Meet a Reader | Kelly from Seattle (and France)
Hello everyone! Today we're meeting Kelly, who I knew as a fellow blogger way back at the beginning of my blogging days. She's an American, but she lived in France for 12 years, which sounds quite lovely.
Here's Kelly:
1. Tell us a little about yourself
Hi, everyone! My name is Kelly, and I live in Seattle with my husband, three teenagers, three cats, and one dog.
We have lived here since 2012, when we moved from France, where my husband is from and where I lived for 12 years.
Once upon a time I used to blog at Almost Frugal, and that led to me becoming a digital marketing consultant, before beginning work first at one, then a second, “Big Tech Company You Have Definitely Heard Of”.
My husband teaches guitar; our oldest two kids are in college and our youngest is a high school sophomore.
We used this photo for our holiday cards in 2019 and it is still one of my favorite pictures of my kids. I have printed it out and it is my laptop background.
2. How long have you been reading The Frugal Girl?
I’m not sure; I blogged about frugality between 2007 and 2011 and am pretty sure I discovered you as part of the frugal living, money-saving blogosphere.
I have been reading long enough to remember posts where you mention all four kids living at home and being in younger grades like middle school, so it must have been a while!
3. How did you get interested in saving money?
I grew up with divorced parents who had very different attitudes towards spending money: my mother has always been good at getting by on a very limited income, and my father had the attitude of “you can’t take it with you, you might as well enjoy it”, which inevitably led to him carrying some level of debt.
When I moved to France, after graduating from college, I had to adjust to a much lower level of salary, although of course the level of daily expenses was also lower.
Then my husband and I started having kids, and he was on short-term contracts during that period; between being out on maternity leave, having a lower salary when working, and my husband being on unemployment, we really needed to stretch our euros.
I happened to start my blog at the end of 2007, which turned out to be a good time to write about frugality given the global economic downturn in the next few years, but my interest in saving money was first and foremost driven by necessity.
4. What's the "why" behind your money-saving efforts?
At this point, similar to your past Meet A Reader participant who earns a healthy salary, being frugal is no longer an economic necessity for me and my family, but a moral priority
I never expected to do this well in my career and I now make more money than my parents ever did. We live a comfortable life where I can easily support us.
Frugality for me is about priorities: being thoughtful about the resources we consume is important to me, as I describe below, and I am thankful (as is he) that my salary allows my husband to work a much lower-paying job that brings him much joy.
Additionally, being frugal means that we can help our kids in meaningful ways, that we can spend money on the things that are important to us like our pets, good food, nice vacations, and giving charitably to our synagogue, all without going into debt.
5. What's your best frugal win?
Buy Nothing! I am an admin of our local group, and I love the community that we have created.
In case readers aren’t familiar with the Buy Nothing project, it was started in the Pacific Northwest by a couple of neighbors who were looking for ways to create community; the mission is to Give Where You Live. I often describe it as the digital equivalent of running to your neighbor’s house to borrow a cup of sugar, as most of the activity happens within local Facebook groups or on the Buy Nothing app.
In addition to the friendships I have made, I’ve received furniture, dog food, people food, clothes, mattresses, and more. I’ve also given away lots of stuff; I love being able to share what we have with others without creating additional waste or landfill.
Sometimes I post something that I am sure no one will want, and there is someone who wants it! Other times, people will ask for things, and we are able to share.
One of my kids got a babysitting job through Buy Nothing; not only has he been working for that family for four years, but we’ve also built a relationship with them and have given, loaned, and borrowed things like suitcases, air mattresses, and toys back and forth.
As well as Buy Nothing, my other major frugal win is budget tracking.
I created an excel sheet budget tracker more than 15 years ago and track every penny going in and going out in a zero-based budget approach. I’ve taught this to my kids as well, although they haven’t yet 100% adopted it. It’s fascinating to look back on what we have spent year over year, or even 15 years ago!
