After you have the menu, write all the ingredients you need to fulfill it. Then copy the list (or store it on Word). Now, mark out everything you already have on hand. Save the original list and menu. After you do this 12 times, you have three months of menus that you can pick from, copy, cross out what you don't need and head to the store. Double that many menus, and you have 6 months! That's 6 months of not having to think about what to make for dinner, no list making. Just grab and go. Use a blog or grocerygame.com to identify stock piling items on sale at your store and after about 3 months, your grocery bill will start to fall dramatically and you'll have a little extra time as well.
spain is not the best place to try and live for free. the country has many immigrants from north africa and they only choose to stay there because it is better than their own countries.
I would not advise anyone to go to spain without money to survive on!
If anyone is thinking of visiting new zealand then its a great place to go campervaning becaise it is a small country with little population making it easy to find free camping spots!
As always, your articles are excellent. It would be an insult to call what you share "tips". Reading this and most of the links has been the best use of my time in a while. I truely appreciate the finanial/life maturity you share. Most of what you provided here I do, but you have helped me figure out why it works and encourages me (my frugality in large part was forced on me by chronic health problems which meant either live in poverty or find a quality life in frugality). This weekend I am motivated to discuss budgeting with my adult foster son again, but with your insight that it is not constraining in itself (but rather a tool to maximize the use of available resources). Also, you have helped me see the joy in the things I spend much of my money on, I REALLY do enjoy helping my foster son start out in life more than a better car for myself, a little vacation... Thank you for making my life better.
I also had a huge vhs collection i don't need, selling to the local half priced used book store...even if i don't make a lot of money, i get the great feeling of an almost empty garage :)
So happy to find out about this site! I couchsurfed around the world over the past year and wish I had known about HERmail sooner so that I could have connected on a more personal level with the foreign cultures. I know now and am signing up for sure!
first of all dont think all papa murphys establishments function like the one you visited. I have worked at a papa murphys for 2 years and we function quickly and efficiently. balancing people who order in the store and people who order over the phone is a difficult task and a managable one at that. Your issues should not be with papa murphys as a franchise, it should be with the specific store you had this bad experience with. If you wanted compensation for your loss of time, TALK TO A MANAGER, they will work something out for you. As employees we try our best to keep everyone happy. So next time you go to a papa murphys voice your concerns to a manager, he/she will happily listen to your issues.
I got netspend account and I love it! Since I hate credict card so i apply for a netspend account so everytime i want to purchase something online I go to a local western union depoist the money and wala i buy my item online! memeber since 4 years
I have traveled to a few countries and I can say most people don't know what 'poor' truly is until you're in parts of Asia or India.
In our 'rich' nations today, you're only poor if you live beyond your means which basically is many of our peers. I'm forever grateful for my parents and my grandparents who taught me to live well below my means.
Material wealth in most cases are just crap. A happy healthy life is a wealthy life.
I bought a slightly used upright commercial freezer for my CSA veggies that were going bad. It was $400, which I consider well-spent. It's about the floor-space of a regular upright freezer, but I don't know exactly how much it holds.
I bought 1 butchered pig last November from my certified organic CSA for $279, and 1/4 beef (about 135lbs) in February from a local farmer for about $2.65/lb. We got chops, and ground meat, and steaks, and ham and the best bacon I have ever had. This is delicious beef, pasture-fed with local, organic grain supplementation in the winter. No antibiotics, no funky hormones, nothing that I would worry about feeding my family.
We've also purchased 18 certified organic chickens from my CSA this summer for $2.65/lb, butchered, whole. We have only eaten two chickens to date, both delicious.
The freezer held all that, plus 2 shelves of processed veggies and assorted other stuff.
It has fed us (my husband, my 2yr-old daughter, my mother, and I) until now (the end of September). My husband would eat red meat at every meal if I would let him, so it's not surprising that we would go through that much meat.
We haven't had trouble with freezer burn, and anything that looks iffy I throw in stew. We eat funky bits, but really didn't get any from our processor. I have to confess I drew the line at the enormous beef liver, which I intend to grind at home and make up into dog food.
We have had a couple of power outages, but the commercial freezer never let it get above 30F, even when the power was out in July for nearly 24 hrs.
We don't buy other meat (which is great, because my husband has been laid off since the end of May), except for twice this summer, rainbow trout from the farmer's market.
Our electricity usage has not noticeably gone up, although the rates have gone up.
