This month I came in under budget by just $2.09! As much as I love grocery shopping and doing hauls, April was kind of close for me. In May I would like to save up some of the budget for bulk buying. The next few months will be very busy for both of us, so I will probably pull a few no-spend weeks or lay off on the sale shopping for a bit.

2. Line dried two loads of laundry.

3. Garden: harvested lettuce and asparagus this week! Planted onions, lettuce, carrots and mangel beets (thanks to the reader who suggested the mangels!). I also bought some liatris corms at Tractor Supply for $5.00 and planted them in the garden with some landscaping fabric. We tilled up the "market garden" half of last year's garden, but I will not be planting the entire thing. Instead, I might do a few rows of flowers or perennials using landscape fabric as weed control. The rest will be planted in a green manure or cover crop, just so the whole thing isn't covered in weeds next year. My plan is to gradually add a row or two of perennials each year until the whole thing is full and growing relatively maintenance-free every year.

In addition to planting, I also collected several wheelbarrows full of grass clippings to use as mulch. I used this to mulch the strawberries, delphiniums, kale, and some of my raised beds. The rest is in a pile, and I will use that to mulch other plants when they start to germinate. In addition to mulching, I also moved some chicken manure up to the garden compost pile to rot. About half the manure went into my still-being-developed raised beds for sheet composting.

Last year, we started just weed whacking between my raised beds instead of weeding or laying down plastic or mulch. It makes the beds look GREAT, and only takes five minutes every other week or so during the summer. Really no different than mowing the lawn. This year I am going to do the same thing with my row garden crops. Anything that isn't mulched is just going to be weed whacked (that is, between the rows). I just don't have time to weed walkway paths, and the mowed grass look is attractive, in my opinion.

4. Collected cans while walking. We also recycled my growing stash of cans this week and earned $11.10!

5. Redeemed $20.00 of Ibotta money for an Amazon gift certificate. I've been working on that $20.00 for about five months now! My average weekly rebate money was $1.00 per week, but in reality it was more like one $0.25 rebate per week plus one big rebate ($3.00-$5.00) per month. If you're looking for quick ways to get more Ibotta rebates, use the restaurant or department/craft store rebates. Like any coupon or rebate, make sure the purchase is one you would have made anyway. I used two craft store rebates on fabric to reupholster our RV cushions, and used a couple for restaurants on our weekly date nights.

6. Went to more garage sales! I spent about $20.00 and bought many needed items and also some cool stuff that I didn't really need. I also found some free tomato cages for the garden!! I am hoping to get up a garage sale haul/philosophy video on Youtube to talk a little more about what I bought and my approach to saving money at garage sales.

7. Made cheese, yogurt, and bone broth. Some of our meals this week were carrot/broccoli stir fry, ham & potato soup, quiche, tacos, chicken noodle soup, pizza, chili and leftovers. I've started a little meal series on Youtube explaining what we have for dinner on each night of the week. Last week I featured Monday's meal; explained how and where I got the ingredients, and how to make the meal. Those of you who watch my hauls might wonder how I came up with a variety of healthy meals if I spent all of my grocery money this week on cheese, a tomato, two boxes of mac 'n' cheese and a bag of candy.

I explain more about this shopping method in my book. It's a "feast or famine" type of grocery shopping. Instead of buying five items at retail price and one item on sale, I buy six things on sale. Then when I get home, my "item of the week" is put in the pantry or freezer and I use it up little by little, over the course of weeks or months, until it is gone. It's probably possible to eat for $10.00 per week (or your state's equivalent) buying everything full price, but it would be a SUPER boring menu with just rice and beans all the time. Hubs and I eat meat, cheese, and produce every day!

People seem to think that feeding two people for $20.00 per week is some sadistic type of deprivation. It's not. It's extremely systematic, and once you get the "system" down, sliding in under budget is an act of creativity and competition with yourself. For me, it's a game that is super, super fun. 

Some other things I try to highlight in my hauls are using coupons, rebates and free stuff to buy high value items that would otherwise be unaffordable. You might also be interested in part two of my "Eat for $10.00 per Week" video series. It's about extracting even MORE value from your $10.00 worth of meat, grains, milk, and produce every week.

