a pictureless Five Frugal Things
I had an appointment this morning, so I'm late to the blogging game! No pictures. But I promise this won't continue.
1. I listed books on Amazon.com
I've been consistently shipping out books sold on half.com this summer.
But.
My beloved half.com is closing forever on August 31st, so I listed some schoolbooks on Amazon and moved some of my half.com listings over to Amazon as well.
The listing process there is pretty easy, and I'm noticing that things sell faster on Amazon (I shipped two already!), probably due to the higher traffic volume.
So, maybe this won't be a super painful switch. We'll see.
2. I used up the last of my bruised peach purchase.
I got another big box of bruised peaches this week, and I've been busily freezing them (and we're eating a lot of them too!)
Totally worth the $15.
3. I paid a medical bill with our HSA.
We have a pretty high deductible this year, so we still haven't met it. But luckily there IS money in our HSA to cover bills.
4. I tried to save money on Lisey's textbooks.
Sadly, there were no deals to be found on either of the ones she needs. And one is that annoying type that's shrink-wrapped, hole-punched pages without a cover. Not re-sale friendly at all, though you know I will try!
5. I...
....cooked at home, made chicken taco leftovers into a pretty darn delicious salad just now, organized my fridge so that I know what's in it, froze extra watermelon, and redeemed my TopCashBack (affiliate link) money for an Amazon gift card (small bonus if you do that instead of cash!)
What do you do with frozen watermelon? I've never heard of anyone doing that and I'm so curious.
Well, Joshua's got this recipe for a frozen watermelon drink...you blend up frozen watermelon, frozen pineapple, and coconut water, if I remember right. Maybe lime too? I'll have to check with him!
That's sounds like it'd be really refreshing on a hot day! Perfect.
I've tried to freeze watermelon before, and it was very mushy when it was thawed. Maybe it's better to eat it right after we take it out of the freezer or make smoothie with it. I'm not so sure, but I love eating fresh watermelon!
Oh yes, it's only good if you blend it up into something! Thawed watermelon is just a pile of mush.
My mom used to freeze watermelon and cantaloupe in balls made with one of those melon scoop things. She served them frozen for dessert and it was a lot like sorbet. Cold and delicious!
We use frozen watermelon and lemonade to make a slush type of drink that is very refreshing on a hot day.
1) We picked the first of the wild apples this week, which I made into applesauce yesterday. There are dozens upon dozens of feral apple trees around here, free for the picking. Last year I made about three gallons of applesauce, which I froze. This year I'm hoping to make more and can it. More convenient in the end and takes up less space in a freezer that will shortly be full of lamb.
2) We also picked all the Seckel pears at our old house/MiL's house while we were there. She can't use them, so I brought them up here. When they ripen (pears are picked hard off the tree and take a couple of weeks to get soft), they'll be perfect to mix with the tart wild apples for apple/pear sauce.
3) I took two big boxes of clothing from my oldest son's friend's mom (got that?) yesterday when I brought him over for a playdate. She just wanted the stuff out of her house. About half of it I'm not going to keep, but there were quite a few useful things. Always worth it to be willing to take things off of people's hands and do all the sorting and disposal as necessary yourself. In exchange I gave her some of the millions of carrots from our garden. Good trade. 🙂
4) I started sourdough bread today. It never fails to amaze me that nothing but flour, water, and salt (and a couple of days) will turn into delicious bread.
5) I made refrigerator pickles and started, um, sauering sauerkraut on Monday. I had to buy the pickling cucumbers and cabbage, unfortunately, but the end result will be way, way less expensive and a lot more tasty than those same products purchased from a store.
We were driving from NY to FL on vacation and stopped in GA for some peaches. I know there was a problem with the crop, but they wanted $25. for 1/3 of a bushel. I cam home to FL and they are actually selling decent peaches in the supermarket. I couldn't believe how high a price they were on the side of the road in GA.
I really like your "Five Frugal Things" series! It's so close to home and so practical! I'm so sad to hear that half.com is closing down 🙁 I used to sell and buy books on half.com a lot when I was in college (which was more than 10 years ago).
We had a hotpot at home with friends this past weekend, and I absolutely loved it! It was a lot of work prepping for the hotpot, but it was so much cheaper and more fun to talk to friends at home! ^.^
You might consider taking Lisey's unbound book to an office store and have them do something like a spiral binding. I did this in college and found it handy. Might help with resale.
