Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

McDonald’s Birthday Parties

Tuesday, July 18th, 2006

We just celebrated our son’s fourth birthday. In the past, I have made the food and we have had the party at our house. It has been fun (for everyone else!), but we still ended up spending a lot of money on food, cake, party favors, etc… We only invited a few friends, but our family continues to grow and now our immediate family alone is about thirteen people. This year, I decided to let someone else host the party…But what is a frugal momma to do when most parties cost so much money?

Have no fear! The McDonald’s Birthday party is the way to go! Each McDonald’s offers a different price, but the prices are usually in the same neighborhood and all of them usually offer the same types of activities.

For $59.99, we could have ten children attend his birthday party. The cost included ten Happy Meals (everyone got their own choice in entrees & sides), party favors, games, cake (chocolate or white), and ice cream. The party times, at our McDonald’s, were two or four, which meant that no one was there eating and we had the whole place to ourselves.

We chose a nice McDonald’s, in our area, and they cleaned up and closed off the play area just for our party. It was, honestly, the best party we have ever had. The kids had a blast in the play area and played for three hours, while the parents sat around and visited. The host did all of the work for us, entertaining the children, taking orders, bringing food…and the ultimate part? All of the cleaning up!

In short, have a McDonald’s birthday party- it is the way to go!

Monday WAHM Spotlight: Stuff A Friend

Monday, July 17th, 2006

Thanks to Lisa for being part of our Monday WAHM for MomAdvice.com. We wish her much success in her business and with her family.If you are interested in being featured, we will be selecting a mom for each Monday of my blog. You can read more and apply. Email confirmations are sent to each mom if they are chosen. I still have many people to reply to on these so please be patient waiting for my reply. I promise to get back to you guys soon! Also remember to do your own research on these companies. If there are obvious red flags on BBB, I do not post them. Check my scam article to find out more about the potential dangers of work-at-home businesses.Thank you to Lisa and her WAHM business, Stuff A Friend, for taking the time to apply and be a part of my Monday feature.

Name: Lisa Johnson

City/State: Green Bay, WI

Name of Company: Stuff A Friend

Two or Three Sentences About Your Company:


Stuff A Friend is a mobile stuffing workshop that comes to you or you can come to us! We do workshops, birthday parties, and fundraisers!

Two Tips for Moms Trying to Work-At-Home (these tips can be how you stay organized, how to be successful, how to get started- anything that you feel would help someone just starting out):


1. Research research research before signing up with a company! Make sure it’s a fit for you (the product, the company values, costs, quotas, everything) and your family if you’ll be working around them.

2. Get organized from the beginning and keep up with it, because once your organization becomes a mess, your business follows!

Carnival of Debt Reduction (#44)

Sunday, July 16th, 2006

Welcome to the Carnival of Debt Reduction (#44). I am excited to be hosting my first carnival (or festival, for that matter!) so I hope that you all will enjoy it! If you have not visited this blog before, I encourage you to take a peek. My blog focuses on cheap eating, recipes, frugal shopping, and inexpensive solutions for anyone who is trying to live a more frugal life.

I love to dine out, but because of the expense, I rarely get the opportunity to do so without considerable guilt. Today’s carnival is guilt free though and full of good information to bite into. I have divided the posts into different categories. The main dishes are the posts that really shine this week.

Thank you to all who participated. Next week’s carnival will be hosted by Money Under 30. Please be sure to stop by there for more great reads.

Finally, if you are interested in hosting, you can find out more information here.

Amanda, the Young & Broke webmistress, shares a new tool at Money Central. This new tool is supposed to help users determine where they stand, debt-wise, and how to proceed towards reducing that debt. Is it a good tool? Check out Amanda’s comments to get the real scoop.

On the Getting Out of Debt blog, Supermom shares her amazing progress that she has made towards reducing her overall debt. You can read her plan of action for the month and where she is planning to put her next funds towards.

The Prince of Thrift, over at Becoming & Staying Debt Free shares how Dave Ramsey encourages everyone that takes his Financial Peace University course to create a financial mission statement. It was because of that that he decided to post his statement in his blog, setting off waves of other PF blogs to also create and post their own mission statements. So what is your financial mission?

Free Money Finance shares some real & true stories of people who managed to pay off their debt, including a couple who had 30K in wedding bills and got them paid down in a year. They implemented things like not eating out and not shopping for expensive toys as ways you can reduce your debt. Hmmm… how about not spending 30K on weddings and say, “I Do!” in Vegas, baby!