8. One last thing... the toilet is finally flushing again! Last week I was cleaning the bathroom, and accidentally knocked an eyeliner pencil into the toilet. Normally this wouldn't be an issue, but I had finished swishing the inside, and was in the process of flushing all the gunk down. The pencil went down the hole before I even had a chance to fish it out. Oh bummer. I thought for sure we would have to take the toilet apart in order to get it working properly. Hubs thought the pencil might "break down" in there. I had my doubts.

We spent the week plunging to assist every flush. Sometimes it took several flushes and plunges to get you-know-what down. I used a lot of homemade toilet spray. Oh dear! You never know what you have until it's gone. Or rather, you never know what you DON'T have until it sits there all day.

On Friday, Hubs had an idea. "Do you have any lye?" he asked.

"Of course I have lye! I'm a soap maker," I said. He dumped a bunch of it down the toilet, and we resumed our activities for the evening. The next morning we celebrated our first unassisted flush in a whole week. I can't tell you what a joy it is to watch all of the contents go down like they are supposed to. YAY FOR LYE DRAIN CLEANER!!!

Perhaps that was all a little TMI for some of you, but I share the story to help out fellow flushers who might be in need. It could have saved us a week of plunging.

Til next time,
-Bethany

Hi everyone! My weekly post is a little late, but better late than never.

1. Shopping: We went to Aldi this week, and I spent $14.31. You can watch my haul video below:

​2. Printed more pages for my daily planner. Last year I made a little planner out of a small three-ring binder, and made customized planner pages with meal plans, egg count and/or milk production from my goat, exercise and other things I think are worth writing down. At the bottom of each page, I even made a place for frugal accomplishments! I've looked into buying planners, but none of them are customized as I like, plus they cost money (like $5.00 and up). I think I got my little binder at a garage sale.

3. Garden stuff: I spent a lot of time this week in the garden. I transplanted some strawberry plants into my raised bed(s), transplanted some raspberry canes into the chicken pasture, and saved some volunteer cilantro in pots before Hubs tilled an area. Most of my garden is in raised beds, but I will be planting sweet corn, lettuce and carrots in a traditional tilled patch. I also moved manure from the chicken coop up to the garden (this will be compost for later!) and planted some lettuce seeds in a pot on the porch.

I am hoping to do a Youtube garden update to show you all the wonderful things that have come up without any work on my part. There are so many fruits, herbs and flowers that only need planted once, and they will come up year after year. I spent $4.00 on strawberry roots the first year we were married, and my plan is to just keep on transplanting those as long as possible. I brought over some raspberry canes from my parents' house (purchased when I was a teenager), and those too have just kept multiplying... for free. A lot of people plant vegetable gardens every year, but I think the BIG money can be saved on fruit, herbs, and flowers. Not only are they a better investment, but they're a lot less work. I've literally had some of my plants for ten years, and they are still saving me money. If you divide the cost of a $3.00 plant between 10 years, you only have to save $0.30 per year to break even. If you spend that money on perennial seeds and get 10 plants, the packet will pay for itself in just three years. 

4. Line dried two loads of laundry.

5. Went to three garage sales! I was able to cross two things off my list; a recipe card holder (for herbal recipes) and a kiddie pool for my ducks. I also found three shirts, sewing notions, plastic disposable dinnerware, party streamers and a spatula. 

When I'm at garage sales, I try to only get stuff that I would buy anyway. Thread is one thing I find myself buying retail, even for little projects that don't need a whole $2.00 spool. So frustrating! I love when I can get four or five colors for a mere $0.25. Another thing I try to buy is consumables like paper products. Usually I don't buy clothes at garage sales unless they are very cheap. The shirts I got were $0.25 and $0.10 each.

The ducks sure loved their new pond!

​6. Saved some restaurant coupons from an ad we got in the mail.

7. Collected cans while on my walks. This week was great; I probably got at least $2.00 worth of cans.

8. Sold my baby goats! I ended up selling them for $75.00 each. Two are going as pets, and one as a breeding buck. $75.00 x 3 = $225.00. That is going to be really good for my hobby farm finances!

