Speaker 1: Episode one Uber Frugal in One Month with Mrs Frugal Woods.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast, where you'll learn to
Speaker 1: save money, embrace simplicity, rights, and liver your life. Here
Speaker 1: your host Jen and Jill. Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast.
Speaker 1: My name is Jen, my name is Jill, and today
Speaker 1: we have the godmother of frugality back on the show.
Speaker 1: You know her as Mrs Frugal Woods and she's also
Speaker 1: known as the author of Meet the Frugal Woods, Elizabeth
Speaker 1: Willard Thames, and we we love her. We love having
Speaker 1: her on the show. She is our fairy godmother and
Speaker 1: has so many good tips. It's it's amazing how much
Speaker 1: we can talk about frugality, how often we can read
Speaker 1: Liza's stuff on her website, out with her and still
Speaker 1: learn more from her. So we're so excited to share
Speaker 1: this with you. If if you consider us your go
Speaker 1: to for frugality, we consider her our go to for frugality,
Speaker 1: so she always brings the heat with her interviews, so
Speaker 1: we're so excited to share it with you. But first,
Speaker 1: our sponsors our goal Planning workshop on December We're doing
Speaker 1: a free planning and strategy workshop to help you break
Speaker 1: down your money goal into actionable month by month goals
Speaker 1: and steps. We think it's going to be super fun
Speaker 1: and helpful. I mean, it's always fun when we all
Speaker 1: get to hang out, It's always fun. Space is limited
Speaker 1: and a replay will be sent out to everyone who registers,
Speaker 1: So grab your seat at Frugal Friends podcast dot com.
Speaker 1: Slash training. Yes, and if you are not excited for
Speaker 1: planning goals now by the end of the episode, you
Speaker 1: for sure will be. This episode is also brought to
Speaker 1: you by eggnog. Who doesn't love a good eggnog this
Speaker 1: time of year? It's the most frugal holiday beverage. Let
Speaker 1: me tell you why a drink literally so heavy you
Speaker 1: can't physically drink more than one at a time, and
Speaker 1: none of your friends like it. So one carton should
Speaker 1: last you all season and put your nice liquor back
Speaker 1: on the shelf. Because eggnog is so dense you'll want
Speaker 1: to use the cheapest bourbon rum or brandy to cut
Speaker 1: through it. Eggnog the thick drink. Two it did. Thanks,
Speaker 1: that's copy. That's copy from the source, So yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: just obliged. Anyways. Anyways, if you want more from Mrs
Speaker 1: frugal Woods. We're going to give you a lot to
Speaker 1: go through. But we also had her back on like
Speaker 1: vintage episode forty four Frugal Pregnancy and Parenting, and that's
Speaker 1: when I was pregnant and so now I have a
Speaker 1: two and a half year old. But that was our
Speaker 1: first interview with her. And we also had her on
Speaker 1: at the Future of Frugal Summit that we did back
Speaker 1: in July, uh and it was such a good episode
Speaker 1: talking about frugal. All I remember really is how anti
Speaker 1: homesteading urban homestead she is. She is a real homestutter.
Speaker 1: She's like, it doesn't save you money, it's just a
Speaker 1: passion project. So take with that what you will. But yeah,
Speaker 1: so we're we're super excited to be talking about how
Speaker 1: to become uber frugal in one month. And that's kind
Speaker 1: of a joke because it is a process. But with
Speaker 1: Lizz's foundations in her Uber Frugal Month challenge, which we love,
Speaker 1: you can start to set the foundations for frug galanty
Speaker 1: and it's it's kind of like what we do with
Speaker 1: the No spa and challenge, and we'll we'll mention not
Speaker 1: a little in the episode, but yeah, so buckle up
Speaker 1: and uh let's go for an uber frugal ride. Liz,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for coming back to the show.
Speaker 1: We're so excited to have you here. Thank you for
Speaker 1: having me. We were commenting before we started the recording,
Speaker 1: how you are our most frequent visitor, even though it's
Speaker 1: been like three years since the last time we were
Speaker 1: on the show, but you joined us for the summit
Speaker 1: and back again and just an overall fan favorite and
Speaker 1: one of our favorites. So thank you so much for
Speaker 1: being here. Well, I'm honored. Thank you. So we are
Speaker 1: every year really excited. You do this thing called the
Speaker 1: Uber Frugal Month, and you do it every January with
Speaker 1: your subscribers, with everyone, and we wanted to highlight that
Speaker 1: a little bit because we're always looking to become more frugal.
Speaker 1: Can you just like tell us a little bit about
Speaker 1: like why you started it and like why you continue
Speaker 1: to do it. Sure, So, the Uber Frugal Months started
Speaker 1: when my husband and I decided to become financially independence
Speaker 1: and independent and work towards fire. So this was back
Speaker 1: in fourteen, and we realized that although we've been sort
Speaker 1: of moderately frugal, we were not as frugal as we
Speaker 1: could be, and we were not tracking our expenses as
Speaker 1: careful as we should be. So we decided to have
Speaker 1: like our most frugal month ever, and that coincided with
Speaker 1: the start of my work on Frugal Woods. And then
Speaker 1: a couple of years later, I thought, you know what,
Speaker 1: maybe other people would like to do this with me,
Speaker 1: and so I wrote out the steps that he and
Speaker 1: I took, and so I tried to really reflect back
Speaker 1: and think, like, all right, what did we do what
Speaker 1: worked for us? And then I catalyzed that into this
Speaker 1: post and this thirty one day program. So it's you
Speaker 1: get an email a day from me every morning, and
Speaker 1: it contains an action item, a mantra, some required reading
Speaker 1: or suggested reading. So it's really kind of like going
Speaker 1: through a course or a class. And some people do
Speaker 1: it every day for the month. Other people have told
Speaker 1: me they'll take one item and do it for several days,
Speaker 1: then they'll move on to the next email and do
Speaker 1: that for several days. Some people have told me they
Speaker 1: spread it out over months. That is totally fine. It
Speaker 1: is free. You can sign up at any time and
Speaker 1: you'll get those emails in the sequential order, and they're
Speaker 1: all numbered, so you can really sort of start and
Speaker 1: stop and start and stop as you need to. I
Speaker 1: do update it over the years. I think I originally
Speaker 1: wrote it, I want to say, just because I feel
Speaker 1: like I had a kid or I was pregnant with somebody.
Speaker 1: I don't know, so I just feel like I feel
Speaker 1: I was like super uncomfortable at the time. So I've
Speaker 1: either like just had a child that was pregnant on
Speaker 1: another one, and I have updated it over the years,
Speaker 1: so you know, the the initial one is not the
Speaker 1: way that it is today, but it is the same
Speaker 1: basis of idea. I just try to add in basically
Speaker 1: new things I have learned and incorporate that into the
Speaker 1: course of the month. And we do it together as
Speaker 1: a group every January, like Jen said, but you can
Speaker 1: also take it, you know, sort of on your own time.
Speaker 1: But I love doing it as a group because everybody
Speaker 1: is like focused and on the same day and talking
Speaker 1: about it. I run a private Facebook group whatever it is,
Speaker 1: it's private. I think it's a group, and so you
Speaker 1: can be a part of that if you're signed up
Speaker 1: for the challenge. And I learned so much from the
Speaker 1: people in there, I'm like, oh, I never thought of that.
Speaker 1: That's a good idea. So we have a really nice
Speaker 1: community that that comes together, um every January. It's beautiful.
Speaker 1: I love the hand holding that's a part of this.
Speaker 1: I think sometimes we know in theory what we might
Speaker 1: need to do, but the actual action steps and community
Speaker 1: is so important for act implementation. So just imagining an
Speaker 1: email coming every morning telling me what to do, Oh,
Speaker 1: can that be for like the rest of my life too?
Speaker 1: I know I've had people can you do one every month?
Speaker 1: I'm like, listen, it's like words long, it's like a book,
Speaker 1: and I can't. I can't do not have it in
Speaker 1: me to do another one. But I do have people
Speaker 1: take it over and over and over again. I have
Speaker 1: a lot of people who come and do it annually
Speaker 1: and they say they get something out of it every year,
Speaker 1: and I do too, because I read through it and
Speaker 1: edit it and I'm like, oh, that's a great idea.
