A Quick Look At Bathroom Garbage

We've been talking about trash a bit lately, so I wanted to show you the way we organized the bathrooms this weekend!

We bought 3 brown, bendy baskets for recyclables, for use in our three bathrooms! Each basket was $1.50 at Daiso, and they had plenty of other colors to choose from, brown was the most neutral. We now have two waste baskets in each bathroom, one for garbage and one for recycle in order to help keep our garbage output low... Remember how I said we were going to make “one whole step!” ? Well, we made 2!!! We are now down to the Once-a-month 32gal garbage pickup starting next week! We are using our own container, and the savings from stepping down from 32gal weekly plus rental covers both the new garbage can we bought, and the little waste baskets in just one month's time!

The "Bendable" Nature Allows For Squeezing Into Small Spaces

The Big Black One Used To Be For Dirty Diapers, Now It's Our Burnables!

We are following Cass's advice on keeping a “burnables” receptacle, which keeps things like wrapping paper that has a foil side that can't be recycled, but really shouldn't be thrown away either!

Now, each week we are only using ¼ of a garbage bag for actual garbage, which leaves wiggle room for birthdays, holidays, buying new things in non-recyclable containers, etc.

REMEMBER: YOU HAVE 2 MORE DAYS TO ENTER INTO THE DIAPER CONTEST!!! The switch from disposable to cloth will dramatically reduce your garbage output, but of course, the switch from diapers to Elimination Communication will reduce your output and energy consumption even more!!!

Just comment here, or message me privately to be entered to win! I have 2 cute BumGenius Brand NEW diapers on the way!!!

Fall Decorations: What to do with Pine Cones…

So the cheapest season to decorate for, and most lovely in my humble opinion, is autumn. Seriously, all you have to do is collect a bunch of leaves from outside, and throw them into the corner that runs along the back of your counter top! They dry out, curl up and turn color...voila, free decor! Buuuuut, every year those scrumptious cinnamon pine cones come out and they are 5 dollars a bag! So tempting, but here’s the kicker, you could make them for 1 dollar!!

We went up to Leavenworth with my brother over 4th of July, and stopped by Sugarloaf Mountain, a logging site and campground, and came back with a bucketful of pine cones. To save you the big trip, you could head to a Pine-y park nearby, or make a trek down to St.Edwards State Park! A lovely park for kids of all ages, plus it is surrounded by Pine Trees.

Now you stop by Michael’s with a 40% off coupon (sign up for their email and scout the paper, it’s worth it), I don’t even bother to say if, because I always have one, and pick up a bottle of cinnamon “essential oil.” I found my bottle at their end-of-summer clearance sale, but they always have them on stock, in littler, but more pungent bottles for oil diffusers and oil burner sets.

Take your bucket of cones and douse them with oil! Shake them around, then transfer them to a basket, because whatever bucket you shake them in will get pretty dirty! Tada! Shake them up every couple of weeks to refresh the scent. You can also achieve the same scent with cinnamon sticks, so if you happen to have them on hand, toss a couple in, as their perfume will last much longer than oil. Re-douse yearly!

Another cute project to include the children, as if pouring oil on pine cones wasn’t fun enough!, is to make pine cone bird feeders! You all remember these as a kid, now it’s your kids’ turn. The bag of seed I bought was $7 at Target, and will last for a few years.

Take out some pine cones for the children before you cover them in oil. Put a mat or a piece of newspaper down in front of each child, and allow them to roll their cones in peanut butter, then sprinkle seeds on them. My youngest eats more than she gives to the birds, but I don’t care! Haha, high protein content!

So quick and easy, all you have to do is take a ribbon and tie it around the “petals” of the cone to stick it up in a tree, or on a post, or from your gutter, whatever you have! The ribbon makes it pretty, and the birds don’t care how much is on the pine cone if your children don’t have the best aim with their seeds. If you make your own peanut butter, each pine cone, including ribbon, cost 38 cents to make! If you buy your peanut butter from Fred Meyer, as I do on occasion, it costs 56 cents a piece! Still an awesome project on a dime!