I think that's about it for this week. How did you do in the frugal department?

2. Made sugar-free peanut butter cookies. For sweetener, I used honey and xylitol. At first taste, the cookies were very bland. After they had cooled down, though, they tasted better. I am going to try this recipe again with normal peanut butter (not the "natural" kind that separates) and see if it helps with the dryness. The cookies were pretty frugal because they didn't call for any butter.

3. Juiced and stored free limes. Remember my free limes from last week? I decided to juice half of the limes right away, and I put the other half in a sealed ziplock bag in the fridge. They are supposed to last for several weeks this way, and I enjoy using fresh lime juice on tacos, meat etc.

4. Dried celery leaves and ends to use in soup. I made a Youtube video about it here. I like drying celery because you don't have to use up more room in the fridge/freezer, plus the flavor holds very well.

​5. Line dried two loads of laundry.

6. Some flowers that I planted from seed last year are coming back up! I chose several different flower varieties to grow from seed last year, and most of them did poorly. I decided to not grow any flowers from seed this year because it was not worth my time. However, I didn't realize that my delphiniums were perennials!! Now I have seven big, healthy delphinium plants that will provide a whole passel of cut flowers this summer. 

The picture above on the left shows what my plants looked like in mid-May of last year. The picture on the right shows what they look like now, in mid-April! Next year I want to grow the rest of the delphinium seeds I still have. In the future I will also try to purchase more seeds that are perennials. This will eliminate a lot of seed starting from year to year, but also help my build up my plant supply for pennies.

7. DIDN'T use some high-value coupons I had. Several months ago I received seven coupons for "free" items from a group of online stores. When I determined the cost of shipping though, at $13.00-$17.00 per item, the coupons weren't worth using. Most were for items that I can make myself or buy at garage sales for much less.

I think that's about it for this week! What were some of your frugal accomplishments?

Hi everyone! Today I wanted to let you know that I'm expanding my Youtube channel. I have been working on some improvements over the past few days, and added a few non-grocery-haul videos that you may be interested in.


For All You Visual Folks...

My goal over the summer is to upload as many videos as possible in order to add a visual element to my blog. I'm certainly no TV personality, but some of the concepts I discuss here are just better seen in person than read about. I'm also hoping to expand on concepts and techniques that I talk about in The Housewife's Guide to Frugal Food.

If you are a Youtube viewer and enjoy watching my videos, please don't hesitate to "like" and subscribe to my channel. Thanks!

-Bethany

Okay, so it's a new-to-us car. But compared to what we WERE driving (see the picture above), it might as well be brand new. I think it's interesting how each family has a different approach to vehicles. Some drive old beaters, some drive brand new cars but keep them for 20 years, some people buy a new used car every few years, and some people hold on to leased cars or cars on payments, for whatever reason. Some people don't have any car at all, which is totally cool!

Living in the country, in Michigan, has its advantages, but having a 10 mile distance between you and town is not one of them. So, we drive cars. And trucks, and motorcycles. If it's a nice day, I will ride my bike within a radius of five or six miles.


Our Automotive History

Until last spring, we were essentially a one-car family. That's not including the motorcycle, or the old sports car that Hubs has (we don't drive it very often... like, a few times per year). So mostly we drove around the big diesel truck that Hubs used for work. During the winter of 2014/15, we purchased a car for $6000.00 and drove that around for a few months. When springtime came, Hubs re-sold the car for $6000.00.

When Hubs hired someone to do deliveries for him, we discovered that our primary vehicle was gone quite often! There were a few times when Mr. Delivery would pull in with the truck and trailer, and Hubs would quick unhook the trailer so we could leave in the truck. That was not a good system.

Hubs, being the resourceful man that he is, literally pulled an old car out of the weeds in our backyard. It was a manual transmission, 1991 Saturn that he drove several years prior (and probably hadn't drove since). To his surprise, the thing actually started up! He drove up by the house, loud and proud.  But I noticed that something was wrong with the car. The back two wheels weren't turning. Instead, they left deep ruts in the yard as Hubs dragged along. "I think there's something wrong with the back wheels," I said.

