Mommie Cheapest

I'm Baaaa-aaack!

Well after a very nice break (during which time I had a new baby girl!) I am back to the world of saving and blogging!

I hope you all have kept up your saving while I was away. I know I, for one, have not been doing the greatest job of coupon matching and sale-seeking lately. I was way too consumed with my babies and recovering from a c-section to worry about bargains, so I'm sure I overspent in a few areas, namely groceries! But I am back and ready to start watching the deals roll in -- and of course sharing them with you! Hopefully you are still with me and ready to save as well!

Before the deal posts begin, I just want to take a minute to thank you all for sticking with me during my maternity leave. There were so many times I wanted to post but just didn't have time with two little ladies under 15 months old. It feels good to be back and even better to know you are still reading! Thanks so much, I really appreciate your support!!

Now on to the deals!

Make Your Own Butter (No Churn Required)

 

When I was a Kindergarten teacher, we would make homemade butter as part of our Thanksgiving celebration. The kids loved it and took a real sense of pride in making something like butter, which we all take for granted normally! But I never thought about making your own butter from a frugal point of view.

Then the other day, Crystal from The Thrifty Mama posted about making her own butter. She noted that she was able to get the Horizon Organic Whipping Cream for $.88. That and a little salt (if desired) is all you need to make organic butter, and $.88 is a lot cheaper than most organic butter I have ever seen!

Here is how you can make your own butter:

• heavy whipping cream
• small amount of salt (if desired)

1. Pour cream into a container with a tight seal. We used a jelly jar so the kids could see the cream change to butter as we went. If you are making a small amount, you can use recycled baby food jars (but put that lid on tight!). Whatever you use, just make sure it doesn't leak!
2. Add salt if you are using it. You can also add honey or cinnamon or dill or whatever you want!
3. Shake vigorously for 5 - 10 minutes. Ok, let's be real. Unless you are a gym rat, it might be more like 20. Ok let's be really real. You can do this in a blender or food processor, but that's cheating. If you're comfortable cheating, well, go for it. I, for one, am very comfortable cheating.
4. There will be a watery substance that separates from the butter as it thickens. Get rid of it. I have always heard it is buttermilk, but whatever it is, it will spoil your butter right quick if you don't pour it out. You can even rinse the top of your butter with a little cold water after you dump the buttermilk for insurance.
5. That's it! Keep in the fridge. There are no preservatives, so it doesn't last as long as store bought butter, so just make as much as you'll use in a few days.

This is not only a fun and extremely easy food project for the kids, but it's true -- it can be done on the cheap!

Thanks to Thrifty Mama for the great money saving idea!

Daily Worth is Back!

I posted this a few weeks ago and now it is back!

Click here to sign up for a daily financial tip designed especially for the ladies from Daily Worth and sent to your email. What's the Daily Worth, you ask?

From the Daily Worth website:

Daily Worth is a free daily personal finance email for women. We deliver practical tips, empowering ideas and the occasional kick in the pants.

Check out the Daily Worth here! Their tips really are super practical and well written (i.e. not dry and boring!) and written from a female's perspective!

Free, Practical Financial Tips Just for Women

Click here to sign up for a daily financial tip designed especially for the ladies from Daily Worth and sent to your email. What's the Daily Worth, you ask?

From the Daily Worth website:

Daily Worth is a free daily personal finance email for women. We deliver practical tips, empowering ideas and the occasional kick in the pants.

Check out the Daily Worth here! Their tips really are super practical and well written (i.e. not dry and boring!) and written from a female's perspective!

MA Residents: Save BIG on Green Appliances!

If you live in Massachusetts and are looking to possible replace an old, tired, energy sucking appliance, Massachusetts has a deal for you! Mass Save is organizing a Great Appliance Exchange! From the Mass Save website:

Are you looking to replace an old appliance that is likely costing you extra on your energy bill? Now is the perfect time! The Mass Save Great Appliance Exchange is offering incentives on highly efficient clothes washers, dishwashers, refrigerators, and freezers when you replace an existing appliance. These rebates are available for a limited time only starting Earth Day, April 22, 2010 at 10:00 AM and running through May 5, 2010. Reservations must be placed and appliances must be purchased during this time. All Massachusetts households, including those of municipal electric utility customers, are eligible for these Mass Save Great Appliance Exchange rebates.

