Not only has the recession been putting a strain on personal financial challenges, it has also been adding new stresses to relationships.  Long distance relationships, newlyweds, and casual dating have all been hit hard by the country’s economic downward spiral over the last couple years.  The good news is that we are all being affected fairly equally, but the bad news is that it might be awhile before the situation turns around.
If you have been feeling this recent economic relationship strain, don’t worry because you are not alone.  I have been hearing about new and challenging issues from friends and …read more

If you follow me on Twitter, then you know from my TwitPic that Sunday I was making Old School Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya from the new cookbook Real Cajun by Donald Link. It was fabulous, by the way. Worth every second of standing by the skillet while I deglazed and deglazed and deglazed.
I think cool, rainy, lazy Sundays call for slow-cooked and fussy meals. Warm, sunny days, of course, demand something grilled. And once Pepper Place farmers market opens here, we’ll have locally grown fresh vegetables all weekend long. (Last year I did a Summer Soup Series with a new …read more

In this shoddy economy, finances can’t help but rear their ugly head.
So, even though it feels unromantic, I must take note that today Perfectmatch.com announced the release of its Love & Money Assessment – it’s basically a tool to measure financial compatibility.
The tool was developed with its chief relationship expert, Dr. Pepper Schwartz and helps to measure financial habits and find the perfect economic profile of a future mate.
I just took the test, and this is the results it found for me:
Love and Money Assessment Results
Money’s moderately important to you in your choice of a relationship partner. …read more

What’s worse for a couple than facing a hard economic downturn?
It seems what is worse is facing said downturn alone.
Marty Babits, LCSW, BCD, says: “Too often people have difficulty communicating, usually because they don’t yet have the skills, which can definitely be learned and sustained through good times or bad.” Babits is the author of  The Power of the Middle Ground: A Couple’s Guide to Renewing Your Relationships (Prometheus Books, 2009). “We’ve learned over the years that love alone isn’t enough to repair the wear and tear that occurs in relationships, solid communication rebuilds love and trust.”
So, I must ask…in …read more

I took a major action step to Save Myself. It wasn’t easy, there were a few fights and one angry letter to Suze Orman over my using $50, of our already very tight budget, to Save My Self by opening a TD Ameritrade Account.

Rewind: Suze Orman had a Save Yourself Plan in her book Women & Money. Women who signed up for a TD Ameritrade Investment Account before March 2008 and automatically save $50 a month for one year will be given a free $100.

So far I’ve saved $100. But, I don’t know what to do with it. The market …read more

Kelly Erb, our own Tax Girl, has done a round up of all the recession chatter around b5media in Recession? What Recession?. There’s lots of takes on it. You should check a few theories out cause well, it effects you. My theory? Recession or Sanity?  

Personally, I’m calling the recession media hysteria about marketers woes.
If you focus on the dire straits of marketing professionals then Houston, we have a problem.
But if your concern is with the consumer, otherwise known as the American People, then this recession looks more like a return to financial sanity.
Wasn’t this whole housing – slash – credit problem created by wanton spending with no foresight into the consequences of such behavior? Welcome, back to Planet Earth!
Was I the only one watching houses sky rocket over the last few years with jaw dropped wondering how an average family could afford to buy …read more