Retrenchment

It's been said that the best way to get rich is to take a dollar, fold it in half, and stick in back in one's pocket. I'm not quite that good, but in the recent weeks I've begun a financial retrenchment effort and discovered a small portion of benefits.

My brother helped me set up an Excel spread sheet to track loan repayments and my budget. I got a little notebook to use as a ledger (those from the banks are just too intense) then entered my expenses (condensed by category) into the spreadsheet. 

I'm trying to save a bit more and also build up some food storage. My brother, again, pointed out that -- if worse came to worse -- you could get a lot of meals out of Cream-of-Wheat and the boxes don't take up too much room. Also, it is something I enjoy anyway. 

Yesterday I went shopping and only bought the things on my list. I'd noticed, via my little ledger, that I normally purchase a lot of small, unnecessary items. But yesterday I felt very in-control when I only bought that which was needful and suppressed momentary satisfactions. 

I noticed more the free things of life. I went to the local public library and got a free copy (valued at $7.99) of To Kill a Mockingbird, in addition to the books I checked out. It's a public service called The Big Read. At the mall, we went to See's Candy, walked around a bit and eventually got a free sample. Then we walked out. Cost: $0. 

There are lot of ways to get free stuff.

I emailed a local theatre and got free tickets. 

The Silver Jewelry Club just wants people to try the stuff so they give it away (but you do have to pay shipping). Find it here.

Couponmom.com offers free coupons -- or coupons for the price of printing. 

I am a member of paperbackswap.com and get free books. I list books I don't want anymore and pay to ship them to someone who wants them. Then I get a credit for a book I want and someone else with pay to ship it to me. They also have a DVD swap. 

There are lots of ways get stuff for free or nearly free. My mom always told me to ask -- the worst that can happen is they say no. How have you retrenched?