And we aren't talking shabby rebates, either, people! Dishwashers are getting a $250 rebate, refrigerators are getting a $200 rebate, washing machines are seeing $175 back and freezers are getting $50 back! That's some serious cash! The only catch is that you have to buy from the list of approved appliances found here (or in retail stores). But there are tons to choose from and the nice part is that a lot of these manufacturers are planning on REALLY making it worth your while to take the plunge into energy efficiency by offering their own sales and incentives, so you can double dip! You also have to shop at an approved retailer. Again, there are tons to choose from... big guys like Sears, Home Depot, Lowe's and Best Buy to independent retailers like Sozio and George Washington Toma.

If you've been wondering how to make the best use of your tax refund, this would be a great way. Not only will you get a great price on a quality machine after sales and rebates, but it will save you money over the long term as well by being energy efficient. Plus you can feel better about doing your part to help the planet! Win-win-win!

If you really want to do this deal, set your alarm for April 22, 10:00 a.m. That's when you can make your reservation online to purchase your appliance(s). This is all done on a first come, first served basis, so be ready!

There's lots of other money-saving -- and of course energy-saving -- advice on MassSave.com. Check it out! And a big thanks to my husband Dan for letting me know about this deal!

BJs: Free 60 Day Pass

 

BJ's Wholesale Club is again offering a FREE 60 day pass to their club! Offer good until July 5, 2010. We did this deal a while ago and it was perfect for us. I seriously doubt you can do it more than once, but if you've never tried BJs, it's a good way to see if BJs would work for your family without having to commit upfront to a long membership.

Click HERE to print your trial pass!

Thanks for the tip, Swaggrabber!

ING Direct: Service Review and $25 To Start Your Account

I posted a while back about using small banks for your everyday banking, as they are aces in customer service. I do admit, however, to breaking my own rule when it comes to saving for a cause.

For us, that cause is buying a home. We are looking to save enough money to have 20% for a down payment on our first house. The faster we get there, the sooner we can start looking, so we knew interest was going to be key. We have a savings account at our credit union which we actively use, but the interest is painfully low. They do offer a decent return in a 30-month CD, but we were (and remain) extremely hesitant to tie that much cash up for two and a half years... just in case. We decided to shop around a couple years ago for a higher interest rate for a savings account we could have access to at any given time, should we need it.

Enter ING Direct. We actually got a mailer from them offering a $25 bonus which was the impetus behind us looking into the details of the ING Orange Savings account. Here is what we found:

The Orange Savings Account

• High Interest - best rate we found at the time.
  
• No Fees, No Minimums - this was imperative to us -- we weren't going to pay to keep our money somewhere. And we didn't start with much, so we needed a no-minimum account.
• No Changing Banks - we just added this account to our existing accounts. We transfer money from our credit union checking account to our ING account.
• FDIC Insured - deposits are FDIC insured up to $250,000, just like any bank.

With that, we opened our account and got started. After a couple of years of being ING customers, we feel we can safely give you a list of pros and cons:

PROS:

1. The interest is significantly higher than our bank's savings account.
2. No minimum balance is required.
3. There are no fees. 
4. We have access to our money, so if we needed to make a withdrawal for some reason, we have the peace of mind to know that we can, unlike a CD.
5. Online transfers are quick and simple.
6. You can link up to your checking account online, so you never have to physically go to the bank.
7. You can set up direct deposit if you'd like.
8. You can also set up regular deposits from your checking account, or you can do them manually one by one (which is what we do).
9. You can view and download tax forms and transaction history online, 24/7.
10. New accounts get a $25 bonus. **see below**

CONS

1. Transfers from checking accounts are not immediate. It takes about 2 business days for your deposits to go through, and five days total to be able to have access to them. (Direct deposits are accessible immediately.)
2. The interest rate continues to drop. We started out at 3.65% APY 26 months ago and we are currently at 1.10% APY. This is reflective of the lousy market in general, our credit union's savings account interest rate has plummeted too. I did check and there are banks that offer savings/money market accounts at over 2% right now, but most of them have specific rules, such as regional limitations, minimums to reach that APY (some as high as $100,000!), crazy restrictions on transactions, etc. For my money (literally) I am sticking with ING.

So overall, I definitely recommend ING Direct. I do hope that the APY will change direction and go back up, but I still have been happy with our return, especially when compared with our credit union's savings account.

