holy crap, im totally THAT mom (a few reasons why i wont buy baby carrots)

so, a few weeks ago, a friend and i took a trip to sprouts so that i could show her how i do our meal plan/groceries so she could save some money on groceries (ive actually done this with a few different friends now, and much to my surprise, they all learned a lot and somehow still want to be friends with me after personally witnessing my grocery store antics), because, you know, thats my thing. if this were my little pony id have one heck of a "not spending unnecessary money on groceries" cutie mark. 

but anyway, we get to a certain point of the shopping trip, and she asks me "what do you get as snacks for alice, like, goldfish crackers? pirates booty? and how do you do that cheaply?", and it took me a minute to formulate an answer, because, once i thought about it i realized ive never bought special snacks for alice, (or any special food really once she got past the purees). this totally innocent question from my friend totally almost opened the floodgates of my philosophy and manifesto when it comes to my food and cooking decision and all the reasons behind them and why it is so very, very important to me to make sure that our food-related decisions are as simple, healthy, cost effective, and least wasteful as possible. thankfully i was able to control myself and simply answer "oh, we dont do a lot of snack foods, she just eats whatever leftovers or fruit or nuts or crackers or chips we happen to have, nothing special". 

but right there in the middle of sprouts it hit me. id suspected it for a while, but james is oh so gracious in assuaging my insecurities and for a long time i had told myself that it couldn't be true. but it was. and there was no getting around it or hiding it or brushing it off any longer. its horrible and embarrassing, but im totally that mom. 

you know, the one that doesnt buy baby carrots. 

im serious. 

ive literally never in my adult life purchase baby carrots because im morally opposed to it. ok, maybe thats a little bit extreme, but still. 

i have my reasons though! i mean, who takes a philosophical stance against a vegetable without reasons for crying out loud? not me, because im a completely normal and rational person (that also happens to take philosophical stances against vegetables....). 

what are these reasons, you ask? well let me get started:

1. theyre expensive. a one-pound bag of baby carrots goes on sale for $1. a FIVE POUND bag of normal carrots is $2.99 regular price (and often sprouts has their organic carrots at this price too). we eat a lot of carrots around here, so im totally willing to spend five minutes peeling and chopping to save a few bucks. 

2. theyre wasteful. you know baby carrots arent actually baby carrots, right? theyre regular carrots chopped and filed down to a "baby" shape (meaning, theyre technically a "processed" food). which i presume leads to quite a lot of wasted carrot. and dont get me started on all the packaging involved in those little baggies of individual portions...

3. theyre inefficient. remember how i said we eat a lot of carrots? well we use them both for snacks AND for cooking. and baby carrots really suck for cooking. meaning, if i bought baby carrots for snacks id STILL have to buy the regular carrots for cooking. and i am NOT buying the same vegetable twice just because theyre in slightly different shapes. also, instead of being harvested, then put in bags to sell like normal carrots, theres the added step of being sent to what im assuming is a separate factory to be made into baby carrots (though really im just guessing here, im from los angeles, i really dont know anything about farms, thats jamess deal)

4. theyre really, really old by time you get them. this is the big one for me. you know how baby carrots always have that whitish dried coating on them? well i just did some research and its called "blushing" and its the result of the carrots getting dehydrated. well, when i first got diagnosed with all my allergies i started pre-chopping massive quantities of carrot sticks so that i could always have a snack that i knew wouldnt kill me waiting for the next time i was starving (which is always). you know how long it takes those carrots to get all dried and white? like a month (im not kidding, i had some that got forgotten in the back of the fridge forever and they had only barely started to dry out). so that has me seriously questioning the age of baby carrots by time you get them home. 

so yeah, i dont buy baby carrots. i wont judge you if you do, i just wanted to shed some light on the reasoning behind some of the quirks i have that maybe dont make a lot of sense from the outside. 

im totally that mom. and now that its out, im no longer ashamed. 

and this is probably why i dont have any mom friends. 

march monthly wishes (+ i could use some career advice right now)

happy monday everyone! its the first monday of the month, so that means its time for monthly wishes, which is when i reveal my "theme" for this month and the goals ive made relating to it. 

i started participating in weekly wishes a few months ago, and i really loved how talking about my small goals each week helped me to be a more productive and goal-oriented person. unfortunately, im a really good list-checker-offer and not a very good big picture thinker, so even though i was getting more stuff done, i wasnt necessarily seeing a noticeable improvement in our household as a whole. 