Boston Gal’s Open Wallet submits a great piece, entitled “Neither Quick Nor Easy.” Of hot debate: was Scrooge a good guy and just misunderstood because of his frugalness? Or, was Scrooge the villain that the world portrays him as? You be the judge!

One of my favorite blogs, “We’re in Debt” suggests a better way of managing all of that paper. What? The random piles we have established all over the house (and in the car, and under the bed, and under my seat) is not a system? I beg to differ!

Jim, over at Blueprint for Financial Prosperity shares his dilemma on paying his student loans back. No, he is not wondering if he should pay them. He is really just questioning in what order one should pay their bills. The post was interesting, but I really found the comments even more interesting.

AboutPMI shares some tips for paying down your mortgage faster. Included is a link to a handy dandy calculator (and I know how much the readers love a good calculator!) showing how much it would benefit you if you paid biweekly versus monthly. Now if I can just get that darn PMI removed over in our house, I would be a happy camper.

Free the Drones asks the question is debt really bad? And if it is, what types of debt do you need to be tackling? Find out about ways you can knock out your debt (oh, and there is a calculator for all of you number crunching junkies!) and find yourself on the fast track to financial freedom.

Steve from Debt Free throws out a suggestion to his readers that maybe if you want to live a debt-free life, you should consider eliminating a family pet into your life’s equation. It is interesting to see the astounding costs associated with owning an animal, but look at their sweet little faces and just try to say no….

The Car Buying Tips blog offers some tips to people who think playing musical chairs with cars is a good idea. Guess what? It isn’t! Read more of Chuck’s blog to find out why you should hang onto your cars and not experience these nasty cases of tradeitis.

Frugal Wisdom From Wenchypoo’s Warehouse discusses a recent letter to the Dollar Stretcher in relation to the fundamentals of economics. Did you ever wonder why the potato chips in those bags are getting smaller and smaller? Well, Wenchypoo explains it all (and then some)!

Paul’s Tips (by Paul, imagine that!) shares how to determine whether you are better off renting or buying. Dust off your calculators, get a pen and paper, & get ready to find out your housing destiny.

Getting the Cheapest Shipping

Saturday, July 15th, 2006

I have just started selling some items on Ebay. We are cloth diapering our daughter (am hoping to write an article on that soon!) and we sold her small diapers to move up to the medium diapers. This was my first experience with shipping on Ebay. I made a guess on the shipping (thankfully, I overestimated!), boxed everything up, took both the kids to the post office, and had an awful time waiting in line. Why? Well, my son decided to run around and befriend everyone, then he began holding himself and saying he needed to go to the potty, then my daughter started screaming because she was hungry, then my son started playing in the trash, then I turned around to yell at him, and then my postage stuck to the wrong place…Are you starting to get the picture? When I had to bring the box up, to have the poor lady correct my postage placement, she then asked me if I wanted this type of shipping or this type of shipping. Did I want this insurance or that type of insurance? I had no idea- heck, I just want you to ship the dang box quickly. I came out of there, with both kids screaming, vowing to never ever go to the post office again.

There has to be a better way than this…and guess what? There is! I found this great site called RedRoller, that actually spits out exactly how much your shipping costs will be and compares them against each other. If you invest in a little postage scale (there were some on Ebay for under ten bucks), you can just do your own shipping from home. I input everything into the RedRoller site and it told me that I could ship my item for $6.60, to the listed destination. You can create an account, have it link to your Ebay account, print your shipping label from your computer, and then just have the carrier pick it up from your home- how cool is that? The nice thing about it linking to Ebay was that it automatically updated my Ebay account and let the buyer know that the item was shipped. Total time spent to ship the package- about five minutes.

The best part for me was that I didn’t have two screaming kids waiting in line with me and I knew I was getting the best deal that I could….you know me and a bargain!

The Greatest Mommy Blogs EVAH!

Saturday, July 15th, 2006

Guy Kawalski, who has an amazing blog AND writes books, has blogged about the world’s greatest mommy blogs. He has provided the list, originally posted by BlogHer, and is continually adding to this amazing list. You really should check it out because there is some of the best reading material in these little gems.

Thanks to Guy for including us in his list of great blogs! We feel honored to have made the cut!

