"My time is worth more than that."

So, I was reading a blog the other day by a gentleman who, among other things, says that it's all right that he spends at least $3 per serving per meal on his family, because his time is worth more than what it would require to cook from scratch.

I've come across that statement before, even in supposedly frugal books/articles. And I think, honestly, people aren't quite looking at it the right way. Yes, I get the concept they're putting forth. For instance, let's say it takes me 5 hours to make a scarf and hat for a gift and the yarn cost me 50 cents from a garage sale. Now, I could go to Target and buy a hat and scarf for $15 and the total trip time is 1 hour. The argument goes that my remaining time is worth more than whatever I saved in making it myself, because I only saved the equivalent of $3.63 an hour. This seems to be used especially by people who explain, "because I make $12 (or whatever) an hour at work" as why something less than minimum wage is beneath their dignity.

The problems I see with this thinking are twofold. First, the assumption is you are actually working instead of making the scarf and hat. Or, conversely, that you are somehow missing work in order to do it. Otherwise, this doesn't exactly stand up. After all, unless you have some really cool, unusual job, it's very unlikely that anyone is actually paying you to do whatever you did on your off hours instead of make the gift - watch TV, go to a mall, see a movie... and so on. The $3.63 saved is actually more than the $0 earned in this case. (More in full post.)

The second half of this problem is well, even more problematic. Please bear with me while I build a totally hypothetical story to make my point.

Bob and Joe are both single and 30 years old. They have the same salary, work the same hours, live in identical houses with the same mortgage note, and drive the same automobiles. Bob lives very frugally. He shops sales, makes his meals from scratch, gets his entertainment for free or as cheaply as possible. Joe, on the other hand, tends to eat out a lot and likes to "party" on the weekends. Neither man lives beyond his means. However, while Bob is banking a full $800 a month of his paycheck by living simply, Joe only saves $300. Joe doesn't like to bargain hunt, wouldn't dream of "wasting" his time on garage sales and figures it's okay to treat himself to nice meals because, after all, he can afford it. It is "not worth his time" to live like Bob does and save a penny here or a dollar there.

Flash-forward 30 years. Both men are now 60 and they've just paid off their mortgages. Bob looks at his savings and realizes that the interest alone will pay him more than he needs to continue living as he has, since he no longer has a house note to contend with. He can retire, re-invest some of his interest earnings to put away for his later years, and relax and enjoy himself. Joe, on the other hand, hasn't saved near the amount Bob did and needs more money month-to-month to maintain the lifestyle he's told himself he's worth these past 30 years. Joe looks at his savings and realizes he'll either need to sell his home, move somewhere smaller, and scale way back, something he's not accustomed to doing at all, or, he's going to have to keep on working, probably for many years.

And this is the big trap of the "my time is worth more than that" thinking when it comes to measuring how to do something. That attitude might carry someone through years of his working life, but it has the very real potential to hurt him in his golden years if it frequently leads to spending more for something than necessary, just because the frugal version would've required more work.

THIS ARTICLE FROM FRONTLINE talks about the rising costs of retirement and how many of us aren't prepared for it. In particular:

"According to the 401(k) plan records analyzed by the Employee Benefits Research Institute (EBRI), Americans approaching retirement have, on average, three times their annual salaries in their accounts. Without any other form of savings, these retirees will burn through their 401(k)s in just seven or eight years, leaving them facing 10 or 11 years, based on life expectancy, with nothing but Social Security."

The article then goes on to say people should have 10 - 15 times their annual salary saved. Now, granted, for people like Bob, the amount needed is likely lower, maybe even much lower, considering he already knows how to live on a smaller amount of money than other people in his income bracket. However, for all the (*ahem*) average Joes out there, they're in danger of finding themselves in this very situation, and it could've been prevented by not being so sure that it wasn't even worth their time to save $3.63 an hour on a gift. Or $2 per serving on a meal. Or $16 by not going to the first-run movie and buying a $5 bag of popcorn and $4 cola on top of the $7 ticket, instead of waiting to borrow it from the library when it comes out on DVD.

A penny saved really is penny earned. Being frugal is more than just a way to live within your means. It's also a ticket to how the rest of your life pans out. I know I'd rather save that money now, while I can, then be looking at needing supervised care when I'm 85 and not having the money to cover it, all because I was "worth more" when I was young. My future is worth more than that.