Autumn Wreath

JUST A REMINDER BEFORE I BEGIN:
COMMENT OR PRIVATE MESSAGE ME FOR A CHANCE TO WIN THE LATEST GIVEAWAY!!! ~A BABY AND TODDLER FOOD BOOK!

Fall is not official for another 2 weeks, but the weather and the children going back to school sure sets the tone! If you’re like me, after a long and lovely summer you are ready for that cool breeze to kick up and the leaves to turn colors, and beginning September 1st you've already scouted your farms and pumpkin patches to visit!

At the end of the season, when everything goes on clearance, every year I allow myself one more piece of Autumn decor! This year my new addition is scarecrows that were 75% off! In the meantime though, if you want more to keep your hands busy than making cider, make your own Autumn Wreath!

2 years ago I bought this simple twisted twig wreath in Target’s dollar section for $2, and I have seen it reappear every year since. On its own, it is very cute and simple, with little curly cues that remind me of pumpkin stems, but I wanted something that was more reminiscent of the large, full, bushy, fall wreaths you see at Michael’s. So here’s the fun part...every year now, my daughters and I collect a bunch of things to decorate our Autumn Wreath! My backyard rivals a forest, so we are able to hunt around a bit and uncover many treasures to put on our wreath, but if you feel your backyard quest will turn up leafless, head to a nearby park and make a field trip out of it. Parks can be wonderful, children who are not interested in searching for natural treasures to put on a wreath can play, and sometimes you can get things like acorns or maple leaves that really set the mood… This is last year's wreath!

  
 

After your field trip is done and you've got a nice collection going, it’s time to head home for the art part! It’s better to have too much than too little, because you can always toss extra clippings back outside. Also, when gathering leaves, try to steer clear of brown ones, nice yellows, reds, and even ones that are still green are easier to manipulate into the wreath, and after hanging for awhile, they will all turn brown anyway! Don’t worry if it’s wet outside, that will just make your leaves more malleable, which is nice for positioning on your wreath.

Now that you have your supplies, it is time to place your trinkets. For a wheat-like fan across the top, start on the left side of your wreath and string in your stems. If it doesn't fit or doesn't work after plenty of jarring and jiggling, try a new spot close to the same place. Starting from left to right will ensure that all of your stems get hidden by the tufts on the following “wheat” stalks. Do the same when arranging leaves. Start at the farthest position you want your fauna to appear, then work around, covering up your stems as you go. I like to add a little filler with varying grasses so my wreath looks full. I also think a couple of pine-cones are a festive look, plus they lend a little versatility for a winter wreath when we will go back outside to collect holly and pine swags. The first year I added pine-cones, I jammed them onto the wreath, hooking the spikes of the cone around the twigs of the wreath, which worked well for about half the season until one broke and I couldn't jam anymore on successfully after that. Solution: hot glue. Anything you don’t mind keeping year after year can be glued into place!

And voila! ~ A lovely Autumn Wreath that was a field trip and an art project all in one, and only cost $2 for seasons of enjoyment!

FREE PAINT! And a Freebie!

Don’t you just LOVE freebies?! So do I! I also love projects, do-it-yourself, and new paint! Everything feels fresher and more home-y with a fresh coat of paint, especially if all of your walls are beige…

Normally I wait until Labor Day (or Memorial Day for Springtime Painting Projects) for Sherwin Williams’ 40% off sale! That’s when all of their paint and stains are available for 40% off, which makes their lovely selection of high quality paint cheaper than Home Depot. I personally can’t stand Home Depot’s paint, as the water to pigment ratio borderlines soup instead of latex, guaranteed to splatter and require at least two coats to cover. These affections are probably the result of having a dad who was a manager at Sherwin Williams, but I have tested his convictions and I feel they are well-founded. But I digress, this year there was no paint sale! Where was I going to get my refreshing hand-picked shades for my new playroom in the works? I can’t just leave the project unfinished, that would be a waste of effort culminated over the summer! So there is one more idea…