Play It Again, Momma! (for my new visitors)

Thursday, July 13th, 2006

Since we are up and rolling on the 9Rules homepage (whoohoo!), I just wanted to take this opportunity to welcome the 9Rulers and share with them a little about myself. What am I all about and why is this your new favorite site? Well, here are a few of my personal favorites that will hopefully show you. If you want to know a full scoop on me, please visit the trusty bio page for more information. I’m a fascinating person.

Things You Should Know About Me:

1. I used to be funny… at least that is what my blog used to be about! My adventures in motherhood. Then people were all up in my business so I took the blog in a different direction. There is no reason that everyone & their mother need to know all about my crappy parenting. You will have to read past entries to catch a glimpse of my former humor. Now I am all business, people! Get it right!

2. I am a creative problem solver. Is your coffee cup overflowing? Does your trash slippeth down? Do you hate your spice rack? Do you lack space in your home? My problem solving techniques will definitely benefit your family, should you choose to continue reading this blog!

3. I love me some kids. Expensive baby-making got you down? Don’t know if you can actually afford to buy your baby food? Love your kids, but is your house becoming a giant showcase for their art projects? These are just a few of the blog entries that show how much I love my kids and how we manage to (creatively) provide for them.

4. I am a freebie junkie! No seriously, I get the shakes when I have to pay for something. I don’t like to pay for my Starbuck’s coffee, I love to sample products at no cost , and I love to give free stuff to my kids.

5. I don’t like to waste time grocery shopping and I hate it when other people waste my time. It is a pet peeve of mine, so don’t slow this lady down or you’ll find yourself one limb short.

6. I love to give cheap gifts… but in a creative way. Not in the I-knitted-you-a-scarf-in-ugly-colors-and-you-have-to-wear-it-or-I’ll-cry kind of way. I think my gifts are thoughtful and well executed and have only received good feedback, but maybe people are just being polite. Check out my links and judge for yourself!

7. I like to cook and I love pretty aprons. NO, my husband does not force me to cook his meal, rub his feet, or boss me around the house. I just love being a wife and he loves that I love being a wife. And you must love that he loves that I love being a wife or else you would not visit this blog because it is partly about me and my obsession for good food and other wifey type of things. I love trying new recipes, and I love to share my personal favorites. It brings me a lot of joy to share the food that I love, just don’t want anyone to walk away with the wrong impression! I am definitely my own person!

8. I am s-l-o-w… like, in the brain! Spell things out for me, dumb your comments down. Don’t throw your intellect around here… I am too slow to get it. Try and overcharge me though and you will find that I will unleash a hellish fury of which this world has never seen.

9. If you really want to know personal stuff about me, you will have to read this entry. That is all that I am sharing though and we will never discuss my personal life again.

10. We are happy to be part of 9Rules, ya’ll! Let me be perfectly honest, I had absolutely no idea what this meant (see #8), but upon explanation- I am just thrilled! I hope that this leads to many great friendships and helps me to be more creative. Thanks for letting us be a part of this experience and I can’t wait to share more with you!

WFMW: Solving the Sand-Between-Your-Toes Blues

Wednesday, July 12th, 2006

Welcome to this week’s edition of Works-For-Me-Wednesday. Swing by Shannon’s blog for more lovely ideas for you & your family! It is something that I know I look forward to every week because I get so many great ideas!

This week my husband is on vacation so we have been enjoying a few day trips to the beach & such. Now if there is one thing that I hate about the beach, it is all of that sand- in the car, in our toes, on our backs, in our hair. Usually there is sand everywhere and it can make for a very uncomfortable ride home.

This time I packed the miracle cure for sanditis- a container of baby powder. Just sprinkle it wherever you have sand and it will instantly just disappear off of you. Not only does it remove the sand, but it also leaves everyone smelling as sweet as a baby!

Keep some in your car or by the door and give your kids a sprinkle after they are done playing in the sand box. No more sand trailed through the house- that definitely Works For Me!

Here are a few other links to some of my past ideas-Giving the Gift of Magazines (Frugally) Solution for Cheap Trash Bags Programming Your Cell Phone Free Up Pantry Space: Make a Snack Weeding Through Your Child’s Art Work Creatively Using the Coffee Maker With Ease Making Your Spice Rack Usable Maximizing Space

Monday WAHM Spotlight: Sprezzatura Systems

Monday, July 10th, 2006

Thanks to Ellen for being part of our Monday WAHM for MomAdvice.com. We wish her much success in her business and with her family.If you are interested in being featured, we will be selecting a mom for each Monday of my blog. You can read more and apply. Email confirmations are sent to each mom if they are chosen. I still have many people to reply to on these so please be patient waiting for my reply. I promise to get back to you guys soon! Also remember to do your own research on these companies. If there are obvious red flags on BBB, I do not post them. Check my scam article to find out more about the potential dangers of work-at-home businesses.Thank you to Ellen and her WAHM business, Sprezzatura Systems, for taking the time to apply and be a part of my Monday feature.

