In our life finance play an important role. With money we pay for food, clothes, medicine and education. We dream that they, like apples, grow on trees, and at will they can be picked. Then you wouldn't have to go to work and spend time, nerves and health to earn them. Our needs are growing, but money is never enough. Wise grandmothers and mothers say that our generation does not know how to save and throwing money down the drain. It is worth considering their words, especially if you are sitting in decree. The allowance for child care is paid up to a year and a half, and after that, a very small amount is due to mother and child - fifty rubles a month. Not everyone has the opportunity to increase their income in maternity leave , but learn to save and competently conduct family budget can.
First you need to have a notebook where you will record all income and expenses. Distribute monthly income for mandatory expenses: utility bills, travel, loan payments, mortgages (if any). Leave the rest of the money for everyday needs: food, medicines, clothes, household detergents. This way, it will be seen how much you can spend on your needs. Collect checks and payments in a separate folder so that in the future you will know what the money was spent on and what expenses were superfluous.
They say that save on food it is forbidden. No need to infringe on food, and even more so to starve. Learn how to cook tasty and varied without spending extra money. Your food basket should contain only healthy foods: vegetables, fruits, meat, fish, milk. Buy them at competitive prices, follow the promotions in stores. Make a menu for the week. Approach this process with creative enthusiasm. Dishes prepared by hand are cheaper than convenience foods or cafe meals.
Twist the minced meat yourself, sculpt dumplings. It is better to take the chicken whole, and not in parts, so it turns out much more economical. If your household loves pies, cakes and cookies, then it's time to learn how to cook. In the season of vegetables and fruits - do not be too lazy to make preparations for the winter. As we can see, eating tasty, healthy and inexpensive is not difficult at all.
Good for sales. Prices for outerwear are lower in summer than in winter. Interesting, exclusive outfits of good quality and for little money can be found in stores - drains and second-hands. Buy, husband and children in online stores, on flea market sites. There you can profitably. Free up space in the closet and get funds. Many mothers on maternity leave sew and knit clothes with their own hands.
And do your own hair, body wraps, manicures and pedicures. You can go in for sports and maintain body tone at home. Buy for practice : jump rope, fitball, dumbbells. You have a wonderful opportunity in maternity leave walk with your child in the fresh air, and walking, as we know, is very beneficial for health and beauty.
Of course, everyone has a need for entertainment. If you learn save, then, perhaps, there will be funds left for going to the cinema, circus, theater or cafe. The period when you have to tighten your belts will definitely pass, and the ability to competently lead family budget will remain.
Every young family is faced with the problem of how to ensure healthy and proper nutrition without spending too much money? What will help solve this problem?
The first thing to remember is that expensive is not necessarily useful. The task of every young housewife is to choose inexpensive and healthy products for her dish. For me, it has always been aerobatics - to cook dinner "out of nothing." That is, do not go to the store every time before cooking and do not buy products from the list. And take and cook a delicious dish from what is at home at the moment.
The taste of the dish depends primarily on the freshness of the product, the ability to cook it and beautifully serve it to the table.
After all, you can cook excellent soup and delicious meatballs from cheap meat. I prefer to buy veal fillets. In this case, there is no waste in the form of bones and fat. The same goes for fish.
In addition, meat can not be cooked every day. Remember, our grandmothers had potatoes as the main dish! For dinner, you can make mashed potatoes (at the same time, we buy potatoes in the fall and store them in the cellar, someone grows them in the garden) and get pickles - sauerkraut, vegetable stew, pickled cucumbers and tomatoes. You will get no less pleasure from such a dish than from, but how you save!
Sweets, expensive sweets can be replaced with grandmother's jam or jam. And if you really want sweets, then you can cook from products that are always at hand.
In baking, you can use not quite fresh products. I cook fritters in sour milk. And an excellent cake will come out of stagnant sour cream and butter.
But it’s best to make it in advance so that the products do not deteriorate.
A little about frozen foods - for the future, prepare vegetables and fruits, a good option for the family budget. It is always more pleasant to get food from your garden from the freezer than purchased from the store. What's more, it saves a lot of time! Once I peeled two kilograms of carrots, grated them, put them in a bag and froze them. And then all winter while making soup, you just take out a little bit of this frozen carrot and add it to the broth. I also have frozen beets, tomatoes, bell peppers and dill. This saves a lot of time for preparing soup for children every day. Especially in winter, these products are much more expensive.
By the way, if you count, then cooking the soup comes out much cheaper than the second course. Yes, and you eat them up faster, especially with bread. Therefore, make it a rule to cook soup every day. This is good not only for the wallet, but also for health! Think soup is delicious? You just don't know how to cook it 🙂 Here are a couple of recipes for very tasty soups from simple ingredients: and.
