Yesterday we went to the local theatre in the small town we live in and saw a movie that was called "The Farmer's Daughter." It isn't the old movie, but a recently made one about a young woman who was once on the local TV station as a reporter, but after her brother died, she gave up her career and came home to work for her father on the farm. Fast forward a few years and her dad became very ill, and she's now running the family farm. It was a good movie and if you are interested in this sort of thing, it is on Amazon and costs $2.99 to rent. It was a movie that showed the moxie of the gal, but also how hard it is for family farm. The two directors were at the movie (it was free for the public) as well as the female farmer. It had a feel good ending so if you like this sort of thing, I encourage you to watch. 

Farmers are planners. They have to plan what they are going to plant and when and how and what can make them money. I think gardeners are as well. I'm not going to claim the title as gardener because I'm still working on it, but I do have plans. I recently planted some potatoes. I've never tried potatoes before, but I had some potatoes that sprouted "eyes" so I figured other than my labor, I'm not out a whole lot, but I am hopeful. I bought some onion sets so I hope to get some of them in the ground soon too. My radishes in the tin tray are starting to come up. I planted some lavender seeds the other day and so far, no sprouts. I'm hoping I get some started. I planted some more in egg cartons this afternoon. I'd like to start a small area of lavender because both bees and butterflies are attracted to lavender. I hope to plant some other plants that are bee and butterfly friendly as well as another small garden of wildflowers that are hummingbird friendly. I know, big plans!

Part of our plan it to plant a small vegetable garden at the back of the property. Here in Central Illinois we usually have a wet spring and then as the summer goes by, it often gets very hot and very dry. DH and I spent some time the other day making a rain barrel. We used a plastic trash can for the rain barrel itself, but built a small wooden platform for it. We finished it Friday afternoon and set it out. It rained some yesterday and then a whole bunch today so hopefully we have a good start on rain for our rain barrel. We need to till the land for the garden and I'm working on planning it. I want enough to get some good eats, but not so big that I'm married to it that I have no time to do anything but weed. I like fresh vegetables and I'd like to have enough cucumbers to make pickles and hopefully enough tomatoes to can a few. We both like green onions so I hope to do quite a few different plantings so we have plenty for the table, not to mention more radishes and hopefully a decent amount of carrots. 

Groceries continue to rise in price. I'm wondering if more people will be planning a garden of some sort to help offset the cost of eating. Although we have enough property we could raise chickens, when I was a kid we had them. People act like they aren't a lot of work, but they are. If you let them run free, you have to make sure they are roosting for the night and locked up so some predator doesn't get into the hen house and kill them and eat them. They only lay so long so it isn't like you are going to get ten years of laying from chickens. And although I helped with the butchering as a kid, I didn't do that much and I don't want to take that on now. Call me squeamish I guess. With the good, there's the bad and unless things change drastically, I'm not ready to be a chicken farmer. 

Let me preface this with, I believe in tipping those folks who provide a service such as a hair dresser or a server. I understand that the tip is actually part of their pay. 

But, and this is a big but, the tipping thing has gotten out of hand. I was looking to order some food for Easter. Food that I will pick up, heat,  and serve. I couldn't understand why the price was so expensive and there it was, at the end, a large tip tacked on. Fortunately I caught it, but good grief, why would the program do that. And who would get the tip if I left it? It's been that way for other things such as when you use a kiosk (sometimes I don't have a choice and can't go to a person and there it is...the tip option. Let's see, I'm doing the work to place the order and then leave a tip too? 

I think it has gotten out of hand, don't you?

Patient Saver's blog about trying times ... I was tempted to copy that title to mine. Again, another week of losing more money in the market than making. I know the market has ups and downs, but it seems more down and up and I don't see it getting any better.

I was watching CNBC yesterday and the CEO of Affirm was saying the economy was OK, people were still spending money. Before that, I had never heard of Affirm, but it is one of these companies partnered with Walmart that has a buy now, pay later plan. He said people are buying and they are paying their bills. Which on the surface sounds good, but it made me wonder if they are struggling or going into debt other ways.

We live in the country near a small town. We go to church in a town 40 minutes away. We either go to this town or another for hardware and stuff like that and try to hit grocery stores since our little town only has a Walmart. I had a gift certificate to a locally owned restaurant and suggested to DH we have lunch there. It's not a diner, a bit nicer than that. I hadn't been there in quite a while and I was hoping the gift certificate was good. I was shocked at how much the prices had raised. The restaurant itself used to be fairly nice -- not top of the line, but not fast food. But the vinyl on the booths was torn on every booth. We got there before noon and figured it would fill up so we wanted to get a parking place and get a seat. We left after 12:40 and it was not full. The manager came by; he remembered me from years ago and he said business has been slow. He thanked us for stopping in. Fortunately the gift certificate was still good and they honored it. We have some money left and I suggested to my husband we better go in and use it because if today was any indication, they won't be in business much longer. It makes me sad. Another small town business struggling. 

As we left, we noticed some of the other restaurants...here it is Friday at lunch time and some places had a decent amount of cars, but some had maybe one or two. Some were chains and others were locally owned. No place was packed to the rafters like it used to be. DH commented, people are cutting back. They are watching their money more carefully. We wouldn't have eaten there if I hadn't had the gift certificate. 

