There's no such thing as "Cheap" Child Care

I've found out one of the most difficult tasks as a parent can be finding someone you trust to watch your children. Whether it's for a night out with your partner or a full-time sitter while you work, you have to be careful and thoroughly research the people you leave your children with. There's just no real way to be frugal or cheap when it comes to paying for child care. This is one time when money can't get in the way of quality. Cheap just won't cut it when your child's safety, emotional and educational needs are involved.

How can you assure your child will get quality care without going bankrupt?

You'll have to learn to scrimp in other areas to afford care for your child. Being frugal in all other areas could afford you to pay for childcare. It's a sacrifice of course, but well worth it.

See if a trusted family member can watch them. While you probably wouldn't want them to keep your child every day, a family member works out nicely for special occasions. Perhaps one of them would like additional income and if need be, watch them while you work. It would most likely be more affordable than hiring someone outside the family.

If you have a job that is flexible and allows you to stay home, then you can do most of your work while your child is sleeping. Maybe hire someone to come in one day a week to care for the kids so you can get a huge chunk done and meet deadlines.

Trade child care with a friend. Setting up a child care exchange system can work out well if you have kids around the same age. Take turns watching each others children and it won't cost you a dime.

Work opposite shifts than your partner so one of you will always be around to watch the kids. In tough times, this can be a great solution but be sure to find time to spend alone with your partner.

Universities will sometimes have a daycare affiliated with it. They usually offer open spots to faculty and students but if there are any left over, you may be able to have your child placed there. Typically, child development students are caring for the children and it's very affordable.

Don't be too proud to seek financial assistance for childcare if you qualify. The US Government has state listings for child care information available. It's definitely an option to explore if you've exhausted all others.

Remember, the care of your child is the best investment you'll ever make so you never want to opt for the cheapest care just because it's cheap. Ask family and friends for referrals, check with your church, search classifieds and online for local babysitter listings, do background checks and ask for references. You can never be too careful.

How do you afford childcare? What sacrifices do you make?

Convincing family to be frugal isn't always easy..

The other day, I touched on the subject of saving money for groceries and mentioned my soda guzzling hubby. Well, that got me to thinking about obstacles in our way of living frugally and how to deal with them. Friends, family and coworkers alike may try to sabotage our efforts to live on less. Even if they don't realize they're doing it, they can make us feel belittled with their comments as well as their actions. I know it really frustrates me that my husband has this soda addiction but that only makes me determined to look for other areas to save.

So, how can you deal with a not so frugal party pooper? Everyone in the household needs to be on board if you want to be successful at keeping costs down. Whether it's a struggle with hubby over buying soda, brand name clothes shopping for teens or eating at home instead of restaurants, you need to convince them to be on your side.

With kids, I've found the best way to get them to spend less is to have them earn their own money. If they get an allowance, make sure they know once it's gone, that's it. If your teen has to have certain brands of clothes, turn the shopping over to them but let them know they have a certain limit and if they want anything else, they need to figure out how to get it for themselves. Of course, introduce them to thrift stores and consignment shops. My daughter knows she can get about 10 pair of brand name jeans at the thrift for the price of one pair at Abercrombie. They'll either learn to shop smart or have a very limited wardrobe.

Younger children want every toy they see on commercials, don't they? The thrifts come in handy for this as well. My 5 year old knows he can buy one cheap toy at the department store or fill a whole bag with toys for $2 at the thrift. He is already learning to stretch his dollar and he rarely asks for anything when we're out shopping because he knows where the bargains are!

Now, for the toughest of all, the adults. Sometimes they're so stuck in their ways they can't imagine change even if it means saving money. I do understand having preferences but I don't understand being inflexible. Talk to them, show them on paper how much you can save by making a few changes and simple sacrifices. Don't nag them. Nagging gets you nowhere. Sit them down and show them all the advantages of your plans to save. Ask them what they're willing to cut back on and go from there. Think of it as playing a game of Let's Make a Deal. If you realize you're not getting anywhere with them, drop the subject until a later time. Again, I have to say, don't nag =)

It's Time for a Little Change...

In the past I've saved change in a jar or container of some sort and cashed it in when it was full, or when I needed a few extra dollars to make ends meet. I've decided to start doing that faithfully to see how much I can save. I'll of course, add this to my emergency fund savings. I recall filling a jar and it was over $80 when finally cashed in.. that's a nice little chunk of change right there.


