I sup
pose I should try to view it more as an investment, but when the goal is to save money, all those dollar signs seem to add up even more quickly.
Take, for example, the weekly shopping. The weekly shopping takes us an hour away to Lincoln, to two stores and one library. To save a bit on the gas (not to mention the time) we are thinking about changing this to a monthly trip. Which means a LOT more groceries at once.
And the need for a place to store it all.
Now, I don’t need fancy cabinetry, but I would like to avoid just stacking it all on the floor. And the mouse that chewed through my five pound bag of flour emphasized the need for containers for dry goods.
And really, another deep freeze would be very helpful in this endeavor.
But that all costs money. And while it may pay for itself in time, hopefully in a season even, it isn’t always easy to lay down all that money up front.
Another challenge for us is that we eat a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables. Now, our local market is relatively competitive for fresh goods and our monthly shopping trip to Lincoln isn’t going to keep me from trips to our local market. Nor will it keep my husband from picking up milk on his way home from work. But fresh fruits and vegetables are pricey.
We have space for an orchard. In the spring, we may even have the money to plant it. And after several years of care, it will hopefully begin to pay for itself. But until then, we’ll be pruning and fertilizing and fencing and hoping to see a return on the investment.
There’s also the garden. And while I have great plans for it, the three pounds of green beans, two pumpkins and four cucumbers it has produced this year hardly justifies the money that was put into it last spring. We are preparing it for some winter gardening at the moment. And while it would be lovely to have garden fresh salads all winter without having to pay for them, we still need to build the cold frames and purchase the plastic to protect the little plants as they grow.
And did I mention my carrots? Carrots don’t grow particularly well in our soil. They like sandy loam and we have clay. Rocky clay at that. Carrots don’t cost all that much so I’ve never really worried about it, but so long as I’ve been reading about everything else under the sun regarding gardening, I’ve come across a bit about carrots. And my children really do prefer the carrots fresh out of the garden. And I know there’s a lot more nutrition in something they pulled from the garden ten minutes ago as opposed to something that was grown who knows where, packaged, shipped, brought home and stored in the refrigerator for another week before being eaten.
So we’re getting ready to experiment with some indoor container gardening focusing on carrots. A few plastic tubs won’t set us back too much. Nor will the soil. And the lighting isn’t that expensive. But a one pound bag of carrots is less than a dollar. This little project will pay for itself if it is successful, but it may take a year. And maybe some lettuce and green onions tucked into the corners.
But still, we’re spending money now in the hopes to save enough in the future to make it all worthwhile. But when a tightening budget is the motivation, it isn’t always easy.
What have you been working on to make a little extra room in your budget?
Exhausted and with sore feet, legs, back and even hands, I began walking from the east side of the state fair all the way back to the western most edge of the west parking lot. My mission: to retrieve the car so we could load dog, kennel, children and grandmother after twelve hours at the fair.











Roscommon Acres is a place to stop and discuss news and information related to faith, family and particularly education. Turn your children out on the pasture, pour yourself a cup of tea and join the conversation!





Join the conversation!