Tag Archives: luxury on less tips

Works for Me: Salon haircare products for cheap

For this week’s Works for Me Wednesday, I’m going to go ahead and disagree with Shannon at Rocks in my Dryer who says salon haircare products are a rip-off.

For people like me with extremely dry, unmanageable naturally curly hair, salon products can be a lifesaver (and a time saver). Many people don’t notice a difference between salon products and cheaper brands, but when I used Suave my hair was a big mess. I could barely get a comb through it, and it was so brittle it crunched when I brushed it. The salon products leave my hair healthier and easier to manage.

So how can I afford salon products on a frugal budget? It’s easier than you think.

I absolutely love Paul Mitchell Super Strong shampoo and conditioner, which runs about $18 a bottle for about 10 ounces in most salons. That’s $1.80 an ounce. Yikes.

I’ve never paid $18 for a little bottle. Many salons sell sets with 1 liter (34 ounces) each of shampoo and conditioner for $26 total. At that price, I’m paying 38 cents an ounce. Much better.

Just by buying in bulk, I’m already saving $1.42 an ounce. Then I stretch my savings even further by limiting my consumption.

My hair is extremely dry (I’m talking Sahara here), so it’s actually much healthier when I only wash it a couple times a week. My sister, on the other hand, has beautiful, easy-to-manage hair. I can’t tell you how jealous I was in high school when she woke up 10 minutes before we left, jumped in the shower, and let her hair air-dry beautifully while I was up 2 hours early fussing with my daily bad hair days. If she goes longer than 24 hours without washing it, though, it starts looking oily and limp. She has to wash her hair every day, but the trade-off is she can use the cheapest shampoo and still have good results.

Most people fall somewhere in between — you might not have camel-hair like mine that can go days without water, but you probably don’t need to wash every single day. Try washing it every other day. If it still looks great the second day (and it most likely will), see if you can make it another day. Don’t wash your hair every single day unless you discover you absolutely need to. Trust me, unless you’re one of those people with extremely oily hair, you’ll discover that cutting back on washing will make a world of difference in the overall health of your hair and reduce your haircare budget dramatically.

Even though I have very thick hair, I only use a tiny dollop of shampoo and conditioner. You’d be surprised how little you need to get a good lather and get your hair clean. Experiment with this, too. Remember, you can always add more if you’re not getting enough lather, but you can’t take it off your head and put it back into the bottle if you use too much.

Using these tricks, I’m able to stretch those 1liter bottles out to about 8 months. My combined cost for shampoo and conditioner is roughly 81 cents a week or $3.25 a month.

Side note: Because my husband washes his hair every day and doesn’t care what kind of shampoo he uses, we use separate shampoos. We buy generics or whatever is free at the drugstores for him.

For those of you with no-fuss hair, getting random brands for free or next to nothing at the drug stores is certainly a better deal. But for those of you like me, there is an alternative to cheap brands that won’t break your frugal budget.

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Being frugal doesn’t mean giving up the hobbies you love

In general, most frugal folks don’t like to admit that the frugal lifestyle deprives them of anything. We pride ourselves in the ability to find ways to get the things we want in life without spending too much money. There are certainly sacrifices involved, but for the most part, we’re able to find creative ways to live a full life on less money.

I’m trying to find balance between frugality and deprivation. It’s tricky to know the difference when you’re just starting out. But I think it’s crucial to balance the two, or you risk resenting your frugal lifestyle and giving up.

I love to quilt. I’ve been doing it to some degree since I was a teenager. It wasn’t until after I graduated college that I got my own sewing machine and started really getting into it. About a year ago, I gave up quilting for my frugal lifestyle.

You see, quilting is an expensive hobby. Compared to the high cost of beautiful handmade quilts, it’s relatively inexpensive. But fabric and thread and other notions can run pretty steep.

Over the weekend, I dug my two unfinished projects out of storage. I’ve put hours and hours of labor into these two quilt tops (one of which was sewn completely by hand), but I stopped short of quilting them a year ago because I deemed quilting a frivolous hobby that would have to wait until we had more income.

Well, now we have more income. I’ve decided that wasting my hard work and the money I already invested in the fabric is more wasteful than spending the extra money to finish them. All of that money and work, and we don’t even have the quilts to show for it?

So I headed to the fabric store and bought batting, quilting thread, and fabric for the backing. Even with a coupon for 40% off the fabric, I ended up spending $30. I’ll have to rework some of our unnecessary spending in our budget to make sure we don’t go over (with my husband’s blessing, of course). But now I have everything I need to complete two beautiful quilts that would cost hundreds in a store. Well, maybe not hundreds, but much more than I paid for supplies.

My point is this: being frugal doesn’t mean giving up the hobbies you love. Is there something that you really love to do that you’ve given up because it’s too expensive? See if there’s a creative way that you can reduce its costs or limit your spending on it without giving it up completely.

For me it was quilting. Rather than giving it up completely, I’ve decided to work it into my budget. Can I afford to spend $30 a month on quilting? Probably. But that seems a little excessive to me, so I’m compromising. I decided to attempt hand-quilting one of them. This will extend the amount of time it takes me to finish it. I’ll be able to enjoy this project longer if it takes me longer to finish.

