Repurposed Garage Sale Finds

I really wanted to give my daughter a dress up box, pretty and full of fun clothes to wear and imagine with. But, when I browsed the toy aisles, I couldn't find exactly what I wanted. Either all the clothes were princess-style, or they seemed to only focus on one style of dress up. Oh, and did I mention they were too expensive?!

So, I made my own. I found a gently used picnic basket at a garage sale and painted it a bright yellow. The color wasn't my first choice, but the can of paint only cost me $1 from Home Depot's discarded paint shelf.

 

Before and After

Then, I looked around consignment and thrift shops for things to fill the basket with. Her favorite items by far - the colored beaded necklaces and the blue tutu. In the picture to the right, she appears to be channeling an Arab woman, but notice the blue tutu is still there!

My total cost for the entire basket was about $6, once I included the dress up items. Plus, there is room to add a few more things that I might find along the way.

I was so glad I could do this inexpensively and still in a cute way. What have you been able to reuse or repurpose for your children?

I was man A, but want to be B

My previous post about whether men should aim to be man A (saving for a family) or B (investing in the Kingdom) led to some discussion, which is great.

I find it interesting that Jennifer says she's snatch up man A, were he to come along (and were she single). Yes, she thinks man B might be more ideal, but man A is a great real-world catch.

It's also interesting that I was quite a bit like man A when Jennifer and I got together. As she said in her "Meet the Mrs." post, "When we married, [my husband] used his savings to pay off the ~$2000 debt on my first credit card."

When I proposed to her, I had a 5-year financial plan worked out detailing how two college students could afford to get married. I had even calculated how much money I would need to earn per year in order for her to be a stay-at-home-mom and for us to participate in our state's pre-paid college program for our future children. I hadn't thought much about it till now, but I was what Mark Driscoll would call, "a dude's dude." We bought our first house at the age of 23 and had credit scores above 800 by the age of 29. As I said in my "Meet the Mr." post, "I once took great pride in my financial self-determination."

I guess the point of this blog for me is trying to work out how I could get from being man A to being man B. See, there's nothing obviously wrong with man A. He is (I was) a good catch in today's world. But, there's also nothing obviously Christian about man A either. Is there any reason man A couldn't be a good, conservative Jew or Muslim? If you take out the part about praying to God, he could even be a conservative atheist.

Man B, however, is not using his money to build a good, conservative, family-oriented life, though such things have value. He's using his money to advance the Kingdom. As John Piper has said:

Only one life.
It will soon be past.
Only what's done for Christ
will last.

Family heirlooms

Thinking about Jennifer's recent post on wedding rings, I wonder if there's a place for buying some 'big-ticket' items with the intention of making them family heirlooms. For example, what are your thoughts on a young Christian couple investing in a nice engagement ring with the intention of passing it along to their descendants one day as part of their testimony of the sanctity of marriage? After all, "a diamond is forever," or at least that's how DeBeers justifies the diamond's cost.

An attractive young man?

OK, I never thought I'd be writing a post about attractive young men, but a recent sermon series by Mark Driscoll, of Mars Hill Church in Seattle, got me thinking about how young single men should live. According to Driscoll, a single man should be saving to buy a home, saving for the college educations of his future children, etc. Then, when he meets a young single woman who wants to know what he's been doing, he can say, "Well, I've been saving to buy a house and send my future kids to college." That, Driscoll, says, is a great way to woo a woman.

Now, I can't disagree that women would be more interested in the man with a plan than with a man who's spent his single-man's income on trips to Vegas. But, here's my question. Which of these is a better choice for a man to be able to say:

A) "For the last 5 years since graduating college, I've saved $18,000 so I can buy a house when I get married, and I've started a college fund for my future children. While my old college friends have been buying nicer cars and taking ski trips, I've been praying that God will help me find the right woman to spend my life with, and I want to be prepared when God sends her to me."

or

B) "For the last 5 years since graduating college, I've been giving most of my extra money to missions and Christian charities. I've been able to help a few families with medical expenses, and I'm investing in clean water projects through Blood:Water Mission. Giving means I can't take ski trips with friends, and I don't have a lot saved for my own future, but I trust God to give me what I need."

or

C) Some combination, or something different altogether. You tell us.

