This Week...Beyond Money 11/10 - 11/16

For me, a life beyond money is making choices so that you can live the best possible life, regardless of your income level. Obviously, you have to make a living, but there are many ways to improve your quality of life without increasing your income levels and correspondingly your expenses. This regular post will be some of the ways that we improve our quality of life beyond just trying to make more money.


Gardening:
* Not much to do now. I'm already missing it desperately. We got a heavy snow fall late Sunday night, so everything is blanketed now.
* Harvested some more lettuce seed from the front-garden containers. I have about a packet's worth now. It's not saving me a lot of money, but I'm learning and hopefully over time will end up with the best lettuce seeds for my microclimate.

Cooking/Groceries:
* Didn't grocery shop at all this week. Ate from the pantry and freezer.
* Made pork stock from leftover bones and loads of veggie scraps. It's delicious and practically free.

Food Preservation:
* Dehydrated lemon peels to use in making syrup later in the winter.

Fun:
* A musician friend of ours hooked us up with discounted tickets to see the symphony. Tickets were $12 instead of $50. We were beyond thrilled. It was one of the nicest nights out I've had in a long time. I was wide-eyed and smiling the entire time.

Nature:
* We went for a hike at a local state park. It was a 5 mile hike around a lake. We off trailed a bit, so we went around 6 miles. With the autumn colors, and just enough leaf fall for great views, it was breathtaking.

Frugality:
* Avoided shopping as much as possible.
* Switched health  insurance for a savings of $50/month, plus lower costs when we use it.

Waste Reduction:
* Planned to use leftovers in other meals to avoid waste.
* Rinsed cans of salsa, tomato sauce and enchilada sauce and put in the Trash Chili container in the freezer. I almost have enough to make a batch.
* Cooked with animal fats saved from cooking other dishes and making stock.

Work:
* Trucker picked up an extra shift so we could have a little more money to put towards visiting a sick family member out of state.
* We packed our lunches instead of buying something. I drank free coffee in the break room.
* Trucker brought home english muffins and scones from his job that were expired. Absolutely delicious, even though they were day old.
* I signed up for our insurance at my new job. We were on a private plan through the marketplace. Even with our subsidy, we were spending a lot for a really bad plan (and just got a notice saying that in the new year it would go up by $30+/month). The insurance at my job is fabulous with a much lower deductible. It includes health, dental, prescription, vision, life and disability insurance for $50/month less than our old plan would cost us (for just really bad health, dental and vision insurance).

Preparation:
* Winterized the vehicles. Put blankets in the cars just in case. Also put in a couple granola bars for emergencies or just in case we forget our lunches for work. I get granola/protein bars for less than a dime at the salvage grocer so this is cheaper than anything we could buy for lunch.

Future:
* Every day on my lunch break I've been writing on my book. I am getting in the habit of writing daily. Even just writing on my lunch break every day would add up to around 60,000 words a year.

What did you do this week?