Thriftiness

Well, I didn't get very far in my thrift reports, did I? Not that I quit being thrifty, but I didn't have as many new ideas as I'd hoped. I did start subscribing to tipnut.com and have found a lot of great tips there, but they weren't original, and I wouldn't want to take credit for them.

So once in a while, I'll just post sites, tips, links and any ideas I may have. Feel free to send links or suggestions in your comments, also.

Here are a couple of things I've done with those jugs from the distilled water I need for my C-PAP.
Cutting the bottom on a slant makes a handy scoop:

It won't handle anything real heavy without distorting, but peat moss and mulch are light enough to scoop out of the wheelbarrow with no problem.


Cut differently, the bottom becomes a saucer for my herbs:

You can't see the deck hangers in this picture, but turned diagonally, the base of the jug fits great inside them, and larger pots fit even better than the small one you see here.

And this weekend, I bought a lightly used composter from a gal on craigslist.


I might have gotten a better price or a larger composter if I'd waited, but I've been unsuccessfully searching for one at yard sales and on craigslist and freecycle for a couple of months, and I still paid way less than it would cost me brand new. No more feeling guilty about tossing celery tops, onion peels, eggshells, coffee grounds, etc. into the garbage. And it's low-profile, too, which ought to keep the Homeowner's Assoc. happy, since it's currently positioned at the edge of the gravel drive for maximum sunlight and reflection off the white rocks.

Now I'm off to fight the slug war again. The stakes are higher now--some of them have ignored the beer and managed to destroy the lone tiny squash that was growing. I'm taking Julie's advice and hunting up some of the diatomaceous earth to put around my plants. Only, Julie, what I'm reading says the pool kind is processed differently and shouldn't be used for pest control.


At any rate, my favorite local gardening shop should be able to dig something out of their nooks and crannies for me.

Die, slugs. Die.

Stashbuster/Thrift Report #2

Let's get the Stashbuster Report for Week #3 out of the way first:

Zero in
Zero out

Yep, I'm on a roll here.


Now for the thrifting part.
I worked on half my goals: I got the flyer from my grocery store, and planned my menu, but then I didn't go to the store. I know, but it was the day it was so cold and the heater wasn't working properly and I couldn't get warm for the longest time, so I wasn't going out in the freezing weather when I was already cold.

That said, I got a new flyer for this week, and went shopping today. Today the weather was no better--it was about 21 degrees, but the winds were gusting up to 28mph so the wind chill factor was 6. It felt like 6 below! By the time I got all the grocery bags strung on bungee cords in my pickup, I couldn't feel my fingers, even with the gloves on. It took both hands to insert my key in the ignition and I had to sit with the motor on for 5 minutes before turning the heat on to thaw my fingers. Dang it, people, this is NORTH CAROLINA! NOT CANADA! Sheesh! Don't make me move to Florida!

Sorry. I had a passionate moment there.
Back to being thrifty.

One of the things I really wanted to check into was what to do with empty plastic jugs. The respiratory therapist who educated me on my C-PAP said to use only distilled water in it, not tap water. It only costs 79 cents/gallon, and lasts 2-3 weeks, so the cost isn't the problem--it's those empty containers I kept throwing away because I didn't know what to do with them.

So I googled it, and found lots of uses for them, but two really stood out for me. One is to cut the bottoms off and use them under my plants. Duh. Last summer it irked me to purchase those flimsy plastic saucers from Lowe's, and the solution was right in front of me all the time.

Another thing, and this is roundabout, is that freezers function better when they are full--something about diffusing the air around them--and one site suggested if your freezer is too empty, to put plain old cardboard boxes, such as cereal boxes, in them. How much better to almost fill one of my jugs with water and put them in there instead? As an added benefit, should the power go out, they will help keep the food cold that much longer.


Other things I did this week:
1. This week is triple coupon week at my grocery store, and though there are restrictions, I saved $50.00 today. I still spent a lot, but I know that the real savings won't show up for a while, when I'm able to start delaying buying some items until they go on sale again because I have enough from the last sale, or triple coupon week.

2. I still don't have the details worked out for sorting, storing and transporting coupons, so shopping is a very long process right now, but I did use some of the envelopes that come in my bills. J-Man has most of the bills set to pay through our online bank, so we usually toss the return envelopes, but they came in handy today. The ones with plastic windows work really well, because I can place the coupons for items already selected face forward and see which envelope they are in. As I collect more, I'll be able to label the envelopes by category.

