What does being Frugal mean to you???? I would say I am frugal, but that doesn’t mean my family lives on ramen or is deprived. Frugal living to me means that our family still dines at nice restaurants on special occassionals – often with a coupon or a special offer. Definitely we budget for our meals out. It also means that we watch most movies we want to by waiting to use the discount tickets from my work to actually see the movie in the theatre, (about 3 times a year), or we simply wait for the video rental.
My three kids dress in fashionable, name brand clothes! Usually purchased secondhand or from clearance racks at favorite stores, must be marked down twice before I will buy it! I will say one thing if you have more than one child to clothe, name brand is the way to go. It tends to be better quality and can make it through more than one child still looking pretty good. Another great store for teen clothes is Plato’s Closet a teen consignment store. For my little one I go to Once Upon a Child and garage sales. I hate to shop as anyone that knows me will attest to, but for my children I have to stop in the consignment places off and on to stock up, etc. It is well worth the time spent looking!
And finally we don’t eat ramen…..sometimes we do….the kids like it! But we eat high-quality, delicious foods at home. Our meals are lovingly prepared from a predetermined menu from sale items at the grocery store.
Frugal living to us means going to the library every week for books, CD’s, movies and Magazines. I do buy some books, but only for my bookgroup since I might like to mark in it.
Also living frugal means living within your means and using a budget. Frugal living means saving up for purchases vs. impulse buying……
Being Frugal to me means not eating out more than once a month, it means not making mini trips to the grocery store for “extras” throughout the week, it means using everything we have in the house to its bitter end before buying more…. recycling clothes between kids…….using the library… and generally living within our means… but it doesnt mean we always do that…. in fact we have a hard time with the living within our means…. sigh
I think it means living within your means. It’s funny because that use to be a given and being frugal was considered someone that really pinched a penny or even someone that was cheap. Now there are so many people that are out of control that just living within your means and having a budget is looked at as frugal. I also think for most people you have to be frugal to live within your means. Most of us can’t afford to live lavishly.
My dh & I talk about what ‘frugal’ means often. And we agree with your definition! Dh & I were also just talking today about today’s kids’ emphasis on ‘stuff’ (Mom,I “need” a $200 mp3 player/PSP/XBox/tanningsalonsubscription/cellphone, etc.), and most of ’em have them. Are their parents ‘richer’ than the rest of us? Maybe a few are, but probably most are living paycheck to paycheck, on credit.
My parents made a bad credit mistake when I was a kid, and they suffered a lot because of it–and they taught US alot because of it–dh & I are determined to learn from their mistake and live within our means.
I knew I liked you, Ostara
thats just living careful and smart lol
I still don’t know what frugal means to me. We have a budget that we stick with, but we have included out-to-eat meals in it. I buy a lot of books and magazines off the stands but I still frequent the library. I don’t buy groceries strictly based on sales ads because I just don’t have the patience for that. I don’t have a lot of patience to find deals, lol. Bargain shopping just wears me out. But, when it comes to ordering things online I prefer to use discount codes, purchase items that are only on sale (doesn’t matter what the percentage as long as it’s just not full price) and I will bargain shop between stores, as in seeing which has the item for a lower price.
Being frugal to me is living within your means. We usually make all of our meals at home. We also buy in bulk (toilet paper, paper towels, soap, etc.)