Category Archives: Intentional Spending

Talking about uncomfortable stuff – the economy

Homemaking, Intentional Spending

Yesterday I went to pick up a long awaited package from the post office. It was mistakenly sent to a location two hours from me, then sent back to the central processing center, then finally arrived back in my area.

It wasn’t fun or easy dealing with Amazon regarding this order, and I wondered if I was going to have to accept the package was lost, along with my money. I was relieved when I finally got the notice it arrived.

I had wanted to order two of this item (it was a set of five toy cars, a gift to be split for children and grandchildren), but waited to confirm that first package made it before buying another one. After picking it up, I logged on to order a second set, to see the following message:

“Currently unavailable. We don’t know if or when this item will be back in stock.”

I checked other sellers – one other seller had it for close to fifty dollars – for an item that five weeks ago cost $22.

I kept looking. I found the same toy cars being sold individually for $11 each (totaling $55 instead of $22). That’s a serious price increase. And my item isn’t the exception – I was notified that a different toy I was considering buying went up over 30% a week or two after I put it in my cart. The prices have risen significantly on many items that I looked at.

I’ve been watching the worldwide economy pretty closely for a number of months so this wasn’t a surprise to me – it was more of a question of when than if.

In the beginning of August when I wrote my sheepdog post, I referenced having concerns that I wasn’t able to share about. When you’re too early to talk about something, people think you’re crazy or paranoid, and it’s not always a blessing that I tend to accurately anticipate things on the horizon before a lot of people. Actually, it’s quite challenging.

I’ve been waiting months for the mainstream media to write about this inflation issue so I can say something to you, so that you can take steps to prepare yourselves. Now that they’re finally writing about the price increases and the serious supply chain issues, they’re still doing their best to minimize it and keep people in the dark.

My understanding is that we are in an inflationary period, which – according to the theory that makes the most sense to me – will be followed by a deflationary period, and then a more rapid inflationary period. I don’t pretend to predict the future, I’m not an economist, I’m not giving you financial advice – I’m sharing my understanding of what the indicators seem to be. So obviously I could be completely wrong and if I am, no one will be happier than me.

Though back in June US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said that the inflation was “transitory“, it was pretty obvious to those of us paying attention that it wasn’t. I was disgusted then at the efforts to hide from the population what was happening, and I continue to be very concerned about being lied to and manipulated. Yes, strong terms and you’re welcome to think I’m exaggerating. I’d rather think I’m exaggerating. Looking at unpleasant facts isn’t fun. History will show retroactively what isn’t obvious to many right now.

This isn’t going to be a small blip on the economic scene, despite the media effort to minimize or explain away the issues. They don’t want a panic and they’re not telling you the truth about the severity of what is underway. They waited as long as they possibly could to even begin to mention the financial crisis developing, and are going to break it to you slowly, so you get used to the idea bit by bit.

I’ve lived on a budget for years and so do many of you. If we were to experience significant price increases in products, food, housing or energy (different parts of the world are seeing increases at different times), that would affect many people. Will that happen? It’s happening across the world right now.

Blessedly, Israel seems to be on the later side of the curve to be affected the the downward economic cycle. I pray we will continue to be minimally affected but the global economy is interconnected, and something major that affects one country inevitably affects the others.

Am I fear mongering, or telling you to panic? Absolutely not. I’m concerned, but I’m not panicking, and neither should you. Wherever you live, and whatever your income, there are things you can do to minimize the impact of increased living expenses on your family. But doing that means you’re going to have to be willing to consider some uncomfortable possibilities rather than hide your heads in the sand (which in the short term is really much more comforting).

One practical suggestion for right now: if there’s something you need or want that is of practical value to your family and you have the resources to purchase it, now’s a good time to buy it.

Going back to that cycle (inflation-deflation-rapid inflation), deflation is when prices fall because rising prices (inflation) have caused people to cut their extraneous spending. If we experience deflation, prices will go down on the things people can live without. (Yes, like toys!) However, it’s unlikely that prices on critical items go down.

The material costs are dramatically shooting up – metals, cardboard, plastics – and that impacts the price for you as the buyer. It also impacts what continues to be manufactured. As with my toy purchase above, some things will no longer be available because the company has decided it’s no longer profitable to make them.