6. What's a dumb money mistake you've made?
We have often carried too much credit card debt. Sometimes it was because we really couldn’t pay for something and used credit cards as an emergency fund, sometimes it was because we were enticed by “special offers”, or simply wanted to buy something but didn’t have the money in our account.
Now we put everything on one card but pay it off every month; the travel advantages we get are well worth it.
7. What's one thing you splurge on?
Food! We like to eat good food at home, and we really enjoy eating out too.
I think it is incredibly important to pay fair wages based on the true value of our food, to think about the human and animal cost of producing our food, and to eat locally.
I don’t necessarily look for organic options, but there is something wrong with the system that can produce a fast-food cheeseburger for a dollar. What kind of suffering was involved just so I could eat a burger for a buck?
We also prioritize travel. Not only is it important for us to see friends and family in different countries, but I also just love visiting new places with my family.
This year—and I have to admit that our level of travel was exceptionally high post-pandemic—some combination of family members went to the following places: Oakland, New York City, Washington DC, Grenoble, Paris, and London.
I am not really a frugal traveler—I think of myself as well past my hostel-staying days—but we do pay attention to certain things.
For example, using our credit card for daily expenses throughout the year (and paying it off) gives us a lot of points that we can use for plane tickets. I always try to find a hotel that has a free breakfast, or an in-room kitchen, because feeding teenagers can be expensive!
And I spend a lot of time before each trip planning out activities, including things like trying to understand the local public transportation system, both so that we don’t waste money on things like taxis, but also so that we have pre-identified places to eat near each activity, so that we don’t make bad, hunger-driven decisions.
I also load up my kindle with a bunch of library books before leaving home so that I always have something to do.
8. What's one thing you aren't remotely tempted to splurge on?
Clothes, furniture, or cars.
I intentionally buy all my clothes except for underthings secondhand, and most of my kids’ clothes as well (my husband doesn’t really buy clothes at all).
I finally figure out what my personal style is, and I have a few favorite brands that I know fit me and I like to wear. Buying through Thredup, or Instagram accounts dedicated to buying and selling clothes, allows me to reduce my participation in the fast fashion world and on the environment.
I really believe in the motto of “Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without” and this applies to my wardrobe, but also many other things in and around my house like furniture, often sourced for free via Buy Nothing or cheap on Craigslist, and cars: my 2009 Subaru Forrester has less than 90,000 miles on it and I fully expect to be driving it another ten years.
9. If $1000 was dropped into your lap today, what would you do with it?
I’d spend it on our front garden!
We changed from an oil heating system to an electric heat pump last year after our furnace died, and when they removed the old tank, they discovered that it had been leaking.
Luckily, when we bought our house in 2014, we signed up for PLIA insurance and they are covering the more than fifty-thousand-dollar cost of cleaning up the soil.
To do so, however, the contractor dug a 13-foot-deep hole in our front garden, displacing many of our beautiful and mature plants. We have money set aside for a gardener to help us rethink the garden layout, and I hope that many of the plants we had to take out will survive, but it is going to be a lot of work to replant everything.
10. Is there anything unique about frugal living in your area?
I don’t think that there is anything uniquely frugal about living in Seattle, but it was very interesting living in France and reading frugal blogs written by Americans! Many of the tips, like couponing, US bloggers gave their readers just didn’t apply!
We also benefited from many government programs not available in the US, like substantial monthly benefits for each of our children, or prepaid vouchers that I got through work that allowed us to employ a weekly housecleaner at very little cost to us; how I miss Anais!
As far as frugal tips that I have tried and abandoned: couponing is still not for me. I find that a mix of buying store brands when appropriate, using my preferred grocery store’s loyalty program, and menu planning is a better way for me to use my time.
I will, however, spend time hanging my laundry! While we had a dryer while living in France, the habit of hanging delicates to air dry definitely stuck with me; I line dry 95% of my clothes, as well as things like graphic tee-shirts of my family members, and find that they do last a lot longer.