Speaker 1: I should do that. So it's kind of like this
Speaker 1: refresher of like, oh, right, these are some tips, some
Speaker 1: tricks that I can be implementing. And if you've kind
Speaker 1: of like forgotten or you know, maybe sort of shifted
Speaker 1: a little bit in some of your spending. January is
Speaker 1: like great reset time. Yeah, I love retaking it because
Speaker 1: sometimes what didn't work for me in that moment, like
Speaker 1: the next year, next time I see it, it will
Speaker 1: be better for me. What works for me then won't
Speaker 1: work for me now. So it's really like take what
Speaker 1: works in the season, leave what doesn't kind of thing. Absolutely. So,
Speaker 1: speaking of the article that you kind of started out
Speaker 1: with after your own journey, we want to go through
Speaker 1: some of those tips for our listeners, not all of them.
Speaker 1: There's eleven steps, so we don't have time to go
Speaker 1: through all of them, but we wanted to pull out
Speaker 1: the first few and hear your thoughts on it, kind
Speaker 1: of the the annotated version. So you talk about that
Speaker 1: the first step is to establish your goals. Can you
Speaker 1: talk us through what that might look like. I think
Speaker 1: it's really important to know why you're doing this, and
Speaker 1: it doesn't have to be a dollar amount. It doesn't
Speaker 1: have to be like a herculean I am going to
Speaker 1: retire in a year with ten million dollars, you know,
Speaker 1: it does not have to be something like that. But
Speaker 1: I do think that the more specific you can get,
Speaker 1: the more granular, the goal, the more likely you are
Speaker 1: to fall allow through on it. That is the case
Speaker 1: for me, But like I'm going to save more money
Speaker 1: is really hard for me because it's just that that
Speaker 1: doesn't really mean anything in my daily life. And so
Speaker 1: people have told me that goals sometimes are pretty large,
Speaker 1: Like I would like to be able to have my
Speaker 1: husband quit his job and be the stay at home parents, right,
Speaker 1: that's a pretty specific goal. Other people are looking at
Speaker 1: a career transition. I don't want to be a lawyer anymore.
Speaker 1: I want to be a yoga teacher. You know, how
Speaker 1: can I get my spending into alignment with the earnings
Speaker 1: change that I would have? For other people, it's like,
Speaker 1: I just I feel like I'm spending way too much
Speaker 1: at the grocery store and we're eating out all the time,
Speaker 1: and I feel out of control with food, and so
Speaker 1: let's really focus in on the food stuff this month.
Speaker 1: For other people, they're saying, you know, I never treat myself.
Speaker 1: I never get a massage. I never sort of feel
Speaker 1: as though I'm spending on me. How can I incorporate
Speaker 1: that into my budget without feeling guilty and with knowing
Speaker 1: that I'm still able to be financially stable. So it's
Speaker 1: really a very broad range of goals that I get
Speaker 1: from folks that I hear back. And so I think
Speaker 1: wherever you are, you can kind of identify if this
Speaker 1: is something that you want to work on for this
Speaker 1: month or for this year, or maybe this is part
Speaker 1: of a five year plan or a ten year plan
Speaker 1: that you're envisioning. And this kind of leads into doing
Speaker 1: this with your partner. So if you have a partner,
Speaker 1: especially if you are sharing finances or living together, I
Speaker 1: think it's very helpful to be doing this together. I
Speaker 1: you know, it seems like the biggest transformations that I
Speaker 1: hear about come from partners who are doing it together.
Speaker 1: And then if you have kids who are old enough
Speaker 1: to sort of comprehend what goes on with the family
Speaker 1: household budget, getting there by in is fantastic. I have
Speaker 1: heard so many stories of people getting their teens involved,
Speaker 1: getting there, you know, ten year olds involved to the
Speaker 1: extent that it's age appropriate for them, but really saying like, listen,
Speaker 1: you know there's a family. We operate as a unit.
Speaker 1: The money that we have is shared, and so how
Speaker 1: can we put that money towards a goal as a family?
Speaker 1: And sometimes that's for a vacation or sometimes it's just
Speaker 1: you know, we need to just feel more secure at
Speaker 1: the end of every month. I love that you've incorporated
Speaker 1: that getting the spouse a part of it. It doesn't
Speaker 1: yeah getting the spouse on board, but even just for
Speaker 1: this one thing. It may not be that you agree
Speaker 1: on all things financial, but I really appreciate that incorporation there.
Speaker 1: I'm curious your thoughts on if you were to have
Speaker 1: a spouse or older child be a part of that
Speaker 1: first step of establishing goals. Is it possible. Have you
Speaker 1: seen people have two separate goals but the action items
Speaker 1: towards that can help both towards separate goals. What are
Speaker 1: your thoughts about that? Absolutely, I've I have heard stories of,
Speaker 1: you know, sort of all manner of this entire spectrum
Speaker 1: of how you know, couples or partners do or do
Speaker 1: not do this together. I think that if you had
Speaker 1: all the same finance, mental goals and feelings, that would
Speaker 1: be a little strange. Like, I don't think anybody is
Speaker 1: going to be in lockstep with their partner, but I
Speaker 1: think having this generalized vision together is really really useful,
Speaker 1: and maybe for you it has to do with the groceries.
Speaker 1: Maybe for your spouse, it has to do with reducing
Speaker 1: the hours of childcare that you're spending on, whatever it is.
Speaker 1: I think that you can sort of come to this
Speaker 1: challenge together, kind of this conversation together with Look like,
Speaker 1: we're not going to be able to reach any of
Speaker 1: these goals if we don't sit down and sort of
Speaker 1: talk this through and think about this as a unit
Speaker 1: and how this impacts both of us, because it's it's
Speaker 1: definitely not about shaming the other person and being like, listen,
Speaker 1: you're spending twenty dollars a month on lattes. I cannot
Speaker 1: believe this. You must stop. You know that that is
Speaker 1: very much not the spirit of this. It's much more
Speaker 1: this holistic conversation of what are those lattes bring to
Speaker 1: your life? Oh, oh, that's when you see your friends
Speaker 1: and you sit down and that time together is really sacred.
Speaker 1: Or maybe oh, I didn't realize I was spending that
Speaker 1: much on latte's. I'll just make coffee at home, right,
Speaker 1: And so it's really getting to the deeper understanding of
Speaker 1: what that's spending is. And you will see this in
Speaker 1: my spending because I share my spending every single month,
Speaker 1: I spent money on like all kinds of like frivolous stuff, right,
Speaker 1: And it's the difference. And what the uber frog a
Speaker 1: month has helped me realize is that it's all goal oriented.
Speaker 1: So my husband and I go out, we have lunch
Speaker 1: dates while the kids are at cool we go out
Speaker 1: to lunch and we spend quite a bit on that.
Speaker 1: But we know it's a conscious decision. It's a choice
Speaker 1: that we made together, and so we're not shocked at
Speaker 1: the end of the month. And we also don't look
Speaker 1: at it and think, what when did we go out
Speaker 1: to eat? Did we go out to eat? It's like, oh,
Speaker 1: that's when we went to such and such with such
Speaker 1: a good time, and it was it was of values
Speaker 1: based purchase. So this kind of gets into this gets
Speaker 1: us a little bit off of the like nuts and
Speaker 1: bolts steps and a little bit more into how this
Speaker 1: is a holistic view, like the the you know whatever
Speaker 1: it is thirty ft view of your life and of
Speaker 1: your money that which you kind of ultimately want to
Speaker 1: get into is not saving every penny, Like that's not
Speaker 1: that's not what we're about. You can go other places
Speaker 1: on the internet, they'll shame you, they'll yell at you.
Speaker 1: Is not thank well, thank you, as my three year
Speaker 1: old sast thank you. This is all about figuring out
Speaker 1: what's tenable for your family, what's tenable for you. How
Speaker 1: you're all sort of having your needs met but also
Speaker 1: meeting you know, financial goals, financial milestones. Yes, yes, yes
Speaker 1: to all of that. That's all I have to say. Okay, no,
Speaker 1: but yeah, And I we get emails all the time
Speaker 1: from mainly women, but some men who spouses just not
Speaker 1: on board with frugality. And I think this first step
Speaker 1: of like creating your goals, they are most likely not
Speaker 1: going to be the same. If one of you wants
Speaker 1: to like just be frugal pay off debt, and the
Speaker 1: other ones are not on board, but they still have
Speaker 1: goals and frugality can help them get to their goals.
