Comments on: 2nd Week of No Spend Month

By: ArianahsNanah

ArianahsNanah — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 01:30:01 +0000

I would love to try this, although living on a small island will probably make this difficult. I would love suggestions on how to save money with two teenagers(one in college,and another in high school) and three younger children. It seems every day there is something new, baseball mitts, poster boards, etc… Typically our family spends about $600 a month on groceries alone, sometimes more and with two cars to transport kids to and from school and all after school activities it seems quite impossible to save. I’ve tried hiding my debit card also, but always cave when one walks in and yells “Mom, I need a new folder/book/pen for school tommorrow’.
I would some ideas on saving some money. We live in American Samoa, and gas prices have still not dropped here(4.24) a gallon and food prices have almost tripled in the last couple of months.
Thank you and God Bless

By: smallnotebook

smallnotebook — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 00:49:22 +0000

Thank you so much for your sweet note Brooke!

By: Brooke

Brooke — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 03:11:22 +0000

Incredible coffee recipe…I think of your blog and this lovely image each morning when I drink it. It’s a very soothing ritual to prepare the coffee the night before, knowing that I’ll wake up to a delicious treat in the morning!

Your blog is wonderful, I love what you write and how you write. Blessings to you!

By: Vera

Vera — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 21:44:00 +0000

Ok, I tried the cold coffee recipe and it is so delicious!!! I drank two glasses and didn’t get that jittery,almost sick feeling I get sometime after drinking too much coffee. I was always a big coffee lover and now I can enjoy it even more. Thank you!!!

By: smallnotebook

smallnotebook — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 15:42:40 +0000

Mirco, I was just recently talking to Doug about getting a bike. Great ideas.

By: paresh

paresh — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 07:33:28 +0000

nice articles, thanks for sharing.

By: Mirco

Mirco — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 02:59:52 +0000

Do you really want to spend less money? Get a bike. Ride your bike to and from work, ride your bike to the grocery store with a backpack. not only does it cost less, but you learn to think twice about buying stuff you don’t need. (how the heck am I going to get this home) If you guys go to the gym for exercise, you can knock that off your expense list too, riding a bike to and from work will take care of your exercise. Think about it. by dropping one of your two cars, you cut your insurance by half, registration by half, gas by half (I’m ignoring the company gas card here) and maintenance by half. All for the price of your average car repair bill, which comes at least four times per year.

By: smallnotebook

smallnotebook — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 04:30:18 +0000

KS - I love allrecipes.com. Thanks for the coffee tip!

Andrea, I love fruit too! We don’t necessarily give those things up, but we do try to balance the expensive items with foods that are less. So I load up on bananas, and beans and brown rice. I buy expensive juice, but then we try to drink more water so it lasts longer. We eat eggs as often as meat. I must say, you are probably a much better cook than I am!

By: Andrea

Andrea — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 04:10:43 +0000

Wow. This is blowing my mind. We spend at least $800 a month on food!! And I thought we were trying to cut back! There are 4 mouths to feed in our family and we do eat out a bit but we spend around $150-$200 per week on groceries. It is the milk, fresh orange juice and fruits that kill us. We also eat a lot of fish, which can get spendy.

Good for you guys! I guess I need to look at what we are eating a bit more and cut out the 15 ingredient recipes!

By: KS

KS — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 19:37:15 +0000

I’m here via Simple Mom and love your blog! I probably won’t have another iced coffee at McDonald’s after reading the ingredients that you posted. In addition to the cold-brew recipe, the recipe for “Easy Iced Coffee” on allrecipes.com is pretty good and quick. I use Trader Joe’s instant coffee in it.

PS Here in Southern California $50 covers more than two meals.