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Why I'll never be a "fashionista".

Here's one for the "Yuh, huh???" pile. DESIGNER BAG HYSTERIA AT WHOLE FOODS.

Okay, so the concept - use canvas bags instead of plastic while shopping - good idea. I'm on board with that.

But this bag? Is horribly ugly. I mean really, really, really ugly. Yet apparently crowds of people couldn't wait to get one. Some even stood in line in the rain for 'em. I guess my fashion taste is just as sadly plebeian as I always figured it was, because - meh. Ugly!

And as far as I'm concerned, this bag sure as heck is not worth the $15 asking price much less: "As of 1 pm ET, the U.S. and U.K. versions of the bags were being bid up into the mid-$200 range on eBay. On Craigslist the bag was being offered for $250."

Whoa.

If you have $250 to blow on one ugly bag, you could just as easily go to ORIENTAL TRADING COMPANY and purchase 12 large canvas bags for about $20. It's not like that bottle of expensive salad dressing cares what it rides home in and then you could take that $230 you just saved, buy a whole lot of food, and donate it to a food bank. Now THAT would be making a difference not just for the environment, but for people less fortunate as well.

Hee. How much now do I want to go over to Cafe Press and design a similar tote bag that says, "I paid way too much for this bag to show-off how environmentally conscious I am!" Betcha I could find a similar font for free.... ;)

(Eek. Is that too mean? Sometimes my snarky side really gets rolling. But honestly, if the idea is to spread awareness - plain bags at an affordable price would do just as well. The more people see other people bringing their own canvas bags to the store, the more people will consider doing it themselves. It doesn't require a bag that actually says, "I'm not a plastic bag." Er... and I hope that's just some sad attempt at some kind of cosmopolitan ironic chic thing there, because otherwise - duh!)

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Some more free crochet patterns.

If you have a daughter who likes head scarves (or know a little girl who does) THIS PATTERN is simple enough that you could whip one up yourself or teach her how to make her own.

And here's a SIMPLE BELT PATTERN - your daughter could make a head scarf and matching belt, or you could make a set as a gift for a special little lady. :)

This one's interesting not so much in what it is, but for the explanation on how to determine the size of a project: CROCHET CURTAINS

Finally, here's a pattern for EASY SLIPPERS FOR BEGINNERS - something else that might make a nice gift.

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Spybot mal-ware program.

Since I'm having computer woes, I thought this might be a good time to point you in the direction of this: SPYBOT SEARCH AND DESTROY. I downloaded this software several years ago and it still works great. It's free, because the creator believes it should be, but he does ask for a donation if you can afford it. If you decide to use the program, please consider making a donation if you can. He and his team of volunteers work hard on this program, constantly having to upgrade it to tackle the latest spyware/malware creations. (But that doesn't mean you have to constantly download upgraded versions. The program is built so that when you run it, it connectes with their database to find everything it needs to know what to search out and destroy.)

The first time I used the software, I was stunned by the number of things that had been installed on my computer without my knowledge or permission. I'm not just talking about malicious programs, either. I'm refering to all the cookies and records that were there. Very scary.

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Computer update.

So, I'm on day - what is it? 5? of Groundhog Day. Each morning, my computer acts as if it's never been turned on before. My husband hasn't been able to fix it, but we have determined this isn't a virus-related problem as far as we can tell. It just seems to be a corrupted file of some sort. This weekend a friend of ours who's *really* into computers is coming over to check on it for me.

Meanwhile, I've given up on accessing my e-mails until then. I keep re-loading them and losing them. *RME* Feel free to leave a comment here about anything until then.

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Friday Five for Free (6)

This one's a little different. These free websites I'm about to list may not be free or even exist much longer.

First, you should read: THIS ARTICLE ABOUT THE STATE OF INTERNET RADIO.

Just today it was ANNOUNCED THERE'S BEEN A SMALL REPRIEVE but nothing is settled for sure. If this interests you, you can keep up-to-date by visiting: SAVENETRADIO.ORG In particular, READ THESE RESPONSES TO THE SITUATION from musicians who explain exactly why this is a horrible turn of events.

