I am going to reveal our top five frivolous expenses that both Mrs Credit Card and myself had (as far as we could recall).

1. Shoes

Who needs more shoes. I guess for me, one or two working shoes, a pair of sneakers, a pair of flip flops and a pair of casual shoes, would be really all I need. However, there are about four pairs of dress shoes, three sneakers (which I hardly use these days), three pairs of flip flops and even a timberland boots in my shoe closet. Mrs Credit Card is a Carrie Bradshaw wannabe. What saved us was her tiny feet (youth size 2), which thankfully prevents her from buying Jimmy Choos and Manolo Blaniks. Nevertheless, there are more ferragamos and guccis in the shoe closet collecting dust at the moment.

2. Cell Phones

How often do you change your cellphones? Every time a new model comes out? No, both of us do not buy a new cell phone every time a new model comes out. But I tend to lose my cell phone every few months and I hardly even use my cell phone. All I need is a really basic simple phone. Yet, when I lose my cellphone, I end up buying the latest model (which is massivley under-utilized). Mrs Credit Card has threatened to unsubsribe my verizon service because I always forget to charge and carry my cellphone with me!

3. Unhealthy Snacks

We should all be eating healthy food. However, given the the types of food available in the supermarkets, it would not be unthinkable to find many of us thinking that regular snacks are ‘normal’ and ‘healthy food’! Even though Mrs Credit Card uses coupons, we find ourselves loading up on Ben and Jerry’s ice cream, and other snacks like mega size chips etc. Mrs Credit Card uses coupons to get free chocolates. So while we may think we are saving money, in reality, we should not have been spending that money at all! We should be instead buying more fruits.

4. Lipsticks

While Mrs Credit Card does not go crazy over cosmetics, she simply cannot resist buying lots of lipsticks. Lip gloss, lip shine, matt lipstick, long lasting lip stick, tinted lip balm with SPF - you name it, she has it. Light pink, shocking pink, fiery red, coral, neutral, plum,vampish & etc etc - one can never have enough.

5. Kitchen Equipment and Utensils

I am sure we all have a coffee maker and a blender. Really basic. However, life is so much more interesting with Cuisinart mixer (which does everything), crock pot, tabletop electric grill, juicer, rice cooker & all other kinds of fancy “I need that” gadgets. Bed bath & beyond is a very dangerous place to go. On top of all these gadgets, we always need differerent size pots & pans, glass vision pots, corning wares, pyrex dishes, serving dishes of all size and bakeware of all sorts. We probably use these “special gadget” 2 ot 3 times a year. Or like our pasta machine, once in 2 years !

Well, I could probably go one and make a top ten list. But I’ll stop here. I would like to hear about YOUR top five frivolous things you spend your hard earned money on?

Everyday, I get (and so do all of you) tons of mails with discount coupons on all sorts of products. In fact, we get the sunday papers solely for the supermarket coupons. While collecting and using coupons wisely does help you save money, I wonder how many times have we bought something that was on a “sale” or “discount” simply because there was an offer, or because the discount was only “valid for the next few days”. As I reflect on this, I think there is an art and science to using coupons and discounts to be frugal, and there is a fine line when you are being sold to buy something you do not really need. This is how Mrs Credit Card and myself compartmentalize this issue :

Regular Coupon Use : The True Money Savers

Mrs Credit Card cuts out the coupon from the Sunday papers everyday. Her supermarket and grocery shopping is very strategic. She only buys stuff which she can use the coupons. She is patient if there is no coupon for a particular item. She simply waits until a coupon appears. In fact, she has done this for such a long time that she knows the coupon cycle!

I’m glad she cuts these coupons because they are real money savers.

Opportunitic Use of Discounts and Sale

At the back of our minds, there is always something that we need, but have put off buying it because we either want to wait and get a better deal or simply do not want to spend that kind of money.

However, once in a while, lady luck smiles on you and you get an offer in the mail, a discount coupon or and store closing sale annoucnement. Very often, Mrs Credit Card is on top of these situations and we do end up taking opportunities of these occasions to buy something that we have always needed, but put off.

Impulse or luxury purchases because of sale

But once in a while, we all fall for the sale, discount coupons when we buy stuff either on impulse or stuff that we do not really need. We fall into this trap often when we are on a vacation and walking into shops with ’sale’ signs outside.