This is super smart! I bound some cheaply made books when they fell apart. I still use them as reference and I'm not stuck with a binder.
1) Scored major deals at a thrift store yesterday! Bought 2 pairs of pants and a shirt for myself, a dress and pair of pants for my daughter, and 4 canning jars with reusable lids (I was really excited about the lids) all for $2.94!!! I still can't believe it. And I walked there, so I didn't use any gas. I think I'm going to start being a regular at that shop.
2) Aldi was selling bananas for 29 cents per pound, so I grabbed two bunches and will freeze the ones we don't eat.
3) I made bread bowls to go with our soup for dinner last night. It was my first time and I had no idea how easy it was! So that's a great, cheap option for next time we have people over and I want to do something fun.
4) I'm wearing capris that I bought at a yard sale.
5) I'm borrowing a couple of parenting books from a friend who teaches parenting classes. I was asking for prayer for creativity in parenting and she thought these books would have some helpful tips. I'm grateful for thoughtful mom friends!
I made an online report to California Tortilla that my tacos had only about half the fillings they were supposed to (yes chicken and lettuce; no beans or tomatoes). They added $10 to my loyalty card.
Trying to clear out my freezer, although the 2 turduckens and the large half-ham is making it difficult. I may try to temporarily rehome those 3 so I can do a better job on the rest of the food.
Still doing the small frugalities so I can spend on things that matter to me. The subject today over at Katy's was a house cleaner. Definitely something I will scrimp for.
I'm selling home school books and college books also right now. I sold some through my local home school co-op, but I still have some less. Have you tried ebay? I'm wondering if I'm better off selling through Amazon or Ebay. Thanks!
5 things:
#1) cleaned out the fridge and had leftovers for dinner yesterday
#2) made a big batch of broth with the leftover chicken bones
#3) found a new place to order my dog's food that is cheaper
#4) scoured the internet for best prices on my son's college books.
#5) stayed out of the stores this week haha...sometimes just staying out of them saves me a lot!
I'm doing the Amazon route just because it's easier than making an eBay listing. I'm not a super enthusiastic reseller, so it has to be easy, or I won't do it!
I am curious as to what makes Amazon easier? I have a few school books listed on Ebay, at a "Buy it Now" price, but would happily switch them to Amazon if it's easier!!
Amazon just feels more seamless...just a few clicks and your listing is made, and you don't have to do any of the describing work or anything! It feels easier than creating a listing to me.
Thanks! I just ended a few Ebay listings I had, because we will be out of town for a week. I am going to try this when I get home!!!
Aw, sorry about half.com! Good job staying up to date on it, though, and moving your listings. Better to do it now than later.
This week:
1. I was out traveling for business. That means my company paid for my food and I'll get a nice little mileage reimbursement check on my next paycheck.
2. I meal-planned before I hit the road, so Mr. Picky Pincher was able to cook at home and have leftovers, instead of eating out.
3. I swiped several bars of soap from the hotel. I plan on shaving these suckers down to shavings and making them into homemade liquid soap.
4. I washed clothes today with my homemade laundry soap (in fact, I need to make more of it this weekend).
5. I turned some of my sister's farm-fresh chicken eggs into tasty macaron cookies to nibble on. I also packed homemade peanut butter cookies and some popcorn my MIL brought over for my work trip, so I didn't have to buy snacks on the road.
I heard about Half.com closing. I have no experience selling with them, but have you looked at Alibris? Just a thought -- I have no idea if that would work for you or not. You may want to just stick with Amazon.
My FF list:
1. I cut my own hair, which always makes me a little nervous to do, but I haven't fouled up so far.
2. I've had a good streak of using up leftovers or getting them into the freezer before they get in the danger zone. I just need to keep up the good work.
3. I finished a photo collage for a grown kid's birthday that I will print onto heavy paper that we already have, for a unique birthday card. While I had the photos out, I made a collage for the other kid, who will have a birthday pretty soon.
4. I got my money back on an error on my receipt for groceries.
5. I dehydrated pears from our tree and put them in the freezer. We'll use them this winter. Dried fruit can be so expensive from the store.