I make soup out of odds and ends at least once a week, and if I have extra soup, I freeze it for later. This way, people can take it for lunch and reheat it, or we can eat leftovers long later. ;)
We always start our meal planning by looking at the fruit bowl, the fridge, and the garden to see what needs to be used up before it goes bad.
Thise last year we've been trying to make one new pressure cooker recipe every week - we got a couple excellent cookbooks (I love Lorna Sass) and we're not all the way through them.
THEN we think of other things we just feel like eating (the four year old gets to choose one meal a week), check the pantry & fridge to make sure we have everything for the list of meals, and make the shopping list.
It sounds complicated, but now that I am used to it, I think it's actually easier than sitting down on Sunday and thinking "What will I want to eat on Wednesday?" And we had a goal this summer of eating out once a week, to help the local restaurants and get out of our rut...but we keep not doing it because we have garden produce that needs eating, at home.
The key point about what Pam says (and the downfall for many people who "invest" in collections is: "when the time comes, you can sell them..." If you can't/won't sell what you collect when you want/need the money, you won't be realizing any financial returns on your investment.
The article about the postal worker/book collector is an excellent, if extreme, example: the guy had amassed a collection of books worth, conservatively, $300,000 in 1984, but it had taken over his life in ways that don't at all seem healthy, and it didn't seem like he got to enjoy the financial reward of his efforts--even if he did enjoy the intrinsic rewards of his hobby.
Far closer to home, my dad was also a collector of certain things: mostly rare books, but also coins, some art prints and other memorabilia associated with his hobbies in history and railroading, etc. He passed away this spring, and now all this "stuff", which is not really well stored in our basement, is more of a burden for my mom than a source of financial security. She's not even at the point in the grieving process to deal with it, and when she is, she'll probably have to dispose of it in lots, at a fraction of what it would be worth if it were divested in a more systematic fashion.
I certainly wouldn't begrudge my dad his hobbies or the collections associated with them, and there's some possibility that the collections may at least break even in terms of what was spent on them. Fortunately, my dad also had plenty invested in much more liquid assets!
I don't think sites like this (and Couchsurfing, and Hospitality Club, etc.) are about making money, but instead about providing a social and safe network for travelers and those wishing to meet/guide/host/talk to travelers.
Thanks for the article! I'm very active on Couchsurfing, which is mostly hosting and visiting, but I like that this site has an emphasis on locale questions, advice, and the like!
@Dan Also, I have to agree on stock photography as a no-go. I used to be a photographer and had some good work with an agency, didn't make a dime. However, I did make good money with seniors, weddings, freelance, etc. That's where the money is. That is, if you have the equipment and skills already. B/c the equipment isn't cheap.
I don't understand people's comments about why they should have to pay back a bank when their house isn't worth how much they owe. Here's the reason...because the amount you owe is the amount the bank paid the person from whom you purchased the house. When you buy a new car, most people are immediately upside down on that purchase...do you plan to not pay the bank back all that money either? And then you wonder why it has become harder to get a loan. Why would any business continue to make loans knowing that nobody takes responsibility for paying them back...and then blame the banks for making the loans in the first place.
If you take money from someone...you pay it back based on the terms you agreed to...plain and simple. If you don't like the terms, don't sign the paperwork.
@dan Agreed on the stock photography. Not worth it. I used to be a photographer and have a number of very good images with stock agencies for a while and didn't get anything from them. Dollar stock (istock) has killed hte market. It's great for bloggers though to buy images! :) Freelance gigs, seniors, or weddings is where the money is if you already have the camera gear and skills.
Lawn moving was always my favorite growing up. Adults can do it to and make a pretty penny.
I needed a tutor for my daughter this summer. I couldn't believe how much they make - we paid $55 per hour. This is almost double what I make per hour at my job, but we paid it because she needed the help. Good idea for part time income for someone qualified. . . and patient! :)
After you have the menu, write all the ingredients you need to fulfill it. Then copy the list (or store it on Word). Now, mark out everything you already have on hand. Save the original list and menu. After you do this 12 times, you have three months of menus that you can pick from, copy, cross out what you don't need and head to the store. Double that many menus, and you have 6 months! That's 6 months of not having to think about what to make for dinner, no list making. Just grab and go. Use a blog or grocerygame.com to identify stock piling items on sale at your store and after about 3 months, your grocery bill will start to fall dramatically and you'll have a little extra time as well.
spain is not the best place to try and live for free. the country has many immigrants from north africa and they only choose to stay there because it is better than their own countries.
