Every other Monday (er, Tuesday this time!), I answer a few of the questions that my readers send me. If you have a question you’d like me to answer in a future Q&A post, just leave me a comment here or email me (thefrugalgirl [at] gmail [dot] com) and put Q&A in the subject line. I look forward to hearing from you!
I think you mentioned a long time ago two of your children have blogs and you use that as a part of your homeschooling. I would like to know how do you incorporate it into their education. Are their posts like assignments or do they just do what they like? Also, I noticed Lisey seems to have her own website but Joshua is a subsection of yours. I’m asking because my daughter has mentioned that she would like to make a cooking blog as well but I’m not sure how to go about it. I would prefer not to pay for it, are there any free options? Also, what age do you think is appropriate for her to start?
-Mona
Joshua’s 365 Blog
Well, I consider Joshua’s blog to be a part of his art education…he’s developing his photography skills, learning to see things in new ways, and learning to edit photos. And though his blog is mostly photos, he’s also getting to exercise some of his writing skills as he titles and writes descriptions of his photos.
I don’t give him assignments for his blog, though….he’s got creative freedom when it comes to his subject matter. I do proofread his posts before they’re published, though, so that I can help him correct things when necessary.
Baking with Lisey
Lisey’s blog is much more of a collaboration, since we do the baking together and we write the posts together as well. Putting together baking posts is a MUCH bigger job than writing 365 posts (uploading multiple pictures, making recipe PDFs, double-checking recipe ingredients and instructions), so Lisey wouldn’t be able to do this all on her own.
Mainly, Lisey’s learning how to bake, but she’s also gaining some writing experience.
I made Joshua’s blog a subdomain of mine because that’s how I had my 365 blog set up, and also because then we wouldn’t have to buy another domain. It seemed odd to have Lisey’s blog be a subdomain of mine, though, so I bought her one. Maybe eventually I’ll get Joshua his own domain, but for now, he’s happy where he is.
Blogging recommendations
You can DEFINITELY blog for free, yes! I highly recommend going to wordpress.com and setting up a free blog. WordPress is the best blogging software out there in my opinion, and if your daughter ever wants to grow her blog and have more creative control and also run ads, you can upgrade your wordpress.com blog to a self-hosting one like mine.
You can give yourself admin privileges and give your daughter editing privileges (that’s how Joshua and Lisey’s blogs are set up) so that way you’ve got full control over the blog and your daughter won’t have access to settings that could mess up the blog. You can also exercise control over the commenting system, which I know was a concern of yours. And as long as you proof-read her posts before she publishes them, you can make sure she’s not sharing information you’d like to keep private.
I love reading your blog for many reasons, one of them being: your very organized approach to savings and budgeting. I have been considering opting into budget billing with my electric and gas bill. I really see no down side to having a steady power bill, but, I must admit, the months when the bill is very low give me a thrill even though I know it all evens out in the end with the high months. Do you use the budget billing option or do you, too, enjoy the thrill of a little extra cash in the budget during the spring and fall months?
Thanks,
Danielle A.
Thus far, I haven’t used budget billing, opting instead to do my own version of that by budgeting a certain amount every month and then putting any extra from that amount into a savings account during the low bill months and withdrawing what we need when we have a high bill.
Most budget billing programs generously estimate your monthly bill so that they’re sure to have enough money to cover your usage. I’m know they give it back to you at the end of the year if there’s extra, but I’d kinda like to have that money in my own bank account all year, you know?
Some budget billing programs do have a system where they pay interest on any extra money you’ve paid into the system, but if your budget billing doesn’t have that, you might be happier sticking with your current method.
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Readers, chime in with your thoughts!
Mona
Wednesday 6th of February 2013
Thanks, Kristen! I like the idea of wordpress because if she does decide to keep up with it she can switch it over to a professional blog. And yes, being able to proof read will make my husband happy so we can control what information is being put out.
Elaine in Ark
Wednesday 6th of February 2013
I have budget billing for both gas and electric, and I live it. They both use a "rolling 12 month" system, which is the current usage plus the last 11 months' usage, averaged out. It keeps the payment amount pretty darn close on a month to month basis, although summer (A/C) and winter (Furnace) are a bit more.
I like the predictability.
Julie
Tuesday 5th of February 2013
Apparently the budget plan varies a lot by provider! Our first experience with it I found the utility tended to slightly underestimate usage - which was fine, because each bill had a running total of credit vs charges, so you could see that coming, and the amount that would be owed during the catch up month would usually not be huge. They also settled things up twice a year, so you never had the chance to get too far off track. (In our case it would run around 200/month in the winter, 170 in the summer, and the catch up when we were coming out of the winter season would be maybe $20 or so. They got more accurate as we were with them longer and had more usage history for them to base budgeting off of too.) I just signed up for a budget plan here, and they settle up four times a year, but I haven't been on it long enough to say how well they estimate usage.
I prefer the budget pay plans because I like to have as many of my bills as possible on direct deposit - it makes it much less likely that I'll loose track of the date when on vacation or when illness strikes the house and end up with a late fee. But I am also kind of paranoid about not wanting anything on direct deposit unless it is a fixed amount - I don't want a huge amount suddenly being taken out of my account without be being aware of it. I always have plenty of extra in my checking, so for a direct withdrawal to be large enough to be a problem it would have to be a pretty huge change and would most likely be some sort of mistake, but still. I once had my credit card info stolen and several hundred dollars of charges put on it within the few days before I realized it and got the transactions flagged - if that account had been on direct deposit it would have been much more likely to be a problem.
janknitz
Tuesday 5th of February 2013
We do the budget billing for gas and electricity. After the first two years or so, it's been pretty close to reality because there's plenty of history to judge it on and our family has been pretty stable in our usage. I like knowing what the bill will be for budgeting purposes--we don't have AC or use the stove and oven much in summer (gas), so summer bills were low, but in winter the big bills for heating can really pack a whollop!
We keep looking into solar, but because so much of our usage is gas (forced air heating, dryer, stove, and oven) we don't use enough electricity to make it cost effective. We do have solar powered attic fans that help so much with keeping the house cool in summer. I highly recommend them.
Larissa
Tuesday 5th of February 2013
Our utility companies call it "equalization payments" and I grew up with my mom doing it so it's been around for decades where I live in Canada. I love it since my gas might be $30 used in July and $160 in December but I always pay $75 (just as a made up example...although the usage swings are sorta like that). Once a year (mine is in June) we have one bill that is either bigger or smaller based on what is needed to balance the 12 month period. They then recalculate for the next estimated 12 months based on the recent usage history. It works great for us and our 12th month is usually smaller than the "equalization" amount by a few bucks. I love "budget billing" and the fact that our city utilities as well as gas and electric do it now.