Why a bare branch budget is a good thing.I love January for the quiet reflective time it provides. For a few weeks, I can look back at what we have accomplished and look forward and make new plans without the pressure of a big to do list. While I was walking outside in the garden today trying to find the beauty in our dormant garden I connected our winter spending challenge to the winter garden. Steven loves the winter garden for the same reason I like January. It is a great time to plan. He can evaluate what worked, and make plans for what he wants to do in the spring. He can see the structure of everything. With all the leaves down he can clearly see the branching structures, next year's buds, and any damage that we may have missed (i.e. the fact that voles girdled more than half of the trees in our orchard!). In a few weeks he will begin pruning for the upcoming season. Grapevines and the remaining fruit trees all have to be pruned at the right time, the right way. We have made lots of mistakes; FYI-cherry trees need a strong central leader and do not grow well in an open vase plan and we can't control voles for anything! We will take out the damaged and diseased trees to make room for a new plan. We have a really exciting new idea underway to share later! I realized that our spending challenge is like winter in the garden. It exposes the structure and potential new growth as well as reveals any damage that has been done. So what have we learned this week? Boredom set in and I'm so excited!Sticking to a budget is hard! Two weeks into our 100-day challenge I cleaned out the fridge. It is as empty as it has ever been before. On the upside it is also very clean. Now I'm sitting here making a shopping list for groceries so I can get everything I need before the snow comes and it occurs to me just how small my $56 dollar budget is for eight people. Before they left for school the kids rattled off a list of "must haves" when I go shopping. My children are all good sports, and they know this is essentially a challenge, a game, and we really could spend more if we wanted to. The things they want are all very basic good requests, and yet I know I won't be able to buy them all this week, but I'll get as many things on the list as I can squeeze into the budget. As hard as it is, this is the very problem for which we planned this challenge. When I was little, there were no cell phones or internet. There were video games, but my mom was a teacher, and she didn't think our brains needed screen time. She still doesn't. We got a lot of outdoor time. We got free time too (well, I got free time, but Steven had pigs and endless chores). Steven grew up on farm that even today does not get good internet connection. Steven learned to work really hard and to make things happen. When he was in 8th grade he wanted to go to Washington D.C. for a class trip. His parents did not have the resources, but said he could go as long as he earned his way. He took it as a challenge and did earn, much to his parents surprise, all of the money needed. My kids love to go to both of their grandparents homes, and they don't complain about any lack of access or fun things to do. They love it! Some people are scared of being bored. They think you have to come up with activities and places to go to stimulate the minds and muscles of today's youth. Technology and activities can be great! But without a plan and goals that puts their abilities to work they will put their brains on idle and not accomplish anything. There are lots of fun things out there, but I think endless entertainment ends up doing the reverse of what you expect. Constantly entertained, we don't need to think, we don't invent, create or imagine, someone else has already done all that work. Henry David Thoreau said, "It is not enough to be busy, so are the ants, the question is: what are we busy about?" Deprived of easy resources, our first reaction is to be bored and wait for some new entertainment or activity to arrive. Being bored is a dangerous at our house as it was at our parents. We always have a list of "great opportunities" (work) that can be done if someone looks like they might not have any good ideas on their own. This goal is more about turning on creativity, and creativity comes so much faster when I have have a goal to invent, make do, substitute and improvise. Creativity under these circumstances means learning how to plan and think ahead. I'll have to make a menu for this week, so I know exactly what to buy and what not to buy. I bought lettuce seeds this week so I can start my own salad greens so I can save a little more of my limited budget. Creativity takes a little more work, resourcefulness, patience, and planning, but it is really fun. Steven and I learned this when I was younger, and it stuck. I am very rarely bored, but when I am, you can be sure that a great idea is just moments from being born. Less, but betterThere are different ways to save money and different priorities. Above is the picture of what I bought this week. Three stores and $56 dollars later you can see that fresh fruits and vegetables make up most of the pile. When I was in college, I had about $25 dollars a week just for me. I liked eating, but really liked going to do fun things like movies and dancing with friends even more, so I managed to save most of that $25 by buying the ten cent Ramen noodle packages and cheap Lipton noodles dinners. You could say that health was not my top priority. Six kids and 24 years later I am in charge of the diet of 8 people, most of them hungry teenagers. One, they eat a lot! Two, they and I like a healthier diet than my college experience so we don't have a lot of Ramen noodle fans. We want to save money, but we also want to prove to ourselves and our kids that healthy food is inexpensive and delicious, and that having fun doesn't take a lot of money.
