Monday, at the last minute, I decided to go to Sacramento on Tuesday to celebrate an event with my daughter and her family. Since I’d seen cheap, last-minute tickets on the Web about five years ago, I was hoping such bargains were still available. I started out by called Alaska... Read more →

I love raspberries. I was pleased to return from my vacation and find my raspberry patch in full production. It’s such a great time of year in the Pacific Northwest. Berries do well here, and we’ll have these healthy fruits well into fall. Raspberries, blueberries, and strawberries contain phytonutrients –... Read more →

Now that her twins are four years old and better travelers, my daughter, who lives in Miami Beach, decided to arrange a home exchange vacation in Seattle. She wanted to visit her friends there and save the costs of a large hotel bill. Since I live 60 miles to the... Read more →

Retail stores receiving meat and poultry products involved in Class I recalls – those with the most serious health consequences – will soon be listed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, according to an announcement from the department. The identity of retail stores with recalled meat and poultry from their... Read more →

MoneyGram Payment Services has agreed to a multi-state agreement intended to help prevent U.S. residents from becoming victims of wire transfer scams. MoneyGram will pay $1.1 million to fund a national peer-counseling program to be overseen by the AARP Foundation. The company also agreed to print an attention-grabbing warning on... Read more →

In these tough money times, figuring out how to reduce your spending by $500 a month would cause excitement in most households. “Cut Your Spending by $500 Per Month,” an article in the August issue of Consumer Reports, offers six tips to find savings in everyday spending. The tips include:... Read more →

For one family, it was a messy mudroom. For another, their kitchen was a dumping ground. For a third family, their home office wasn’t working. Other problems included a laundry room that wasn’t providing a space for exercising, a dining room that had to double as an office, and a... Read more →

“In (Desperately) Seeking a Clutter Cure,” which appeared in the February 2008 issue of Domino magazine, Cynthia Kling, a self-professed thing-aholic, took a humorous look at clutter books. The prime motivator of clutter books is guilt, Kling said, who reviewed more than 30 books on the topic for the article.... Read more →

When we were getting ready for our Fourth of July party, I thought of two lists I’d read on the Co-op America Web site: Ten Things You Should Never Buy Again and Five More Things to Never Buy Again. Avoiding the purchase of these items will help the environment, according... Read more →

Money can often be an underlying reason why couples aren’t happy. Denying that you have a money problem or wishing the problem would go away, won’t fix the financial difficulty or the relationship disconnect, said Suze Orman, financial planner. “If you know there’s a problem now, it’s only going to... Read more →