so i was really, REALLY happy when melyssa (who obviously must have been reading my mind) started doing monthly wishes. since january, every month I've picked a "theme", and picked a few larger goals to work on that month pertaining to the theme. so far, its been wonderful (though not entirely perfect, but well get to that in a minute when we review februarys goals). last month, though, instead of making the big monthly goals, and then separate smaller weekly goals (like i did in january), each week i simply talked about my progress on my monthly goals as i worked my way through them. for me, this was a really great way to take my larger goals and break them into more manageable steps and it really helped me stay focused since every week i was able to look back on my progress so far. 

so, long story short, thats how im handling my monthly wishes from now on. 

and before we start digging into marchs wishes, lets go back and take a look at februarys:

februarys theme was "clean", and my main focus was to purge and declutter so that we could do a deep clean of the apartment. i was maybe a little too ambitious in just how many different areas i wanted to organize (and james ended up working again, so i didnt end up having as much free time as id thought i would, but in a good way). heres what i wanted to clean:

1. the file box.

2. our closets. 

3. alices clothes and toys. 

4. files/pictures on the computer.

5. the kitchen. 

6. my craft supplies.

and that was really way too overambitious. 

really the only one i completed was my closet and alices things, BUT james made me a new workspace in the living room so my craft things are a lot better, just not perfect. and the kitchen and file box are actually very small projects that could be done in an evening sometime in the future. the only thing that i completely disregarded was the computer files and thats just because i just CANT do repetitive computer tasks (so, ill be working on this indefinitely). BUT! in general our habits regarding clutter ARE much better, and while we didnt get to do an all-day deep clean of the whole apartment, i have been putting a few more minutes into each days daily chores, and holy moly that makes a HUGE difference. 

so, februarys goals werent completed perfectly, but i can deal with that. 

now on to march. 

marchs theme is PREPARE. 

the reasoning behind this is because, in case you missed it, I'm going back to college and my first classes start at the end of this month. and there are a few things that need to be done before my classes start:

1. fill out/turn in my financial aid appeal form. after i filled out my fafsa i found out that were so poor that i qualify for all the financial aid, BUT since i already have a degree, i do have to go through an "appeal process" (it sounded really scary at first but the financial aid counselor treated it like it was no big deal and as long as i turn in the form on time ill get it). 

2. bring them my marriage license to change my name my paperwork and get a new student id. this is the same college i went to before i was married, so all my records are the same as from my first degree, and about half the stuff says meyers and half says patterson. apparently theres an office that can fix that. 

3. get a new student id. even if i still had my original student id (which i dont think i do), i was fifteen in that picture so i dont really think that counts as an acceptable photo id. 

4. research and purchase some new running shoes. the school im going to is literally two blocks away, and i am NOT buying a parking permit to park a half mile from my apartment for two hours at a time. also, the classes im taking are on the edge of the campus farthest from any parking, so the walk from the parking lot to my classes might actually be farther then the walk from the house to the classroom. but, walking to school and back twice a week isnt something i can really do in improper footwear. and ive literally never owned athletic shoes. so i have to find some that will work for me (that also arent hideous, i mean, fashion school) and try and find a good price on them. not really looking forward to this process. 

5. get a decent amount of beans/soups/etc. in the freezer. this semesters classes are at night, so i wont be home to cook every night. i actually already bought tons of dried beans so that james and alice can have burritos on my school nights, i just have to cook them. 

5. take alice to the zoo. ok, this one isnt entirely school related, but ive wanted to take alice to the zoo for like a year and a half and weve never had both the time and the money and i am DETERMINED to get us to the zoo on the next available saturday (which, hopefully will be before school starts)

and finally, 

6. decide what im going to do about my job at joanns. theoretically, ill be able to get a decent amount of financial aid and apply for scholarships and the combination would totally replace my (mostly inconsequential) income from joanns next semester. this semester i HAVE to take these one-unit classes and its making the financial aid situation weird and basically i have to keep working (or, poverty luxe can start bringing in a little more money and that would fix everything). 

and this is where i could use some input: i have a really complicated relationship with working at joanns. i really love my teaching position, BUT the hours are unpredictable (i only work if the class gets enough students) and scheduling/communication problems come up A LOT. my cut counter position is not my favorite, BUT since ive worked there management has been really great about keeping the scheduling consistent (because i have to keep other nights open for classes, i can only work fridays, and they just put me on every friday). both positions have their pros and cons but both of them require that i work at night, since i do not make enough money to pay for childcare. starting at the end of the month ill be at school two nights a week, so keeping both positions after school starts is somewhat unrealistic (i really can't be gone EVERY night). but because jamess job is really inconsistent (though it has picked up quite a bit recently), i feel like quitting outright wouldn't be wise, so that we still have something for when work inevitably slows down. and im not sure what would be best. (its REALLY too bad that the homeschool co op is only one day a week because i LOVE teaching those kids and wish that could be my only job). 

