Monday Message

"The best food storage is not in welfare grain elevators but in sealed cans and bottles in the homes of our people. What a gratifying thing it is to see cans of wheat and rice and beans under the beds or in the pantries of women who have taken welfare responsibility into their own hands. Such food may not be tasty, but it will be nourishing if it has to be used." (President Gordon B. Hinckley)

There is great satisfaction seeing food on your shelves. Plus, it gives a feeling that things will be okay.

If I have five dollars left over. I ask myself if I had hard times what would I wish I would have spent this five dollars on?

Just picture in your mind what do you have on hand right now if you couldn't get more due to funds. What would you have wished you had gotten?

Also, if you throw in more frugal meals it would free up some of your grocery funds to stock up a little more.

These are some of the things that have helped me get more on my shelves.

I would set aside an amount for yard sales - it has been a very useful thing to do over the years, I was able to use this to stretch our income. I was able to get school clothes for the kids and household items that made it possible to have and help me fix meals. I even got a sewing machine and supplies to mend those clothes. Winter coats and gear and shovels and whatever we needed.  Yes, getting things used has served us well all these years.

So though things right now make this hard to do, think about down the road and use your Facebook groups to find things you need used for less.

We just recently needed to replace a remote and had to get it online...new. It did not cost very much $7 but using it is very hard till I noticed that if I rolled a small piece of paper and put it in a spot inside that I can get it to work as the battery does not stay in place. My point being that new doesn't always mean better.

So being frugal is something that takes learning to make a little stretch to make enough. We can learn skills that we can put to use in our frugal quests.

I guess this has been on my mind as this week I was going through and testing my embossing powders to see if they were still good after twenty some years and I have been spring cleaning and reorganizing, so I tested them on little labels which I stuck to the bottom of the jars and turned them over so I could see at a glance. I bought only three bottles new. A gold and a silver and clear. There were some that were from swaps, some from Freecycle and the rest from yard sales and thrift stores as proof of the ten cent stickers. It is amazing how fast they added up. So the blessings of buying used has helped a lot.

These were 59 cents each, a huge huge savings.

Missy said this used granny square blanket is mighty fine.

Gus says always look for an item used before buying new if possible.

Our king size sleigh bed frame came from Freecycle. So I guess what I am saying is don't overlook used items. Free, as in the bed frame, or used can really boost the budget rather than bust the budget.

I threw this in to mention it is almost time to have the gardens again, this is another way to help stretch the budget too.

I never said stretching the budget wasn't work as it was work going yard saling, and Freecycle is picking things up and gardening lots of work and putting up the food is work. But all of it was worth doing.

But being content is the best of all.

Keep being safe, look for ways to be frugal, help others as you can and pray if that is all you can do, it all helps and so many need the help right now.

Love one another.