Comments on: 24 Hours, 24 Ways We Save Money

By: Trent

Trent — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 12:42:09 +0000

The comments here are hilarious.

First of all, this is not an hour-by-hour accounting of my life. It’s an example to show how frugality flows through the things my family does on a daily basis.

Second, if you bothered to think about the schedule for more than a few seconds, the above comment would be stunningly obvious. Do you believe I spent an hour taking a shower?

The reality of the matter is that I work from home, an eight hour day, but my wife commutes. I use the time she’s commuting to do a lot of household chores so that when the kids are home, family time is the focus – dishes are done, the dinner table is set, and often supper is at least somewhat near done. That means I do things like grocery shopping, showering, doing dishes, and meal preparation when my wife’s not at home. That’s called having respect for your wife and your family, not the nonsense spouted by the comment above.

By: steve

steve — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 11:45:58 +0000

Great article. Shows that life is going to be very different for us in the coming years. But all bets are off if the predictions of ten dollar a gallon gas comes true. No matter how frugal you can be, life will turn into a struggle just to survive.

By: bh

bh — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 00:14:43 +0000

Lots of neat ideas here. I’m interested in how long you spend washing the cloth diapers prior to (I presume) running them through the washer? Having an infant of my own and knowing how much time I spend hand-washing stains out of bibs and clothes, I don’t image that cloth diapers get clean too easily…

By: FDR

FDR — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 22:37:40 +0000

LMFAO. Going grocery shopping in the afternoon and then taking a shower while your wife works her ass off at work and the kids are in daycare. You are a sorry excuse for a man.

By: Bill

Bill — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 16:42:48 +0000

Low flow showerheads?

All showerheads have been low flow for a number of years now.

By: sara l

sara l — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 06:17:35 +0000

The beauty of personal finance is that it’s personal. There are overarching principals that appy to all (ie spend less than you make), but the idea is to find what works best for your life.

There were lots of comments that I found to be rude, but my question for comment 46 is how feasible is carrying two kids on a bike seat through snow and ice?

Trent- thanks for the openness and sharing the wide variety of things that are working for your family.

Also, I’m not the same person in comment 51.

By: Katie

Katie — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 03:28:01 +0000

Why the attacks on Trent for having his kids in day-care? That is a choice between him, his wife and the children.If the tables were turned and Trent was working full time outside of the house and his wife were home, I bet many readers would think Trent was being anti-feminist if he asked her to watch the kids too. Furthermore, the suggestion that his wife take a part-time job instead of a full-time job is a bit ridiculous. Full-time jobs have much better benefits, and it is hard to pursue a career part-time in some fields and at some companies. Clearly he and his wife have figured this out, stop harassing them!

By: Artdogs

Artdogs — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 16:59:44 +0000

Great post, Trent.

sorry it’s turned into open season on your life!

By: Baker

Baker — Sat, 31 May 2008 00:14:42 +0000

As far as the windows go don’t any of you have windows with the safety catch. Its a little thing that pops out of the frame so the window can only be opens a few inches. Also if the theif really wants to get in you think he would hesitate to just break your window? Last for about $30 you can buy a quick pick and after a few hours of practice be able to pick an average door lock in under a minute. Your house is not secure and cracking a few windows won’t make a difference.

Rhonda, I don’t know where you live but I’m just outside Chicago and our water and sewage bill runs about $6 per thousand gallons. Our highest water usage ever was 4.4 thousand gallons in a month for a huge $24 water bill. We have a old toilet and about the highest flow shower head I could find. Sorry but I do not feel clean at all after using low flow heads. I can only assume water in iowa is equally as cheap

By: HappyGirl2000

HappyGirl2000 — Fri, 30 May 2008 21:09:52 +0000

What’s up with all the criticism/judgement on Trent’s kids being in daycare or not? He writes a website that GIVES us all FREE tips and help, and all you can do is jump on him for a lifestyle choice he and his wife made? He’s not telling people how they HAVE TO spend their money or time, he’s offering us ideas from which we can pick and choose to help ourselves. His parenting choices are really none of your beeswax, so stop with the holier-than-thou carping already!