____________
Kelly, I remember you from your Being Frugal blog and it is so fun to see your kids all grown up now too.
I nodded when you said 2007/2008 was a good time to start a blog; I started mine in 2008, and it was very unintentionally good timing for me too!
I share your love for the Buy Nothing groups (I wrote about my experience with the one near my current rental!) It's such a wonderful way to get items into the hands of people who want/need them.
A question from me: How did you end up moving to France originally? Also, what do you miss most about France, other than your housecleaner?
Kelly,
What a fun interview. A vibrant personality comes through in your writing and pictures. I love that your Buy Nothing group has led to relationships as well as sharing.
I agree that being frugal can become a "moral priority" and I appreciate that stance.
Thanks so much for the lovely comment, @K D!
Hi Kelly! Why were your daily expenses lower when you moved to France originally? Because of that particular country, or because of your stage of life? Or some third thing? I don't think of France as a particularly cheap place to live, I guess, but then, I've only been there once for a few days.
@kristin @ going country, great question! I think it was a combination of things. First, the cost of living is lower in France (especially outside of Paris); for example, the apartment that we lived in before we left France was 900 euros a month; an equivilent apartment in Seattle was about $1800. Food is a lot cheaper there, even now; we keep track of the price of cheese in the US and in France (cheese is very important to French people!), and comparable products are about 4X more expensive here than there. Public transportation is also much cheaper! I was also a fresh college graduate, and used to living cheaply, which made a difference too.
@kristin @ going country, I think a lot of Americans don't understand that rural France is actually quite poor. Of course, Paris, Nice, etc are expensive, but France in general has a poverty rate of 14% or so, while the US's is 11% or so.
@Rose, wow. I never knew that.
What an interesting interview! I agree that Buy Nothing is a great resource. However, I would love to hear more about life in France. Did you live in Paris, another city, or rural area? Did you cook at home frequently? What is food shopping like? Since I’m a huge Julia Childs fan, I tend to romanticize life in France.
@Bee, thank you! We lived in Grenoble, which is a midsize city in the French Alps. Most Americans know it either because of Peggy Fleming, who won her gold medal in Figure Skating in a skating rink right across the street from my first apartment, or from the Tour de France. Because Grenoble is in the foothills of three mountain ranges, the Tour de France goes through or near it every year. Fun fact: one of those mountain ranges is the Chartreuse mountains, and that is where Chartreuse liquer comes from, and the color of the alcohol is where we get the name for that vibrant yellow color we call chartreuse!
We cooked at home a lot, as we do here, but we also ate out a lot (as we do here!). I will say that Americans do tend to romanticize the whole experience of going to little outdoor markets every day, or frequently, to buy their food from the greengrocer, the fish seller, the butcher, etc, but my experience as a busy working parent was that it was much easier to go to the large supermarket once a week than try to find time to go to the market during the hours it was open, which was when I was at work! Living in France was, in many ways, a lot like living anywhere else: you wake up, get your kids to school, go to work, run errands, come home, cook dinner, collapse, rinse repeat. Of course there were many lovely, different things about it too, but living there long-term isn't like being there on vacation (which is also lovely!).
@Kelly, thank you so much for sharing. I’ve enjoyed reading about your unusual frugal life.
"I think it is incredibly important to pay fair wages based on the true value of our food, to think about the human and animal cost of producing our food, and to eat locally.
I don’t necessarily look for organic options, but there is something wrong with the system that can produce a fast-food cheeseburger for a dollar. What kind of suffering was involved just so I could eat a burger for a buck?"
Kelly, thank you for this awareness. I can't imagine how little we have been paying for food in the U.S! And how horribly we treat the animals- as if they are products from a factory!!
You have a beautiful family and I love the picture from the Bat Mitzvah :).
