Meaningful, But Frugal Gifts for Teachers

It was a scrapbook to remember, organized by a few parents as a going-away gift for a beloved early-childhood teacher. Each family was given a blank page from an album, with instructions to fill the empty space with photos, recipes or decorations.

When the individual pages came together, the scrapbook was filled with irreplaceable records of shared moments in the classroom, dance festivals and other school events. As a bonus, families also contributed cash for a beautiful silver candle set.

There are many ways to select and package holiday and year-end presents for educators and classroom assistants. At one area school, PTA members collect small contributions from parents and compile the funds to provide a substantial gift certificate or cash gift for each teacher, with each family signing the card.

At my house, my children have enjoyed making necklaces, pictures and cards for their teachers. From their enthusiasm, I've learned the importance of incorporating children into the gift process for teachers. Kids also enjoy customizing calendars, T-shirts, mugs or canvas bags as gifts for their favorite teachers.

More ideas, including a wide range of activities for the child to do alone or with parents, are posted on www.familyfun.com. These projects can involve the entire class or a single family.

Homemade gift projects include personalized calendars that are printed from your home computer, with children drawing pictures and graphics. Other gift ideas include a mini-garden, decorated trays, a handmade storybook or scrapbook, a custom collage on a clipboard, poems and letters.

The classroom cookbook is one of my favorite ideas. This year in my son's English class, each student wrote down a favorite recipe and filled the page with a story and an illustration about that food item. My son contributed a story about the hamburgers our family had prepared on the grill and consumed during the power outage following Hurricane Katrina.

Although it was a classroom assignment, the project -- and a gift certificate to the teacher's favorite restaurant -- would have been an ideal holiday present. I'm keeping it on my file for next year.

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Posts I liked Last Week

As always, there were many terrific posts in the world of personal finance, especially at pfblogs.org, my favorite aggregate. Here's a roundup of a few of the pieces that caught my eye.

Real Estate Bloggers has a very informative piece about the housing bust and the boom in rental rates.

Likewise, on a similar note, Blunt Money has a thoughtful piece about when it makes more sense to rent.

Single Ma has a fun piece about her holiday spending tally and her efforts and plans to contain seasonal spending.

I enjoyed The Simple Dollar's post about building a better blog and developing a reader profile.

Dumb Little Man featured a super piece about great deals at university and government surplus outlets.

The Mighty Bargain Hunter featured a good piece on crazy Black Friday promotions and strategies.
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Tightwad Holiday Gifts

Holiday shopping is subdued, but the National Retail Federation(NRF), is still forecasting holiday shopping spending levels of $457.4 billion, a 5 percent increase from holiday sales of $435.6 billion in 2005.

What if you don't want to spend a lot? This MSN article has great tips on Tightwad Holiday plans.




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Frugal Wine Report: Cheap Bubbles from WSJ

With price tags of $130 to $190 a bottle, expensive bubbly wines from the Champagne region are largely wasted on me. I prefer to spend much less for sparkly wines (under $20 a bottle), which was why I found the Dow Jones Sparkly Wine Index so helpful in today's Wall Street Journal.

Unlike the eye-popping, triple-digit prices for sparkling wines from France, the American Bubbly versions reviewed by WSJ ranged from $13.99 to $29.99, with most priced under $20 a bottle.

In fact, the Best Value honors went to a $13.99 bottle from Gruet Winery: "dry austerity and intensity, good tartness and bracing tastes," according to the DJ Wine Index.

Best Taste honors went to Scharffenberger Cellars ($15.99):

Classy, with true, clean tastes of minerals, toast and ripe grapefruit. Nutty, with a slightly buttery finish that's quite luscious and lasts. --WSJ

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Chasing the Prince of Profits in Blogsphere: Ideas from Dumb Little Man

I'm not really blogging for dollars. It's fun; it's ego; it's informative.

Basically, blogging has become an addictive hobby. But I have a friend, who began knitting as a hobby and has found a way to make a few bucks from her part-time passion. (She knits killer suits that look like some Chanel couture creation that Linda Evangelista* could wear in Vogue magazine. My friend also teaches classes to other would-be knitters.)

*(FYI Linda E. is my favorite supermodel. Evangelista is another bottom-line girl. She was famously quoted as saying that she does not wake up in the morning for less than $15,000 a day.)