Speaker 1: And so really you just need alignment in your lifestyles
Speaker 1: even if your goals are different. So yeah, and learning
Speaker 1: more about your partner is like so life giving and
Speaker 1: and promotes like a longer relationship. So this is just
Speaker 1: there's so much good in this. And not to be
Speaker 1: like super negative, but you know, money is one of
Speaker 1: the leading causes of divorce. In the US for a
Speaker 1: while it was the number one cause I don't know
Speaker 1: if it's still is that study is a couple of
Speaker 1: years old. But you know, this is like, this is
Speaker 1: a real thing. You know, this is we can kind
Speaker 1: of more money and say like, oh, I'm not materialistic,
Speaker 1: I'm not a math person. I don't I don't think
Speaker 1: about money, but that often does manifest in, you know,
Speaker 1: challenges within the relationship unless you're just like fabulously wealthy
Speaker 1: and have tons of money. But then I really don't
Speaker 1: think you're listening to this podcast if that's the case.
Speaker 1: So you know, it's one partner might have the goal
Speaker 1: of let's say, paying off the debt, and the other
Speaker 1: partner has a goal of quality time. I would like
Speaker 1: to go out to dinner with you once a month, Okay,
Speaker 1: find do both of those things, right, Like find a
Speaker 1: way that I think so often we think like either
Speaker 1: I am paying off debt or I am eating out
Speaker 1: every day. For every male it's like no, no, there's
Speaker 1: like a lot of bread. So there's a lot of
Speaker 1: nuance that you and your partner can tease out and
Speaker 1: figure out where the values are and who can compromise
Speaker 1: and on what nice. That leads us into step two
Speaker 1: when we're thinking about our spending, is to review your
Speaker 1: last month's spending. Why is this step two? Oh? This
Speaker 1: is so important. This is something I did not I
Speaker 1: did not do this. When we first started tracking our expenses.
Speaker 1: I was like, there is no way that we spend
Speaker 1: that much of money at Trader Joe's. My husband was like, well,
Speaker 1: it's like kind of like right here. It's like, you
Speaker 1: know the cheese section at Trader's Joe's, you know the
Speaker 1: wine section. I was like, oh, I know. Those ar
Speaker 1: count was it was like a thousand dollars or something,
Speaker 1: which in it have been to summer so it was Christmas.
Speaker 1: Ti'm like, layoff. But the point is you really need
Speaker 1: to know what you're spending and what you're spending it
Speaker 1: on because that really leads you into all the other
Speaker 1: steps of this process. So I say, look at the
Speaker 1: last month of spending. What you're gonna come out of
Speaker 1: this challenge doing, I hope is tracking or spending every
Speaker 1: single month because it changes, it varies like you would
Speaker 1: not believe. Right. So you've got you know, your car
Speaker 1: insurances do one month you have to pay for your
Speaker 1: heating oil for the winter in the next month, you
Speaker 1: have to pay for Christmas the next month. What you
Speaker 1: eventually want to do is know what your twelve month
Speaker 1: average is. So when I do reader case studies on
Speaker 1: my blog where I have real people send in real numbers,
Speaker 1: I say, listen, you gotta like average out Christmas. I
Speaker 1: don't want to see no zero dollars for Christmas because
Speaker 1: I know that that spending occurred. I'm using Christmas as
Speaker 1: an example that spending occurred in ice elation. But you
Speaker 1: need to really amortize that overall twelve months. So this
Speaker 1: is getting you into that habit of tracking and and
Speaker 1: understanding the trends. Because spending three dollars on groceries one
Speaker 1: month sounds great, but if it's a boomerang where the
Speaker 1: next month you're spending a thousand on groceries, you need
Speaker 1: to look at how you might even that out, how
Speaker 1: you might stabilize that, and where the efficiencies might be.
Speaker 1: So I have a lot of people come to me
Speaker 1: and say, ah, I can't. I was doing the Uber
Speaker 1: Frugal Month, but then my car needed a repair, So
Speaker 1: now I'm not doing Uber Frugal Month anymore. But yes
Speaker 1: you are. You know your your life is going to happen,
Speaker 1: like your car is going to break down, your kid
Speaker 1: is gonna get sick, like these things are going to happen,
Speaker 1: And so you want to be figuring out, like what's
Speaker 1: the holistic view of my finances over the course of
Speaker 1: a year. And I think a year is like pretty
Speaker 1: decent unless you have major life changes like you have
Speaker 1: a baby or you move, that maybe an aberrational year.
Speaker 1: But you want to start seeing that data year after
Speaker 1: year so that you really know what you're spending over
Speaker 1: the course of the year. So start with the previous
Speaker 1: month and then go forward with tracking. And I talk
Speaker 1: a lot in the challenge itself about software that you
Speaker 1: might use for tracking. There's a lot of free programs available.
Speaker 1: There are plenty of people who also write it down
Speaker 1: or do it in a spreadsheet. It doesn't really matter
Speaker 1: how you do it, just do something that works for you. So,
Speaker 1: once you've got it written down pen and paper or
Speaker 1: you've input it into a software and you've got all
Speaker 1: of your spending kind of you've seen it, you've interacted
Speaker 1: with it, you talk about step three, which is then categorizing.
Speaker 1: Can you talk a little bit about what that process
Speaker 1: is like sure, So we all have expenses that are
Speaker 1: fixed and expenses that are not fixed, and those are
Speaker 1: kind of the two big categories. So fixed expenses are
Speaker 1: the things that do not change or do not change easily.
Speaker 1: So that is your more, get your your rent, if
Speaker 1: you have debt repayments, student loan repayments, car loan payments, UH, utilities, electricity, UM, internet,
Speaker 1: things like that, those are fixed expenses. Everything else is discretionary.
Speaker 1: So even things like groceries, those are discretionary. UM, even
Speaker 1: though they are mandatory, that amount can change. So you
Speaker 1: want to kind of think about what are the things
Speaker 1: that I just absolutely have to spend on every month. Okay,
Speaker 1: I have to spend on daycare, I have to pay
Speaker 1: my rent, I have to you know, sort of do
Speaker 1: these things that are a fixed cost, and then everything
Speaker 1: else we're gonna look at it and further categorized. So
Speaker 1: within that fixed cost bucket, that stuff could change, right,
Speaker 1: you could move. These are changes that you could make,
Speaker 1: and I don't think we're gonna get to that within
Speaker 1: the context of this conversation, but the uber frugal month
Speaker 1: will take you there because at a certain point, you
Speaker 1: know you can do everything you want with a discretionary
Speaker 1: you may need to move, right, Like, if your mortgage
Speaker 1: is more than you can afford, you're never I mean
Speaker 1: you're not. You either earn more or you move and
Speaker 1: you change that fixed cost. So it's yes, they are
Speaker 1: fixed expenses, but you don't just throw them out. You know,
Speaker 1: you need to keep them in mind and remember that
Speaker 1: you do, to a certain extent have control over that,
Speaker 1: even though it might be a very difficult change to
Speaker 1: for example, to move. So then in that sort of
Speaker 1: non fixed discretionary bucket, you can start to subdivise and
Speaker 1: subdivide and categorize because you're gonna have stuff that's mandatory
Speaker 1: and then stuff that's not mandatory. So groceries are mandatory,
Speaker 1: Gasoline for your car is mandatory. Close maybe they're not mandatory.
Speaker 1: You know, really think about kind of why you're spending
Speaker 1: the money and what it's going towards. And so then
Speaker 1: that gets us into sort of like what can we reduce,
Speaker 1: what can we eliminate, and that takes us into the
Speaker 1: next step of the challenge. Yeah, I love the mindset
Speaker 1: shift you have to make knowing that your your fixed
Speaker 1: expenses aren't a hundred percent fixed And I think it
Speaker 1: overflows into thinking about your income too, to think, Okay,
Speaker 1: so my expenses aren't fixed, There's always something I can do,
Speaker 1: even if it's really hard, I can do it, and
Speaker 1: say with your income, your income isn't always fixed. You
Speaker 1: can always increase your income. It's it's sometimes it's really hard,
Speaker 1: but it is doable. So it's an entire mindset shift
Speaker 1: on income and expenses. Absolutely, And the reason why I
Speaker 1: encourage people to start with Uber Frugal Month as opposed
Speaker 1: to thinking about their income is that you can do
Speaker 1: this right away. You know, you don't need to ask
Speaker 1: your boss for a raise, you don't need to go
Speaker 1: on a job search. You can start making these changes
Speaker 1: immediately and seeing results immediately, and then like Jenna saying,
Speaker 1: you can look and say, you know what, with this income,
Speaker 1: I am never going to reach these goals, Like there's
Speaker 1: there's only so much you can frugalize, right, I mean,
Speaker 1: eventually it's like you can't. You know, you hit a
Speaker 1: certain point and you can't save anymore. You have to
Speaker 1: change the other side of the equation. But I encourage
Speaker 1: people like start with this part. This in my mind
Speaker 1: is sort of the easier part because you are in
Speaker 1: control of it and then start looking externally at your
Speaker 1: job and how you might need to change that. So
Speaker 1: then we get into the next part, which is step four.