Finally, here are 5 free internet radio sites. I imagine the big guys - aol, yahoo, vh1 - will hang around, though it wouldn't surprise me terribly if they started charging subscription fees. And the "little" guys? They'll probably go out of business, which is a huge shame, as you can see from the musicians' pleas for help.

YAHOO RADIO
AOL RADIO
LIVE 365
VH-1 RADIO
RADIO TOWER

Just to note - I listen to free internet radio frequently, as does my daughter. We very often will let contemporary Christian stations play while we work, including one we really like called LifeTalkKids, which has Christian and Inspirational music and dramatic Bible readings. LifeTalkKids is definitely one on the endangered list.

I do understand that people in the music industry have a right to compensation; however, IMHO, this attempt to jack up royalties is nothing short of base greed and will in the end only hurt the majority of people involved in music/audio production while fattening the wallets of a few folks at the top. If you agree with this sentiment, please consider following the links at savenetradio.org to contact your congressmen and ask for help.

Thanks!

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Well, phooey!

I just realized that if you search under a label - like "recipe chatter" - you don't get all the posts, only the more recent ones. *grumble* I guess I'll go ahead and try to fix that, but as of right now, that still leaves me where I was a month ago when I was considering building a links page. There's nothing *wrong* with that per se, except that it would mean I'd need to manually update it and the whole point to blogging is supposed to be the ease of "push-button publishing." Still, I guess it couldn't hurt to organize everything better here, since my posts are generally as random as they could get.

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Wednesday Quick Tip (4)

Are you an OPEN OFFICE (a lot like MicroSoft Works) user? My computer came with "pre-installed" software from MS, but it turned out to be some sort of trial-only version and if I really wanted to use it, I was supposed to go to the website and pay for a download.

Er. Well. Thanks anyway. I'll take the free open source version. :)

If you use Open Office, you might be interested in the following links. They have templates for everything from CD covers to labels to resumes and so on.

From the Open Office site itself:
TEMPLATES 1
TEMPLATES 2

From off site, user created templates:
LABELS
VARIOUS TEMPLATES
ANOTHER VARIETY SOURCE

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There's nothing wrong with you!

There's a very good reason we have such a problem with spending in our culture. We're not just being bombarded with commercials and advertisements designed to convince us we Just. Can't. Live. Without. such and such gadget, but we're also subjected constantly to an attitude that money equals success and therefore a lack of a large bank account must mean failure.

And who wants to feel like a failure?

This starts very young. It's not just the entertainment industry and retail businesses feeding us this horrific lie, either. Starting all the way back in grade school we are told that we must perform well in our classes, not to become better people, not to acquire knowledge to help us someday make a difference in the world; no, we're told this because it will be important that we "get into a good college" when we graduate high school. And why is that so important? Because, of course, we have to "get a good job." That's it. In the end, public schools are teaching us that it's all about the money. (More in full post.)

With that kind of pressure on us, is it any wonder so many of us wind up in the big houses we can't afford, driving the expensive cars and wearing the designer clothes, so we can at least appear like we aren't failures, even if it means being way over our heads in debt? And the pressure only grows when we have children, as others tell us we're depriving our kids and damaging them for life - even abusing them (!) - if we don't let them live like we're quite well off, even if we aren't. And if we aren't affluent enough to afford all the latest this-es and thats? Well, there comes that failure label again, only now, we aren't just personal failures, now we've failed our children, too.

It's all a bunch of horse hooey.

Children need to be fed. (Nutritious meals - NOT Burger King!) They need a clean, safe home, whether it's an apartment or a condo or a house or a manufactured home or a trailer. They need clothing - no over-paid designer's name stamped on the pocket necessary. They need an education, which doesn't have to cost thousands of dollars to be good. And mostly, they need the love, care, and time of their parents/guardians. The things beyond these basics are treats and should be handled as such. No child *needs* to watch television. This is a treat. No child *needs* to have an ice cream cone with mint chocolate chip ice cream and chocolate sprinkles. Again, it's just a treat.

Give them too many treats to often and you wind up with spoiled children who have no concept of money nor of self-restraint. And self-restraint is not a bad thing! It prevents you from buying every little thing that catches your temporary fancy, which will only drive you straight to financial ruin.