3. Still haven't painted the sewing room yet, but had narrowed the choices down to two colors, using Behr paint chips from Home Depot. When I went online to Behr.com, I found I could take a picture of my sewing room with my digital camera, and use their website to "paint" my room and see how it would look. Is that not the coolest thing? Only now, I've added back two more colors because they looked better than I'd thought when viewed online. But when I finally choose a color, I know I will truly love it.

4. I already mentioned baking, burning candles, and running the dishwasher to keep the house warm when the heater was on the fritz.

5. Millstone Coffee has those little vacuum-packed flavored coffee samplers that cost about $1.48 and make maybe 2 pots of coffee.

I'm not a fan of strong coffee, so mixing a teaspoon or two of the package with my regular coffee grounds (I have a 2-mug coffee pot) is enough to flavor my coffee without using the entire package at once.

Goals for this week:
1. Still plan to start going through my quilt magazines and pull out or scan what I want to keep. Although the mini-computer isn't here yet, I did buy a second thumb drive so I can have one all to myself for all my quilting stuff. I figure I can pare down even more if I scan the articles and patterns to the desktop, then download onto the thumb drive in categories. This will take a while, so once I start doing it, I won't mention it again until it's all done, probably months from now, unless the Thrift Muse strikes again.

2. Didn't get those letters written yet--back on the list for this week.

3. Clean out the "linen closet". It occurs to me that since the linen closet is right by the kitchen, if I get rid of and organize it's contents a little, I can use at least one of the shelves to store extra pantry items for when they go on sale--like bulk paper towels or even canned goods. Who says a linen closet has to hold linens?

Are these old hat to you? Anything to share? I'd love to hear, um, read it!

Thrift Report week #1

I'm going to preface this with saying some of the things I'm trying, you probably already do. Most of you could give me tips out the yingyang for how to be thrifty, and I'm learning a lot out there in blogland.

It's not that I've never been thrifty or on a budget. But we've been in a far better financial position the last few years than ever before, and now that DD's been graduated from law school and we don't have to send her money every month, it's been easy to just get the little things we wanted, or eat out whenever we took a notion to. We pay gobs more on our credit card than the minimum payment, and in 18 months, the SUV will be paid off, so the credit card will be done shortly thereafter. We only use it for emergencies or major purchases now, like the heating and cooling system last year, and the gutters the year before, etc.

But I'm hoping to retire in 8 years, and it would be nice to get the house paid down and to get in the habit of being thrifty before it is absolutely necessary.

Besides being thrifty with our money, I'm looking for ways to be thrifty with my time, space, health, energy, and relationships. I miss opportunities all the time, but I'm trying to become more aware of them.

So, this is what I've done this week:

Money-savers
1. Used 1/2 dryer sheets instead of whole ones. I've not noticed a difference, nor does the static electricity seem to be any worse.
2. Am using the myriad of sample shampoo bottles from past hotels to clean the toilet. Soap is soap and it works just fine. I don't use the shampoo/conditioner combos, but I'm thinking this is probably better than harsh chemicals.
3. I bought way too much lunch meat when the family was here at Christmas. Ordinarily, we would eat off of it until it went bad, but I took half of each package and put them in zipper freezer storage bags and plopped them into the freezer for now.
4. This I started last year, but will continue; as my quilting magazine subscriptions run out, I will not renew them. With so much available on the internet via blogs, tutorials, and websites, there really is no need to clutter up my house with the magazines.
5. Began clipping coupons. What I can't use personally, can be used to buy donation items for the local foodbank.

Space-savers:
1. Culled through the Christmas decorations for donating. Actually had one bin that wasn't full!
2. Pulled the box of 1997 tax info down to shred. It's been 11 years, so all that I need to keep are my returns and W-2 forms. The receipts and bank statements can be destroyed now.

Energy-savers:
I had to learn this the hard way. After going through all my CDs and loading them onto the computer, I was laboriously clicking and dragging each song into a folder or playlist to categorize them before loading onto my iPod. It was taking FOREVER! When DD figured out (though IM) what I was doing, she showed me how my iPod automatically does that for me, and I will only have to do a playlist for those songs I want to categorize by exercise, or blogger friends. If I'd asked for help, I would have saved myself lots of time and frustration. Independence is a good thing, but not when it costs needless time and energy.

