ladyai...oh boy, do I hear ya. I am currently going through a life simplification process, learning to make do with less.

This year we moved from a 2100 sq foot house with lots of storage into a 1300 sq foot house with minimal storage (it's 120 years old...ONE real closet). AND, I left a good paying job and have since been unemployed, looking for the "right" thing.

We have had to cut way back on everything and have had to get rid of a lot of stuff, some of which we still were using. While I absolutely agree that you get what you pay for, we are finding ourselves going the, shall I say, "lighter" or "lesser" route. It's been really hard. But many times we have simply gone without because we know that often you get what you pay for. And it works out OK.

So we reprioritize, make do with what we have, and learn every day because we are trying very hard to stay out of debt (the handcuffs, the life-controller, etc) and stay focused on what really matters. So far so good.

Fortunately, we already have very functional (and pretty nice) bikes!