So while we actually save on “full retail price” on these items, the fact is that we would have saved simply by not buying them. I have found that we tend to fall for these impulse purchases when we go through an extreme period of being very frugal. I think one way we get around this is by not being fanatically frugal and giving ourselves little luxuries once in a while. For example, I would not recommend depriving yourself on Starbucks simply because you have heard Suze Orman talking about how much you would have saved in 20 years if you stopped drinking Starbucks everyday. This is just like dieting. Once a week, you need to have a mini pigout session. Otherwise, there’ll come a time when you snap.

But this same phenomenon also happens when Mrs Credit Card uses her coupons for the grocery shopping. I sometimes think we are buying too much stuff simply because we have coupons for them. I get the feeling that sometimes we buy food not because we particularly want to eat them, but simply because they were on sale. And though we may be ’saving’ because we use our coupons, we may have saved even more if we did not use all our coupons.

We haven’t really looked into this in detail yet, but I think the solution to this is to really write down what you really have to buy, or want. Then take advantage of it when there is a coupon or sale. If there is a sale on something that you do not want, then just ignore it. Easier said that done!

About a month ago, Mrs Credit Card attended a Silent Auction for a public charity - National Organisation for Hearing Research (NOHR) Foundation. It was Tea at The Rittenhouse Hotel and the organisers did a fantastic job securing many donations for the event. There were gift certificates to dinners at Morimoto’s or Buddakhan’s with tickets to The View, gift certificates to dinners at Delmonicos Steakhouse and etc etc.
The presentation of some of the auction items were phenomenal. The presenter of the event was Stephanie Stahl - medical reporter of CBS 3 Philadelphia. It was a successful event and they raised close to $200,000.

Mrs Credit Card bidded $40.00 (minimum bid) for a gift certificate valued at $100 at Delmonicos Steakhouse at the Hilton Hotel including a recipe book named SPICE. It was the only bid and she got it.

So we made use of the gift certificate yesterday as it was Mrs Credit Card’s birthday. And we did save quite a bit. For appetizer, I had the crab cakes while Mrs Credit Card had a mushroom risotto with Sea Scallops. Yum Yum. For the main course, Mrs Credit Card had the Ribeye steak, medium rare. I had the rare Blackened Ahi Tuna Steak. We also ordered a side of Asparagus not knowing that a salad came with the entree.

The portions were so huge we had to doggy bag! When it was time for desert, we were both stuffed. But we got a few pieces of desert for the kids. So how much did we spend and how much did we save? Here is the cost breakdown.

1. Crab Cake Appetizer - $13.00
2. Sea Scallop/Rissotto - $13.00
3. Voss Water - $6.00
4. Chevalier Champagne by the glass - $7.50
5. Delmonico Steak - $31.00
6. Rare Ahi Tuna - $24.00
7. Grilled Asparagus - $6.00
8. Lava Cake - $6.50
9. Desert (4 slices of cake for kids) - $26.00
10 Tea (for two) - $5.00

Subtotal - $138.00
Tax - $9.89
Total - $147.89

Because we had a $100 voucher, the bill came up to $47.89. We gave a $25 tip. Hence the total cost for the night worked out as follows :

Cost to get the $100 voucher - $40.00 (charity donation)
Cost of dinner - $72.89
Valet Parking - $3.00
Baby Sitter - $12 (our neighbour!)

Total Cost - $127.89. We would have paid $187.89 instead without the gift certificate. We saved a total of $60.00. In fact, we could have saved another $30 if we had shared the main course. The portion was so huge that we had to doggy bag (guess what’s for dinner tonight ?)

To be honest, we seldom go to steakhouses or any fancy restaurants. But it was Mrs Credit Card’s birthday, so a nice dinner was an absolute must! But it’ll felt good that w actually donated some money to a worthy cause and yet at the same time manage to save on our extravagant dinner.

My son is now involved in spring baseball. His team is the Cubs. Recently, we had to take a team and individual photo session. I found out that Sports Legend Photography was the company taking the baseball pictures for every team. Choosing the type of “package” you want is a real test of frugality. Here are the choices available.

Player Pack (Package A) - The player pack cost $30.00. It consist of a Composite Memory Plate and 16 Trading Cards. According to the brochure, it was a $42 value and you save $12!

Sports Pack (Package B) - This package consist of a large memory plate and four wallet photos. At $15.00, this was the cheapest package.

Best Buy Pack (Package C) - For $35.00, you get a memory mate, eight mini wallet photos, four wallet photos, two individual photos, one photo magnet and one bag tag.

Pro Pack (Package D) - The Pro Pack came with a large memory plate, eight trading cards, two individual photos, eight wallet photos and two micro magnets. The cost was $45.00 - $57 value save $12!!