No one forbids, in addition to soup, to cook also a second course. But the portion in this case will need much less.
Homemade meals save a lot of money. It is extremely rare for a husband to eat in canteens, most often he takes lunch from home to work.
- this is what you need to learn in family life, to save properly and without harm to your family and your stomach.
Governments different countries now busy with the adoption of anti-crisis programs. A family with children is also a small state. And his own anti-crisis program will not hurt him either.
Save on food
No, no, I do not call for switching to the cheapest milk formula and canned food with modified starch and sweeteners, produced in the city of Verkhniye Chukhry. But saving is a great reason to get rid of chemical yogurt products, and finally get a yogurt maker. The unit will make a liter of homemade yogurt overnight, which can be colored with jam or jam (hello, grandmother's stocks!).
It also makes sense to honestly answer a simple question: why does your child spread food from expensive imported jars around the kitchen? Does he really not digest anything else? Or are you too lazy to cook?
Meanwhile, there is an opinion that one organic zucchini, a head of cauliflower or pumpkin, put into the freezer on time, is enough for months of complementary foods. And boiled chicken, turkey, lean pork and rabbit meat perfectly turn into mashed meat with a blender. Leftovers can be frozen immediately in small containers (an ice cube tray will do).
Banal drying successfully cope with the role of special children's cookies. And porridge, after consulting with a pediatrician, can not be made from a soluble powder, but cooked from flakes, and then from ordinary cereals.
In a word, call your parents and ask them. They successfully fed us without a blender and an electric steamer. By the way, dairy kitchens function to this day. Maybe your child still needs a referral? Ask your local pediatrician!
Save on diapers
A pack of Japanese diapers sits next to your changing table because "they're the only ones that fit my baby"? Or because "you can afford it" and "only the Japanese know how to make good diapers"? You can pick up cheaper brands of this product. The baby usually does not care what to get dirty.
The second way to save money (requiring investments at the initial stage) can be used by advanced parents. A small PR campaign for the protection of nature, buying high quality reusable diapers online or in the store... And now you are washing great reusable diapers made from hemp or special wool.
And you can not show off and remember the good old gauze diapers. You will not believe how diapers are saved if the child does not wear them at home! In poor regions of our vast country, they do just that, by the way - a disposable diaper is put on only “in people”. In these places, diapers are still sold in pharmacies by the piece. In addition, at the end you have happy grandparents and a district pediatrician, because it was these people who were most worried about diapers on your son!
Well, if your child has long outgrown the "diaper age", maybe it's really time to hold a potty training campaign? Who knows, suddenly the child is ready for a long time, you were just too lazy to make a little effort?
Save on clothes
It seems that we did not play enough with dolls in childhood and are trying to catch up. How many items in your toddler's wardrobe have only been used a few times? What's left with the store tags?
Therefore, I advise you to stop buying children's things just because they are so good. And only buy them if you really need them. Parents in megacities often, at the first opportunity, briskly raise the bar for the price and quality of children's clothing. You can also relax as part of the anti-crisis program: cheaper membrane overalls, boots Russian production- shoes too. The child will not even notice that you have given up something there, he does not determine the “company” “by label and cotton”.
Membrane clothing is a find and salvation for many modern parents. However, you can do without it. Let's say, buy a waterproof suit "made in our Russia." A child can safely fall into puddles, rubberized fabric will endure everything. And at home you will pour clothes from the shower, and it will again be like new.
You should also pay attention to sales and joint purchases - this way you can halve the store price.
Finally, I will say a seditious thing for some especially tender parents. There is nothing terrible about second hand. While children are small, they rarely have time to wear out their clothes. Sweatshirts, sweaters, jeans, trousers, overalls, hats, even a complete dowry for babies - all this can be purchased almost in its original form. Many forums and communities provide an opportunity to buy and sell used children's things.
Save on toys
In fact, deep down you already know this: it is more important for a child that you play with him. Therefore, it is not at all necessary to bring him a lot of toys, buying yourself half an hour or an hour at the computer monitor. The situation, when there are almost a hundred units of automotive or construction equipment in the house, clearly gives room for savings. To get started, collect and hide most of the toys - most likely, the baby simply covers the floor with an even layer of them so that you step on a typewriter or a cube in the dark and energetically utter a funny forbidden word.
Periodically change the assortment: give out the hidden and hide the boring. Excavations in a box with a well-forgotten old will keep even a very active child busy. And don't buy new toys all the time! Yes, it's hard to resist. But who do you buy them for? Your inner child, who is dazed by abundance? Make a forceful decision and make big purchases in this area on New Year and for a child's birthday.
