Using Creativity in Frugal Living

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Some people choose to live frugal by choice while some people choose a frugal lifestyle out of necessity. 
My daughter and I have lived on a smaller income since 1998, so we live this lifestyle out of necessity. Over the years we've learned to get the things we needed using some creativity along the way.
Oftentimes in our consumerist society it's easy to buy what you need if you have enough money. Our problem was that we didn't always have the money to buy the things we needed. 
So we rolled up our sleeves and did what we had to do to get those things we needed. We got creative and you can do the same thing. If you get creative with your needs, instead of buying what you need, you will be able to save money and sometimes a lot of money.

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What if you don't have money to buy groceries? Creating a meal using the food you have at home is being creative. We do this on a regular basis. 

When my daughter switched over to cloth pads full time and found the brand she liked they were expensive, so we could only buy them once or twice a year.  
Finally we came up with a better solution. I took her favorite cloth pad and figured out how to make them for her at home. We upcycled clothes to make them and today those are some of her favorite pads.  

When my daughter needed a scientific calculator for school and we didn't have an extra $100 to buy one, we got creative. We traded for one at McKay Used Books. 
Amy Dacyczyn said it best when she said, "when there is a lack of resourcefulness, inventiveness, and innovation, thrift means doing without." That wasn't the case in our home. 
Now I've seen a lot of creativity in my lifetime and I'm sure you have too. I've seen the maintenance man at school fix a door with the end of a matchstick. Now that's being creative. 
We all have creativeness inside of us and it depends on us as to how we used it to the best of our advantage. 
As Theodore Roosevelt said, "Let us do what we can, with what we have, where we are." 
Belinda ~ Living within our Means ~

Frugal Friday ~ June 15, 2018

Frugal Workshop is now on Instagram if you're interested.

My frugal drink for the week. Kool-Aid lemonade with only about 1/4 cup of sugar. You can save money by adjusting the amount of sugar or sweetener to your taste. I save money by using less sugar.   

While perusing YouTube this past week I stumbled upon the Prepper Princess channel. She has some great videos on how she saves money if you want to check it out. 

My daughter got to see Tonks and the Aurors at a free concert held at the library this past week. The library is a great place to save money and find free entertainment. 

I needed to pick up an RX at Food City and checked the yellow sticker meat section. I found an almost 1/2 pound burger for $1.59 and a package of pork chops for $1.42.

This week I sold my Kitchenaid mixer on Facebook Marketplace for $100 because I did not use it. I bought it brand new twenty years ago for $50 in one of those closeout stores. It was a bargain for me at the time and a bargain for the man who bought it this week. 

I perused the grocery store sale ads online. I see a lot of pork on sale this week and ground chuck for $1.99 a pound in the ten pound rolls at Fresh & Low. I'll be buying one or two of those and planning meals around those this month. 

Kroger has Kraft mayonnaise on sale this week for 99¢ with their digital coupon and will allow you to buy up to five. So, if we get down that way we'll definitely stop in to get that deal. 

My brother in law changed the oil in my car this week and only charged me $20 for supplies. 

Belinda ~ Living within our Means ~

Frugal Friday ~ 3~30~2018

Hello to all my frugal readers. 

If you read last week's Frugal Friday post you know we've been on Spring Break this week. My plan was to stay home for the majority of spring break and get some sewing done. 

This was definitely a week of minimal driving, so no extra money spent on gas for my car. 

I made my daughter a Dr. Seuss cloth pad this week. This was upcycled from a scrub shirt she found while thrift store shopping. 

We went to Joann Fabrics on Sunday. I used a coupon on my smart phone rather than print one out, which saves ink from my printer. 

Printer ink is expensive and we need to use it for reselling, so we try to conserve it whenever possible. 

We both listed more items to sell on Ebay. One of the items I picked up at a yard sale last Saturday sold on Sunday. That was pretty neat. 

On Monday the tension on my sewing machine wasn't making stitches correctly, so I had to work on it for a while, but I managed to fix it watching a few Youtube videos.

I went to Walmart on Wednesday to pick up a few things and bought some bread on markdown. 

On Thursday I earned another $5.00 Amazon gift card from Microsoft Rewards. 
We stayed home on Thursday and I spent part of the day sewing a new to me project. I'll wait until next week to post any pictures of the project, but I'm excited about it.  
How was your week?   Belinda ~ Living within our Means ~

Frugal Workshop is Back Up and Running!

First off, our internet is back up and working today! 

On Thursday we went to the 127 Yard Sale and started our day in the town of Pikeville, Tennessee. 