Farhana, you may want to go on some field trips to farms. I take issue with your statement "and how horribly we treat the animals" - you can be sure that people who treat their animals poorly don't do well. Most farmers I know were raised to respect and treat their animals well. You know there's a lot of propaganda out there that just isn't true, but thanks to the technology available, it is foisted on us incessantly. Go and meet some farmers. You'll be glad you did.
Some people shouldn't have animals, I agree. But not many of them are farmers, thankfully!
@Farhana, thank you! I will say that there are a number of large, industrialized farms here in the US that treat their animals (and sometimes the workers in them) as cogs in a factory wheel; it is important to me that we (my family) think carefully about the products that we consume so as not to contribute to that system. As Ingrid points out below, there are many, many farmers and ranchers who are working thoughtfully and intentionally to do thinks differently, and ,for me, it is important to support them through my buying decisions.
I think it’s wonderful that you made frugal clothing choices for your daughter’s bat mitvah! Costs can skyrocket for these events.
We also tried to make wise choices, not just to save money but also to not buy in to the idea that b’nai mitzvahs have to be splashy affairs. They are first and foremost religious milestones.
@Kathy L, thank you! I think it is helped by living in Seattle; growing up in Los Angeles, I attended a whole bunch of b'nai mitzvah celebrations that cost as much or more than a wedding! For each of our kids we gave them the option of having a party or doing a family trip; they all chose the trip!
@Kelly, me too, here on Long Island. One I went to cost $200K. Indoor fireworks! ha.
@Rose, whoa!!
Ah! France is such an amazing country. My mom, during my sophomore and junior years in high school, went to the University of Grenoble for business management. It was always a treat to leave the US and spend a week or two there!
@Hannah, what a fun experience! I got my masters degree at the GGSB (Grenoble Graduate School of Business); is that where your mom went?
Loved the photos of the kids! You have way more success getting teens to smile for photos than I do. What a fun reader story!
I loved Kelly's kid photos too; their smiles made me happy!
@Hawaii Planner, I literally used to pay my kids to smile and to pose together.
@Hawaii Planner, thanks! usually we end up taking hundreds to get a couple of really fun shots-- thank you phones with great cameras! I also take lots of photos of them, and if you could here me as I'm taking them I am saying things like "teeth! show me your teeth!" because none of them like to smile widely in photos, but which always makes them laugh.
edit: if you could *hear* me!
Hi, Kelly, you were a fun read!
My cousin and his wife moved their family to France for about a decade as missionaries, and they spoke of some of the same differences between living there and living here as you. They are back here now, but return to visit friends as often as they can.
I agree about paying more for food, which I do for my health and for moral reasons. I do prefer organic, but a big priority is that the farmers take care of the soil, the water, their plants, and their animals. That's a big reason why I use certain local farmers. They are passionate about all of those. Their food costs more, but I have become a blackbelt at not wasting food - something I first started paying more attention to when Kristen was regularly posting about food waste.
Thanks for posting!
@JD, I love "having a blackbelt in not wasting food"! Food waste drives me nuts; I do a lot of menu planning so that we are not (almost literally) throwing our money away with food we can't use. I've learned a bunch from Kristen too, as well as getting some great meal ideas!
Hi Kelly! I miss Seattle. I used to go there often when I myself worked for a big tech company you definitely have heard of. I was based in New York City.
I do think Seattle and the PNW are very different from, say, the New York area. People are much more hippyish, liberal, concerned about the environment, and frugality plays into that. (Every time I visited Seattle I timed the first white guy with dreads I saw, which is something that does not exist in New York City.) I have been behind a lady at Dick's Drive In angrily give back a penny to the cashier because pennies are toxic wastes of natural resources.
Anyway, thanks for sharing your family with us.
Thank you @Rose! I agree with your comparison of the PNW to the east coast; I have never lived there, but I do feel a bit "country mouse-ish" when I visit NYC or DC, what with my birkenstocks or clogs!
@Kelly, Birks keep shimmering in and out of fashion every few years. My NYC snob daughter broke down and bought some this summer and allowed as how they were comfortable. Hahahaha!