And look: maybe someone is selling bags of used Lego or Megablox constructors. These are indestructible toys that are perfectly washed in the dishwasher and last a really long time.
Save on baby dowry
All those sweet little bells and whistles—cradles, cool strollers, swing beds, bottle sterilizers, breast pumps, playpens, walkers, jumpers, deck chairs, New Zealand lambskin envelopes, trendy slings—someone has already bought before you. He used them quite a bit and now he is eager to help out at least something for this good gathering dust in the corners. In many cribs with coconut mattresses, no one slept!
The main thing is to think sensibly - do you definitely need them, all these things? Freestanding changing table? A high chair with a swing and musical accompaniment? A tub with a drain hose?
You can give up a lot without the slightest damage to yourself and the baby. Alternatively, it is worth buying all these things as the need arises. And not because "every baby should have" ...
Our hands are not for boredom
During past crises, many of us have already gone through this: we sewed our clothes on a rare Singer, knitted a new jumper from a loose old dad's sweater. Most likely, some even swore a terrible oath that the beggarly hungry years in home-made things would never be repeated.
However, if your hands remember exactly how it is done, you can have a lot of fun turning yarn or old soft knitwear into children's sweaters, vests and hats. You can uncover a forgotten sewing machine and easily build pants with straps, shorts and skirts, flannel pajamas. You can sew all those rag balls, educational toys and rugs that you planned to buy in the store. By the way, a good reason to clutter up your closets and use everything that you haven’t worn yourself for a long time, but your hand didn’t rise to throw away.
If you do needlework next to the child and with him, then this will be a good lesson for him that things can last longer and more varied than one could imagine. In addition, you will be busy with simple creative work, which is a good cure for anxiety. The machine chirps softly, loops jump from knitting needle to knitting needle - almost psychotherapy.
Where can I get this time? Well, we're in a crisis. Let's assume that clubs, theaters and cinemas have become less accessible.
What not to do
Buy used children's shoes. Shoes for the baby should be new: his foot is just being formed, so shoes worn on someone else's foot are not the best option. Shoes should meet the wishes of the pediatric orthopedist - securely fixed on the leg, have a hard back and the right sole. At the same time, you can switch to domestic brands and pay three times less for the same set of properties.
Buy very cheap children's clothes. Almost for free - also not very good. The tights are slipping, everything is shedding, deformed, the buttons come off, the threads stick out. The origin of the raw materials is not clear; what dyes were used is unknown. Not the best option for a small child.
Save money on a car seat. Everything is simple here - it’s better to let the tights slide off, the stroller will be simple, just one car of toys and an economy class diaper. But a car seat should be appropriate for your child's age and weight, and be as secure as you can afford.
Buy very cheap toys. The temptation to buy some nonsense so that the child does not ache is always there. But fragile cheap toys with an incomprehensible "pedigree" fall apart too easily in the hands of small destroyers. And those sharp pieces of plastic and little wheels can be dangerous.
Enemies of economy
Enemies are the same as friends - joint purchases, forums, message boards for the sale of children's things, sales.
A simple example: a child needs jeans. But for the sake of pants alone, it makes absolutely no sense to get involved in a joint purchase or wool forums for the sale of children's things - there is too much fuss. And now, under the auspices of what is “cheap”, the economical mother buys jeans, trousers with straps, a sweatshirt, a shirt and a sweater. And at the end he has a wardrobe for the off-season for his baby - quality things at a reasonable price. Another question is that everything, except for the notorious jeans, is superfluous, because the baby is already provided with clothes to the most nowhere.
The same with the sale: they came for a pair of panties and T-shirts, as a result they bought a whole cart of unnecessary clothes, which "cheaper". A sensible mother would not allow this. She takes her baby only jeans right size, and everything else is cheap - "for growth". And ... still pays a tidy sum. And before that, the "growth" runs into another couple of purchases, receives gifts from girlfriends and a whole bag of beautiful children's clothes from a colleague ... As a result, a lot of things will lie with tags.
The “apophageal” of the joint-purchasing disease is to start buying a wardrobe for a child for the next winter in March. And in the fall, respectively, attach those clothes that did not live up to the size forecasts.
To stop in time, buying children's things in this way - this is the first anti-crisis task!
When I was much younger, my mother "sorted" my boyfriends, including by the degree of their willingness to spend money on our hypothetical joint child. For example, a young man who said that he would have borrowed a stroller from childhood friends fell below the plinth in his mother's rating and never got out from under this plinth. Because "the child should have everything new and the best"!