"Oh, they're just locked up. I'm sure they will loosen up after a little bit of driving!" He pulled out of the driveway, onto the black top, and headed down the road... leaving two dark black tire marks behind him. He came back not as confident as he left. "Well, I guess I will need to work on it a bit."

To his delight and my amazement, the car did loosen up after an afternoon of work and test-driving. I was still scared to ride with him, though. I mean, it was the car from the weeds. The speedometer didn't work, the headliner was falling down in my face, and as we drove along, pieces of plastic interior would start to rattle, making it hard to hear each other. I asked him how many miles the car had, and he said he didn't know. The odometer quit working before he got it. Every now and then, the putrid odor of feces would come through the heat/air vents. "What is that smell?" I asked him.

"Oh, I think there's a mouse nest under the hood. I'll have to look at that."

Eventually I "learned" to drive the car; everything from buckling my two-part seat belt, rolling down the window so it wouldn't get stuck, maneuvering with powerless power steering (which is worse than no power steering at all!) and guessing my speed by RPMs. I actually came to like the little car. It was a lot smaller than the truck with fewer blind spots, plus it got better gas mileage. I think.


Time For an Upgrade

Alas, the time came late this winter when I was ready for an upgrade. After several longish trips without heat (Hubs corrected me; the heat worked, but the fan that blew the heat did not work) in the dead of winter, I had made up my mind that we wouldn't drive it through another December. "The fan works," Hubs said. "You just have to plug in that wire under the dash. On your side. It should work if you make sure it's plugged in." After feeling around for several minutes hunched over and getting carsick, I found the plug and plugged it in. Still nothing.

Several weeks later, we were caught in a storm on the freeway. All of a sudden, Hubs' windshield wiper came completely OFF the windshield and started flapping against the driver side window. He thought it was funny. I didn't think it was very funny. Thankfully we reached our destination with limited visibility.

I think the flapping windshield wiper was really the straw that broke the camel's back for me. I could live with the broken speedometer, ratty interior (pun intended) and no power steering. But I had no desire to be a backseat mechanic, just wondering what would stop working next. I didn't like driving it at night because the "brights" were more like fog lights on a normal vehicle. One blinker still didn't work. It was time for an upgrade, for real. 

​
A New (Used) Car

When we go car shopping, we try to stay away from the dealerships and just use Craigslist. Hubs has enough mechanical understanding to spot major problems, and most owners are pretty honest. Hubs loves looking for cars, so he made it his part-time job for a few weeks to find a new car for us.

In the end, we bought a 2011 Impala for $4050.00 after taxes/fees. It is a newer car by our standards, but has a lot of miles; hence the lower price tag. Thus far, we are very happy with our new automobile! It has heated seats and a remote start (awesome for Michiganders), as well as the elements I had requested: a working speedometer, working power steering, no rattling interior, no poop smell, heat that works, and one-step seat belts! It also has an automatic transmission and functioning no-crank windows, which is a bonus.

"Do you realize," I asked Hubs, "that we made a 20-year leap in cars? Most people will upgrade by five or ten years, but we upgraded by 20 years!"

"Yeah. That's pretty cool," Hubs replied.


Frugality vs. Safety and Risk

I realize that not everyone is going to drive a free car that they pulled from the weeds. But honestly, I am kind of going to miss driving around our Saturn. It was so... frugal.

There comes a time when frugality competes with safety, and safety wins. Each person and family must decide for themselves what is "safe", because definitions for that word vary so much. Some people think eating soybean oil is dangerous. Some people think going to Mexico is dangerous. Some people think going to Detroit is dangerous. I am a firm, firm believer that safety is relative. It changes with every decade and physical location. Back in the day, toxic pesticides were used freely. Even today, many European countries have banned GMO crops while we Americans are partaking freely- even celebrating them*. 

Obviously, when opinions differ on what is safe and what isn't, arguments can occur. Judging can occur. The self-appointed safety police come out of the woodwork and make the risk-takers feel bad. Meanwhile, the risk-takers start mocking the safety police for being such prudes. Oh dear, what a hornet's nest.

