We're building a room addition. Putting a few guys to work and giving our contractor a job (his first in 2 months), the lumberyard will get some money as well as a few other places we'll buy supplies from.

spending money

I just bought a coffee pot on Ebay.
Oh...and I bought a house.

SamKaren
your resident DJ

I'm continuing to exercise decent financial judgement. I don't buy what I can't afford, from people who don't need the money, with money I don't have, just to impress people I don't like.

I am tempted to buy some properties now though as an investment. Hopefully it won't take too long to recover from the debacle we endured.

paying my bills...and feeding my family..
It's all I can do..LOL

I'd just be happy to cover my darn bills.
Utilities have gone up twice in one year. Insurance went up. My rent increased by 100.00 a month. Got a notice last week from Visa that they are raising my rate to 28.99% starting this Friday! Groceries are unbelievable. I've got medical bills coming out my ears. But my salary isn't going up. I'm lucky to still have a job. Where the hell do these conglomerates think I'm gonna come up with $$$ for all the increases?

It's beyond depressing...

HD works for a Warren Buffet company...in turn, contributes to Buffets Wells Fargo Insurance stocks, avoiding his Geico companies, drinking only Pepsi products since he too has shares in Coke (really, we prefer Pepsi) and not buying any carpet or mobile homes..(yeah he has some of those too)... ...so I guess that is why the media seeks his opinion...right or wrong! Bill Gates loves him too!

Let me start by saying that we are NOT wealthy people! We work very hard for everything we have. DH has been with his employer for 20+ years, I work 40+ hours many weeks, and we owe very little money.
Having said that, we are fortunate that this region of the country has not been as affected as most, so we haven't scaled back at all. Truth is, we've probably spent more in the last 12 months than in a "normal" year.

*We drove from Oklahoma to Maine last year when national gas prices averaged $4.00/gallon.
*We also had several home improvements done recently (to the tune of about $20k).
*DH bought a new tractor last fall.
*I've booked a cruise for January 2010 with some girlfriends. And I suspect DH and I will take another trip somewhere this year---although probably not as far away as Maine! :-)
*DH "may" have to have surgery in the next few months. We'll pay through the nose for that...even with insurance.

Granted, things could change at any moment. That's life... But for now and the near future, we'll just keep doing what we do.

shop at walmart and the $ stores and get the most from my money

We are rapidly paying down our already very low credit card debt, shopping and eating locally, we (within the last 8 months) bought a travel trailer, new computer, and are in the process of buying a second home. We also have not stopped our rate of investment into the stock market or our retirement accounts. Buy low - sell high.
We are far from rich also. DH is a firefighter and I am a stay at home mom. We have just completely stopped nonsense purchases and are more focused with where the money is going. That nickle and dime stuff is what kills us.

I'm trying to buy American. I wanted some cookware (which I really didn't need), and KTers reminded me it was not made in the US, so I passed on it.

Also, our grocery store produce department has signs telling where the produce was grown. I try to pick the US grown produce.

Danihoney, how brave you are to invest in the stock market. I bet someday you will tell yourselves what a smart move that was.

I'm just trying to make my house payment so we don't have one more home in this beautiful neighborhood go into foreclosure.

Amen to what Cynic said.

We go out twice a week to an inexpensive resturant and make sure that we tip the waiter/waitress.

Socks - it is nerve racking investing with all the bad news, but we haven't lost any of the money we have invested (yet). We have lost a LOT of the money we've made. We are keeping the faith that buying stock right now will eventually pay-off for us when we approach our retirement years. The money comes out pre-tax so if we were to stop having it taken out, we would lose so much of that extra cash to taxes, we would hardly notice the difference anyway.

We purchased a basic model travel trailer so we could still get our kids out (with our dogs) and not have to pay for hotels and boarding expences for our pets. We can get away as a family for $30 dollars a night instead of $100+ or just staying home. We love it and wouldn't change a thing.

The home we are trying to buy (still waiting on the bank/seller) is a foreclosure in a nice older neighborhood. We will be rehabing the house and (in our eyes) rescuing it from the massive pile of abandoned properties cluttering our little town. That excites me. It is marked down so low that we would actually be able to make money turning our current home into a rental. In ten years or so when our boys are (hopefully) out making their way in the world, we stand the chance of making a nice profit on the rehabed home to put toward our retirment, then we can move back into the smaller home we have now. Assuming this is still the town we want to live in.

