Start thinking of Christmas gifts now and save money

As a young girl, I can remember darting home from the bus stop to catch the last thirty minutes of Little House on the Prairie. I was smitten with Laura's long braids (What little girl in the 70's wasn't?) and enamored by domestic life on the Ingalls' homestead. Some thirty years later, I've found that I still enjoy those early episodes, including one depicting the Ingalls' first Christmas at Plum Creek. Click here to read the rest of the blog post.

New recipes and friday post

Happy Columbus Day! Make sure you check out our new Seasonal Gourmet posts in the Seasonal Gourmet section and our Friday post in the Stress Free Fridays section!

Recipes and Stress Free Fridays posts

We've just posted new recipes in our Seasonal Gourmet section and a new money tip in our Stress Free Fridays section.

Make sure you check them out!

Attention followers!

If you've noticed recently, we have added a couple of elements to our blog page; one is a new section entitled Seasonal Gourmet, which has a new post each week of a recipe using seasonal ingredients, and our Stress Free Fridays section, which has a weekly tip about how to simplify your finances and enrich your life. We just realized that the subscribers to www.stressfreefinancial.blogspot.com may not be getting the subscriptions to each of these sections, so make sure you subscribe to www.stressfreefridays.blogspot.com and www.stressfree-seasonalgourmet.blogspot.com as well. This way you can make sure you're getting all of our information, since we normally post on those spots rather than the main page.

Thanks and happy reading!

Success Stories

Brian*, a 21 year old full-time worker was concerned about how much debt he was carrying. These concerns fueled his decision to go see a nonprofit credit counseling agency about options for dealing with his debt. In addition to his full-time day job, he works another part-time job, leaving him working virtually every day, evening, and weekend. Even though he had no free time and was working around the clock, Brian was committed to paying off his huge debt load. The credit counselor and Brian went through his budget together and made adjustments and changes to allow him enough extra cash a month to enroll in a Debt Management Program, which is a program offered by many credit counseling agencies and allows a client to make one lump payment to the agency each month. The agency then distributes the money to the client's creditors. Many times a credit counselor can negotiate better terms with the creditor, such as reduced interest rates and waived late fees, making it easier to pay off the debt.

Brian was excited to learn that he'd be able to afford a $728 monthly payment to the program with the execution of the counselor's suggestions. These included putting the kibosh on Brian's rent-to-own television and Xbox. After he kissed his TV and Xbox goodbye, he started working on making the $728 payment to the plan. The end result? Brian was debt free after 6 months, an incredible feat!

Now that the crushing weight of debt is lifted off his shoulders, he can start saving money for his future financial goals. And hey-- he could even write down the goal of having a bigger, better, 50" plasma if he wants. Or better yet, how about a day off?

*Name has been changed.