The vendor booth in this picture is selling paper hornet nests. This is something my Dad has done. You wait until winter when the hornets have left the nest and then you cut them down from the tree. Dad had two one year that he sold for $25, so this can be another source of passive income. 

Some of my readers know we lived in the town of Pikeville when my daughter was first born, so I took her around to various places to show her the first house she lived in and some other places and things. 

Here is a photo of one of the houses we lived in and a tree I planted back in 1992, so 25 years ago. Visiting there was a sweet walk down memory lane. 

The sale was so much fun, and miles and miles of yard sales. We stopped at many of them and found some great items. 

One of the things I bought was this aloe vera plant. You can see it already has babies and I'm going to replant them and sell them as another passive income source. 

I also bought a new bottle of hand gel and a cute yard of fabric for $1.00. 

Another one of the places we stopped at was The Country Cupboard in Crossville, Tennessee. I used to love to visit the store when we lived in Pikeville. They have the best prices on spices there. We even found pints of flax seed for 99¢.

The cucumbers and apple were free as one store was giving away the cucumbers for free and we picked the apple off of a tree, with owner permission, that was loaded with them. 

The rest of my blog post is from last week, before the Internet went down here. I wasn't able to post a blog post, but here it is for you to read now. 

Pictured above is cloth pad number 30 for my daughter so I've finished that project for the summer. 
I cleaned and organized my sewing area and made one tub for fabric. 
On Wednesday I took off two loads of garbage to the garbage dump including one broken chair that needed gone. I also cleaned off the back porch, which looks much better. 
I put an ad on Craigslist this week for one free chair and a free rolling file cabinet and these were picked up already. 
I sold one living room chair this week for $100. We had too much furniture in the living room, and getting rid of this chair has made a big difference. I should have done it sooner. 
I  earned another $5 Amazon gift card this week from Microsoft Rewards Points this week and added it to my Amazon gift card balance. 
Tomorrow is the Goodwill first Saturday of the month 50% off sale, so if your local Goodwill is participating you may want to check it out. 
Belinda ~ Living within our Means ~

The Frugal Weekend

The temperature hovered around 95° over the weekend, which made it around 118° in the car when it was closed up during the day. Needless to say, it was hot!

We spent Friday and Saturday morning at multiple yard sales and rummage sales, which is one of our favorite things to do. 

One of our best finds was a graphing calculator for $1.00! The lady who sold it may not have known what it was worth. We plan on trading this at McKay's Used Books.

We also lucked out on several free things such as a Vera Bradley Purse, The Mummy Movie on Blu Ray, and a 8 quart bag of Miracle Grow potting soil. I was very surprised to find these things in a free box, but they were ours for the taking.

We also stopped by an Mennonite roadside produce stand and picked up some terrific grape tomatoes for $2.00. They are so sweet that they taste like candy.   

I made four more cloth pads for my daughter this weekend. This material came from the scrub shirts we bought at yard sales this summer. This makes pad #26, 27, 28, and 29 so far this summer. Only one more to go to make our goal of thirty pads.

We had a mystery shop for free pizza, after reimbursement, on Saturday night. We brought the movie home and turned it into a movie night and watched Disney's The Parent Trap. 
How was your weekend?
Belinda ~ Living within our Means ~

First Frugal Week of July 2017

Monday we went to the YMCA for my daughter's Zumba class and I went for a swim while she was exercising. I used my new to me swim bag that I picked up at a yard sale for 50¢.

I made three new pads for my daughter this week. The one above was made from a Camp Rock sheet, which was bought at the thrift store and upcycled. The one below was a scrub shirt, which we bought at the thrift store. 

This cloth pad below was made from a flat sheet, which we bought at Goodwill and upcycled. We kept the pillowcases. 

I only have five cloth pads to go before I reach the number of thirty that we settled on before. 
We stayed home on Tuesday and had a quiet 4th of July. I made a vegetable stir fry for dinner and made some more vegetable egg rolls. We wanted to go to our local fireworks show, but it was cancelled due to rain. 
On Wednesday I went to Walmart because I needed a few things. I picked up some distilled water for my CPAP machine. I like to get it there as it is only 88¢ per gallon. 
I looked at the fabric while I was there, but didn't find any that I liked. I did pick up a birthday present for my Mom. It was a set of summer pajamas. I also bought her some soap, on sale for $3.00, from Bath & Body Works over the weekend. 
Afterwards we went to the library with our laptops and utilized their Internet. We also picked up a couple of movies to watch at home later. No money spent there. 
When we came home my daughter gave me and herself a haircut. No money spent there either. 
I baked a cake on Thursday for Mom's birthday on Friday.  
I paid for my auto insurance this week. I could have paid two installments or a one time payment. Paying the one time payment saved me $12, so that is the one I chose. My auto Insurance is now paid up through January 2018.
On Friday and Saturday we went to several yard sales before the rain set in for the day.  