Speaker 1: And I love this one. What can I eliminate entirely?
Speaker 1: Because I would much rather eliminate things and expenses entirely
Speaker 1: than try and like scrimp and save a little bit
Speaker 1: on every single thing. So tell us about this. So
Speaker 1: this is like, this is kind of the hard one
Speaker 1: because you're just giving stuff up, Like there's not a
Speaker 1: there's not like a trick or anything like cool here,
Speaker 1: You're just doing stuff anymore, Like I don't you know.
Speaker 1: This is sort of where people start to think this
Speaker 1: is deprivation, and I'm like, it's not, because we're going
Speaker 1: to get to the next step in a minute. But
Speaker 1: this is the stuff that you, like Jenna saying, you
Speaker 1: can't eliminate it whole cloth. So these are things that
Speaker 1: you look at at the end of the month and
Speaker 1: you can't remember them, you know, So like meals out
Speaker 1: that you don't remember clothes that you forgot you even bought,
Speaker 1: uh subscriptions, you know, so magazine streaming, Um, I don't
Speaker 1: know people subscribe to anything that you might subscribe to
Speaker 1: that is sort of a monthly recurring charge that you're
Speaker 1: not necessarily deriving value from really anything that you feel
Speaker 1: you could take out and still live, you know, a
Speaker 1: life that you enjoy living. So everybody's answer is going
Speaker 1: to be different here because this goes back to step one.
Speaker 1: What are your goals? Are you trying to pay off
Speaker 1: a thousand dollars in debt? You're gonna need to give
Speaker 1: up more than the person who's trying to save a
Speaker 1: thousand dollars for a family vacation, right, So this again,
Speaker 1: that's why we start with the goals, so that you
Speaker 1: have in mind, Okay, if I want to pay this
Speaker 1: debt off, you know, I can't buy shoes for a while,
Speaker 1: Like I can't pay for yoga classes for a while.
Speaker 1: You know, I need to do yoga at home. I
Speaker 1: can't buy a new car and take on the expense
Speaker 1: of that lease. So it's really again going back to
Speaker 1: the goals and then looking at it and just like
Speaker 1: crossing stuff offul list, like Okay, I'm just not going
Speaker 1: to do this anymore, and that is going to be
Speaker 1: a simplification of my expenses of my life. I'm letting
Speaker 1: go of clutter so I think a lot about minimals
Speaker 1: and with this step. And I have thought about this
Speaker 1: a lot in the context of my kids activities, because
Speaker 1: my oldest is almost six, and this is like, so
Speaker 1: they're like doing like sports now, and you know, you
Speaker 1: and have an activity every single day of the week
Speaker 1: after school. But that's expensive and to me, it's stressful
Speaker 1: and hectic. So we have we do one activity at
Speaker 1: a time, and so we did swimming, then we did soccer,
Speaker 1: Then we'll do basketball, then we'll do skiing. And so
Speaker 1: it's spending money in a way that I think is
Speaker 1: important on something that she wants to do, but it's
Speaker 1: being sort of minimal about it and trying to reduce
Speaker 1: the clutter that it would bring into my life. So
Speaker 1: this is where it really becomes a holistic question. It
Speaker 1: is not just the money, it's also how you're spending
Speaker 1: your time. Yeah, we were just talking about this two
Speaker 1: days ago, decluttering your transactions and like choosing quality transactions
Speaker 1: over quantity. I also love the example you gave Liz
Speaker 1: in your article about just deciding to stop needing makeup,
Speaker 1: like constantly looking for inexpensive good makeup, but then realizing
Speaker 1: through through this challenge what if I just didn't need
Speaker 1: it anymore? And of course, as you say, that example
Speaker 1: could shift person to person, but even that question of
Speaker 1: what what if I didn't need it anymore, I might
Speaker 1: be able to find a more frugal, cost effective option.
Speaker 1: What if I just cut it out altogether? Absolutely, And
Speaker 1: that's a great one because for a while what I
Speaker 1: did is I like total makeup, fast, no makeup. Now
Speaker 1: I am wearing some makeup. I have on some I
Speaker 1: makeup and some lip makeup. But for me, I don't
Speaker 1: do this every day. So it's kind of that like
Speaker 1: it has become for me an occasional thing. I would say,
Speaker 1: like maybe once a week I put on I makeup
Speaker 1: and lipstick and you know, and so it's like I'm
Speaker 1: doing it, but I'm not doing it every single day
Speaker 1: as a matter of habits. Same thing with painting my nails.
Speaker 1: Like I was painting my own nails buying like all
Speaker 1: this nail polish. I still paint my nails occasionally, it's
Speaker 1: not as much of a habit and it's not as
Speaker 1: expensive as it used to be for me. So one
Speaker 1: of the things with you a Frugal Month that I
Speaker 1: encourage people to do is to consider doing a fast
Speaker 1: like consider doing the month with let's say no eating out,
Speaker 1: let's say no makeup, See how that goes, and then
Speaker 1: decide how you might what you might want to add
Speaker 1: back in. So maybe you're like me, You're like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna wear makeup, like maybe once a week. I'm
Speaker 1: going to eat out once a month or once a week.
Speaker 1: I'm going to stop the like mindless buying lunch at work.
Speaker 1: I don't even remember what I ate purchases. So a
Speaker 1: lot of this is to really just to get you
Speaker 1: to think about what you're spending and it's you know,
Speaker 1: so if you stop spending it and you don't miss
Speaker 1: it at all, that is very telling. If you stop
Speaker 1: spending and you're like, this is awful. I hate not
Speaker 1: wearing makeup, there's your answer, then you know that you
Speaker 1: are a makeup person. Right for me, I stopped wearing makeup.
Speaker 1: I just thought the world was gonna end. Nobody noticed.
Speaker 1: I was like, really, who even notices? So it was
Speaker 1: kind of this reset for me in a lot of ways. Financial, body, image, time,
Speaker 1: the amount of time it took to put this up on.
Speaker 1: So you're really kind of trying to give yourself the
Speaker 1: freedom in the space to think about what you want
Speaker 1: to be doing. Again, it comes back to your time
Speaker 1: and your money every day. Yeah, I actually gave up
Speaker 1: make up for a year, and uh yeah, it was
Speaker 1: the same story at like after I had Kai, though,
Speaker 1: I was like just feeling icky, and so then I
Speaker 1: started like wearing it sometimes, like going out again, and
Speaker 1: so no, yeah, I wear it like once or twice
Speaker 1: a week. But yeah, And that's why we love no
Speaker 1: spend challenges because they challenge you to, let's get rid
Speaker 1: of everything discretionary. We figure out what we need, what
Speaker 1: we don't need, what we want, what we don't want,
Speaker 1: and then we bring back what we truly value absolutely.
Speaker 1: And I wanted to say too that what you mentioned
Speaker 1: earlier about taking some things from the challenge and leaving others.
Speaker 1: The phase of life that you're in right what is
Speaker 1: it that you need right now? Because when I was
Speaker 1: younger and had not had kids, this is a very different.
Speaker 1: I'm like, I can wear anything and look great, and
Speaker 1: then I'm like, I can, but do I feel great?
Speaker 1: And so after my second was born, I was wearing
Speaker 1: maternity clothes all the time, and I had done this
Speaker 1: like no clothes buying for like four years or something,
Speaker 1: and I had to sit down myself and be like,
Speaker 1: you know what, I really don't like wearing maternity clothes
Speaker 1: when I'm six months postpartum, and I don't nothing else fits,
Speaker 1: Like I just cry every time I look in my closet.