If we are going to live on Dave Ramsey's "rice and beans" budget, then the splash of color and flavor from the fresh stuff we buy and the garden produce we preserved changes the rice and beans diet from sad subsistence fare, to a gourmet peasant food vibe. Healthy, hearty, inexpensive, and better than you could buy in a restaurant delicious. That is the target I am aiming at for in week 3! Which budget covers haircuts?We just wrapped up week one of our 100-day limited spending challenge! We don’t have any spending to report this week. With the pantry, fridge, and freezers full, we haven’t needed anything yet. Last year we focused on food, this year we are trying to stop all the unnecessary spending in the whole budget. The biggest challenge so far is finding all the little leaks in the budget that I would normally spend money on. Unconscious spending will quickly deflate our limited budget if i'm not careful. Think of my budget like a tire that leaks air. The spending freeze is like putting the inner tube of this leaky tire in a pail of soapy water and looking for the bubbles that tell you where the leaks are. Turns out they are everywhere! It is so easy to spend. Day one began with a fun challenge. Steven had forgotten to get his hair cut before we started. "No problem," I said. "I've cut it before and we have all day." To clarify, I have cut his hair before, once like fifteen years ago. Apparently, the results were acceptable, but it never really caught on. However, to this day, we have kept a barely used basic haircut kit under the sink in the bathroom. "Do you want to look up how to cut hair?" he inquired politely. I took this as acceptance of my offer, and confidently said, "No, I can just wing it." I was thinking at the time that if I totally messed it up it would quality as an emergency and would therefore be covered in a different budget. However, let the record state that Steven, who apparently really does trust me agreed at this point for me to cut his hair, and also that while he was away, I quickly looked up several YouTube tutorials on how to do a basic men's haircut, and tried to quickly commit the steps to memory. Steven and I were very pleased with the results, but so far no one else has taken me up on my offer to cut their hair. My oldest who was concerned I would somehow talk him into a home style haircut, went the next day to get a professional cut paying his own way. My youngest was very interested in the process of cutting her own hair. Way too interested! Speaking of emergency budget items, I probably need to find those scissors! Less shopping, less wasteOne week into our challenge we still have a counter full of fruit and a bin of veggies in the fridge that need to be used up. Shopping usually works like this. I look at the ads, find the deals, go shopping and return with bags full of perfect fresh food. The beautiful produce fills me with visions of healthy home cooked meals filled with gorgeous vegetables. Mentally, I'm committed to this plan, I might even make a great menu. I do try, and we do have some great meals, but it turns out that this whole-food plant based cooking thing that we do takes more than a fridge full of veggies and a menu. Frequently, when I get busy or I'm tired, I don't make the healthy and delicious meal I intended when I went shopping. On garbage night I guiltily slip the leftover limp cucumbers, brown lettuce, slimy celery and other shriveled fruits to an ignominious burial in the bin. When the weather is warm enough, they get a more merciful burial in the compost pile, but it is the same guilt. This week I am trying harder to use the veggies before they expire. Whole-food plant based cooking can take a lot of time, but a few tricks help me save my produce and time. On my "clear the fridge Friday", I'll dice and saute carrots, celery and onions and freeze them into packets that are easy to add to soups. We will make a LOT of banana muffins and freeze them for later. Maybe I can give some away. Heads up, if you end up with a plate of these on your doorstep, just know I’m trying my best to waste less and save the planet, and the tastiest way I can think of is sending my three big bunches of bananas to banana heaven in the form of big beautiful muffins. Seriously it is a fantastic recipe. Do we miss anything yet?There is some excitement in coming up with a great plan and acting on it right away. One thing we are adjusting to is not running out to the store whenever we want. I have five fabulous drivers in the house who can all run errands and drive places. Choosing to make do with what we have on hand is a great challenge. Online shopping is another thing I miss. It is so easy to order whatever we need. I never have loved shopping in stores, but I really like the convenience and selection of online shopping and packages that come right to my front step.
