Festival of Frugality

Looking for this week’s Festival? Hop on over to Frugal for Life where Dawn has done yet another fantastic job hosting with a Silver Edition of the Festival of Frugality. It has a few silver trivia facts along with all of this week’s greatest in frugality. For example, did you know that the 1964 silver Kennedy Half Dollar was 90% silver and replaced within three months of the President’s assassination? The facts just keep coming so you have to check it out, but here were the four editor’s picks:

• Mrs. Nespy’s Frugal World: 8 Items Your Baby Really Doesn’t Need – Since my sister is having her first baby this one caught my eye and I sent to my sister to review.
• Personal Finance By The Book: Five Reasons Why a Penny Saved is Better Than a Penny Earned – I fully agree, saving money to me is more fulfilling than earning more.
• Budgets are Sexy: Frugality on a Whole New Level! – The post is short and to the point, but the comments are better. Always nice to see commentors who are willing to voice their opinions.
• Bargaineering: Your Take: Why Are You Frugal? – Another short post but the comments make up for that with wonderful personal experiences.

Next week the festival goes to Frugal Upstate, so please get your submissions in early!

The 218th Festival of Frugality comes to us this week by way of RC at Think Your Way to Wealth. This week’s Festival of Frugality coincides with America Saves Week and RC makes a great point, the fastest way to save money is by being frugal!

Here’s what America Saves Week is all about:

During America Saves Week, individuals will be encouraged and assisted to assess their savings progress and take action to advance this progress. This encouragement and assistance will be provided by organizations and professionals with an interest in improving the financial security of individuals and families.

Here were RC’s editor’s picks:

• Frugal Babe presents When The Going Gets Tough posted at Frugal Babe. Great thoughts and tips for avoiding “frugality fatigue.
• Silicon Valley Blogger presents How To Use Electronic Coupons With Your Grocery Card posted at The Digerati Life. This is something new to me-have you tried electronic coupons yet with your grocery card?
• Jason presents Finding Happiness: How You Can Own More by Owning Less posted at Redeeming Riches. Living on less can lead to a more rewarding life.
• Nicki presents Drawing The Line With Cell Phone Plans posted at Domestic Cents. Waiting as long as possible before upgrading electronics and other gadgets is a great frugal tactic.

The 219th Festival will be hosted by Miss Thrifty and your entries are due on Monday, you can use this submission form.

This week’s Festival of Frugality #216 comes on the heels of one of the biggest spectacles in sports – the NFL Super Bowl. Whether you watch it for the game on the field or the fun in the commercials, it’s certainly an enjoyable time for anyone who watches. What was your favorite commercial this year? My personal favorite was the E*Trade baby and the milkaholic one…

As for the Festival, it too comes with a football theme and I think Dan did a very clever job in picking who gets to play which position. Here were this week’s MVPs:

• Joe from Personal Finance By The Book presents Tax Refund? How You Should Use It and Why You Should Lose It.
• MD of Studenomics presents 8 Principles for a Frugal College Student to Follow.
• Darwin’s Finance presents How Much Could You Reduce Your Budget if You Get Laid Off?
• My Dollar Plan presents Throw a 50th Wedding Anniversary on a Budget.

Next week the Festival moves to Simply Forties and you can submit your entries for consideration here!

The Festival of Frugality travels this week to the Ultimate Money Blog, where the festival urges us to save green and live green. No specific editor’s picks in this festival, which gives me license to pick a few of my own:

• How Often Should You Check Your Credit Report? posted at Military Finance Network
• Save Money By Making Your Own Household Cleaners posted at The Canadian Finance Blog
• Make Use of The Free Time You Have posted at Free From Broke

Thanks for hosting! Next week the festival travels to Pragmatic Environmentalism so get those entries in early!

