunday mornings made their way out of the organizer less and less frequently.  There are rarely coupons for produce, flour, sugar or dairy which are our most frequent purchases.  Even for things like cold cereal, we almost never buy the name brands.  We don’t have double coupon days here, so it’s just the coupon face value, and the coupons aren’t good enough for me to justify the additional expense.    And the latest box mix or cleaning product?  Not interested, thanks.  I don’t have much experience with on-line coupon sources but the ones I’ve looked at, still rarely have any that I would use.

The one exception to my coupon clipping are the in-store coupons from my local groceries.  They sometimes offer great deals on things like flour or sugar that I snap up.  Before the holidays, they had coupons for 5 lbs of flour for $.88.  The down side of this is that they have a limit per coupon or per visit.  Fortunately, the grocery store is on the way home from work and I’ve been known to stop in more than once for really good deals.  Another local store often has ’super-coupons’ for their meat department.  They have a fabulous meat counter- no plastic wrapped styrofoam packages here, it’s all cut and wrapped by hand in paper and they pride themselves on service.  Last week they had chicken for $.39/lb, IF you purchased the entire 10 lb package  as they get it from the processor (limit 2 per family).   No problem there, we can easily repackage and freeze it, and 20 lbs of chicken makes many meals for our family.  I have some misgivings about this purchase, though.  While it was labeled free of hormones and such, I realize that it was raised in a factory farm environment, which I have a hard time supporting.

I try to provide the most nutritious, sustainably produced food for my family at the best cost.  However, the realitiy of our budget- still waiting for our old house to sell,  with two loan payments, a car payment and heating two houses (although one minimally) means that I’ve got to cut corners somewhere.  For us, that has come from our grocery budget and free-range/organic meat is often out of our price range.  Still, cooking mostly from scratch, avoiding the expensive name brands and box mixes, and careful planning of our resources has helped us survive our budget crisis.   For me, the basics are always a better buy than the name brands, even with coupons.  I never understood those people who would purchase something they wouldn’t usually buy just because they had a really good coupon (I’m thinking my MIL here).

Once our house sells (and we have an accepted offer!!!) I’m not likely to go back to the rabid coupon clipping of my youth but I’ll still peruse the coupons…you never know what you’ll find.

Anyone else find that their coupon use has changed over time?  Or any good online coupon sites?

One Way to a Healthier Body and Budget

by Paulette of Smith Funny Farm

Last year we moved to the country. Way out in the country. Well, 30 minutes from town if you don’t get behind a tractor or other farm vehicle. We’ve had a lot of changes to our lives since we moved out here, but one of the biggest was fast food and food delivery withdrawal. When you move 30 minutes from town, you won’t find anyone that will deliver to you. No one. So that has resulted in some big changes for us. We thought we were so busy that we just had to either pick up fast food or have food delivered for dinner … a lot. It got to a point that we were ordering our favorite salads from our favorite place, Steak Out, two or three times a week (one of our neighbors, while standing at the edge of our yard one day watching a tree being removed from the top of our house suddenly commented ‘Ya’ll sure do order Steak Out a lot don’t you?’ No kidding.). We almost always had pizza delivery on Friday nights and ordered out or picked up something every Saturday. Between that and picking up lunches at least 4 days a week, it was nothing to spend over $100 dollars a week … to not cook. Of course we were still buying groceries and cooking some meals, mostly prepared, packaged food.

Wow how things have changed. We had a little garden last year and did much of our other shopping at the local farmer’s market and preserved food to eat through the winter.  I started baking bread again, something I’d not done in years and a couple of friends gave us local fresh eggs. We are eating so much healthier now. I’m cooking home made meals every day, and have gotten very efficient at it…preparing meals on the weekend that we can have through the week so that we don’t have to come in and start from scratch. Another huge change is that of the food budget. It’s amazing. It’s funny, the one thing we really thought we’d miss when we moved out here is the one thing that has probably made the most positive change in our lives, in many ways.

