• Thanksgiving

    Thanksgiving Already? Stop the Hustle and Choose What is Better

    Thanksgiving is next week already, but that doesn’t mean it’s time to kick it into the high-stress, high-gear, faster-than-the-speed-of-life mentality to start off the holiday season! It can be easy to get wrapped up in making the preparations – so wrapped up, in fact, that you ignore the people who are there to see you, not just eat your food!

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  • Cake Decorating

    Budget Cake Decorating for Non-Artists

    With all the ready-made tubes of colored decorating icing and gel available in the grocery store’s birthday cakes section, you’d think it would be fast and easy to decorate a birthday cake yourself.  But what happens if you can’t draw? It may be a great intention to make a frugal birthday or baby shower cake at home, that is- if the horses and flowers you draw on top of the cake really look like horses and flowers. Mine look like “The Scream” from the famous Edvard Munch painting. Not a pretty sight! You want an inexpensive cake that agrees with your grocery budget, but that doesn’t look like your school-aged…

  • Kitchen Tips

    Go Green and Save on Shipping with Popcorn

    Kitchen Tip: Pop edible popcorn to use as packing material! The holidays are fast approaching and many of us will be packing up boxes of presents to mail out to loved ones.  Shipping materials can be expensive to purchase and usually are made of plastics that aren’t the friendliest on the environment.  There are many fillers that are used, such as styrofoam packing peanuts, plastic bubble wrap, plastic pellets, plastic bags filled with air, and newspaper.  Even used plastic grocery shopping bags can be used as stuffing in packages to keep items in place!  However, there is a better, cheaper, more environmentally friendly material to use as a packing material, and it’s in…

  • Frugal Living

    Save Money and Paper with Kids' Gift Tags

    Say Goodbye to Cards and Hello to Gift Tags! Large families mean a lot of birthdays, and a lot of birthdays mean a lot  of parties to attend.  Parties mean presents and cards.  A card to each person, and sometimes even a card on each gift for the same person, adds up to a lot of greeting cards going around. Giving birthday or other cards to adults is socially acceptable and expected; after all, many adults like to read and keep cards as keepsakes.  However, is it socially expected to give a card to each child with a gift? I first took this into consideration when my husband and I…

  • Time Management

    Photo Cards for Time Saving Thank You Cards!

    Thank you cards can take a lot of time to write out, address, stamp, and mail. Use your photo for the front of a custom photo card.

  • Easter

    Frugal Easter Baskets

    Frugal Easter Baskets Here is how I made 2 cute frugal Easter baskets for my kids while keeping the costs down (hurray Walmart for the supplies; some of you who have Walgreens and CVS may do better finding your deals there). The supplies: · Easter grass x 2 bags = $2.00 · Plastic Easter eggs 48pk =$1.68 · 2 wicker baskets = $0.00 · Jelly beans (in eggs)= $ .50 · Chocolate bunny = $ .94 · Easter jump rope = $1.00 · Mini pastel bibles x2 = $4.94 · Pennies (inside eggs) = $ .14 · Bunny = $0.00 Total cost of supplies for 2 Easter baskets = $11.20.…