Budget Archives - Making Sense Of Cents

10 Easy Homemade Snacks To Bring On Your Next Hike

June 20, 2018 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 10 Comments

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10 Easy Hiking Snacks To Make. Going on a hike soon? Here are 10 easy hiking snacks and backpacking food to make. These all look so delicious and will be a great addition for your next trip #hikingsnacks #backpackingfood

Hiking is definitely one of my favorite activities.

I love exploring new areas, going on exciting adventures, and seeing beautiful views, all while getting in a fun and enjoyable workout.

For a good hike, though, you also need hiking snacks. Whether I'm hiking, biking, or something else, I always bring a snack. Lately, I've been making more homemade hiking snacks. Homemade ones are great for a lot of reasons, and one of them is that homemade hiking snacks usually taste better and are healthier than what you may find at the store.

Plus, making them at home means you will probably even save a good amount of money. Hiking snacks at the grocery store are not cheap!

The hiking snack recipes mentioned in today's article can be great snacks for other times too – not just hiking!

Other recipe roundups to check out:

Note: If you're looking for easy weekly meal plans that are full of budget recipes, I recommend $5 Meal Plan. $5 Meal Plan is a meal planning service that sends you a delicious meal plan and shopping list every week for just $5 a month.

Here are 10 easy hiking snacks and backpacking foods to make:

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How Kayla Earns $10K/Month From Home as a Virtual Assistant

June 15, 2018 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 20 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links. Please read my disclosure for more info.

How Kayla Earns $10K/Month From Home as a Virtual Assistant Today, I want to introduce you to my friend, Kayla Sloan. Kayla is a full-time blogger, virtual assistant (VA), and project manager who earns over $10,000 per month while working from home. She is also the founder of $10K VA, her new program where she teaches exactly how you make a consistent $10,000 per month as a virtual assistant too!

Kayla used to work a full-time job as a credit analyst, earning about $2,000 per month. She was struggling to make ends meet while paying off debt, so she started a side hustle as a virtual assistant.

In our interview, she shows how she was able to grow her business from part-time to full-time and now earns 5 figures per month from the comfort of her own home. She also shares how this is a great way to make money on the side or even as a full-time career.

Check out the interview below for more information and be sure to check out Kayla’s course $10K VA to learn further about how to become a successful virtual assistant. [Read more…]

Is too much house making you house poor?

June 6, 2018 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 42 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links. Please read my disclosure for more info.

Is too much house making you house poor? I keep hearing stories from people who, after buying their first home, become immediately overwhelmed by the financial toll of homeownership, especially when they spend more than they can actually afford. And, when buying your first home, it can be so easy to get in over your head.

When we were in the process of buying our first home, we were given a pre-approval amount of $150,000.

If we would have bought a house for that amount, I'm sure it would have led to us being house poor, which is when you buy more house than you can actually afford. While that amount may not seem like much to some, it was more than enough to purchase a good starter home in St. Louis, where we were living at the time.

This $150,000 number seemed high to us because we were quite young, just 20 years old, and we both had mediocre jobs. Yes, we were both working full-time, but our yearly salaries put together were still very low, and I definitely do not think we should have been approved for $150,000. If I remember correctly, our annual take-home income was only around $30,000. [Read more…]

4 Mindsets That Will Rob You Of Your Dream Life

June 4, 2018 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 38 Comments

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4 Mindsets That Will Rob You Of Your Dream Life #dreamlife Are you your own worst enemy?

Recently, I read a discussion in which people were talking about the ways they hold themselves back and cause themselves to fail at their dreams.

This got me to thinking about all of the habits and mindsets we use, sometimes unconsciously, to hold ourselves back, and trust me, I’m even guilty of some of these.

This is something I've talked about extensively on Making Sense of Cents – how you are often your own worst enemy when it comes to reaching your dream life.

We all do have things that hold us back, and I don’t want to overlook or underestimate the difficulties people face on a daily basis.

But, today, I want to talk about a few ways people self-sabotage and may fail at reaching their potential, then robbing themselves of their dream life. [Read more…]

6 Actions To Take To Find Your First Customers When No One Knows You

May 30, 2018 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 16 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links. Please read my disclosure for more info.

When it comes to side hustling, one of the top questions I receive is about how to find customers. Of course, depending on your side hustle, the answer to this question will vary, but today I would like to help you brainstorm and find the right clients so that you can make more money.

How To Find Customers For Your Business - Creative Ways To Find Clients #howtofindcustomers #howtofindclients #waystomakeextramoney Launching a new side hustle can be intimidating, and there is a lot that goes into growing your side hustle business. One of the most important things to think about is how to find customers.

Learning how to market your new side hustle is extremely important, and it's a step that no side hustler should skip.

There are many ways to grow your side hustle. Whether you eventually want to turn it into a full-time business or if you just want to start making more money, growing it is possible.

When I first started side hustling, I had no idea what I was doing. And, I definitely didn't have a clue as to how to find customers/clients, but I went for it anyway.

Eventually, I found several clients and began earning enough money through freelancing that I was able to cover all of my bills. And, I started from nothing – I had no idea what I was doing! [Read more…]

How This Couple Retired at 38 and 41

May 23, 2018 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 45 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links. Please read my disclosure for more info.

How This Couple Retired at 38 and 41 My monthly Extraordinary Lives series is something that I'm really enjoying doing. First up was JP Livingston, who retired with a net worth over $2,000,000 at the age of 28. Today's interview is with Tanja Hester, who retired at the end of 2017 at the age of 38.

You probably know her from the amazing blog Our Next Life. Our Next Life is one of my favorite blogs, so I'm glad Tanja said yes to this interview!

In this interview, you'll learn:

How she managed to retire so early;
How she still lives comfortably in one of the most beautiful places in the world;
Her advice for retiring early no matter what your career choice is;
How she decided how much she needed to retire on;
The sacrifices she has had to make;

And more! This interview is packed full of valuable information! [Read more…]

29 Money And Life Lessons I’ve Learned

May 21, 2018 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 28 Comments

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29 Money And Life Lessons I've Learned

I always think it’s a good idea to reflect on any life and money lessons you’ve learned throughout the years. While it helps me see what mistakes I have made, it also reminds me that I’ve made good decisions too. Whether they have been good or bad, I’ve learned a lot of valuable life lessons.

I usually just let my birthday fly by, but I realized that my birthday would be a good time to think about the lessons I’ve learned and share them with you.

I published the first of these posts two years ago, 27 Money And Life Lessons I’ve Learned, and last year I added another for 28. That’s one lesson for every year, and now I can add one more lesson, which I plan on doing for each new year ahead of me.

I really think self-reflection is a good idea because we can learn so much from the past, both the good choices and the mistakes we’ve made.

And, I've made mistakes, but I've also made some great choices. I've learned a lot of valuable life and money lessons, and now I am happier than ever. [Read more…]

Here are 10 easy hiking snacks and backpacking foods to make:

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