@Rose, hahaha, that's amazing-- I love it when teenagers "discover" new things. 🙂
Kelly, what a fascinating life you've had/are having! And your family is just lovely!
I must admit to being a bit green with jealousy that you have such an active Buy Nothing group where you are. There's one where I live, but it appears to have gone on life support a long time ago. Frugaling is more of a "do it yourself" than a community effort here, but I'm keeping on with it.
@Ruby, I get intermittent pangs of guilt that I don't use Buy Nothing groups. But, I simply do not have the patience for the flakes who don't show up or call, which unfortunately turned out to be everybody. But I do take things to a charity store and just recently changed charities to one more in line with our beliefs.
@Ruby, @anne, when I first discovered Buy Nothing a few years ago the group wasn't as active as it is now, partly because it was a young group and partly because it covered a big geographic area. I decided that if the group was important to me, and I really wanted to get something from my participation in it, that I needed to take an active role in helping run it*. We have been through two sprouts (where the group gets so big that it is subdivided into smaller groups), and I think that our geographic boundaries covering a reasonably walkable area really helps our engagement.
*This is the same approach I have taken towards my synagogue; when we first joined a few years ago I decided to be as involved as possible; I'm now on the board and do a few other committee type things. I'm not typically a joiner, but when I do join something that's important to me, I like to give back as much as I can.
Hi Kelly, nice to meet you! We have a red cat very much like tours, and he is originally from France. Very much an Aristocat.
Like you I am very much a fan of line drying my laundry, so much so even that I feel wasteful when I use the dryer for a change.
Your buy nothing group sounds wonderful!
@J NL, Our orange cat is American, but we did bring a tabby cat to the US when we moved from France; she was the very definition of a cranky old lady! (She recently died and we miss her very much.)
Thank you for sharing with all of us, Kelly. And I agree with you about coupons, I'm in Canada and we can't stack coupons like in the US. It's very different here. And I also feel my time is better spent in other ways, like menu planning.
Oh, and your children have the most lovely cheek bones and dimples!!!
@Leann, thank you! They get them from their father. 🙂
Bonjour!
I loved this. Beautiful family.
@Stephanie, merci beaucoup!
Hi Kelly - My husband and I must moved up to Port Orchard WA from California. We also love all of the places to hike and be outdoors - We even love the weather because we came from a very hot, dry place. I can't imagine hanging laundry though - how do you accomplish this or is is only during July/August? Our Buy Nothing group isn't terribly active so I envy you yours!
Your kids are all adorable. Great post!
@Bernie, thank you! I have to say that I think I was a treefrog in a former life; I love the moderate heat, grey days and (surprising) lack of humidity here! Kristen's gratitude posts where she talks about the weather always make me laugh-- and be extra grateful that we don't live in a hot, humid, climate!
As far as line drying laundry, we are lucky that our basement is fully finished, and where our furnace lives, so it is nice and warm. We have an ikea drying rack and (so far, knock on wood) haven't noticed any issues with hanging clothes inside.
Do you keep detailed records of your solar system?
Do you share them publicly?
@Robert Sterbal, good question! I don't, for either. We know it is running efficiently, and every year so far we have gotten money "back" from the utility company for the energy we put back into the public grid, but that is as detailed as we get.
I also like hanging clothes to dry. It's almost therapeutic for me (my little quirk) and the side benefit is clothes are WAY easier to fold when taken off the drying rack as opposed to taken out of a dryer. Plus I never have piles of unfolded laundry getting wrinkly since its folded immediately upon removal. 🙂
Seattle is a lovely place to be. I've been several times to visit my sister in law.
@Rachel, Agreed! I actually love hanging clothes too, although my husband does most of the laundry.
Along with everyone else, Kelly, I enjoyed your interview. Your life is very different from mine (except for the dedication to hanging laundry!), but as always on The Frugal Girl, "Different strokes for different folks."
