Insurance Cutting & Glasses

Wishing to be the best home economist and Proverbs 31 Woman that I can be, I'm constantly on the lookout for any and every way that I can trim our budget. It's been a long and difficult road as I've tried to persuade the rest of the family we need this, but we're getting there.

Yesterday, Jeff and I re-enrolled in his company's health insurance plan. They offer us many different plans accompanied with many different prices. Also included are options for dental and vision insurance. Some of the plans are really great and some of them just aren't. All of them cost quite a bit out of pocket. We tweaked our current plan and made the painstaking decision to drop some of our current coverage because of the weekly amount of taken from Hubby's paycheck in order to pay for the insurance coverage. Ouch. It hurt.

This left us with the dilemma of, "How are we going to pay for medical services when we need them in the next year?" One thing we did was slightly increase the amount of money we put aside in a health care reimbursement account. This will help us to pay for the uninsured costs as they arise. Another thing we plan to do is to set aside a bit each week to cover the unexpected. We probably won't be able to do that a whole lot during the winter months, but over the summer it should be easier.

Now, one thing we found that can really help us poor vision people - there are four of us now who wear glasses or contacts, five when Amanda gets them this year - is to find a source for quality eyeglasses that won't cost us everything we have.

We finally found a company that offers quality eyeglasses for as little as $8.00 a pair. They have the cutest children's frames; I'm excited about that! Ordering glasses is really easy when you have your prescription in hand, as you only need to punch in the numbers as directed on the order page. You don't have to worry about sizing because Zenni tells you how to figure your size - you won't believe how important that is. And they offer an easy return policy.

With our children contributing to our new financial plan by collecting pop cans and bottles, working harder to save electricity by keeping lights off and bedroom heaters turned down, I think we're on a better path than we were last year. Today, Amanda and I are working on a homemade gift list filled with things Amanda can make (with my assistance). Maybe cutting insurance won't be so bad.