Have we gone too far?

Can we ever be too cheap in our wartime efforts? Apparently, Jennifer and I go through an inordinate amount of toilet paper--so much so that we need special storage for our back-up (no pun intended) supply. We're sort of like the rich fool who built barns to store his grains, except we're storing toilet paper. Anyway, in an effort to live a wartime lifestyle, Jennifer decided to buy the cheapest tp storage around. So, my question is this: When is it OK to spend a little more on something that is no more functional, but doesn't make you feel like your living in...well, a house that would have something like this?

Wartime Wedding

I've been reading the blog of a lovely lady named Ali who serves as a nurse missionary with Mercy Ships. Recently she announced her engagement and shared the story of how Phil proposed. I was particularly intrigued with how they decided to handle rings. She wrote,

When I told Phil that I didn't want a fancy diamond engagement ring, he was more than happy to believe me. I wouldn't feel comfortable wearing a diamond in a third-world country, and we both agreed that the money that would go towards a ring could be much better spent paying our crew fees for the next however-long we're on the ship. But we both knew that the symbol of a ring was important, and so one day he jokingly told me he was going to put a tie wrap on my finger when he proposed. I thought it was perfect, especially since he's an electrician and would have easy access to all sizes!

The tie-wrap wasn't meant to last forever, you'll have to click over to her wedding blog to read the rest of the story about their rings. But isn't this a wonderful example of using our resources for something greater than ourselves. It makes me wish I had felt so strong a calling to use my resources this way when I was getting engaged. Furthermore, it makes me wish I could get a decent price for my wedding rings just so I could give the money away and wear something simpler.

What wedding traditions would you give up so that you could do something greater with the money?

Image Courtesy of AuntieP's Flickr Stream

What war are you fighting?

The Peters' family is fighting a war to help save their children. One of their wartime strategies is to sell everything they own so they can afford the special care their 2 special needs children require. (HT: BabyCheapskate)

Can you help the Peters family?  

Click here to donate via PayPal at their website, EverythingWeOwn.org.

They war we are fighting, to bring glory to God, is an even bigger batter. What are you willing to give up?

Waste Not, Want Not

While browsing the internet for inspiration on post ideas, I found this statement:

Talking of waste, it was illegal to throw out food fit for human consumption during the war. People were fined for putting bread out for the birds.

Could you imagine if we applied that same standard to our lives now? Just how much perfectly fine food is tossed on a daily basis?

Recently, I was in a Quizno's for lunch and saw the sandwich maker cut off the 2 ends of a loaf of bread then toss them into a trash can.

I asked, "You aren't throwing those away are you?" He said, "Yep, there is nothing we can do with them."

The store manager joined into the conversation and said that his father had asked to have them when the shop first opened. The father intended to make croutons out of them. That lasted for just a few days, when there were more bread ends than he could possible keep up. The manager next looked into donating them to a local soup kitchen, thinking a hungry person wouldn't mind using the rounded end of a bread loaf to sope up the last bits of soup. But he was turned away there as well. There were too many rules and regulations about food donations to even make that possible.

What if, I suggested, he bagged them up and left them outside his door at night, in hopes that a hungry person or family could scoop them up. No go there either. If he did that, his shop would be fined for littering.

I know we can't control the laws and regulations that prevented that Quizno's manager from making use of his perfectly fine food, but we can control what we throw away from our own kitchen. I want to encourage you, and myself, to make the best use of all the food we purchase. I often end up throwing out bagged salad because it end up rotting in our veggie drawer before we finish it. I'm going to try to only buy what I know we will eat and make sure we eat what I buy.

What food do you waste the most?

Singer Solution

Peter Singer, Professor of Bioethics at Princeton, wrote "The Singer Solution to World Poverty" (a magazine-length article) to outline what he viewed as a the moral imperative and method for helping the world's poor. If you have 10 minutes, read it and tell me your thoughts.

Is Singer right or wrong? How do his views compare or contrast with Christian hedonism and the wartime lifestyle?

Does your daughter dress like this?

A long time ago, Jennifer and I agreed that our little daughter was not going to be wearing those shirts that say "hottie," "princess," "wink, wink" or anything else along those lines. Well, I guess we should have included bibs along with shirts.