Speaker 1: And so I got rid of it's pretty much everything
Speaker 1: I own and bought new clothes, you know, and some
Speaker 1: summer from the thrift store summer new and I'm just
Speaker 1: I have like a uniform. My friends all joke because
Speaker 1: I learned leggings and a dress every day, Like I
Speaker 1: don't believen like pants zip anymore, Like I just don't.
Speaker 1: They're not I can't literally love that. I love that.
Speaker 1: But my friends was like, can I borrow a pair
Speaker 1: of jeans? Like I do not own jeans? Like I know,
Speaker 1: they're not part of my life. So phase, the phase
Speaker 1: of life you're in, right, you know, if you're a
Speaker 1: postpartum and feeling you know, not great, this may be
Speaker 1: the time to spend money on clothing, right. So it's
Speaker 1: it's very much identifying that phase of life and what's
Speaker 1: a priority now, because sometimes what's a priority now is
Speaker 1: not a priority in a year. You know, you don't
Speaker 1: need to buy a new wardrobe every year, right, But
Speaker 1: it's knowing what's going to help you to feel good,
Speaker 1: I think is really important because sometimes money is the answer,
Speaker 1: Like sometimes you just need money to like get some
Speaker 1: leggings that fit what you're saying. Speak so much too,
Speaker 1: I think naturally what you define as the next step
Speaker 1: here of embracing the art of substitutions. Once you've identified, eliminate,
Speaker 1: slice and dice this other stuff, then you talk about
Speaker 1: getting creative with some substitution. Can you say more about that?
Speaker 1: This is my favorite thing because you don't have to
Speaker 1: give anything up here. You just have to like swap
Speaker 1: stuff around. So the easiest one is yourself phone. If
Speaker 1: you are an not using an m n v O
Speaker 1: which or an m v n OH mobile virtual network operator.
Speaker 1: This is the T J max of cell phones, all right.
Speaker 1: So they they re sell name brand service, they resell
Speaker 1: T Mobile, a T and T Sprint for a like
Speaker 1: way cheaper price. So my husband and I were spending
Speaker 1: something like eighty dollars of phone on service, and we
Speaker 1: now spend I think it's about ten dollars per phone
Speaker 1: per month. That is the easiest substitution. There is no excuse.
Speaker 1: There's a whole day on the UBU frug a month
Speaker 1: like devoted to this. I have a chart on Frugalds
Speaker 1: that shows you which m v N O S resell
Speaker 1: which service and sort of what the base price is.
Speaker 1: So like do that. You're getting the same thing but
Speaker 1: for less anywhere that you can find that, we'll be
Speaker 1: doing that. That is that is the best. Usually the
Speaker 1: cost here is some administrative labor on your part. You
Speaker 1: have to like call the phone company. You got to
Speaker 1: get the SIM card. You could take it out and
Speaker 1: then drop it on the floor, lose it, find it again,
Speaker 1: put it in the phone. You know, this is not
Speaker 1: a frictionless process, so it's not like, oh, just do this.
Speaker 1: And you know, I don't have a personal assistant. I
Speaker 1: don't know, so it's like, yeah, I have to get
Speaker 1: on the phone with the phone company and like it's
Speaker 1: kind of annoying. And I don't have cell reception at
Speaker 1: my house, so I had to drive to town to
Speaker 1: like put in the pin code. Reality that you're this
Speaker 1: process really is like they were like, we will text
Speaker 1: you a code. I was like, do not text it
Speaker 1: to me? And they're like we have texted you a
Speaker 1: code and it's like, oh you have you have three
Speaker 1: minutes to use that. So my husband is like drive
Speaker 1: was like it's like a little spot kind of on
Speaker 1: a mountain like park on the side of the road,
Speaker 1: and like trying and put in so like I just
Speaker 1: want to, you know, be real, like it's not like
Speaker 1: this stuff is not kind of annoying to do. But
Speaker 1: when you're talking about saving thousands of dollars over the
Speaker 1: course of the year, you know, have some discomfort, Like
Speaker 1: this is a little annoying. Just do it and then
Speaker 1: you will save money forever. And so that's the other
Speaker 1: great thing about this is like you do it once.
Speaker 1: It's super annoying, but then it's done. The other thing
Speaker 1: I talked about too is comparison shopping for things that
Speaker 1: people don't think to comparison shop for. The example I
Speaker 1: use is um oil and propane. So we have oil
Speaker 1: as backup heat, we have propane for our stove. Those
Speaker 1: prices are not set prices, there is a market price.
Speaker 1: Every company will quote you a different rate. So every
Speaker 1: year I sit down and I spend I mean probably
Speaker 1: like three hours calling all these companies because of you know,
Speaker 1: God forbid. They list the price on their website, So
Speaker 1: like calling all of them and I make a spreadsheet
Speaker 1: and then I calculate how much we save every year,
Speaker 1: and again it's thousands and thousands of dollars. So yes,
Speaker 1: it is. It is not frictionless. It is kind of annoying,
Speaker 1: but um, I find it to be worthwhile. So this
Speaker 1: is where you know you are putting some effort into it,
Speaker 1: but you're reaping a benefit. And I don't suggest doing
Speaker 1: this for stuff that costs under five dollars, right you.
Speaker 1: You want to see a pretty significant return on the
Speaker 1: investment of your time. So I have a great example
Speaker 1: about this. I needed some new underwear and I bought
Speaker 1: some at Walmart. But I bought like you, you don't
Speaker 1: try it on. So I bought like three packages, you know,
Speaker 1: because I didn't know like the style, the style I
Speaker 1: don't know so style the underwear we like where it's cut,
Speaker 1: you know, and my husband, you don't know when they're
Speaker 1: coming in those packages. You don't know there is help.
Speaker 1: You're looking at the picture, You're like, oh great, she's
Speaker 1: like me. So that's not h anyway. So I found
Speaker 1: the one that worked, kept it had the other two
Speaker 1: packages in the back of my car for like I
Speaker 1: want to say, six months, because Walmart is forty five
Speaker 1: minutes away, Okay. Instead of returning those to get my
Speaker 1: twenty bucks back, I donated them to the thrift store
Speaker 1: in the package. So so it's like you got to
Speaker 1: think about the amount of time versus the benefits. So
Speaker 1: me like driving to Walmart standing in line, that's not
Speaker 1: worth my time, you know, twenty dollars for two hours
Speaker 1: of my time. No way I make more if I'm
Speaker 1: working right. So I'm not encouraging people to be like,
Speaker 1: you know, trying to recoup that the five dollars or
Speaker 1: the twenty dollars from the Walmart underwear donated to the
Speaker 1: thrift store. But do spend the time on the heating oil,
Speaker 1: on the cell phone, on the stuff that that again
Speaker 1: you're gonna see the higher return. And that threshold is
Speaker 1: different for everybody. You know, it may very well be
Speaker 1: that you need to return the underwear because that twenty
Speaker 1: is going to have an impact. I'm not saying that
Speaker 1: that doesn't for some folks. But that's sort of my
Speaker 1: most recent example of know what the end result is
Speaker 1: because when I started, I did have this very much,
Speaker 1: this mentality of like every cent matters. And my husband
Speaker 1: was like, okay, so you just spent all this time
Speaker 1: finding coupons to save four dollars and I'm like, but
Speaker 1: it's four dollars. He's like, right, but you just spent
Speaker 1: two hours doing coupons. And I was like, Oh, that's
Speaker 1: kind of a good point. So your time has has something.
Speaker 1: Absolutely your time is valuable too. I think a lot
Speaker 1: of times we can forget that. And yeah, that is
Speaker 1: an example in some ways of being cheap. We do
Speaker 1: have frugal fails along the way. And we were in
Speaker 1: that Oh that wasn't eric and I just bought a
Speaker 1: six dollar pack of like twenty granola bars or like
Speaker 1: these granola bars are normally like three dollars apiece, so
Speaker 1: this is great, but they're like two months from expiring
Speaker 1: and they're super hard and we might break a tooth
Speaker 1: on them. That was a frugal fail. Yeah, exactly. It's
Speaker 1: like a bomber. It's and we always say, like, frugality
Speaker 1: is it's it's not the it's not inconvenient. It's just
Speaker 1: not the most convenient, that's what it is. It's not inconvenient,
Speaker 1: it's not consistently being inconvenience or inconveniencing others. It's just
Speaker 1: not the most convenient option. So take take with that.
Speaker 1: And on the subject of m v n o S.
