Frugal Experience (your younger days)...

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Heloise
Posts: 835
Joined: Sat Dec 17, 2016 12:11 pm

Frugal Experience (your younger days)...

Post by Heloise »

I was giving thought to this as of this morning... as to who else had first-hand expertise doing frugal things way back when. For instance...

- I remember my mom teaching me how to sew buttons on, and I would have been all of about 8 or 9.

- Also remember being taught how to properly dry and handle clean dishes. Placing silverware in drawer while still holding onto it inside/within the tea-towel.

- Learning how to stuff a turkey.

- Making simple and easy meals.

- Folding and changing cloth diapers (baby siblings, baby cousins, general babysitting).

- Making homemade baby food and formula. My mom bought nothing in the way of already/pre-made things. Everything was prepared from scratch in our home.

- How to wash a load of laundry and hang it to dry (clothesline).

- Helping with canning.

- How to fold towels and things correctly.

Would love to hear about your frugal experience or expertise related to (way back when, when you were younger)!
ChristmasTrees
Posts: 3983
Joined: Fri Aug 28, 2015 12:53 am

Re: Frugal Experience (your younger days)...

Post by ChristmasTrees »

My mother taught me so many things. She was a depression kid...so nothing was ever wasted. We had two clothes lines...one inside one in the basement. We did also had a dryer.
All of our meals and snacks were homemade. I learned how to make meals really stretch when unexpected company showed up near dinner time.
We learned how to sew and mend things. My Dad taught us how to repair things.
We all helped (and learned) making and canning jam.
All such useful skills that I passed along to my son and niece (who we raised)..and am now teaching to my grandaughters.
rinty
Posts: 1919
Joined: Fri Aug 28, 2015 3:54 am

Re: Frugal Experience (your younger days)...

Post by rinty »

Hmmm,

My frugal experience from my younger days are MORE actual good financial role models rather than June Cleaver/Little House on the Prairie sort of "frugal hair shirt trivia".

My father was chronically ill meaning DM had to work ......A LOT. He died in Canada 1972 so ,trust me, we also lived by the lower income standards of the time. Of course we cooked from scratch, what else would we have eaten. Of course we line dried, how else would you pay the electricity bill. DM worked 2 jobs when things were particularly hard. As a young widow with 2 children she worked. We helped at home , played rubber chicken S T R E T C H I N G the food budget, wanted less, were careful with what we did have. DM work meant we had all we needed and we remember our childhood happily, we went on school trips and it was all down to DM 's Work Ethic.

As a mother with 5 kids, youngest very disabled, did I work ? I certainly did. Partly for my own self esteem and mental health frankly ( caring for a disabled child is no picnic ) I could only work in school time when he wasn't home. Living in the Real World meant my earning got us through a redundancy with DH when he was 55, and prior to that my earning meant we had a decent savings plan and a nice home without working my DH into the ground.

But , the BEST thing I would say, is when my teen DD was asked, when careers/jobs were being dicussed............." Who do you know who would do their job if they weren't being paid ? " and she said ..........My Mother.

And I am so proud of that.

Go back and that is down to my mothers work ethic. Go back another generation. My DGM worked as a seamstress at home to supplement the family income. in her 60s she moved into house renovation " buying and flipping " houses. We scraped wallpaper and painted woodwork alongside her after school.

My Great grandmother worked in a paint factory in northern England in the early 1900s. She was widowed in WW1. She was a TINY woman with little education who worked like a slave but she WORKED.

My best frugal experience is definately that its a Work Ethic that will will be the best thing you hand on to your children rather than 1,000 way to use a corn cob. A very important thing to pass on to her daughters especially.
Jens_Cats
Posts: 465
Joined: Sun Aug 30, 2015 1:41 pm
Location: Jefferson County, WV

Re: Frugal Experience (your younger days)...

Post by Jens_Cats »

For me, it was always buy quality, even if you have to pay more for it. Things in our houses lasted FOREVER. I STILL have furniture and art and such from when I was growing up.

I also learned my work ethic from my mom. Unfortunately, from my experience, that doesn't mean diddly in today's work world. I did everything right when I was working full time, but I STILL got kicked in the face. Hard. All the time, which is why I'm not going back to work full time, ever, if I can avoid it. :( That said, I have not let go of that good work ethic, because it is the right way to be.

Also, not throwing things away if they are still good/working or can be repaired or reused.

Jen M, WV
Sage Alley: My green/simple living blog:
http://sagealley.blogspot.com
jackie26us
Posts: 84
Joined: Fri Aug 28, 2015 5:38 am

Re: Frugal Experience (your younger days)...

Post by jackie26us »

My family has always been frugal. We grew up chopping and stacking wood for winter as we only had a wood stove for heat . My parents had 5 kids so they couldn't afford a furnace. They bought their house as a fixer upper and completely renovated it over time. It didn't have plumbing when they bought it. They did it themselves over time.

As a kid we hand washed dishes, hung clothes to dry, had a huge vegetable garden. We learned how to fix things and make them last. Some years (didn't find out until I out of the house) my lost a job and we didn't have money for meat. So Dad hunted so we usually had venison or rabbit. We did have horses and animals so there were sacrifices to have these like not eating out.

DH's family is frugal and always has been. They don't make much money so always learned how to fix things. DH learned at age 7 how to take a vehicle apart and rebuild it. He learned carpentry, how to garden and most importantly auto repair.

As others have said we both learned to have a great work ethic. DH was out of work before a couple years ago. He ended up making more money doing side jobs for people than he did when he worked for someone else.
Shelsmiles
Posts: 265
Joined: Mon Aug 31, 2015 9:19 am

Re: Frugal Experience (your younger days)...

Post by Shelsmiles »

Yes. :)

Picking crab apples from neighborhood trees (with permission) and hauling them home in old Pillowcases so momma could make enough jelly to have some for us and some to sell

Cutting up old discarded clothes into rags and stuffing them into bags to sell to the auto shops etc but making sure to cut off and save all the good zippers and buttons to reuse

Collecting cans to turn in for money

Helping momma take apart a piece of her old clothing with a seam ripper so she could reuse the fabric to make clothes for me

Wow. I haven't thought about a lot of those things in a real long time.
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