The most important things you can do now are pray, and visualize our world stabilizing and healing. On the physical plane, I’m going to be talking more about frugality since taking responsibility for your personal economy is more important than ever.

Avivah

Bulk food shopping option for regular shoppers

Intentional Spending

Before I left social media months ago, I was part of a Facebook frugality in Israel group.

In that group, someone mentioned going to a store that sells to smaller storeowners and directly to the retail buyer as well, and finding significant savings. This is a unique shopping opportunity, since almost none of the wholesale stores sell to private individuals.

Naturally, I made a note of the details and put it into my schedule to check it out.

The first time walking into this store was a bit overwhelming. It’s different, and you feel that as soon as you get your shopping cart, which is a heavy duty loading cart. I learned that it’s a good idea to find several discarded boxes and put them on my cart as soon as I go in, to put your small items in, since they would fall off a cart like this. (Empty boxes are discarded as they are unpacked throughout the store.)

Once inside, items are available in standard sizes with a minimum purchase of six or twelve, or in larger sizes just one can be bought. Prices, if listed, are all listed before ma’am (17% sales tax). Lots of things don’t have the price listed, and when I first went in, I wasn’t impressed since I saw items I could buy for less at my local large supermarket chains.

However!! It was worth continuing on past my initial impression, because if you’re a discriminating shopper and you pay attention to item pricing, you can definitely save a lot of money. Just don’t assume that everything will be cheaper. Which is true when you go into any store, really.

When I shopped for my fifteen year old’s bar mitzva, I saved a ton by getting many of the items here. They have almost everything you would get in a regular store, but in bigger quantities. So you’ll find paper goods, cleaning products, drinks, food – but not fresh vegetables or chicken and meat, and there’s a very limited dairy/refrigerator section.

It’s not a store I regularly shop at, since it’s so far away. But when I’m ready for a group buy of staple items, it’s worth the trip. So don’t be quick to dismiss this as an option for you, because even if you don’t have a big family, if you shop with a couple of friends, you can all save money.

Spices – these are available in bags of a kilo, and I haven’t found anywhere cheaper for them. Previously I was buying the largest size spice containers at Osher Ad, but this is definitely a much better price.

Dried fruits, nuts, seeds – also all available in 1 kilo bags, and also good prices. Again, I haven’t found cheaper prices.

Canned goods – you can get flats of twelve of whatever items you usually buy, but that’s more than I can store so I generally don’t get them. They also have 10# cans, which I find more helpful for items I use a lot of like tomato paste, olives, and pickles. (There are all kinds of canned goods in both sizes, I’m just mentioning what I get.)

I used to get vaccuum packed tuna in kilo packaging, but I haven’t seen that for a long time. Then I got the 2 kilo packages of tuna instead, which I didn’t find nearly as useful because there’s just too much in each package, but now that’s no longer in stock either. And it’s been over a year since the canned salmon I used to buy has been available. It definitely makes me wonder. Maybe it’s there at other times than when I’m there. But although it’s not personally as helpful for me, there was still plenty of other canned fish items in different sizes when I last went.

Refrigerator items – there is a built in dairy room that reminds me of the walk through freezers when I used to shop in Amish country, though this is on a very small scale. They have cheeses, butters, large containers of chummus and a few other dips.

Snacks and candy – there is a huge selection of these things, and though I don’t buy any of it, I see it’s a big item for the kiosk owners. (Most of the other shoppers are restaurant or store owners – you can tell if someone is shopping for a store or for themselves by a glance at their cart.)

Condiments – this is interesting, because there is such a huge variety of sizes. For example, you can get a liter container of soy sauce or a five gallon bucket. I like getting the four liter container of vinegar since I use vinegar and baking soda for cleaning, and I rarely see that size in regular retail stores. They have all the sauces that restaurants use in their cooking.

Legumes and grains – they have packages with ten or twelve standard sized units, or you can get 5 kilo bags. Or 25 kilo bags (other than sugar, five kilo is as much as I buy here – but again, with friends, splitting bigger packaging could be a great option).

They also have things like eggs and packaged baked goods. Other than for the bar mitzva, I haven’t bought any of that but the savings were significant then.

I took this picture to show you the biggest sizes available in the very back, but in most of the store the items are packed in a more user friendly way for a family. I didn’t think of taking a picture for you until the end of my shopping, though.

