Be More Self-Sufficient

Let's face it, if you don't have something you need, the easiest thing to do is to get it from someone who has it. When it comes to food, most of us get what we need by buying it from the grocery store. There are definitely times when that is unavoidable, and it's one of the biggest expenses here at our house. Okay, so we can't stop going to the store for a lot of our needs, but we can cut a big chunk out of what we spend there by having to buy less. How do we do that? No, we're not planning on booting out any of our kids--haha. But we are planning a garden.

Even if you think space is an issue that would exclude your from this option, keep reading, there is usually a way around this.

In our area, the general rule of thumb is to not plant anything until after Mother's Day--about the middle of May. We use to go and buy all of our tomatoes, squash, watermelon, pumpkin, cucumbers, cantaloupe, peppers and everything else at the garden centers. They were already started for us, and we just took those leafy greens out of their pots and transplanted them in our prepared soil.

We'd tried the seeds before, but the birds got them all, and we never got so much as a baby carrot. Instead of putting our thinking caps on, we gave up on them and would drop about $80 or so on the starters.

This year, we're planning ahead. My hubby got the idea to start our seeds inside. We didn't even come close to spending $80--It was $20 at the most, and with the seeds in each pack, we'll have so many more starters to transplant than our previous seasons that it's laughable.

We've done our homework. We're going to start them next weekend, giving them close to two months before we plant them outside (lessening the risk of freezing). We've saved up our cardboard egg cartons, have potting soil, are getting some florescent light bulbs and setting up shop on a big work table in our garage. For information on lights for your seedlings, you can go here. From what we've read, windowsill light is not always enough.

We've been enriching our soil with grass clippings and manure (fun stuff). And will also be picking up any extra soil or compost we need at the local landfill (saving quite a bit).

Another way to save with coupons, receiving email and postal mail offers, and also get gardening tips is to sign up for Home Depot's Garden Club, or Lowe's Learn2Grow Garden Club. You can even sign up for both and get double the offers and tips. We also have signed up at our local nurseries for offers and email tips. Look in your area to take advantage of those avenues.

We've already planted strawberry, raspberry and boysenberry bushes last year--along with several fruit trees. While the fruit trees won't produce much this year, the fruit bushes should do pretty well.

Not everyone has a lot of space for gardening, and in those cases you can look into container gardening, or even a garden box in your yard. It's a lot of fun, tastes so much better than store bought and gives you sense of accomplishment you can't get by going to the grocer's produce department.

So if you haven't considered doing this before now, you're not too late. If I can do it, anyone can. I didn't grow up doing this, but I wish I had! If you end up growing more than you can possibly use, then you can move on the the next step for self-sufficiency and start canning your harvest!

Happy Growing!

*The links in this post are not advertising, but will take you to more information on the topics that are highlighted.

Free Samples and Advertising

So I found out about a really cool program last night. This program is beneficial for both those just looking for ways to save and make money and get stuff for free, and also for you blog/website owners looking to generate more income. I put all the ads down below here so you wouldn't have to search for them.

First, about the free stuff. You just follow the links to the sponsors and they will give you free samples of their products:








There were so many offers to choose from, I couldn't possibly list them all here. If you have any in particular deals you are looking for, let me know and I'll be happy to check for you.

Now for the money-making opportunities:





Now you site owners are probably all wondering where I got all these, and there were many to choose from. I got them all from Logical Media. I was approved as an affiliate for them and now have access to more offers for my readers and also more revenue for me! They also pay for referrals, if you sign up with them.

So get busy saving and making money!

Another Way to Make a Little Money

I found another way to make a little cash from home, using your computer. If you have an email account and a cell phone with text messaging service, then you qualify to take part. The company's name is YouData (youdata.com). When you sign up with them you are given ads to look at, and paid for each one. You don't have to follow through with any of the offers, just look at them and you get paid. They give you a referral link so you can make money off of others signing up under you, too. It's not a whole lot of money, but any little bit helps and it only takes minutes to make a couple dollars.

To make things even easier, they also offer an email template, with much of the information I have here, for you to send to your friends and family to sign up under you. There's nothing to lose here.

By creating a MeFile at YouData.com, I now control what ads I see and when I see them. I can even put their widget on my desktop so I don't have to login to their site to see the ads I'll be paid for looking at. I can use the funds to buy music and video online, donate to charities, give to my favorite blogs and websites, or keep the change myself and do whatever I want with it.

It's real. They pay. You should check it out.