Because I only quilt for a little while in the evenings, it will probably be another 3 months before I’m ready to invest in the materials to start a new project. Hopefully, I’ll enjoy hand-quilting more than machine quilting, and I’ll be able to extend the time it takes me to finish projects. That way I’ll always have something to work on, but I’ll spend less money.

My husband’s expensive hobby is movies. He would go to the theater once or twice a week and rent movies every day of the week in between if we could afford it. His solution is to rent old classic movies at the library for free. His university has a huge selection of quirky classics that he’s never seen before. We haven’t given up the theater completely, though. Every month or two, there’s something we really want to see, so we go to the last matinee on Sunday when tickets are cheapest. We still end up paying $10 for two tickets, but that’s a huge discount compared to the Friday night ticket price ($8.50 per ticket).

Maybe you love photography, but you don’t want to spend hundreds on equipment. Look into a used camera or get creative with the digital editing on your snapshots. Maybe your beloved hobby is scrapbooking, but you can’t afford all the materials. Limit yourself to a reasonable amount of scrapbook spending each month proportionate to your budget, and take a break when you reach your limit. It may take months to complete your projects, but that will just make them all the more satisfying when they’re done.

Above all, being frugal is about finding a way to live the lifestyle you want without living above your means. Get creative. Find a way to make it work. You might be surprised what you can work into your budget if you want it badly enough.

How do you make room in your budget for the hobby you love?

Make eating out the exception, not the rule

Who doesn’t love going out to dinner? Unfortunately, frequent dinners out are not part of a frugal lifestyle. It’s expensive and usually leads to weight gain.

Before I found a full-time job, we avoided restaurants for months. We just couldn’t afford to eat out. Only on very special occasions, like birthdays and anniversaries, did we opt to eat at a restaurant. The rest of the time, we cooked our meals at home.

When I was hired and we found ourselves with more wiggle room in the budget, we decided to cut ourselves some slack. However, I still didn’t want to make it a habit. In the past we ate at restaurants at least once a week. That was costing us over $100 a month!

Our compromise? We eat at restaurants only once a month. On the last weekend of the month, we look at our budget, and if we have room for a restaurant meal, we treat ourselves.

This weekend will be the third month that we’ve followed this rule. So far it’s worked out well, and it’s been a lot of fun. We can afford to fit $30 into our monthly budget for a meal out, and I enjoy it a lot more now that we don’t go out frequently. It’s a fun way to celebrate a successful month and a great incentive to stay on track to make sure there’s room in our budget for it.

We carefully select a local restaurant that we’ve never tried before instead of settling on a chain. In fact, I think we’re more likely to try new things now that we only go out once a month. We were more likely to be complacent about our restaurant choices when we ate out frequently. After all, why not make things easy and pick a chain when we know we’ll have the opportunity to try something new later? Now that we only get to pick one restaurant a month, we choose carefully and try something new.

It’s also a lot easier for us to choose an expensive restaurant if there’s room in the budget, because it’s only a once-a-month expense.

The best part? It’s a lot easier to manage a $30 restaurant budget than $100+.

Luxury on Less Tip: Sample fine wines without spending a fortune

My husband and I are wine enthusiasts. Don’t get me wrong, we’re not big drinkers. But we love to sample wines. With some meals, there’s nothing quite like a glass of wine to complement it.

When consumed in moderation, red wine is also proven to have a wide array of health benefits, including increased cardiovascular health, lower risk for certain cancers and obesity, decreased effects of aging, and even a longer lifespan.

It’s possible to find many fine wines for under $10 a bottle, but even $10 is too much to spend on something as frivolous as wine when you’re on a tight budget. We do occasionally use some of our entertainment budget to pick up a bottle for special occasions or date nights at home, but it’s a rare treat.

Our favorite way to sample wines is by visiting local wineries. With several scattered throughout most states, it’s possible there’s a full scale winery right in your backyard. You can use this winery directory to find one near you.

Most wineries offer 100% free tastings. You can sample various wines and learn about how to pair wines with meals and taste like a connoisseur. Many also offer free tours of the facility, which can be a fun way to spend an afternoon. They often have beautiful grounds where you can stroll or enjoy a picnic.

If you do find a wine that you particularly enjoy, you can pick it up with confidence since you’ve already tried it and you know you like it. If you don’t budget money for entertainment, or you’d rather not spend it on wine, then you can leave the winery after a lovely day with some knowledge about fine wine without spending a penny.

If there isn’t a winery near you, another option is to host a wine tasting party. Everyone chips in a bottle, so everybody can try a little taste of a wide assortment of wines. It’s a classy way to spend an evening with friends without busting your budget. Cheers!

Luxury on Less Tip: Porterhouse steaks for two

When we see Porterhouse steaks on sale for under $10, we usually buy at least two and freeze them.

One Porterhouse steak easily feeds two people. We cut the NY strip steak away from the filet mignon and cook them separately. I usually eat the filet, and my husband eats the larger strip steak.

They make wonderful, elegant at-home meals for date nights at a fraction of the cost of eating out at an expensive steakhouse. And they’re just as delicious.

Today we bought two Porterhouse steaks for $5.60 a pound. Both filets and New York strip steaks typically cost at least $12 to $15 each at a steakhouse … sometimes a lot more depending on how fancy the place is. At $5.60 a pound, we’re getting two steaks for under $3 each! You can’t beat that price, and it’s such a nice treat to have a fancy steakhouse meal at home.

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