So right now what I want to say is this: There is nothing wrong with you! (Or your spouse.) You are not a failure just because you don't have a six figure income. Your house does not need to be a palace. Your car doesn't have to be a Mercedes. If you've been struggling with this lie, if you've been feeling ashamed or guilty or anything else because our society gives off an attitude like nothing less than a McMansion is acceptable, take a moment to step back and re-evaluate.

Whether you are just beginning to get control of your own finances, or if you've been living within your means for a long time, real success is not the amount of money you have, but rather how well you are living your life regardless of how many dollars you can call your own. Ignore the critics and focus on what's really important. So what if your own home is only 1100 square feet in a working class neighborhood while Family X lives on some million dollar estate? They are no better than you are and you are not a failure because of it. Don't compare what you have to what anyone else has. It doesn't even matter in the end.

Remember, it's a cliche, but it's true. You really can't take it with you. And when you come to the end of your life, you will not be looking back at your bank account. You will be looking at your friends, your family, your loved ones, at the memories and milestones.

And should someone ever imply you're a failure for not having some smashing career with an outrageous salary, just remind yourself that you are doing what's right, and doing what's necessary to live by the means you have for you and your family. Yes, sometimes you might slip or maybe you're currently facing a mountain of debt you're trying to climb out of, but if you keep working at it, one baby step at a time, then you are a true success, not just the flimsy image of one.

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Family traditions, part 2.

To follow up from my FIRST TRADITIONS POST, I wanted to talk about some other traditions we have in our family. (More in full post.)

One thing I didn't mention in my last post but we also do every November, along with our Thanksgiving traditions - we participate in NaNoWriMo's YOUNG WRITERS PROGRAM. If you are familiar with the original NANOWRIMO - National Novel Writing Month, then you know every November thousands of people try to write a novel, or at least 50,000 words, in one month. The young writers program is a little different, in that you can set a word goal ahead of time, not necessarily 50,000. (In fact, we follow the rule of thumb for 1,000 per age year. For instance, a 9-year-old would write 9,000 words, except both my children work together on the same book.) Once the official writing frenzy is over, we take the work we've done, clean it up and "publish" it by printing it, designing a cover, and comb-binding it. Several years ago the children made up an imaginary kingdom with a name that's made out of parts of their first names combined and each story they write is set there. I consider these books family heirlooms now.

BTW - If you're interested in participating in the Young Writers Program, they do allow homeschoolers to join. In fact, there's a special homeschoolers section on the forum.

It wasn't until I got married that I learned people actually eat certain things for "good luck" on New Year's Day. Since I really don't put any stock in luck, I told my husband he was welcome to keep eating black-eyed peas and cornbread on January 1st, but I wasn't going to make a big deal out of it. (Especially because we eat black-eyed peas and cornbread several times a year!) We also don't write out resolutions. What we *do* do is on December 31st get out our New Year's Notebook and write down our most exciting or favorite memory/event/activity from the past year, and why we chose it. It's fun to look back over the years and see what we all chose in the past. There's a definite trend in events always seeming to be something that happened in the latter part of the year - which doesn't say much for our memory skills! :)

Our Valentine's celebrations always consist of a "everyone makes his/her own cake" afternoon. What that really means is I bake a few small round cakes and a few small square cakes and we cut them up and use them to make heart shapes, which the kids and I then frost and decorate with a choice of toppings. We also all make homemade Valentine's hearts (from construction paper) for each other and then they are displayed by hanging them by thread from the ceiling over the dining table. Each heart has a message written to the recipient that starts with "I love you because...". After Valentine's Day, these are put away in a shoe box like our Thanksgiving tree leaves, so that we can take them out and look at them while we're making our new hearts each year.

