I started a clothing-focused mini-series over the summer wherein I managed to devote two ENTIRE posts to the topic of just me and my clothing alone:

• My Ever-Evolving Relationship With My Clothes
• The Clothes I Wear For Comfort and Confidence

Riveting as that was, a number of you requested I write about the clothing of the other people in my house. In response, today I bring you a deep dive into the closets of my children, Kidwoods, age 7 and Littlewoods, age 4.

The Hand-Me-Down Train Continues

We’ve been on the used/hand-me-down train since before the girls were born and haven’t disembarked yet. I get the bulk of their clothing (and shoes, toys, books, puzzles, etc) from three sources:

1) Garage sales.

The vast majority of their clothing (and everything else) comes from yard sales because it’s often one-stop shopping AND they have the best prices.

Continue reading How I’ve Saved Thousands of Dollars on Clothes for My Kids at Frugalwoods.

I have a kid old enough to start learning about money! Of all the parenting milestones we’ve marked over the years, I think I’m the most excited about this one. 

You all have been asking me for advice on teaching kids about money for eight years and I’ve demurred because I didn’t know how I was going to teach my own kids about money. Until today!

Our oldest child, six-year-old Kidwoods, started asking about money this fall and her curiosity reached an inflection point earlier this week thanks to a school book sale flier advertising a $7 unicorn book. So here’s my non-expert, imperfect tale of how we’re teaching money management to our children. Well, really just to Kidwoods since Littlewoods (age almost four) remains unimpressed and uninterested.

Wait Until They Indicate Readiness

This is the approach we’ve followed with pretty much every aspect of our parenting.

Continue reading How We’re Establishing a Family Money Philosophy with Our Kids at Frugalwoods.

I don’t think I’ve ever kept a New Year’s resolution. Ever.

In my frittered youth, I made impossible, vague and numerous resolutions. I’d resolve to “lose weight, achieve inner peace and volunteer more,” all in the same year, with no specifics, no action plan and no accountability. I think we can all see why this approach failed. And it didn’t fail just once. It failed every single one of my resolution-making years, which was probably a contiguous 20 years.

Based on this enviable track record, I decided to be ultra-specific and action-oriented for 2021. Will this work? I HAVE NO IDEA. But the opposite never did.

Here are my two goals for 2021:

1. I will hike every single day.
   • I know I’ll miss days here or there, but saying ‘every day’ makes it WAY more likely I’ll get out on the trail on the regular.

Continue reading We’re Spending 1,000 Hours Outside in 2021 (maybe, we’ll see how it goes) at Frugalwoods.

People ask me about childcare all the time. How to pay for it, how to find it, what I do with my kids. Other than what to eat for lunch, which credit cards to use, and how to buy used cars, I think childcare is the most asked question I get from readers. And it’s the one thing on that list I haven’t devoted a lot of time to writing about.

Probably because I’m not a childcare expert. Probably because I’m not a parenting expert. Definitely because childcare prices and arrangements vary wildly by family, age of children, family composition, region, country, and even state.

In short, it’s complicated and I do not have answers for everyone and this post will not provide solutions for all situations. What I can share are the decisions my husband and I have made and how they’ve impacted our family in the four years since becoming parents to four-year-old and two-year-old girls.

Continue reading Childcare: Controversial, Expensive, Complicated, Necessary at Frugalwoods.

This is the story of flying with two toddlers on a plane, a free hotel stay, and why credit card rewards are a good thing.

Here’s a boring (but important) explanation of how Frugalwoods makes money.

Air Travel With Two Toddlers: How Bad Can It Be?

In November, we flew to North Carolina to celebrate Thanksgiving with my in-laws. Two kids, two adults, and 45 individual boxes of raisins.

Being four years old, Kidwoods got a seat all to herself while Littlewoods was relegated to the role of “lap infant.” Both girls were fascinated with the seat belts, the tray table’s up-and-down capabilities, as well as the play-doh, dolls, coloring books, crayons, books, mini farm animals, and small trucks I’d packed. Then we taxied down the runway for takeoff. Kidwoods asked if we were there. How to explain we hadn’t left the ground yet?

Continue reading Travel Rewards, Flying With Two Toddlers, And A Free Hotel Stay at Frugalwoods.