Now I think that this myth has played a cruel joke with many - we jump over our heads where it was completely unnecessary. In many situations, the best is the enemy of the good. And besides, it costs a lot more.
Today, with the availability of Internet technologies, it is not difficult to offer your work to the market. But, as always, the first roles in the life scenario are played not by means, but by our urgent needs and desires.
Close up for readers Reconomica- the story of a young mother Marina from the city of Verkhnyaya Pyshma in Sverdlovsk region. Another vivid example is that saving money and buying a car necessary for the family in a short period of maternity leave is a completely feasible task.
So, set a goal - there will be opportunities.
My name is Marina, I am 28 years old. I live in Verkhnyaya Pyshma, Sverdlovsk region.
Quite recently, a car broke down in our family, and it broke down so that it was easier to buy another car. So we did. We had to sell the old car for auto parts. The amount we received for it was 50,000 rubles.
At first they wanted to buy a new car, take out a loan, but I just went on maternity leave. Therefore, paying for a loan and living on one salary of her husband, our family would not have pulled. We opted for a used car, but a good one. The amount for its acquisition fluctuated within 250,000 rubles.
The car was necessary for her husband to work. Yes, and we live in the suburbs, and it is very difficult to get to the city by public transport, the more soon the baby was supposed to appear.
Upper Pyshma, Sverdlovsk region.
Collecting almost two hundred thousand rubles (we had 50,000 rubles for the sold car) seemed to us a difficult task. If I had the opportunity to work, it would be easier. For example, my salary would be put aside to buy a car (or they would take the same loan), and my husband’s salary would be spent on food.
We calculated: to save one or two thousand rubles every month is a very long time. At this rate, we would have bought a car when the child was already grown.
At first I thought about taking some courses. For example, "Shugaring" courses are very popular now, as well as courses on make-up, eyelash extensions, etc. But I will give birth very soon, and it was already difficult to walk, let alone attend courses.
The husband got a part-time job. A month is an additional 5000 rubles. The work turned out to be simple and easy: twice a week to earn extra money as a night watchman. After his main job, he immediately went to work, there was an opportunity to sleep and even watch TV. There was no need to guard any complex objects, and there were no video cameras there. This is understandable, since the salaries of security guards are much higher. And he just had to look after a small warehouse.
This is his small salary, we began to postpone. But all the same, we could save only 60,000 rubles a year. The amount is good, but I wanted to take even more effective ways- I too strongly went to the purpose.
To be honest, saving is very difficult, especially with such small amounts. And when there was a shortage of money or something was strongly needed, I would still take a thousand from the money set aside.
In order to save a little and for a long time - you need iron nerves. In general, then it seemed to me that in this way I would never save up, so I decided to do needlework and sell my products.
It took me quite a bit of time to learn to knit and crochet. With the help of special knitting videos, magazines and books, I mastered the basics in a week. First, I learned to knit toys, children's things, and then complex things: men's sweaters, women's cardigans, and so on. For example, it took me two to three weeks to knit a men's sweater. Everything depended on the complexity of the pattern, my state of health (after all, I was in a position, it was already difficult for me to sit for a long time). But the end result was a beautiful handmade product that I sold online.
It takes quite a bit of time to learn how to knit and crochet.
An ordinary, knitted women's sweater without any special and complex patterns from ordinary yarn costs from 3,000 rubles. The thread on it goes (also depends on the size) from 250 rubles.
So I knitted a women's elongated vest, size 42. They bought it from me for 4,500 rubles. And the thread took 9 skeins. One skein of thread costs 55 rubles, that is, I spent about 500 rubles on yarn. It is easy to calculate that I received a profit of 4,000 rubles for my work.
For a month I tied a product that could cost from 2,000 rubles to 8,000 rubles.
But the most important thing was to find a buyer for it.
To do this, I created a group on social networks and posted my work there. Placed products on special sites. So I didn't even have to go to the market and trade. Buyers came across from other cities, I sent them a knitted product by mail, cash on delivery.
I would like to separately mention knitted toys. They knit very quickly and are in great demand. Once I came to work with my husband with knitting, sat, waited for him and knitted. One of the employees saw my work, and now the whole office still orders knitted toys from me for their children. For a while, I even had a queue. And I was earning 5,000-6,000 rubles a month on this.
Knitted toys knit quickly and are in great demand.
As a result, my husband and I began to save 9,000 rubles for a car every month. And, of course, they tried not to spend this money. According to our calculations for the car, we should have saved up for 2.5 years.
But in our family there was always an acute shortage of money: either I needed medicines, or the tap would break ... In this regard, we decided to put money in the bank so that it was more difficult for us to get to them.
