Money Saving Tips

Ok, first of all, I'm trying these tips out myself so let me know if it works for you. I'm just like you... don't know how or which is the best way to save money. Since I'm already spending so much money on formula and diapers, I really need to do something about saving money.

Plans for 2010:

1. Refinance your mortgage! We still haven't done that, but we will. Hopefully that will lower our monthly payments. I found this cool refinance calculator, if you'd like to see if it's right for you:

http://www.bankrate.com/calculators/mortgages/refinance-calculator.aspx

2. Right now our phone and internet are one bill, but we're thinking about getting tv (so much for saving money right?). If we put cable, internet and phone in one bill, that will cut down on the number of bills we will get IF we get cable. We are thinking about the future... what if teagan wants to watch barney? lol -- I don't want to deprive her of tv because kids learn a lot from shows like sesame street, barney and dora.

3. On second thought, I could just get rid of my home telephone! So like #2, I can just combine tv and internet w/out the phone. We really don't need our home phone anymore b/c we are home most of the time anyway. What are cell phones for anyway?

4. Eat out less -- we're actually doing good on that. We eat at home everyday except for Sundays b/c we're at church all day.

5. Shop online - amazon.com - it's so much cheaper! I say this b/c I like to read. I know you have to pay for shipping, but you can get used books for less than $5!!

(there's more, but it's enough for today)

So that's the plan, here are the things we are sacrificing!

1. No more personal (clothes, electronics, books, makeup... etc) shopping b/c we have enough... more than enough.

2. Like I said before, we love to eat! We are not to eat out as much anymore. ONLY ON SPECIAL OCCASIONS & SUNDAYS. Sunday, however, is most likely cheap foods like McDonalds.

3. Grocery Shopping - I know it's a must, but we go all out. We'll buy a whole bunch of meat and veggies. Sometimes we can't keep up with how many things of meat we have in the freezer. Don't get me started on the vegetables! We just can't catch up, so the veggies rot in the fridge. There's only 3 adults and a baby in our house, but we buy grocery for a family of 8! Not only that, we like to buy junk food, so when we crave it, we can snack on it. No more junk food. We'll only buy enough grocery for the week, so they won't go bad.

THAT'S ALL I CAN THINK OF RIGHT NOW... GOTTA GO CHANGE THE BABY.