Speaker 1: Shout out to our partner, Ting Mobile, who loves the
Speaker 1: show and supports us. And you can get twenty five
Speaker 1: off on a plan by going to frugal dot ting
Speaker 1: dot com that's got the switch to them from another provider.
Speaker 1: And I, yeah, I'm really happy right there there. I
Speaker 1: keep it, keep it handy, alright. So the last step
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about on this UM episode is
Speaker 1: step six to reduce spending on discretionary expenses. So we
Speaker 1: we I feel like we're we got into this a
Speaker 1: little bit, but expound on it for us. Sure, So
Speaker 1: we kind of saved the hardest part for last because
Speaker 1: f you, you eliminated stuff right then, you substituted, You
Speaker 1: got your ting, you got your cheaper heating oil. Why
Speaker 1: can't I not think of another example? Whatever you got
Speaker 1: to like? For me, it's like, what did I just
Speaker 1: buy last week? Because if I had never spent money before.
Speaker 1: You talk about exercise, that can be and gym memberships
Speaker 1: can be expensive. Okay, they can be worth it for
Speaker 1: some people that The example that I had for exercise,
Speaker 1: which it's like so obvious that this started before I
Speaker 1: had kids, was that I was going to yoga like
Speaker 1: five times a week, which is the thought of just
Speaker 1: like having the time to do that. Now to me,
Speaker 1: it's like and my husband we went together every Saturday
Speaker 1: morning and then they got a coffee. I'm like, that's
Speaker 1: so cute, and you thought you had clap. Oh my god.
Speaker 1: So the example at the time was I was doing
Speaker 1: this yoga all the time. That's good, right, that's a
Speaker 1: that's a good thing. That's a beneficial thing. It's good
Speaker 1: for my mental health. I had a lot of friends,
Speaker 1: it's good for my physical health. It was twenty dollars
Speaker 1: a class, you know, And so sitting down and looking
Speaker 1: at that expense at the end of the month, said, gosh,
Speaker 1: I do derive a lot of value from this in
Speaker 1: these different categories of my life. But I think, you know,
Speaker 1: it was probably two a month. It was like, that
Speaker 1: seems ludicrous, Like that seems just a ridiculous amount. And
Speaker 1: so I looked at the studio the next time I
Speaker 1: was there, and I saw that you could do a
Speaker 1: work trade. So you could work at the desk and
Speaker 1: check people in and then take the class for free.
Speaker 1: So that's what I did. I did that until we
Speaker 1: left Cambridge, so I did it when I was pregnant.
Speaker 1: I did it after I had my first I would
Speaker 1: check people in for the class and then I would
Speaker 1: like mop the floor afterwards, and I would take the
Speaker 1: class for free. And then I also I asked them
Speaker 1: if they had an asynchronous time thing that I could
Speaker 1: do because it was hard for me to get there
Speaker 1: after work to check people in. And they said, well,
Speaker 1: we need somebody to take the trash barrel out like
Speaker 1: around the alley and then bring it back. I's like
Speaker 1: on it. So I would like get off the bus there,
Speaker 1: take the trash barrel around, and then I would be
Speaker 1: able to book a free class for that. And you
Speaker 1: know that that's a very specific example, but I have
Speaker 1: heard from people who have been able to work out
Speaker 1: this kind of barter and trade situation for so many
Speaker 1: different things. I have heard it for childcare, I have
Speaker 1: heard it for all manner of exercise. I have heard
Speaker 1: it for specific services. So I have someone a reader
Speaker 1: of mine who is a massage therapist, and she has
Speaker 1: a client who is a lawyer, and so they actually
Speaker 1: trade legal for massages and then and that works for them.
Speaker 1: You know, they have an agreement whereby that is beneficial
Speaker 1: for both people. So this is again you're finding those
Speaker 1: expenses that you didn't want to eliminate. You could not
Speaker 1: find a good substitution. Can you bring barter and trade
Speaker 1: into it to make it equitable for everyone and to
Speaker 1: make it something that you know that works for everybody.
Speaker 1: So I often find like if you talk to people,
Speaker 1: they're like, oh, yeah, well we can. You know, I
Speaker 1: really need someone to pick my kid up from school.
Speaker 1: So if you can pick my kid up, I will
Speaker 1: give your kid free piano lessons. Right. So have these
Speaker 1: conversations in your community. What I have found is that
Speaker 1: like most people would like to save money. You know,
Speaker 1: this is not a radical thing. Most people are like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: we can both save by yes. So the more comfortable
Speaker 1: that you can become sort of having these conversations with
Speaker 1: your friends, with your community, I think the more you
Speaker 1: will find people are like, oh, that's a that's a
Speaker 1: great idea. You know, if we can find a way
Speaker 1: to economize and create efficiencies and also hey, create like
Speaker 1: a deeper friendship and a better community environment. Yes, absolutely
Speaker 1: these things. I mean people are so afraid of like
Speaker 1: bartering or trading because they don't want to look like
Speaker 1: cheap or poor. But it fosters this sense of community
Speaker 1: that you don't get when you just solve your problems
Speaker 1: with money. Like when you look to solve them in
Speaker 1: creative ways, you can foster like deeper sense of community. Right,
Speaker 1: And you're not trying to get something for free. You're
Speaker 1: not trying to rip some money off, right, that's not
Speaker 1: that's not the goal. The goal is like, how can
Speaker 1: I help you? Jen, Like, I don't want to pay
Speaker 1: you for these piano lessons for my child? What can
Speaker 1: I do for you? Could I clean your house while
Speaker 1: you give her lessons? You know, my sister for a
Speaker 1: long time cleaned the ballet studio so that she and
Speaker 1: her three kids could take free classes. So she'd go
Speaker 1: one night a week and she cleaned, do all the bathrooms,
Speaker 1: clean the whole studio, And the studio manager said, this
Speaker 1: is great. This is way less than what I was
Speaker 1: paying a cleaning service. You're doing a great job. Fine
Speaker 1: for you and your kids to have classes. Right, So again,
Speaker 1: it's like expanding your mind what could I What could
Speaker 1: I offer that's going to be helpful to you and
Speaker 1: you can help me meet my goals too. It's recognizing
Speaker 1: that time and skill are valuable to not just money,
Speaker 1: and it's almost cutting out the middleman of money in
Speaker 1: some really beneficial ways. It's a win win, not yeah,
Speaker 1: taking advantage of or just being cheap. I love of it.
Speaker 1: There was a time that I traded childcare for food.
Speaker 1: This woman would make me meals and I would watch
Speaker 1: her kid and that was far better than money for
Speaker 1: me because I just didn't have the time to cook,
Speaker 1: or desire or skills. I love that that That is
Speaker 1: so perfect. That is like the perfect example. And I
Speaker 1: have to continue. With my sister and the ballet studio,
Speaker 1: this started that way. She now teaches there because she
Speaker 1: created this relationship. She's been a dancer for decades and
Speaker 1: you know, she created this relationship with the studio manager,
Speaker 1: and the studio manager was like, you're an incredible dancer.
Speaker 1: Would you ever be interested in teaching? And she's like, well,
Speaker 1: yes I would, And so it's you know, uh, kind
Speaker 1: of creating again. You never know sort of where this
Speaker 1: network will lead you when you sort of open yourself
Speaker 1: up and you're a little bit vulnerable, right, You're like,
Speaker 1: I would like to do this, but I can't really
Speaker 1: afford it, and and so you're kind of inviting that
Speaker 1: confidence and that intimacy and that relationship might go great places. Amazing,
Speaker 1: so much fruit goodness here, Liz, thank you so much.
Speaker 1: And we didn't even get through the whole list, So
Speaker 1: if you want to see the rest of the list,
Speaker 1: you're yeah, if we didn't, yeah, we didn't even get
Speaker 1: through the list. We're gonna have it up on our
Speaker 1: show notes, so we are. Or you can just sign
Speaker 1: up for the Uber Frugal Month too. That's also a thing.
Speaker 1: And you know what else is a thing? The Bill
Speaker 1: of the week. That's right, it's time for the best
Speaker 1: minute of your entire week. Maybe a baby was born
Speaker 1: and his name is William. Maybe you paid off your mortgage,
Speaker 1: maybe your car died, and you're happy to not have
Speaker 1: to pay that bill anymore. Tough bills, Buffalo bills, Bill Clinton,
Speaker 1: this is the bill of the week, Liz. You know this.
