Re-do, re-use, re-purpose... resist (Three)

I'm still feeling on the queasy side, experiencing chills, and napped for three hours today (count them, THREE)... otherwise I am better.  Except my thinking, which is known to be challenged, anyway.  Stephanie says I was never right again after the baby came.  That being Christopher who will soon turn twenty-one.  Sigh...

All that to say, I want to write what is going through my mind and we will see if the words come together in some sort of readable fashion.  If nothing makes sense, blame the flu symptoms... that sounds good.  To make it simple (for me, not for you), I'm breaking what I wanted to share into more posts... today writing about spending money to save money in the long run.

While I have long known at times it can take a little spending to save, I was inspired by a Nigella episode, you may have seen it recently, where she made very simple cupcakes but placed purchased sugar roses and daisies on each little cake... amazingly beautiful.

Now, one could spend money to learn to make sugar roses and that would be a very good thing.  Not exactly in my future of trying to keep blood sugars level.  However, I checked the price of such sugar flowers and while on the expensive side... combining them with inexpensive cupcakes (or a cake) would be much, much cheaper than buying a bakery cake for a special occasion.

While I make many cakes from scratch, I have also found my family sees the cake part as only the vehicle in which to ingest my homemade butter cream frosting.  Thus, there are times I make cupcakes with an 88 cent box of (you will not believe this)... boxed cake mix.

It's kind of like the day I saw the Pillsbury pie crust box in my mother-in-law's refrigerator.  Hallelujah and Praise the Lord (not out loud because she was a Lutheran and not used to such outbursts of emotion).  My husband's mother was famous for her pies and in her 70s had come to realize she can get by with a really good Pillsbury crust, especially when she is not entering a County Fair contest.  But I digress... as usual...

As you know, I like to buy things as cheap as possible because I have extremely limited funds in which to work.  But sometimes it does pay to... pay.  Especially if the expenditure is for supplies or knowledge or both... which will come together to make it possible for us to make our own at another time... whether that is a dress, a sweater, a meal, a dessert, a garden, or any other infinite number of items we need for our day to day existence.

I was thinking of this last night when I made a late trip to the grocery... to buy Diet Sierra Mist... and I passed the deli section where packages containing deviled eggs were being sold... $5.99 for a dozen deviled eggs... that being $5.99 for six eggs and a combo of mayo and vinegar and a dollop of mustard.  That was the cheapest package of deviled eggs, too.

I thought of the food magazines I had just passed, having stopped to peruse a few dozen since the Holiday Issues are now making their way to the shelves.  If I remember, the most expensive magazine was $7.95 for one of the glitzy issues containing lots of beautiful pictures of the recipes... showing them as they should appear after making or baking or mixing.

The conversation going on in my mind was this... would I rather pay $4.95 to $7.95 for a magazine which will give me at least one recipe to use all year or... $5.99 for six eggs and some condiments (of course, I was there only for my much needed Sierra Mist so neither was purchased).

You see, the magazine is not cheap but it gives one lots of ideas and options to make something for dinner or tea time or to serve before a football game.  Knowledge is a good thing to spend money on and every person who makes a home (single or married, male or female) needs a good reference library which they can peruse when an idea is needed.

If one purchases deviled eggs for a minimum of $5.99, there is nothing to show for that expenditure.  However, if one were to purchase a cookbook or magazine which teaches them how to make deviled eggs... how much will they save over a lifetime of pot lucks?

I know this is but one way of looking at money but when one is rather dizzy, one tries to make it quick and simple so here is my humble opinion...

Budgeting for how-to idea books and magazines and cooking classes and sewing classes and sewing machines and good quality cookware and a chef's knife and yarn and carpenter's tools and gardener's supplies and any other stuff which invests in our doing instead of buying... it is all an investment and not throwing money away.  That is what frugal is all about.