Cut Spending

In today’s economy more and more people are looking for ways to live a simple life. The prospect of finding employment is down, and the folks that are working, their hours have been reduced. One day the market is down and the next day it is up. We are living in fragile times, but I believe the market will come back and jobs will return. In time all of these things will turn around, but while we are anticipating this turn around, we can cut spending on unnecessary items. There are several ways we can cut spending on entertainment, groceries, and utilities.

Entertainment
We can go to the community parks and play softball with our kids or wade in a creek and enjoy a picnic lunch. My kids always liked movie night at home. After dinner and homework, we would gather around the TV and watch a movie and eat popcorn. There are lots of creative ways of having fun without spend a lot of money.

Groceries
My grocery budget also includes our eating out money, so one of the easiest ways for me to cut my grocery expense is to eat out less. We cut coupons out of the ad pages that are enclosed with the Sunday paper. We use the store brands instead of the brand names; we make a menu and shop for the menu, by doing this we can shop for the week without running back to the store several times a week. It is amazing how much we save by making fewer trips to the store, because I always end up with more stuff than I was shopping for.

Utilities
By flipping the light switch off when we leave a room, we can save on our electricity. When we turn the water on for the shower, we place a bucket under the facet to catch the cold water while waiting on the hot water; we use this water to water our plants. We have cut some of the extra channels on our cable TV bill.

There are lots of ways to cut spending and live a simple life. It is fun to gather the family together and let everyone suggest a way that the family can cut spending. Kids have great ideas and enjoy being included in the decision making process.