Blessings From Home

Job and Money Stress and preperations

Today has been a pondering day for me. My husband, who does his best to save me any undue stress (God bless him), felt the need to share with me his concerns over his job and the concerns over what may come in the next many months or years. As far as I knew, all was fine, with his job anyways. I had my own concerns about the economy from several readings on the web and watching of the news, and had been trying to gather my thoughts on how best to prepare for that, but my husbands job, as I should have known is not secure, and work has been slowly dwindling for his company over the last several months.

They've begun talking lay-offs, nothing official yet, but it's something to be aware of, and to prepare for. I am not prepared for anything, to say the least. I think at best we'd make it a week on what we have on hand here.

So I've been making lists, (I am a listmaker, ya know). Lists of things we need to cut back on, lists of things we need to stock up on, not just food, but medicines, fabrics, necessities, things for schooling the kids, etc. We have a lot of unneccesary expenditures like eating out, cable tv, and a few other things that will be going away. Internet will stick around for as long as we can afford it, because of it's multiple resources for homeschooling, recipes and frugal living.

I've made a well layed out plan of our backyard, and how we are going to transform it into our own little homestead in the city. It will take us many years to get completely to that goal, but it is definately possible. I'm starting in the most frugal area possible, and that is growing some of our food. It's too late to start anything now, at least planting, but I'm beginning by starting my compost, gathering lumber to build square foot boxes, buying heirloom seeds, and clearing out the area where we will be putting the boxes.

My dad has some extra lumber to share that I'm going to use to make a clotheline that I saw on one of my many visits here. I was originally going to go and buy an umbrella clotheline, but it was going to cost 70 dollars plus the cost of cement, and by making one like the one in the post, all I should need is cement, and maybe some lattice eventually, but I'm going to post on freecycle first to see what I can find.

I'm doing my best to look around here first before I go out and spend money on things. My parents, who are the packrat king and queen, always have extra things they're willing to share, and if I just looked around, ya never know what I'd find in my own home.

I'm trying to not let myself panic about anything, because I know that never does any good. But I have definately had my eyes opened more than ever about how much I need to prepare for what may come, whether it  be economic failure, or job loss, temporary or not, or just for the joy of being able to be a bit more self sufficient, it must be done.

The main thing I need to do is accomplish these goals and preperations as inexpensively as I can or we'll end up being in worse shape than if we had not done anything at all.

The easiest place for me to start saving money in after eliminating other unnecessary expenses is the grocery bill. We've been slowly making changes to the way we eat. Making our own bread and baked goods, eating ground turkey over ground beef, eating beans at least 2 times a week, among other things, but to say we have been doing these things religously is an understatement. We do it as necessary, but it has come to the point that it must be done on a daily basis. So that is where I will concentrate my efforts first. And when there is extra money, it will be used for stocking up on foods and other things. So now I'm off to make my weekly menu and shopping list, and will know more on what I can stock up on this week when hubby arrives home with his check. Be on the lookout for posts on some major changes coming to this household, and our journey there.

Blessings, sara

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{ 03:50, Wednesday, October 1, 2008 } { Posted by Amanda }

Another thing to think on would be using your insurance while you have it. Example: dental, health etc. You never know when it will be taken away from you. (That is if you have it at all.)

These are my hubby's thoughts because he is also worried about his job security. It's all in The Lord's hands. Praise His name!

Amanda <><
II Corinthians 5:7

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{ 05:21, Wednesday, October 1, 2008 } { Posted by gabbie427 }

We got word that the department my hubby works in may or may not be folding or selling out. Right now he is safe, but we don't know for sure what the future holds for us, but we do know God is our provider and he will take care of our needs.

We have stocked up the pantry and freezers, but still working on putting more there. We have cut back on almost all careless spending, and cut down on cell phone expenses, and cut all extras on the home phone, just in case. The extra money that would have gone to those things and any other extra money that can be scrounged up is going into our emergency fund. Although we were saving up money for Christmas, we have all decided we will do a mostly homemade Christmas this year to cut down on things a little in that area too.

Even if hubby keeps his job and all is well, we still need money for taxes at the end of the year (that are going up), and for emergency cases such as car repairs, and to have just in case the price of gas goes back up again.

We don't feel like we are panicking. No, we are following God's instructions to be ready. This is just another way God is providing for us, by helping us, help ourselves.

God's Blessings,
Amy Jo