My Secret Addiction

This month has been crazy -- filled with productivity, action, and meaningful long term planning.  I've been sitting at the computer a little less and doing a little more.  I'm not ready to say I am kicking ass and taking names on my July To Do List but I will say that I am getting there and definitely everything I have chosen to do this month has been a conscious choice, which has been AWESOME! Something about being choosy with how you spend your time makes life seem a lot less stressful and a lot more under control.  (Most of you are probably shouting "DUH!" at your computer screens right now.  I know.) But can I tell you what is totally out of control this month?  Our magazine subscriptions!  (And here's a confession:  I just subscribed to 2 more TODAY!  OMG what was I thinking.)  I'm not really sure what to do about it.  In some ways it is so easy, in others it is so overwhelming. 

How many magazines do you subscribe to? 

These are the magazines that make their way to our mailbox every month:

Cooking Light - This is a monthly staple that I just love getting.  It inpires meals every month and they usually have a few articles I'm interested in peppered throughout.  I know I could mostly get these recipes online but I love flipping through cooking magazines on Sunday when I meal plan.  Sitting at the computer is just NOT the same.  Plus, I got a year of it for $5 on Amazon at Christmas.

Real Simple - Great articles, great recipes, great home stuff -- I find this magazine to be lifestyle eye candy.  and again, I got it for $5 a year on Amazon at Christmas, so it definitely has paid for itself, even if I don't read every page of every issue.

Rachael Ray - I'm on Team Rachael Ray, feel free to judge me, and I love her magazine!  Recipes are usually fairly simple, lots of fun cooking and travel articles.  It's just always a fun (and quick read) and usually a few pages end up dog-eared for that Sunday night meal planning session.  This would probably be the first "cooking" magazine I would cut, but dammit, I DON'T WANT TO!

Fitness - I don't know why I still get this.  I'm not sure I have ever paid for, renewed, or requested this magazine, yet it keeps  coming to my mailbox.  I think the exercises are always a bit weak sauce, and the "health" articles always seem a bit gimmiky and advertiser driven (well, more obvious than most magazines I mean) but some of the recipes are fun and it can be good inpiration to shake up my workout at times.  I don't love it, but I still get it.  

Vanity Fair - some of the best and intriguing magazine articles aroun -- and usually they are about stuff I never even knew I wanted to know about.  Plus celebrities!  I mean, this tickles both the intellectual and superficial side of my brain and I kind of love it.  I don't really want to give it up, plus I recycle it when I'm done with it and pass it on to my mom, so it's also my good deed for the month. (right?)

The New Yorker - I have wanted a subscription to The New Yorker for ages and finally this Christmas I bought myself one.  It was $35 on Amazon around Christmas and I thought to myself, hell, I buy at least 6 issues a year (and they are painfully almost $6) so this pays for itself.  AND DAMN IT, I'M WORTH IT!  The only issue (haha, "issue"  See what I did there?  Ok, sorry) is that it is an incredibly dense magazine and it comes EVERY WEEK.  So it's a lot of reading, and truth be told, I don't read every issue from cover to cover but it is also one of the magazines that both Garrett and I like to read.  As long as I keep that price locked in, this one's a keeper. 

Sunset - I can't get enough of this magazine and it is one of the only magazines that I pretty much start reading on the way back from the mailbox and don't put it down until it's done.  I am always cutting out inpirations for decor, vacations, recipes.  So damn useful!  This mag is a MUST.  The funniest part of this magazine is that I never used to read until Garrett's mom got him a subscription to it for Christmas one year (it's tradition that she buys him a new magazine each year and they are always thoughtful interesting choices.)   

Organic Gardening - This year's subscription from Garrett's mom.  A magazine I probably would not have chosen myself, yet I adore all the great info in it! It's slightly above my skillset but it gives me something to aspire to. 

California Country - Complimentary magazine for being a California Farm Bureau member.  Great articles about the local agricultural economy, recipes, and fun facts.   

Glamour - All I can say about this magazine is how much I hate it and how it fills me with rage every month that it shows up in my mailbox.  I used to subscribe to Domino (RIP! Sob!) and when it went under I got this stupid, dumb, stupid, dumb magazine as a replacement.  BECAUSE THEY ARE SO SIMILAR.  ugh.  It reminds me on the regular how much I miss Domino.  Can't wait until this runs out. 

Popular Mechanics - Another $5 Amazon Holiday deal (if you haven't noticed yet, December -- great month to stock up on the magazine subscriptions.  Best kept secret, I tell ya!)  I don't really read this but Garrett does and he enjoys it. 

Via - Yes this is the free AAA magazine, but you guys it is so fun to read!  Before Garrett and I lived together I would steal this from him every issue.  Now that we are roomies, I still savor the benefits!

So this alone, is quite a long list  (And it doesn't include the free mags we end up getting from Costco, Charles Schwab, The Fed, and some other weird finance-y publication that I can't remember.  Obvs, I don't read it.)  It's kind of a ginormous list, actually, now that I type it all out.  But seriously the difference in price for subscribing vs. buying a few issues a year is practically negligable and in some cases ($5 Amazon deals) impossible to pass up!  So I don't really feel guilty about it so much as I feel well...just RIDICULOUS.  And then today I added two new subscriptions (!!!) because I needed another like I needed hole in the head. 

But here is my justification:

Everyday Food - Hi I'm sorry, do we not know each other?  I'm a Martha Stewart Zealot.  Yes she's a nutty control freak, but man do her recipes and entertaining tips deliver.  Not to mention I am a total lover of the Everyday Food Cookbook Series.  And this magazine, silly little minx that it is, taunts me at the grocery checkout 10 TIMES PER YEAR.  And almost always, I give in.  To the tune of at least $4.  I recently purchased a subscription to this for my mom on her birthday and I noticed on the little subscription mailer that it came with an added bonus.  A subscription to Whole Living Magazine.  Swoon!  This magazine is another little grocery store temptress and the two for one deal was hard to pass up (hello, $12!  For 20 issues!)  I mean really how could I say no?  Well the answer is, I coulnd't.  And now I am the owner of 14 magazine subscriptions.  And I'm not even satisfied.  Can you believe I still want to subscribe to Oprah?  

It's a problem you all.  But admitting it is the first step, right?  Right????