Blissfully Frugal Entry: Living Inexpensively in an Expensive World

Alyssa Avant is a Christian writer & speaker and founder of Beauty by Design Ministries a ministry to tween/teen girls and their moms. She is wife to Greg and mother to three amazing children all under the age of 7. She and her family reside in Carrollton, MS. She blogs at Life from My Laptop. This guest post was originally published on her own blog as her entry in our Blissfully Frugal contest. Be sure to read all the entries and vote for your favorite.

Let’s face it, in today’s economy it is an understatement to say that “living is expensive”. Just recently, my husband and I did our budget trying to determine ways to save and ways to pay down debt. The way that we worked the budget this time around, we discovered that his entire paycheck goes to “necessities”, mortgage, insurance, groceries, gasoline, propane, electricity, water, sewer, you get the point. Next to none of his paycheck is left for “extras” or for “debt reduction”. That’s where my income comes in.

That’s also where living “inexpensively” or frugally comes in. I have tried many times to be “more frugal”. Sometimes, I have succeeded, but sometimes I’ve failed miserably. I think the important thing is that I “try”. I have always been taught to be a good steward of what I have. I believe all that we have comes from God and as a result we are responsible to Him for what we do or do not do with what He gives us. As a result, I am always one to be a wise spender. I meal plan, I dabble in couponing, and I shop the clearance racks. In fact, most of my clothes have been obtained either as gifts at Christmas or my birthday, or from clearance racks or even “hand-me-downs”. Yes, I’m fortunate to receive those from close friends, both for myself and my children.

I don’t feel by doing this that I am “slighted” in life in anyway, in fact the opposite is true, I feel blessed to have the things that I do have, and I am always looking for ways to “save”. Many times, the opportunity to live inexpensively is a bit easier to do than you think. You’ll find “savings” opportunities in the strangest of places if you just take the time to see what’s already there to begin with, you may not “need” the things that you so desperately “wish” that you could have.

Living Inexpensively or at least “less expensive” is doable in this expensive world.