Beating Broke

Personal Finance from the Broke Perspective

My Container Garden: The Season is Over

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This spring, frustrated by the lack of any good growing space in our yard, we decided to give a container garden a try.  We bought up a whole bunch of pots to put everything in, got some good potting soil, and planted away.  Once we were done, we planted a couple pots of tomatoes, a couple pots of cucumbers, a longish pot of green beans, a pot of green peppers, a longish pot of carrots, two pots of onions, and two large pots of potatoes.

Last weekend, with the low temperatures in the forecast dipping below the 32 degree mark, we decided it was a good time to pull up the root vegetables, and pick anything that was ripe.  Considering the few silly things we did, and the terribly hot summer we had, I think we did O.K.

Container Garden Harvest

In the picture, you can see some of what we pulled up last weekend. I wasn’t quick enough on the camera trigger to get pictures of the carrots or peppers before they got taken into the house. Also not pictured are any of the cucumbers, beans, or tomatoes we’ve harvested throughout the summer, or any of 10 or so potatoes that we pulled out from the bottom of the potato bag in August.

Overall, I’d have to say that I was slightly disappointed with the harvest.  None of the onions grew to very good size.  What cucumbers we did harvest were all seeds and no flesh.  The heat really played havoc on most of the plants in the containers.  There were several weeks where the plants really needed to be watered every night, but we were either gone, or didn’t get home in time to do it.  I also made the mistake of planting a few too many plants in some of the containers, and I think they got crowded which stunted their growth.

The quality of what we got, however, was pretty good.  Fresh potatoes taste nothing like what you get from the store, they’re so buttery and sweet.  The onions, while small, were very good as well.  My wife made a salsa with some of the tomatoes and onions, and it was very, very good.

I’ve already got a pretty good mental list of the things that I’ll be changing next year.

  • We get such a short growing season here, that I either need to start the seeds much earlier in the house, or just spend the money and buy greenhouse plants when it’s time to plant.
  • I’ll have to be careful to reduce the number of plants in the pots as well, to cut back on the crowding issue we had.
  • I’m also thinking about building a few planters attached to the deck so I don’t have to buy any more pots.  Of course, I could try and find some second hand pots as well.
  • The soil we use may have to change a bit as well.  The stuff we bought this year, while good potting soil, just didn’t seem to keep it’s consistency very well.  Part of that may have been the need for more watering.
  • I’ll be changing the mix of plants that I plant as well.  The cucumbers didn’t seem to take to containers all that well, so I might cut those in half.  I’d also like to add a few more tomato plants, and a few more varieties of peppers.  We only planted green peppers this year, but I’d like to try some jalapeno, and maybe another variety of hot pepper.

How did your garden turn out this year?  Do you plant in a garden or in containers?

 

Take an Off Season Fall Vacation and Save Big

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The summer is rapidly drawing to a close, and you may think that your summer vacation window is closing.  However, if you are looking to take a trip on the cheap, now is the perfect time to take a late summer vacation and save some serious money.

For many destinations, the summer is the top vacation season.  Families pack up and take road trips to a variety of locations.  Once school begins, tourism drops off significantly.  In fact, “The Travel Industry Association says that 38 percent of trips are taken during the summer; the number drops sharply to 23 percent in fall” (MSNBC.com).

You can take advantage of this drop off by scoring better rates and benefiting from thinning crowds.  Here are some trips you may want to consider:

Take a trip to the beach—in September.  This isn’t possible for everyone, but if you don’t yet have children or you home-school, September may be the perfect time to hit the beach.  It is still warm, but the crowds have left and you benefit from discounted rates.  Great destinations include beaches on the coast of North Carolina or even Key West, where the prime tourist season doesn’t ramp up until November and December.

