Welcome to Savvy Shopping Mama – a forum on smart shopping, organized motherhood and, all-in-all, housewifing on a budget in a very challenging world!
In truth, my journey to savvy shopping began many years ago with circumstances through which I never foresaw this ultimate evolution. Although I’ve always considered myself a financially-responsible person, I have by no means lived my life as a bargain shopper or penny-pincher. In short, I have not always been entirely “smart” with my finances. It has taken some difficult life lessons and important experiences for me to truly appreciate the value of a dollar, and the significance of spending it wisely.
In recent months I have been introduced to the many opportunities the world holds for supporting a family on a budget. Thanks to friends, family, and a great deal of self-motivation, I am a different person today than I was six months ago; and I trust that the next six weeks, months and years will present me with many opportunities to further benefit myself and my family. My goal is to continue to embrace this information and lead my family happily down the road of financial responsibility and stability.
If you are reading this blog in hopes of joining the world of “couponing” and “savvy shopping”, please know that a few hours of your time each week can make a significant difference in your household budget. Less than a year ago I was extremely skeptical of coupons, and it wasn’t until October 2009 that I even received my first coupons via the Sunday paper. A mere four months later, my family’s grocery bill has been cut in half. Not only has that been great for our bank account, but I am incredibly more organized and my family is eating better than ever! A little time and patience as one works through a short learning curve, is all it takes to join the ranks of the many savvy shoppers filling our stores!
Like I said, my journey to smart shopping has been evolving for years. To better explain, let me start at the very beginning…
Dreams & Wishes
From early childhood, I looked forward to being a mother. I absolutely loved to play “house”, even enjoying it at an age when most girls had moved on to more “grown-up” activities. As a little girl, I loved caring for my dolls as if they were real babies: feeding, changing, nurturing them for hours on end. I spent much of my young life day-dreaming about a house full of children, and am pretty sure I had all twelve (yes – I swore I’d someday have twelve kids!) of their names chosen by the time I was seven. Someday I would find my “Perfect Man”, and together we would embark on our journey to Happily Ever After, or “parenthood” in my eyes.
As I grew up, I always knew I’d be a SAHM. My own mom stayed home and I loved it. She was the room mother, Girl Scout leader & CCD teacher. I loved that she was able to be involved in everything and was always available when we needed help. My dad was a successful business man with a demanding job; however he too somehow always managed to be incredibly involved in our lives. He coached soccer & tee-ball, put together countless science projects and was always readily available to help with homework. Although I was young, I believe I always realized that this was all possible because my parents were a strong team, working together to do everything right. We had a great family life: dinner was always on the table when my dad walked in the door, family game night was a regular event, and I had two parents who somehow never missed a school event. I was very lucky to grow up like this, and always knew this is exactly how I would raise my own kids.
As the years went on, I lived my young adult life to the fullest. I graduated from college with a business degree & moved to downtown Boston where I got a great job and began working on a Masters Degree in Accounting. During these years of my early twenties, I worked hard and enjoyed the many benefits of the young professional life: shopping, traveling & enjoying the city’s many offerings. I never had to worry about money and while this was a blessing, it was something I tried not to take advantage of too often. Although I shopped, I only did so at conservative stores; vacations were relatively modest, and I did my best to always live within my means. Credit cards were not used and I regularly put money into both short-term and retirement savings. I viewed myself as financially responsibly – and in many ways I was – but I now know there was much room for improvement! Life was good, though, and I enjoyed & accomplished a lot in this unique phase of life, a phase I will always reflect upon fondly.
Welcome to the Real World
In July 2006, my sister, her future husband and I moved from Boston to Raleigh. I was thrilled to finally be living closer to many of my fellow Hokies and to be pursuing a lifelong dream of becoming a Carolina girl. A few months later that “Perfect Man” mentioned above walked into my life. He was smart, handsome, interesting, fun, respectful, patient (a key attribute for someone dating me!), and most importantly, the most good-hearted, kind person I have ever met. Like I said, Perfect. Our relationship was easy and natural from the very first date. We fell in love quickly and spent that first year of our relationship having a wonderful time! Life couldn’t have been better and I couldn’t have been any happier!
In the Fall of 2007, as we were looking to buy a house together and talking about marriage, we were surprised to discover we were expecting a baby! Okay, so this sequence of events may have not been exactly in accordance with the script of my perfectly planned life, but children are a blessing and I had been waiting for motherhood for more than two decades. Besides, although the timing of this pregnancy was a surprise, we were both grown, responsible adults with a strong relationship, a lot of love, and good jobs that would easily support a family. We were elated!
