Guest Posts

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Facebook is a funny thing, isn’t it? I recently heard about this great local blog called $20 Dollar Date Nights by a blogger named Christy. I then realized via Facebook Christy is actually married to a friend of mine I’d gone to high school with! (And we went to a very small high school, too.) Talk about a small world! I was intrigued by Christy’s blog and concept and ask if she’d share more with the Coupon Project readers. Here’s her post!

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A year ago, I commented to my husband that we never got a chance to go out. “It costs too much,” he said. “If we could afford it, I would take you out more often – believe me!” He said. And then, one day when we were reviewing our bills, I got creative and suggested we try to squeeze in a date for a small amount of money that our budget could handle. And that is how $20 Dollar Date Night was born.

For the past seven months, we have consistently planned a date every week, and (except for a few minor slip-ups) managed to keep it at or slightly above $20. The crazy thing? It really isn’t that hard; although friends of ours in the restaurant  business didn’t believe us until we proved it to them. And even the reporter from Seattle’s KOMO 4 News was skeptical…so we brought her on a date with us – and she was impressed. That story was recently featured on a special segment of the KOMO 4 Evening News, which you can watch on the blog.

The most exciting thing about our journey is the feedback we get from couples of all ages and stages in their lives. Married couples who haven’t gone out for years tell us they are going to start dating again. Empty nesters are saying they are excited to know that there are affordable options for local dates out there. Recently, a friend commented to me: “You know, you have a really good point about dressing up to go on date night. You’re right! It’s good to dress up!”

When people tell us they saw us on TV or the radio, it’s so fun to hear the excitement in their voices. They’re excited, because our story helps them believe they can have fun in their relationships again, too. The icing on the cake is that they now have a variety of options for their own budget-friendly date nights. Who wouldn’t be excited about that?

Our biggest secret is keeping it simple and planning ahead. We use the Date Night Jar to pick where we’ll go each week – and we trade off so each of us gets to choose where we’ll go and what the date night will consist of.

Recently, we celebrated our anniversary in Seattle, and found all kinds of great places to spend quality time together, while keeping the costs within a shoestring budget.

As a Freelance Writer and Seattle area resident, I’m always looking for fun places to go and things to explore. The opportunities are endless. It’s exciting to see $20 Dollar Date Night gaining such a following. In our current world, marriages and relationships need regular extra boosts for many reasons, including the current economy. For many, resources like $20 Dollar Date Night are a breath of fresh air.

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Please do check out Christy’s blog, $20 Dollar Date Night for lots of great frugal date night ideas and tips. You can also follow $20 Dollar Date Night via  Twitter and Facebook! Congrats, Christy, on all your success and inspiring others to get back out and dating! 

Does anyone have a great frugal date idea to share?

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This morning, I received a lovely guest post in my inbox from Kerri at The Cunning Couponer. For those of you that don’t know, we’ve been house-bound in my neck of the woods due to a heavy snowfall and subsequent ice storm that hit the Seattle/Tacoma region this week. Given that, I found Kerri’s post completely appropriate and wanted to share it with you today.

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With the recent snow we’ve experienced here in Washington, I’ve had some time on my hands to reflect a little on snow, coupons, family and life in general.  Here are ten things I’ve learned while being trapped in my house by snow.

Stockpiles are good things.  I am writing this on day five of being snowed in.  I haven’t been to the store now in a couple of weeks and yet we’ve had plenty to eat.  Good stuff, too.  Turkey noodle soup.  Spaghetti with homemade sauce. Chili.  My nice little stockpile of coupon items I have going on in my pantry has served us well.  Other than having to ration milk among my five thirsty children by the time we got to day five, we have fared quite well.

Hummingbirds can live in Washington in the winter.  Really, I had no idea.  How I’ve never seen one this time of year before I don’t know, but we have a few little guys (or gals) we’ve been keeping alive the last few days.  Weve been following the advice from the Seattle Audubon Society and have been having a great time taking care of our little visitors.

Fireplaces are necessary.  The last time we had a big snow we didnt have a fireplace. We also lost our power. Nothing dampens the thrill of snowball throwing and sledding like coming into a frigid house with no means of warming up.  After the adoption of our fifth daughter we decided to add onto our house and put in a fireplace when we did.  This year the kids can sled to their hearts content and actually get warm afterwards even when we lose power.

Free hot chocolate does taste better.  I have drunk more hot chocolate in the last five days than I have in the last year.  I still have a little stash of free Swiss Miss from a killer sale at Albertsons.  I can easily dole out hot cocoa to all the neighborhood kids without breaking the bank.  And, yes, it does taste better when it’s free!

You can get beaten in Scrabble by your nine-year old daughter.  Even when you were an English Lit major in college.  And when you have a Masters in Librarianship.  And when you consider yourself an avid reader.  Very, very humbling but it’s true.

Long walks in the snowy woods are just this side of heaven.  Seriously, putting a leash on my dog and taking off on a long, quiet walk on a snowy path through the woods is my idea of a fabulous time.  If it wasn’t for the guilt I feel every time I think of my husband glued to the kitchen table playing endless rounds of Monopoly with our five kids while I enjoy total peace, I would probably just keep on walking all day.

There really is nothing on TV.  Although we own a television, its only used to play dvds from the library. There are always too many clothes to fold, dishes to wash and books to read.  Not to mention coupons to clip.  With the way snow slows everything down, though, one night we turned on the television just out of boredom.  I quickly realized I haven’t been missing anything.  Real life really is better.  Well, maybe not the laundry and dishes, but the rest of it.