By: Mister E

Mister E — Fri, 30 May 2008 16:34:08 +0000

$1/person is pretty good. I can usually get a meal done for $2 or so per person but I’m not sure what I could do to lower that much.

By: Rob Madrid

Rob Madrid — Thu, 29 May 2008 22:09:11 +0000

Very interesting, always wondered how you spend your evenings if you didn’t have TV. When we moved over here to Europe we lasted about a week without a TV. As well I surf the web almost more than I watch TV.

By: Dasha

Dasha — Thu, 29 May 2008 22:05:15 +0000

How nutritious is your $1 meal? Are we talking beans/rice/veggies? Even if you grew your own it wouldn’t be that cheap. Are you drinking plain water? If not, I’m sure your homemade wine also cost. Great idea to cook at home with wholesome ingredients, but $1 is not realistic.

By: L

Thu, 29 May 2008 17:37:01 +0000

Just wanted to say kudos to your wife for pumping for so long. It is hard to stick with pumping and keep your milk supply up with a baby in daycare (ie: baby can’t regulate your milk supply himself, a machine does it).

It’s definitely a commitment – she should be proud of herself!

By: Sharon

Sharon — Thu, 29 May 2008 15:32:28 +0000

I love this blog and I read it every day, but I must be honest and say I was very surprised to hear about a breastfeeding child being in day care or about children being day care for so many hours a day. I also work at home, as an editor, but I work part time. My husband works full time. That way we don’t require day care. I work in the evenings, on weekends, when they are napping or on a playdate, etc. If I worked more, my earnings would be offset by what I paid out in day care. Consider this, if you work less, you also pay less in day care. It’s not permanent. You can always go back to full time when the kids are older. I personally have a lsw degree and do plan on going back to more substantial work later on. In the mean time, you save money on day care and get the advantage of being with your kids more. Just a thought. Thanks for the great money saving ideas!

By: Larry

Larry — Thu, 29 May 2008 10:43:59 +0000

Another great post. I love the creative ideas to save money.

By: Rhonda Hubert

Rhonda Hubert — Thu, 29 May 2008 06:59:54 +0000

I noticed that your shower was listed as ‘nice’ – does that equate to ‘long’? To be frugal (not to mention being able to afford the water bills) we attempt to limit our showers to 4 minutes each as we have 6 adults in the house and water is extremely expensive. Is it cheap in Iowa?

By: Khurram Farooq

Khurram Farooq — Thu, 29 May 2008 04:55:13 +0000

Trent,

I don’t understand this:
You have breakfast at 6am, lunch at 12pm, and supper at 5pm, and you go to bed after 11pm. Don’t you feel hungry again at night?

I’m asking specifically because here in Pakistan, our usual routine is breakfast at 8am, lunch at 2pm, dinner at 10pm, and sleeping around 12am.

By: Brian

Brian — Thu, 29 May 2008 00:55:48 +0000

Calling Trent a hypocrite is absurd. The whole point of being frugal is so you have enough money to spend on what you want. Right now at this point in his life, day care is one thing he wants to spend money on. He has mentioned several times the back-and-forth decisions over it, and also said that they’re not going to use day care as a permanent solution for all of their children.

By: Joel Falconer

Joel Falconer — Wed, 28 May 2008 23:53:40 +0000

Wow. The ignorance from those condemning Trent’s use of a daycare is ridiculous. Have you got any concept of reality at all, or what it takes for some of us to earn a living and keep a roof over our head?

My guess is that you’re housewives whose husbands go to work and look after your every need while you keep the kids at home, but the reality is that in most families, both parents need to work. What are they meant to do with the kids?

And if you’d bothered to read, once the family is at home instead of plopping in front of the television – which I’m sure is your idea of evening entertainment – they spend quality time together.

Sounds like a pretty damn good system to me, for living with the pressures of modern life and still having time for family.