How about you, are you caught up in this habit? Have you had it and conquered it, and if so, how did you go about it?

Fighting winter doldrums

by Theresa

Like these baby lettuce, I probably ought to be under lights this time of year. I’m not fond of the term Seasonal Affective Disorder. I think the disorder’s in a culture that’s so far removed from the natural world that we can’t use the dark months to regroup, but instead must go at the same pace we do the rest of the year. Still, I live in that culture and have to go to the day job that prevents me from hibernating as my body wants me to do–and since I’m grateful for said day job in this economy and don’t want to be either grouchy or sleepy at it, I’m doing what I can to fight back.

It’s a bit early to start seeds for the outdoor garden, though seed delivery willing, I’ll get some celery going in a few weeks. But I got the bright idea of growing mesclun mix under lights. I took the photo above early in the week. They’ve about doubled in size since then and soon I’ll be adding them to salads. Seeing the growth lifts my heart and gives me hope for spring. Probably the grow light doesn’t hurt either!

I’m also forcing myself to combat my natural desire to hermit. This afternoon, for instance, I’m going to a belly dance show in a neighboring town. It’s fun, it’s benefiting Haitian relief efforts (so I can justify spending money on something “frivolous” that’s just for me–I’m awfully cheap!) and I think a few hours of bright, colorful costumes and hot Arabic music will go a long way to raise my spirits. Speaking of belly dance, I’m making a point to get to class every week, even though it’s late at night and runs counter to my nesting urges. The exercise, companionship and music seem to help–although I could do without getting home at 11 pm on a week night!(Does not make reconciling the books for the week easier on Friday morning. Just sayin’.)

How do you combat the winter doldrums? (Please note that anyone who says “take a tropical vacation” will be poked with cold aluminum knitting needles until she hands over her tickets.)

Let the seeds begin!

by Stephanie of Going Green in So. IL

Growing up I can only remember one year when my parents had anything resembling a garden, I remember my mom explaining why we could not grow certain things.  I always wanted a big one like my grandfather, who even had a grape arbor.  After he died when I was 3 1/2 my grandmother never grew another thing.  I remember years later when the arbor was tore down and how it broke our hearts. I had tried several times without success to grow things around our house growing up but my parents had a penchant for weed killer.

Flash forward to now. I am not a master gardener. I will say shamefaced that I haven’t had my soil tested yet (though I might this year) and my compost piles this last year kinda sucked. Yet here I am pouring through the seed catalogs picking out the last bits to add to my stash for the 2010 garden.  It’s more than just a love of growing things, it’s about ensuring that the food that my family eats is good for them.  That means seeds that are Non-GMO (genetically modified).  I’m sorry, I just don’t believe that there should be fish genes in my tomato plants.  It also means trying to grow my food in the best possible way. The stuff that you see in most stores is trucked in from all over the world and in order to do this they are often bombarded with chemical sprays.  This on top of all the pesticides and fertilizers that were used in the growing of said food.  I myself have been guilty in using SevinDust that past two years to combat japanese beetles and squash bugs. This year I am trying companion planting in conjunction with natural, organic pesticides/pest deterrents.

The planning that goes into this for me started this fall. No use in planting a bunch of eggplants if I am the only one who will eat them, I had to pick things that my family would eat.   I decided I wanted to start saving my own seeds and that I wanted open pollinated and heirloom varieties.  I got catalogs from Seed Savers Exchange, Bakers Creek Heirlooms and Johnnys.  Good sources but a little on the expensive side for somethings.  I recently lucked out in finding out that Livingston Seed Co. carries non-gmo seeds and they are sold at my local Rural King. What I can’t get from them I will get from the catalogs.

In about 2-3 weeks I will dig out my seed trays and seed starting soil. My husband converted an old fridge into a grow-box, the second one for our household. With a little luck and work I will have a great garden this year that will be preserved and see us through the next winter.