So here's my bottom-line assessment of my blogging obession: Do it for fun, but try to make it pay! I've thought about offering editing services in exchange for small fees or some kind of ad barter. Or maybe I could peddle print articles about my so-called life as a blogger to big-ticket, big budget magazines.

For other ideas, I turned to Dumb Little Man, who has recently offered some great lists about money-making ideas and other tips on writing:


1. 50 tools for improving writing. This is a link I've used before my Dumb Litte Man introduction. I teach a journalism class to high school students and this list has great tips for writing.

2. This is a great DLM list, featuring 40-plus ways to make money on the Internet. I have been systematically going through his various ideas.

3. Then Dumb Litte Man followed up with another list of money making tips.




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My Interview at Money Blogger Podcast

Scott at Money Blogger Podcast was kind enough to interview me for his latest broadcast. I've enjoyed listening to past interviews in the series and I feel fortunate to be included.

I had so much fun chatting with him about personal finance, the world of blogging and frugal living. I appreciated his questions about my dual life as a newspaper columnist and my other life as a blogger. The opening music on his podcasts is very cool; Scott asks great questions, including some from other bloggers like Queer Cents.

Thanks to Scott for providing the space and to Flexo (Consumerism Commentary) and Mapgirl for mentioning the interview on their blogs.

I also appreciate the mention from A Penny Saved (who supplied a great question) and anyone else who took note on their blog.
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Tips from Adam Sandler's Bulk Shopping Trip

This Us Weekly magazine photo of Adam Sandler's recent bulk shopping trip made me think hard about some of the benefits of bulk shopping. Purchasing large quantities of jumbo-sized products represents a mixed bag of savings.

Sandler's shopping back included:

"family-sized packages of Charmin, Brawny paper towels, Coke, Diet Coke and Diet Dr. Pepper at Ralphs in L.A. Nov. 11."
--source: Us Weekly

Stocking up on jumbo packages of paper goods is a smart move because a) potential cost-savings and b) huge supplies of non-perishables have a long shelf life. My best frugal friend Melisa has converted a linen closet and a large pantry into a mini-family warehouse for non perishable sale items.

But based on my own shopping experiences and Adam Sandler's shopping cart, I've developed these rules for bulk shopping.


1) Skip the national brands: Sandler's purchases -- clearly visible in the photo -- consist of many name brand items. Unless there's a super cheap sale, I usually skip the name brands. Many so-called private label, store-brand or generic products are produced in the same factories as the big-ticket name-brand version. The only difference: you're not paying more for celebrity endorsements and national campaigns.

2. Buy large quanitites: I like Sandler's jumbo shopping binge. Save time, gas and money, by scooping up lots of products at one time.

3. Watch per-unit costs. Not every jumbo package represents the best deal. Sometimes a smaller package offers the biggest money-saving option. Do the math before stocking up on the jumbo bundles.


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Holiday Stain Removal Kit

Our dog Scruffy danced on the rain on our balcony. He's a happy puppy and we're happy just watching him until we let him inside. His muddy paws leave prints on our grey carpet.

By trial and error, we've found an easy mud carpet removal tip: Wait, let it dry; then vacuum. When we immediately tried to wipe up the wet mud, our efforts were only counter-productive: The mud just seeps deeper into the carpet pile. After vacuuming, remove remaining dirt with a bit of clear packing tape.

This easy trick for mud removal is only one of a few holiday stain removal tips featured in a recent issue of Woman's World magazine.

Here are a few others:

1. Wine Stain on carpet: Pour a bit of cold water the stain. Apply a paste of three-parts baking soda/one part water to the stain. Let it dry and then vacuum up the dried paste and stain.

2. Lipstick marks on collars or shirts: Put a towel under the stain and then blot up the lipstick with a babywipe.

3. Cranberry stain on napkins: Get out a fresh lemon and a bit of salt. Squeeze fresh juice from the lemon onto the stain. Pour salt onto the stain. Rinse the napkin with cold water when the stain fades.

4. Gravy stains on tableloths and napkins: Lather up the fabric stain with shaving cream. Let the lather remain overnight. Next morning: Use a cold water rinse. Hint: the alcohol in shaving cream banishes the gravy stain.
Source: Woman's World

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Furniture Tips from the Shop Cop

I'm finally back after an extended bit of travel for a High School class reunion in New Jersey and a family Thanksgiving gathering in the Orlando area of Florida...In this post, I offer insights from an undercover shopper.