Visit Mickey—Take a trip to Disneyland.  Disneyland can be very expensive, but if you plan a trip in the fall, you will benefit from reduced rates and shorter to no lines for rides.  The trade off is that the park closes earlier and that there may not be as many shows being performed.  However, I will take that trade off if it means I will save a few hundred dollars on accommodations and will save time not waiting in line!

family vacation camping

Take a trip to the big city—Cities also experience a drop in tourism after the crisp fall weather sets in.  While New York City, Chicago and Miami may be prohibitively expensive in the summer months, hotels often discount their rates in the fall, making a trip to the city a bit more affordable.  Most of the big city locales, regardless of location around the country, still have relatively comfortable weather.  In Chicago and New York City, you don’t generally have to worry about biting cold weather and snow at least until November, leaving you the entire fall to enjoy.

Go big guns and visit Europe—I made the mistake of traveling in Europe in August, and it was packed and expensive.  Unbeknownst to me, many Europeans have August off and vacation with their families in addition to all of the travelers who come from outside Europe.  Save yourself money and the need to fight the crowds by traveling to Europe in the fall.  The only drawback?  You may have to deal with some rain (or sometimes a lot of rain), especially if you are traveling to a Mediterranean country.  You can defeat this drawback in part by scheduling museum days and other indoor attractions for the rainy days.

While the dog days of summer may be past us, there is still plenty of warmth left.  Take advantage of the lovely fall weather to take an off season vacation and save some serious money.

img credit: librarygroover, on Flickr.

Saving On Eyeglasses

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If you’re one of the people who needs them, eyeglasses can be one of the most expensive medically necessary things you will have.  Unless you need some other fancy piece of equipment, your eyeglasses can cost several hundred dollars up to a thousand dollars or more if you decide to go with the name brand fashion designer frames.  (If you’re reading this blog, I fully expect you wouldn’t, but we all know there are those that do!)  Before I go much further, I must admit to not being one of those people who needs eyeglasses. (yet.)  I have, so far, been blessed with good vision and very few problems as far as my eyes go.  My wife, on the other hand, is not so lucky.  And, if either of the kids takes after her in the vision department, we’ll be looking at some not-so-fun expenses in the future.

Some people will go to the optometrist, get their prescription, and then order their lenses right on the spot.  And, most of those people will spend a whole lot more for their lenses and frames than they really should.  Depending on how often your prescription, and thus your lenses, changes, you might be buying new lenses and frames on a pretty regular basis.  Add it all up, and the expense can be enough to make you actually consider cutting off the bottoms of coke bottles and super-gluing them to some bent coat hanger wire.  Attractive image, no?

What should you do to save some money on your eyeglasses?

Eyeglasses on TableStart by shopping around.  Just because your optometrist is your eye doctor doesn’t mean you need to purchase all of your eye related devices there.  The doctor already has gotten paid for the visit.  No other compensation for their time and the visit are necessary.  Most towns will have at least two optometrists, and bigger cities will likely have 10-20 or more.  Bigger cities may also have at least one of the new discount eyeglasses stores that have been popping up recently.  Take your prescription home, then call a few of them and ask about prices for the eyeglasses you need.

Take your business online.  If you know what style of frames you want, there are several places where you can purchase prescription glasses online.  Places like Glasses.com (run by the same company that runs 1-800-Contacts), can offer discount prices on eyeglasses because they don’t have as much overhead as many physical retail stores have with employees.  Also, because they aren’t in a physical location, they can tap into the wider customer base of the internet and get bulk discounts on the glasses that they pass along to the customers.

One last place to look that many people forget about are warehouse and membership stores.  Places like Costco and Sam’s Club usually will offer discounted glasses to their members.  Even some Walmart supercenters have vision centers in the building and can offer a better price on glasses because of their size and purchasing power.

Eyeglasses are an important, and often necessary, thing that many people will use over their lifetime.  As your prescriptions and tastes change, you’ll want or need to pick up new pairs of glasses.  Shopping around, both locally at other optometrists and at warehouse stores, and online has the potential to save you hundreds of dollars on your next pair of glasses, and thousands over your lifetime.

Use the money you saved to help pay off a credit card or some other debt!

What other tricks, tips, and hints to you have for saving on eyeglasses?

img credit: NCBrian, on Flickr