Mom’s Plans

Debt Snowflake Challenge #4, Getting Your Food Costs Under Control

by Melissa on January 27, 2012

Welcome to week four of the Debt Snowflake Challenge.

One expense that people often have trouble containing is food costs. Do you go out to eat too often? Even if you pick up fast food at the end of a busy day, you could easily spend $20 to feed your family. If you do that once a week, you will spend $1,040 over the course of a year. I am not saying you should avoid going out to eat, but make sure it is planned and that you have the money set aside. Perhaps you can carry non-perishable snacks in the car for those times when you would normally pick up fast food such as when a meeting runs late or after a doctor’s appointment when the kids are hungry. As extra motivation to avoid spontaneous eating out, you may want to try this little trick: every time you want to pick up food but resist, snowflake that money!

Unfortunately, even when you curb your appetite for eating out (excuse the pun, but I couldn’t resist ), groceries can also get out of hand. I am the perfect example of this. This month I budgeted $300 for groceries, which probably wasn’t enough for our family of 5. I haven’t added up all of my receipts for the month, but I know I have spent well over $300 on groceries this month. My first warning sign was when I kept running to the store a few times a week to buy “just a few” items.

Just like you should plan when you go out to eat, you should also plan to curb your grocery expenses. Hopefully you regularly make a menu plan. You might want to consider implementing freezer cooking too. I do both of these things, but clearly I am still struggling. To solve this problem, I sat down and developed a 30 day meal plan for the rest of January and February. I based it around the ingredients I already have at home, so hopefully there will be no more little emergency trips to the grocery store. My plan is to only shop twice in February and to limit my spending to $200, which is low, but only because I spent SO much this month on food. It will be our mini-pantry challenge.

What are your strategies for saving on food? What difficulties do you have curbing and controlling your food budget?

Our Progress

This was a great week. I can’t wait to see how much debt we have paid off at the beginning of February.

I took on a new virtual assistant job recently, and since that is extra money that we don’t technically need to make our monthly budget, I decided that all money I make from that particular job will be snowflaked.

Virtual assistant job: $44

I also designated one different, small virtual assistant job to our snowflake. I make $15 at this job per week.

Second designated virtual assistant job: $15

Once again, I got an out-of-the-blue advertising offer for $400. After expenses, I used all of it to snowflake on debt. Having said this, I have been very lucky with advertising this month and don’t expect to see such high revenue next month. I wouldn’t be surprised if I have very little, if any, advertising.

Unexpected advertising deal: $340

We did many different activities over the last week to find money to snowflake on our debt, and the result was that we were able to snowflake $399 since my last report a week ago. In the last fourteen weeks since we have gotten gazelle intense, we have “found” $5704.45 to snowflake!

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Why I Am Trying to Hire a Babysitter

by Melissa on January 26, 2012

Last year at this time, my husband and I were scraping by on his small grad assistantship and student loans, relying on credit cards to get us through. It is a situation that landed us in a great deal of debt that we are currently paying off with gazelle intensity.

The Growth of My Business

Last February, I was delighted when I obtained one staff writing job and one virtual assistant job. The two jobs together netted me $100, which was something, but not nearly enough to cobble together enough money to supplement my husband’s income. I worked diligently on my two jobs, but additional work was slow coming. In March, I had one staff writing job and two virtual assistant jobs. By April, I had three staff writing jobs and four virtual assistant jobs, and I was finally beginning to have a positive impact on the family finances.

I had no idea how fast word-of-mouth referrals would snowball my business. Now, I simply have more work than I can handle. I do my best to squeeze working time in at naptime and at night and all day on Saturday and Sunday, but it is not enough. For a good month now I have toyed with the decision to hire a babysitter one or two mornings a week to watch the girls for 2.5 hours while I work.

Making the Decision

I am overprotective of my kids and have only left them with my mom and aunt before. They literally have never had a babysitter. Yet, if I want to watch my business and income to increase so I can do my part to meet our big, hairy audacious goal, I need more time to work. As it is now, I feel that I am neglecting my health because I have not found time to exercise or take any “me” time.

