FRUGAL FRIDAY

Tomorrow is Valentine's Day. My mother always celebrated Valentine's Day by leaving some little gift along with a beautiful Valentine's Day card at our place on the table. When we got up in the morning and came in for breakfast, our Valentine remembrance from her was waiting for us. I have always done the same thing.

When I was first married, money was very tight, so I made my Valentine's Day cards and sometimes the presents. In time, I resorted to buying my cards and presents. However, this year I looked at cards and the price for the 8-10 cards I wanted to send added up to more than $30 and those were not the really fancy cards. AND that did not include postage for mailing them. This made me think about how to save money this year!

First of all I remembered that I had a program on my computer for making greeting cards. I bought greeting card paper (on sale) for $10 and found a package of large envelopes on sale for $2.50. I made my cards and added a few bits of glitz that I already had to some of them. I also made gifts for a few of my friends. I must admit that I did buy my husband a small bottle of the cologne that he had a hankering for at Christmas.

The last few years I have ordered a bouquet of fancy cookies delivered to the retirement center where my mother lives. It was expensive, but a nice way to thank the ladies who take such good care of her. This year I decided to make the cookies myself and deliver them to the various shifts that work today and tomorrow. The cost of that was much less than half what the delivered cookies cost.