Educated in business school and groomed on the trading floor of a bank, Jennifer Litwin never planned to get into the furniture business. But after a few disastrous shopping trips for home furniture, Litwin took a furniture course at Sotheby's and changed her career. Known as the ''shop cop,'' Litwin, an author and a frequent national television guest, has great advice for shoppers during the holiday season. Litwin reviews furniture on behalf of Consumers Digest and has written a book called The Best Furniture Buying Tips Ever based on her undercover shopping research.

During a typical outing, Litwin has queried sales people about the difference between a $2,000 and $5,000 piece of furniture. She found that the sales staff at some of the top home-store chains provided answers that were either wrong or misleading. She was also troubled by deceptive product labels. In 2002, the U.S. government eased standards on how furniture could be labeled and manufactured. The United States also is importing more furniture from China and other foreign sources that operate with different production standards. As a result, Litwin has found products made from cheaper woods or particle board, but sporting labels of expensive woods such as cherry or oak.

Before you write the check or hand over your credit card, it's important to understand each store's written warranty and return policy. For example, Apple and Circuit City stores have a 14-day return policy for some merchandise. Pier One has set a Jan. 31 deadline for merchandise purchased after Oct. 29.

Crate and Barrel and Target have a 90-day cash back policy but will grant store credit after the initial period. There is no return deadline at Nordstrom and Costco.

Some stores charge re-stocking fees as high as 15 percent to 20 percent of the original purchase. Rooms to Go, for example, charges a 20 percent re-stocking fee, Litwin said. Re-stocking fees typically apply to furniture, bedding and electronic equipment. Stores have also become increasingly reluctant to accept bedding and jewelry as gift return items, Litwin said.


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Tip Tues: Alternative Uses For Cranberries

My Thanksgiving memories are stained with cranberry sauce. But beyond turkey platters and festive holiday meals, there are many alternative uses for cranberries. From home-made lip gloss to decorative touches, cranberries have multiple uses.

The Miami Skin Institute, for example, recommends cranberries for exfoliating the skin, according to the Nov. 20 issue of First magazine.

Here's a recipe for creating a lip gloss that will exfoliate dead skin from your lips:

1. Take 10 cranberries, 1 teaspoon of honey and 1 tablespoon of almond oil and put them in the microwave for two minutes.
2. Mash and stir up the mix
3. Cool down the mixture then use a fine sieve to strain the goop.
4. Pour the mixture into a small container.
5. Apply on lips as needed.

Here are other uses for cranberries:

1. Aromatherapy: Place cranberries around a burning candle in a bowl filled with water. This mixture is appealing to the eyes and the nose. Replace the berries after two weeks. Use common sense with the burning candle.

Source: First

2. Medicinal: Many alternative medical sources tout cranberry juice as an excellent treatment and/or prevention of urinary tract infections (UTI). Here's a link to a University of Pittsburgh report about cranberries and UTI.

3. Salad dressing. Whip up a 1/2 cup of cranberry sauce (jellied version) with 1/3 cup of red wine vinegar and 2 tablespoons of water.

4. Sandwich spread: Mix together two tablespoons of mayonnaise and three tablespons of cranberry sauce.

source: Woman's World 11/21/06

Here is a link to cranberry recipes from Epicurean.com

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My Favorite Posts From Last Week

Here are a few of my favorite posts featured on other blogs last week.

Divorce to Financial Freedom has a cute piece about holiday shopping budgets, filled with excellent advice.

Wedding Excess (in honor of TomKat's nuptials) is on the agenda at Double Income No Kids.

All Financial Matters has an informative piece about organic food budgets, with throughtful replies from readers.

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My Stuffed Couch: A Thrift Store Find

After carrying a heavy, feather-stuffed couch to my apartment, the delivery men looked out our window and laughed when they spotted an ocean-front tower. The building was quite familiar. That’s because the furniture crew had recently picked up a couch from that ocean-front building and days later crew delivered the same couch to my home.

The previous owners — according to a second-hand account — bought the couch, were allergic to the feathers and promptly donated the item to the thrift store. Spotting the piece during a shopping trip, my husband Avi spent $200 for an almost-new couch that was perhaps worth thousands.

For my husband, an interior designer, thrift shopping is a passion and a profession. The walls of my home are decorated with second-hand paintings; our living space is lit by lamps from thrift stores and our chairs provide second-hand comfort.

