Newspaper Interview, Part 2

What does your husband do for a living?
My husband is a Web Developer.

Do you work also?
I do not have a job outside the home.  Because we don’t have a second income, I look at part of my job for our family to be as frugal as possible. 

In short, I guess, how do you manage it? 
It’s not easy!  When I was pregnant with our 3^rd, we thought I was going to have to go back to work part-time.  I wandered around, looking for a place that I thought might be interesting, as far as retail goes, but just never felt comfortable with it.  My husband and I finally started really praying hard about our situation.  About a month later, my husband got a new job with a raise in salary that was equal to what I would have made at a part-time job at a bookstore.  A definite answer to prayer.  Since then, I have never again tried to look for a job.  Every time my husband and I wonder how we’re going to make it, God just provides in amazing ways. 

Recently, Darin received a 6% pay cut.  That is what our grocery budget was!  It’s been very tight since that took effect, but God is still providing.  Darin does freelance work when he can get it, and is about to start a new job, but it seemed there was nothing else on the horizon.  As I was driving home from the store about three weeks ago, I prayed and told God, “Darin really needs some freelance work.  I don’t know where it could come from, but You do.”

The next day, we were sitting here in the office and Darin was chatting about a friend from high school.  I told him to look him up on Facebook.  We found him, and from that contact, we found another guy that Darin used to work with 13 years ago.  Darin added him as a friend, and as they were catching up with each other, it turned out that this guy needs a new website.  Darin is going to build him one.  Three others have also turned up.  God is good.

Besides relying on God for provision, we also do without the things that most people think are absolute necessities.  We have received most of our furniture for free from relatives or friends.  None of it is the leather couch we would like to have, but at least it holds us.  ;-) 

We rely on hand-me-downs for the kids.  I have many, many storage bins full of clothes for the kids.  They are all labeled by gender and size.  We are blessed by people who give us things.  There have been a few times when I worried that we weren’t going to have what we needed, but I just “pray it in.”  ;-)  I tell God what we need, and He sends it our way.

We eat out as little as possible.  It costs up to $50 for our family to go to a sit-down restaurant.

We line-dry our clothes as much as possible.  Amazingly, this can save us up to $100 a month on our electric bill.