**One thing though -- the $25 bonus seems to be gone for new customers unless you are referred by an existing customer. I looked everywhere on their site and can't find the $25 offer for non-referrals. However, you can get the $25 startup bonus by getting a referral email from ING (they get your email address from their existing customer).

If anyone wants to be referred to get their $25 bonus, let me know and I will refer you (I get a smaller bonus as well). If you want me to refer you, either leave your email in the comments here giving me permission to pass it on to ING, or if you prefer, you can email it to me here. You will then get an email from ING. If you open an account by using the link provided in the email, you will get the $25 bonus. You have to use the link provided in the ING email though! You can only open your account once, so make sure you use the email link because if you open it any other way, you don't get the bonus. You can also email me with any questions as well!

Either way, saving your money in a shoebox just isn't cutting it anymore! Why not earn money as you deposit it! High yield savings accounts are a great assistant for saving with a goal in mind and ING Direct is a trusted, proven provider of a high-yield savings account with its Orange Savings Program.

Share and Share Alike

 

No doubt you are already a good sharer. If you grew up with at least one sibling like me, and especially if you were the older of at least one, your mother drilled it into your head that sharing was the right thing to do.

Well did you also know that sharing is the frugal thing to do? (By the way, "frugal" is such an old-fashioned word... we need to come up with something modern and stylish!)

Sharing with others (and by nature of the laws of reciprocation, them sharing with you) is a great way to save money and be able to afford some of the luxuries in life you might otherwise have to do without. It is also an easy and practical way to foster a sense of friendship and community, things that are lacking in much of society these days. It is such an old idea that has gotten lost in the wild world of currency we now live in. Here are some concrete ways to make this tried and true concept work for you:

1. Swap your tomatoes for their cucumbers. If you garden, this is an easy way to score some free produce. You can plan ahead with your neighbors and friends and coordinate who is planting what so that by exchanging, you have a well-rounded supply of produce all season long. You can also do this with flowers -- who doesn't like fresh flowers in their house, and they're expensive to buy! For those who don't have gardens, you can get produce from your friend's garden and in exchange, turn some of it into yummy food that you then give back to them. For example, if you get three dozen apples from your friend, you keep half and use the other half to make apple pies and cakes and canned cinnamon apples and applesauce and give these items back to your friend as "payment" for the apples.
2. Babysit for each other. This is an oldie but a really goodie. Whether it's short term or long term, sharing babysitting services will save tons of money. You can keep it small: you each take one day a week to watch the other one's kids for two hours while they run errands, go to the gym, clean the house, etc. This way you both get some kid-free time each week without any expense and not much hassle. You can stretch that into: a couple times a month, take each other's kids for a few hours on a Saturday night. This you can use for some likely much needed time with your significant other, or for you single parents out there, some likely much needed grown-up time with friends, or even a hot date! You can stretch it even further to accommodate overnights and even vacations! I am a firm believer that as much as we love our kids, we are adults and we need time away from children to reaffirm that. How much time you need varies from person to person, but everyone -- your kids included -- benefits from you recharging and actually missing your kids and looking so forward to giving them a big hug and kiss when you get home!
3. Carpool. Again, an old idea, but I am not just talking about to and from work. It is probably not too far off the mark to assume that you and the people in your neighborhood share schools, churches, go to the same community events, sports practices, etc. Taking turns riding together saves gas and wear and tear on your vehicle and allows for some casual interaction during the ride. You can also take turns carting each other's children to and from school or practice so you don't always have to play chauffeur.
4. If you mow their lawn, they'll wash your car (or whatever floats your boat). There are little services we pay for that really wind up adding up, like lawn care and car washing/detailing. If you hate doing yardwork, say, but delight in Armor All-ing the heck out of a car, you might be able to strike a deal with a like-minded neighbor who has opposite interests. Just make sure the amount of work in one approximates the other so no one feels slighted! Or, you can use this idea on a case-by-case basis. Your neighbor needs his house painted, so you help. He saves money by not having to hire a service and the two of you get it done in no time. Later, you need help building a treehouse for your kids. Who ya gonna call? That's right, your neighbor with the beautifully painted house, who is more than happy to oblige since he really owes you one.
5. Split the cost, and the use. If you are particularly close with a neighbor, you could always go in on a big-ticket item together, like a backyard above ground pool or a sweet swingset and share the use of them. You could set up rules-of-use together and make an agreement as to who gets what if one moves away. Hopefully your friendship will outlast the item! You could also do this with items such as an extra refrigerator or a deep freezer if you share common space with a neighbor (like a shared cellar in a multi-family home) or are willing to open up your garage to them. This could really come in handy if you stockpile-shop but don't have several hundred dollars to shell out upfront for a freezer on your own.
6. If you're a meat-eater, share a cow. Seriously! Being from the East Coast, not much of this (if any?) goes on... in fact I had never even heard of this until I started reading the money-saving blogs. But evidently you can buy a portion of a cow. Once the farmer has the cow entirely sold off, he butchers it and you all share the meat. This is supposed to be a much more economical way to buy your meat, and you can better control the kind of meat you purchase (for example, you can ensure that it is hormone free, grass-fed, free-range and humanely farmed rather than wondering where on earth it came from, how it was treated and what is actually in it). You'll probably need that deep freezer we were talking about in #5.
7. Swap tools. In the old days (a.k.a. the 90s) if you were doing a big project, you went to Home Depot and bought all the tools you needed. Maybe you were the frugal type who actually rented them. It still cost money. Nowadays, it pays to ask around. Maybe you can borrow someone's table saw for your project in exchange for later letting them use your air compressor.