Click this link to sign up. My MeFile ID, nell79, in the "Referral Code" will tell them I sent you.

http://www.youdata.com/join/nell79


You should also know that they have excellent customer service. When I had trouble receiving the activation code via text message, I let them know and they worked quickly and efficiently to set my account up. I'd say this one is definitely worth your time to check out.

Take care!

Get the Word out

I promised I would share more of what we learned at the employment agency, and I intend to keep my word. She asked if my husband had done any networking. My ears immediately perked up because I've become very familiar with that term over the last few weeks. After all, it's the key to becoming a successful blogger and making a good living off the internet.

Of course, it would apply to a regular job too. It was another "oh, duh" moment. It makes sense that if you have experience and expertise in a certain area, and you're in need of work, that you would get the word out to others in that area. Our close friends and family all know what's going on, but we never thought of telling them, or anyone else for that matter, that my husband was looking for more work and would love for them to spread the word.

If you want to be successful in any business and you are looking to make money, you can't do that by being quiet and accepting things as they are. At most, we get what we ask for out of this life. If you work hard and ask for more, you're more likely to get it than someone who doesn't ask, right?

Anyway, make sure if you're looking for work, that you let friends, family, neighbors and even people from your church know that you are. This keeps more eyes looking and can produce more results for you than you'd get on your own. It's especially important that you connect with people in the same field as you're in so that they can let you know of available jobs too.

As for you blog/site owners, make sure you're networking too. Search out sites that are similar to yours. Connect with the owners and see about doing link exchanges. Make sure you're also connecting with people who would be your audience. Forums are a good place to start with this. One of my favorite places to network and do traffic exchange is LinkReferral.

Now get out there and spread the word:)

$50 Walmart Giveaway

It seems a fellow blogger is looking to pass some of her good fortune on to someone else. This mommy and her family are being featured in March's Redbook in an article to do with coping in this recession. This is definitely a topic affecting so many of us and should be a good read. She's offering a $50 Walmart giftcard to one lucky subscriber of her blog. She also offers a second entry to those who will link to her site about this offer. I just thought I'd pass this along to all of you! If you're interested, just click on the title of this post and it will take you straight to her site.

Back to School

So my husband and I were given some food for thought. He went into an employment agency yesterday to talk about his options. While he does still have a job, he's not getting enough hours to cover the bills right now. We're digging into our savings, which will only last so long.

So, in the interest of being proactive, we went to see what was available to him. We actually got quite a bit to think about. I'm going to have to split things up into different posts because there was so much information. Today's post will focus on furthering education.

My husband has a diploma and 3 1/2 years of trade school. He was able to skip the last half of the the fourth year because he had enough school and work experience to take the test. He took and passed the journeyman test and got his license as a journeyman plumber. While he does believe that things will eventually pick up (most people in this country do have indoor plumbing after all--and several even have outdoor), he didn't become a plumber because it was his dream, he just sort of fell into it. He does have interests in other areas, but never really had a strong motivation to look into any of those areas--until now.

So, the woman who helped us at the employment agency talked to him about (among several other things) going back to school. She told him it would be beneficial for him to get his associates. He could even, if he wanted to, look into getting an education in another field of work. Of course, he would have to continue to work while attending school, if we went this route.

We automatically told her that we didn't have the money to go back to school. It's odd that what she told us next had never even occurred to us. She said with the cut in pay we've experienced, that raises our chances of qualifying for financial aid. We were stunned that we hadn't thought of that. So now we have pamphlets of information on how to apply for grants and other financial aid.

I thought I'd pass on the information here, since it very much applies to both saving and making money. Applying for Federal Aid is free. These are funds available through the U.S. Department of Education for eligible students enrolled in eligible programs as regular students at schools that participate in the federal student aid programs. These funds cover tuition and fees, room and board, books and supplies and transportation. It can also help pay for a computer and child care expenses.

You can get more information from a school counselor if you're still in school, or the financial aid office at the college you're wanting to attend, or from the US Department of Education, Federal Student Aid or 1-800-433-3243.

If you're not planning on attending college this fall, but want an idea of how much aid you might qualify for you can go to the FAFSA4caster to check things out. You can apply online on the FAFSA website and find a full list of the documents you need there.

When considering a college or career school to attend make sure you do your homework. Find out if you meet the admission requirements, if the school offers the courses for the type of program you want to go into, if they participate in the federal student aid programs and if there have been any complaints filed against the agency with the Better Business Bureau offices.

