Having one parent be home with the kids often means living on a pretty tight budget. Even when the at home parent works, it’s often not enough to really ease the budget crunch. But being frugal all the time isn’t much fun.

Some of the problem can come from having to think about practically every purchase, no matter how necessary. It’s skipping your favorite treats. It’s telling the kids “no” all too often when they want a treat. It’s seeing friends and family be so much freer about how they spend money, and knowing you can’t do it.

Do You Have Any Options?

Some people say that you always have options. That’s true to a degree, but you can’t always exercise them right away. There aren’t many times that you can suddenly earn more money because you want to do more fun stuff. And you can’t just decide to splurge if you’re living paycheck to paycheck… at least not if you want a roof over your family’s head, working utilities and enough food to eat.

But you do have the option to try to bring in more money, if what you really want is an overall lifestyle change. You won’t be able to get it right away most likely, even if you were to start working outside the home, but you can set goals.

But I Want It Nooooooow!

Sometimes you can work in the small splurges. It’s wonderful when things work out that way. If you can afford to indulge yourself or your family just a little while being frugal, do so. It can really help ease some of the strain caused by being so careful with your finances.

If you can’t, it may be wiser to go over why you’re trying to save money in the first place. To an appropriate extent, this can be discussed with children. They shouldn’t be burdened too much with their parents’ financial problems, but knowing why they can’t have everything they want isn’t going to hurt them.

Especially if they watch a lot of television, kids want things. Lots of things. It often seems like they want everything they see.

Frugal or not, that’s not going to happen, right?

With that in mind, even as you say no because money is tight, think about how often you’d be saying no even if it weren’t. “No” is a great word for kids to hear when they’re trying to get you to buy stuff they don’t need. “Save your own money” isn’t a bad choice either.

When it’s stuff you want, think about what you want most. Do you want the shiny whatsit or do you want to meet your financial goals more? As a grownup, you should be able to decide sensibly whether or not you should indulge… even when you aren’t feeling like being sensible.

Get Support

No, not money. Find friends, family members, your spouse or significant other, and make sure you have emotional support for your choices. It’s particularly helpful to have the support of others who also need to be frugal. It can be a bit of a competition to see who can keep being frugal, save the most money, stick best to the budget, whatever.

Being frugal is much easier if you don’t feel alone in it.

And yes, it can still be exhausting. But you can get past that and keep working towards your goals.

The holiday shopping will be kicking into high gear very soon. But if your family is like many others, times are tighter than usual. But even if they aren’t, could this be a good time to simplify your Christmas gift giving?

My family has long kept our gift giving pretty simple. My sisters and I draw names to shop for, with definite budgets for everyone. It allows for smaller budgets all around. Even so, we’re looking at simplifying further yet as most of us are facing financial challenges of one sort or another.

Ways to Simplify While Still Giving Great Gifts

Visit Thrift Stores and Consignment Shops

A great gift doesn’t have to be new. It’s amazing sometimes what you can find at thrift and consignment shops. There may be a lot of stuff that is just too worn down to give as a gift, but other times you will find beautiful items to give.

This also allows you to be more creative. You probably aren’t going to find the latest and greatest anything at one of these stores, but you probably will find something you wouldn’t have thought to give otherwise.

Give Experiences

A family day out, tickets to movies or the theater, play time on a miniature golf course. You can make it memorable and avoid the clutter of unneeded stuff.

Agree to Skip the Adults

How often do you get frustrated with buying for the adults in your family because they don’t need anything? Talk it out and consider just giving to the kids instead.

Do Favors

My sisters and I have done things such as painted my mother’s house for her rather than buying gifts. It’s great to be able to help her get something done that was being put off.

Babysitting, painting, massages, house cleaning, organizing… follow your skills.

The beauty of simplifying is that it lets you focus on the real reasons why you are celebrating at this time of year. It’s not all about the gifts. It’s about the meaning your family puts into the holiday season, no matter which holiday you’re celebrating.

Most families get hit with cash flow issues at one time or another. That’s just life. And of course right now many people are very worried about how the economy is going. Is it time to limit your spending on your home business?

Maybe. But hopefully not.

When to Cut Back on Your Home Business

If the money you spend on your business is making it hard to feed and house your family, then yes, it’s time to cut back. But only if you really have your household spending under control first. I’d suggest cutting things such as cable television long before you cut out your home business. There are a ton of other ways you can save money around the house that may help you to keep your business going financially.

Sometimes the money you spend on your business is not immediately paying you back. A profitable home business is always worth it, but if the payback isn’t quick it can be hard to think that way. If you’re having trouble keeping up, that’s a legitimate issue you need to face. Can you work things so that whatever income you are getting from your home business is helping you where you need it most?

A business that isn’t turning a profit yet can be a trickier creature to handle. Giving up means that you are losing the potential for a new income stream. It’s not always the right long term decision.

Your attitude towards your business is a part of this decision. Is your feeling more “Gosh, I hope this works,” or is it “I’m going to make this work, whatever it takes!” Is your feeling realistic, or are you letting emotion get in the way?

If the short term is what you need to think about, try to figure out if you can cut your business expenses way, way back but still keep things going. It may not be easy or even possible in all circumstances, but I recommend trying. If the business model is overall sound, giving up can be a really poor choice.

Finding Frugal Alternatives for Your Home Business

When it comes to just keeping things going, you don’t necessarily want to just keep your business up and do nothing to market it. You have alternatives.

If you don’t have a website, for example, get one! There are both free and cheap ways to get your business online. Bringing your business online can be a great way to expand your reach without spending a lot.

If you’re already online but need a way to cut the costs, take a solid look at what you’re spending versus what is being brought in. A domain name and website hosting are cheap enough that unless you’re bringing in close to nothing, they’re probably paying for themselves. Considering that you can get decent hosting for under $10 a month, this is probably not a make or break expense… unless you have a ton of traffic.

If domain name and hosting are your only expenses, but you still aren’t earning anything, it is very much so time to consider why. Too little traffic? Now’s the time to focus on marketing. Too little income but plenty of traffic? How are you monetizing your site?

When it’s traffic you need you can be frugal by considering the free options, such as article marketing. Whether or not you enjoy writing articles, this can be a great way to bring in links and traffic to your site.

You should also consider posting quality, relevant comments on related blogs. Just saying “great post” isn’t going to get people to click on your link. Blatantly advertising your site is just going to annoy people. Having something interesting to say gives you the best chance of bringing interested people over to your own site.

Monetization can be a bit more challenging. If you’re an information based site, perhaps you need to find more products that will be interesting to your site visitors.

If you’re selling products, but not enough of them, how’s your sales copy? How long has it been since you tested something new? If the same old copy worked over and over again, we’d still be seeing ads from the ’50s or even earlier. And we’d like it too!

The key here is to just not give up. Your money troubles are probably temporary, and giving up is often a very poor choice. Instead, find ways to make it work. Push your limits and see where you can take your business.