Speaker 1: Every time every episode we invite a listener or guests
Speaker 1: to share with us. There, Bill, and we know that
Speaker 1: you have one for us. It is traditionally, even duck bills.
Speaker 1: It's what you're known for. I've done a lot of friends. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but I hear you might have something you might be deviating.
Speaker 1: I am deviating from the duck bill today because it
Speaker 1: ties right into another step in the U Frugal Month
Speaker 1: that we that I didn't quite cover because I was
Speaker 1: got so carried away on the barter and trade. Sorry
Speaker 1: about that. This bill is my bill, my most recent
Speaker 1: thrift store bill. So I went to the thrift store
Speaker 1: because now that my kids are in school, I can
Speaker 1: actually go to the surf store. So I'm looking at
Speaker 1: my list. My bill was forty nine dollars and seventy
Speaker 1: five cents. Here is what I bought. Three winter coats
Speaker 1: from my kids, one of them brand new with tags on,
Speaker 1: one pair of kid winter gloves, one puzzle which I'm
Speaker 1: gonna give to one of my daughters as a Christmas present,
Speaker 1: one princess snow globe which is a birth a present
Speaker 1: for the other daughter. A dress for me which I
Speaker 1: am wearing right now, a jean jacket for me, dresses
Speaker 1: for each of my kids, three pairs of kids shoes,
Speaker 1: and a superwoman costume for a future Halloween and also
Speaker 1: this mug for fifty cents. So this is another ethos
Speaker 1: of frugality, ethos of uber frugal month is really you
Speaker 1: gotta embrace the used market, all right. I am a
Speaker 1: great lover of clothing. Three dollars for address fifty cents
Speaker 1: for a fashionable mug. My husband was like, do we
Speaker 1: need another mug? I was like, doesn't matter. It is
Speaker 1: so cute. So, you know, finding this is a great
Speaker 1: way of finding a way to treat yourself to enjoy life.
Speaker 1: I sufused, you know, and I have a lot of
Speaker 1: articles on like if that's kind of a hurdle for you,
Speaker 1: or a mindset that's hard for you. I've talked a
Speaker 1: lot about sort of the myth of like the gross
Speaker 1: used thing, or the myth of like who buys used things?
Speaker 1: So you know, if you kind of it's yourself over
Speaker 1: that hunt and then really embrace that and sort of
Speaker 1: your first entry point anytime you need anything, you will
Speaker 1: save so much money and you will find such like cute,
Speaker 1: unique stuff a men. I just did a thrift trip
Speaker 1: last week on half price. They do the tags half
Speaker 1: price they start every Tuesday. They switched to a new tag,
Speaker 1: so went last Tuesday because Kai needed pants and I
Speaker 1: spent I think thirty dollars and I maybe got like
Speaker 1: everything was definitely a dollar, and so I had to
Speaker 1: have gotten like twenty pairs of pants and some other things.
Speaker 1: Like kid is stocked for the winter. You know, he'll
Speaker 1: go through all those pants and get holes in all
Speaker 1: of them. Yeah, I mean it'll be and then we
Speaker 1: can pass them on to like somebody else through by
Speaker 1: nothing group and it's like a great donation. Yeah, thrift
Speaker 1: is everything. And I actually this morning was thinking like,
Speaker 1: how am I going to describe it the reason we
Speaker 1: do this, like to my children in the future, because
Speaker 1: like most kids, their mom shops at the thrift store
Speaker 1: and they're like, oh, but I just want new clothes.
Speaker 1: But I really want to emphasize, like, we don't just
Speaker 1: buy second hand because it's cheaper. We buy it because
Speaker 1: it's better for the people who are making the clothes,
Speaker 1: so that if collectively we buy less new clothing, then
Speaker 1: they're you know, less you know, indebted to their you know, employers,
Speaker 1: and have more freedom and can raise wages. So for
Speaker 1: those people. We do it for the environment because we
Speaker 1: don't need half of the new things that are are
Speaker 1: created every year. Um, and so we do it. We
Speaker 1: do it for that, and then we also save money.
Speaker 1: And and then the other thing that I that it does,
Speaker 1: I think is that it reduces the endowment effect, so
Speaker 1: such that as you were saying, when your son is
Speaker 1: done with those clothes, you will pass them along. You
Speaker 1: will not be trying to recoup your costs. You will
Speaker 1: not sort of cling to material items because the value
Speaker 1: that you have on them is a little bit lower.
Speaker 1: And I find that with my kid's clothes, like they
Speaker 1: grow stuff, they have grow toys and out of my
Speaker 1: house to take it, somebody take it. I don't feel
Speaker 1: that I need to get money back because I spent
Speaker 1: so little on it. And I also don't have this
Speaker 1: like deep attachment to most of my material things because
Speaker 1: they were so inexpensive to begin with. My garage sale
Speaker 1: lamp is right here. That's my five dollar lamp. I'm
Speaker 1: so happy about that. So I think it's like when
Speaker 1: you start thinking and using this mindset, it is holistic.
Speaker 1: And now my kids this is the greatest thing. As
Speaker 1: we drive down the road, if there is like a
Speaker 1: pile of free stuff on the side of the road,
Speaker 1: they go, oh, Mama, garage sale. You gotta stop, we
Speaker 1: might need something saying that, I'm like, we do not
Speaker 1: need everything just because it's free or just because it's
Speaker 1: on sale, does not need we need it because they're like,
Speaker 1: but there's a garage sale, so they're like so into
Speaker 1: like the used thing. I think I don't know that
Speaker 1: they even know this stuff like can be bought new.
Speaker 1: I'm sure they do. That's amazing, Liz, thanks for sharing
Speaker 1: your bill. I can't believe you remembered all of the
Speaker 1: things that you and my most recent monthly expend support
Speaker 1: on frugal was Otherwise I would not. If you have
Speaker 1: a bill that you want to share, whether it is
Speaker 1: about how how much you got at the thrift store
Speaker 1: for a low amount, or bills you paid off, you
Speaker 1: know the drill, submit your bill of the week at
Speaker 1: Frugal Friends podcast dot com slash bill. We love to
Speaker 1: hear it. And now it's time for ground. So today
Speaker 1: we are going to all share a reset or re check.
Speaker 1: We will be doing this January because it definitely pays
Speaker 1: every year to check in with what you're doing, check
Speaker 1: in with your habits, and just because we've been doing
Speaker 1: fruality for a while, doesn't mean we don't check in. So, Liz,
Speaker 1: is there anything that you will be resetting or checking
Speaker 1: in January? Yes, I am going to reset on my
Speaker 1: seventy two our rules. So this is part of the
Speaker 1: Uber Frugal Month, and it's that you wait seventy two
Speaker 1: hours before buying something that you think you want. During
Speaker 1: the pandemic and now with the supply chain issues, I
Speaker 1: have gotten into this really bad habit of being like,
Speaker 1: we need this, we need it now, get it on
Speaker 1: Amazon right now because I don't know when it will
Speaker 1: be delivered. I don't know when it will be available,
Speaker 1: and I'm not giving myself the space and time to
Speaker 1: go through all the considerations of could I borrow this,
Speaker 1: do I already have something that would work, Do I
Speaker 1: even need this thing to begin with? Can I find
Speaker 1: it used? I'm I've kind of fallen out of habit
Speaker 1: with that, and I find myself like thinking like, oh,
Speaker 1: I need to like buy this this thing right now
Speaker 1: online so that I make sure and have it. So
Speaker 1: I'm going to try this January to really start putting
Speaker 1: that space in between me identifying a need or a
Speaker 1: want and then buying it. That's awesome, beautiful, I like
Speaker 1: the example that you're giving of why you kind of
Speaker 1: fell off the wagon with that rule. I think that's
Speaker 1: realistic for so many of us. We kind of have
Speaker 1: these set ways of engaging, but then something shifts in
Speaker 1: our circumstances. But then there's always opportunity to revisit and
Speaker 1: re establish that way of engaging again. That's amazing. I
Speaker 1: just love that tipe. I want to reevaluate home renovations
Speaker 1: in January. It's obviously for so many a really good
Speaker 1: time for to sit down and look back and look ahead.