OOPS! paint! They sell it at Home Depot for $7 a gallon, and Lowes for $5 a gallon! Despite requiring two coats to cover, that is massively cheaper than buying even the lowest quality paint on sale at Sherwin Williams! And let’s face it, none of us really NEEDS to pick the exact shade of our color, just a general selection will suffice. The only time you ever NEED an exact match is when you are painting an entire house, or matching a color that’s already inside. Or if you NEED "Ceiling White," which I recommend buying on Amazon, because even if you can hit the 40% off sale, it's still more for a standardized product, and Home Depot runs about $38 for a gallon:

But seriously, if you are coming to a project fresh, a dark red is a dark red, a light green is a light green, no one cares if you have Sunset Yellow or Sunrise Yellow!

So here’s where a bit of imagination is required: we found a lovely light green, but no other viable color options. The OOPS! paint selection refreshes daily, so it is worth it to go home and paint with the single color and come back the next day for more variety. With this almost electric green, we had the opportunity to go with a pastel theme for our playroom, or a natural theme, with earth tones and such. The paint selection would decide our fate. We had snagged this awesome green from Home Depot (watch out for how much is in the container, because they sell as is, so if it’s in a gallon bucket they charge $7 regardless of how much is left in it, which is not true of Lowes, and Lowes will actually mark how much is left in the can if some did perchance to spill), the next logical step was to check out Lowes’ stock of mismatched paint!

Lo and behold the fate of our new room went the natural route! There was a sweet pebble grey, and a fetched deep forest green! For $5 each! Now, here’s the kicker: Lowes is currently offering a $5 rebate on all of their gallons of 4000 Series paint (their Paint+Primer goes on a little thicker, and is nice for walls that already have a color on them that you are trying to cover, but a rebate is a rebate, yo!), and our little green beaut was exactly that variety...4000 Series, but discounted down to $5 because it  was a mis-mix. That means, when we got to the checkout with our two gallons of paint, we paid $5 for the grey, $5 for the green, and got a receipt for a $5 rebate that we mail in! That’s FREE PAINT! That is a score!!!

We continued our search yesterday for a blue to go along with our set, by now we had been into Lowes for a few days in a row. The nice gentleman at the counter noticed this, and checked every bucket he had behind the counter, and even marked out some paint that was left behind that day for us. You never know when your efforts will be rewarded with your perfect color! For us, that perfect color's name is "Autumn Sky," the blue to round out our set. When all was said and done we painted a 200 square foot playroom/classroom for $17. That was 4 gallons of paint, all different colors, making our home unique and wonderful! I don’t advise buying every color they have, as there was a light blue that bordered on white that we didn't take, despite our quest for blue. Not every color is a winner, but sometimes you have to open your mind to color possibilities, and sometimes you have to get a general color in mind and aim for that, being prejudiced towards extreme off-shoots of that color you’re aiming for, but not too picky for ballpark matches! Even if you're just looking for a nice Tan color to refresh your neutral walls, sometimes they will have two or three gallons of the same mis-match. You don't always have to go for accent walls like we are, although you can get some pretty fun colors that way! They also have deck stains, concrete stains, exterior paint, and more!

With this new tip in hand, get out there and go scrounge for 4000 Series mis-mixes from Lowes, and refresh your home for fall for free!

Speaking of Freebies, I have a Freebie for you! Since I've been keeping you up to speed with recipes and money savers for your food budget, I realized all you have is food for adults! My girls eat like adults now, but they didn't always, and you should be prepared for that too! Do not buy that canned baby crap, make it yourself! It's much healthier for your little one! To help you out, the Giveaway on this Wonderful Wednesday is the book: "Wholesome Meals For Babies and Toddlers, Healthy Food Your Kids Will Love To Eat" which has food for your cutie separated out by the different stages of development! This book was given to me when I was a new mom, now I am passing it on! It has recipes from 6 months old to 4 years old! It is not a vegan book, but there are plenty of vegan recipes, especially in the baby food section.

