The Simple Wealth

We had been using AT&T until last year. We didn’t make many phone calls, but the bills were between $30 to $45 a month. It’s hard to understand their bill. Pages and pages long. And taxes. I felt that we paid way too much for the amount of time we use. I have been using Skype to make phone calls to Taiwan, using a USB phone connected with my computer. I like Skype, it’s cheap or even free if you both are users. But your computer needs to be on in order to make phone calls or to receive incoming calls. I was looking for another alternative to replace AT&T service as my home phone. I found Joiphone.

Joiphone

Joiphone provides VoIP service, voice over Internet Protocol. If you have cable internet or DSL, you can use VoIP service. They will send you an adapter to connect with your cable/DSL modem and your regular telephone. You don’t need to use your computer to make or receive calls, just use your regular phone the way you used to. They have several plans:

100 minutes plan–$6.95/month ( if you pre-pay a year, or $9.95 month to month), each additional minute costs only 2 ¢. Low international rate, 2~3¢ per minute for most countries. They will not send you paper statement, instead they email you.

Unlimited calling within USA and additional 9 countries–$8.95/month ( if you pay yearly, or $17.9/month paid monthly)–including Argentina, Canada, Denmark, Portugal, Cyprus, Ireland, Singapore, Spain, United Kingdom. This is their new promotion. I like this new plan, with unlimited calling if you pre-pay a year, you don’t need to worry about telephone bills for a whole year. They didn’t have this plan when I signed up, so I chose the 100-minute plan.

Joi to the world–$14.95/month–unlimited calling in USA plus 800 minutes free to 40 additional countries and 50 destinations.

They have other plans, including adding a virtual phone number, adding 2nd number, adding toll free number. And all plans include 40 calling features for free, like caller ID, voice mail via phone, voice mail via web, 911 and 411, 3 ways calling, fax to email. Their customer service is good, very easy to reach a live person.

I save about $500 a year by switching my phone service to them from AT&T. You can keep your current number too, just email them with your info, telephone company, account name and address, telephone number, and it takes only a couple of days or so to transfer.

If you don’t live in the United States, they now also accepts international orders, $8.95/month unlimited calling from any country.

Subscribe to The Simple Wealth

Related Post:

•AT&T is hiking their price for calling features

We have been using Netflix since 2004 and have watched most of the movies that we are interested in. I have been wanting to cut down this expense but Michael has not been willing to until recently. One of our New Year resolutions is watching less TV at night, so I canceled our membership last week. He now works on his music recording, one of his hobbies and talents, after dinner, …..well, besides playing with Katrina.

Discount movie tickets for sale at Costco

Recently I noticed that Costco sells movie tickets in their warehouse, 2 for $15.99 for AMC movie theaters, and $14.99 for Cinemark theaters ( including Century theaters). The prices of tickets for AMC theaters currently are: adult $10.25, matinee $8.25, child $7.25; for Cinemark theaters are: adult $9.75(Fri/Sat), matinee $7, child $6.50, so it saves $4.51 for 2 adult tickets and it is valid for any movie any time in general. It doesn’t save much or at all in comparison to matinee tickets, but you don’t have time restrictions. I bought 2 tickets last time I shopped there. I think it’s nice for Michael to take Katrina to the movies sometimes, for me I rather stay home with my baby. Anyway, some of the money saved from Netflix could be relocated to going to the movies.

DVD rental machine

I saw a DVD rental machine in Foods Co. You can use a credit card or debit card to rent up to 3 DVDs and you will be charged $1 per day per DVD. You can check locations near you online at The New Release . If you only watch DVD occasionally, it could be a good option for you.

I saw a different DVD rental machine in FoodMaxx, called Redbox. You can rent DVDs online at Redbox, and choose a location near you to pick it up. Other participating stores includes Lucky, Longs Drug. You can return DVD to any Redbox machine. They offer a free rental, if you provide your email address, they will email a code to you. Click sign up page here.

And if you shop in Safeway, there is another DVD rental machine company, DVDPlay. They also offer a free rental, click sign up page here.

