Do you ever feel like your money is flying out the window and you don’t know where it’s going?
Me too at times.
But my husband and I have learned a few tricks over the years to calm the chaos in our finances so we can start saving money, and today I’m sharing a couple of ways we saved money last week.
3 Ways We Saved Money (& you can too!)
Keep “Easy” Meals On Hand
I don’t know about you, but I’m not a fan of cooking. And NOT cooking is my default when I’ve had a stressful day or I feel tired.
But ordering “emergency” pizza or takeout is EXPENSIVE.
So I work with my too-often lack of cooking mojo by stocking quick-to-fix meals and bulk cooking ahead of time. Last week I made a batch of 3 Day Chicken and relied on the pre-cooked ground beef in my freezer (see How to Freeze Ground Beef HERE) for speedy tacos and slow cooker chili.
I also served frozen pizza one night instead of ordering delivery. It’s even cheaper to make your own crust, but as I mentioned, I need fast, easy meals to prevent “let’s order out” syndrome.
SAVINGS: $50-$100 this week from NOT ordering takeout for the family two nights when I wanted to.
TIP: Grab my 27 Fast & Frugal Meals HERE for more simple, budget-friendly meal ideas and recipes.
Be Okay With “Good Enough”
We’re currently renovating the master bath in our Fixer Upper (read about our Fixer Upper Projects HERE).
I would love to have a Pinterest-worthy bathroom to showcase, but we have a tight budget so we need to choose the most budget-friendly options as we move along in the process.
We’ve been looking for a used vanity, but haven’t found one that will fit our small space. I found a custom made vanity that I love, but I just can’t justify the price tag given our budget for the entire renovation.
So we decided this past week to purchase a “good enough” bathroom vanity (pictured above) and reuse our existing faucet in order to save money. Vanities are relatively easy to change out later if we decide to, but this stock cabinet and sink combo will work for now — and it’s a VAST improvement over what we currently have.
SAVINGS: $400 from NOT purchasing the designer vanity I wanted.
TIP: When money is tight, make sure your purchasing choices make sense for your current budget.
Sign Up for Free Offers
My husband and I like to enjoy a weekly date night to keep our relationship strong and vibrant, but dates can be expensive. We saved money last week by using a free birthday offer at a local restaurant and drinking water so our entire meal and tip was less than $15.
SAVINGS: $10 from the free meal coupon and NOT purchasing drinks.
TIP: Check out all of the current Birthday Freebies HERE and sign up for your coupons and deals!
I would love to hear how you saved money recently so leave a comment. 🙂
We can do this!
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I loved the “go to meals” portion of this post. I have a couple really good hearty soup and salad recipes that I like to stick to to save some money, plus I end up craving them throughout the week anyway! In the wintertime, using the crockpot is my life-saver. It makes saving money on meals SO easy and coming home to the aroma of whatever has been cooking all day is the best!
To eat out, we use gift cards or coupons when we have them, but most eating out is done while mystery shopping to make our meals very cheap or free! We went out on Saturday with my in-laws to celebrate two birthdays while doing a mystery shop dinner and only spent $7 out-of-pocket for the 6 of us!
That’s awesome Jackie! Thanks for the tip!
We love to travel and we can do more travel by keeping it all on a really low budget. Last week we spent our spring break beach camping 🙂 Plus, it gets us all outdoors and keeps us outdoors 😉 Vitamin D from the sunshine, plus fresh air, and moving around more – it’s good for all of us after a long winter. The drive is long but it’s worth it. We do a simple breakfast and lunch. But since it is our vacation, we go out to a low cost BBQ spot for dinners that are abundant in nourishing foods and veggies. Still, with eating out each night, we save a ton by camping – plus, it’s more fun!
I LOVE this idea Jean! We have so many good memories of traveling together as a family.
A small savings: Grocery store sale had several things “Buy 6 save $3”, mix & match items. One item was tea: I had coupons for 3 that made one free. The other items I chose were all treats for what each member in the household likes. From regular cost – which I wouldn’t pay – I saved $9 (40%). With coupons, from sale price, I patted myself on the back that I saved nearly $5.
A bigger savings: Since Zero-turn-radius mowers first hit the market, my husband has watched ads, YouTube and tried to figure when we could fit it in. We knew we were going to have a sum to handle in late February. Last fall he found a used ZTR mower for sale- it matched his qualifications – and watched it, thinking it would be gone long before we had the cash. He was one happy guy the day we went and made the purchase a few weeks ago; the grin on his face as he bounced around the yard trying to maneuver it made it worth the daffodils that were ran over!
That’s so awesome that he was able to get the mower, and those grocery savings really add up. Good for you!
We did something similar when we renovated our upstairs bathroom last summer. We got a stock vanity and re-used our existing faucet. In fact, the vanity we selected is very similar to yours. I am perfectly satisfied with it. I love having the undermounted sink and drawers for storage, and I like the clean white look. I couldn’t justify spending money on something fancier.
Good to hear that I’m not alone! 🙂