When I visited Mrs. Micah’s personal finance wiki, I discovered all sorts of new sites I hadn’t visited before, and came across lots of great articles from some of my favorite bloggers. Here are a few highlights that inspired and/or intrigued me:
None of us are average when it comes to how much we’ll end up spending to raise a child. I agree that we’re all different when it comes to how much it will cost to raise a child, just as we’re all different when it comes to the amount we spend on all the other aspects of our lives. I have no doubt that the Frugal Babe household will spend considerably less than the average in raising our child.
Some yummy-sounding recipes from Frugal Upstate.
The passport photo ripoff. I couldn’t agree more. My husband and I spent $16 to get our photos taken last year when we needed to renew our passports. The lady at Walgreens just stood in front of us with a digital camera and took the pictures – they didn’t even use a tripod. Why does it cost $8 per picture when a digital print on one of their machines is about 25 cents?! I remember when my whole family needed updated passports in the 90s, my parents took the six pictures on a 35 mm camera, got double prints, and ended up with six renewed passports with a total picture charge of about $10 (film and processing).
Thirty good personal finance rules to live by.
A very comprehensive post about the pros and cons of paying off a mortgage early. My husband and I do pay extra on our mortgage every month (currently $150 extra, but we increase that amount by $10 each month), and hope to pay off a 30 year mortgage in about half that time. But it’s not nearly as much of a focus as our HSA and IRAs.
Here’s a welcome change from all the people I hear talking about their tax refunds (some of my friends get refunds of $5000 or more!). Fiscal Musings made the W4 changes necessary to keep more tax money throughout the year, and will be paying taxes next month. But no free loan to Uncle Sam!
A post that reminds us to find our inner purpose and seek to make peace with ourselves. It doesn’t matter how much money we’re putting in our IRAs or emergency funds if we’re not happy with who we are and what we stand for.
An informative post about credit reports and credit scores. I really liked the snapshot of the credit report card from credit.com – I’m tempted to go see my own, but I’m sure I’d have to pay for it…
Things we need to know about 529 plans. This is a good one for me, as we’ll be opening a 529 sometime later this year for our little one who will be arriving in May.
It amazes me how many great pf blogs are out there. I love reading other people’s ideas and seeing what worked or didn’t work for them. It’s always nice to not have to reinvent the wheel.
Rachel says
I agree that the passport thing is a rip off. I got my photos done at the post office for $12 before they switched to digital from polaroid. Because I didn’t have my birth cert. with me, I couldn’t do the application the same day. By the time I got back to finish the application about a month later, they had switched to digital and would not except the photos I had paid them for. Moreover they told me I couldn’t possible have had them taken there!
What also irked me is that you have to send your ORIGINAL birth certificate if you don’t have an old passport, and just trust that they’ll get it back to you. With their 20 week turn around these days, I was lucky I didn’t need it in that time. The lady was even angry with me that I demanded she photocopy it for me before sending it away!
Emily says
Thanks for the link!!
PT says
:)
Fiscal Musings says
Thanks for the mention here. It’s true that there are so many great blogs out there.
MillionDollarJourney says
Thanks for the mention!
FrugalBabe says
Rachel – I know what you mean. My passport was just about to expire a couple years ago, and I had gotten married a few years earlier, so I needed to have my new passport show my married name. They made me send them my original marriage license and trust that it would get back to me eventually. It did, but I wished that I could have sent them a copy like I was able to with everybody else (credit card, mortgage company, etc – they all took copies, but not the passport people)
This Mom says
I love reading your blog, and I have found so many others to read thanks to you, also!
Pinyo says
Thank you for sharing my post with your readers. You and another commenter made a good point about prepaying should be secondary to retirement savings. Cheers.
Kaye says
Thanks for all of the helpful links! I love links to places I have not yet found. I posted something similar (less detail) yesterday just because I like reading other posts like it! Thanks!
Mrs. Micah says
Oh yay, I have hoped that the Finwikian will provide a place for bloggers to find other bloggers. :)