Subscribe to The Simple Wealth

I was planning on making roasted chicken for dinner tonight, but the chicken wasn’t fully defrosted in the fridge yet, so I changed my plan. I looked what I had in the fridge and saw the leftover ham. I could make salad with shrimp and ham. Quick and easy. The ham was leftover from a dinner for 7 people last weekend, and I made a pasta dish with some leftover ham for dinner the other night. It’s great to be able to make several meals out of it.

So I dice some ham. Defrost some shrimps in cold water. Mince some garlic, half for salad dressing, half for shrimps. Chop some romaine lettuce. I love romaine lettuce, it stays fresh in the fridge for a couple of weeks. Thinly slice some red onion. Get some plates ready. Put lettuce and red onion on the plates. Heat a sauté pan. Drizzle a little extra virgin olive oil in the pan, and pan fry the ham dices for 2 to 3 minutes to get some nice brown color and some more flavor. Get the ham out and add to the plates. Then pan fry the shrimps 2 minutes on each side, and season well with salt and pepper. Get the shrimps out and add to the plates.

Then make salad dressing.

2 tablespoon Mayo

1 tablespoon Dijon mustard

1 tablespoon minced garlic

1/2 tablespoon Italian seasoning

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon sugar

1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

Whisk all the ingredients together while drizzling extra virgin olive oil until desired consistency or thickness of the dressing.

Subscribe to The Simple Wealth

This is by far my favorite simple meal to make: roasted whole chicken with roasted vegetables. The oven does the cooking, and I only do the preparation. You will need 1 whole chicken and plenty of spices ( salt, black and white pepper, garlic or onion powder, some chili powder if you like). Be generous, and cover each inch of chicken skin with spice. You can mix the spices in a bowl first, but I usually just season plenty of salt on the chicken first, then garlic and pepper, and then just a little bit of chili powder. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Put the chicken in a roasting pan or baking sheet and bake for about 1 hour and 20 minutes, and baste the chicken with the pan drippings or extra virgin oil or butter once or twice in between.

Then chop some vegetables. Anything you have on hand is fine, carrots, potatoes, onions, mushrooms, yams. Add some herbs if you have, like rosemary or thyme. Coat the vegetables with extra virgin olive oil, season with salt and pepper. Spread the vegetables onto the roasting pan or baking sheet with the chicken after the chicken has baked for 30 to 40 minutes. Then go take a bath or do whatever you like.

I make this dish about 3 times a month. Because I have done many times, I know it takes about 1 hour and 20 minutes if you only open oven once or twice. And it tastes great if you season the chicken generously.

The leftover chicken meat is great for making salad, or pasta, or fried rice, or tacos. You can use the pan drippings in pasta or fried rice, it adds a lot of flavor.

Subscribe to The Simple Wealth

I live in California. My household needs related to grocery shopping are: my husband prefers Atkins’ low carb diet and he enjoys a couple glasses of wine and liquor at night, which I do too with lesser amount, and we have a toddler and a baby. For the past few years, I spent about $700 a month in groceries.

Use Coupons

When I started to look for ways to cut down in grocery expenses several months ago, first I looked at coupons. Every Sunday morning I browsed coupons, and cut the coupons that I could use. I also searched online coupons. I tried it for a few weeks, but I didn’t find it save much money, maybe one dollar or two at a time. I still use coupons but I look for some other ways that can do a major cut.

Try Different Stores

My pattern of grocery shopping was to shop in 99 Ranch( a Chinese supermarket) and Trader Joe’s, and sometimes in Costco. And I usually had to shop at least two stores, because the Chinese supermarket doesn’t carry a few items that I need. I decided to try a new store. Since the prices of groceries in 99 Ranch are usually better than that of Albertson or Safeway’s, I didn’t need to try those two stores. I browsed the weekly sale flyers and noticed that Foods Co(Food for less) has very good sale prices. I began to shop in Foods Co. Foods Co sends out just one double-page flyer weekly, very simple, not like other stores with pages and pages of ads. I circle the items with good sale price on the flyer and bring it with me to shop there.

Know the prices

After a few weeks of attentive shopping, I began to have very good idea of the prices in Foods Co. They usually have two, three items for sale in vegetables and in meat, and their sale prices are usually very good. For example, every few weeks, they have twin pack of whole chickens for sale for about $5~$6 dollars total, so I always buy a twin pack when they are on sale. I found that knowing the prices plays the most important role in controlling grocery budget.

