So, this morning while I was doing my daily catch up on headline MSN news, there was this article. 6 ways to save like a billionaire.

I totally read the whole article (It was like 8 paragraphs...) hoping to find sneaky ways to save that little bit of extra money. Billionaires are billionaires for a reason, right? I mean, you don't get to have that much money spending every dime you make.

But let me be the first to say, no average person is going to learn how to save money from those worthless tips.

Like step one, drive the same car for years, don't take a helicopter to work.

Um. Done.

Or buy clothes off of the rack, instead of directly from the designer. Sorry Miriah, but that's a pretty easy one too.

My personal favorite was, Don't spend your money wastefully on frivolous toys such as yachts and jets.

That one is going to be the toughest to follow.... Zach and I already put the deposit down on our 10 million dollar yacht and we secured the storage warehouse for it... Shoot. I hope we can get our money back....

Ridiculous.

Being a frugal billionaire means not spending $1,000/minute.

Being a frugal poor person is an entirely different plane of existence all together.

Don't worry. I am totally not turning into one of those people that's all down with the rich, spread the wealth, I deserve some of the pie just because I'm poor. Ok.

Those people worked hard for their money. They figured something out that I couldn't. Or more accurately, haven't yet. :) If they can make billions on a product the rest of humanity can't do without then more power to them.

Same with wallstreet. It's hard being poor, but I didn't work for their money. I had nothing to do with how they earned it. So I for sure have no claim on it.

But, all the same they got to where they are somehow, so msn.com, I would appreciate a little more effort in the area of helpful articles. This may surprise you, but I actually find it super easy not to spend all of my money on a yacht in the middle of America where our biggest body of water is the Fremont Lakes. And I doubt even Warren Buffet drives a canoe around that endless circle of man-made-no-where-to-go.

I think the bottom of the issue is that I was really looking for an article from like Dave Ramsey other than a billionaire.

Which trust me. We've definitely been taking a page from his books lately. Cash budget and all. It's a lot easier said than done, but hey, money makes sense when its tangible.

You already know my secret to less expensive pedicures.

My favorites though recently are two great ideas that I figured why not share. The first is called The Passport. And it's only for a select number of cities, but Omaha happens to be one of them. It's basically like a diners' card. Like a credit card or gift card, there is a list of around 50 restaurants and the card is used at the end of the meal before you pay for everything. It's all buy one get one free! That's the best part. So you're limited to the 50 restaurants on the list, but one meal will always be free. It's not for everybody, but Zach and I are looking forward to the limitations. Narrowing down the entire city of Omaha, to fifty restaurants sounds pretty much amazing to this girl who can't decide between the best steak house in town and Burger King. But the other great thing about it, is that if you recommend it to people and they purchase it and tell them who referred them, then the next year(It's good for an entire year.) you get a discount and if more than one people join you get it for free! (It's like $80 up front.) So if you only even ate out once a month and used the card, you are saving at least $100 after the $80 you spent a year. And for us, we eat out more than once a month so... Imagine the Savings! :)

That's one idea. The other one I have is probably my favorite. It sounds amazing, I just haven't signed up for it yet. Actually I asked for it for Christmas because you can gift it a year at a time.

It's called E-Mealz. Or something like that. But it's a weekly menu planner. But SO much more than that. So you sign up for it and then you have access to seven meals a week in the form of 2 printable pages. The first is the list of meals, including the side dishes, ingredients, recipes and day of the week, how long it will take to cook them and little extra pieces of advice, such as especially for the kids, or put in ahead of time. The second page is a grocery list, divided into your grocery sections, such as produce or dairy, and then with the item listed and if its on sale and how much it will cost. And then at the bottom of the page, the cost of the entire menu is totaled out for you. Plus you can pick menus for whatever grocery store you frequent. Such as Kroger, Wal-Mart or Aldi, and then the meals are based on the sales for those restaurants per week. And they have meals for a family of 4-6 or for 2, and then you can go by diet. So if you are low-carb, on the weight watchers points system, gluten free, vegetarian or low fat, and then of course just regular meals, there are weekly menus designed for your taste.

I think this is amazing!

Especially for someone like me who hates staring at the bare cupboards at 5:00 pm wondering what the crap am I going to throw together before Zach asks the most loathed question of all as soon as he walks in the door, "What's for dinner?"

Well, I should say, it's only loathed when I have no idea what the answer is. When I actually know the answer, or even better have already started the dreaded task of making it then it's my favorite of all questions to answer.

So anyways, just a few ideas that I think are fantastic that I thought I'd throw your way!

Ugh. Being a grown up is the worst.

Zach tells me repeatedly that I'm crazy for not feeling like I belong in this life. He's all, you're on your third child for goodness sakes, time to feel like an adult.

Am I the only one out there that feels like I am severely unprepared for all of the responsibility of this life?

Fine. It's just me.

But where is my continuing education in making daily meals, budgeting, making money appear from thin air, mothering, wife-ing.....

Seriously. I think that's my issue though. I depend on education to get thru this melee of life and since I've never taken one Foods, or Home-Ec, or Finance class maybe I feel unprepared. We all know I'm seriously lacking in the common sense department and street smarts sounds like a dirty word to me. Or two dirty words.

So anyways, as I fumble my way blindly through it's nice to find the little helpers that make all of the grown-up stuff I'm unqualified for, make sense and in fact a little bit easier.