Due to the timing of the baby, it was assumed that I would work for a while with this first child. I was extremely fortunate in that my manager surprised me with the offer to work from home two days per week. I knew I was lucky. Even better, my extremely wonderful, kind and caring sister generously offered to care for the baby on the remaining three days. Again, I couldn’t believe how lucky I was – I’d only have to leave the baby three days each week, and on those days he would be with this “second mother” who loved him to pieces. We had the “perfect plan”.
Andrew was born early in the Summer of 2008 and, as it does for most women, maternity leave went by much too fast. I returned to work in September, and spent the next month in tears. I hated being away from him, and quickly realized that being a working mother was not for me. Dean and I decided I would cut back to two days/week, and I was again extremely fortunate to have my employer agree to this. What a relief – was I ever happy!
And then, one month after my hours (and pay check) were adjusted to part-time status, the economy tanked. My husband, who worked in sales, was making a fraction of what we were used to. Couple this with my part-time salary, and the wedding expenses we were now incurring, and for the first time in my life I had to worry about money. Concerned about going through our savings, we started using credit cards to pay for wedding vendors and other related expenses. We tried to comfort ourselves with the fact that these cards were interest-free, but as two people unaccustomed to using credit cards, we saw this as what it was: debt, regardless of the related interest rate. We were entirely uncomfortable with this, however over the next several months, we acquired a few thousand dollars in cc debt. We both hated this, and it was the most stressful time of my life.
In April 2009, Dean & I were married and have not touched a credit card since the last day of our honeymoon. That spring we took a look at our financial situation and were fairly comforted by a few factors:
• Due to the fact that we were planning on my husband returning to school the following Fall, we had been very conservative in our wedding expenditures. Although we did incur some debt from the planning, we really had done a good job staying reasonably on budget. As we looked at our remaining bills, we knew they would not be insurmountable with some hard work and planning.
• These were one-time expenses, and although we were faced with some significant bills, we did not have major lifestyle or spending habbit adjustments to overcome.
• Our remaining everyday expenses were manageable. We were smart to have bought a smaller house than we could “afford” on our previous two full-time incomes. We had also cut back on eating out and unnecessary shopping. I thought we were in pretty good shape
Little did I know, my perspective on money and financial savviness was about to change – forever.
Friends In Low Places
In July 2009, my college friends gathered for our annual Girl’s Weekend. This year’s overwhelming topic of conversation was none other than money. Similar to me, two of my friends, M & W, were working to make the SAHM scenario work. We exchanged budgeting stories, complaints & advice. Some of the girls were lifetime savvy shoppers, accustomed to working the sales and socking away a good amount of money each month. Others, like myself, were new to this penny-pinching concept and skeptical of whether these budgeting scenarios were even worth the effort. I sat there dutifully listening to the words of advice, in my head making excuse after excuse as to why these plans would never make a real difference in my family’s life.
As if shopping store brands and clipping coupons wasn’t crazy enough to my closed-minded self, I was really in for it when M, who had just read Dave Ramsey’s Total Money Makeover, started talking about his teachings. She began talking about using nearly all savings to pay off debt. By this she wasn’t speaking specifically of credit card debt, but also student loans, car loans and the like. You name it, if you have debt your saving should be used to eliminate it. She then went on to discuss his principal of living frugally in the near-term to pay off a mortgage in a few short years (or, if currently renting, saving up and paying cash – yes cash – for a first home purchase). Apparently, Dave Ramsey’s theory is to “Live Like No One Else” now, to be able to “Live Like No One Else” for a lifetime.
I sat there staring at her as if she had three heads. M is a great person and a wonderful friend, but had clearly lost it. What about the 3-6 month Emergency Fund any financial advisor recommends? Student loans are “good debt”, aren’t they? No average family could possibly pay cash for a home purchase! Yes, we girls had every comeback in the book for her. And she confidentially responded each time with “No debt is good debt.” and “This financial plan can be done!” Like I said, great girl, but clearly losing her mind…
I didn’t buy her “Live Like No One Else” theory, but one piece of advice I did take away that weekend was to give coupon clipping a try. I had serious doubts that cutting coupons for Fruit Loops and Doritos (coupons are only for junk food, right?) would make any difference in our budget, but I agreed to give it a run. It took me three months to follow-through with it, but on October 18th, my first Sunday paper was delivered.
