Dumping Debt… Dumping Friends?

February 1, 2008 > 1 Comment

Hope is the Word has a great post about socializing on a budget. I thought this was one of the harder parts of our Path to Freedom. How did we reconcile our tightwad mentality with our social calendar? The most important thing we did was to be honest with friends and coworkers. This was easier to do with our friends, but I must commend my husband for taking a stand at work. There were a few occasions when he would eat his lunch at his desk and then go out to lunch with his coworkers and just get a water. That way he could still participate in the working lunches, he just didn’t eat. As for our friends, we told everyone we were trying to get out of debt. Not only did it help them to understand our new ways, many friends began to hold us accountable. They knew we weren’t going to spend $50 on one dinner so they didn’t suggest it. We learned creativity in planning our time with friends. Some of the things we started doing more regularly with friends were:

Trips to the beach with a picnic dinner or lunch
Trips to the zoo (we had passes) with a picnic lunch
Meeting at a county park, the kids would play and the adults would visit
Having people over for potluck dinners or bbq’s. We would add to this by getting our fire pit going and roasting marshmallows
Having friends over to play games

One thing that we really started taking advantage of were free events in our area. Many places in our area had days or times when there was free admission. Since we are military there were also places that had free military days. One of our most memorable nights was when our family of 8 and our friends (family of 6) all dressed in our pajamas and went to Brusters for pajama night and received a free ice cream cone.

We never pressured our friends to adopt our frugal ways, but some did. We also set aside some money every month for those events that we just had to participate in. We found out that it could be fun to hunt down entertainment bargains and our friends had fun too.

If you like this post Stumble, Digg, or Bookmark it:

Comments

One Response to “Dumping Debt… Dumping Friends?”

hopeistheword
February 1st, 2008 @ 3:04 pm

Thanks so much for the “link love”! I enjoyed reading your ideas, and I commend you for your dedication to getting out of debt. I know the rewards are great. This is great encouragement to me to not only tell our friends what we’re doing, but to also look for cheaper ways to spend time together. Thanks again!

Post your response

Dumping Debt… Dumping Friends?

Comments

Recent Posts

Archives

Categories

Meta