Fulltime Mama My name is Elizabeth, and I am the happy wife of ten years to Fabio and fulltime mama to four beautiful children: Joshua-9, Dominique 7, Israel- almost 5, Johann-3 and expecting a new baby in April 2012! We are currently living in Brazil as missionaries and life never ceases to be an adventure!!! I love motherhood with a passion and am passionate about providing a place here at MamaKnowsBest where mothers can learn, grow, and share ... pooling the wisdom of many into one big jackpot for mothers. View all articles | Contact author

Ways to Save (and Be Healthy)

*Buy foods as close to possible in the way they were originally made .For example, whole chicken rather than boneless, skinless chicken breast, or dried beans rather than canned. It is much cheaper to buy that way, and healthier too!

*Cook from scratch instead of buying packaged products. Again, besides being cheaper, it is much better for you!  It is not difficult to learn to make simple foods from scratch, and there are a multitude of recipes for free online!

*Grocery shop at Aldi, but be sure to be a smart shopper and compare prices so that you are sure not to get hood-winked!  There are a few items that are cheaper at other places. ;)

*Substitute ground turkey for ground beef in your recipes. It is usually cheaper than ground beef (although turkey has gone up lately), and in most cases, it is very difficult to tell the difference. I have served dishes with ground turkey even to picky company and they were not able to tell the difference. (I asked them after the fact!)

*Remember these five foods: potatoes, beans, rice, eggs, tuna.  In our particularly lean times, we have invented hundreds of meals using these simple foods. They are extremely versatile, as well economical, and fairly nutritious too. :)

*If you are into healthy food, look into buying from a local food co-op. We buy our dried beans, whole oats, brown rice, wheat berries, etc that way in bulk for a fraction of the cost, and it’s organic too!  We are also able to get vitamins and supplements from our co-op, for just barely more than wholesale price.

*Grow some veggies in your garden. The benefits are endless. I admit to having failed several times at gardening, due to challenges of having a very shady yard and things like that, but I think I have finally found a solution - some pots out by the curb! It is not huge, but it is a help, and nothing beats garden-fresh tomatoes and zucchini!

*In order to simplify life while not buying packaged, pre-prepared foods, cook in bulk every time you cook, and freeze! For example, make a BIG pot (or crock pot) of soup, stew, beans, etc. and freeze in meal-sized portions. If you are making lasagna or a casserole for supper, it is not that much more work to make two instead of one and freeze the extra.  Brown double the amount of ground meat that you need and freeze the extra. Cook a couple of chickens at once, pick the meat off the bones, and freeze. Then it is ready for future casseroles, soups or stir-fries.  Once you get in the habit of cooking and freezing this way, meal preparation becomes so much easier.  On a super busy day or on a day that Mom gets sick, you can just pull a casserole out of the freezer instead of resorting to going through a drive-thru on the way home or making ramen noodles for supper!  And if you have the meat already cooked and ready, the rest of the meal is much faster and easier to put together.

*Try to minimize the amount of disposable products you use. Clean up messes with real towels or rags rather than paper towels. Wash those plates rather than using paper or Styrofoam.  Consider using cloth napkins rather than paper. Cloth napkins are super easy to make, even for the most inexperienced seamstress, and they add a lot of class to a dinner table too. :)

*If you have babies, there are three or four things you can do to insure that they cost you virtually nothing for at least their first year! 1. Buy their clothes at garage sales. When they are little, babies almost never wear their clothes out, so you can find new or next-to-new clothing for peanuts! 2. Breastfeed. As everyone already knows, besides being economical, it is much better for both mama and baby.  3. Don’t buy store-bought baby food. It is quite simple to mash an avocado, banana or carrots for your baby and you will be doing both your baby and your budget a favor.  4. Cloth diaper. Again, this is not only cheaper, but healthier –for baby and for the environment. Cloth diapers these days are quite high-class and nearly as easy to use as disposables. No pins required! If you really want to get economical, you can make your own diapers using these instructions, even using recycled fabric!  There is quite a bit of good information on cloth diapering here, including reviews on several different brands of cloth diapers. Check it out!