Frugality reigns

It seems it's been a long time since my last post, almost 6 months in fact. Making money online is certainly more difficult than I expected - I felt ripped off by sites like bux.to who never paid me out, writing sites such as dooyoo and ciao, certainly help as does Slicethepie.com, blogging for a while also paid it's way. One thing I found though that it wasn't enough to survive on, whilst students being supported by parents might be able to do it, it's not a good method of looking after a family and when the opportunity of a job came up, I found that it was the most simple way. 8 hours a day at work and being able to switch off afterwards certainly has its benefits.

With more money in the bank account, I found that I just ended up spending more though and I haven't really managed to get rid of any of the debts I was hoping to. Frugality it seems is the key.

I once had a Jewish friend, whose spendthriftiness always impressed me, he could go out, travel and barely spend a penny, his fridge was empty but his bank account was doing nicely. He wasn't unhappy and despite being a bit tight at times, he also had plenty of friends. This skill had been passed on to him by his parents and growing up in a frugal environment had certainly done him well.

My parents have always spent what they've earnt and I'm pretty sure that's where I get my lack of money skills. I've been working on becoming frugal though and have to say that it eventually becomes a pleasure rather than a negative restricted feeling.

To make money, you have to spend money. In the next post I shall recommend frugal tricks.

Saving Tips No. 1 - Cut baby wipes, cut the cost

Although not directly related to earning money online, I thought I'd start a new section called "Saving Tips" revolving around good ways to save money. After all, saving money is just as good as making it.

Recently, I became a father and like all babies - my daughter needs a fair amount of nappy changes throughout the day, at least one and sometimes two or three baby wipes are used at every nappy change, however the butt to baby wipe ratio is not exactly 1:1, so I often find myself folding over the baby wipes.

It occured to me that cutting them in half would save 50% of the cost on baby wipes and wouldn't effect the outcome of the wipe.