A few years ago, we started a new Easter tradition, aside from the food and goodies we serve. Good Friday and Easter Sunday are devoted to church and family time, but the Thursday before Easter my kids have a "school-work hunt", because we don't have Easter egg hunts. (They're a little old for that now.) All right, I know what you're thinking - who'd want to look for school work? If you've looked at my lesson plans, you know we rely heavily on the internet. The week before Easter, I pick certain websites with activities and games that pertain to what we are currently studying. I build a web page with some sort of outdoor/forest image as the "setting" and I hide the links to the websites on the page. The children have to mouse around the page and find these links. For instance, a bird in the sky might be a link, or a certain flower, or a rock on the ground. Once they find a link, they click on it, play the game or do the activity, then go back to the webpage to find another link, until they've found them all. Once they've completed the tasks, they click on a link that says, "I'm done!" and that takes them to the beginning of a story I've written about the scene/setting they've just explored. It's really just some sort of long-ish writing prompt. They take my story starter, and it's their job to finish it. They LOVE doing this. So much so, in fact, that they keep asking if I'll make a school-work hunt for them in the fall, too.

We end our school year with a Make-Your-Own Pizza and Banana Split party. This is basically a family celebration where the kids get to build their own pizzas using dough I've made and a variety of toppings and then make their own desserts. Afterwards, we watch a movie (checked out from the library) together. We also present the kids with promotion certificates I've printed from a free site.

So, these are our family traditions. Feel free to post more of yours and share ideas. I love to read about what other families do. :)

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8 Things About Me

CHARITY tagged me. (*Waves* to Charity. :) No worries about going "off topic"!)

The Rules:

The rules are simple. Each player lists 8 facts/habits about themselves. The rules of the game are posted at the beginning before those facts/habits are listed. At the end of the post, the player then tags 8 people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know that they have been tagged and asking them to read your blog.

Thing One: I'm such a geek, I had to fight the urge to correct the rules to say "Each player lists 8 facts/habits about himself/herself.", and then continue on through the rest of the rules to fix that error each time it shows up.

Thing Two: I don't lie about my age or have any problem telling people how old I am (37). Wrinkles are a badge of honor in my book.

Thing Three: I really, really don't like spiders. I grew up in an area with FIDDLEBACKS and so spiders were always considered the enemy. I never really got over that.

Thing Four: I read The Lord of the Rings when I was in 7th grade - all three books in just four days, while school was in session. I read every spare minute I had, in class, at lunch, after school and late, late into the night until I fell asleep.

Thing Five: Any time someone says, "Life doesn't come with an instruction manual." I promptly reply, "Sure it does. It's called the Bible."

Thing Six: I married my high school sweetheart one year after we graduated. Our 18th anniversary is in 10 days.

Thing Seven: I believe in going to the source of things. If I suspect an article or story is bogus, I will investigate. I have called the FBI, the CIA, and various other law enforcement agencies (to find out about crimes supposedly committed), university professors (to confirm studies done on various foods or products), and tracked down countless footnotes in things I have read. There is a highly disturbing amount of information out there that is total bunk when you start really looking in to it.

Thing Eight: My current "just for me/not a gift" project that I'm working on is a filet crochet table cloth for a round table. I hope to have it done by late October.


And... my apologies to anyone being retagged if I missed it.

1) 5 KIDS AND A DOG
2) HOMESCHOOL IN THE LITTLE HOUSE
3) WALKING ALONG THE ROAD
4) MY TWENTY CENTS KEEPS MOVING!
5) WING AND PRAYERS
6) THE RANDOM ACCOUNT OF QUASIMODO
7) PEAKMORE ACADEMY
8) THE ROAD TO TOTAL GROWTH MIND BODY AND SPIRIT

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Money talk in the news.

First, ACCORDING TO THIS REPORT I am now worth $138,095 a year. Heh. Guess what. To my family, I'm priceless. It's highly unlikely I will ever earn that much money in one year, but I know you can't really put a salary on the work mothers do, so it's always amusing to see what someone tries to say our work is worth.

And then there's THIS STORY that will make your head spin. For instance, there's this:

In wealthy Westchester, N.Y., a couple earning $200,000 a year could barely afford the $2,500 fee that Kathy Boyle, a New York certified financial planner, charged for creating a plan.

"If you drive by their house in Westchester, their life seems like nirvana. They live in a $1.1 million home on a gorgeous road, with two luxury cars in the driveway," Boyle says. "But walking inside their financial house, it's in shambles."

Today, their 19-year-old son's college bills are paid by a generous family friend because they cannot afford them. Yet the mother stays at home with the 13-year-old daughter.