Diverse Crowd of Shoppers

And we’re not alone. Driven by frugality, creativity or community spirit, the pool of thrift-store shoppers is as diverse as the furniture and knick-knacks stocked on store shelves.

Shoppers range “from interior designers to the indigent and everyone in between. They approach decorating with fun and generosity,” said Heather Klinker, founder of Grubstake, an organization and thrift store that supports underprivileged families, especially women and children.

The $18,000 Discount


Grubstake offers an unusual showroom of value. Past merchandise includes armoires, tables, sofas and chairs that sell for an average price of $150 to $200. On the higher end, recent sales included a black lacquered Roche-Bobois dining room table and chairs set, featuring inlaid wood base and a glass table top. Grubstake was selling the set for $2,000, which is far below the original $20,000 ticket price.


Deals for a Dollar

Prices drop still lower at the end of every month, when Klinker literally cleans house with a bargain sale. To make room for new donations, most items tables, lamps and other merchandise are priced at $1.

At many thrift stores, merchandise is often scooped up quickly by antique dealers and interior designers. Almost daily, professional shoppers begin their hunt early and are known to make purchases quickly after delivery trucks arrive with donated items, according to several thrift store managers in South Florida. (The merchandise is typically sold as antiques in a prettier setting and a higher price.)

“We have a lot of dealers who come here,” said Terry Mack, store manager of the Douglas Gardens Thrift Store in Miami. “Frequency is the key.”

Tips for Shoppers

To get the most mileage out of thrift stores, he recommends that consumers calculate any cost of reupholstering or refinishing second-hand furniture. It also helps to keep an open mind and to explore alternative uses and placements of furniture in the home.

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Life Lesson from Joe Girardi, NL Manager of the Year

In money and life, vindication is sweet, but a long-term view is even better. That's the snapshot of Joe Girardi, National League Manager of the Year.

Girardi received that honor today from the Baseball Writers Association of America and it's a sweet tonic after he was rudely booted from his position by the cranky owners of the Florida Marlins. (Can you hear me booing management from Miami!!!)

The Florida Marlins did not believe Joe Girardi was the right person to continue as their manager after his performance in 2006. But the Baseball Writers Association of America felt that no one in the National League did a better job than Girardi and named him its manager of the year yesterday. Source: New York Times

In the face of a job loss, Girardi had a healthy outlook that applies to financial, professional and personal difficulties:

“We just move on, and there will be bigger and better things ahead of us,” Girardi said in a published report today.

Here's the link to the complete text of a New York Times sports article.

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Diva without Dollars: 10 Goofs from my 20s

An article about retirement and savings strategies for the 20-something crowd in the Wall Street Journal has made me think about mistakes I made when I was younger.

Here's my list of errors

1. Too many restaurant meals on credit

2. Waited too long to join my company's stock sharing plan. (The public shares had already spiked dramatically before I came on board.)

3. Too careless with credit cards and other debt.

4. Too many weekly hair and nail appointments.

5. Loans against my 401K account.

6. Not putting enough money in the 401k plan

7. Going to Paris & Florence when I was unemployed. (HA!)

8. Spending a book advance that never arrived. (I was a Dim Light in the Big City)

9. Too many hours in the Ann Taylor Loft.

10. Buying holiday presents for big bucks at the last minute.

This snippet of advice from the Wall Street Journal is excellent:

401(K) BASICS

• Max out: Contribute enough to capture your employer's maximum matching contribution.
• Allocate: People in their 20s should generally have at least 70% of their account in stocks. You have a long time to save; don't fret about market volatility.
• Don't default: Avoid your plan's default option if it's a money-market or stable-value fund. The low returns won't serve you well over time. source: WSJ

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Web Pages That Suck.com

Want to make more money on your site?

There's help: Web Pages That Suck.com is the actual name of a website featured in a New York Times Article: How to make your web site sing.

Web Pages That Suck provides links to websites that are hard on the eye or the mind and the features include the "Daily Sucker." It is a very informative and entertaining site.

A site must have addictive content, said Vincent Flanders, a Web design consultant in the Seattle area who is the creator of Webpagesthatsuck.com, a site that analyzes why some pages do not work. “People must be willing to crawl through a sewer for it. --from the New York Times

Personally, when it comes to blogs, I am especially fond of the content and design of Millionaire Artist and Dumb Little Man. Those sites sing to me.

But I've also picked up a few pointers from the New York Times piece and the sucky website site.