I have had a few conversations with Miranda at Planting Money Seeds who is a busy writer around the personal finance blog world. From our conversations, I know that even though she worked from home since her son was small, she had him go to daycare so that when he was home, she could focus her attention solely on him.

My husband and I finally decided to find a sitter so I could work from home. I will do my work in another room while a sitter stays with my girls. The road to finding a babysitter has not been smooth. I interviewed one person who seemed enthusiastic and took the job, yet when I called her to confirm she was coming the night before she was scheduled, she didn’t return my call. The next day, she didn’t show up; I have not heard from her since the interview.

This past weekend I interviewed someone who seemed like she would be a great fit for our family. My oldest daughter, who is quite shy, kept talking about the sitter after our interview. However, she is a nanny 4 days a week, and the mother just told her she might need her for the 5th day, which means she would not be able to take the job with us.

Just this week I interviewed another babysitter who told me that she really likes to stay in her house, and she loves her mornings, so I would have to pay her quite well for her to want to give up mornings in her house. I wondered why she interviewed. Needless to say, she won’t be the babysitter I choose.

I have one more person to interview this week. I am hoping she works out.

Still, despite the difficult, my husband and I feel this is the best decision. I can make two to three times more money per hour than I need to pay the babysitter. Now, we just need to find the right person.

If you work from home, do you feel conflict between caring for your children and your work load? How do you deal with the feelings?

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E-Mealz New Whole Food’s Plan Review and a Giveaway

by Melissa on January 25, 2012

I was delighted to learn last month that e-mealz, one of my favorite menu planning services, had released a new Whole Foods menu plan. I have had the pleasure of using e-mealz’s portion control plan before, and I loved the ease of menu planning. (You can see my full review of that plan here.)

However, we have recently begun to eliminate most processed foods from our diet and to focus on eating more organic vegetables and fruits, so I was delighted to see the Whole Foods plan.

Three out of five of my family members cannot eat dairy, and two of the five of us can’t have soy, so we were a bit limited in our sampling of the menu. However, each week, there were at least two meals that we could make from the plan, and we enjoyed those greatly! Two of our favorites were Mushroom Barley Soup and Mexican Black Bean Chili. Both of these recipes were loved by all members of our family and will be on our menu again.

If we did not have food intolerances, I would, hands down, subscribe to the new Whole Foods plan. There are so many delicious meals on the menu plan including Pasta with Creamy Wild Mushroom Sauce and Spinach Salad with Chicken, Apples and Walnuts, just to name a few. E-Mealz even provides a sample one week meal plan and grocery list so you can see for yourself what the plan includes.

Many people think that eating healthy foods means eating tasteless foods, but the e-Mealz Whole Foods plan shows that is not true. Some of these recipes feel as fancy as restaurant dishes, but are less expensive. In fact, e-Mealz states that you can feed a family of 4 for less than $4 a person for each meal. Each week’s menu comes complete with a Whole Foods’ grocery list that also includes the expected price per item. In the sample menu, the price for the groceries for the week totals $144.

While it is true that this plan relies on groceries that are more expensive than other e-Mealz plans, keep in mind that you are buying mostly organic items. Organic meat, especially, can be costly. A way to lower the overall menu would be to stock up on organic pantry staples such as beef stock, when it goes on sale. Another way to reduce the cost is to make items at home. The plan relies on canned beans to save time, but it would be more cost effective to take one Saturday a month to cook up beans and freeze them in can size portions. If you want to feed your family a wholesome, organic menu, you can do so and save money by finding ways to cut costs.

The Giveaway

E-Mealz has generously agreed to give one lucky Mom’s Plans reader a free 3 month subscription to their new Whole Foods plan. This giveaway ends on February 3, 2012 at 10:59 p.m. CST.