Boyle advised the mother to consider going back to work, but she declined, saying her daughter "needs her." The extra income could have helped the couple tackle their $20,000 credit card debt and maybe start a college-savings fund for their daughter.

Wow. Let me just get past the making $200,000 a year and can't even pay the bills thing for a moment and focus on something else here. I sure hope Ms. Boyle did a lot more for her $2500 than tell this mother to get a job! And if this family honestly needed to pay someone to tell them something plainly obvious - then it's no wonder they're in such financial trouble! The tone of this article is astounding. "... because they cannot afford them. Yet the mother stays at home...." This is posed as if everything is out of whack solely because mom's not working outside the home. This family has a real problem and quite frankly, Ms. Boyle's advice is actually pretty bad. If mom goes back to work, based on their current spending habits, it is only very likely that they will simply start spending and buying more with whatever money she brings in. More money is not going to be an overall solution here. This family needs to rethink their spending habits on a grand scale and learn to live with less. Until that happens, they will always be in trouble. Hopefully Ms. Boyle will actually explain this to them, or someone else will do it, because only then will they be able to achieve some sort of financial stability.

But you know the real question here?

Just what is it dad does that he's worth $61,905 more than I am? ;)

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Well, golly. I rock! Hee.

So, *blush* MOMMA KNOWS - nominated (designated?) me for



- which? Aw. Thanks. And I totally think you rock, too. :) And my husband will be so amused by this, because I'm such a nerd, no one would ever usually associate me with something, you know, cool. LOL!

Now I get to choose 5 ladies who also rock and wow! That's hard! Not because there aren't any - I assure you - but because there are so many! I just love the internet and how we can all connect this way.

So, here's what I thought I'd do. Rather than just linking to a blog itself, I'm pointing you to my nominees by way of posts they've made that I found particularly awesome. I'm assuming that's okay, because I did manage to track down the creator of the award, HERE and I'm not seeing any definite rules.

Go see Kathy at BROKEN HOMESCHOOL - and read "8 Things Everybody Knows You Need To Homeschool (But You Don’t)" - I couldn't agree more with her - she nailed it.

Have some COFFEE WITH MRS. DANI - and explore whether Mom can even afford to work. She breaks it all down very well and I hope plenty of moms considering staying at home run into someone who can offer them this same sage advice.

This next one might seem like an odd choice. Tersie at THE ROAD TO TOTAL GROWTH MIND BODY AND SPIRIT has an amazing blog that shows a determined, gutsy lady I really admire, and if you aren't a regular reader already, you should be. But I chose this post not for those reasons. I chose it because it made me laugh out loud when I read it. So loud, in fact, that my children demanded to know what was so funny and when I told them, they laughed, too. (Tersie - we weren't laughing at you like, "What a moron!" or anything. We were laughing because on more than one occasion I have tried to open the doors to vans that don't belong to me. Fortunately for me, I haven't actually succeeded yet!)

Quasimodo, might call her blog a RANDOM ACCOUNT, but her posts on paying attention to home are very thoughtful and thought-provoking. I'm linking to part one, but make sure to also read her newly posted part 2.

And last (but of course not least!) Drop in at THE HOMESCHOOL IN THE LITTLE HOUSE - for a beautifully written post reminding us that we are who God made us and meant for us to be - whether we are oak trees or sunflowers.

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Fascinating article about price tags.

THIS ARTICLE has some interesting theories about the adverse (for consumers) effects of the "price tag only on the shelf" system that has become the norm for most of the country. The story ends with words of hope, about a possible solution, but, in the meantime, we should all be very aware of the points brought up here.

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Sign the Declaration of Independence.

Blogging fly-by from Summer Science Camp: THIS SITE (THE NATIONAL ARCHIVES) has an awesome feature where you can sign and then print a copy of the Declaration of Independence. Too cool.

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Family traditions, part 1.

Independence Day is this week and so I thought I'd mention some holiday traditions in our house. Having certain traditions creates an even deeper sense of family and belonging and it gives your children something special to look forward to. That does not mean that you have to go crazy in a "buy-out-the-store" way like retailers would have you believe. In fact, focusing your traditions on other things, outside of material gifts, can make them all the more meaningful. (More in full post.)