Name: Ellen Ferlazzo

City/State: Pleasanton, CA

Name of Company: Sprezzatura Systems, Inc.

Two or Three Sentences About Your Company:

I write web content (copywriting) for high tech companies. At various times in the past I’ve also worked as a user interface designer, on both Windows and web applications.

Two Tips for Moms Trying to Work-At-Home (these tips can be how you stay organized, how to be successful, how to get started- anything that you feel would help someone just starting out):

1. Set a schedule and keep it! I like to keep my work hours as close to a normal workday as possible now that my kids are older and off to school most of the day.

2. Have an office space of some kind and a separate phone line that the kids know not to answer. I’ve gone from the dining room to a spare bedroom, but always have a space of my own.

Works-For-Me-Wednesday: Giving the Gift of Magazines (Frugally)

Wednesday, July 5th, 2006

Welcome to this week’s edition of Works-For-Me-Wendesday. Swing by Shannon’s blog for more great ideas (and I mean More with a capital “M”) for you & your family!

This week I am going to clue you into giving another frugal gift. For each holiday & birthday, I try and get someone a gift subscription to a magazine. Do I purchase these gift subscriptions from those handy little slips in the magazine? Of course not! Those prices are ridiculous! Instead, I make most of my magazine subscription purchases off of Ebay. Ebay, you say? Why, yes! Ebay has dirt cheap subscriptions and I think magazine subscriptions are the perfect gift. They get a whole year’s worth of magazines and you get these magazines for little to no money. For example, I got someone in my family a gift subscription for three years for only $3.97. This magazine retailed for $14.97 per year. This person was *super* happy and I was *super* happy because I didn’t spend an arm and a leg buying them a gift.

Just a couple of little helpful hints about purchasing magazines through Ebay. First, make sure you include the gift recipient’s address. Don’t forget to include this (I usually include this in the notes section or however the listing descibes I should include this information) or the magazine will come to you (and that would be so silly!). Also, make sure that you read the reviews of the seller. Don’t buy from someone who has lots of negative feedback or from someone that has no feedback. You want a Power Seller or someone who is known for providing services as described and who has gotten rave reviews from their buyer. Finally, make sure that there is no shipping and handling on the magazine. For example, I was buying a gift for someone and the subscription price said $1.99 for a year’s worth of O! Magazine. What a great deal, right? Wrong! The seller wanted $19.97 for shipping the magazines. What a rip off!

Some of the more obscure publications are not available, but the basics are usually easy to find. Just search under the magazine name!

If you don’t want to pay for magazines at all, read my blog entry on getting free magazines (or this other entry that includes some more great information). What am I getting for free right now? Spin, Interview, Family Fun, & Antiques magazine. How cool is that?

If you are new to the world of The Motherload, be sure to visit my past WFMW entries for even more great ideas!

Solution for Cheap Trash Bags
Programming Your Cell Phone
Free Up Pantry Space: Make a Snack
Weeding Through Your Child’s Art Work Creatively
Using the Coffee Maker With Ease
Making Your Spice Rack Usable
Maximizing Space

Fireworks Galore

Wednesday, July 5th, 2006

Were the fireworks crazy where you live? I decided to hit Walmart last night (because all of their perennials were marked down so low that it was nuts!) and when I got home the sounds were deafening. I brought my husband out, to show him the plants I got for a mere three dollars, and we noticed some weird black things buzzing by. What were they, you might ask? Why, they were bats! Bats by the dozens, swooping so low to the ground that they were almost touching the grass. I have only seen more bats than that at the zoo, and they were confined within glass. I was so freaked out that I ran into the house, and made my poor hubby drag all of the plants in, because I was afraid they were going to attack me. We figured that the sounds were throwing them off, as much as it was throwing off the rest of our family. Know what makes for good quality family entertainment that doesn’t even cost you a dime? Why, watching numerous crazy bats flying down to the ground at six zillion miles per hour. How was ya’lls evening?