The list of ideas about how sharing can help you save money truly goes on and on. You may have to be a bit careful as to who you are sharing with... make sure you trust them and know them well. But the spirit of sharing is not only a great way to save money in this tough economy, but also is good for the soul. Back in simpler times, this is how things were generally done. And most people agree that simpler times, in the nostalgic sense, were better times. I think many of us could stand to go back to those times and learn a lesson or two about how to make better use of our resources while also encouraging a real sense of community for ourselves and our children. As they say in preschool, sharing is caring!

Do you have any sharing ideas of your own? Please feel free to share them in the comments!!

Entertainment Books Now 50% Off!

I posted a while ago about the Entertainment Books being 40% off... well now they have been reduced to 50% off! Click on the image above to be taken to their website. Enter your zip code to find out the deals that the book can offer you! The book for my area has been slashed to $17.50 -- that in exchange for thousands in coupons for restaurants, travel, and fun places like museums, tours, and shows. Shipping the book to you is free. They also give you a preview of what's included in your book on their site, so check it out!

What Are YOU Saving For?

 
Saving money is awesome. Sorry, but no matter how wealthy I become I will never enjoy the feeling of spending money as much as I do saving it. Some people would say this makes me cheap. I think this makes me smart. If I say so myself.

The thing is, if you are randomly saving with no goal in mind, the saving/spending line becomes kind of blurry. You may think, "oh, I have money in savings, I can spend on this <insert frivolous item here>." Or you may think, "I have X amount in savings, I can take out $1000 and get a new <insert frivolous item here>." You might even lose motivation to save altogether, because your savings account just sits there doing nothing. Your checking account? Now that's exciting. That gets you stuff. That account sees some action.

I've been there, and my savings have suffered for it. When I moved here to Boston five years ago, I had over $5000 in savings and no job. I had nothing but time on my hands and cash in that savings account. And wouldn't you know it, that savings account was all but gone in a matter of a few short months, and I really had essentially nothing to show for it, except a supreme feeling of guilt and shame. In that time I could potentially have doubled that $5000; instead, I squandered it.

It wasn't until I set a savings goal for myself -- to save enough cash to put 20% down on my first home to avoid private mortgage insurance -- that I saw the savings begin to stack up. My husband also came on board. A former non-saver, this savings goal helped clarify for him why he was saving, giving him more motivation and momentum. Every time I check our savings balance and give him the update, I can see in his eyes his excitement and pride at how we are managing to go from being over $15,000 in debt to being at 54% of our savings goal... especially considering we did it in 2.5 years and despite my job loss and having our first child, things that can drastically reduce your income.

There is no trick to it; we are not special. It's literally just asking yourself things like, "what do I want more? To buy this trinket, or to have a house of my own?" The answer comes easier and easier each time. There are techniques that help, of course... things like menu planning, combining coupons with sales, buying generic, reducing trips to restaurants, etc. But we have definitely found that having a stated savings goal is absolutely fundamental in keeping us focused and motivated.

The goal could be anything! Maybe you want to save for your children's college, or a home improvement, or a sweet vacation. Maybe you want to save cash for a car, or for a new camera, or a day at a spa. Whatever motivates you is what's important, because you will be the one saving!

So let's hear it, what are YOU saving for?