I found a sewing box to store thread for 25¢. 
We also did well on finding scrubs both days. Some people were just wanting to get rid of stuff and were willing to sell us a bag full for $2.00 at one sale. 

In all we ended up with about 20 scrub shirts for about 25¢ each, which certainly beats the Goodwill thrift store price of $4.99 each. 

We found two Disney movies for $1.00 each. 

I'm going to file this under unbelievable. We bought two brand new HUGE beach towels for 25¢ each. They are Better Homes and Gardens brand and one of them still had the tag for $12.97 on it. They practically gave them away!
My daughter found multiple items to resell online. She has done well for herself this summer by flipping and reselling items. 
We had a good frugal week here and hope that you did too! :)
Belinda ~ Living within our Means ~

Final Frugal Week of June 2017

One of the ways we've saved money here this week is by turning off our air conditioner at night to save on the electric bill. It's been cooler here than what is normal for this time of year, so that will help save on our electric bill next month. 
Another way I saved money this week was to use residual heat to finish any cooking I do on the stovetop, such as making popcorn one night.

My neighbor set his free produce basket out again this year, so we picked out three cucumbers. 
We traded board games at McKays Used Books this week. We paid $4.50 for nine board games at yard sales last week and earned $43.00 in trade credit. 
We picked out two TV shows on DVD and several books with the credit. We do not have streaming services here (which also saves us money), but are able to still pick up DVDs on the cheap here.  
We found Princess and the Frog last weekend at a yard sale for $2.00. It had been on our wish list for about six months. 
We stopped at Food City on Wednesday to pick up some red bell peppers, which were on sale. I also picked up five bags of 15 bean soup beans. 
We also stopped at Cooke's on Wednesday as they had their bags of coleslaw for 99¢. I picked up five of those and also the last two bags of Cajun 15 bean dry soup beans. 
I made baked vegetable eggrolls with some of the coleslaw. They are easy to make. You take one package of the coleslaw mix and microwave it for four minutes. 
Meantime in a separate bowl you add one tablespoon cornstarch, two tablespoons soy sauce, one teaspoon sesame oil, one teaspoon ginger, one teaspoon garlic, one teaspoon salt, and mix together. 
Mix with the cabbage and place a spoonful an egg roll wrappers and roll up. Bake at 350 for 25 minutes. 

My daughter picked up a scrub shirt jacket last week at a yard sale, so I cut it into useable fabric pieces. I was able to make two pads with it for her. 
This week I was able to make four cloth pads for her, which has resulted in doing less laundry.  
I've made her a total of 19 pads now and she isn't having to wash them everyday like she did when her stash was smaller. 
She went three days without doing any laundry this week, so that will be an additional savings on our electric bill next month.  :)

Another way we've been saving money this summer is by not buying any meat. The last month I bought meat was in March and our grocery bill for that month was right at $300. 
I've not bought any meat since then and our grocery bill has dropped over $50 each month. I do have some canned salmon on hand if anyone wants meat, but we've been eating a plant based diet all summer and have even dropped a few pounds. 
We went to the yearly SDA church rummage sale on Wednesday. We only found a couple of things this year, nothing to write home about. Same with the 40% off sale at the Habitat Restore sale this week. We didn't buy anything there and yard sales were rained out on Friday. 

On Saturday we headed out to our local Goodwill stores for their first Saturday of the month 50% off sale. 
You can read about our trip in June here.  
I'll be posting about this month's trip next week. 
I hope you have a great weekend.  :)
Belinda ~ Living within our Means ~

