Little Seeds Homemaking

Over and over again, my husband and I say that the decision for me to stay at home has been the best decision we have ever made for our family. However, this wasn’t something we were able to do right away.

Yes, I wasn’t always a stay-at-home Mom. In fact, I didn’t think I would ever get the opportunity to stay at home with my son. Life is so expensive. And it certainly didn’t look like it would get any more affordable when my maternity leave was over. So, I reluctantly went back to work.

“this great challenge became our greatest blessing“

Little Seeds Homemaking

It was heart-wrenching. As it is for most mothers when they go back to work. Initially, I went back 4 days a week, and then 3 days, and then 2 days. And then, the COVID-19 pandemic hit and I was temporarily let go from my job. I had no other choice but to stay home with my then two and a half year old son.

At first we were really scared because we knew that our budget would be really tight with only one income. But we remained grateful that we had that one income coming in. I know the quarantine months were extremely challenging for many people but for us this great challenge became our greatest blessing.

The pandemic was the event that showed us we could afford to have me stay at home. There were, and still are, major sacrifices that go along with being a stay-at-home Mom. But, overtime, we have managed to find ways to save more money and have a much better family life than the days when I was working.

5 Ways I Save Money as a Stay-at-Home Mom

• Making home made meals. We save so much money every month by eating at home. Now that I am a stay-at-home Mom, I have the time to make most of our meals from scratch. It is so much cheaper to buy ingredients from the grocery store than it is to eat out at a restaurant.
• Fixing items instead of throwing them away and buying new. We live in a wasteful and consumer-driven society (in Canada at least). Now that I have the time, I will assign hours in my day to fix items instead of quickly ordering a new one on Amazon. We are less wasteful this way and we also save a ton of money.
• You don’t need to outsource household duties. Many homes with two incomes eventually hire out some of the homemaking duties. Cleaning is a big one. Now that I can do all the cleaning myself, we save a lot. This is also the case for many other household duties like paying for dry cleaning, yard maintenance, and dog walking.
• Less gas and car maintenance costs. I use to drive 40 minutes into the city for work and then 40 minutes out each day that I went to work. Now that I am a stay-at-home Mom, most days I only drive 5 minutes to get my son to school and 5 minutes back (twice a day on the days he isn’t taking the bus). So, I spend way less on gas now that I stay at home. The mileage of my car is staying much lower which also means less maintenance and associated costs.
• No more daycare or after school care costs. This is the biggest area that we saved on. We were spending well over a thousand dollars a month for childcare. Now I get to be with my son on his days off school. I get to be the one to greet him when he comes home. And I get to be the first one to hear how is day went.

I want to take a minute to say that I understand that not everyone can make this lifestyle happen. Even with the money saving realities listed above; not everyone has the privilege to stay home. I am not writing this blog to make people feel bad about their own situations. I am writing it because I WAS in that situation too.

I am hoping to be an inspiration to you. I want to give you lots of tips and tricks to make your work life balance better. It has taken a lot of trial and error and sacrifice but we have been able to make this lifestyle a reality for our family.

In this blog I will share with you my trials and tribulations as well as my successes as a homemaker, wife and stay-at-home Mom in Canada. I would love it if you would join me on this journey!

I am a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn advertising fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated websites. This means that I will earn a small amount of money if you purchase through the links on my website at no additional cost to you.

Thank you for reading this post and I would love to hear your comments. Please leave a comment and let me know why you love being a stay-at-home Mom. Or share your family’s money saving hacks with the rest of us.