The Mom Crowd

Happy Earth Day! In honor of Earth Day I have composed a few easy things you can do to contribute to helping the earth be a little safer for our kids.

1. Next time you go to the store try buying Tide for Cold Water. Using cold water on all laundry uses less energy–thus reducing your carbon footprint. It will also save you about $65 per year on your electric bill.

2. Reuse those baby food jars! They can be used to:

• transition toddlers and preschoolers to a big girl/boy glass at the dinner table

• serve ice cream, pudding, or mouse in them for great kiddie sized portions

• organize your “junk drawer” for things like rubber bands, thumb tacks, paper clips, small watch/toy batteries, stamps

• put paints in for your budding artist to dip their paintbrush into

• catch bugs in

3. Break out those cloth napkins that you registered for at your wedding! I don’t know about you but I registered for cloth napkins and I never used them. We just went through our LAST pack of paper napkins and we are now using cloth ones. Buying or using cloth napkins reduces the use of energy and resources to make the paper napkins. You can also reuse old dishcloths and make them into cloth napkins. If you want to get creative you can assign each person in your family a colored napkin. You could also have napkin holders with each persons name on it. When the napkins get yucky enough you can throw them in the wash. They don’t have to be washed after every use!

4. Consider purchasing a reusable water bottle for every member in the family. 38 billion water bottles are put into landfills every year! A reusable water bottle will help decrease that amount. Sigg and Kleen Kanteens are great choices that are environmentally friendly and recycleable! They also make them in great kiddie sizes.

5. Turn your heat/ac up/down 1 degree. One degree won’t be that noticable and it will also reduce your energy bills and carbon footprint!

6. Arrange a Toy Swap with your other mommy friends. Toy Swaps help rid your house of clutter toys your kids have lost interest in and provide “new” toys for the kiddos to play with. It doesn’t necessarily cut down on toy clutter but it does help reduce waste from buying new toys. With 3 kids I have toys coming out of my ears. Sometimes the plastic toys make me feel like I’m going insane. I have a pile in the basement of toys that we have grown out of or have lost interest in and I am already planning on making a stop at good will or arranging a toy swap of my own!

I recently bought a book that just came out called Healthy Child, Healthy World: Creating A Cleaner, Greener, Safer Home. It is a book with tons of information about making your home nontoxic, recipes for air freshener, bubble bath and pet flea repellents, green gardening, how to avoid those scary toy recalls and how to choose safer art supplies, smart choices for remodeling your home and even a shopper’s guide for quality green products, brands, stores and websites. I haven’t read it all the way through but I have read most of it and have been impressed with the helpful information in the book. One thing I appreciate about the book is that each chapter covers the impacts of our choices on the environment. I know that the idea of being green and changing family patterns and habits can be overwhelming but the book emphasizes that any choice to go greener is a step in the right direction. I think it would be impossible to overhaul everything in our lives all at once. I know in our family we are taking one step at a time and it still feels like we are doing so little. I am trusting that my small contribution combined with others contributions will help make a big impact on making the world a better place for my kids and grandkids.

Being green is definitely becoming more popular and easy to do. What kinds of green things do you do?

In the past ten months my husband and I have both quit our regular day jobs. We know that it wouldn’t have been possible to pursue our dreams if our finances were out of control. About three years ago we were both were working full-time jobs making more than the national family average and we had nothing to show for it. Our net worth was negative. We decided to take charge of our finances and learn about money. Since then we have paid off more than $50,000 of debt. The biggest tool that got us under control was a budget. This post is not about how to make a budget, but simply the act of getting together and trying to set a budget for your family.

Around the first of each month my husband and I get together and have a family budget meeting. We discuss how we want to spend the money that we are going to earn that month. Famous financial guru Dave Ramsey, says that when you budget, you’re spending on paper, on purpose, before the month begins. We use a zero budget and give every dollar a name. We never have to wonder where all our money went, because we knew where it was going before the month even started.

Getting together monthly helps us to plan out our calendar and our finances accordingly. We look to see if there are any birthdays or holidays that we want buy gifts for. We always know when Christmas is coming, so we know we need to save for it. Looking at the calendar also helps us be on the same page with how we are going to spend our time.

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My husband and I try our best to use a cash envelope system to manage our grocery, dining, household, clothing, auto, and personal care budgets. When we use it, it works.

This week I had $120 in cash to spend - $40 to buy groceries to last us four days, $40 for a Costco trip, and $40 to buy some kids furniture that I wanted from Craigslist.

When I went to the grocery store I only took $40 in cash with me. Knowing that I could only spend that amount made me think about what we really needed and what could feed us for a couple of days. When I went through the check out line I was ready to overcome embarrassment and put a few items back if I was over budget. The total rang up to $34! It is such a good feeling to come in under budget. $40 for about 10 meals is do-able, but you have to fight the pizza temptation when you are faced with a mound of dishes to climb!

When I went into Costco I had $40 and a random $1.50 in cash in my purse. I had my list and my phone calculator ready. I really had to write down what each item cost and calculate the best buy for my money. It took extra time, but it was worth it. My total was $40.23. I am ashamed to admit that I spent forty bucks on paper products, only to be used and thrown away. At least the quantity will last us six months and the paper will biodegrade fast in the landfill.

I saw a table and set of 4 chairs on Craigslist that I had wanted to buy from Ikea. Buying the four chairs and table from Ikea new would have cost me $95 plus tax and gas. I bought the same items second hand and barely used for $40. Awesome.

Using self-control and taking some extra time to plan and calculate saved my family a lot of money this week.

Bonus Links:

Dave Ramsey on the Cash Envelope System
Suite101.com on the Envelope Budget System
Leave Your ATM Card at Home by Liz Pulliam Weston
How To Track an Envelope Budgeting System in Quicken
I Do Not Use Credit Cards by J.D. on GetRichSlowly.org