Speaking of online ordering, we are looking forward to our 2020 spring plant sale! We are getting out the catalogs and making lists of what to order (business expenses like seeds don't count against my challenge). If you see something amazing in your seed catalog that you really want to try this year let us know! If you had a favorite last year that you want to make sure we are still going to grow, send us a message or email. We can start them for you and have your seedlings ready to go in the spring. We have had several requests already and we are getting excited about the spring lineup. Now that is the kind of shopping I really do like to do. Let's go! A food challenge in the winter?On January 1, 2020 our 100-day challenge began! Here are the rules. We will spend no more than $1 a day per person on consumables like food and toiletries. We also get $1 a day per person for non-consumable things like clothes, entertainment, and home/auto maintenance. Fixed expenses like mortgage, insurance, utilities, and gas are excluded. We get 3 exception items if something critical comes up, but we are limiting our shopping to just once a week. We have a family of 8 so that means Steven and I each get $56 a week to spend. Nothing is growing right now so why don't we wait to do this challenge in the summer when we have lots of fresh garden produce? You may be thinking we will be hungry or the food will be really boring. Hardly. We grow a huge garden and all summer long we packed the storage room and freezers with delicious produce from the garden. Most of this challenge is about getting us to use it! The garden produces more than we can eat in the summer so we preserve all we can and give the rest away. Here is a slideshow sample of some of the yummy things we tucked away when the weather was warm and winter seemed far far away. Why keep such a big food storage?My mom laughed when I called this a challenge, after all, she has been doing this for years, and she was here this fall and knows exactly how much food I have in storage. She helped me organize the freezers below when she was here last. As long as I can remember my family has worked on having a food storage and garden. Our church has counseled for decades to "prepare for adversity in life by having a basic supply of food and water and some money in savings. We ask that you be wise… [and] do not go to extremes... With careful planning, you can, over time, establish a home storage supply and a financial reserve.” (See All Is Safely Gathered In: Family Home Storage). Planning for adversity covers a lot of ground. The most common adversity I have seen in my life is unemployment or a setback in your health. When I was younger, unemployment happened in my family. I'm sure my parents worried, but I never did, in fact it would be difficult for me to tell you exactly which years were the good years and which years were the lean years, because we always had plenty of good food in the storage room. In the summer we worked on canning. I remember sitting and pitting pie cherries, peeling apples, and wiping the rims of the dozens of jars of golden peaches. We put honey in jars one year. I remember because at 9 years old I was allowed to write the labels on the jars. Steven has great memories of his own growing up on a farm in Washington state. He grandparents lived half a mile away and had fruit trees and a huge raspberry patch. He used to pick boxes of cherries and full flats of raspberries. When he was 12, an uncle gave Steven a dozen blackberry plants and told him to sell the fruit to save money for college. He never actually sold any, but his family and extended family sure enjoyed them. Steven's mom canned a lot too and he can remember helping his dad build shelves in the entry way closet of their small home so they could have a place to store dozens of jars of canned fruit and vegetables. When I grew up and got married we lived close to my grandma for awhile. We wanted to continue what we had learned as kids. We lived in a four-plex with no garden spot, but we asked the manager if we could have the little strip of land between the apartment complex driveways to grow a few things. He said yes and we bought a shovel and a hose and some tomato starts. When we got it dug up and planted we were so proud of our little garden. Then it hailed and flattened everything. We were too sad to pull up the crushed tomato plants, so we left them and planted new ones right next to them. Imagine our surprise when the original plants and the new plants all grew and we had a tangle of tomato plants. Counting the cost of the hose, the original plants, the new plants and the shovel, I'm sure we lost money on the garden that year, but we were so proud of our ability to provide some food for ourselves. Steven was excited when he learned one day that someone he met through work had a plum tree that they would let us pick. He left to see what he could find and returned with boxes of plums. We were excited to make jam. We took this harvest up to grandma's house so she could help us, and she laughed at the amount. A few cups of fruit were all we needed, but we had 40 lbs in boxes. She helped us make jam, then helped us turn the rest into fruit leather, a treat my family still really enjoys. She helped us again when in youthful exuberance we brought her boxes of tiny apricots that we picked when they were still green. She showed us how to lay them out and ripen them so they would be sweet and then helped us turn them into jam. Apricot jam is still a great favorite of mine. When we went to graduate school and had a third floor apartment, we tried our hand at gardening on the terrace. I'm still not great at a garden in pots. When we moved to Iowa for a job we bought a small house with a big yard. We really wanted