We had a bunch of errands and it always seems like when we do that, it is a day long event. Not always, but often. We did get what we wanted. I bought some loss leaders at the grocery and also bought three things for the pantry. We bought some things at the hardware store. I had candles to fill at church so we stopped and did that. I had fuel points that we cashed in to save 30 cents on gas; seems our gas has gone up another ten cents from the ten cents it went up last week. I'm afraid many of us are going to be spending less as we are cautious. So the plan now is to stay home tomorrow since we did so much running and spending today. And hope that next week is better as far as the economy. 

Based on the market dropping and prices increasing, do you think we bound for a recession? I keep reading and hearing that our economy seems to be ripe for one. To be honest, it is frightening because it seems like our world is topsy turvy with all the wild things coming from the news. The trade war and prices increasing and the marketing losing money doesn't seem like a good thing in the near future. Are you planning on doing anything to combat this?

I feel like we are already trying to save money. Granted, we are spending money on things, but DH and I were discussing what else we can cut back on. Which just feeds into more economic woes if enough of us do that. 

We already planned on planting a small garden. I've started a few things from seeds and have them on the sunporch. Hopefull they will sprout. I continue to make my own bread. I buy things on sale. But even so, we spent almost a hundred dollars at the grocery store yesterday and we didn't bring home a whole lot. Fortunately we can afford it, but I don't know how people who are already struggling are going to make it. 

So, what are your thoughts?

Here in Central Illinois it isn't exactly warm, but it isn't freezing either. When we don't have the usual gloomy winter days, it makes me think spring is around the corner and I'm getting excited.

We have this lovely sunporch on the back of the house. Although it is early to be planting a vegetable garden, I'm getting excited about doing so. Scratching around here, I found a metal pan and asked DH if I could use it to plant some seeds in it and have it on the porch. The porch seems warmer than the outside with the afternoon sun and the way it is built, it doesn't get super freezing cold when the weather is cool outside. So, I bit the bullet, put some potting soil in it and planted some radishes. Hopefully they will come up and we can enjoy some. I saw this dude on Facebook stating you could start strawberries by planting a small slice of a strawberry in dirt, so I did that as well in the plastic containers and those too are on the sunporch. 

We've been throwing out ideas on what we want to plant for this year. Last year we tried a few things and some where successful and some were a failure. DH had this wooden raised garden and the soil just wasn't deep enough to grow tomatoes or cucumbers because of the way it was made, the soil dried out so fast. We had some fierce, hot days so it made it tough to keep things alive. We bought one of those small raised metal garden rings too and planted tomatoes in that and they did really well. So, we bought a second one and that's the plan for this year -- 4 tomatoes in the two of them, two each. We are going to till up a spot and fence it in for other things like cucumbers, onions, and other things. I have garlic planted already and a small herb garden in a small area as well as strawberries. So hopefully we will get some good things this year. I'm hoping to preserve some of the things we have. With grocery prices we hope to have some fresh produce. I'm also hoping that the rhubarb and the black raspberries produce a lot too. 

Last fall I planted tulip bulbs and I'm looking forward to when they break through the soil. I plan to take a photo of the three spaces in case I need to fill in spots. I can plant things, but we have two dogs who like to dig so I think some of the bulbs have been moved. 

I seem to concentrate on food a lot, but since it is a necessity, I'll validate it that way. A few months ago I bit the bullet and bought a large toaster oven. I always had one to use for smaller things to bake, but when I moved out with the divorce, I didn't take the one that was at the house. I missed it. We have a perfectly good oven, but I know ovens are a big energy pull so unless I can bake more than one thing at the same time, I prefer to use a toaster oven to save on electricity. Lunch today was a casserole and heating up a vegetable, both fit in the toaster oven. As I have watched my retirement accounts decrease the past few weeks, I feel a little better knowing I'm saving a few cents here and there. It adds up as we go along. 

One thing that probably isn't frugal, but I have been crocheting little items and leaving them with a note that it is a free gift and if the person can, post a photo of it and where it was found. I crocheted bookmarks and left them in the Free Little Libraries in our small town and one person posted a photo on the Random Acts of Crochet Kindness so that was cool. I'm going to leave shamrocks this week around town. Most people who post talk about it being a day brightener. I hope it is. 

This has little to do with my post, but I can no longer post photos on my blog. Any ideas on how I can do that? I always get an HTTP 400 error. 

Today was the first time I heard the term, "Doom Spending." It is consumers spending more than they normally would for fear of rising prices due to the tariff threat. CNBC had an article about it and it said it was more than just stocking up, but people buying things they cannot afford because they fear the prices are going up. The issue is some of these people are already deep in debt and instead of working on paying down their debt, they are increasing it.

Things are uncertain and I think there is a fear that people won't be able to get things  if prices continue to rise. I can't imagine any of our SA folks succumbing to it, but I can see people rationalizing a big purchase saying they are saving money now by buying a big ticket item. 

Here is the URL for the story if you are interested: https://www.cnbc.com/2025/02/27/1-in-5-americans-are-doom-spending-heres-how-that-can-backfire.html