Be careful of scholarship scams. According to The Guide to Federal Student Aid, millions of dollars are lost every year to scholarship fraud. The Federal Trade Commission cautions students to look for these types of lines.

-"The Scholarship is guaranteed or your money back."
-"You can't get this information anywhere else."
-"I just need your credit card or bank account number to hold this scholarship."
-"You've been selected by a 'national foundation' to receive a scholarship."
-"You're a finalist" in a contest you never entered.

For more information on scholarship scams or to file a complaint with the FTC call 1-877-FTC-HELP or visit the FTC website.

Well, I hope this information has been useful to you. I'm going to dive right into it all here, too! Who knows, maybe both the adults in this household will be furthering their educations! Best of luck!

Let's Talk Video Games

Whoa! I can't believe how expensive these things are when you buy them new! My sister bought my son a $50 video game and within a week it was toast. My daughter, two at the time, thought it looked pretty tasty and tested her new chompers out on it. My son was devastated and I vowed I would tell everyone to only get used games from then on out (we were already doing this ourselves).

The cool thing about the used video game market is that most of the video game stores will give you cash or credit for the old games you're tired of playing. They also offer membership cards which will give you more credit on each item traded in, and also gives you a lower price on the used gaming products you buy in their stores. We've taken full advantage of this and saved mega bucks. Our kids don't care if the games they're getting once belonged to someone else, so long as they're getting one and it works--and all games are guaranteed by the stores.

Our favorite places to go when we have a little cash to burn, or if we want to unload our old games, are Game Crazy and Game Stop. They each offer a one year subscription (with membership) to a gaming magazine (different ones), so your kids--or even you--can see what's new and sometimes even get coupon offers inside them.

One nice thing that Game Crazy does is fix your scratched video games. If the scratches don't go too deep, they have a pretty good success rate. We've saved many a game this way, and we got it done for free with the membership. If you don't have a membership, last I checked it was only a dollar for them to fix each disc for you. They also will do CDs and DVDs, so that's pretty cool.

If you're not into trading for games, or you don't care about memberships, you can also find games for good prices on Video Gamesby clicking that link for Amazon. Ebay is also a great place to either sell your old games or buy some new-to-you games.

Don't forget that you can also save or make money on your video games or equipment by going to the pawn shop, too. If you go this route, don't necessarily take the first offer they give you. It doesn't hurt to ask for a better deal. What's the worst they can tell you? "No"?

Anyway, these are my tips on cheap video game entertainment. Make a buck or save a buck. Do with them what you will.

Working from Home

If any of you are like me, then this economy has probably put a big dent in your cash flow. We're lucky in that my husband still has a job though his hours, and therefore his paycheck have definitely been cut. I count ourselves lucky though--there are plenty of other people who weren't so lucky and lost their jobs.

I've been looking for more Work at Home opportunities, and it seems they're being advertised everywhere. Before I feel comfortable listing them though, I try to research them, because the last thing I want is to be responsible for referring someone to a scam, but I still caution you to do some homework of your own before signing up for anything.

I found a couple of sites that I'm willing to share here. One of them is OGC Work at Home Directory. The other site is called My-Data-Team (Not to be confused with My Data Team with no hyphens). I found a thorough, and more importantly, independent review on My-Data-Team on a site called Data Entry at Home, where you can also find other work from home jobs listed.

You can view the other job opportunities I've found so far by looking in my labels here, or scrolling down to my Make Money links on this site. I wish you all luck in your pursuits and welcome any input or knowledge you may have on this subject. In the meantime, I'll continue my research in this area:)

*After further investigation, while I won't say it's a scam, I wouldn't recommend My-Data-Team to my readers. While it may not be a scam, it may not be all it claims to be. If you have experience with this company, please feel free to share it here with us.

Blogging Shmogging

I have to say that I do enjoy writing here. However, there is a not so fun side--and that's working to get my blog on the radar--but it's not too tedious. I've spent a lot of time promoting my blog on Link Referral and I've signed up with Traffic Swarm, Technorati, Easy Hits4U, Traffic Splash, I Love Hits, Dragon Surf, Blog Top List, Blog Catalog, and Ongsono. I've also been promoting myself on eHow when it's relevant, and posting my link in my article resources there when my article has to do with something I've discussed here.

I found a new site for website/blog owners called The Website Owner Zone, where you can make connections with others and promote your blog. It looks interesting and I'm trying all I can to get the word out there, since I am hoping to eventually make money doing this.