I'm going to take this one step further and save all of my one dollar bills as well. I got this idea from "The Dollar Bill Challenge". I really have no idea how much I could save but we'll see. With our budget as tight as it is right now, I'm not sure if I'll put all the savings from the dollar bills toward the emergency fund or see if I have enough to pay a bill and then save whatever is left. We'll see how it goes.

This will only be effective if I cut back on using the debit card. What I'm planning to do is use the debit card when I make my main household purchases such as toilet paper, shampoo, toothpaste and such but get cash back with the transaction. I can't stand the thought of wasting a few of my hard earned dollars on ATM machine fees. As of right now, there's no charge for getting cash back so that's the best option for me.

Saving For a Rainy (er) Day

We've all heard how important it is to set up an emergency fund. Some say we should have enough saved to get us through three months with no income, others say six. I'm going to say that in this day and age, I'd like to have closer to 9-12 months saved just for my own peace of mind. Right now, I have a whopping $16 in my emergency fund. I'd be lucky if that bought diapers for a week. I didn't mean for my fund to be so low but things came up and it didn't take long for the small amount I had saved to dwindle. So here I am back at square one.

I think it's important to set small, weekly savings goals and take baby steps toward building up savings. I know if I really try, I could save around $10 a week easily. In a year that would be $520. What I need to do is to figure out how to save beyond that. Perhaps even adding extra income and adding that toward my emergency fund. Below I'm going to share my ideas on ways to boost my emergency fund. I'll be sharing my progress with you over the months to come.

First of all, I need to look where we're really spending extra and could scale back. I've mentioned in previous blogs my slight aversion to coupon use. Well, I'm going to bite the bullet and relearn coupon usage. Way back in my early days of parenthood (when dinosaurs ruled the earth =)) it wasn't uncommon for me to walk into a store with a fist full of coupons and walk out with a cart full of stuff for up to 80% off. I got out of the habit of using coupons when I decided it was no longer worth my time and time equals money, right? Well, right now I have a heck of a lot more time than money so coupons, here I come.

Next, I'm going to get my husband to switch from brand name soda to store brand. This may or may not work but it would make an extreme difference. Right now, he's drinking over $1,000 a year worth of Mountain Dew. If I can tackle this feat, I'm guessing we could save around $50 per month.

Getting my two year old potty trained would be such a blessing financially. Right now, I have two in diapers and the cost, as a lot of you know, is outrageous. For sanitary reasons, I won't go the cloth route. I know so many people use cloth and are very successful but I'm a former cloth diaper user and I sucked at it. That was back when I only had 3 kids, I can't imagine the mess I'd make now. I lack the organization it takes to keep the diapers properly washed, etc so we won't even go there. It's an ugly, gross memory that I'd rather forget ;)


Since the weather is getting nice in my area, I'm going to have a yard sale and perhaps also set up at a local flea market once a month or so. We always have things lying around that we don't use so why not make a little extra cash from them? I may sell higher end items on eBay because I've learned from past experience, a global marketplace can be the way to go when selling pricier items. I can reach far more people than a yard sale or flea market would and make more money even after I deduct the fees.

I'm planning to get in touch with my creative side again and start selling on Etsy. I used to be an avid crafter and I did pretty well in a few shows. I'm sure I can come up with something to generate a few extra dollars. I'll be brainstorming over the next several weeks until I come up with a few good ideas. It has to be something original and something of quality. I'll keep you updated and welcome any suggestions.

I'm an expeditor for a company called ChaCha. It's a text search company that finds information for it's users and sends it back to their cell phones. When traffic is good, I can make around $20 in a few hours. It's great to do in the evenings after the kids have settled down for the night.

I started writing for eHow last month and I'm hoping in time, it will boost our savings even by a minimal amount. So far I only 17 articles and have made a little over a dollar but I'll keep adding articles and see what happens. I'm wanting to add around 30 articles a month, more if possible.

You may be saying, "Why not get a part-time job?" but I don't think that's feasible for me right now. I'd have to pay for a babysitter, use gasoline to get to and from work, purchase work clothing.. the expenses would cut so far into the extra income it wouldn't be of much benefit. I've been down that road before and it wasn't pretty. Perhaps when all the kids are in school I'll give it another go.

So there you have it, a few things I'm planning to do to make baby steps towards saving. If you have any other ideas or suggestions, please, please feel free to share!