And I agree with everyone else that your three kids are definitely keepers. I can't think of many who'd cheerfully wear a Mom hand-me-down dress and Goodwill shirts to a bat mitzvah!
@A. Marie,
I love that expression of yours. I think of the readership here as a huge Venn diagram overlapping now here, now there, according to situation and inclination.
@A. Marie, thank you so much! One of the things I love most about The Frugal Girl (in addition to Kristen's voice) is the diversity of readers in this community she has created. As I wrote Kristen when I volunteered for this post, she and I are different in many, many ways, but I've always learned so much from her and everyone else here.
Thanks for sharing, Kelly! It's fascinating to me that you line dry so much of your laundry since you live in the PNW. I'm in Michigan (cold but not as wet as Seattle) and like to do it in the summer but limit how much I do in the winter. I feel that it would fill our whole basement with laundry for my crew of 5, so I'm intrigued that you do it for 5 and found a way to make it work!! Way to go!!
I love the pictures of your family. Thanks for sharing your journey with us! It was really interesting to read!
Also... We visited my in-laws when they lived in Hong Kong and they had a 550 sq ft apartment. At the time we had 2 small children and one on the way, so I can picture you raising your family in that space for 6 years and it makes me smile.
@Ruth T, it helps that we don't line dry everything! Just my clothes, and anything that is nylon, or has a graphic design on it. Most of the jeans, sweatshirts, etc, that are bulky and would take a long time to dry go through the dryer. 🙂 Drying clothes in the same space as the furnace also really helps in the winter!
And living in a 550 sq foot house was an interesting organizational challenge to be sure, but three things really helped: we moved in before we had kids, so we adapted to the space slowly but surely; the house was two stories, so it didn't feel like we were on top of one another, and we lived on a private driveway, so there was lots of outside space for the kids to play!
Hi Kelly! Thank you for your post. It is interesting to read about frugality in other families who travel or live overseas, as it's often not associated with being frugal minded. It's also nice how you have raised your children to be frugal and seeing different perspectives in life, something that will serve them well.
For close to three decades now, my family and I have also split our time living back "home" where I'm from in Europe, and making sure our children have been able to visit often to keep up their family and cultural ties when we live in the States. I lived there as recently as last year and furnished my apartment from scratch, largely with the local freecycle or thrift stores. I think frugality has been the great enabler in how we were able to manage without any support, even as penniless young parents in our early twenties.
I agree that although salaries are lower and some costs higher where I'm from in Northern Europe, overall I am always amazed with how much less we can make do when not in the United States. There are so many "needs" here that don't necessarily apply there, like expensive health insurance, cars, upkeep for larger homes etc. It's an interesting thing to experience a smaller bank account yet feel more relaxed.
@Kristina M., I agree! I always say that living in France taught me so much about being an American, in both the good ways and the bad!
What a fun post! Thank you for sharing a peek into your life. Your frugal choices sound so intentional. How nice to be at a point where you can choose what you’d like to spend more on! I noticed you have solar panels. Was that another choice or did your house come with them? Also, your husband’s photo face is hilarious.
@Jem, it does feel good to *finally* be in a place where we can choose how we want to spend our money, rather than have our circumstances dictate what we have to spend money on, but I recognize our immense priviledge (in this and many other ways).
In regards to your questions about solar panels; we put them on, and have had them about 6 years so far; we have 39 in total-- you can't see the ones on the other side of the roof! Getting them was an intentional choice: we've also installed super high-quality double-paned windows, added blown-in insulation to the walls on our main floor (for a while our house looked polka dotted, because they drill the holes from the outside and we waited a few months to get the house painted), and just replaced our oil furnance with an electric heat pump. We've made all these choices both for environmental and frugal reasons, and got a number of tax credits, etc, to help pay for them, but would never have been able to consider doing so without being in the financial place we are today.
@Kelly, The lucky thing about your area is that electric costs are rock bottom because of hydroelectric power. I have to stick with oil because my electric is the highest in the continental United States, while yours is the lowest. Oh well, every area has it downsides.
