Trimming back

For the majority of my adult life, I've been 'working poor' - barely keeping my head above the poverty line, whatever that may be. I learned a hard lesson when I was 22 - you can't run from your debts. Especially when your parents co-sign for the loans.

And now with a house and a 6-month old baby and absolutely no desire to return to my moderately well-paying job come December, I've been hunting down ways to make things in our life a little lighter on the pocketbook.

For me, it's hard. I have a very set income right now (thanks to EI) so what I get is pretty much already gone by the time I even get 'paid'. Ninety-five percent of my 'bills'? Personal debt. It sucks. Massively. But I do have a car and I am, in theory, building credit history. And we have the house, which is a massive step beyond renting. Especially in a city where rents have skyrocketed and it would be impossible for us to find anything with a small child that would be half-decent and pest-free.

For my partner, he's got personal debts, too - student loans. And he takes care of most of the hosuehold bills, too, because he's got the better income. Always has, and likely always will.

Even with a precarious juggling act every month when it comes to paycheques and bills, I still feel like we could be doing a lot more to cut back. Like I've mentioned before, I'm trying to cut back on the grocery bill by making our own bread (which tends to start at $2 a loaf, and that's the low-end stuff). I have a garden, which is doing okay for it's first year; most of what comes out of that garden will be used for my daughter's food - I absolutely refuse to buy pre-made baby food for her. I want to know exactly what's going into her body and it saves money. It also takes a grand total of 1 hour every couple of weeks to do up a couple of ice cube trays of fruit. But I digress... I know there are other things we can cut back on. The only question is - do we have the willpower to do it?

The local message board here has been rife with comments about the standard of living here and how people can save money. There are the obvious suggestions - walk instead of driving, get rid of your cable, don't buy name-brand products... but when you've been doing things like that for 10-15 years, it's hard to change the habits.

So the search goes on. When the time comes, I will have to go back to work. I'm hoping to keep a part-time schedule so we don't have to put our daughter into child care, because that would mean me getting a second job, leaving me no time with my family and someone else raising our child - not exactly the ideal situation. What I need to do between now and the time I do have to go back to work - that'd 4.5 months from now - is figure out how people do live on 1.5 incomes. And still enjoy life.

I think the lottery's looking mighty good right now...