Six months after the birth of the baby, we left for the village, away from the dusty city. The husband stayed at home, as he worked and looked after the apartment.
Summer, fresh air, homemade milk, fruits and vegetables.
I did not quit my knitting, but I offered my husband to rent a room in our apartment. It turned out 1000 rubles per day, 7000 rubles per month.
We have a two-room apartment, separate rooms. One room was still constantly empty, although we made a small cosmetic repair in it. My husband was categorically against sharing the kitchen and bathroom with someone else, but I still insisted on my own. He agreed and took a nice boy to live with us - a student who had no bad habits. In the summer he worked part-time and did not leave the city. The guy was neat and clean. My husband even got so used to him that now, when he has already moved out, they still communicate.
Finding a good neighbor is very difficult, and in this we are lucky. But it happens that not quite conscientious tenants come across. Therefore, no matter how good or bad they seem at first glance, it is better to draw up a rental agreement in advance.
In it, indicate all the things provided for rent, do not forget to prescribe the amount of rent, deposit, deposit and length of stay.
Now my husband and I managed to save 13,000 rubles every month. If the amount turned out to be more, then we covered the “debts” - the money that we had to take from the deferred amount or if we had previously set aside a smaller amount.
We managed to collect two hundred thousand in a little more than a year. To be more precise, for 1 year and 3 months. So I didn’t even have time to get out of the decree, as the car had already been bought.
Of course, this is mostly the merit of my husband, but I consider my contribution quite significant.
Recently, many mothers, especially those who are planning the birth of a baby or are already on maternity leave, have to deal with family budget austerity. This becomes relevant when the woman herself was the main earner in the family, and due to the will of circumstances, her income during this period will be much less. The situation can be significantly aggravated if an airbag has not been formed in the family in a timely manner, there are unpaid loans, and it is not particularly necessary to count on the help of the husband and relatives during this period.
The topic turned out to be quite relevant for my family in particular. Currently, I am expecting the birth of my fourth child, my husband, almost immediately after I went on maternity leave, was left without work due to the difficult financial situation of the enterprise where he worked. The city is small (20,000 population), there are no city-forming enterprises, mainly trade and public sector(hospital, education). The situation on the labor market is simply catastrophic, finding a job with salary more than 10,000 rubles is almost impossible. I think the situation is familiar to many. Now let's talk about what we can do in this situation.
1. Talk to your husband. So that both have a clear understanding of the seriousness of the situation that has arisen, the need to save money and find ways to replenish the family budget. Everyone should understand what the family will have to face in the near future, what expenses are coming, the size of the sources of income ( wage, allowances, income from additional earnings). If the children are already quite old, we connect everyone to the conversation to assess the situation.
2. Make a plan for expenses and income. Clearly distinguish between mandatory and current family expenses by items (loans, utilities, mobile communications, kindergarten fees, tuition, taxes, debts, etc.), food, household needs, transportation costs, clothing, etc. You must clearly understand what you cannot refuse under any circumstances, and what you can save on.
3. Make a savings plan utility bills and mobile communications:
Our actions:
4. Keep a book of income and expenses in electronic form. For these purposes, I downloaded the free AbilityCash () program. She quickly adapted and adjusted herself. Although I also keep a notebook in paper form, I also paste all checks there. This allowed, after 2 months of conducting, to form a clear idea of what the family needs for food, loans and other expenses. Before, ask me how much money we spend on food, I could only say approximately, not imagining at all that how much more money is spent on all sorts of "nonsense". It immediately became clear where there is a reserve for savings. For example, we clearly saw that our car VAZ 21014, manufactured in 2006, “gobbles up” a lot of money, and mainly for spare parts (at one time they took it cheaper from our hands, which turned out to be sideways for us). Together with her husband, we decided to sell it and buy an economical Okushka. At first, the husband resisted as best he could, the stereotype worked that OKA was a car for the disabled. But believe me, from the very first days I realized that I had been deeply mistaken before. Firstly, we saved 45,000 rubles on resale (we sold the old one with a mileage of 140,000 km for 95,000, we bought an OKU in perfect condition with a mileage of 40,000 km for 50,000 rubles). Secondly, saving on gasoline was also not long in coming.
6. Create a family financial plan . Planning period for at least the next 3-4 months. The plan should provide for all planned family incomes, all expenses. If you have already started keeping a book of income and expenses, this will make it easier to plan for the real situation. Drafting financial plan will reveal your budget deficit or surplus. If there is a shortage, go to the next item. If revenues exceed expenses, consider creating an airbag for future period, or early repayment debts.
7. Finding sources extra income and receipts. We write out on a piece of paper, all possible sources of additional income to the family budget. For example:
