Frugal Reading

Making my own bread to save some dough!

I've been reading books on how to live more frugally. Number one bit of advice? Stop eating out so much. Cut those restaurant bills, I'm told, and you'll save thousands.

Only, we never eat out. Or hardly ever. Okay, so cut out those weekend get-aways! Those weekly bouquets of tulips! No more bottled water! Take your lunch to work and school! Wash and reuse those baggies!

Hmmm ... I think I need I need a book on frugality for people who are already sort of frugal but spend too much on fabric and yarn and books. I suppose it would be called Stop Spending So Much Money on Fabric and Yarn and Books!

I have mixed feelings about the frugality books I'm reading. On the one hand, I appreciate the tips (some of which are actually helpful, especially when it comes to using less energy around the house). On the other hand, there's often a "holier than thou" tone I could do without (as well as the "what kind of idiot would spend money on ____" shtick that you often find in books written by men. "Yeah, we used to be chumps like you suckers," writes Mr. Cheapskate Testosterone, "and then we stopped heating our house and saved thousands each year!").

A book I was reading last night suggested I stock up on crescent rolls when they're on sale so I could make homemade desserts with them. Does layering a pan of crescent rolls with chocolate chips really constitute a homemade dessert? Maybe, but I'm a little suspicious.

I am interested to see how low I can get my weekly food bill without causing the family to revolt. I'm committed to baking more, which should go over well, and to stretching out meals (which may prove less popular). Last night we had beef and noodle soup made from leftovers from the bottom roast we ate the night before. It was a three pound roast I'm determined to stretch out into at least three meals, possible four (though not in a row).

Other frugal reading? My credit card bill. I'm fairly good about scanning it from time to time online to make sure there's no suspicious activity (both the Man and my dad have had their accounts hacked). But now I'm determined to check daily. On Friday, a mysterious $46 charge showed up. After some sleuthing, I determined it was an automatic renewal for a quilt magazine subscription I'd given to my mom for Christmas 2012 (at a much lower rate, I might add).

I called the subscription agency and had a frustrating conversation with a computer, who spent a good three minutes trying to entice me to continue with the subscription (which my mom no longer wanted, by the way). Finally, I got it through the computer's thick head that I wanted no great deals, no free issues, nothing. By the end of the conversation I was yelling, "No! No! No! Just cancel it!"  Finally, sounding very sad about it, the computer promised to cancel the subscription.

So $46 that might have very well slipped under my radar has been saved! The trick now is to not spend it.

Back to the books. More soon!

$14

Money-making project: Build bee motels and sell them on Etsy!

On Thursday, I sat down with a notebook and went month by month through my bills from 2013. One of my goals for this year is to get a handle on my spending. I want to end 2014 with zero credit card debt and a notable increase in my savings account. That certainly didn't happen this year--why not?

The $14 purchase is why not. $14 doesn't seem like all that much, does it?  $14 for fabric or sewing notions, $14 for a skein of sock yarn, $14 for a book.

But if you spend $14 often enough, it adds up to a lot of money. I will not reveal here how much money I spent on fabric and other craft supplies in 2013, but the sum is appalling--and about twice as much as I would have guessed. Twice as much! The funny thing is, it's not the big cash outputs that were the problem. They happened once or twice a year, and I was very conscious of them.

No, it was the little dribs and drabs that did me in. The fat quarter cut of fabric. The used book from Amazon.com. The fact is, I have nickled and dimed myself into a budget crisis.

So yesterday, after writing down all the numbers, adding them up, and nearly fainting when I saw the results, I came up with a budget. A real budget--not the imaginary budget in my head that I'd been sure I was sticking to. A budget that requires I write down every purchase I make and subtract it from my monthly allowance. A budget that allows for fabric purchases, but insists that I shop my own stash of fabric first. A budget that tsk tsks at the very thought of idly tossing a magazine in my shopping cart as I wait in the checkout line. A budget that insists I go to the library instead of the bookstore.

When I realized what I actually spent each month, well, it was sort of embarrassing. It's like that moment you step on the scale and realize you've gained twenty pounds. You have no idea how you gained twenty pounds. It's not like you eat cake and ice cream every night. In fact, you thought you'd been cutting back.

But when you finally look at reality--how much you really spend, how much you really eat/smoke/drink/live on the Internet--it's also incredibly liberating. Now you know the truth and can do something about it.

I hope to blog more this year--I'm shooting for twice a week--and will keep you updated on my new frugality. I plan not only to spend less, but to earn more, mostly by teaching, but by selling as well. I'll share my experiments with making my own dish detergent and cleaning supplies. I'll give breathless accounts of my experiences with getting books through inter-library loans. You will be riveted, I promise.

Do you have plans for a more frugal 2014? Please share!

2014: The Year of the Bean

 

This summer I grew black beans in my garden. The pods turned magenta as they ripen and provided about as much beauty as you could ask for from a bean. I didn't plant my beans until later in the summer, and only got a couple pounds worth, but what beans they were! We ate a whole bunch of them tonight in a wonderful black bean soup, and they were marvelous.


I love beans. We didn't eat them growing up, not the dried kind you have to soak overnight, or really any kind other than green beans and baked beans on the 4th of July. When I discovered my first bean eaters in grad school, I was a little dubious. I did not find their black bean stews visually appealing. But after my first bowl of black beans and rice, I was hooked.

As I plan my spring garden, I will make plenty of room for beans. I want to grow beans that you can't find in the store--cranberry beans and scarlet runner beans and rattlesnake beans. There is something so satisfying about growing your own gorgeous protein and then eating it in a soup on New Year's Day. Very fine.

***

Christmas has come and gone. It was good, it was fine. I don't love Christmas, except for the part where I get to spend long stretches reading new books. There's too much work involved, too much money spent. I took a lot of notes in my Christmas notebook and most of them have to do with not getting so much next year--food, gifts, wrapping paper. Scale it back.

My two favorite parts of Christmas: 1) The Christmas Eve service we attended at the church up the street (the one where we spent so much on pumpkins earlier this fall), which was lovely and peaceful, and 2) The Christmas quilt I made, my first big applique project. Wanna see?

I wish the picture were better. I think if you click on it, you can make out some of the details. It was like putting together a puzzle. I see much more applique in my future.

***

Yesterday I went to the side yard with a saw in my hand and started pruning the fig trees. We have two enormous figs that we have not pruned an several years, and they've grown up to the second floor windows. We talked about hiring someone to prune them, but I decided that I should at least give it a try before shelling out any money.

Reader, I felt like Pa Ingalls out there. I can't think of the last time I sawed anything, but honey I went to town on those trees. It was hard work (I need to invest in a pruning saw, methinks), but so satisfying! And now I'm thinking I can take on the scraggily trees in our front yard, the ones we want to get out of the way so that Will can play football with his friends there. I think I can clear out the underbrush (now that the snakes are gone) and take care of business.

I had no idea I could cut down stuff all by myself. I feel like a new woman. That's a nice way to feel on New Year's Day. Who knows what else I might accomplish? The mind boggles, doesn't it?

A Pause in Advent #4: May Nothing You Dismay

Year One


I was still standing
on a northern corner.


Moonlit winter clouds the color of the desperation of wolves.


Proof
of Your existence? There is nothing
but.

 --Franz Wright

 Walking  to Martha's Vineyard

I keep trying to write something that will capture what I want to say better than this poem does, but I can't.

Emmanuel: God with us.

That is the most exciting thing I have ever heard.

A (Late) Pause in Advent #3

I have joined Floss and others in a Pause in Advent. Check out Floss's site for a list of other bloggers participating in this annual event.

I'm composing a playlist of Christmas carols that I'm not sick to death of hearing. I love Bing and Perry and Andy Williams and Burl Ives, but I've been listening to them sing "White Christmas" and "Frosty" and "The Christmas Song" for nigh onto fifty years now and can no longer really hear them. I need new versions, new songs.

On my playlist I have the great Odetta's "What Month was Jesus Born In" and "Shout for Joy," and the strange and enchanting Sufjan Stevens' "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing." I have Big Star singing "Jesus Christ (was born today)." And I have what may be my favorite Christmas carol of all time, Tom Waits' "A Christmas Card from a Hooker in Minneapolis."

There's actually no mention of Christmas at all in this song. It starts out with the narrator writing to her friend Charlie, telling him that she's pregnant,

"and I stopped taking dope
and I quit drinking whiskey
and my old man plays the trombone
and works out at the track.

and he says that he loves me
even though it's not his baby
and he says that he'll raise him up
like he would his own son

and he gave me a ring
that was worn by his mother
and he takes me out dancin
every saturday nite."

The next few stanzas continue on describing how good the narrator's life is. And then we get to the end of the song:

"Hey Charlie,
for chrissakes
do you want to know
the truth of it?
I don't have a husband
he don't play the trombone

and I need to borrow money
to pay this lawyer
and Charlie, hey
I'll be eligible for parole
come Valentines day. "

It's right around this time--a week away from Christmas--where I start to feel like the narrator of this song. I'm trying to paint a beautiful picture with the Christmas tree, the lights and decorations, the house that smells like Christmas cookies and banana bread. But it's too much. Suddenly I'm cranky and out of sorts, on the verge of getting a cold. Hey, Charlie, you wanna know the truth of it? I'm not all that merry and bright.

And that, my dears, is when Christmas really starts, when I'm ready to tell the truth about my own poverty. I don't have a husband and he don't play the trombone. Most days I'm stuck in a jail of my own making.

Christmas is about many things, but to me, for it to have real meaning, Christmas has to be about hope. O come, o come Emmanuel, pay my bail. Shine a little light in this darkness.

