After yesterday's mega-post, I thought I might just be a little more bland today and write about something that happened earlier on in our journey. If anything it shows that there is a challenging side to it.
On a funnier note, two friends who aren't even keeping up with my daily entries, but are following along just by nature of seeing me fairly frequently, have decided they want to beat me up. It was quite funny as I was sitting right there when one of them actually said this to the other one, "Why don't we just take her out back, beat her up and then just leave her in the shed." I was laughing very hard, but told them someone might notice eventually that I was missing. Oh well! I told them I didn't recommend they start reading my blog and definitely not the post I wrote on Christmas. They are very annoyed, bugged, irritated - and they've pretty much decided we can't be friends anymore unless I lay off on this penny pinching stuff. They just can't do it, they say. I don't blame them. I told them they just aren't sick and tired enough yet. We were and even if I'd received 100 evil comments yesterday as feedback, which I didn't, I still would have kept on. So if you are starting to feel irritated, too, join the club!
Ok....Little by Little...a story about watching pennies.
Proverbs 13:11, "Dishonest money dwindles away,
but whoever gathers money little by little makes it grow."
This was a couple of weeks ago now when I was first deliberately watching the sales in the flyers. I was super excited to head out to the grocery store to get a ton of cheese as we've discovered that dairy is probably one of the most expensive things on our list of groceries. It was on a major sale and I had done my research, supposedly anyway, so I packed all the little ones into the van and off we went. When cheese goes on sale, I typically by about 12 bricks of it and then freeze it and most times it lasts until the next sale. It saves me nearly $40 if I do this.
One of our new vows, remember, is to not buy a single thing full price (within reason, I should add, more on that at another time). I had been shopping this way for years to some degree, but if I really wanted a red pepper and it wasn't on sale, I would buy it anyway - well, no more.
The grocery store I went to was one of the higher end stores where you are definitely paying for the shopping experience as the lighting is lovely, the displays are impeccable and the smell of fresh bread is lofting through the air. Not my typical experience as I tend to stay in the bargain grocery stores where you have to fight for your food. Once I got to the cheese section I did see the classic sales slips everywhere, but not on the cheese I wanted! What was going on!!?
I quickly grabbed someone who works there and asked him where the cheese was that was on sale - he tried to kindly remind me that the sales start on Thursday so I had missed it. Honestly, I thought I was going to cry because that meant the milk I had put in my cart was also not on sale. Picture this, it was only 66 cents more to buy the milk there, but I had made a vow and I was determined to watch my pennies now.....oh, I needed that milk! Remember when I went out for coffee here and there, spending pennies only, or so I thought, and it had added up to some exorbitant amount? So I walked back, seriously feeling tears in my eyes, and put the milk back on the shelf.
This meant the kitty litter was also not on sale, but I walked over there anyway and I picked up some small bag of no name litter that amazingly was on sale and went to the check out. #6 asked me, "So all we're getting is kitty litter and mushrooms?" (the mushrooms were on a super sale!) "Yup. Just kitty litter and mushrooms."
Now maybe cheese will go on sale next week somewhere else, but it might not. I use cheese a lot and this was new for me, to be willing to go without it until it went back on sale, but it is obviously about so much more than having a cheese-free diet. It was about checking my determination to get debt-free, was I willing to sacrifice even in the area of cheese???? See, I've looked at flyers before, but again, I've been kind of lazy about it - I didn't even check the dates of the sale! A serious sales shopper would have known to check the dates! I would have known the sales always start on Thursday! It revealed once again, how I've always just bought whatever I want whenever I want.
The kids always unload the van when I get home from the store. They actually don't mind as they get to see what we get to eat that week and if I've bought anything "good". When #3 came out to the van to unload, I said, "I didn't get anything. I missed the sale." "What?!" he yelled. "What are we going to eat for dinner!!?" he asked in a panicked voice! You see, it was dinner time when I got home. (Here's a tip, never shop right at dinner time.)
So, I start praying - Lord, what can we eat for dinner? I knew I didn't have enough leftovers from a casserole I'd made at lunch for everyone, so I went scrounging through the fridge and amazingly I found a bowl of fresh vegetables I'd cut up earlier on in the week that I quickly stir-fried into a side dish. Then I found a bowl of beans (which my younger ones love) and warmed that up for them. Then I found some cheese and garlic and quickly made stuffed mushroom caps as another side dish for Renaissance Man. The older kids finished off the casserole as there was enough for them. When RM walked in for dinner it smelled wonderful and I had only spent $1 on the mushrooms. A little dinner miracle was what I had needed. It felt good to use up what was in the fridge instead of letting it go to waste.
So, this is the new me - ready and willing to make what seems like a small sacrifice in the big picture - give up cheese until it goes on sale.
The verse from Proverbs at the top of the page says, "...but whoever gains money little by little makes it grow"!!!! I had never even read this before. It may as well say count your pennies, because that really is the littlest financial unit, isn't it? To think that could make our money grow? This I gotta see. So now, I even have Biblical support to be a little tightwad. This means the reverse is also true and this is my translation of the verse backwards, "Money gained through honest, hard-working means will not dwindle away, but will in fact remain in your account, growing all the time, but whoever spends money little by little, say, at coffee shops, thinking it won't matter, is wrong - it will dwindle away at an astounding rate!" That is the New International Penny Pinching Version. The Bible speaks such wisdom. How sad it took me so long to listen. I know now that it is these small decisions are what make the difference down the road, so I will continue to count my pennies.
On a side note, it was only the following week the cheese went on sale - I bought a lot.
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