You can find other pictures and videos if you want to get a better sense of it from their FB page, which also has address details. Shimurei Eichut, Holon. (In case you’re wondering, I have no financial links to them and receive no compensation for sharing this information.)

As prices move up, it’s helpful to know there are other shopping options that can help keep your budget in check!

Avivah

Making homemade grape juice – so easy!

canning, Intentional Spending

I’m fortunate that being in an more agriculturally oriented area, that sometimes I get really good deals on produce. It tends to be feast or famine (like when friends of the farmer picked and shared watermelons left in the field after harvesting with us and many others, and every day for a couple of weeks our boys ate an entire watermelon. Seriously. Every.Single.Day.). It’s not predictable at all. But when it works out, it’s really nice.

Last week I got a great deal on green grapes (free :)). I decided to get more than what I would use for eating during the course of the week, and to experiment with using them for making grape juice.

It’s been a loooong time since I made homemade grape juice. (Nice thing about having a blog is I can check details like this – it’s been twelve years!) And I didn’t know if green grapes would make good juice. But with the price being what it was, it seemed like a worthwhile experiment. 🙂

Ds13 did the first batch, and he did it his way. Though I shared the general instructions with him, he didn’t feel there was any point in heating the grapes before blending them and then straining, so his batch was totally raw. Very fresh tasting. A day later it began to ferment, and then he had fizzy grape juice. I thought that improved the flavor!

But I wanted to do it the traditional way, so I made a batch and then ds12 made the final batch. It was interesting that the color changed when cooked. The raw juice was the color of the green grapes, but the cooked juice had a pinkish hue.

Here’s how complicated making grape juice is: 1) destem the grapes (that’s the most time consuming part). 2) Put them in a pot with some water (I didn’t add too much, but if you wanted it to be less concentrated or added sugar, you could add significantly more water), and sugar if you desire (we didn’t desire :)). 3) Let boil and then continue simmering on low for about fifteen minutes. 4) Mash the grape mixture with a potato masher to release the flavors. (You can also use a food processor but this was easier.) 5) Strain. Voila!

It’s fun to make something that you’re used to thinking of as an item you need to buy at the store.

I don’t have a lot of freezer space for a bunch of bottles, and I had just bought some glass jars the day before, so we decided to preserve the juice so that it would be shelf stable.

I haven’t canned in AGES. I used a couple of recycled juice jars, and all the rest were standard glass jars with pop-top vacuum lids. (These lids vacuum seal when water bathed.) Since I could only fit six jars in the pot and I wanted to go rest, I asked ds13 to finish canning the last jars.

When I woke up, he had cleaned up the kitchen for Shabbos, the jars were not only taken out but had cooled and put on the pantry shelf. He was so excited to show me! It really is gratifying to do something like this; I know that very pleasant productive feeling.

From our free grapes, we made 13.5 liters of sugar-free, all natural grape juice (there are four cups to a liter). We canned 11.5 liters; the two liters of raw juice we didn’t heat process and enjoyed as is. We opened the first bottle that evening for Shabbos kiddush, and all agreed that it was very tasty. We should have enough to get us through the holidays, when we can share it with visiting family!

Avivah

Are food prices rising?

Intentional Spending

Have any of you checked your grocery receipts and noticed food prices seem to be going up?

I have!

For the most part, I’m not seeing major increases. Well, except for meat at the supermarket I regularly shop at, which went up about 25%, and ground beef hasn’t been available for several months now. The butcher can’t explain why it’s disappeared or why prices jumped like this. I know that’s not the case everywhere, and that increase isn’t typical. What I am consistently noticing are steady smaller increases.

I talked to a couple of people who work in wholesale food sales, who both told me that prices are “jumping” at the wholesale level. I’m always interested in the behind the scenes understanding of what’s going on, so I asked each of they could explain what is causing the prices to increase.

One didn’t know (but he told me if there was something I wanted, to buy more of it than I would usually buy to offset the ongoing price increases), but the other told me that shipping costs are dramatically rising, that costs have shipping containers have gone from less than $3000 for a load to several times that. Those shipping costs have to be passed on to the consumer, which means…higher food costs.

And that’s not affecting just food. A few weeks ago at the housewares store I spoke to the owner while I was checking out. Literally as I was at the checkout, they increased the price of my item by five shekels. When I asked why, they told me their shipping costs are rising and they are raising the prices on every item by five shekels.