Any frugal person will probably face the safety vs. frugality issue at one point or another. That is YOUR decision to make for your family; not anyone else's. My encouragement is to carefully evaluate risk vs. benefit (whether that is financial or something else) and make an educated decision that you can be proud of. 

Note: There was another reason we bought the car, too. I talked about that in my last email newsletter! You can subscribe to my monthly newsletter here.

**While I do partake, I wouldn't go so far as to celebrate GMOs.

1. Shopping: I spent $22.44 this week on groceries. This was a little over budget for us (we do $10/person/week) but HAM was on sale! You can watch my Kroger haul below, and my Walmart haul here. ​

This week I spent almost as much money at Walmart, even though I got fewer items. That's because I shopped at Walmart for items that I "needed". Conventional wisdom is to always shop with a list. I don't make my list based around a meal plan or what we are going to use in the next week, like most people do. Instead, I make a list of what will be the best value at the store each week for my $20.00. I always spend more money on items that I urgently need, because I don't have time to wait for sales and coupons with those. 

I have been working a little harder at Kroger eCouponing (is that a thing?) but it's difficult because I have to "clip" the coupons on my phone, then write all of those coupons down, and then match my coupon list (with expiration dates) to sales. This week I saved $0.70 with eCoupons, and got two free items with additional eCoupons. These coupons were for vegetables, cream cheese, salsa, and a sugar-free/grain-free snack bar. Coupons are not just for junk food!

Note: I uploaded my videos without music this week. Sorry about the furnace going in the background! 

2. Sold two bars of soap and seven dozen eggs. My husband actually sold most of this to HIS customers! I think he is a better salesman than I am. :) It is so nice to have some hobby farm income again.

3. Made yogurt. I also used my discount ham to make ham broth for future meals. It was really easy to do- I just put the ham bone, some chicken feet, water and apple cider vinegar in the Instant Pot and let it do its thing.

4. FREE LIMES! My mom brought over three bags of limes to share with me. Over the weekend we had two potlucks, so I used some of the limes to make key lime pie. I am looking forward to finding uses for other two+ bags. What is your favorite way to use limes?

5. Scavenged a graham cracker crust. I was going to buy graham crackers, or a pre-made graham cracker crust for my key lime pie, but instead I used the crust from a boxed cheesecake mix that I had.

6. Collected cans. I have been trying to walk at least a mile every day for health reasons. This has been pretty profitable in terms of cans. If I vary my route, I can get at least two or three cans (worth $0.10 each). One day I walked two miles and came home with at least $1.00 worth! It doesn't sound like a lot, but 3 cans x 5 days = $1.50 per week. I think most weeks I can get more than that, especially if mix things up with a 3-4 mile bike ride here and there. 

7. Modified a piece of clothing to make it last longer.

8. Watched a show on Netflix. For the past few weeks we have been watching "The Great British Bake Show". The first season was excellent! The show is very clean, educational, but still fun to watch because of the competitive nature. The second season has been less interesting (I feel like they were not as picky about their contestants), but still fun to watch.

I think that is about it for the week! What were some of your frugal accomplishments?

WE HAVE GOAT BABIES!!!

Goats: A Trio of Boys

Adi finally had her kids! Technically they were born in April (2nd), but I'm putting them in this update anyway. According to my calculations, Adi should have been due no later than March 15th. I waited and waited. Our trip to the DR for my SIL's wedding was fast approaching, and no sign of kids. I started to panic. What if she had the kids while we were gone?!? Who would take care of them? I felt bad asking the neighbors or friends to babysit my pregnant goat, let alone handle labor and delivery on their own.

In the end, I asked my parents to come and do chores, checking on her twice a day and possibly taking care of the kids if they decided to show up. I printed out a list of bare-bones instructions and crossed my fingers that all would go well. And yes, I prayed for my goats. That seems like such a silly thing to bother God with, but it was weighing heavy on my mind and I needed to focus on other things beside worry.

