The Hobbit And Other May 2023 Expenses (2026)

If hobbit other may 2023 is on your radar, this short guide cuts through the noise. Here is what is worth knowing, and how to put it to work today.

Key Takeaways

• Yes indeed, we’ve welcomed a hobbit into our home.
• FW is a well-known lover of The Lord of The Rings books and the main reason he wanted to have children was to one day read the series with t...
• He’s been working Kidwoods up to The Hobbit by having her first read the Fern Hollow books (by John Patience), next the Redwall series (by B...

Yes indeed, we’ve welcomed a hobbit into our home. Mr. FW is a well-known lover of The Lord of The Rings books and the main reason he wanted to have children was to one day read the series with them. He’s been working Kidwoods up to The Hobbit by having her first read the Fern Hollow books (by John Patience), next the Redwall series (by Brian Jacques) and finally, last month, she began reading The Hobbit to him.

Kidwoods reading to Mr. FW: their afternoon ritual

To facilitate this love of literature, we purchased a gorgeous, illustrated, hard-cover copy of The Hobbit (affiliate link). Normally, we purchase zero new books-they all come from the library or a yard sale, but this was a special one Mr. FW wanted to gift to Kidwoods.

This is now their daily afternoon habit-she sits in his lap and reads him books. It started out as an assignment from her fabulous 1st grade teacher at the beginning of this year and, wouldn’t you know it, her reading has advanced quickly and dramatically. Having her read aloud to him enables us to track her progress and ensure she’s nailing the pronunciations as well as internalizing the context and story line. She now delights in giving me the rundown on what the characters are up to each day!

I initially thought The Hobbit might be too scary for a seven-year-old, but she LOVES it and it provides a lot of opportunities to discuss when characters aren’t nice to each other. She can recognize bad behavior when it crops up in the story and is able to articulate why it’s bad. All in all, an adorable routine is cemented in our home. The only downside is that Littlewoods is FURIOUS she can’t read yet.

Yard Sale & Thrift Store Scores

The other notable line items this month are my yard sale and thrift store scores since it’s yard sale season here in Vermont! My yard sale buddy, RW, and I’ve been hitting it hard early on Saturday mornings and have made some excellent hauls.

As longtime readers are well aware, I utilize yard sales and thrift stores to procure the following:

• Birthday and Christmas gifts for our kids! No reason to purchase new when there are so numerous amazing second-hand toys/games/books/puzzles available.
• The marble run: a fantastic hand-me-down!

  Birthday gifts for other kids! Anytime I find a new, unopened, tags-on, in-package toy/book/puzzle/craft kit, I scoop it up for one of the numerous kid birthday parties we attend.

• Household decor and furniture! I purchase all of my seasonal decor, everyday decor, lamps, tables, picture frames and more from yard sales. Very occasionally I need to purchase new, but I’m able to find just about everything I need/want from the affordable used market.
• Clothing and shoes for me and the kids! I get nearly all of our clothes second-hand, with the exception of things like: underwear, socks, swimsuits, running shoes and any other specialty items we need, such as ski goggles or ski socks (if I can’t find them used). I very rarely find anything used for Mr. FW-occasionally I’ll find a good insulated work shirt, but most men’s clothes seem to be torn to shreds so we typically have to purchase his stuff new.

Why Purchase Used?

I mean, honestly, why not? I’ve written tomes on this in the past, and for my longwinded thoughts, check out:

• How I’ve Saved Thousands of Dollars on Clothes for My Kids
• How to Thrift Like a Rockstar: Plan Ahead, Purchase Ahead and Focus on Depreciation
• How To Find Anything and Everything Used: A Compendium Of Frugal Treasure Hunting
• The Myth Of The Gross Used Things

More Than Money Saved: Other Benefits Of Buying Used

Beyond the astronomical amounts of money I save by accepting hand-me-downs and thrifting it up, I’ve discovered a slew of non-monetary benefits of the used market:

Littlewoods rocking a second-hand dress

1. Buying used = fewer decisions, which makes us humans happier.

• More choices actually decrease our happiness and too numerous choices can push us into a paralysis by analysis spiral of doom:

Infinite choice is paralyzing… and exhausting to the human psyche. It leads us to set unreasonably high expectations, question our choices before we even make them and blame our failures entirely on ourselves… Too much choice undermines happiness (source: NPR).

