Hi!! My name is Alice and I’m a frugal working mom living in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Two adorable little kids call me mama (often over and over), I work full-time in a career I love, am luckily to be married to my awesome husband for the past 10 years, and dog mom to a lovable pitbull who will steal food right out of a baby’s hand. I’m originally from Washington, DC (yes, people are actually from there!) but since this is a blog you can’t tell that I don’t have a southern accent.

I am a personal finance nerd and enjoy balancing our family budget for funsies, love the Simpsons and the Office, coffee, and mint chocolate chip ice cream (well, pretty much any ice cream really). But my unhealthy enthusiasm for budget spreadsheets and personal finance blogs and podcasts doesn’t mean that I’m perfect with money. We are still clawing out from under a massive mound of debt but have so far paid off $40,000 in the past three years! *pats self on back*

I may not be an expert at avoiding debt, but I am an expert at being frugal. If there is a penny to save, I can find it, damn it! I swear I’m genetically engineered to say “I have a coupon for that” thanks for my frugal parents, and my friends turn to me as the expert in saving a few dollars on just about anything.

I’ll tell you what, nothing has so much has turned my financial life upside down as having kids. Being a proud working mom and breadwinner for my family is a blessing and I am grateful every day to have a career that I love. But damn, its a hell of a lot to juggle everything, much less try to figure out how to stay on budget, pay for daycare and diapers, pay down debt, sock away some savings, and generally try to feel like we can keep our heads above water financially. Living paycheck to paycheck sucks. So does not knowing how you will afford your maternity leave, struggling when your income is exactly the same as your outgoing bills and then a tire blows, watching food and gas prices creep up and eat into any margins you hustled to find in your budget, going without a paycheck for weeks thanks to a government shutdown, dropping to a single income household for years, and still fighting to come out the other side. I’ve made a million mistakes but through those I have learned a lot and I’m here to share what I’ve learned (and am still learning) with other frugal working moms who are trying to get fiscally fit. I’m proud of the hard knocks I’ve taken and lessons I have learned and am happy to de-stigmatize talking about money, proudly frugal, and on the path to getting out of debt while still enjoying life.

I’m out here trying to live my best frugal mom life. That means I’m looking for ways to live and spend with intention and purpose, get out of debt, save for tomorrow and the far away future, declutter and simplify my life, be productive and organized (yes, I’m a perfectionist and Type-A-ish), become more eco-friendly, and live the happiest, most frugal and intentional life I can. I share all this and more on this blog and would be thrilled for you to come along with me on this journey.

I started this blog originally in 2011 as Earning My Two Cents and after a decade and two kids I rebranded in 2022 to Frugal Working Mom. So if I’m familiar, “Hi!”, and if you are new here, “Hi also!”

I would love to hear from you!! If you have questions, comments, praise, disdain, post ideas, or want more information on anything I blog about, please shoot me an email at [email protected] to get in touch with me. I hope to share my experience and offer help to frugal working moms of all kinds, but even if that’s not you if you have a frugal living issue I can help offer an answer for please drop me a line.