Between the ages of 25 and 26 things in my life sucked. I was broke, I was underemployed, I was scared, and I felt helpless. I had no direction, no money, and a boatload of debt. I was watching lots of my friends succeed in seemingly every area of their lives: getting raises and promotions at work, […]
Month: July 2015
My Money Mindset, Post Debt
Paying off all my student loan debt was the best thing I have ever done for myself and my finances. It’s made everything better. Becoming debt free doesn’t mean suddenly becoming wealthy though, or even financially stable. While not having to make a debt payment each month does mean ownership of my money I am still […]
Free is All Around Us: Finding Free Fitness Classes
Night swimming! The last two weeks I’ve been making a serious effort to get out of my house and experience my city. I’m a homebody for sure and sometimes it can be hard to roust myself from my house. Austin is a great town and since I plan on moving away some day I want to […]
Get Out Of Debt Now, For Your Future Self’s Sake
When you’re carrying debt, sometimes it feels like you’re standing at the bottom of a hole, just looking up. Your debt has built up all around you and you feel stuck, unable to get out. Even though I have successfully climbed my debt mountain, I still talk about debt all the time. I mean, it’s all […]
Staying Frugal When You Celebrate
July is a month full of celebration for me. The month kicks off with Jubilation Week, a whole week of fun that my roommates and I made up. That includes the anniversary of us living together, the 4th of July and a birthday. Today is actually another roommates birthday and next week is yet another […]
Can Money Buy Happiness? A Broke Person’s View
It’s a common enough refrain: money can’t buy you happiness. The general idea behind the phrase is that the things in life that cause happiness are not things so much as experiences or emotions. Money can’t buy you more time with a grandparent. Money can’t buy you late nights with best friends. Money can’t buy love, and […]
How It Feels to Not Have A Debt Payment
This month marks the first time in four years that I haven’t had to make a student loan payment. KaraKara Perez is the original founder of From Frugal To Free. She is a money expert, speaker and founder of Bravely Go, a feminist financial education company. Her work has been featured on NPR, Business Insider, Forbes, and […]
A Frugal Meal, Italian Style
Continuing my quest to become a better adult through cooking, this week I made a very simple but delicious pasta dish. Once again my boyfriend and I stood together in the kitchen and asked that eternal question: ‘so…what do you feel like eating?’ My modus operandi has become this: look around the kitchen and try and […]
I Broke My Clothes Shopping Ban
Last week I bought my first clothes items of the year! As I’ve talked about before, I hate shopping. I was planning on going the whole year without any clothes shopping but that plan has changed. Turns out I have approximately zero clothes that are really appropriate for a work setting. So now I’m on a […]
I’m on Twitter so Come Follow Me!
I’m taking some time from my non-profiting to make just a quick note today- I’m on Twitter! You can see on my handy dandy side bar the Twitter logo. Click that and it’ll take you to my new page. @frugaltofree is where I’m at and I’d love to connect with everyone reading this. Feel free […]