It may sound like we are being frivolous to many people but really everything is being pretty carefully planned and thought through. But my fingers are crossed, just in case.

1. I file my monthly financial statements quickly, after only a cursory glance, thereby reducing my chances of having a costly (to my health insurance company) mental breakdown.

2. I got a job with a 45-minute commute each way, thereby incurring weekly fill-ups and increasing the wear and tear on my car, which will result in the need to replace it at some point. Of course, I'll probably buy another Toyota, so there goes that benefit.

3. I did buy an American-made washing machine (Speed Queen) last week. But the bigger selling point was that it came with a 3-year warranty.

4. I bought a TV armoire that does not look good in its intended spot, so I'm giving it away. Therefore, we can count this expenditure as a generous donation to the furniture company. Let us ignore the fact that the armoire was made in Indonesia.

5. I also bought three made-in-India rugs. They look good in their intended spots.

6. I hired a contractor to create a laundry alcove for me. Since he is a future in-law and therefore a member of my extended family, he undercharged me and I underpaid him. But hey, every little bit helps, right?

7. I'm staying out of trouble, financial or otherwise.

I've always tried to buy from local merchants. Windsor is surrounded by agriculture. I try to buy my produce locally and also my meat. Nothing is better tasting than fresh chicken that isn't bought in a store. We have an abundance of fruit and veggie stands in the summer and we have the Heinz store where local tomato products can be purchased. I try to go the the farmer's market as often as I can.

Recently many of the farmers around here are getting together and producing a map to show where we can purchase locally grown food products. One farmer will even sell his beef 2 steaks at a time. We have turkey farms around here too. When I want sausage I purchase sausage that is local. Same for my bbq sauces and bottled salad dressing if I decided not to make my own.

Every season I pick my own strawberries, blueberries and cherries and apples. I freeze enough blueberries to last until I pick them again. I buy and freeze rhubarb from a local man who has a big patch near the airport. He always throws in some apples. I won't buy squash in stores when I can buy it locally in the fall for much less money and store it for the winter.

I believe in supporting my neighourhood businesses and restaurants and always have. Same for services.

Most of my family members buy North American built vehicles and some that were made here in Windsor.

I like to support my local economy as best as I can even when money is tight. I'm not saying that I don't shop some of the big box stores because I do now and again. I do prefer to buy at Canadian stores though. I don't like to go into Wal-Mart but I have done so fewer than 10 times. LOL

I have also joined a group on Facebook for the purpose of buying locally grown food in Essex County.

Anne

I'm not sure that Westerners spending more money on Chinese-imported trinkets and trash is the answer to our economic woes. In fact, I'm of the opinion that *that's* what got us into this mess to begin with.

We're saving every spare dollar we can, paying down our debt and we have ceased spending for anything that's not essential. We were going to buy a new car but decided against it.

America needs to (again) become a nation of savers, not spenders. In the short term, stopping the nationwide-spending spree may cause more financial pain but in the long term, it's the best thing to do.

Just my two cents.

I'm taking up a new-to-me hobby, I'm going to make a small quilt. Of course, that meant a new rotary cutter, a bit more fabric to add to what I have, a new big ruler, geez, all this adds up fast!

Since we have no debt, we haven't changed our ways much at all. We live a simple enough life and if we got any simpler, we'd be sitting in the dark. (Oh, wait we did that last night, our power went off for 2.5 hours just before dinner time.) We haven't sold any of our stocks so all our losses are paper ones.

I'm with Cynic and Marilyn.

I helped Citibank by paying off my debt to them with another credit card, since they screwed me over (along with thousands of other people). Of, course they won't get all the extra money from interest now. I'm sure part of their recent profits come from hiking up everyone's interest rate for no reason.

When I go out to eat now I make it a point to leave a bigger tip than I normally do.

Over the last 9 or 10 months I've been slowly buying things from U.S. companies for our trip this summer: backpacks, travel clock, small microfiber towels, plug adapters, guidebooks, phrase books, airline tickets, car rental, etc...When we go we will be stimulating two of our allies' economies also, especially France's-lol!

I also look more closely at food products and put back anything made in China...not so much to help our economy as to protect myself and my kids. I don't trust them at all. I also like to buy from local growers now that I can afford it better. They usually have fresher, better tasting fruits and vegetables.

I quit contributing to my retirement account last year, not because of the stock market starting to crash, but because I was trying to use every penny to get out of debt. I'm seriously thinking of starting it back up today.