Joni Smith

Joni Smith

Joni is a 40-year-old wife and mother in Kansas City, MO. She started budgeting in 2013 and was able to quit her job as a computer programmer in 2017. Her family now has financial freedom, living comfortably on only her husband's teaching salary. (This includes 3 humans and 3 cats living under one roof.) These days, Joni enjoys finding simple ways to live the good life while saving money and the planet at the same time. Her hobbies include DIY projects, gardening, quilting, making self-improvement goals, and brainstorming ways to reduce, reuse, and recycle.
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8 Uses for Hand Sanitizer (besides sanitizing hands)

September 10, 2017
Joni Smith
Cleaning & Organizing

My husband is an elementary school teacher and if there’s one thing that they keep around in abundance in the classrooms, it’s hand sanitizer. If you talk to him, he’ll tell you that it’s a total necessity, but I’ve learned to try to avoid hearing his germ stories from school. In any case, they are always well stocked with hand sanitizer! Because of this, we recently found ourselves the new owners of a LOT of hand sanitizer. I’m talking, A…

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Injured Squirrel

How to help injured wildlife

September 9, 2017
Joni Smith
Garden, Life

I was in the backyard this week when I heard a commotion in one of the trees. I went closer to check it out, and the neighbor’s cat followed me. We were both staring up in the trees trying to figure out what was going on up there. Leaves were streaming down like rain and I heard screeching. Then I saw an adult squirrel jumping around, and only moments later, a small squirrel fell from the tree only a few…

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DIY curtain rod for odd length windows

September 7, 2017
Joni Smith
Home Projects

I like looking around on Pinterest for diy ideas to try. Especially when something is going to cost more than I want to pay. Can I make it myself more affordably? We are trying to set our basement up for movie viewing with a projector, but a lot of light comes through two high windows. We really wanted a way to black them out as needed. So I Pinterested and I bought the supplies to make a curtain rod for…

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Set up a mudroom space in the smallest entryway

September 7, 2017
Joni Smith
Cleaning & Organizing, Home Projects

Every day, I’d notice one of my daughter’s tiny plastic chairs over by the basement door. I asked my husband about it and he said he was doing that so he’d have a place to sit and put on his shoes before leaving for work in the mornings. That got me thinking. How could I make the set up better for him so he didn’t resort to using plastic kiddy chairs? And how could I do it with things We…

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Will Safekeeping

September 6, 2017
Joni Smith
Finances, Life

We finally printed off our wills, got the necessary witnesses signatures, and put them in a safe location in our home. But if our family can’t find those wills if the time arises (God forbid), it would be like we had never made them at all. So we emailed family members describing the location of said wills. If you have not made a will, I encourage you to do so. If it is needed, it’s one less thing your family…

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Delicious Fish Even a Non-Cook Can Make

Delicious Fish Even a Non-Cook Can Make

September 6, 2017
Joni Smith
Food

? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Do you struggle with cooking edible meals at home like me? When it comes to cooking, I usually try to avoid it – I’m not very good at it, and I’d so rather be in the garden! But it’s much cheaper and healthier than fast food and restaurants, so it’s well worth the trouble.  I’m starting to make a list of easy (read: fool-proof for the non-cook like…

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pilates

Morning exercise

September 5, 2017
Joni Smith
Health & Fitness

If I’m going to exercise, it’s got to be in the morning or I won’t have the energy to make it happen later in the day. And it has been so long since I exercised regularly that I knew I needed to start off doing something that wasn’t too hard so I wouldn’t give up yet would also give me some results quickly. Pilates was the natural choice. It’s low impact, fun, almost like meditation, and I don’t want to…

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Organizing the freezer #LWSZ

September 5, 2017
Joni Smith
Cleaning & Organizing, Food

Organizing and Inventorying the freezer was also supposed to be part of LWSZ day 1 time permitting, but time did not permit for me. Luckily, with the help of the hubby on Labor day, we finished up organizing and Inventorying the rest of our food in the freezer(s). Not only was this a great opportunity to find out what we already had on hand in the house for meal planning during this no spend month, but it was great for…

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