New Project

Yes, our daughter is almost 13 months old. And yes, we still need to fill some of the walls of her bedroom. My husband and I have been debating and browsing art for over a year now, but a sale on art.com finally got us moving. We just bought these prints for our daughter's room and two prints for our room- we've been in our house for over three years and the walls of the master bedroom are still mostly bare.

Next step is for my husband to build frames and mat them. As I mentioned here, framing and matting your own art is a thrifty strategy. The art for her room will all have matching white-stained frames and each will have a different colored mat (I think). The frames for our room will be stained to match our bedroom set. I have step-by-step pictures from his most recently finished framing project, those will be coming in a future post.

Thrifty Strategy- Travel Websites

In the past week I have been planning (OK obsessing over) a couple upcoming vacations. I've used my usual online strategies and have been able to find some good deals, so I thought I'd share them:



From Source

Hotel Methodology:
1. Use Hotels.com, Kayak.com, or another agregator website to search for lodging. They have great filters so you can search for the exact amenities you need.
2. Once you have the list narrowed down to a few properties, go to each of the properties' individual websites (for example Embassy Suites or Holiday Inn Express) and search for rooms there. You will often find different prices and deals that aren't available through the agregator sites.
3. If the price is the same, always book the room through the individual hotel's website as opposed to through Hotels.com or another website. In the event that you need to change or cancel a reservation, you're much better off dealing with the hotel individually.

Other thrifty tips when deciding on a place to stay:
- Look for a place that offers free breakfast. You can often fill up on a free buffet which saves you not only on the breakfast itself but also on lunch later. Plus, breakfast prices at most hotels are exorbinant.
- If you will need to park a car, be sure to check for parking fees. At some resorts and hotels that can add quite a bit to your bill. It might be worth paying a little more at a property that doesn't charge for parking.
- Consider renting a condominium with a full kitchen or staying at a hotel that at least offers a microwave and fridge. That way you won't need to eat out for every meal.

Flight Methodology:
1. Use Orbitz or another website to search for flights. Sites such as these are helpful because they can combine flights on multiple carriers for more complicated itineraries.
2. Also look at the websites for any regional carriers who don't participate in Orbitz
3. If the flights you're interested in are all on one airline (which they usually are), go to that airline's individual website to find the same flights and to book. I have found it's better to book through the airline directly. You will get the best price and it's easier to deal with the airline directly if there is a problem.

Do you agree with my recommendations? Have any experiences to share?

Mint: I'm not the only one!



from http://www.mint.com/


One of my favorite "mommy blogs" is alphamom.com. It's good for interesting topics, funny advice columns, and some great resources for everything pregnancy and baby. I was happy to read today's post and see that I'm not the only one who recommends http://www.mint.com/ for organizing the family budget. If you remember, I have posted about it here and here.

Alphamom: A New Budget for the New Year

A bad online purchase experience turned OK

Last week, I found the perfect sweatshirt on Cafepress.com for a Christmas gift (the recipient will remain anonymous). The price seemed kind of high for a screenprint sweatshirt at $33 plus shipping, but I figured it was worth it.

Then the shirt arrived.

It was the flimsiest "sweatshirt" ever! And the design on the front was at least an inch or two off-center. I thought maybe I was being over-critical, but my husband agreed with me on both counts. I went to the Cafepress website and filled out a webform requesting a return and refund.

Imagine my surprise when about 12 hours later I received this email:

Thank you for contacting CafePress.com!
We want you to be 100% satisfied with your CafePress.com experience.

I have processed a refund for you in the amount of $33.00. Please allow 3 - 5 business days for the refund to be reflected on your credit card statement. I know the item received is not up to your complete satisfaction but as our way of an apology please go ahead and keep it. There is no need for a return!

If there is anything else I can do for you please let me know. Your ticket code is 00000000. Please use this code in any further communication.

Best Regards,
x 
CafePress.com Support Representative

Wow! I get to keep the sweatshirt and am only out the $5 or $6 I paid for shipping. Not so shabby. I can still give the person the sweatshirt and will explain the story, it's the thought that counts, right?

Lessons Learned:
1. Cafepress products are of questionable quality
2. Their return/refund policy is good
3. In the future, don't just grin and bear it when I am not satisfied with a product, I might again be pleasantly surprised

Shutterfly- a thrifty lifesaver!

