Tightwad versus pink

I was the lucky recipient of a Hobby Lobby (HL) gift card at Christmas. I also noted that HL began selling online as of January 1st. This gave me the opportunity to check out whether they had something I've been wanting to add to my stitching tools.

Those stitched floss tags are cute and I'd like to stitch one. (I don't use floss tag rings; I store my WIP floss in a Darice box.) Still, I'd like to stitch a floss tag. You need some way of installing an eyelet on your floss tag if you are actually going to use it on a floss tag ring. (I plan to string ribbon through the eyelet and hang the floss tag as an ornament.) Anyway, I'd read about the Crop-A-Dile, a tool that installs eyelets and snaps used by scrapbookers.

HL carries them, but only in pink. I hate pink. Did I mention that it's also a 40% off coupon week at HL? I hate pink. I looked around on the Internet for a lower-than-40%-off price. No joy. But I did find that the Crop-A-Dile is also available in a nice green color. But not at HL. I hate pink.

If I ordered the green Crop-A-Dile off the Internet, I'd have to spend ten more dollars plus the value of my HL gift card. My inner tightwad beat up my inner pink hater. My new tool and case, complete with 400 assorted eyelets, cost me $1.56 after using the gift card. A tightwad triumph!

But I still hate pink!

Uncle Sam...

...is a pain. I spent the day doing our taxes. Yippee. No, I didn't wait until the last minute. We always have to pay, so I see no reason to give Uncle Sam my money until I absolutely have to.

Some of y'all are gasping in horror at this. I know how you look forward to getting your tax return each year. Well, I'd rather have the money in MY account making ME interest than letting Uncle Sam have it and use and abuse it all year without paying me interest on it. I'm a tightwad. That's a basic tightwad principle - my money should work for me, not Uncle Sam.

Last year I even put a calculator to it and figured out the I made $12.32 in interest by owing on my taxes instead of getting a refund. Not alot, but I STILL MADE MONEY.

I do our monthly budget on MS Excel and I also spent time today setting it up to keep track of the state sales tax we pay as I found out recently that it is deductible in the state of Texas. Others of y'all are now gasping in horror. "What?! Keep up with all that? No way!!"

Another tightwad principle - keep track of EVERYTHING you spend down to the penny. DH and I keep every receipt for everything we buy and I enter into my monthly budget spread sheet. No, it doesn't take a lot of time. I'm at my computer everyday, so it takes very little time to enter in a receipt or two each day. Then at the end of the month, I check everything against our credit card and bank statements. So now I enter sales tax, too, and let Excel keep up with it.

And now, in celebration of having the taxes done, I think I shall hie myself off to stitch.

Saying goodbye to an old friend

Soon after DH and I got married, we bought a new 1988 Chevy step-side pickup truck. We were young and dumb and bought it on credit. It lasted us over 20 years. It had 227,000+ miles on it, burned and used a quart of oil every few days, clunked, rattled, had two black eyes, and it still ran. But not reliably.

So this summer, right in the middle of all our moving/remodeling frenzy, DH decided we REALLY needed to replace it when it started getting REALLY unreliable. Being repeatedly stranded by the side of an asphalt farm road in the middle of nowhere in the 100+ degree summer heat was not appealing to either of us. As we didn't yet have enough money saved up for a new truck, we bought a used one with the money we had at that point. And we paid someone to find it for us.

And before someone gets on the "ya gotta save gas and the planet" bandwagon, let me point out a few things. If you do remodeling, or own property with trees, or hunt a lot, you need a truck. You can't haul logs or brush to the dump in a VW Jetta, and you can't get a full sheet of sheetrock or a 50-gallon ice chest in one either (not to mention all the stuff a hunter seems to need to go on a hunting trip; it will fill the back of a pickup truck!). But I digress...

DH has a friend who used to own a car dealership. He still has access to all the dealer databases, so we hired him to find us a truck. We told him how much we wanted to spend, brand preferences, mileage wanted, etc. He found us one in about 10 days and then went and picked it up for us (it was in Texarkana, Texas). Best money we've spent in a while as DH really didn't have time to do all the legwork involved in looking for a used vehicle. That old time versus money equation again - our time remodeling was worth more to us than the money we paid DH's friend.

So now we have a new-to-us truck that is reliable and I had to say goodbye to Old Faithful, my dear old truck (painted Aggie Maroon, no less!) of 20+ years. By the way, the new truck is MINE. The truck is always MINE. DH gets the car; he likes cars better than trucks. Silly man.

They just don't get it!

