Frugal Friday

Katharine Fullerton Gerould ~
 
The real drawback to the simple life is that it is not simple.
If you are living it, you positively can do nothing else.
There is not time.

Every night I fall into bed and plan on reading a bit.  But I can barely keep my eyes open.  Most of the 30 minutes or so of my reading time is spent with the book dropping every few seconds as I keep falling asleep.  I finally give up and turn out the light.

The next day, I plunge back into my busy and simple life.  That is why this quote made me laugh when I saw it this morning.  I enjoy finding ways to save money.  I love baking my own bread from scratch.  I feel so much satisfaction when I can and process my own foods.  But it most certainly is time consuming.

This week alone I canned 10 quarts of dill pickle spears, 10 pints of dill pickle chips, 13 pints of bread and butter pickles, 7 pints of relish, and put up a bushel of corn in the freezer.  Then on top of that, I ran around for my business, made meals, did laundry, cleaned bathrooms, practiced music for Sunday with my husband a number of times, and a host of other things.

I love my life.  But I'm not sure simple is quite the way to describe it.  Fulfilling might be a better word.  And that brings me great satisfaction.

Here are some ways I saved this week:

$ My sister gave me about a half bushel of cucumbers for free.

$ I purchased another half bushel for $10 from a farm stand.

$ I purchased a bushel of corn for $18 which came to $ .30 an ear.  The cheapest I've seen it in the store is $ .50 an ear.

$ I cut Dan & Nathan's hair.

$ Stephen broke his glasses and I reordered from Zenni Optical online and got them for $19 instead of $150.

$ When it came time to can, I went out to the shed and pulled out canning jars that I've used and saved for years.

$ I continue to live by the philosophy, "Use it up, wear it out, make do or do without!"