Let the Savings Begin
That first paper arrived two days before Dean’s birthday, and as luck would have it there were both Betty Crocker and Breyers coupons in that issue! We cheerfully clipped our coupons and walked out of Harris Teeter with a gallon of Breyers ice cream, a Betty Crocker cake mix, and a container of frosting. We spent $3, and saved $7. Not too bad for my first coupon excursion, I was pretty excited!
In early November, Harris Teeter offered its Triple Coupon event. I feel very fortunate with the timing of this sale because I was quickly introduced to the real value of coupons. Unfortunately, I did not save my receipts so I don’t have the exact figures, but that week I saved about 50% on my groceries – buying roughly $120 worth of goods for about $60. Wow the girls may have been onto something, this may actually work…
For the remainder of 2009, I threw myself into educating myself on savvy shopping. I learned how to accumulate and organize a good supply of coupons. I read and re-read store coupon policies and studied strategies on maximizing savings. Not only did I work on grocery store deals, but also endeavored into the world of drug store sales. The deals were unbelievable. Before I knew it, I had a stockpile of food, household supplies and toiletries, all of which I had obtained to free, or very near free.
The savings was exciting, addicting and REAL! I was hooked!!
Now and Then
As was planned, in September 2009 my husband returned to school as a full-time student. This was a scary time for us, but something we knew would be best for our family in the long run. Fortunately, (despite acquiring some wedding debt) we had planned for his return to school and been diligent about building a comfortable savings account to help support us during his temporary return to school. We were now faced with the challenge of living off my part-time salary, while minimizing the use of our savings.
Incredibly, these months in which Dean has been in school have been the most financially stable times of our adult lives. We have been extremely successful at sticking to a budget, uncovering great deals, and discovering a plethora of options for affordable family fun. In accordance with M’s advice, we have even paid off all of our credit card debt – oh what a great feeling that was! In March, we will be trading in Dean’s unnecessarily expensive car, and buying a more affordable car with cash. During that month we’ll also be paying off the balance of my car loan. We often look at our situation with amazement: we are living well on 40% of our previous salaries and not only avoiding taking on debt, but also paying off the debt we incurred when earning significantly higher salaries!
Our remaining debt now consists of some student loans from my days in grad school as well as our mortgage, not too bad in my eyes. Dean’s days as a full-time student are quickly coming to an end and he will be returning to the work force in the next few months. At that point, we will be sitting down and making a plan to pay the mortgage and student loans off as well.
Yes, you heard me correctly; I now believe it is entirely possible for young families to live mortgage and debt free. I believe it will take some serious dedication and hard work for a few years, but it is possible. This may be our “shoot for the stars” goal, but even if we do not land directly on target, we will still be well on the way to a great destination. Thank you to a wonderful friend for introducing us to this “crazy” and wonderful idea!
The Good Life
Through this past year’s financial challenges, I have spent a lot of time worried about our future, jealous of those who didn’t need to worry, and angry at the various circumstances that lead us down this path. Recently, however, I have realized how blessed we have been to have learned these important life lessons at such an early age. We do not live with the sense of entitlement or instant gratification that is so common in today’s society. My husband and I have learned the value of a dollar; we have learned lessons in smart versus wasteful spending, and how to turn seemingly unattainable dreams into blissful reality. These are lessons we will carry with us for the rest of our lives. I now confidently believe that every challenge we were faced with was part of a bigger plan, a plan meant to lead us down a path to our best lives possible. We have been forever changed, I am forever grateful.
Today, with great assistance from two great friends, an extremely helpful husband, a patient toddler (if such a thing exists!), and the loving support of family and friends, I continue my journey through couponing, savvy shopping, and true financial responsibility.
This blog not only serves as a means to provide readers with information on great deals, but also to hold myself accountable for the goals I set. I will be sharing information on the various means of organized housewifing and budgeting: from shopping to menu planning, stockpiling, cooking & saving!
I hope to serve as a source to which the average American woman can relate. I have made my share of both good and bad decisions. I have faced seemingly overwhelming obstacles, and I continue working to overcome them. My life has been blessed in countless ways, but I have also faced my share of challenges. I am a normal woman with normal problems, challenges, and triumphs. I hope you find this site interesting, beneficial and inspirational.
Now, all you savvy shoppers, let the savings begin!
Round 2 $0.50
Round 3: $0.32