The kids were born a day before we got back, and my parents did a fantastic job keeping them warm and dry and healthy. My mom has dealt with quite a few sheep births (and some bad ones, at that), so I knew she would be the best person to take care of the babies. Plus she loves me... only someone who really loves you is willing to spend the night and check on your goat at 3:00 am. I was so thankful that my parents could step in during my desperate situation.

Adi surprised us with THREE babies! There were actually four, but one was a runt (weighed less than half of the others) and most likely stillborn. That number was a shock for me, because in previous years Adi has only had two kids. All four babies were bucks. I was a little dissappointed at first, but now I don't have to worry about registration, tattooing, keeping them separate from Barry (my buck) or selling them for a high price. 

To be honest, now I'm excited about my little passel of bucks. Three of them means I will get more experience in dehorning, "fixing" and giving shots, without the worry of ruining their sale value. I am going to try and wean them as quickly as possible, then sell them as pets first. If they don't sell as pets, an easy solution will be to raise them as meat goats and butcher in the fall. I won't make as much money this year (probably $50.00/goat max, IF I can sell them), but it will be a nice rest from the registration and hassle that came with girls last year. 


Chickens: Roosters are Not a Good Deal

Well, we finally did it: butchered some roosters! We actually ended up doing four roosters and a spent hen. After doing a little bit of math on the cost of poultry, I discovered that I have been losing major money on my non-laying birds. $1.24 per month does not sound like a lot, but when you have ten birds that aren't laying eggs, it adds up over the course of a year. More birds create more work in addition to more expense.

One discovery I made is that roosters are a terrible deal. About half of the ones we butcher have less meat than a stewing hen, even though they cost the same amount to raise. If you get a free rooster and butcher it right away, it might be a good deal. But if you keep them around like I do, they are just a giant money pit. In addition, when you have too many roosters they just pick on the hens, make noise and become a general nuisance. I figured out that if we factor in a meat/bones value of $5.00 per bird, I would be loosing $2.48 on every rooster that I raise to butcher at 6 months (and let's be realistic- most laying breeds would not be ready to butcher in that time). That being said, it's TOTALLY not worth my money to be raising roosters for meat. They are also more difficult to butcher because of small hips, and with no meat on them anyway, even a free adult rooster is a toss-up if you value your time.

Over winter, the chickens really dug up their pasture. My goal this year is to get their numbers down enough (and possibly reseed the pasture) so my chicken grass can be sustainable. I want them as free range as possible, not just in a "run" of dirt yard. According to my spreadsheet, I only need five young (1-3 years) laying hens per person in order to get free eggs by selling 50% of all that I collect. So my goal this year is to get as close to that ideal as possible without spending a lot of money or wasting the birds I already have. I am hoping to butcher several birds per month over the summer in order to meet this goal. Another pasture-conserving idea I had was to slowly replace 50% of my chicken flock with ducks. Ducks seem to be more consistent layers, plus they don't scratch up the grass like my chickens do. If I have to replace the water every day for two ducks, I might as well do it for five ducks. They only eat a little more than a chicken, plus the eggs are much larger and male pekin ducks (the kind we have) actually store enough meat and fat to be worth butchering. However, I have not done the exact math on raising male ducks; maybe that is a project for next month.


Profit & Loss

Income:
Eggs- $14.00
Books- $6.64 
Total Income: $20.64

Expenses:
Layer Mash- $44.00
Corn- $20.00
Goat feed- $21.03
Total expenses- $85.03

Net profit: -$121.69

Year-to-date Net Profit: -$186.08

​
Looking Forward

I am very excited about the month of April. I have more energy now to put into my hobby farm (read why in my next newsletter!) as far as cutting costs and increasing value are concerned. I'll be able to start milking Adi in a few weeks, which means fresh milk for us, plus the weather is getting warmer with more foraging and gardening opportunities. Now that our poultry flock has been cut significantly, feed consumption will be lower even though egg production will remain the same. It's also time to start signing up for farmers markets, which is super exciting!

Next month I expect to double income and have very few feed expenses, if any. That means I can work on getting my year-to-date net profit back to zero. Yay!!

Til next time,
-Bethany