What I didn't do:
1. I didn't separate out the Christmas lights to see which strings still work and which ones I want to group together by tree, outside, windows, etc. By the time I got to putting it all away, I just wanted to be done with it, so dumped them in the bins. Next year I will regret this.
2. By not checking all the lights, I couldn't make a list of what needs to be replaced, so as to check the sales now, or in July when it all comes back around again.


Goals for this week:
1. Begin sorting through my quilting magazines and either copy or pull out those patterns I want to keep. The rest will be taken to my quilting bee to give away. This will give me more space in my sewing room to get things off the floor and out of my way.
2. Get the flyer from my grocery store (forgot to buy a paper yesterday) on the way home from work tomorrow morning and see what is on sale.
3. Menu-planning, based on my coupons, and the sale paper. I hate grocery shopping and I hate planning the menu, but I have to admit, I am less likely to impulse buy or stand in front of the fridge at 6pm wondering what I'm going to cook for supper.
4. Write 2 friends, either email or snail mail, that I have been neglecting. Relationships are too important to lose.

The Big Plan

Happy New Year, everyone!

Did you watch the ball drop? Did you enjoy that extra second we got? I thought it was a particularly nice second, didn't you?

Actually, I was busy transferring the rest of my CDs to the computer so I can group them into playlists on my iPod, and didn't even notice the time until 0019--and that ball was history. And since the TV here in the living room is STILL not functioning, there was nothing to remind me. So I just shut the computer off and went to bed.

I obviously don't have this iPod thing down yet--there must be an easier way to group all my music together in categories than to laboriously click each song and drag it to the folder. I have 8 or 9 Sarah Brightman CDs alone, so that's what, 80-90 songs that I have to click and drag? There's got to be an easier way!

In the meantime, as I sit and click and drag, I've been pondering the option of New Year's resolutions. I haven't made any in years, because they went the way of most resolutions....to Resolution Cemetery. So I'm not inclined to resurrect them, because what's the point?

However, new season, new year, a bit of quiet here as we adjust to Life After the Holidays--all has lead to some introspection. I've decided on a theme for this year instead: Thriftiness. I thought about "Frugal" but the definition had a negative cast to it:
1. economical in use or expenditure; prudently saving or sparing; not wasteful: a frugal manager.
2. entailing little expense; requiring few resources; meager; scanty: a frugal meal.

Meager? Scanty? Mmmm, no, just didn't inspire me.

"Thrifty", on the other hand, was more positive:
1. practicing thrift or economical management.
2. thriving, prosperous, or successful.
3. thriving physically; growing vigorously.

Now, we're doing okay right now, even though census has been low for a while, and I haven't had a full paycheck since September. We just aren't putting much in savings. All this has been simmering in my subconscious a while, I guess, and as I have become more aware this year of just how much we really have compared to the rest of the world, I've had to ask myself if I've been a good steward of those things I am blessed with: not just money, but time, resources, health, belongings, relationships.

The answer is a shameful "no".

So my Plan is to begin to ask myself, "Am I being thrifty with________(fill in the blank)? Is this the best use for _____________ (ditto)? What's the wisest move here?"

Now, how do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. I know myself well enough to realize that if it is too hard or too time-consuming, I will get frustrated and abandon all good intentions. (I'm SUCH an extremist--it's so all or nothing with me). To be as successful at this as possible, I plan to start by taking 15 minutes each week to look at what I have done, haven't done, and could do better, and to formulate a goal for the upcoming week. At some point, I might be able to evaluate things on a more frequent basis, or spend a little more time at it, but for now, 15 minutes a week is do-able. And do-able insures success, which spurs me on to more effort, etc., etc., etc.

One way to do this is join Judy Laquidara's Stash Busters Group. As I bring all the fabric and supplies back into the sewing room/holiday guest room, I will re-evaluate UFOs and refamiliarize myself with the fabrics I already have.

This morning as I drank my coffee, I purged some cards from my recipe box of those dishes I will never make. Honestly, I know J-Man doesn't like ginger, or curry, or feta cheese, or lots of garlic (he's no fun), and to make those dishes would be a waste of food and time. Having the cards in the box wastes space, and makes me feel guilty that I'm not a better cook. That guilt is a waste of time and internal resources.

Small successes. Prosperity. Thriving.

I think it's a pretty good Plan, myself.

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Would this be the appropriate time to mention we ordered a mini-notebook computer from QVC this morning?

I can justify it.

No, really.


You can email me if you want to know the reasons.


I just didn't want you all to think I wasn't being completely honest here.