2. Used stuff is more environmentally friendly.

• Used stuff avoids the embodied environmental costs of new: packaging, shipping, manufacturing, etc.
• Plus, it keeps stuff out of the landfill!

3. Buying used allows for the experience of kismet.

• Oh yes, there’s kismet in finding excellent used deals. I love my garage sale scores and I delight in the sheer kismet of finding, for example, a $1 baby doll stroller that my girls ADORE.
  • They adore it so much, in fact, that I was thrilled to find another ($2) used baby doll stroller so that they can each push a stroller around the house at the same time.

4. Buying used reduces the endowment effect.

• My nearly 100% second-hand home (there’s that high chair!!)

  Since so much of our stuff was purchased used at a deep discount, I’m not super attached to any of it. This allows me the freedom to let it go so that it doesn’t clutter up my life. This is also why I’m in favor of the Plan Ahead, Purchase Ahead approach.

• Since I paid nothing, or very little, for our stuff, I don’t feel compelled to hoard it or sell it in an effort to squeeze out a return on my investment (which is unlikely to happen, based on depreciation).
• It relieves me from being held hostage by the endowment effect, which occurs when, “…an individual places a higher value on an object that they already own than the value they would place on that same object if they did not own it” (source).

5. Buying used is fun! So fun.

• Similar to kismet, I find second-hand shopping fun. It’s not stressful because if a yard sale doesn’t have anything I need? I just move on. Conversely, if I do happen to find a excellent deal, it’s cause for frugal celebration!
• Another reason I find garage sale shopping so delightful is that I have a BGSGP (best garage sale gal pal). With our forces combined, we are garage sale mavens. We plan which Saturdays we want to garage sale, we get up early those mornings, leave our husbands and kids at home, and quest forth for finds. Garage saleing-like most things-is better with friends.
• Plus we now have some hilarious stories, like the time a guy tried to convince us VERY EARNESTLY that his old, small cooler was worth $40… 

Littlewoods on her first birthday in the high chair!

6. Buying used and handing stuff down creates community.

• When I shop at a garage sale, I’m giving money to my neighbors, which I love. Their stuff gets a new life, I get a excellent deal, they make a few bucks, and everyone is happy.
• My cycle of receiving and giving hand-me-downs further enhances a community mentality of sharing, lending, borrowing and just generally taking care of each other.
• I was over at a friend’s house last week and saw our old high-chair (which was handed down to us) in her kitchen. I hadn’t passed it along to her, so I asked her to relay the chain of events:
  • A few years ago, I gave the high chair to friend A, who handed it down to friend B, who handed it down to friend C (who is currently using it). That made me SO SO SO HAPPY!!! It’s a fantastic high chair that’s now been through ~7 kids and is still going strong!!!!!!

7. Buying used takes less time than buying new. 

• It takes drastically less time than shopping new. There’s a misconception that it’s more time consuming, but that’s a fallacy if you do it the right way.
• My BGSGP and I don’t go to garage sales every weekend-that would be far too time consuming! Garage sale season in Vermont is confined to the summer months, so she and I scout out the most likely goldmine sales in advance and do strategic strikes. We go early for the best selection and are typically home by late morning.
  • Note: we are not always successful, but then we have excellent stories including, but not limited to, the $40 nasty old (and small) cooler. P.S. I just looked it up and that cooler is currently $22 new… LOL

I Still Spend Plenty Of Money

…on other things (such as restaurants and coffee shops!). From my perspective, if I can get perfectly good stuff used for affordable, why purchase it new? I can’t get perfectly good used lunches out with my husband, but I sure as heck can get fantastic used bikes for my kids. It’s all about saving where it’s simple to save so that you can spend in other areas.

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Final Thoughts

The bottom line: a little research on hobbit other may 2023 goes a long way. Compare your options, watch for seasonal offers, and never pay full price when a better deal is one click away.

Originally published at frugalwoods.com.