Have I told you of my love affair with Shutterfly? It's such a fun, useful site and can be thrifty. Let me count the ways:

• Beautiful, creative photo cards for the holidays and any other occasion. I've used them for Christmas for seven years now and for our daughter's birth announcements. You can have them printed at your local Target instead of paying for shipping too. Even better, the cards come with envelopes, one less thing you need to buy.
• There always seem to be deals going on, with codes you enter at checkout to get free shipping or a percentage off of your order. (Never order a photo book or larger order without a discount, if one isn't offered, just wait a few days and one usually comes up on their site)
• Their photobook making tools are very robust and easy to use. There are tons of backgrounds, layouts, and book types. They make great gifts, too. You can design a book once and then have copies shipped to everyone on your list.
• Again, you can order and have photos printed at Target in an hour, including larger prints like 5 x 7's. Couple that with a nice picture frame and you can give a gift of a photo the same day that the picture was taken! This works well for weddings and family events. Also great for loved ones who live far away, you can send photos to their local store to pick up.

Do you use a digital photo website other than Shutterfly? Which one and why do you love it?

How much do YOU spend per day?

The September U.S. consumer spending numbers come out on October 14th. Slate.com is running a poll to guess how much the average consumer spent. In August it was $63 per day. Remember this is an average of spending over the whole month, on things from mortgage payments to gasoline.... so go to the site and place your guess. You'll find out if you were right on the 14th.

Thrifty Strategy- Buying lightbulbs online

Do you have any light fixtures that require specialty bulbs that you have to keep buying? We have four identical ceiling fans in our house that each have two 40W high intensity lightbulbs. It seems like we have a bulb burn out almost every month! We also have halogen bulbs outside in our landscape lighting.

My husband has discovered that lightbulb websites often offer better prices than stores do. You can Google the model number of your bulb (usually located on the side of the bulb) and then comparison shop online. The problem is that shipping can decrease your savings, so you usually need to buy quite a few in order to save money, but it's worth it. We placed one order for 20 ceiling fan bulbs and 20 halogen bulbs and were able to save about 50% compared to the Home Depot price.

Here's the site we used:
1000bulbs.com

Money Magazine's Personal Finance Blog

I came across a blog I hadn't seen before, the Money Magazine personal finance blog. I like the title: More Money. Looks like there are some interesting and diverse topics to learn about. Here's the link:

More Money- Money Magazine's Personal Finance Blog

Top Websites for Getting Great Deals

This article on Kiplinger's website caught my eye. It outlines 21 top websites for getting great deals online. It includes everything from sites that help with price comparisons, coupon sites, and even sites that sell giftcards for a price lower than face value. I am going to give some of these sites a try!

21 Websites for Finding Deals Online

More about Mint.com

The Wall Street Journal and I must be on the same wavelength! They just published an article today about recent upgrades to Mint.com. Haven't tried this new feature yet but it sounds like a great tool.

Goalkeeping Gets Easier at Mint.com

Thrifty Website- mint.com

Your assignment for today is to explore mint.com. It's a really useful site for getting a handle on your finances. You can set up an account and then connect all of your credit cards, checking accounts, and even your 401k to one place. Then you can use their tools to help with budgeting, paying bills, the sky's the limit!

More posts to come about Mint, but first just spend some time exploring the features and resources the site offers.

Thrifty Website- art.com

When we were decorating our first house, my husband stumbled upon the website art.com. It is a great place to find the perfect artwork for any room. You can search and filter on a ton of categories and most of the pieces are available in multiple sizes. Once you create an account you can build "galleries" to save your favorite pieces in as you're exploring the site and trying to decide what to buy.

There always seems to be some kind of sale or deal going on. We receive email coupons from them every month it seems. When you combine that with the fact that we have a mat cutter and my husband makes the mats and frames for the artwork (post coming in the future about that), we save a TON of money. Most of the time we buy the art and then pick the paint color for the room afterwards. It's easier to match paint to art that you already have, you can bring the art right to the hardware store to pick the perfect color!

Want examples of what we have purchased? See below for some pictures.

This is one of the two pieces that started it all. We bought it along with a similar one of Cabernet Sauvignon for a bedroom in our first house, it's moved with us twice and is in a bedroom in our current house. We used identical mat and frame colors for both prints.

This is one of five prints we purchased for our upstairs hallway. It's a series of line drawings of animals by Picasso. We used a different color mat for each print but identical frames.

We purchased three Asian-inspired prints with similar colors and used them in our hall bathroom. Each print has a different mat color but the same frame color and thickness.

When we lived in California, this along with two other fish designs by the same artist were the color inspiration for our guest bathroom. Now they're in a bedroom. Each piece has the same color frame but different mat colors.