1. The front page counts most.
The first screen view is important. In newspapers, it's called above the fold (that top half of the front page). Not everyone scrolls down to the lower half of the screen.

Studies by Mr. Nielsen’s company, the Nielsen Norman Group, an Internet design firm in Fremont, Calif., show that only 50 percent of Web visitors scroll down the screen to see what lies below the visible part on their PC monitor.--NYT

2. Grammar is important.

3. Get rid of unnecessary items: Too many bells and whistles can be a turnoff.

4. Avoid "Mystery Meat Navigation," which are links that don't tell the reader where they are going. Like this. (Hint: it's a link to an article about mystery meat links.)

5. Don't be long winded. And on that note. I'm signing off.

Here are other links to articles about blogging and money that I found helpful.

1.Blogging for customers from Forbes

2.40 ways to make money on the Internet from Dumb Little man

3.7 ways to make the most of your blog from Folksonomy, which was featured on Cyberjournalist.net.

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Imelda Marcos, Shoe Diva, Shops in Flea Markets and Gets a Job!!

Imelda Marcos has hit the flea market circuit and she's working for a living. The former diamond and shoe Diva Dictatoress has launched a new line of jewelry made from flea market finds and assorted cast-off materials, according to various news accounts.

She's also fashioned her accessory and jewelery line from her old clothes (vintage stuff!!) and newer items. Imelda -- the former first lady of the Phillippines -- uses "a glue gun, scissors or pliers," to create her pieces, according to her daughter.

"The Imelda Collection," will makes its debut on November 18. The initial designs do not feature shoes, but footwear may be in the future. And the prices range from $20 to $100. Hey maybe she'll make a line for Target, Kmart or Walmart.

Here are links to the ABC news feature about Imelda Marcus making jewelry from flea market finds and an AP story.

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Carnival of Real Estate Investing

The Landlord Blog has put together a helpful string of posts about the real estate market in the Carnival of Real Estate Investing.

The selection of articles includes tips for getting the greatest real estateinvestment bang from Craigs List, the value of investment mentors, and a post about insanity & the mortgage market.

I'm pleased to be included on that menu. Thank You Landlord Blog.

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Congress Eyes More College Aid: WSJ

Led by Rep. Nancy Pelosi, frontrunner for new House Speaker, the new Congressional leadership has made affordable college education as a top priority, according to a piece by Anne Marie Chaker in today's Wall Street Journal.

The agenda is likely to include: cuts in student loan rates, more aid for low-income families and a tuition tax credit for parents, including middle and upper-middle class wage earners.

Among the measures Democrats have proposed is halving the interest rate on some federal student loans, which could save students thousands of dollars over the term of their loans. Parents could benefit from a proposal to allow tax deductions for tuition paid by families earning up to $160,000 a year. And lower-income families could get added help from a possible expansion of the federal Pell Grant program. --WSJ

Here's the link to the complete article, which has some interesting points about how the program will be funded and what kind of bi-partisan support will exist.

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Festival of Frugality with Cartoons!!!!

The latest Festival of Frugality is very festive. Experiments in Finance has put together a sharp-looking line-up, complete with cute cartoons, sub-divisions and editor's choice citations.

What a great read! I'm honored to be in the pack. Check out cheap dates, frugal hair cuts, New York City on a Budget and other great posts.

Congrats to Experiments in Finance for hosting such a great round.


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Can We Not Swap Gifts?

Is it possible to halt the holiday gift cycle with friends? and still be polite? and still keep your friends? Try these words: "The greatest gift we can give each other is the gift or our friendship. So let's just go out for coffee instead." That's a gift detour suggested by Mark Victor Hansen,(a Chicken Soup for the Soul co-author) in a recent issue of Woman's World.

Too often, we get caught in a cycle of giving-way-more than we can afford, Hansen said. It's tit-for-tat, presents-by-rote. Keep more of your money and keep your friends out of long merchandise-return lines. Consider thoughtful and frugal presents of time, an afternoon over hot lattes or other creative gifts.


My other favorite frugal gift ideas:

1) Make a scrapook for someone.
2) Fill a beautiful vase (from a thrift store) with pretty flowers.
3) Create a fun basket filled with favorite treats from dollar stores, clearance aisles of Marshall's/Ross/Target, gourmet stores or thrift stores (for unusual one-of-a-kind items.
4) Cook a special lunch.

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