to be able to garden. We got a bucket full of raspberry starts from a friend at church and our raspberry patch was born. We tried plum trees and cherry trees, but the varieties we bought were more ornamental. We had beautiful blossoms every spring, then a late frost, and no fruit. Our dog Sam kept sitting on the rhubarb patch, and we have tried asparagus with no success four times. When we moved to the house we live in now, we decided to really see what we could do with the garden. We brought raspberries with us from the old house. We got rhubarb starts that actually grew, we planted blackberries, several fruit trees, and a big vegetable garden. Some things have worked, some things we have pulled out, but we began to get really good harvests. Over the years we have collected the equipment to help process this bounty. A pressure canner one year, a victorio strainer/sauce maker another. A steamer juicer, a dehydrator, a wheat grinder, vacuum sealer, 2 water bath canners, and an outdoor stove to can on were all added over time. Now we can 100's of bottles of tomatoes, peaches and apples every year. My kids help me like I helped my mom and grandma all those years ago. It is such a feeling of comfort and security to have access to all that great food that we have grown. Take a look at the slide show below to see my garden helpers through the years. Food we buyWe can't grow everything we need in our backyard farm so we have to buy the rest. It turns out that food cycles in the grocery store are not that different than food cycles in the garden - it is seasonally on sale so that is when we stock up! We buy lots of citrus this time of year. It is fresh, delicious and inexpensive. In October, when the freshest apples are on sale everywhere we buy a bunch and make applesauce for the year. Canned vegetables are on the best sale of the year the month before Thanksgiving, so that is when we buy it. Even the staples have a season. In the fall when the new harvest comes in, I can get a great deal on staples like oatmeal, sugar, flour, and beans. I had a friend when we were college that made a great menu every two weeks. She would calculate everything she needed for those meals and and buy it. She probably saved some money because she didn't waste any food, but she ran ALL the way out of food every two weeks which left no buffer or flexibility in the non-food parts of their budget. If they didn't get paid for one week, or had extra expenses like a broken car, water heater, or dishwasher, they couldn't eat. Our 100-day challenge is our showing ourselves that the reverse is so much more secure. We always have food on hand, so if we have an attack of adversity, like a car breakdown, or a appliance failure, then that week or month we just eat out of the storage and use the money we would have spent on groceries to pay for whatever needs to be covered. Just this week we had to buy a new dryer. The blessing is that it went out just before the new year so we were able to get an end of year model for half the regular price. We just paid in cash and took it home and installed it. An expense like that when we were students would have been more than a month's rent, but with food in the pantry to allow flexibility in our budget, it was relatively no big deal. The savings from last year's 50-day challenge allowed us to buy new couches upstairs and down, a TV with new gaming system because the kids wanted a place set up for them to be able to invite friends over, and a new clarinet for our daughter who needed the next level up. All paid for in cash with no interest or future obligations. They have a wish list to work for this year too. We have been working hard to get out of and stay out of debt and have a growing savings. With six kids at home and me staying home to take care of them, it takes some planning. Braces, cars, instruments, appliances, school trips, clothes, medical bills and other expenses seem to come in waves. Having a reservoir of food and savings really helps to even out the ups and downs of family expenses. Back to the 100-day challenge. We have observed that the best sales in food are before the end of the year. When we hit January, everything is cold, its dark early, and groceries aren't on great sales. Here in the Midwest, our produce is shipped long distances, and does not always arrive looking fresh. We'll get stuff shipped in from California and Mexico, and get Chilean fruit by March, and I'm very grateful for that, but on the whole, most of the produce is coming from storage. They aren't growing potatoes in Idaho in January, February, or March. All the potatoes you buy are coming out of storage. Same with apples and many other items. If I know they are all coming out of storage anyway, it makes sense to just have them in my storage, bought at a price I like and saved for when I need it. So that is what we do. Now when things are more expensive, we are avoiding impulse purchases, cooking at home using our preserved harvest; because I do need to get through all the stuff we stored in order to make room for fresh new stuff coming next summer, and saving money so that when the next opportunity, or emergency arises we will be prepared for it. Follow our adventures!To sum up, a budget and this budget challenge, isn't about not having enough and scraping by. It is about living abundantly and planning ahead to make our goals and dreams happen. My parents lived this way and are now retired, living debt free and enjoying life. My grandparents did the same. I know it is a system that works.
I'll post our adventures of the next hundred days on Instagram and Facebook. Come follow our winter adventure there to see what we will learn this year and how much we will be able to save! |
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