We are so grateful to everyone for participating in our very first Frugal Friday give-away. I hope you’ve taken the time to read through all of the amazing tips that your fellow Going Beyond readers posted. They are very thought provoking and challenging. More than once, my eyebrows were raised in surprise at how simple, yet strategic, instituting some of these things would be. Now, I’ve got an artillery full of financial weapons-new websites and videos (Thanks Robert) to encourage frugal living.
We loved being challenged by Rebecca to ask ourselves, “Is this what I need?” when walking up and down grocery aisles, and Rachel told us simply to shop smart. Lyndsey challenged us to plan our meals for the week and Jules taught us that it is ok to tell our children, “No”! (Amen Sister!)
Then there was Melissa who suggested we buy our meat in bulk from a local farmer (I shouldn’t have a problem with that here in Texas) while Zoanna saves pennies by saving wrapping paper and bows from one Christmas to another. Terri and Tiffanie, thanks for helping us make Christmas meaningful for our kids. Emily reminded us that contentment is the key. And don’t forget, DeborahC who told us that we could save on gas and groceries if we just shopped with a friend or family member, bought in bulk and divided it up evenly.
And of course, several of you reminded us of something that our culture would rather us forget – God loves a cheerful giver and we will always reap a vast harvest when we choose to sow seeds.
O my, I could go on. All of you submitted wonderful tips. Suffice it to say, you’ve got to look at the list for yourself. But I know what you really want to know is -WHO WON! Well, you’ve gotta know, it was so hard for us to decide but we finally settled on…Heather at Quiet Place of Rest. From making things to give, shopping year round for Christmas gifts, using coupons and shopping local suppliers for things like beef and eggs, she had a well-rounded list of tips that seem do-able and practical. Congratulations, Heather! And thank you so much for participating! Please email us at info@goingbeyond.com so that we can get your prizes to you asap.
Now, for the record, we’ve decided to change things for choosing our next winners. From this point on we’ll be drawing the name of our winner from the pool of those who post a tip. (Can you tell that we are chickening out? This was waaaay harder than we thought it would be!) So, I hope you will join us next week. We’ll be blogging about interesting things every day, and will have another Frugal Friday at the end of the week. We’ll be looking for more tips like the ones this week, and sharing practical principles that can make a difference. It will be another opportunity to learn from each other and give away another round of fab Dave Ramsey resources.
Until then, live frugrally-live well.
Priscilla PS. . .We couldn’t help but give a humongous viritual standing ovation to Jolanthe and Melinda M for paying off HUGE sums of debt. You go girls! There ain’t nothing like debt free living!