Jennifer purchased a pack of bibs at Wal-Mart because the pack was significantly more cost-effective than individual bibs. But, the pack came with one bib neither of us really cares for. In such a case, would it violate the wartime lifestyle ethic to throw the less desirable bib away? Would it violate Christian ethics to donate the bib to someone knowing you're giving them something to put on their daughter that you wouldn't put on your daughter?

OK, it's all sort of a moot point in this case, since we clearly use the bib. Charlotte is too young to be affected by its message, and it's not something she wears in public. It's not like she's walking around with "juicy" on her butt, which would be gross on a baby. Still, this picture made me wonder about the principles here. What if some distant relative decides to send her a "I'm too sexy" t-shirt for her 12th birthday? One has to be prepared for these things, right?

John Piper on the economy

Here's a YouTube video of John Piper discussing how we should respond to the economic crisis.

weddings

I recently saw a story on CBS's Sunday Morning about the high-end wedding market and the economy. According to the story, regardless of the economy, many people are still spending very large amounts of money on weddings. One couple highlighted in the story spent $600,000 for their special day.

Now, I'm sure most Christian hedonists will agree that $600,000 is an absurd amount to spend on a wedding. But, how do we decide what is an appropriate amount to spend?

At least Thabiti Anyabwile thinks there is a certain minimum we should invest in a wedding; he wasn't impressed by a $200 wedding in a Taco Bell officiated by a minister ordained online.

Choosing a college

How does our desire to live wartime lifestyles influence college selection? Everyone who has a chance to influence teenagers, whether in their families or churches, should think about this issue.

I have worked for a few different universities, private and public. And now I work with high school students as they are deciding where they want to attend college. My general advice to them (all of whom want gradate degrees*) is to choose an inexpensive undergraduate school and then choose the best graduate school; no one cares where their physician earned his or her bachelor's degree.

I also advise them to choose colleges (undergraduate and graduate) that fit their own goals, personalities, etc; for example, some people benefit from small schools while others relish large schools.

But, that advice is geared toward students in general rather than Christian hedonists. What about Christian hedonism and college selection?

What weight should cost have in selection when college loans are widely available? Is it more important to not spend enough to buy a small house, or is it more important to attend a Christian college? I'm a Southern Baptist, and there's actually a mandate for Christian colleges in our Faith & Message (statement of beliefs). But, Palm Beach Atlantic University (a Baptist school) is about 600% more expensive than the nearby Florida Atlantic University (a state school).

Tim Keller encourages Christians to move to urban areas so we can shape culture. Should Christian hedonists strive to attend top schools--even the extravagantly expensive schools--because that's where we'll interact with the future leaders of the world? Incidentally, Columbia University, in NYC, is about 1,200% more expensive than Florida Atlantic.

If we're looking for bang for the buck, it might seem 2 years at a community college and 2 years at a state university are the way to go. But, is there more to wartime living than bang for the buck?

Financial issues are always more complex than they appear. I once calculated, for a project in a doctoral class, that attending a public university could cost graduates more than $250,000 over their lifetimes. The reason was simple: on average, it takes public university students more than a year longer to graduate than private school students. That extra year in school has costs well beyond graduation. For example, the person will presumably work one year less in his or her career, and that will mean one year less for retirement savings. While that might seem insignificant, the person actually loses many thousands of dollars because he or she is losing the last--and most profitable--year of compound interest.**

Yet, the question remains: What role should cost play in the college decisions of young Christian hedonists?

---------
* I teach at a magnet high school.
** For example, someone who placed $20,000 in a 401K for 35 years at 7% interest (compounded quarterly) would end up with $226,907. But, if that same person had 36 years, instead of 35, he or she would end up with $243,213--a difference greater than $16,000.

replacing clothes

Use it up,

wear it out;

make it do,

or do without.

That was a WWII slogan encouraging Americans to conserve resources for the war effort. In Jennifer's introductory post, she had a picture of a WWII poster with a woman repairing her hubby's pants.

But, when should Christians, living a wartime lifestyle, replace old clothes? Would a Christian wearing these pants be telling the world, "My treasure is in heaven," or "I still listen to Nirvana"?