Then a week later I went into one of my favorite nurseries, and noticed that plants that were 25 shekels the week before were now 37, and that every single plant had increased in cost. This time the owner was busy and I didn’t ask him why everything had gone up so much.

I found it interesting. But while the food wholesalers were very clear about their concern, increases take time to trickle down to the retail market, and maybe it’s not yet so noticeable that prices are moving up?

And this was also interesting – the US has announced that it will be increasing food stamp benefits by 25% on October 1. To me it seems that those making the decisions expect retail prices to rise and are preparing the recipients accordingly.

What does that mean practically? One super helpful strategy for keeping a food budget in check is buying the sales. If you have a freezer, you might want to buy some extra chicken or meat at today’s prices, which may be tomorrow’s sale prices. You might want to buy a bit more of the foods that you already eat, particularly those that are non-perishables. If the prices go up more, you’ll save money; if prices don’t move up any further (let’s hope!), you’ll still be eating the same groceries you would have eaten anyway!

I’m curious about if you’re seeing anything like this where you live. My impression is that prices are rising faster in other parts of the world than Israel. Have you noticed food increases, and if so, what kind of increases?

Avivah

An abundance of summer tomatoes and what to do with them?

Intentional Spending

Someone who has an organic tomato patch invited us to come and pick as many tomatoes as we wanted (which became an activity for my visiting married children and grandchildren!), and the day after, I got an amazing deal on four cases of tomatoes. So the question was, what to do with all this amazing abundance before it turned to mush?

For reference, the pots are 16 quarts and 12 quarts.

My dehydrator isn’t working, and I didn’t want to dehydrate slices of tomatoes in my outdoor setup that I described to you when I recently dehydrated mushrooms. Also, my past experience with dehydrating tomatoes is that they sat for AGES in a glass jar in my pantry before I finally threw them away. If I’m not going to use it, there’s no point in dehydrating them, right?

I decided to try something new, sun-dried tomatoes (in the oven!), which was super yummy and a big hit.

I cut a bunch of tomatoes in half or quarters (depending on the size), then sprinkled them with olive oil and a mixture of herbs. (One batch was salt and zaatar, another was a mixture of salt and Italian herbs.) I slow roasted them in the oven at about 200 degrees Fahrenheit for hours, until they were mostly dried out but still had some moisture. (These wouldn’t be suitable for long term storage due to the oil and moisture.) When I took them out of the oven, these flew off of the pan!

So I made another huge batch for Shabbos, which I dried a bit less and they were even better! Very tasty on top of challah or eaten on their own.

I also cooked a huge pot of tomatoes and made matbucha, which I froze in meal size containers. We enjoy a variety of dips at our Shabbos meals, and matbucha is one of our staples.

Avivah

Creating personal space for young children – our DIY clubhouse

Intentional Spending, Parenting

A few months ago my next door neighbors built a clubhouse, and it was hardly completed before ds8 began regularly disappearing into their yard. Usually when he would go to their house, it would be to play with their children, but when I would search for him, each time I would find him sitting or laying inside their clubhouse, happy to be in this private space on his own or with ds4.

It was clear to me that he really wanted some space of his own. Don’t we all sometimes want that freedom of just being, without oversight or needing to be accountable for our time?

I had been thinking for a while of building a clubhouse for ds8 and ds4, but seeing this galvanized me to take action.

A business in the industrial zone of a neighboring city advertised that they were giving away large wood crates. They listed their address and asked not to be called, to just come. So one night when my husband was on his way home from Jerusalem with ds22, I asked them to stop before coming home and see if any of the crates were still left. There were three left, so they chose the one that looked best. Using the rachet straps stored in the car, together the two of them got in on top of the car and fastened down – it was an unwieldy load!

The packing crate, before – you can see the outdoor couch next to it for size reference.

Several times I had asked a couple of our teens to build some kind of clubhouse using some of the scrap wood left from their projects, but they weren’t very interested. I didn’t see any reason to insist on it, and it didn’t happen. But once I had this basic crate to work with, it was much easier to get them involved.

I asked ds13 to cut a door and window into it. The wood isn’t strong at all – it’s a basic cheap packing box that isn’t intended to hold up to long term use – so he reinforced both the door and window. After that, he put a waterproof roof on it, using material from a cage we were given but hadn’t ended up using.