@Rose, excellent point! And we don't really need to worry about water costs for things like the garden, either, because most of the year we don't need to water it! We have rain barrels that we use during the summer.
Nice to meet you! It's fun to hear about the life adventures that you have had. Thanks for writing!
I got a kick out of your daughter's bunny shoes. My almost 17 year old girl would love them.
@Kris, those were a Goodwill find!
Interesting. I like your eco efforts. My ex-husband was raised in France. As a kid he loved to ride his bike to a local ice cream place. As an adult he loved ice cream from a carton from the Piggy Wiggly. He didn't see much difference.
@Tiana, interesting! We all value different things in life, I guess, especially at different life ages and stages 🙂
@Kelly, lol.not really. He could still ride a bike to piggly wiggly, he'd have to take a jet to Orleans
First of all, thank you to everyone for your lovely, warm comments, as well as all the compliments on my kids :). I love this community, and major thanks to Kristen for bringing us all together.
Now, to answer her questions:
I first came to France during a college year abroad. I wasn't particularly passionate about France, per se, but as a slightly older than the norm, non traditional student (I took a few years off between dropping out of highschool and going back to college), I really wanted to travel abroad. I had been taking French as a foreign language, so off to France I went. It was originally supposed to be a five months trip, but I extended it to 12 months, and met my husband six weeks before returning home. I knew it was something serious, and 12 months turned into 12 years before I knew it!
As for what else I miss about living in France, the people are first and foremost. My husband comes from a closeknit family, and we made lots of lovely friends while living there. Luckily social media helps us keep in touch, but it's not the same as getting to see people on a regular basis. I also miss the food and being so close to some of my favorite cities in the world, like London and Paris! I don't miss the bureaucracy, the educational system, the lack of work opportunities and the anti-semitism, all of which are reasons we now live here, not there. 🙂
@Kelly, I do like how France, a country smaller than Texas with over twice the population, is one of the first places to have laws against food waste
@Tiana, they are very thoughtful about it!
@Tiana, There are definite downsides to that social media memes ignore.
@Rose, I wouldn't know, haven't seen the memes
Thank you Kelly; there are so many interesting things in your post! Your photos are great (as someone who has an older brother, I liked seeing the recurrence of the "knuckle sandwich to the head" (what my brother called it anyway) in your pictures - rings very true with me : ). It was fun to see the joy between siblings.
I really like how intentional you are about choices in all these areas of life. Do you and your husband tend to have a similar outlook in that sense? Our family had more of a mixed approach at first; it's interesting to look back and see how we've compromised and prioritized over the years!
@Suz, interesting question! I will say that my husband is very easy going, and tends to let me lead the way; I can tell that something is really important to him if he pushes back, and then he usually has a really good point. That said, he's also much more fiscally conservative than I am and is much more likely to want to stash money in savings and much less likely to want to spend than I am.
And yes, my kids really do like spending time together; it's a great joy to see them hanging out without me!
Bonjour,
Vos enfants vont allez en fac en France ou dans UE? Notre fils fait son master à Venice et bonjour les économies par rapport au EU.
Le grand avantage des multi-nationaux.
Profitez vous également des voyages birthright pour vos enfants ?
Je suis une juive française vivant dans les Antilles néerlandaises.
@Bella Lewin, merci ! Mon fils aine est le seul qui fait les etudes en France pour le moment, mais juste pour cette annee (il pense); il aura plus envie d'aller en Irelande l'annee prochaine que de retourner a Grenoble. Le deuxieme a une petite- copine ici a Seattle, donc il n'evisage pas a partir loin d'elle... peut-etre ca changera dans l'avenir. Par contre, ma fille veut bien faire des etudes en France, mais pas d'habiter chez ses grand-parents, ou se loge mon fils, donc on va voir. 😉 Et pareil, je veux les faire beneficier du Birthright, mais c'est que ma fille qui s'interesse pour le moment...
