Growing up, my folks taught me to buy only what we needed, to reuse whenever possible, and to recycle everything. As a result, I am highly conscious about both material and financial waste.

I recently purchased a box of quart-sized Ziploc freezer bags to store homemade beans and realized it had been eight years since my last purchase of any kind of plastic container.

My family eats a lot of eggs. We purchase them from local farms, which costs more than conventional eggs. It’s well worth the extra few dollars each week to value farmer’s hard work and food grown in its natural environment. Also, being frugal means getting more for your money and research shows that pasture-raised eggs can be more nutritionally beneficial than conventional eggs.

Counting every dollar, I don’t spend money on foods that my family doesn’t need. My “unnecessary foods” list includes a wide range of readily available, high-sugar products such as candy, cookies and other commercially made baked goods.

Winter is the season of water, and attuned to its pooling, quiet qualities, I crave soup! Likely the easiest food to make out of almost any ingredients, often I find myself using leftovers to make a pot of soothing soup.

My household has moved into a soothing soup phase, turning to root vegetables, squash, garlic and onions procured at the last farmers’ market. One way to enrich our soups and to save money is by making veggie broth from scratch.

When building my son’s lunch box, I start with a minimally processed protein – some kind of nut butter, hummus, beans or fish from last night’s meal. Then I decorate the protein with colorful fruits and vegetables.