Dd15 painted it blue, using leftover paint, and then ds12 painted the trim white – his idea, not mine. It made it look much nicer. Then one of the boys cut some artificial grass to fit on the floor, and voila, a clubhouse!

Ds8 and ds4 were delighted when they came outside and saw this mini house, all for them to play in. They’ve spent hours playing inside together; our granddaughters and visiting young children have also enjoyed it. And once we built this, they never went into the neighbor’s playhouse again.

(As an aside, this is not an uncommon dynamic when a child seems to be misbehaving – in this case leaving our home without permission and going into someone else’s yard without permission. If we can identify the need they are expressing and address that need, then the behavior will often fall away completely, since there’s no longer a need for the behavior.)

When I told a friend about this project, she sent me a paragraph from a Betsy-Tacy book, when the author of the fictional series writes about the young girls finding a piano box and making it into a play space. There’s something about having a space of one’s own that is significant for people of all ages. It might be going too far to call it a primal need, but it’s not too much to say that it’s deeply appreciated.

Ds12 has been asking for a space of his own for a while, and we haven’t yet figured out how to make that happen – he shares a room with ds4 and ds8. There’s a staircase on one side of our kitchen that leads to the second floor, and back in the fall when we were putting in the new kitchen, he asked me if he could put a narrow mattress in that space under the stairs and it would be his room. Yes, ala Harry Potter, but in this case he felt it would be very desirable. He wasn’t happy when I told him I planned to use that space for kitchen storage.

t’s a simple playhouse and due to the quality of the wood, I don’t know how it will hold up once the rainy season comes. But we literally spent no money and not more than a couple of hours putting this together, using recycled materials we had at home. As long as it lasts, I appreciate the enjoyment they’ve been having in this space of their own.

Avivah

Beginning kitchen renovations – yes, again!

Homemaking, Intentional Spending

I told a friend in the US that we’re about to start renovating our kitchen, and she said, ” You’re always redoing kitchens. Maybe next time you move, buy a place with a renovated kitchen!”

We did our first DIY kitchen renovation thirteen years ago; the last three took place in the last six years. And here I go again.

So why not buy a house with a renovated kitchen? Very simply, because I’m able to buy more home for my money by being willing to do my own upgrades.

For my past kitchens, I’ve purchased used kitchens and then customized them to my space. It requires being able to visualize and think out of the box, and I’m good at that.

This kitchen has been a lot more challenging to plan than any of the others. The way space is allotted here is unusual, and I’ve spent ages thinking and rethinking and rethinking again. Now that I’ve bought the kitchen (yep, used once again!!) and the various cabinets are sitting in front of me (the configuration is different than the detailed measurements I was given and had planned for already), I’m reworking out the details yet again!

The old kitchen was pulled out two days ago, and it was nice to to get it out. It was only seven years old but looked really dilapidated, and when we took it out, some of it was moldy and rotted.

I had originally planned to replace the kitchen before moving in, but when we suddenly moved a few months early, that plan changed. It ended up much better that I lived in this space for a while because it completely changed my idea of how to renovate.

It’s never fun taking out a kitchen because nothing is where it belongs and instead it’s piled up all over, and it makes it hard to prepare meals. But we’ve got a better workable temporary setup than ever before – we put a piece of granite from the used kitchen that I bought on top of the cabinets that will be the island, and that gives us a workspace.

The sink we’re using is in the bathroom, and here’s my workaround – I’ve placed a dish drainer set into the laundry hamper, so that I can stand at the sink and put the dishes in the drainer without having to bend down to the floor. Simple but it works and it makes me happy to find a way to make the renovation process less stressful!

Quite small but it gets the job done.

So much easier than how I washed dishes last time we did the kitchen, sitting on the edge of the bathtub/ on my knees leaning over the tub.

If you’re wondering about specifics of putting in a kitchen like this, feel free to ask! Someone on a FB group for those doing building projects/renovations in Israel asked about putting in a used kitchen a couple of years ago, and out of thousands of members, I was the only one to respond. This is my fourth kitchen here in Israel and I have a good sense of what’s involved in terms of cost and getting outside help.