Hi Kristen, this week has seen me cleaning and decluttering like a mad woman, you see, this is my last week of long service leave and there were areas in the house that were really screaming for a good clean and tidy. I do try and get the basics done every week but some things like skirting boards, tops of tiles, window ledges and behind the toilets gets neglected. Only one more day of cleaning and then I will have the weekend off before heading back to work. Frugal stuff that has been happening is
Cooked from scratch every night
Line dried the washing
Pickled some radishes and chillies using home made pickling vinegar
Picked some beautiful red Paw Paws from our tree o have with our fruit and yogurt for breakfast
Used the car very little, rode my bike to do errands close by
Used up any leftovers from lunches
And that's all I can think of at the mo.
Have a lovely day.
Fi
I'm doing the same thing! Hurrying to finish my decluttering before school starts up again.
I had to take my daughter to the dr and ENT dr unexpectedly the other day (the typical, shove something up your nose when you're supposed to be sleeping situation... you know) and was excited that our HSA was full still and ready to pay! Thank goodness!
I made homemade granola bars, instead of buying extra store bought ones. The kids typically like mine better anyway, I just don't always feel like making them
Love this series! It makes me really think about what I've done well this week in that department!
This is a link to a post I read today (on another tumblr blog, where this had been reposted), maybe this will help (this is tumblr and there are a couple of very mild swearwords, just some advanced warning, nothing offensive for grownups 🙂 ) http://roseverdict.tumblr.com/post/163772530340/1-4victor-acknowledges-all-inunchartedwaters
Sorry, meant to say that this link is for free downloads of textbooks. I don't live in the USA, so I don't know how helpful this is, but I thought I would share 🙂
Don't feel like I have much to brag about in the frugal department lately, but here it goes...
* Sending daughter to a culinary camp tommorow. Paid 5$ instead of 45$ by exchanging my PC points (loyalty card)
* Got 100% natural peanut butter on sale, 1,99$/500 grams. Bought 8.
* Went through my kids clothes to see what still fits for school. The only things I had to buy so far - on sale : 2 bathing suits, a vest and 2 pairs of leggings.
* Talking with a hairdresser friend I realized how much I save on everything-hair-related : I never go to the hairdresser (long hair+ponytails), don't color my hair and use whatever is on sale for shampoo and mousse, no other products. I don't have a special expensive brush. Heck, I don't even own a hair dryer! Simplicity is key. Same for cosmetics: I wash my face with castile soap and leave it alone. No cream, toner, masks, etc. No makeup eighter, except for lipstick. And, no, I don't look like crap. And, yes, I am feminine, ahah!
* Always working on my goal of eating more from the freezers and pantry, which minimizes food waste. I *might* have a slight problem with buying too much food, ahem...!
Ooh, a culinary camp sounds like so much fun!!
1. Packed lunch, drinks and snacks for our day trip.
2. Contested a charge at the urgent Care facility because they ended up sending us to the ER instead and they dismissed it. (Which is good because they didn't do anything anyway)
3. Used library to get free passes to a local historical site
4. Pumped up my kids bike tires at Wawa using the free air pump with the handy pressure meter on the way to the trail.
5. Have bought the most minimal of school supplies. Reusing a lot, foregoing some....
Aw man, I hate those textbooks. I teach at a university and our lower level language courses use a pack like that. We do use it for all four semesters of language courses, so it ends up being fairly reasonable over time. I also don't require my students to buy it because their access code for the course gives them a digital textbook. Anyway. I hate asking students to buy textbooks almost as much as they hate buying them!!
We live north of Houston and we're battening down the hatches for Hurricane Harvey. My frugal things are mostly preparedness related:
1) I bought 16 gallons of water, a couple at a time, over multiple grocery trips during the spring. Instead of the milk jug type bottles that break down over time (ask how I know...), the ones I bought are like a regular bottle of water . They didn't cost any more, but we can reuse them for water storage.
2) Since I bought my water a few months ago, I wasn't stuck buying overpriced Voss water or juice like the carts I saw at the supermarket tonight.
3) I keep enough food on hand for simple meals (for those nights when I just CANNOT with the meal plan), that I only needed to get milk and tomatoes today. We'll be fine for the next week or more without a trip to the grocery store.
4) Several years ago we used a gift card to purchase an older version of this lantern: https://www.kelty.com/lumaspot-rhythm/ This plus Amazon basics D batteries has kept us going through lots of power outages.
5) I have a stack of delightful library books to get me through any days when we are rained in. Hooray library!
Oh, hoping you stay safe and that it's not too bad! I'm a Floridian, so I can really feel for you!