To win, please leave a comment or private message me with a money saving tip! Or a question on a particular area you are struggling to save money in!

A Penny For Your Thoughts? (Part 2)

Ebay!

There is money to be had from your used stuff! From experience, I have found that people will pay a buck or two for things you would otherwise give to your local thrift store.

Step One: Find as many items as you can to sell online. My rule of thumb is If it hasn’t been used in two years, and it’s not reserved for future children, SELL IT!

Step Two: Take pictures of everything! If it’s damaged in any way, take photos of the damage! The more info you have on your item, the more likely it is to sell, and a picture is worth a thousand words.

Sets are great for Ebay!

Step Three: List your items! A few pointers though--list each item separately ending on a Tuesday or Wednesday. Start your bid at the lowest price you are willing to accept, 0.99 is a great price, but if you know your item is a collectible or a higher value, start the bidding higher! Most auction-style listings won’t be charged for if you list them under a buck, but the attention to an item priced so low will surely bump its final sale value far beyond its starting price. Also, in your title, spell out exactly what you are selling, including brand name (even if it’s not high end), size, pattern, and add a few common names for the item (for example, a nail clipper should also include the words “file, scissors, pedicure manicure tool, pedi, mani,” or whatever else you can fit on the line--the more hits the better!) And one last thing, NEVER OFFER FREE SHIPPING! (Unless you are an experienced ebayer, and I confess I still am not!) The amount it will cost you to ship your item will put a huge dent in your earnings, and people will still bid on it with a reasonable shipping cost.

Completed StarWars Puzzle, box included, originally a Thrift Store find!

I made $11 once from selling an MSI t-shirt my husband didn’t wear anymore, and $15 on a StarWars puzzle we completed together, but knew we weren’t going to piece it together again. Puzzles are actually perfect for Ebay, since you can pick them up virtually anywhere, even a thrift store, and once you’ve completed it, you can take a picture of the puzzle, completed to prove it has all of its pieces and use that as your selling point. We originally purchased the puzzle for $5 at Goodwill, and listed it for the usual 99 cents, but its popularity turned a profit! It doesn’t always happen that way, but it’s worth a try before you throw things out!

A Penny For Your Thoughts? (Part 1)

This week, I would like to address the plethora of money-making ideas out there, please feel free to share your tips and go-to's in the comments below! I would love to brainstorm before we dive in!

Now that we have our budget in place, most of us will see that we just don’t have enough. Remember, THIS IS A MATH PROBLEM, AND DOES NOT REFLECT YOUR EFFORTS!! My mama taught me this concept; she is just full of refreshing wisdom and you can share in it by visiting her blog: mamacookscottage@blogspot.com (two heads are better than one when it comes to money saving tips!) I recall when I was little, she would sit down to budget out the month, and things were tight, but in big letters across the front of her bill file always read “It’s a MATH problem!” All too often we blame ourselves for the situation we are in, and sometimes true self-inspection can solve money issues, but other times, the ends really don’t meet. It’s at those times when you are not doing yourself or your family any good by fretting, and frankly stressing over it is actually detrimental to all involved.

How do we remedy this problem? The answer is simple; earn more money. I know, duh. But I’m not talking another job, rather a whole bunch of ways to scrounge up little bits of cash. Some of your options don’t even require leaving your home, but not in the same way you find “work from home” gimmicks. Are you ready to roll up your sleeves?!

Until tomorrow, are there any questions or dilemmas with your budget layout?

These are those categories I was talking about in the $1 expandable files!

In this file you will see "Food" and for my 4 person family, that looks like $300 a month, but just a year ago that figure was $200 a month! Figure out what you can live on, then adjust the extras to where you deem they are important! We personally enjoy food and friends more than clothes...

I carry the both of these around in my purse, and pay out of the categories as needed. I do not feel it is necessary to write down where I spend all of the cash in them, as Dave Ramsey has you do, because I do not need to locate money spending problems. You know yourself, and if you need to keep track, DO IT!

Cheers to Fancy and Frugal!