Thrifty Thursday-My Escape Edition

     I am back to my regular blogging, my daily escape and mental outlet for capturing little snippets of my life. Every day it seems i have more and more reason to watch all the ways I use the time, resources, and money in my life. More people need help this week than last. More exposure has been brought to light as to the harm that unchecked spending on fast fashion, fast food, fast furniture and other newly determined disposables have on our world. With that, I'll capture a couple weeks worth of thrift from my perspective. business opened up a bit in my part of the country on May 18th, though I didn't change my actions too significantly. 



Time 

• My older daughter and I had 22 hours at the lake with no one else except my mother-in-law who came mid-Saturday monring. We had dinner together, went for a walk, and sat by the fire. In the morning, we sat by the lake and just  were there. 
• For some variety to our activities, I spurged a bit and bought a couple more inexpensive tennis rackets. The rackets we have are quite old and warped, plus we only had two. None of us are master players, but it will add a bit of variety to some entertainment within our family, and with a few friends that play.
• Last Thursday the girls even convinced their dad to join us for the river walk. The dog just loves these wlaks, and you can see his big wind swept smile! 

 

• Today I am workign from my daughters as she has a shoot all day, and has a packaged scheduledfor delivery. It feels good to be working away from my own house! My sister mentioned that sitting at peoples houses waiting for packages woull be a reall good gig for a retiree. I think there might be a service like that. does anyone know?
• Yesterday was my youngest sisters birthday. We had a small gathering outside at her house. I think we were socially distanced enough,but sure nice to be with family. 

Resources

• My hostas are flourishing and the ones are doing well in the pot. They might just stay that way. I got a whole lot of addiitonal plants from a friend, though I am less sure they will survive. 
• I've really hit a rut with cooking. Waste though is moslty under control. I cobbled a make shift spinach and tomato dish for DD2 with greens past their salad prime. One of her jobs is in a restuarant, and while she gets a free meal each shift, it's the same type of food and she thought the dish was a nice change. 
• I saved several large cardboard boxes that I will use for short term vegetable garden raised beds. I watched a YouTube Video on what looked like an easy way to try a starter garden. I have been lazy about getting them in the ground but that is the plan for Saturday. 

Money

• I didn't make my end of month $100 challenge, but I also didn't buy stuff we didn't need and use. I'll call that a fiscal win. 
• I like to look over the deal on FreebieShark for items I might want to try before buying. Last week i ordered a sample of a new kind of muscle pain cream and Lara bars. We ordered for my daughters address as well. It's a nice way to try before buying. I need my cream and the girls are always grabbing bars for their back packs.
• I hinted at it above, but DD2 got a second job! She was hopng to be called back to work with the summer child care, but with so much up in the air until health guidelines could be met, programs didn't know what they could plan. She roughly will be working 25 hours a week , consistent schedule. The first job had said when she was hired, they would work with her schedule if she got called back for the now second job. My guess is she will work about 20 hours there, with a couple days a week overlapping. Her plans are to bank almost all, and put towards study abroud, if and when those opportunities come back. 
• Surprisingly, we actually banked a bit of money. Family members so far are doing OK, and with some of our expenses lower we were more than in the black. We did make several on-line donations over the weekend, which will show-up in the credit card  after June 10th.

     There will be things I continue to spend more on than I did four months ago. Groceries will keep being a large part of our spending as there are no deals and I like how my local grocer has handled health and safety measures. We're throwing a small for our family baby shower on June 13th for my niece. It will be outdoors and for food we ordered individual lunches and indiviudal deserts to be on the safe side so no serving, no food prep, no multiple hands on the same utensils. We'll likley double what it normally would cost, but worth it. Both the lunches and the desert are coming from local small businesses. I like to think I'm spending my time well with people I want to be with, looking at increasing my families sustainability, and using my money for both necessary and important purposes, even if not the lowest cost option. That's my thrift goal.