My husband is talking about looking for a second job until his first one's hours pick back up. I really hate this idea, since it would mean we wouldn't see him much. My family is so important to me, they're all I have that really matters. When you grow up the way I did, you never take that for granted. They're what I've always wished for, and I still can't believe how lucky I am to have them.

But anyway, off the mushy stuff. I was just really hoping I could help him, and others too, by starting up my writing again and making a profit off the advertising and affiliate programs. I'm using Google Adsense, AdBrite, and Amazon. I've also applied for the Ebay affiliate program. I hesitated, but figured it couldn't hurt to put a paypal donate button here too. These are all places I found while researching how to get a blog off the ground.

I also found a useful website called Self Promotion. On there, the site owner gives you lots of useful tips, including a way to find out if you're listed yet with the big search engines. I found that I was with most of them, but not with Open Directory, so I submitted my site for approval there, too.

I also learned that I could submit my eHow articles to the search engines and to Pingomatic for driving traffic there, too. So I think I've been accomplishing quite a lot, and I'm happy to share these tips with all of you so that you don't have to do all the digging:)

One downside of all of this work is that I feel like I'm dropping those juggling balls when it comes to the homemaker side of things. I've told my family that I know I'm not quite as available as I was before, but once I've got this up and running, it will be mostly about maintaining. I hope that's right. I'm wondering how long it takes to get it up in the air though.

I'm enjoying writing again though. It's such a great release and even if this doesn't all go the way I'm hoping it will, I won't regret it. Plus, if I help anyone with what I'm doing here, that's payment in itself. If I can make money from home doing what I love that is a bonus!

I did have a company call me, I believe they said they were "Orange Soda." The guy was really nice and offered his company's services to promote my blog, though he said it would be easier to do with a website. When I asked him how much the services would cost though, there was no way I could do that. I'll just have to try this all on my own. So far, everything I've done here hasn't cost me a penny, and I like it that way! Saving money is definitely a plus!

Well, good luck to all you bloggers and siteowners who are working to promote your sites! I hope this has been helpful for you. I'll be looking for more ways to help us out here. Until then.....

New vs Used

Okay, now I know as much as the next person that you can't get everything used, like underwear for example. Haha. I don't care how much you boil it, if it's been on your unmentionables, I don't want it anywhere near my unmentionables;) And I personally prefer my shoes new, unless they're given to me by someone I know (and they don't have really stinky feet), and they're still in good shape. The shape is important because, let's face it, they're only comfortable after we've worn our foot print into them, and unless someone has your same footprint, it's just not likely to work right the second time around. Also, I've got a phobia against foot fungus.

But actually, there are a lot of things I don't mind getting used. I love hand-me-downs for my kids, so long as they're in decent shape (so they don't become targets for the lucky kids who have never even had to think of hand-me-downs). It's pretty cool when my friends have been able to pass things on to me, too and vice versa.

I also like getting good deals on other used things, and I've listed a few places to get great used things for a fraction of what you'd pay new.

You can find just about everything you want, that someone else no longer needs at thrift stores. I've actually found clothing in there with the tags still on--no kidding. But they also carry furniture, electronics, books, games, movies.....you name it. Sometimes you just get lucky and hit the motherload.

A friend of mine got a baby exersaucer in nearly new condition (because really, how long do they actually use it?) along with some other baby goodies for free just because she happened by when someone was waiting in line to drop off some things at a thrift store, and she asked if she could have it. I'm probably not that brave...but I'm sure it would have still been a great deal once it made its way inside the store.

Yard sales and swap meets are other good places to get things, and more often than not, the price is negotiable. I've actually made money doing both of these things, and I have to tell you that I never refused an offer that I felt was good enough, simply because I didn't want to pack those things back up again. I wanted them gone.

If you don't want to go outside looking for your deals, you can find plenty of them online. We got a killer deal on a bunkbed set that had the attached dresser and desk with it. We'd priced the same set new for about $800 and then bought one in great shape from KSL Classifieds for $300. Check out the classifieds for your area, you'll be surprised what people are willing to settle for.

You can also find Used Items on Amazon and Ebay. With Ebay, you can either bid for your deal, or you can find one for a set price. On Amazon, the price you see is the price you get, but you have several vendors competing so the pricing is competitive.

So I'll leave you on this note. New is not always better (unless it involves the unmentionables or old stinky feet). Happy hunting!