I would not advise anyone to go to spain without money to survive on!
If anyone is thinking of visiting new zealand then its a great place to go campervaning becaise it is a small country with little population making it easy to find free camping spots!
As always, your articles are excellent. It would be an insult to call what you share "tips". Reading this and most of the links has been the best use of my time in a while. I truely appreciate the finanial/life maturity you share. Most of what you provided here I do, but you have helped me figure out why it works and encourages me (my frugality in large part was forced on me by chronic health problems which meant either live in poverty or find a quality life in frugality). This weekend I am motivated to discuss budgeting with my adult foster son again, but with your insight that it is not constraining in itself (but rather a tool to maximize the use of available resources). Also, you have helped me see the joy in the things I spend much of my money on, I REALLY do enjoy helping my foster son start out in life more than a better car for myself, a little vacation... Thank you for making my life better.
Yes, i agree, i have tons and tons of books...
I also had a huge vhs collection i don't need, selling to the local half priced used book store...even if i don't make a lot of money, i get the great feeling of an almost empty garage :)
Thanks
So happy to find out about this site! I couchsurfed around the world over the past year and wish I had known about HERmail sooner so that I could have connected on a more personal level with the foreign cultures. I know now and am signing up for sure!
first of all dont think all papa murphys establishments function like the one you visited. I have worked at a papa murphys for 2 years and we function quickly and efficiently. balancing people who order in the store and people who order over the phone is a difficult task and a managable one at that. Your issues should not be with papa murphys as a franchise, it should be with the specific store you had this bad experience with. If you wanted compensation for your loss of time, TALK TO A MANAGER, they will work something out for you. As employees we try our best to keep everyone happy. So next time you go to a papa murphys voice your concerns to a manager, he/she will happily listen to your issues.
I got netspend account and I love it! Since I hate credict card so i apply for a netspend account so everytime i want to purchase something online I go to a local western union depoist the money and wala i buy my item online! memeber since 4 years
I have traveled to a few countries and I can say most people don't know what 'poor' truly is until you're in parts of Asia or India.
In our 'rich' nations today, you're only poor if you live beyond your means which basically is many of our peers. I'm forever grateful for my parents and my grandparents who taught me to live well below my means.
Material wealth in most cases are just crap. A happy healthy life is a wealthy life.
I bought a slightly used upright commercial freezer for my CSA veggies that were going bad. It was $400, which I consider well-spent. It's about the floor-space of a regular upright freezer, but I don't know exactly how much it holds.
I bought 1 butchered pig last November from my certified organic CSA for $279, and 1/4 beef (about 135lbs) in February from a local farmer for about $2.65/lb. We got chops, and ground meat, and steaks, and ham and the best bacon I have ever had. This is delicious beef, pasture-fed with local, organic grain supplementation in the winter. No antibiotics, no funky hormones, nothing that I would worry about feeding my family.
We've also purchased 18 certified organic chickens from my CSA this summer for $2.65/lb, butchered, whole. We have only eaten two chickens to date, both delicious.
The freezer held all that, plus 2 shelves of processed veggies and assorted other stuff.
It has fed us (my husband, my 2yr-old daughter, my mother, and I) until now (the end of September). My husband would eat red meat at every meal if I would let him, so it's not surprising that we would go through that much meat.
We haven't had trouble with freezer burn, and anything that looks iffy I throw in stew. We eat funky bits, but really didn't get any from our processor. I have to confess I drew the line at the enormous beef liver, which I intend to grind at home and make up into dog food.
We have had a couple of power outages, but the commercial freezer never let it get above 30F, even when the power was out in July for nearly 24 hrs.
We don't buy other meat (which is great, because my husband has been laid off since the end of May), except for twice this summer, rainbow trout from the farmer's market.
Our electricity usage has not noticeably gone up, although the rates have gone up.
I make soup out of odds and ends at least once a week, and if I have extra soup, I freeze it for later. This way, people can take it for lunch and reheat it, or we can eat leftovers long later. ;)
I appreciate this. I have a friend who I talk to alot, and he NEEEEEEEDSSSSS the advice from Four Pillar about selecting a good tenant.
I will be sending it to him immediately. :)
Great post and lots of great ideas.
One other to add to the mix is affiliate marketing if you have a sales and marketing bent.
These opportunities are about representing someone elses products or services and they also require no set up costs and are free to start.