I received a complimentary copy of the plan for review purposes; I received no other compensation. All opinions are my own.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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Get Dave Ramsey’s Kids Money Education Monster Pack for $48

by Melissa on January 24, 2012

As I have mentioned previously, my seven year old son is quite the spendthrift. So, when I saw this Dave Ramsey’s Kids Money Education Monster Pack, I knew I needed to buy it for my son as one of his birthday presents. While he is a spendthrift, he is also learning from the financial conversations my husband and I have at the dinner table and the books he is reading, so I figured now would be a good time to round out his financial education.

This pack, which retails for $105 but is currently available through Mamasource for $48 includeds:

-Financial Peace Junior

-Junior’s Adventure 6 CD set

-and a kid’s bank.

Shipping is free.

How do you like to educate your kids financially? Have you used this kit before? Would you recommend it?

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The Clock that Saved My Sanity – The Stoplight Alarm Clock

by Melissa on January 24, 2012

I was lamenting on Mom’s Plans Facebook page a few week’s ago that my three year old daughter was routinely waking up at 4:30 to 5 a.m. EVERY morning and then proceeding to turn on the light, dance around the room, hide in the closet, slamming the door in the process, and waking up both her brother and sister that she shares a room with and us, not to mention our neighbor’s upstairs. In short, we were all exhausted and grumpy.

While many Facebook followers offered solutions, the one that did the trick for us was from Teri who suggested The Stoplight Alarm Clock. This clock looks like a traffic light, and at night, the light is red. Kids are not allowed to get out of their bed until the light turns green. We set the clock to turn green at 6 a.m. and went to sleep not expecting much. To our surprise, our daughter, who did wake up before 6 a.m., stayed in bed quietly until the clock turned green. We couldn’t believe it and thought it must be a fluke. However, we have now had the clock for a week, and it has worked like a charm.

If you are having trouble with kids who wake up too early, you just might want to try this light. Thank you, Teri! I now feel human again. :)

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Mexican Black Bean Chili

by Melissa on January 23, 2012

I love all sorts of different chilis, but this one from E-Mealz‘s new Whole Foods menu was delicious. Perhaps it is because they suggested serving it with warm tortillas and I had never thought of doing that before. We ended up serving it wrapped in tortillas and it became a delicious, different type of taco.

Mexican Black Bean Chili

1 lb. ground chuck
1 cup diced onion
1 cup diced green pepper (we used a mix of red and orange peppers because that is what we had on hand)
2 cups beef broth
1 Tbsp. chili powder
1.5 tsp. cumin
3/4 tsp. oregano
1/2 tsp. each salt and pepper
1 Tbsp. minced garlic
2 -14 oz. cans diced tomatoes
2 – 15 oz. cans black beans, drained (I cooked ours from dry to cut costs)

-In a Dutch oven, cook ground chuck, onion and bell pepper until brown and crumbly. Drain the fat.

-Add remaining ingredients and simmer for 30 minutes, until thickened.

Serve in bowls with flour tortilla triangles on the side, or serve wrapped in flour tortillas. Delicious either way.

I shared this post at $5 Dinners and Tempt My Tummy Tuesdays.

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The Saved Quarter Challenge, 2012, #3, Earned $166

January 23, 2012

This week I earned $166, all of which was from staff writing, virtual assistant work and advertising. That means for the entire month so far, I have earned $3.097.22, which I find mind-boggling! When I had to make the decision to quit my job in June, I knew that if I stayed at the job, [...]

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Debt Snowflake Challenge #3, Every Penny Helps

January 20, 2012

Welcome to week three of the Debt Snowflake Challenge. I have noticed that some people believe that there is no point in snowflaking money because they can’t generate hundreds of dollars to snowflake. Maybe they can only find an extra $5 to snowflake a week, so they think, what is the point? The point is [...]

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Introducing My New Blog, Fiscal Phoenix

January 19, 2012

I have just launched a new blog, Fiscal Phoenix. This blog is dedicated to helping people rise from the ashes of their financial mistakes. It is still in its preliminary stages, but I am excited about it, so I wanted to share so you could join me in this blog from the very beginning. We [...]