Mama Money Bags

I went into Lilly Pulitzer yesterday, primarily because I saw they were giving away Duck Donuts. Anyway, while walking around with my free donut, I spotted this visor. So pretty! And I love visors! But at $38, it's a little steep for this Cheap Mom. Then I saw that items in the Tennis Collection got a free towel (not that I need another towel...). My internal debate grew strong, but so did my resolve to not buy anything. See how they did that? Lure me in with the promise of free donuts, tempt me more with a free promo... Only when I looked up the special on my phone as I walked away, I saw they excluded the "less expensive" visor from the promo. Touche Lilly P! Touche! If you want to find out more money saving tips, check out  Mama Money Bags , my e-book on Amazon Kindle. It's just $2.99 and you'll learn so much about being frugal.

Rainy weekend. I spent a good chunk of it counting box tops. You know, those tiny little rectangles that come on products you buy--cereal, soup, baggies, even mac and cheese. They look like unless junk. But you know what? Those tiny rectangles added up to nearly $800 for my youngest daughter's school this year. Here's an example. Things I collected on my weekly walk around the neighborhood. I admit it: Mondays are my favorite days of the week for collecting these goodies. Looks like a bunch of garbage, right? Right there, my friends, is the equivalent of 65 cents! Yes, I know we're not talking about earth-shattering amounts of money, but when it comes to free money you find, maybe, just maybe, 65 cents really isn't too bad. Week after week, it really adds up. Plus, I contribute my own box tops, and my daughter's class is suddenly giving $65, even though we're the only ones who bothered collecting them. To quote a recent episode of my favorite sit...

One of the easiest ways to put more into your Mama Money Bags is to cut back up front. Less is more, after all. Here in my part of Pennsylvania, PECO supplies our electricity and gas for heat. They send these handy dandy charts every month to show you how you compare to your neighbors. Here's my most recent one, which says we are more energy efficient than our efficient neighbors. The thing is: our mid-century almost 3,000 sf house isn't efficient at all. I just do little things every day to save electricity. Exhibit A: my clothing rack. We have an electric dryer, but I usually hang and entire load to dry on this Ikea folding metal rack all year long. It's at least 10 years old, and yes, I do about a load of laundry every day, which isn't too surprising with a family of five. Other ways to save on energy: --Leave the overhead lights off. When I work (often from home typing on a laptop) I just use one small lamp with an LED light bulb. --Adjust your therm...

I went shopping the other day by myself. My favorite kind of shopping--when I head to the stores with multiple freebies and coupons. See all that stuff? Two Victoria's Secret undies ($10.50 each) and $5 facial mask, $2.99 card from Hallmark, $5.50 lotion $12.50 shower gel from Bath and Body Works. About $42 worth of items for--wanna take a guess? $1.06! How? You know when those cashiers ask you for your phone number or email at checkout? Well, you should be giving it to them! Then, months later after you haven't been a very good customer (because you are a Cheap Mom and didn't have any coupons) they send you really really good deals to get you to come back into the store. Gap just sent me $20 for FREE this way! I bought my youngest daughter two shirts, a pair of leggings, and a dress for less than $5. Anyway, for this latest shopping trip: --Victoria's Secret sent me a coupon for two free undies with any purchase, so I bought the facial mask (on sale fo...

Mama Money Bags is now live! Starting tomorrow, it will be on sale for just .99 cents--two days only--before going back up in price to $3.49. If you like  Mama Money Bags , please leave a review and follow my blog, Facebook page, or Twitter. I'm also dabbling in LinkedIn, Pinterest, and GoodReads. It's a whole new world of social media out there! To celebrate the new e-book, Marla Being Born  will also available for FREE on Sunday and Monday. Download it and enjoy! Entertainment without spending a cent--that's a great way to start filling your Mama Money Bags.

Mama Money Bags is just about ready; just putting the finishing touches on it! My sister Korren ( www.korrendesign.com ) designed the cover and I absolutely love it! So what goes into writing an e-book? Honestly, patience, stubbornness, and time. Now that I'm here, sitting with my second finished e-book, I keep wondering why I never tried to publish on my own before. I've come up with a few answers. First , and probably the biggest reason, is because this is the first time in 13 years that all of my kids are in school full-day; it's also the first time I am a part-time employee (70%) instead of a full-time one without kids around all day. I do miss them, but summer is coming soon. Second , my coworker (also an author of e-books) said to not start another project before you finish the first one. That single piece of advice helped me so much! I am always starting and stopping some project or another. Even though I have the beginning of my next book laid out in my hea...