For all others, Bella was asking if my kids are going to go to university in France or in another EU country, and her son is doing his masters in Venice thanks to an EU exchange program. I answered that, so far, only my oldest is interested in it, given that my second son has a girlfriend here in Seattle and my daughter is too young. She also asked if my kids are doing Birthright, which is an organization that sends Jewish youth on a free trip to Israel; same, my daughter is the only one who is interested for the moment, although I would love to send all three of them!
I think for most Americans with dual nationality, studies abroad are a very good way to save money. For my son master we pay 1500 euro a year of university fee plus cost of living. And the birthright trip is a good move too. I presume other religions/ organizations have theses types of travels too? Going to Rome with the catholic youths?
Hello, Kelly. I must admit to a shiver of delight at hearing about someone else with a spread sheet who tracks every single penny in and out and who likes to go back and see what the household was spending at other points in life. Go spreadsheet nerds!
Our Buy Nothing group should have been named Do Nothing group. Eventually it faded away but in the meantime we have neighbors on all sides and we have become the Share Everything group. Excess summer produce, equipment, furniture, and the sharing of fishing and hunting results are comon and constant. Half the group is retired and half is young marrieds with kids and the older ones act like a neighborhood watch, and do stuff like accept packages for each other, while the younger ones run over when they see the older ones struggling to lift something or put up holiday lights. I am seriously impressed that you have kept your Buy Nothing group functioning.
I love the pic of your kids on the porch! And of all the travels with mom and dad stories they will recall in later years.
@Lindsey, the Share Everything group, how amazing! I love that you are building that bond with your neighbors. I have a few immediate neighbors that I have gotten to know through Buy Nothing, but nothing close to what you describe!
And yes, spreadsheet nerds unite! I have to say that my budgeting in excel has paid off in my daily work; I spend a lot of time in spreadsheets and take a nerdy joy in making formulas work for me...!
@Kelly, I enjoyed reading about you and your family and your frugal lifestyle. I too have been tracking our finances for over 20 years but through an off the shelf software. Unfortunately, the company quit supporting the software about a year after I started using it. It has been fine all these years but I keep telling myself I should switch to using Excel since I don't know when/if this software will quit working. I cringe every time Windows has an update because I wonder when it will no longer be compatible. I hate to think of all those years of history being lost because it has come in handy to search things, like when we replaced our washer, roof, etc. or how much we spent for xyz last time we bought it. I was wondering if you had any suggestions as to how best set this up in Excel. Did you use one of the templates online and modify to fit your situation?
@Barbara, I think I started with a template from excel, but then I modified it to meet my needs, by adding in formulas and so on. For me, it is most important to track the bills that need to be paid, so I make sure everything gets paid on time (I don't really trust automatic payments because several times things have gotten screwed up and I have missed a payment). I am less concerned about tracking individual week's spending on groceries, for example. Here is a version of our spreadsheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1osH8Gzn_FBKUFxbHh7RpmFjACilllfvUtK-0rAK3XpY/edit?usp=sharing. You will see that all discretionary spending is lumped into the credit card payment, because what I really want to track is the fact that I pay it off every month.
Nice to meet you, Kelly. Your children's smiles are a testament to your mothering, I think. They look so genuine.
@Jody S., thank you so much; what a lovely compliment.
Hello! Lovely meeting you, Kelly. Wondering what you feed your dog if you felt comfortable sharing that. Penelope is a very cute name. She looks darling.
@Molly F. C., Thank you! She is the bestest dog ever and we love her very much! She gets a variety of food; she's sensitive to some things, and so we have found that a combination keeps her scratching at bay: Hills prescription kibble (the dental care kind) in the morning, Merrick kibble and canned food in the evening (the cats also eat Merrick food), and a variety of treats; she especially likes Fruitables, which are like a meat and fruit dried jerky. We do spend a lot on food for her and the cats, but they're important to us, so I think it's worth it.