so  what do you think? i have about three weeks left to decide...

so those are my goals for the month, what are yours?

february in review + march call for sponsors

so, yesterday i was *this* close to catching up on our wibbly-wobbly blog week and start march off right on schedule... 

but...

right as i was about to get started on my february in review post, my friend shannon texted me and asked if i wanted to go hit up the local salvage fabric store, right now. it was her birthday, and she was asking me to go to my favorite place ever, so obviously i couldn't say no. i mean, how could i pass up a golden opportunity to play in all this:

so... today youre getting a combo february in review/march call for sponsors post. 

which actually ends up working out ok because february wasnt exactly action-packed around here. as far as family life is concerned its been a lot of boring work stuff for the grown ups and crafts for the alice:

that day in particular alice was making a beard. 

oh! and we finally got our first winter rain storm so alice got to stomp in puddles for what I'm pretty sure is the first time ever (california life is rough, guys):

 so, what else happened last month? 

lets see... i made a whole slew of cleaning-related goals, but i only did so-so on them (ill talk more about this on monday)

i did our taxes all by myself, which was a pretty huge deal because I'm really bad at math and paperwork (also, i didnt notice that wed gotten our refund for about four days because id been too afraid to look at our bank accounts, and i guess that was kind of funny).

james totally spoiled me with valentines day surprises, most notably a new functional workspace, which ive really enjoyed putting to work. 

i listed TWELVE new skirts in the shop. this is where id normally have some kind of preview of whats coming next shop-wise, but actually i took a little break from shop sewing to make bow ties for my friend shannons wedding (unfortunately she invited me out right when i finished so i didnt get a picture). also, i made eight bow ties which was a pretty huge accomplishment. 

jamess work finally started picking up again, which is a huge relief (though the work going on right now is all out of town so theres a whole other challenge there). 

i went to my first ever blogger meet up, and it was super scary but it was also fun and i made some new friends so it was actually pretty cool!

then the next day, james and i got all fancy for dapper day and strangers took our picture a bunch and that was weird (but grown up time at disneyland was nice!). 

oh! and I'm helping give away a super awesome dslr kit on the freckled fox right now! there are still a few days left to enter i think, so get on that!

and then the month ended with a huge emotional roller coaster as james (and i, by extension) endured a grueling interview process for a really awesome job opportunity but then he didnt get it and that was really upsetting but then his literal three month battle with unemployment finally got resolved so that was nice but now my job is causing issues so honestly i dont know how to feel these days. 

but enough about that. february was maybe not my favorite month ever, but we had some fun times, and work seems to be picking up for james, and I've got lots of big plans for both the shop and this little blog here. so, march should be pretty cool. 

and speaking of march... you know what time it is?

yep. its time for me to tell you all the reasons why you should sponsor poverty luxe in march. 

mainly, remember all that work i did in january to overhaul everything and make this blog awesome again? well, I've been working REALLY hard to keep the momentum going and well, the numbers dont lie. you can check out my sponsorship page for more details. 

and if you clicked on that link, you may have noticed that my sponsorship options have changed a tiny bit, and this is because ive been watching my sponsorships closely to see whats working and whats not, and adjusted accordingly. 

thats a thing nobody really talks about in blogging, the constant learning and adjusting when it comes to offering sponsorships. since i jumped into paid sponsorships WAY to early and WAY not prepared, ive been making adjustments basically every month. and ive decided that every month im going to share them (and the reasoning behind them), so that my learning experience can be your learning experience too. 

so heres whats changing this month:

the in-post ad seems to be doing well, i mean... its booked till mid april. so, im keeping things the same, but the price is going up to $10 (because, well, its actually a lot of work).

the large ads i really like, but they havent been selling super well, so I've lowered the price down to $3. i also noticed that theres really no reason why i have to limit how many people can participate, so ive opened it up to ten spots instead of the previous five. 

and finally, the small ads. this was a hard decision to make because i really like the idea of free ad swaps and i wanted to make it as easy as possible to offer them here. the thing is... for a few months now, the small ads have been booked solid, and... um... not a whole lot of those are actually swaps. SO now the small ads are $1. UNLESS you want to swap, in which case you can contact me for a promo code and we can totally do a free swap. oh, and one more thing i want to clarify: i can ONLY do the introductory tweet if you put your twitter name in the "about this ad" field, so, if your buying a small ad, be sure to remember to do that so i can introduce you to all my followers!

so thats whats going on in sponsorship land these days. please check out my sponsorship page for more details, id love to have you join my sidebar for the month!

hope youre having a great weekend so far, ill se you monday for monthly wishes!