Does it save money to shop in Costco?

I was searching online about saving money on grocery, and I saw some people’s opinions that they don’t find shopping in costco save money. I had the same feeling before. I felt that it’s hard to control budget every time I shopped in Costco. This was until recently. Now I usually do my weekly shopping in Foods Co, and once a month I shop in Costco. It works out well having a schedule like that. There are things that I buy there: coffee beans, Splenda, extra virgin olive oil, salad greens, bacons, paper towels, cheese, eggs, etc. The list changes. I just added butter to my Costco shopping list. They sell 4 LB of butter, 4 boxes of 4 sticks of butter. I have been a Costco member for 5 years, and I had never bought butter there until recently. I used to think what did I need that much butter for. But it saves me at least $3 dollars in this case by buying in bulk. I have changed my questions to ” do I need it? do I have space for it?”

Shop in Trader Joe’s

I also shop in Trader Joe’s about once a month to stock up on wine and liquor. They have very good quality and price wine and liquor.

Always look for the best price for your must-have items

One of my must-have items is Special K’s protein plus 9 gram net carbs cereal, that’s the only cereal Michael will eat. Costco used to carry it. Then I found it in Food Max and then in Wal-Mart. Then they stopped carrying it too. I had no choice but to buy it in Safeway and it costs me about $5 a box. Then I started to look through all the weekly flyers. When I saw Safeway had Special K cereal for sale for two for $5, I went and bought as many as they had on shelf.

Another one of my must-have items is Silk soy milk, that’s the only brand of soy milk that Michael will drink. Sometimes I feel that he really gives me much more trouble in shopping. I used to buy twin pack in Foods Co for less than $6, but recently they increased price to almost $7. I noticed in Food Max they still have twin pack for less $6. Food Max and Foods Co are kind of similar stores. You will have different grocery stores where you live, but I’m sure there are some kind of food warehouse or discount store in your area. I saw on the flyers that Foods Co had Silk soy milk for sale twice recently, a few weeks apart, two half gallons for $5, and each time I bought as many as they had in the fridge. They last for two, three months in the fridge. One advantage of keeping plenty of what you need on hand is that you won’t be forced to shop because of that one thing you must have is out, and the less you shop the less you spend.

Another one of my must-have items is coffee beans. We like French roast. I have looked many places for best price, and tried once on Amazon until I found San Francisco Bay French roast for about $10 (3 LB) in Costco.

So far for the past few months since I started cutting budget, I have been able to cut down about $200 a month in grocery and not sacrificing the quality or the quantity of things we enjoy. Actually I save more than $200 a month considering that we dine out less and I stock up more stuff. It’s still a process. I’m sure I still can do better. I’m sure there are people do much better than me. I feel that paying attention to prices and to be aware of your needs and wants is a good practice of mindfulness. By paying attention to something you must do, something like grocery shopping, in turn increase your awareness in general.

Subscribe to The Simple Wealth

Both Michael and I enjoy Margarita a lot. I used to buy Margarita Mix until a few months ago I made friends with a couple who just moved into the neighborhood. They have a big lemon tree in their yard. They are very friendly and kind. They said that we could come anytime to pick lemons and if they are not home just open the gate. Something very welcoming in their words. It’s something so nice that you can come knock at a neighbor’s house without giving a ring first. We enjoyed walking to their house and picked a big bag of lemons home. However the lemons are kind of mushy and soggy, maybe the tree is not very healthy. No no, I’m not complaining. I’m totally happy to have free lemons.

Recently we were invited to my another new friend’s house for dinner. Maybe the law of attraction is working for us regarding lemons. They have a big beautiful lemon tree in their backyard. We came home with a huge bag of lemons. I used about 5 lemons to make two glasses of Margaritas the next day, plus some triple sac and tequila. The ratios for me is 2:1:1, 50% of lemon juice and 25% of Triple Sec and 25% of tequila, for Michael is 1:1:1, 33% of lemon juice and 33 % of Triple Sec and 33% of tequila. Plus a little sugar and pinch of salt. It’s so fresh, so good, really great Margaritas.

Subscribe to The Simple Wealth