My daughter, her husband and our granddaughter will be coming to visit for a week, arriving Thursday night. (And next week another of our couples, is arriving for an extended visit and the week after the third family arrives!:)) I’m very much hoping to have the countertops and sinks put in by Friday – it would be so nice to go into Shabbos with a new kitchen!

Avivah

The vitamin D hammer for the flu- boom!

Healthy Living, Intentional Spending

When my twenty year old son called from his dorm and said he was feeling so sick and achy that he was coming home, I knew he had the flu.

Just a few days before my son called, I happened to read a Pubmed abstract referencing the ‘vitamin D hammer’, a term and dosage that were unfamiliar to me. In it, the doctor writes, “A colleague of mine and I have introduced vitamin D at doses that have achieved greater than 100 nmol/L in most of our patients for the past number of years, and we now see very few patients in our clinics with the flu or influenzalike illness. In those patients who do have influenza, we have treated them with the vitamin D hammer, as coined by my colleague. This is a 1-time 50 000 IU dose of vitamin D3 or 10 000 IU 3 times daily for 2 to 3 days. The results are dramatic, with complete resolution of symptoms in 48 to 72 hours. One-time doses of vitamin D at this level have been used safely and have never been shown to be toxic.8 .”

(I’m including a link in case you’d like to see where this came from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4463890/?fbclid=IwAR1-aVcZEeMysIWUgOy0v1cMzb91L0-K74K5P12rtWRmitxM9wpZ-aIK3vs )

Of course I knew about the importance of vitamin D for the flu since years ago when there was the swine flu panic I did some research on that. And I’m very, very comfortable and experienced with megadoses of vitamin C. But megadoses of vitamin D? Not something I had done.

I went straight to the pharmacy to pick up some vitamin D so I could have some ready for my son as soon as he got home. I was told the only options in Israel were for 400 iu or 1000 iu; I usually buy 5000 and 10,000 iu per capsule online. So I got more than one bottle.

Five minutes after he got home, I gave my son 25,000 iu and gave my other kids 5000 iu for prevention.Three hours later he took another 25,000 iu before going to sleep.

He was really sick and I expected he would be in for a rough night, and sure enough, he was. But by the morning, he was feeling much better; within 24 hours, the achiness and fever were completely gone (though he felt tired). Within 48 hours he was completely back to himself.

BOOM! The hammer was a winner for us!

It’s not coincidental that the flu comes around seasonally when it’s cold and dark, and most of us aren’t getting much sunlight (sunlight being the natural source of vitamin D). I read somewhere that the flu could be called a vitamin D deficiency; if you aren’t deficient in vitamin D, you aren’t going to catch the flu.

The day before this I was in the doctor’s waiting room with someone whose two children were just over the flu, and she told me how hard it had been for her to have nothing to do but let them suffer and wait for them to get better. That’s such a hard feeling for a parent. It’s so empowering when you know how to speed up a child’s recovery from an illness!

The amount I gave my son was for an adult, and I was wondering what a child’s dose would be. The formula I found to work out a weight based dosage is this: multiply a person’s weight (in kilograms) and then multiply that by 1000 to get each person’s dose. This dose would be the amount to take daily for only three days, then stop.

(Vitamin D is a fat soluble vitamin, unlike vitamin C, so megadoses are only for when sick. This isn’t an amount to take daily for an ongoing period!)

I love finding easy and effective ways to deal with seasonal illness! My son was certainly grateful.

Avivah

Manifesting our newest car – combination of unusual features at an amazing price!

Intentional Spending, Self-Growth

Sometimes it seems there’s no way to get what you want within the parameters you’re working with. And then something like today happens and reminds me that I don’t have to try so hard, I have to allow things to unfold. It’s quite marvelous how what seems impossible can happen with so easily with so little effort.

A few months ago I bought a new car after my previous car being totaled in an accident. So why was I once again looking for a new vehicle?

Here in Israel there’s an interesting phenomenon: families with several children will often choose to buy a smaller vehicle that doesn’t seat all their family members when traveling at one time, rather than getting a minivan. When living in the US, I never heard of anyone making a choice like this, but it’s very, very common in Israel.

The reason this is done here is because the costs of buying and fueling a larger vehicle are significantly higher. Often, families will rent a second car to travel together during vacation but keep their daily mode of transportation a smaller and more affordable car.