I'll start with Independence Day, since it's right around the corner. We celebrate the day a few ways, including a reading of the Declaration of Independence. We also have a "red, white, and blue" shortcake for dessert with our dinner - which is strawberry shortcake with blueberries added. I only make this once a year, on the 4th, so my kids see it as an extra special treat. (Familiarity breeding contempt and all that.) In the evening, we take a blanket and a bottle of lemonade and go sit out by a nearby lake where there's a fireworks display. It's all very simple, but it's something the children know as a family tradition and something they can look forward to.

On the first day of October every year, I start the morning with pumpkin pancakes and homemade apple syrup, plus slices of Canadian bacon. Again, this is something that only happens once a year, so my kids really love it. Were I to make pumpkin pancakes more frequently, they'd lose their "specialness." Weather permitting, we follow our breakfast with a nature walk where we gather up some fallen leaves - not a lot here in Florida, sadly, and usually they're all brown - and we bring them home and do leaf rubbings using crayons that are orange, red, and yellow - so that we can make our own fall foliage. (On the one year that it was just pouring down rain that morning, we ended up drawing our leaves instead.) These leaves are set aside until November, for a special Thanksgiving project.

The Sunday before Thanksgiving, we make our "Thanksgiving Tree." This is a bare tree cut out from construction paper and taped to the wall. We carefully cut out our leaf rubbings and write things we are thankful for on them, then tape them to the tree. This will include the names of friends and families and other blessings from the year. On Thanksgiving day, we get out a shoebox where we keep the leaves from Thanksgivings past and read out the things we'd written in previous years, and after Thanksgiving is over, we add the current year's leaves to the box. (Actually, the box has gotten quite full. We might be needing to start a new one this year!)

In addition to the traditional Thanksgiving dinner we always serve - plus a chocolate pie my husband loves, also something I only make this one time of the year - every Thanksgiving we also read from a book about the Pilgrims and the first Thanksgiving.

And this leads into the Christmas season for us. We do not do any formal schooling from the Sunday before Thanksgiving until the new year. (Hence the reason we're actually doing school right now.) First of all, it gives us the chance to focus on the holiday season and second, here in Florida the weather is so hot right now, we might as well stay inside and get our book work done, and then, in the late fall, when things are much nicer, we spend a lot of time outside.

After Thanksgiving is over, we do two things. We get out our Christmas decorations and we construct our advent calendar. We make a new calendar each year out of construction paper. We decorate our home (with mostly handmade things) and set up our Advent wreath. (Special note - I've seen Advent wreaths in catalogs in recent years, costing quite a lot of money. You can assemble one yourself using discount store purchases for around $5.) At the beginning of December, the kids will make a bunch of ornaments. Some are given as gifts to family members, and some are hung on our own tree. We also make a special trip to the grocery store where we buy things to be delivered to the local food bank. In mid-December, we have our annual "Yummy Baking Day" where we will make cookies and spiced/sugared nuts and candy, to be used as gifts for various people, like the kids' Sunday School teachers. And of course, the kids get to eat a lot of the results themselves. We don't often have dessert throughout the year, except on special occasions - but we sure make up for it at Christmas time!

Christmas Eve we have a special dinner with any family members in town, followed by a Bible reading about the birth of Jesus, and then we go to a midnight service at church. On Christmas morning - pretty late in the morning; everyone sleeps in! - the kids get up and get their stockings, then we have a brunch which is always Monkey Bread, fresh fruit, and Quiche Lorraine. (Which - yep, you guessed it - the bread and quiche are only served this one time of the year.) Because the kids choose their gifts themselves, they aren't surprised by anything, but they are allowed to bring their new things out to play with in the afternoon, then in the evening, after a nice dinner, we watch a movie together.

I will talk about other holiday traditions we have in another post, but I wanted to bring the topic up because I think maintaining traditions - whatever may suit your family - is the best way to keep any holiday focused on the meaning behind it, rather than on the "buy-buy-buy" mentality advertisers try to sell us. Don't you just *love* those commercials every year where we're being sold the idea that it would be really awesome of us to give cars as gifts? Oi!

