The Frugal Five: #93

 The Frugal Five: #93

With inflation on the rise and salaries not increasing, our ability to make ends meet keeps going down.    Therefore, we must be more careful with our money.   The Frugal Five is a series where we celebrate the daily or weekly activities that help us live a frugal life.    

I am exploring how to keep costs down during busy weeks. One strategy is to keep dinner on the table instead of eating out. Here are some of my tips and trips.   

1- Grateful for Social Gathering 

October has been a month filled with many social gatherings.    On the last Friday of each month, the social committee takes turns providing a treat for everyone.  In addition, our community garden hosted a thank-you luncheon for the gardeners for all of our hard work.   As a bonus, I won one of the raffle prizes.   There was a wedding shower breakfast and our school has conferences twice this month.    The PTO supplies the teachers with dinner each conference night and there is always enough food for lunch the next day.   

2- Vaccines 

I used my health card insurance and got my flu and COVID-19 vaccines.   This should help protect me from getting sick this winter.    Since my insurance provides this protection is free, there is no reason not to get your vaccine shots.    However, everyone will need to make their own decisions regarding this issue. 

3- Pantry Clean Out and Rotation

Since I have picked up a lot of shelf-stable items over the past few months, it is time to clean out, organize, and use up my pantry items.   I checked their expiration date, rotated them, and put a plan in place to use.  November is a big sales month, so I want to have space for the upcoming deals. 

4- Winterizing My Home

Winter is on its way and the reports indicate it will be wet and cold.   The shovels, salt, and scrapers have been pulled from storage.   Our seasoned wood pile rotated and a wheelbarrow of wood was brought up to the porch.    Windows and doors have been checked for drafts and sealed if needed.     The boiler has been checked and the fireplace is cleaned out.     We have rotated our bedding, clothes and have taken our winter gear out of storage.   Our cars have their winter emergency kit updated.    We are ready for the season.  

5- Soup Season is Here!

The menu has changed from salads to soups. We enjoy many soups, stews, and other comfort foods. Soup is a great way to use leftovers or stray vegetables left in your refrigerator. In addition, there are usually leftovers, so lunches are easy to pack. Our crock pot is regularly used, so I don’t put it away. This makes dinner during the week easy to get on the table after a long day.   

What Free-bees have you been able to pick up this year?    My entire year is attached below.    

Here is my list:

Do you want to see what we did last week?   

Just click on the picture for the link. 

Please leave a comment below with your ways of saving money this week.