Snow days are not fashionable days.  Forget the images youve seen in Lands End or Mini Boden catalogs.  In their crazy assortment of hand-me-down snow clothes my children look more like clown escapees from the circus than cute snow bunnies.  But, living in western Washington, there is no way I’m forking over money for snow clothes that may or may not get used over the course of a normally rainy winter.  Unless I have a great coupon.

It’s nice if you really like your husband.  If I were a premarital counselor, Id forget the usual questions about family background and financial views.  The pivotal question I would ask an engaged couple would be:  Could you be trapped in a house with this person for five days with five children and still like them by day six?  Fortunately for me, I hit the jackpot.  On the evening of day five my husband is still making me laugh.

And, finally…  Snow is the new coupon.  Forget coupons.  If you really want to save money just get thirteen inches of snow without owning a four-wheel drive.  It’s even better if, like me, you live on a steep and treacherous hill with several drop-offs that even the thought of driving down terrifies.  Rumors of great deals on Old Navy clearance?  Your favorite items on sale for a limited time at Bath and Body Works?  I’ve learned you save lots and lots of money if you cant get to the sales!  Now, if the snow would just knock out my internet I’d be on my way to saving some serious money.   Luckily for me, when the snow melts away I can go back to saving money the easy way… clipping coupons.  I’ll take organizing my coupon binder any day over putting on chains.

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Kerri Cunningham lives on beautiful Camano Island, Washington where she stays busy raising her five children, clipping coupons, enjoying the rain and lamenting the fact that the nearest Albertsons is forty-five minutes away.  She blogs for fun at The Cunning Couponer.

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My blogging bud Maegen from Sounds Fun Mom is at it again with another fabulous guest post today on understanding the pros and cons of a CSA membership. Since so many of you are looking to save on produce, I thought her post was very timely. Enjoy!

Is there anything that doesn’t change when you become a parent? In my single days a typical dinner might have been cold cereal and a diet soda. I definitely wasn’t spending a lot of time thinking about what I was eating, and I was spending even less thinking about where it came from.

Once our boys arrived, though, I got a lot more interested, especially with more and more information about the potential hazards of hormones in milk, and chemicals in veggies, and on and on. Watching those chubby fingers smooshing banana, I realized that I really wanted to make better choices for all of us.

Full disclosure: We’re not a strictly organic family (in fact, we’re not strictly anything). My kids eat their share of Happy Meals and potato chips, not to mention sugary treats that the universe just seems to send them no matter what I do. We are, however, eating more organic fruits and veggies than ever before. The easiest way I’ve found to introduce more good stuff into our diets, and save money while doing it, has been by joining the CSA at a local farm, Terry’s Berries.

CSA stands for community supported agriculture. Basically, the idea is that members pay a certain amount at the beginning of the season and then pick up their share of veggies and fruits once a week. At Terry’s, it’s all organic, and most of it comes right out of their fields. Other items, like eggs and bread, are also available as an add-on, though the egg shares seem to sell out faster than the chickens can work.

Our share has introduced us to veggies we would never have tried otherwise, from kohlrabi to kale. My boys also love feeding Terry’s chickens, playing with the old Tonka toys in the dirt, and roaming the fields to see what’s growing. My husband and I like being a small part of helping preserve one of the last big chunks of farm land in the area.

The picture above is our weekly share.  Our share is the sample size,  which is a little more than half of the amount in the full share. We paid three installments of 127.00 for 21 weeks of produce. It works out to be about 18.00 a week for items that would cost me at least 30.00 at Fred Meyer. I do usually buy some extra fruit, but we find that it’s plenty of veggies for our family of 4. Bigger families (or bigger eaters) would want the full share.

Despite all the benefits of share membership, I’m the first to say that a CSA isn’t for everyone.  Here are some questions to ask yourself before you sign up.

• How important is it that your food be organic? If you try to choose organic produce all the time, I think a share is a great value. If you are o.k. with a mix of organic and conventional choices, the savings would be much less for you.
• Do you eat your veggies? If your kids wail at any veggie that isn’t carrots and dip, a CSA is probably not the best choice for you. Because you’re eating locally, you’re also eating seasonally. Around here that may mean a lot of unfamiliar leafy greens in the spring and big root vegetables in the fall. While our share has encouraged us to be more adventurous cooks and eaters, there are still some things that have done the walk of shame to the compost bin.
• How much time do you have? Some CSA farms have central pick-up areas, but many require you to go to the farm and weigh and select your items. If your day is already swamped, it may be worth the extra money to sign up for a delivery service instead, or just get your produce at the grocery store with the rest of your items.
• Can you afford to pay up front? Again, each farm has its own policies, but most will ask that you put down a sizable chunk of money in advance. If you don’t have room in your budget for this, you may be better off shopping your favorite organic vendor weekly.
• Do you have other options? If you have a sizable garden, like Angela’s, or you can frequent your farmer’s market, or even barter with the neighbors, a CSA may be an expense you can do without.
• What is your mess tolerance? This will sound funny, but there are some ways in which joining a CSA is as much a lifestyle choice as a shopping one. My boys come home from our weekly trips dusty in the summer and muddy in the fall and spring. The vegetables are much tidier, but they do require some prep, too. This just isn’t for everyone.

If you think you’d like to give it a try, you can find a CSA near you at localharvest.org by searching by zip code. If you’re not sure how well it will work for your family, considering finding a friend or family member who would go in with you and share your share!

If you’re a local, and you’d like to try Terry’s Berries, there are still some spots available in the summer share, and they’ll prorate the cost.

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Maegen Blue writes about events and activities for families in the South Puget Sound atSoundsFunMom.com.  She likes to keep her eating and her fun local. She lives with her husband and boys in Puyallup.

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