1. I used Flipp to do up my grocery list and found a product I regularily buy on for $20.00 less at an online store. I promptly ordered (using Ebates of course) and am so pleased to have saved so much! Free shipping too.
2. I checked my grocery receipt and I found I'd been overcharged for an item I'd purchased. I went back through the store found the display where I had pulled the item from, took a photo, then presented it and my receipt at customer service. Not only did I get the difference in price corrected but they gave me an additional $10 for there being an error in their price at the till.
3. I put off a painting job until I can pay cash for the paint (it will also allow me to watch for sales)
4. I only drink water and tea and coffee throughout the day
5. I cleaned my desk (finding envelopes, photo paper, butterfly clips) all of which were on a list to get and now I don't have to spend any money!
We're getting ready for school which starts next week. We've been very lucky lately with gifts of hand-me-down clothes. So I just need to buy shoes for my older daughter. She's a half size right now, so it's really hard to find her shoes that aren't crazy expensive.
I'm starting to freeze more local veg for the winter. Earlier in the week I went to the basement to turn my chest freezer back on and discovered that several millipedes had gotten inside and died. Gross! I was in the middle of so many other things that I just walked away. Tomorrow, I'll have to be an adult and clean it up.
Isn't it so great when you can navigate a season with pretty much just hand me downs?
My niece has a similar textbook and my sister put all the sheets in plastic sleeves so the paper will be pristine and highly resellable.
Holy moly. That's some serious dedication!
1.My 4 chairs, a side table and picnic table in my outdoor space really needed a spruce up: paint faded, worn and/or peeling; we had such a wet summer there's lichen grown on some of it. So I bought a pint of TSP and scrubbed it all down. I bought a gallon of exterior/interior primer on sale and used a third of it to seal the worn spots and fasten down the flaky parts. Then I got two nearly-full gallons of paint for free at the waste depot and mixed about half of each for a nice cappuchino colour. The furniture looks new for a $35 expenditure (and I still have primer for other projects!).
2. Filled my car with gas the day before a big price increase and used a $10 gift card for some of the cost.
3. Went to a free folk festival -- great music and even got a $10 full-length CD of one of the groups I heard.
4. Two jars of organic peanut butter (pint size) for $2.99 and 4 liters of apple cider vinegar at 99 cents each at a local discount grocery.
5. Eating from the pantry, freezer, and home-canning shelves + garden produce = less than $30 on food the past couple of weeks for the two of us.
1. Packed lunch, snacks and drinks to take along to the local fair while we volunteered at the rabbit tent at our local fair. We still got some fun food, like fried Oreos, but didn't have to buy all our meals there.
2. Waited to ride the rides at said fair till the half price ride bands went in sale.
3. Used our free parking pass we got for exhibiting rabbits at the fair to park for free, saving $4 a day, total saved $24.
4 watched the weather and only did wash on days I could line dry it outside.
5. Made a veggie and fruit platter for a picnic out of what was in the fridge rather than buying a pre made one at the store.
Also a thought on the loose leaf "text book" keeping it and selling it on a three ring binder would keep it in pretty good shape.
I did NOT know half.com was shutting down!! Ive nevertheless sold on amazon - can you tell us more about that sometime?
1. Made a lovely flower bouquet for my kitchen table from grocery store freebies & garden flowers.
2. Froze a stash of sale blueberries for smoothies or oatmeal.
3. Made breakfast for dinner 1 night this week & eating lots of cheaper protein (eggs, chicken drumsticks on sale) for meals.
4. Bought a shower gift from garage sale. New & name brand.
5. When life got crazy bought Little Caesars for dinner vs. higher fast food splurge. Also bought store brand frozen pizza. Back to school is not for the faint of heart!
I have found for books like that, they are easier to resell by listing on Craigslist and posting flyers at the beginning of the semester near the classroom that I had. Then the next semester students can easily see what I have for them to buy from the same teacher.
Thankfully my Comp 2 teacher this semester is using all online resources instead of assigning a book.
I started selling my college textbooks recently on Amazon (I've never tried selling on half.com), and I must say, watch out for their fees. Make sure you look at those when you list your items. I sold one book for $8 (there was a TON of them listed for low prices, so I went with market price, just wanted it out of my house) and didn't realize Amazon would charge me $4.60 in selling fees. Ugh.