Recently, DH and his coworkers were discussing what everyone did over the weekend. DH reported that we had gone out and bought a refrigerator. One coworker commented, "Wow. I didn't think you tightwads ever spent money on things like that!"

*Mental sarcastic voice: Yeah! We have a magic frozen hole in the backyard where we keep our perishable food items fresh. Who needs a refrigerator?

The coworker just doesn't get it. Yes, DH and I are tightwads; we work hard at it. We are constantly improving and adding to our knowledge and use of tightwaddery. Tightwads DO spend money. We just spend it carefully and to our best advantage.

Because we are tightwads, we are financially able to do most of the things that we want to do. We have no debt other than a home mortgage, and we'll pay that off early. We buy nothing on credit. We are able to handle financial emergencies (like a dying refrigerator or car repairs). We have savings. When an old one wears out, we pay cash for new cars. I could go on and on about what tightwadding does for us.

Tightwadding is a discipline that gives us great financial freedom. Our money works for us, not the other way around.

Another tightwad triumph!

For over a year now, DH and I have known that our 17+ year old refrigerator is on its last legs. It makes a clunking and grinding noise when the compressor comes on. It has too cold spots inside and the vegetable drawers are always too cold and dry. The door seal is going. The ice maker died last year.

Last week, I spent several hours on the Internet researching refrigerator features and prices. I made a list of our top three models based on the features and prices from my research. Yesterday, DH thought it might be a good idea for us to hit appliance stores and check out local models and prices.

On a whim, we stopped by Best Buy. In the past, we have never found a bargain or an appliance there that we liked. But today, they had a clearance on floor models. We found the second model on our list at $200.00 off! And the optional ice maker was on clearance also! Another tightwad triumph!

Tightwaddery and framing

My local Hobby Lobby sells off their "orphan" frames twice a year. These are custom frames that were refused by a customer or slightly damaged. When they hit 80-90% off, I buy the ones I think I'll use - the bigger, the better.

The bigger the frame, the more linear feet I can get out of it. Once, I drove home with three door-sized frames in the back of Old Faithful (my '88 Chevy pickup with 223,000+ miles on it). I spent $37.00 and ended up with about 54 linear feet.

DH cuts them down to the correct size for me. Last year, I spent a total of $100.00 and ended up with 250 linear feet of frame . If I had paid full price, it would have cost me $1200.00. Another tightwad triumph!

Now, some of you are saying, "My DH is not at all handy, nor does he work with power saws." Be aware that many frame shops (not places like Hobby Lobby or Michael's who do not have the tools to cut frame stock on location) are happy to cut down a frame for you for a nominal fee. I was tipped off about this service and about Hobby Lobby's orphan frame clearance by the guy who owns the frame shop that cuts glass and mats for me.

DH has been busy

My DH spent the afternoon making four frames for me. He enjoys woodworking and is very gleeful when he gets to use his compound miter saw (with laser guide). Stay tuned for pictures as I get the projects stretched, mounted and framed during the coming week. I have Pippi and Beau to frame, along with a deer project for my deer-hunting DH. The fourth frame is for the JBW Dog that I am currently stitching. Look for a picture on Monday. After going into apoplectic sticker shock at frame shops, I taught myself how to frame my work. I read up on it on the Internet and in the library, and talked to professional framers. It's not as hard as it looks, it's just tedious, especially if you're a perfectionist like I am. I still have a local frame shop cut my glass and mats (if I use mats), but I do all the rest myself. I bought the proper tools for framing online. Believe me, having the right tools really helps and makes the job easier.

A Tightwad Triumph

I'm a card-carrying tightwad. I do things like make and follow a budget, use a price book, pantry shop, and other strategies basic to tightwadding. So when I find a great bargain in an unexpected place, I just have to tell someone about it. I've been looking to buy a couple more of those 8" x 8" Pyrex dishes. DH and I hate cooking on Sunday night, so I've been making a casserole during the week and freezing half of it for Sunday. I have two of these dishes already, but wanted two more so I could stockpile the freezer, and/or make two different casseroles at one time. My Wal-Mart quit carrying Pyrex, and I'm not big on Anchor Hocking. Target has the dish for $6.49. The Kroger near me had it for $6.99. I last bought one at Wal-Mart for $3.79. So today when I was in Kroger, I happened to go down the "Target and Wal-Mart wannabee housewares aisle." Normally, I avoid this aisle as it makes my trip through the store longer and I don't buy housewares at my grocery store. But lo and behold, Kroger had my Pyrex dish on sale (with my Kroger Plus Card) for $3.49! So I bought two of them. A tightwad triumph!!