December, with all its merry festivity, is naturally the month we contribute to our daughters’ college funds. Ah yes, just what every four-year-old and 22-month-old want for Christmas: well-funded 529 savings plans.

Don’t worry, in addition to putting $5k into each of their 529s, we did give them actual Christmas gifts (most of which were either hand-me-downs or purchased at garage sales last summer… ).  

Save On What Doesn’t Matter: Spend On What Does

This is my approach to spending money on our kids. So, yes, they both have hand-me-down cribs and a dresser we found on the side of the road, and used clothes, and toys from yard sales. And yes, they have snow pants from thrift stores and coats that don’t match; but to me, none of that matters.

Buying used stuff for your kids isn’t going to save enough money to put them through college, but it will save something and something is better than nothing.

Continue reading How We Use 529 Plans To Save For College at Frugalwoods.

Before having kids, I knew a lot about parenting. I’d look at tantruming toddlers in grocery stores and scoff to my husband, “how can they LET their child scream like that? In public?” Now that I have kids, I don’t even notice when other people’s kids are ripping ears of corn off the produce section display like feral raccoons. I’m thankful it’s not my kids and I’m also in solidarity that it could be/has been/will be my children.

We went to the county fair with the kids last week and, at one point, they were both in the grass, squabbling over the (identical) peanut butter sandwiches I’d packed. Nearby, another mom with two toddlers was juggling their demands to both ride in the baby backpack at the same time. We locked eyes and laughed. “Why do we even bother leaving the house?” I joked.

Continue reading Toxic Positivity and What I Thought Having Kids Would Be Like (versus what it’s actually like) at Frugalwoods.

From Mrs. Frugalwoods: I don’t publish posts written by other people, so today is an exception. When my friend Emma told me about her struggles with prenatal depression and anxiety, I begged her to write about it. Last year, I shared my raw experience of being diagnosed with postpartum depression and received hundreds–if not thousands–of responses saying a version of: “I went through the same thing” or “Reading this gave me the courage to call my doctor” or “I’m going to start taking the medication I was prescribed for my PPD,” and crucially: “I thought I was a terrible mother and the only person who felt this way.” You are not alone. We are not alone.

Trigger warning: this post contains information about depression and suicidal thoughts, which may be triggering for some people.

Today’s post was written by Emma Pattee.

Continue reading My Friend Always Wanted To Be A Mom; Then She Got Prenatal Depression at Frugalwoods.

Try not to faint. Today I bring you a RECIPE. That’s right. Your pleas, your emails, your notes, your requests have not gone (entirely) ignored. You all want frugal food. Specially, you want MY frugal food. The last time I shared a recipe was January 2015, which was, uh, over four years ago… So apparently I’m on the one-recipe-every-four-years schedule. I have good reason for this, people! I am not our household’s–nor anyone else’s household’s–cook. Mr. Frugalwoods is our chef-in-residence and he is a master of frugal + healthy + delicious. But he doesn’t cook from recipes. And he doesn’t write down his creations.

Truth be told, his meals are different every single time he cooks them, which we love, but which makes recipe writing nigh on impossible. The massive downside of this approach is that he sometimes forgets stuff he cooked and when I ask him to make it again, he has no idea what I’m talking about.

Continue reading My Healthy Oatmeal Pumpkin Bars Recipe + How I Get My Kids To Eat Kale at Frugalwoods.

In honor of Littlewoods turning ONE YEAR OLD this month, I’m enshrining my ideas on how to be frugal with infants. ALL of my ideas. Seriously, I don’t think I left anything out. You’re welcome and/or I’m sorry.

Waxing Nostalgic

With Littlewoods’ first birthday, I finally understand the feeling “bittersweet.” As my second, and final, baby transitions out of baby-ness, I’m nostalgic. I can’t say I’m sad because I don’t love the newborn phase. Neither does Mr. Frugalwoods. Those newborn months were our toughest experiences of parenting. To date, that is. I reserve the right to revise this statement when our kids turn 13. So no, I don’t miss when my infants screamed for milk every two hours around the clock and no, I don’t miss my painful recoveries from childbirth (c-section the first time, VBAC the second), and no, I don’t miss pumping at 3am every day.

Continue reading How I Saved Tons Of Money During My Baby’s First Year at Frugalwoods.