Festival of Frugality #17

Welcome to the 17th edition of the Festival of Frugality. What follows are the submissions that are (in my opinion) clearly about frugality, or that at least talk about spending less. All in all, there were nineteen such submissions this week. I opted to leave out a few others weren’t (in my opinion) on topic. And with that introduction, we’re off…

The Founding Father of the Festival of Frugality (try saying that ten times fast!), jim of Blueprint for Financial Prosperity, contributed Low Cost Weekend Ideas: Visit Local Wineries — “I’m starting a new series here and it’s called Low Cost Weekend Ideas. I plan on trying to highlight some cheap fun things to do on weekends that are relatively low-cost but loads of fun.”

The Wandering Indian Monk contributed 3 Rules to Help Save Everytime and Anytime! — “I wanted to share 3 rules that my ‘wife’ came up with. Following these 3 rules have helped us curb wasteful expenditure/impulse buying and thus contribute to our savings.”

The Family CEO contributed Magazines on the cheap and a word of caution — “Recently I received a bill for my subscription to Chicago magazine and was surprised to see my renewal rate was $30/year. I couldn’t remember if it was this much when I originally subscribed, but I really wanted to keep this magazine.”

Mapgirl contributed Frugal Fashion Advice — “Don’t listen to fashion magazines. Try DE-accessorizing an outfit instead of accessorizing it.”

LAMoneyGuy contributed Wedding Stuff: Reducing the Guest List — “The most important fincial decisions in planning a wedding come right at the beginning. None are bigger than how to reduce the guest list.”

FreeMoneyFinance contributed Comments: Save Big Money by Using Generic/Store Brands — “Thoughts from my readers on a money saving tip I suggested.”

Frugal for Life contributed My Money or My Dog — “The value of a pet to the cost of keeping it. It’s not always about being the most frugal.”

The Common Room contributed Frugalities — “Lentil sprouts are cheap, tasty, and delicious in salads in place of lettuce.”

Money and Values contributed Cable TV for -$7 — “Two of the three times I’ve had this ‘limited basic’ service installed by Comcast, I’ve turned on my TV to discover that I have instead received the full/expanded basic cable lineup! For -$7 a month!”

Money and Investing contributedPantry Challenge – March 2006 — “Trying to live out of the pantry. Still spent almost $150 on groceries/eating out/supermarket, but was a reduction from the usual $400. We helped conserve resources, save the enviroment, and cover for some of the increased heating expenses.”

MightyBargainHunter contributed A Brief Night at the Auction — “Auctions are good places for bargains. Here’s my experience with one this past week.”

SoundMoneyTips contributed Saving On Home Improvements — “ReStore is like a Goodwill store for home improvement materials.”

The Young Professionals Financial Blog contributed Young Professionals Frugal Living Guide – Part 1 — “This new Frugal Living series will take a look at some of the steps that the Young Professionals use to save a little extra dough on the things that we buy.”

Single Mom Extraordinaire’s Blog contibuted Living Well on Less — “A story that shows making more money isn’t always necessary to do what you want.”

Money Talk$ contributed Lightbulb Moment — “Some people refer to a lightbulb moment as a moment in time when the fictional lightbulb in their mind illuminated. That moment when *bang* an idea hits you and starts you thinking. I am not using the phrase ‘lightbulb moment’ as a metaphor. I am literaly refering to the moment at which I turned off a few lightbulbs.”

Frugal Living, My Way contributed The Ties That Bind: Third Generation American Reflects on Her Frugal Roots — “Can we learn any lessons from so many years ago? Some might say those were different times, things have changed, it’s not possible to remain at one job for your entire career, and the cost of new construction is prohibitive for many young families today. Or that it’s not safe to allow one’s children so much free, unsupervised time. What do you say?”

Multiple Mentality contributed Paying for Pesadich — “Given that we’re not rich — not even close — Passover is always a tough time of year, especially since we also just got our income tax bill, and we owe more than just a little bit, plus the accountant’s bill. Can we maybe move Passover to, say, June? June’s an easy month for us.”

The Bargain Queen contributed TWO articles this week (tsk, tsk!). Here’s the first one that I got: Do sweat the big stuff — “If you want to stick to your budget and still be fabulous, there will be some trade-offs you have to make. Maybe you spend all your money at the hairdresser and live in a hovel? Or eat like a King and dress like a hobo? Or drive a great car but panic each year when the insurance bill comes in? Or perhaps you ignore the trade-offs and buy the things you can’t afford on credit cards or hire purchase. The first three are completely valid trade-offs to make; the fourth will lead you to a world of financial pain.”

Frugal Upstate contributed Grow your own veggies in any weather — “Anyone can grow bean sprouts-it doesn take any kind of expensive equipment. Since you can get 1 Cup of sprouts from 1 TBS of beans, it is quite an economical vegetable. (as well as just being fun to watch!)”

That’s it for this week. Thanks for stopping by, and please don’t forget to check out next week’s festival over at Canadian Capitalist. And to all of you submitters… Please don’t forget to use the handy submission form at Conservative Cat — it makes hosting so much easier.