We made a similar decision when we bought our first car over a year and a half ago. Though we’re a large family and in the US I drove a full size 12 passenger van, I mostly needed something to get around locally for errands, and for that a small car was fine. We have great bus transportation and sending older kids on buses if we don’t have room for everyone is an option, as strange as that might sound to those who don’t live in Israel!

However, with our decision to move to northern Israel came a realization that we would need a larger vehicle. (We didn’t know we’d be moving to the north when we bought the replacement car or we would have made a different choice.) Public transportation where we’ll be living is weak and having a couple more seats will make a big difference.

I didn’t want to leave the selling and buying of a car for when we’re moving since there will be plenty of other things to do, so I decided to do this now. Almost three weeks ago, I sold our five seater.

Prior to selling and since then, I’ve spent waaaaay too long reading every bit of data I could get on various makes and models. The more I read, the fewer choices I seemed to have. I wanted a number of features and when considering my very conservative budget, even a basic functional car of that size looked completely unrealistic. It as also complicated by the fact that every time I found something suitable, my husband would raise concerns.

I would have been totally discouraged and overwhelmed if I didn’t continually remind myself that somehow we would find something that would work for us no matter how unlikely it seemed. (And I also reminded my husband he could trust me to buy the car as I’ve always done it and it’s always been fine.)

The choices that were the most affordable, spacious and gas efficient were all made by French manufacturers. None of these companies have a reputation for long lasting/hard wearing vehicles, and I was concerned that my lower acquisition costs would be more than offset by ongoing repair costs. When a mechanic for one of these companies dealerships told me to stay away from them, that finalized my decision to look at other options.

I thought and thought and thought some more about what was most important to me, and finally edited my original list to the following priorities:

  • Japanese manufactured
  • well-maintained
  • decent fuel efficiency
  • non-diesel engine (because I want to convert the engine to run on propane fuel and diesel vehicles can’t be converted)
  • price below xxx shekels (this is so low that I don’t feel comfortable writing it :))

Last night I decided to look at a car model I hadn’t previously considered due to a concern that the very back two seats wouldn’t be be comfortable for my hulking sons. 🙂 When I checked out the listings online for sale by private owner (I don’t buy from dealers), one stood out to me among a number of listings for the same model, year, mileage and price.

Sometimes I get a feeling about things; from just the wording of the ad I’d be hard pressed to explain why one listing calls to me and similar one doesn’t. I do think there’s an element of logic mixed in with it; it’s not all based on my gut feeling.

This car had slightly higher mileage than most of them, but there was nothing in my price range that wasn’t high mileage. My biggest concerns about buying vehicles that were older and high mileage was that it we might have to replace the engine or transmission in the near future, both very big expenses.

One of the things I debated with myself is if it would be more financially prudent to spend more on a newer car upfront to minimize the possible repair costs. However, we would have to dramatically jump up in price and of course there’s never any guarantee that even a newer car with lower mileage won’t need expensive repairs – in my reading in different forums I read a number of worrying stories like that. So I stayed with my original low price point.

When I called about the car I was pleasantly surprised to learn that the engine had been replaced three months ago – there was no mention of this in the ad.

Both the wife who took my initial phone call and the husband who showed me the car were very honest and forthcoming with information. Before I went to check out the car, I was pretty sure that unless something was really wrong when I saw it that I would be driving it back home with me. 🙂

(When I buy a car, I’m buying in large part based on my feeling about the seller. Buying a used car is unpredictable and I need to trust the person who is selling it and what they are telling me. Yesterday I looked at a car and within one minute of meeting the seller knew I wouldn’t buy the car. Not because of the car, but because of the seller. )

It was only because of a specific question while test driving the car today that I asked that I learned that the transmission was replaced six weeks ago! In two conversations with the sellers, neither of them thought of mentioning that to me, even though that was a very positive factor in favor of the car.

After the sale was completed, I looked at my long list of things I wanted that I had put aside so I could focus on the basics, and I got every single thing. Every single one.

