Monday, May 20, 2013

Feeling thoughtful

As in, full of thoughts!
I have lots on my mind this evening and I'm not sure where to start, but I do want to write more in general.
One thing I've been thinking about a lot, but not really acting on, is this blog post and all that it's talking about. I think we do a lot better than most Americans when it comes to expenses & finances in general. We don't have much debt; we buy, borrow & inherited lots of used things; we use coupons for grocery & other shopping & take advantage of deals where we can. We are gardening, using cloth diapers and I'm breastfeeding. All of those have financial and other benefits. They aren't without their costs, though. Mainly: time.
Sometimes I read things like the blog post linked above and I think of how much less we could be spending (money) on various things. My hubby points out the time trade-off for many of these things. The cloth diapers, for example, mean that diaper changes take a little longer and laundry takes a little longer. Since I'm a stay-at-home-mom, we decided the time investment was worth the financial pay-off. Hubby isn't all gung-ho for them, but is happy to be saving money.
That's where I am on a lot of things. There are few issues I take a very strong stance on, the rest of the time I'm trying to find a balance.
We're still doing many of the things we're doing rather selfishly, to save money, and not as good stewards of this nation or planet; though that is a happy side-effect of much of it. Sometimes I see or hear/read something that gets me really motivated to change in one way or another, like the blog post linked above, but I go back to wanting a moderate amount of little luxuries as well.
If this blog post seems a little wishy-washy and haphazard... that's just because that's the way my brain works... or doesn't, depending on your perspective. ;)