On a break at work today, I sat with a couple friends from college and frantically knitted the last of a scarf (Christmas gift) while we discussed Cheap Women.

Laura talked about some of the ways her parents save money (like freezing lots of post-Halloween pumpkins that stores give away free), and it got me thinking about the ways my own parents and grandparents creatively save money.

Most of my friends (me included) graduated college with the idea that we should have lives just like those we left with our parents. We moved into our own apartments (and bought our own houses) and immediately got cable and furniture and a fridge full of food.

How did we get this impatient? Is it really just our credit cards that have convinced us that waiting is unnecessary, or is this attitude indicative of a bigger societal problem? I feel like we aren't willing to work or wait for anything anymore -- whether it's material goods or a career or a home or love.

Maybe it's always been this way. But I think about some of those "old" cheap ideas, like saving a freezer full of pumpkin, or making a quilt from old clothes, or making curtains from fabric scraps instead of ordering new ones from Ikea.

It seems these items carry with them some history, and some reminder of the work and time that make our comforts possible. We like to say that old, handmade or worn items have "character." But maybe the real point is the character their presence builds in us.