The other day I was sitting in the office checking my email, and all of a sudden I heard this noise, an unfamiliar yet recognizable whir, and I started smelling something unusual. Mr. Money had kicked the heat on. As my stomach turned, I realized I was being a little over dramatic; after all, it is chilly out and normal people do turn on their heat in the winter. We’d just been trying to avoid turning it on by using our wood burning stove and being clothed properly. I knew breakfast was almost ready, so I walked into the kitchen, and immediately stopped in my tracks. There stood Mr. Money.

In his t shirt and boxers.

Because he already thinks I’m completely nuts, and sometimes rightfully so, I decided not to add fuel to the fire, and I decided I would casually walk over to the thermostat and yank it back down to 50 degrees, where it belongs.

“Honey, why don’t you put some pajamas on? It’s not too cold in here, but I’d hate for you to be uncomfortable.” I decided my subtlety would maybe give him the hint.

“I just turned the heat on- wait a minute… did you turn it back down?” Imagine the icicles reforming on his nose.

“Yes. If you would put a sweatshirt on it wouldn’t be bad. You’ll be fine.” At this point me mumbles something, walks into our bedroom, and puts on some clothes. I realize I am lucky to be married to such a wonderful man. That was pretty much the end of our conversation.

I realize that sometimes I can go a little overboard, and honestly, we don’t keep the heat at 50 degrees, but it just bugged me because instead of putting some extra clothes on, he was turning the heat on.  A quick fix would have been to just put a sweatshirt on.

What are some “unfrugal things” your spouse does that aggravate you?

Posted under Money Mistakes

This recipe is inspired by Mr. Money.  They actually serve it at his restaurant.  Of course, this is not the exact recipe because I can’t steal all his secrets; plus, it has to be quick, easy, and frugal, and most of his recipes aren’t like that.

This one is one of my favorites because it is so easy to make, even I can make it!  

Ingredients:

• 1 spaghetti squash (should be in season now!)
• fresh tomatoes or crushed in a can
• 3 pinches of basil
• 3 pinches of oregano
• 2 pinches of salt
• 1 small onion
• 1 clove garlic
• 1 celery stalk
• 3 carrots
• 4 mushrooms
• any other chopped veggies you have on hand that will go well in the ratatouille.  Ratatouille is basically a meld of veggies that you need to use up.

Sautee onions, garlic and celery in some extra virgil olive oil.  Add carrots and other veggies that you are using.  Sautee the vegetables until they are medium firmness. Cut your spaghetti squash in half, put it on a baking sheet, and bake in the oven at 350 degrees for about half an hour.  I turn mine face down so that the insides don’t dry out.  Check after 15 minutes to see how it’s doing.  It should look soft and delicate.

Take it out of the oven, put your vegetables inside, and eat!  It’s pretty easy to make and yummy!  If you really want a quick meal, you can use a jar of spaghetti sauce and eat that with your spaghetti squash.  Use the squash instead of noodles.  Less carbs, and more veggies!

Let me know if you try it!

Posted under Recipes

I’ve been putting this off for a few days, but it’s inevitable, and the sooner I write about it, the sooner I can come up with a plan.  On Friday, the financial institution I work for was purchased by another bank.  The only problem?  The bank has many branches already existing in the area I work.  The odds they’re going to shut down my branch (and leave me without a job) are very high right now.  It makes me sick to my stomach to think of this, but I need to come up with a plan, and make sure I can execute it.

No spending month is going to be no spending ever. Well, really we can’t do that, but we can make sure we’re not spending money on things we don’t need. I think doing the no spending month has prepared me in many ways to cut back, and it’s also taught me a lot about what I can do instead of spending money, and how little things we actually need. We’re just going to have to be really careful, and I’m hoping that we can make it on Mr. Money’s income.  Of course, I’ll have snowflake money (that I usually use to pay off debt), and I can try harder to make money online, and that should definitely help. I’ve been trying to sell things on craigslist and ebay, but haven’t had much success with that.

The market is going to be saturated with people looking for new banking jobs.  With the amount of branches that I’m anticipating will be closing, it’s going to be really hard to find a new job in my field.  I am thinking about going back to school for nursing, but I don’t want to take out more student loans.  I’m going to wait and see what happens before I decide to go back to school.

This is going to allow us the opportunity to see if we can really live on one income.  I’ve always wanted to stay at home when we have children, and this is going to be our trial run.  I’m nervous but glad we’ve got our emergency fund, and you bet that any extra money I find in the next few months will be going straight into our emergency fund.

I never thought this was going to happen.  I thought our bank was safe, I thought my job was safe, I thought I would retire from this company.  I’m really let down, but I’m going to make the best of this situation.

Do you have any advice for me?  What would you do if you were in my shoes?

Posted under Economy, Jobs