Frugality

For the past month or so my usual breakfast has been a couple of scrambled eggs. I’ve been able to get eggs on sale for $1 a dozen. That comes out to 8.33 cents per egg. Missouri charges sales tax on food so I figure my two egg costs about 18 cents. It might be another penny or two when you add in the cost of cooking spray, but it is still going to be less than two bits for breakfast.

A two egg breakfast is only about 160 calories which isn’t much for a meal so the calories need to be made up later. I’ve found that two eggs is a satisfying breakfast for me and three eggs seems to be too much. I could add a banana or orange for around a dime more to add some calories to the meal and make it a little more nutritious. I often take a piece of fruit to work and have it as a snack later in the morning. It works for me.

Back when I kept my food budget under $100, before I started indulging my penchant for junk food/fast food too often, people would wonder how I did it. Some would even say it wasn’t possible. There are a lot of cheap breakfasts and other cheap meals that are possible if you do a little research. The meals don’t have to be unhealthy just because they are cheap. How healthy having two eggs for breakfast is, is debatable, but that breakfast is still better than the fast food/junk food I normally eat.

Since I’ve started working my full-time job in addition to my part-time job I have been indulging in fast food way too often. I’m tired after work and it seems so much easier just to have some fast food, plus I tell myself I deserve it for all the hours I’m working. For the month of February I’m going to cut way back on my fast food/junk food purchases. My goal is to cut the amount I spend on junk food/fast food in half. I’m not going to worry about the cost of my healthier food, but I expect I will lower my overall food bill.

I was pleasantly surprised to find out that my electric bill for December was only $14.74. My actual energy charge was only $4.87, the rest of the bill was for the customer charge and taxes. This is why I didn’t want an apartment with natural gas heat. The gas company charges a $25 customer charge before you even use any gas. Electric heat ends up being much cheaper for me.

I used 66 kwh of electricity. The average household in Missouri uses 1,112 kwh of energy in a month. Since I am a single person and have a studio apartment rather than an average size household and house it makes sense that I would have a lower electric bill. There are several ways I save on electricity by living in a studio apartment. My hot water comes from a central boiler which allows me to take 15 minute hot showers without running up my electric bill. Another advantage I have for using less electricity is that I don’t have a washer/dryer. The biggest savings came from the fact that I didn’t use my heat at all. My apartment just seems to naturally stay warm. I guess that is from having a third story apartment with south facing windows. This could be a big disadvantage when it starts getting warmer.

There are some things I do to save electricity. I think they are all pretty well known electricity saving tips. I keep the microwave unplugged when I’m not using it. I use a fluorescent lamp rather than the overhead light in my bedroom. In the bathroom I use just one light bulb and keep the others unscrewed since one bulb provides plenty of light. Sometimes I shower in the dark. I don’t have a TV, I use my laptop for watching movies and other entertainment. I use sunlight for illumination during the day.

Even with all of that I’m surprised my electric bill was so low. I would have thought the refrigerator would have used that much electricity by itself. If the electric bill was a mistake I’ll find out next month. If not, I think I have my electricity costs about as low as they can go.

Using a safety razor allows me to keep my shaving costs low yet get an excellent shave. I have extremely sensitive skin and even using a high quality razor, shaving gel, and shaving in the shower my skin is very irritated from shaving. On a post about saving money on shaving at another blog a couple of commenters recommended using shaving oil and mentioned that it lessened the irritation of their skin and left their face feeling soft. Based on that recommendation I decided to give it a try.

The cost of shaving oil is much more than shaving foam but I figured if it worked like the commenters said it would be worth the extra money. I don’t always choose the lowest cost option. I found a somewhat reasonably priced shaving oil that also had positive reviews and bought it. The price was still a little more than I would have liked, but I had lots of Amazon credit from Swagbucks so it didn’t cost me anything out of pocket.

I have been pleased with the performance of the shaving oil. My skin is less irritated after shaving and feels much softer. I initially used the shaving oil with shaving soap but when I ran out of soap I just used the oil and it worked fine by itself.

Even though I am happy with the shaving oil, I don’t like that it costs so much more than shaving foam,gel,or soap. Looking at my bottle of shaving oil I saw that it was made from a blend of olive oil, peppermint oil, sandalwood oil, and other oils. That made me think I could make my own shaving oil. A quick internet search revealed that plenty of people do make their own shaving oil. You just need the base oil, which for me is olive oil, and a few drops of essential oil.

What I have done is just add olive oil to the remaining oil in my shaving oil container. I will eventually need to get some essential oils but since you only need a few drops per ounce of the base oil it shouldn’t raise the cost of my shaving oil much. My cost of shaving was already very cheap and now it is even cheaper.

Cutting the grocery bill is one of the easiest ways for most families to save money. The typical American family spends about $6,000 a year on groceries. If they could cut that bill in half they would have an extra $3000 to save or spend elsewhere. Saving money on groceries does not need to take a lot of time or mean sacrificing all of your favorite foods.

One of the simplest ways to save money on groceries is to stop wasting food. Approximately 12% of food bought for the home is wasted. If your family wastes an average amount of food then you could cut your grocery bill by 10% or more without even changing what foods you buy. One way to reduce food waste is to plan out your meals so you only buy groceries that you will use in your meal plan. If you take leftovers for lunch you can save money two ways. One, by not wasting the leftover food and two, by not having to buy lunch. If you get tired of leftovers then you can figure out a way to incorporate your leftovers into a new meal.

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