To have a look at how they work have a look at
this link.
I'm not suggesting that you necessarily become an affiliate of One Sherpa but seeing an example can often help people grasp the opportunity.
Please note: Best to be an affiliate in something you're naturally passionate about becasue its a representation business.
We always start our meal planning by looking at the fruit bowl, the fridge, and the garden to see what needs to be used up before it goes bad.
Thise last year we've been trying to make one new pressure cooker recipe every week - we got a couple excellent cookbooks (I love Lorna Sass) and we're not all the way through them.
THEN we think of other things we just feel like eating (the four year old gets to choose one meal a week), check the pantry & fridge to make sure we have everything for the list of meals, and make the shopping list.
It sounds complicated, but now that I am used to it, I think it's actually easier than sitting down on Sunday and thinking "What will I want to eat on Wednesday?" And we had a goal this summer of eating out once a week, to help the local restaurants and get out of our rut...but we keep not doing it because we have garden produce that needs eating, at home.
The key point about what Pam says (and the downfall for many people who "invest" in collections is: "when the time comes, you can sell them..." If you can't/won't sell what you collect when you want/need the money, you won't be realizing any financial returns on your investment.
The article about the postal worker/book collector is an excellent, if extreme, example: the guy had amassed a collection of books worth, conservatively, $300,000 in 1984, but it had taken over his life in ways that don't at all seem healthy, and it didn't seem like he got to enjoy the financial reward of his efforts--even if he did enjoy the intrinsic rewards of his hobby.
Far closer to home, my dad was also a collector of certain things: mostly rare books, but also coins, some art prints and other memorabilia associated with his hobbies in history and railroading, etc. He passed away this spring, and now all this "stuff", which is not really well stored in our basement, is more of a burden for my mom than a source of financial security. She's not even at the point in the grieving process to deal with it, and when she is, she'll probably have to dispose of it in lots, at a fraction of what it would be worth if it were divested in a more systematic fashion.
I certainly wouldn't begrudge my dad his hobbies or the collections associated with them, and there's some possibility that the collections may at least break even in terms of what was spent on them. Fortunately, my dad also had plenty invested in much more liquid assets!
Granted...they do need money to keep the sites running...most of these kinds of things are funded by donations and lots of volunteers...
I don't think sites like this (and Couchsurfing, and Hospitality Club, etc.) are about making money, but instead about providing a social and safe network for travelers and those wishing to meet/guide/host/talk to travelers.
Thanks for the article! I'm very active on Couchsurfing, which is mostly hosting and visiting, but I like that this site has an emphasis on locale questions, advice, and the like!
Remindng me to plan is a very good thing. Having a list helps me to not overspend. I also must remember not to shop when hungry...mmmm!
@Dan Also, I have to agree on stock photography as a no-go. I used to be a photographer and had some good work with an agency, didn't make a dime. However, I did make good money with seniors, weddings, freelance, etc. That's where the money is. That is, if you have the equipment and skills already. B/c the equipment isn't cheap.
That is an intereting concept. I wonder how they make any money?
I don't understand people's comments about why they should have to pay back a bank when their house isn't worth how much they owe. Here's the reason...because the amount you owe is the amount the bank paid the person from whom you purchased the house. When you buy a new car, most people are immediately upside down on that purchase...do you plan to not pay the bank back all that money either? And then you wonder why it has become harder to get a loan. Why would any business continue to make loans knowing that nobody takes responsibility for paying them back...and then blame the banks for making the loans in the first place.
If you take money from someone...you pay it back based on the terms you agreed to...plain and simple. If you don't like the terms, don't sign the paperwork.
Lawn moving was always my favorite growing up. That's something adults can do too.
Lod
the liquid ice... is actually can of air which u just turn around and ice comes out lol
@dan Agreed on the stock photography. Not worth it. I used to be a photographer and have a number of very good images with stock agencies for a while and didn't get anything from them. Dollar stock (istock) has killed hte market. It's great for bloggers though to buy images! :) Freelance gigs, seniors, or weddings is where the money is if you already have the camera gear and skills.
Lawn moving was always my favorite growing up. Adults can do it to and make a pretty penny.
Lod
love this idea of a dry erase board! thx
I needed a tutor for my daughter this summer. I couldn't believe how much they make - we paid $55 per hour. This is almost double what I make per hour at my job, but we paid it because she needed the help. Good idea for part time income for someone qualified. . . and patient! :)