It's no coincidence that the narrator of this song is writing a Christmas card. It's no coincidence that she's a hooker. Jesus served the lowliest of the low. Some say he preferred them. For those of us who have money, nice homes, status, sometimes we forget our poverty. It's only when we hit the wall that we see the light shining from the other side. 

A Pause in Advent #2: Housekeeping

 I have joined Floss and others in a Pause in Advent. Check out Floss's site for a list of other bloggers participating in this annual event.

Here's something I wrote on this blog a couple of years ago:

Yesterday I was told a story about a young pastor visited at home by an older pastor. The older man told the younger man that every table in his house should be an altar. By this, he didn't mean the young pastor should have a chalice and a silver platter of communion wafers on his bedside table and TV trays. Instead, he was preaching a kind of mindfulness. Pay attention, he was saying. Keep God in mind whatever you do.

When I think about cleaning my house for Christmas as a way of making it picture perfect for a picture-perfect Christmas, I feel cranky and tired. Count me out. I would rather celebrate Christmas among the dust bunnies, thank you very much.

But when I think of Advent as a time of making altars throughout the house, then I feel much more cheerful.

The reason we observe Advent is that we have to prepare our hearts for Christmas. We have to make them big. And by building our little altars, we are reminding ourselves that God is on His way. We say, We are ready to be hopeful. We are ready for peace. We are ready to truly love one another.

We are ready, we say, to greet God when He appears in our doorway. 

With that, I bring you this week's poem, by Mary Oliver.

Making the House Ready for the Lord

Dear Lord, I have swept and I have washed but

still nothing is as shining as it should be

for you. Under the sink, for example, is an

uproar of mice –it is the season of their

many children. What shall I do? And under the eaves

and through the walls the squirrels

have gnawed their ragged entrances –but it is the season

when they need shelter, so what shall I do? And

the raccoon limps into the kitchen and opens the cupboard

while the dog snores, the cat hugs the pillow;

what shall I do? Beautiful is the new snow falling

in the yard and the fox who is staring boldly

up the path, to the door. And I still believe you will

come, Lord: you will, when I speak to the fox,

the sparrow, the lost dog, the shivering sea-goose, know

that really I am speaking to you whenever I say,

as I do all morning and afternoon: Come in, Come in.

From Thirst, Beacon Press, 2007

A Pause in Advent

The season of Advent begins on the fourth Sunday before Christmas. While our contemporary consumer culture begins the process celebrating Christmas right after Thanksgiving--with relentless marketing and an endless soundtrack of carols and songs--liturgical tradition takes a different approach. In liturgical churches you won't hear carols or see a Christmas tree in the sanctuary during Advent--those festivities are reserved for Christmas. Advent, by contrast, is a more solemn season of preparation and anticipation. We set aside these four weeks to prepare ourselves to receive this great mystery into our hearts.

"First Sunday of Advent: History of the Feast," God with Us

I've decided at the very last minute to sign up for Floss's A Pause in Advent. I would like the spiritual discipline of taking time every week to write about my favorite liturgical season of the year.

The above passage from God with Us goes on a little later to say, "Just as we might clean our house in preparation for the arrival of a special guest, so church tradition asks us to take stock of our souls and be at our best when the special day arrives." That's daunting, isn't it--the idea of taking stock of one's soul? How is your soul doing these days?

In general, I have felt that my soul is in need of watering. Of better care and feeding. I was reading an interview with the wonderful (and, sadly, late) poet Jane Kenyon last night and was struck when she said that poets need to be stewards of their gifts. "Protect your time," she writes. "Feed your inner life. Avoid too much noise. Read good books, have good sentences in your ears. Be by yourself as often as you can. Walk. Take the phone off the hook. Work regular hours."

Not only is that wonderful advice for poets, I think it is fine advice for someone preparing to receive a great mystery. I will do my best to be quieter this Advent season, to turn off the radio, to turn away from the Internet, to read poetry and take long walks. On winter Sundays, I like to set out on a walk twenty minutes or so before dusk, so that as I'm headed for home the sky is flooded with pink and gold and a blue giving over to darkness.

I will leave you with a poem by Jane Kenyon from her wonderful collection, Let Evening Come (Graywolf Press, 1990).

Let Evening Come

Let the light of late afternoon
shine through chinks in the barn, moving
up the bales as the sun moves down.

Let the cricket take up chafing
as a woman takes up her needles
and her yarn. Let evening come.

Let dew collect on the hoe abandoned
in long grass. Let the stars appear
and the moon disclose her silver horn.

Let the fox go back to its sandy den.
Let the wind die down. Let the shed
go black inside. Let evening come.

To the bottle in the ditch, to the scoop
in the oats, to air in the lung
let evening come.

Let it come, as it will, and don't
be afraid. God does not leave us
comfortless, so let evening come.