Speaker 1: So we are in the middle of tons of home renovations,
Speaker 1: but I've been seeing in the past year that some
Speaker 1: of our big stuff is getting put on hold, or
Speaker 1: our savings for the big stuff is getting a bit
Speaker 1: hijacked by the attainable projects that I can do immediately,
Speaker 1: But then it's kind of stealing away from the bigger stuff,
Speaker 1: like the kitchen that absolutely needs to get done hopefully
Speaker 1: in so miss January, we're sitting down and looking at, Okay,
Speaker 1: how can we put these tinier little outdoor garden projects
Speaker 1: maybe on hold so that we can get at the
Speaker 1: bigger goals. M Yeah, that I mean that kitchen really
Speaker 1: does now that I've seen your laundry room and how
Speaker 1: beautiful that is, Like I I personally need your kitchen
Speaker 1: to look like that. So for those who don't know,
Speaker 1: it's it's exposed wires, it's foam on the wall. I
Speaker 1: think we have a cabinets. We have video of it
Speaker 1: in the highlights of our Instagram. Oh, I thought that.
Speaker 1: I thought it was like deleted after twenty four hours
Speaker 1: there for everyone. Thanks John. I think I think our
Speaker 1: social media or Rebecca put it in our highlights. She
Speaker 1: made a highlight reel just so everyone can just what
Speaker 1: a dumpster fire it is, and then you'll know how
Speaker 1: much that priority needs to be. Bottles of wine on
Speaker 1: the floor to that is that makes it che check
Speaker 1: that Yeah, alright, So mine is to rese I want
Speaker 1: to reset my spending so that I can save for
Speaker 1: like some smaller trips. So we've been consistently saving my
Speaker 1: income to invest in real estate, and so hopefully that
Speaker 1: is going to happen soon. I've been told that I
Speaker 1: need to stop saying hopefully and to say it will
Speaker 1: happen soon. So but in like after we get that,
Speaker 1: I'd like to take some more like smaller trips like
Speaker 1: weekend trips. We're we're good at planning like the bigger ones.
Speaker 1: But I mean there's like, we live so close to Orlando,
Speaker 1: and like a are places you know that are touristy
Speaker 1: in Florida. So I would I would like to to
Speaker 1: reset and reprioritize to incorporate those Oh that's me amazing
Speaker 1: big things, big things for all of us in January
Speaker 1: and hopefully all of two. Liz, thank you so much
Speaker 1: for joining us again. If people want more from you,
Speaker 1: when there is so much more they can get from you,
Speaker 1: where can they find you? So I'm at frugal Woods
Speaker 1: dot com and you can sign up for the free
Speaker 1: uber Frugal Month challenge there. I'm also on Instagram, Facebook,
Speaker 1: and Twitter at frugal Woods. And I also wrote a
Speaker 1: book that is Meet the Frugal Woods Achieving Financial Independence
Speaker 1: through Simple Living. Thank you coming, And yes, I think
Speaker 1: I might participate in the January Challenge this year. I
Speaker 1: don't know, we'll see. Maybe we could do like a
Speaker 1: debrief afterwards. Okay, okay, I see experience like, Okay, this
Speaker 1: sounds good. All right, well we'll see you in the challenge.
Speaker 1: Sounds good. I am amazing about it. Yeah, I just
Speaker 1: I really enjoy her. I think one of the things
Speaker 1: that I appreciate is how much she's able to back
Speaker 1: up each statement. She's not just this rotating I've got
Speaker 1: my talking pieces. She has such a wealth of examples,
Speaker 1: not only from her own life but from her own
Speaker 1: fans and followers. And that really helps, at least for
Speaker 1: me to solidify concepts. Is when I can hear all
Speaker 1: these different ideas of how it looks to implement the
Speaker 1: creativity part of it, the lack of deprivation just so
Speaker 1: so much goody goodness. And you could just tell she's
Speaker 1: been doing this for over a decade because she speaks
Speaker 1: like a fair godmother. Yeah, I I love her so
Speaker 1: much for just how relatable she is. And I think
Speaker 1: this is it's why I love our show too, is
Speaker 1: that none of us were like frugal at birth. We
Speaker 1: don't come on this like I think of Travis when
Speaker 1: I think of people who just love saving money and
Speaker 1: hate spending money just for the sake of not spending
Speaker 1: and saving. Even his mom's like, I don't know where
Speaker 1: he got this from. So it's just so true. That
Speaker 1: is so true, and and and so we're not like that,
Speaker 1: and Liz isn't like that. She came upon this through learning,
Speaker 1: and that makes like what she writes more relatable and
Speaker 1: easier to understand because like talking from prior experience. So
Speaker 1: I just I love that about her so much wisdom
Speaker 1: gained from experience and not just like, well this is
Speaker 1: what I do. This comes natural to me, so it
Speaker 1: should come natural to everyone sort of thing. So thank
Speaker 1: you for listening, and we want to thank you for
Speaker 1: your kind reviews on Apple podcasts like this one. It's
Speaker 1: from Melissa vladish Skin and she just happens to give
Speaker 1: us five stars. Relatable, hilarious, and informative. Frugal Friends is
Speaker 1: more of a podcast. Is more than a podcast. It's
Speaker 1: a community. Jen and Jill have brought together so many
Speaker 1: like minded individuals who all have similar goals. The podcast
Speaker 1: has motivated motivated me to become a better person and
Speaker 1: has positively impacted my family in our future. I recommend
Speaker 1: Jen and Jill's podcast anyone looking for more tips on
Speaker 1: leading a frugal lifestyle and a brighter financial future. Meliss
Speaker 1: for all your kindness, And that is the thing. It's
Speaker 1: not just about frugality, is also about community. So glad
Speaker 1: that you've picked up on that and have been able
Speaker 1: to engage and enjoy that aspect of this podcast. We
Speaker 1: also want to thank our friends who share these episodes
Speaker 1: on social media, So when you share the latest episode
Speaker 1: on Instagram, we're adding you to our monthly drawing. For
Speaker 1: every five tags and reviews we get each month, we
Speaker 1: give away or currently we're giving away fifty dollars five
Speaker 1: zero for you to spend in the Frugal Friends shop.
Speaker 1: M h. I got a lot of digital products to
Speaker 1: help you become more frugal, So keep leaving us reviews
Speaker 1: wherever you listen to podcasts and sending the screenshot to
Speaker 1: Frugal Friends podcast at gmail dot com, and don't forget
Speaker 1: to tag us on social See you all next week.
Speaker 1: Frugal Friends is produced by Eric Syrian jill Um. The
Speaker 1: day after this comes out is your Um. The syrianis
Speaker 1: annual Christmas Holidays bonan'sa blowout. We're calling it annual even
Speaker 1: though this is the first time we're doing it, we're
Speaker 1: just already committing to doing it regularly on an annual
Speaker 1: basi that on you. I'm going to put that party
Speaker 1: on like on you to just do every year. I
Speaker 1: was actually told about it at the gym. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: Justin told Yeah. Justin's like, yeah, we were We felt
Speaker 1: so special. We were invited to Um, Jill and Eric's
Speaker 1: Christmas party. You were too, And because I hadn't checked
Speaker 1: Facebook yet, I was like, oh, that's good to know
Speaker 1: that I was also invited. Thank you. Of course, because
Speaker 1: we're actually friends, like believe it or not, right, Um,
Speaker 1: so we go to each other's parties and and yeah,
Speaker 1: so everyone is excited. Jill, Hey, we we decided this
Speaker 1: year we're going to get out the invitations early because
Speaker 1: everybody's December books up, and even still, I know there'll
Speaker 1: be other opportunities and people might flake out because something
Speaker 1: might seem better. But you know, you get in that
Speaker 1: invitation early, you make it seem awesome. And we really
Speaker 1: did it this year, and I'm I'm excited for it.
Speaker 1: So yeah, the day after this comes out, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: have to get my rest and I have to start
Speaker 1: prepping all that food. We talked about, I think in
Speaker 1: an earlier episode about spending around the holidays and what
Speaker 1: we are willing to spend on and save in other areas,
Speaker 1: and this type of thing is that for me that
Speaker 1: I really enjoy hosting. I want to provide for people
Speaker 1: to come and enjoy, and this is going to be
Speaker 1: one of those where I just I have all the
Speaker 1: food and bevies, including that eggnog, including that we Eric
Speaker 1: did by agnog. Already he's like, this always sells out.
Speaker 1: I gotta get in early. I know he's got to
Speaker 1: really embrace that seventy two hour rule, but they did sponsor,
Speaker 1: so mm hmmm, I know. Yeah, it's just better for us.
Speaker 1: See you there, m