Fourth Frugal Week of June 2017

Last Friday I made arrangements with someone on Craigslist for a free chair. We both agreed to the day and time, but when I went to the home no one answered either door and they ignored my text as well. Sometimes our good deals do not always come through. 
Lucky for us though we were able to pick one up while we were going to yard sales on Saturday, so we were happy with that. 
Last Saturday, Sunday, Tuesday, and Wednesday we stayed home, so no wear and tear on the car, no gas used, and no money spent. 
On Monday, dd went to her Zumba class while I did a quick run to Food City. I found bananas on markdown as well as taco sauce and water chestnuts. I also bought more 15 bean dry soup beans and tortillas. 
The only other groceries we bought this week came from Aldi, which included two watermelons and ten packages of sweet corn on the cob. Both were on sale and a great price. 
We packed a lunch to take with us on Monday and brought water to drink in reusable water bottles. 
We also went to McKay Used Books on Monday.  I found a good book about sewing. 
We also went to the thrift store. I found a couple of shirts to reuse the material. And an electric can opener. I found a brand new Saltbox Illustrations notepad, still in the wrapper for 55¢. That will be going into my gift closet for Christmas.
I made four more cloth pads for my daughter this week. I've made her a total of seventeen pads now. 
Friday we went to multiple yard sales including some in Chattanooga. We found several things that we were needing such as a new rug for the bathroom ($1.50), a new shelf for our board games ($2.00),  a pencil box filled with new embroidery thread ($1.00), heated drying rack ($5 goes for $47 @ Amazon).
Ironing board ($1.00), two Dr. McDougall books ($1.00 each), several board games (50¢ each), several items of clothes (4 pieces for 50¢ and the lady even gave dd a very nice coat), and multiple other things I cannot recall right now. We checked off several things on our "things we need list", which is always a good thing.
How was your week? Hopefully it was a frugal one. :)
Belinda ~ Living within our Means ~

Second Frugal Week of June 2017

It's been a busy week at the Frugal Workshop this week. 
On Monday I received two checks in the mail thanks to the reward programs I spend a few minutes using each day. 

The first check was from Inbox Dollars for $33.88. 
The second check was from SendEarnings for $28.82. 

I also earned $5.00 in Amazon gift cards from Microsoft Rewards. I now have $47.42 in gift cards from Amazon for this year. I'm saving them for something special like Christmas. 
Other things that happened this week include...

I earned $112.50  before fees on Ebay this week after selling three of the items I listed for sale last week. I paid $13.26 in Ebay fees on this amount and $4.75 in PayPal fees, so I paid a total of $15.16 in fees and brought home $97.34 on the $112.50 I made. 
I couldn't have made as much as I did on Ebay at the flea market or a yard sale, so I'm glad this option to sell online is available. I think all the tightwads shop at the flea market because they want to haggle with me on the price, which is what I do at yard sales. LOL
I also listed five other items up for sale on Ebay this week. I did a tiny bit of decluttering and decided to go ahead and see if I could sell them on Ebay. I'll only list them one time and if they don't sell, I will donate them to our local charity thrift store. I'm not willing to hold onto them any longer than that. 

I made five more cloth pads for my daughter this week. I asked her how many she wanted to have on hand and together we settled on thirty-five. That way she could go a whole week without doing a load of laundry if necessary. The chevron pattern above was one of my favorites. 

I made a new page for the Frugal Workshop on cloth pads. You can see it at the toolbar on the top of the page and here is a link to it if you're interested. Mostly stuff you've already read if you are a regular reader here, but for newbies they can find all the information in one place. 
While folding the laundry this week I found a pair of pants that needed a small section of the inseam restitched, so I picked up my thread and needle and stitched it together right then. No sense in putting little tasks like that off since I am off from school for the summer. 
On Thursday I made a large stockpot full of Taco Soup based on this recipe from the Prudent Homemaker. I like that it calls for ingredients I already had in my pantry. I did use fresh onions though since I had them on hand. 
My daughter did a CVS haul this week where she bought two tubes of Colgate toothpaste and a bottle of Dawn dishwashing liquid for 21¢. 
Here is a short video of her deal:

On Friday we went to several yard sales. 
Items we picked up included:
- 3 new glass bowls $2.00 (I broke one last week & needed replacement) - Microwave cover - 10¢ - 3 music CDs - $3.00 (one was brand new/just released) - 12 flannel blankets - $2.00, which was 17¢ each - Fabric to make more cloth pads - $2.00 - Multiple textbooks to resell (some were free) - 2 scrub shirts to make pads - 50¢ - Bag of 107 adorable quilt squares - $2.00 - Storage container on wheels for cat food - $3.00 (been looking for one of these for years - didn't want to pay retail) - Battle of the Sexes board game - 50¢ - Lamp - $3.00 (to lighten up my sewing area) - 2 brand new swimsuits - $3.00 (needed to replace dd's swimsuit top as chlorine stretched hers out)  - French fry cutter - $1.00 (still in the box)
We had a great yard sale day.  :) All in all we had a good week here at the Frugal Workshop. We hope you had a good week as well and have a wonderful weekend ahead.  :)
Belinda ~ Living within our Means ~