Special times are not made special because of the amount of money we spent on them. They are made special by togetherness, fun, and the time spent on them. I did not grow up in a family that had many traditions, and neither did my husband, so we've had to create them ourselves as we go along, but we've found them to be something our children adore and anticipate with a great deal of excitement. This past Easter I had suggested to my children that perhaps we didn't need our traditional "baby chick" cookies* I always make, because I thought maybe my kids would think they were too old for them now, but both children were utterly horrified at the suggestion and so I made them again. Lesson learned! I suppose I'll still be making those cookies even when my kids are grown.

So feel free to jump in here with any traditions your family enjoys! We can swap ideas and perhaps find new traditions to begin. :)

*Baby Chick Cookies - these are made using a BASIC COOKIE MIX - and following the COCONUT COOKIES RECIPE, in which I tint the coconut with yellow food coloring. I make the cookies by making one batch of larger cookies and one batch of slightly smaller ones. (The larger cookies go into the oven first because they need to cook longer.) When the cookies come out of the oven I put them on the cooling rack and gently press one smaller cookie next to one larger one - to become a head and body. I press a chocolate chip in for a beak, and use snips of green-tinted coconut for eyes.

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Embroidery chatter.

This is the Bible cover I'm working on, that I mentioned in a comment. I'm sure you've seen these sorts of kits before. They come with instructions and a pre-stamped piece of fabric.

As you can see from the picture, I keep everything I need to work on this project in this little purse. (I purchased it from the Dollar Spot at Target.) I just stick the needle directly into the fabric liner to keep it safe. Whenever I'm going somewhere where I might be sitting/waiting for awhile - such as the kids' doctor appointments - I just grab the purse to go along. Er, yes, I sometimes get strange looks when I'm stitching (or crocheting or knitting) in public, but more often than not, it seems to bring out the friendliness of people. Many of them will strike up a conversation to ask about whatever project I'm working on.

I will make sure to take a picture again when I finally finish this one. :)





Just to mention - THIS SITE offers free vintage embroidery patterns, and includes instructions on how to transfer the patterns to your fabric.

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I'm supposed to spend HOW much?

Have a look at THE USDA FOOD PLANS: COST OF FOOD CHART for May. (The latest figures.)

Here are my family's numbers, per month:
Thrifty Plan: $567.80
Low Cost Plan: $739.40
Moderate Plan: $920.00
Liberal Plan: $1121.30 (Oh, come on!)

Considering we only actually spend around $190 - I guess the government must think we're starving to death. And my total includes things like toilet paper and shampoo. So I'm trying to decide what to call my actual costs. Is it the Conservative Plan? (Hee.) The Yes, People Really Live Like This Plan? The Reality Plan?

This chart says "Cost of Food at Home" (emphasis added). I could see where dining out very frequently would run your bill up to over $1100. But eating strictly at home? Yikes!

And just in case you were really wondering, here's where the government thinks your food dollars are going: RECIPES AND TIPS FOR HEALTHY, THRIFTY MEALS.

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Friday Five for Free (4)

Five free software programs to help you get creative with your computer.

PAINT.NET - image editing and photo manipulation software

DOGWAFFLE - an artist's painting and animation software

WEBPLUS - website design software (Non-programming. HTML knowledge not needed.)

1ST PAGE 2000 -HTML Editing Software

PAGEPLUS - desktop publishing software

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Photos?

Well, I have to admit, I've only once ever taken a picture of a gift I made, and while I'm posting it here, I'm afraid this will be a little misleading! You see, this was a gift made for a woman in our support group and is not like my usual gifts, because this was coming from all of us and other women contributed to the over-all costs. In fact, that's *why* I took the picture - so the other moms could see the final product before we presented it.

I can tell you this - the candle was $1.00 from Dollar Tree, as was the ceramic trinket box (The round thing by the basket handle.) The chocolates cost $1.00 total. I don't know about the basket or bath soap; someone gave them to me. The green material was - er, maybe .15 cents? I cut it from a fabric I bought at 50 cents a yard. The cloth that I embroidered I got in a large bundle of embroidery fabrics from Goodwill. I would say about .25 cents for that, rough estimate, based on how much I paid for the entire bundle.

In any case, as per requested by Iris, here is one picture anyway. I will have to start taking more pictures! It simply never occurred to me before!

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