Here’s the longer list:

  • Seller location – since I was traveling by bus to check out the potential options, I was hoping to find something not too far from home even though I was looking online at cars across the country. These sellers listed their location as the city where the wife works, which would have been very time consuming and difficult for me to access by public transportation. Another reason I shouldn’t have called them. They live just a a 25 minute bus ride from here and that’s where I saw the car.
  • Roof rack – knowing we’d have a small trunk, I wanted to have a space to load up for trips
  • Trailer hitch – this seemed an unlikely feature to find in the class of vehicles I was looking at but a previous owner had it installed
  • Tinted windows – this cuts down on the heat quite a bit in the summer and one of my kids requested it
  • Driver seating position – I prefer sitting higher up to have a better view, with my legs more vertical than horizontal
  • Head space – my last car didn’t have much and I missed having that
  • Feel of driving a car rather than a minivan
  • Propane system – this was complicated because I didn’t want to spend the money to put in the system on an old engine, and I didn’t want to buy a car already converted since a poorly done conversion can shorten the engine life. In any case, only a very small percentage of cars are converted to run on propane. This car had a propane system installed by a reputable installer, then it was reinstalled on the new engine.

This last point was the one that made the entire buying effort seem impossible. I wanted a newish engine already converted to run on propane by a reputable installer that I recognized (which totals three names in the entire country) at a ridiculously low price, or as a very much less appealing distant second option that I almost don’t want to mention because I really didn’t want to do this, a car so cheap I could afford to replace the engine and put in the propane system (adding lots of aggravation and at least 11,000 shekels to my purchase cost).

Was that situation with the propane alone extremely unlikely? Yes. Combined with all these other things, it was very, very, very unlikely.

And yet, that’s exactly what I got!

How could I have gotten all of this for the very low price I had budgeted?

Here’s an amazing bit of synchronicity regarding the price! (This is when in my house I burst into song, G-d Loves Me!!! Yes, I really do that.No, my children don’t always deeply appreciate my constant singing about everything but that’s the mother they have. :))

After having their vehicle on the market at fair market value for a month and not seeing movement, the sellers decided to get it sold and dramatically cut the price yesterday. It was last night when I decided to consider this model and saw the listing.

They listed it for 100 shekels less than my budgeted amount (remember, with none of the information about the very recent and expensive work they had done – they just wrote ‘excellent condition’).

I heard a statement somewhere (I wish I remember where so I could credit it): “Whatever you are looking for is looking for you.” I felt that so much with this purchase.

No, the car isn’t perfect. I didn’t have that on either of my lists! But it’s a really good fit for me and it’s been really wonderful to see this manifest in this way.

Avivah

Upcyling my unused tubes of lipstick

Intentional Spending

I don’t wear much makeup on a daily basis, but I do wear lipstick. Or I used to.

At some point over a year ago, I stopped wearing lipstick. I had a couple tubes of shades that I really liked but they no longer glided on smoothly. I had another tube that was way too pale, and a fourth was too thick and uneven. I tried applying one and then the other to get a blended color but it wasn’t effective, so I just stopped wearing lipstick.

After making antibiotic salve last week, it occurred to me that it might be very simple to create new lipstick from these unusable ones. That’s what I did!

I took the four tubes of lipstick that I’m not using, and pushed the applicator to the very top. I broke off each lipstick at the base, then scraped out the remaining contents into a glass jar. I then boiled a small pot of water and put the glass jar into the pot (creating a makeshift double boiler). I added some petroleum jelly, then waited a few minutes while it all gently melted together.

The easiest thing would have been to pour the mixture into a small round glass container but I wanted to try to use the original lipstick holders. This made a little more mess and took a bit more time, but was worth it.

I adjusted each empty lipstick applicator to the lowest position, then poured the liquid mixture in until it was just about flush with the top. I let it set in an upright position until it completely cooled. I didn’t get a nice smooth pointed shape like lipsticks in the store, but with use it will smooth out.

I am so delighted with the results of this little experiment! Instead of four tubes of unusable lipstick, I now have four tubes of a color that I love. It’s the perfect shade for me, and amazingly, it not only goes on smoothly but it stays on longer than my old lipsticks used to.

Not only that, I don’t need to blot it to prevent it from getting on my teeth. I always thought it was a waste to apply lipstick, then blot it and have half of what I just applied be thrown away on a tissue! I don’t know what is different now, but practically it means my new upcycled lipsticks are easier to use and will last longer.

If this sounds time consuming and difficult, it really wasn’t. It didn’t require any special skills – just melt and pour. The entire project took somewhere between 15 – 20 minutes from start to finish.

Avivah