You’ve made it! All your hard work has paid off and you can finally take a vacation! Don’t make packing as much work as your day job, and don’t pack more than you need. A simple checklist of things to bring will help you avoid packing too much.  Research the area you are traveling to. While it’s impossible to predict the weather 100%, you can base your wardrobe on the typical climate.

Make a list, and don’t skew from it. If you’re going to the beach, only pack 1 bathing suit. If you’re going to a colder area, don’t bring more than 2 light jackets. 1-2 dressier outfits will suffice, unless you are traveling for more than 10 days.  Pack 1 pair of sneakers, and 1 pair of dressier shoes. If you wear a lot of jewelry, don’t bring more than 5 pieces, or you’ll be carrying around a lot of heavy things you probably won’t wear. Remember, you will most likely be purchasing things on your vacation, so don’t over pack to reserve room for your souvenirs. Your vacation fun is not contingent on the clothes you are wearing, so remember to relax, only pack the essentials and have fun!

Everyone is doing it. Nowadays, Americans are learning to tighten their belts and live with less. You may be surprised to learn that a few simple cuts in your spending can save you a lot of money. For example, if you skipped your morning stop to the coffee shop, to get your favorite latte, and instead brewed coffee at home you could be saving up to $1,000 a year!

Other simple ways to save money include hanging clothes outside to dry during the warmer months, instead of using your dryer. Also, invest in a water filter and reusable thermos and ditch expensive water bottles that only pollute the environment. Another great way to save money is to eat out at restaurants only on special occasions, and to cook family meals in your home. Eating in the home can save thousands of dollars a year. Lastly, gently used clothes are available in great styles and designer labels, so you can avoid costly department store price tags. Enjoy more time with your family this year, and less time worrying about money. Be creative and discover new ways to limit your budget.

I know that sounds a bit weird; that you get some kind of power surge from cleaning out a closet but it’s true! There is something quite cathartic when you are able to step away from yourself and look at your stuff from a different point of view and purge that which you no longer need even though you may think you want it. It was this kind of feeling that I recently experienced when going through my side of the closet I share with my wife. I thought I was the one who kept up with ridding me of all the stuff I could no longer wear but that was not what I discovered.

As I pulled my pants out of the closet I realized that I actually wore only a couple of these in the last year. I work from home so I have very little need for dress pants anymore. Yet there they were all 7 pairs. Same with the shoes in my closet and then the shirts that I hardly touch much less wear. It was an eye opening experience indeed and I found out that I have about fifteen things that I wear over and over again until they loose a button or get a tear and then they hang in my closet waiting for the repair that will never come.

Several years ago my wife and I decided we lived in a house that was just too big for two people.  It was a 2400 square ft home with a half basement where I stored all my tools and lawn equipment.  We decided to sell the home and rent a house and see if we could live smaller.

So we found a house that was 1800 square ft and rented it for 1 year.  What we found out was it too was just to large for us.  We never went into one of the bedrooms, the dining room or another small living area.  However, this house did have 1 car garage where I stored my lawn equipment and tools.

At the end of that year we decided to go ahead and look for a smaller home and buy again, which we did.  What we realized after we bought our present house is it is a great size for us.  We utilize all the space but we had one major problem.  Since there was neither a garage nor a basement, there was no place to store the lawn equipment or tools.  The answer was a storage unit and we have never looked back.

Down at the local pub last week I ran into a buddy of mine and we got to talking about space.  My friend is adamant about he and his family living a small sustainable life and he was telling me that back in the late fifties the average American lived in 300 sq ft.  I thought back on the house I grew up in and it was about 1500 sq ft with a 2 car garage.  For four people that was 375 sq ft throughout the sixties and into the seventies.

What surprised me was, with the population being so much higher today that each American now lives in 800 sq ft!  Now I had to stop and think about it and today, my family lives in about 550 sq ft. each and we use every part of our home plus a large 10 x 14 storage shed that is pretty full.

In fact, if we didn’t have the storage unit, we would have to have either more space or less stuff.  It’s our ability to store things outside of the house that has enabled us to live a little bit smaller than we used to (900 sq ft).  One of the best bonuses for us of living smaller has been the reduction in utility bills.