Plague Pack (Package E) - This is the mother of all packages. You get one team with individual walnut plague, eight trading cards, two individual photos, one ID pack which consists of two ID-cards, three zipper tags, two key tags, one bookmark and one door hanger). You also get one photo magnet. The cost is $55 (but off course it is a $64.00 value and you save $12.00).

Individual Pack (Package F) - The individual pack consist of one collector’s pack (one photo, four wallet with text and graphics - whatever this is), two individual’s phots and one photo magnet. This one cost $20.00 ($28.00 value - you save $8.00!).

Which did I choose?

Well, at first Mrs Credit Card wanted to just get the Individual Pack. When I got to the photo session, I asked them which was the most popular ones. It turns out that the Sports Pack (the cheapest) and the Player Pack ($30.00) was the most popular. The Player Pack was popular because of the trading cards.

I asked a few parents what they were getting. A couple said they were just getting the cheapest. One commented that their wife filled it out and they got the most expensive ones! I decided to get the Player Pack because I thought my son would love the trading cards. I got the Player Pack not because my son wanted it. Frankly speaking, he did not really give a toss about it. It was just me!

It made me realize that many times for our kids, we buy things that we either want them to have (cos we did not have it when we were kids) or because we think they would like to have it. What ends up happening is that we spend more on things that they will either not remember or will probably lose them!

I’m certainly guilty of this. Are you? Share your views on this. Which package would you have got?

Left and Middle - Individual and Team Photo, Right - Memory Mate

For those who have been following this blog, you know that both Mr Credit Card and myself recently went to the Pottery Barn Outlet store in Lancaster County. There, we some furniture that was going for a huge discount.

While we were there, we also saw some blinds and curtains that we had always wanted to get for our kids’ rooms. However, there was a problem. We did not know the exact measurements. So what we did was to take out the blinds and did a ‘rough estimation’. We figured that it was fit the windows just fine.

We took a long time deciding on the color and finally settled on a checked blue pattern as it fitted both our son’s room. It was obviously on discount as well so we were happy to pick them up.

After the drive home (which was about an hour), we took the blinds and went to our sons’ rooms straight away. Then to our horror, it did not fit! The blinds we bought measured 26 inches by 63 inches. Our kids window measured 31 inches by 63 inches! Worst of all, there was no return policy.

Just two days ago, I was going to make a trip back to Lancaster again. I called the store and they agreed to exchange the items if we found something that suited us. After the hour journey there, we quickly found out that there was not any blinds that had the measurements or color that we wanted. We also could not return the goods.

Lesson - We learnt a good lesson here. While shopping at Outlet stores can save you lots of money and is certainly a smart way to be frugal, you can fall into the trap of buying something you either do not need or in our case, not sure if it is exactly the thing you need. Now that we know the precise measurements, we will not make this mistake again.

The lesson here is to make sure you know what you want to buy, only then should you look for the best bargains. In our case, we did the opposite. We stumbled upon bargains, then tried to decide what we want. I’m pretty sure that is how most of us get into credit card debt as well!.

When the Home Depot was closing down to make way for a Walmart in King of Prussia, they started having sale to get rid of inventory. It started off with 10% to 30% off and 2 weeks later - it’s now 20 to 40% off.

During the first week of the sale. I would drive by and remind myself to do a list before I go in. My lists included a window screen, several light bulbs, mulch, air filters, carbon dioxide detectors, rugs, garden hose, flash lights & a toilet seat. (Yes, mine needed to be replaced !)

I persuaded my neighbor - who is a contractor to come along. He has the Chase Home Improvement Rewards^SM Card which he used for my purchases as he would earn 3 rewards for every dollar he spent at Home Improvement Stores. Needless to say, he also loaded up.

When we finally went last Friday, we saw so many guys with big trucks loading up their merchandise. Somehow I was getting excited and thought maybe I’ll get a good bargain for a grill. (Although it’s not on my list) It’s so hard to focus when you know everything is discounted. You want to buy almost everything because you tell yourself that you’ll need it someday. So, I walked around for 2 and a half hours and only succeeded in getting light bulbs, mulch, garden hose, a rug, 3 flash lights and yes, my beloved toilet seat. No, the grill is still out of reach - maybe it would be further reduced in another week of two. It’s such a big place and if you are not a frequent shopper in Home Depot, you spent half the time searching for the right ailse. Frankly, it’s not my favorite shopping destination.

As much as we made some savings with purchases that we eventually needed to make, going to close out sales can tempt you to buy more than you planned, and often on unnecessary stuff. If I had done it again, I would have wrote down a list of things I needed to buy rather than walk around for two hours looking at every discount!