This week the Festival of Frugality goes to the Cooking Manager blog, where you can learn to cook frugally and without wasting resources. Browse the festival’s wisdom this week, including a few that stood out to me:

• Are You Spending Less This Year? posted at PT Money.
• Make Your Own Disney Greeting Cards posted at Family Balance Sheet.
• Convert Any Toilet Into A Dual-Flush Water Saving Machine posted at Energy Saving Gadgets.

Thanks for hosting! Make sure to be included in next week’s edition by submitting your entry here!

Or maybe they do, when they come to rest at Yes I am Cheap! The festival this week looks at New Beginnings, in honor of the new year and new resolutions. These made the cut as editor’s picks:

• How To Achieve Your Top New Years Resolution posted at Wealth Creation Blog.
• January Extreme Challenge posted at The Conscious Shopper.
• File Your Taxes on the Cheap This Year posted at PT Money.
• 365 Days of Saving Money: Streamline Your Bathing posted at Modern Tightwad.
• 101 Ways to Cut Your Spending This Year posted at Being Frugal.

Thanks for hosting! Make sure to be included in next week’s festival by submitting your posts bright and early!

The Festival of Frugality gets off to a rip-roaring start, beginning 2010 at Eliminate The Muda. Hop on over to find out what Muda is (I didn’t know!) and check out the great articles! One that especially caught my eye, being that I am far from handy, was:

Funny About Money: When DIY Doesn’t Save Much. It would save nothing for me in a lot of cases! Recently I thought I’d have to tear out my ceiling because my bathtub was leaking and a plumber determined it was actually the wax seal on my toilet (a very easy fix). Goes to show me.

Thanks for hosting!! If you’d like to host a future edition of the Festival – contact us! We’d love to have you.

I’m not really all that up on the borders of decades, but this week’s host of the Festival of Frugality, Foreigner’s Finances, points out that this week’s Festival is the last of the decade. Where does time go? And with that, he celebrates a decade’s worth of frugal people, and a decade’s worth of entries as well, including a few I picked out:

Free Money Finance: Are Outlet Stores a Good Idea?

Frugally Green: The Art of the Staycation

Thanks for hosting! Make sure to be a part of the first festival of the NEXT decade by entering your best work here!

Or the festival entry, in this case.  Blog carnival stopped forwarding us any submissions late last week, so this week’s festival, hosted by Out Of Debt Again, became the short and sweet one.  The editor’s early bird picks included:

• David R. Lampsen presents Frugality Unplugged: Time to Play Van Helsing! posted at Personal Finance Analyst.
• Mrs. Money presents Oil Cleansing Method posted at The Ultimate Money Blog.
• Kalani presents Seven Ways to Stay Warm in a Cold House posted at Not Spending Money.

Thanks for hosting!  While we investigate the blog carnival issue, posts for the next edition at ABC Frugality can also be submitted through the contact form here.

With edition #205, the Best Purchases edition at The Financial Blogger!  Along with his own best purchases, TFB highlights these entries:

• Baker presents The X-Men Guide To Unlocking Your Financial Mutant Powers posted at Man Vs. Debt.
• GLBL presents Homeschool Finance posted at Gather Little by Little.
• Peak Personal Finance presents 5 Financial Rules for Women posted at Peak Personal Finance.
• Super Saver presents Opportunity to Pay Zero Federal Income Tax in 2010 posted at My Wealth Builder.
• Fabulously Broke presents Major Holiday Busters Part 2 posted at Fabulously Broke ….in the City.
• Kristia presents Use Your Frugal Skills and ‘Adopt’ a Family This Holiday Season posted atFamily Balance Sheet.
• MiddleWay presents Year End Utilities Review posted at Early Retirement the Middle Way.
• Tyler Tervooren presents Give Yourself the Right Tools for the Job posted at Frugally Green.
• Ash presents Costs, Part 1 – Opportunity Costs posted at Breathe-Smile.

Thanks for hosting!  Next week the festival will travel to Out Of Debt Again so make sure to enter early (but not often – one per customer!)