Last Week's Thrifty Moves

Sunday morning I baked a fresh loaf of French bread and once it was cooled I sliced it and made poor boy sandwiches.  I used bologna and salami, sliced cheese, lettuce, sliced tomatoes and mayonnaise to put them together.  We took our sandwiches and our water bottles and had a picnic at the park.  Then when we were finished eating we walked through the MK Nature Center.  It was a perfect family outing and my youngest was thrilled to be able to get out of the house.

I relisted a couple items for sale on Craigslist for free.

eBay offered me 20 free listings this month.  With my oldest's help we managed to sort, organize and photograph a bunch of stuff.  As a result I listed eight groupings of older styles of eyeglass frames.  If I manage to sell them all I will have eliminated two bins of stuff from our storage area.

I added two more items to my Etsy store.  It costs me 20¢ to list an item on Etsy.

I made two hanging dish towels to give as gifts.  Now I just need to make some for my store as they tend to be pretty good sellers.

I printed off six online grocery coupons.

I made a pint of homemade chocolate syrup for ice cream.

On Wednesday I baked another loaf of French bread.  The girls wolfed down the one I made Sunday and said "it was sooooooo good can we have another?"  How could I refuse?

I harvested the last of the blueberries, some lettuce and four cucumbers.  I shared some lettuce and stale whole wheat bread with our chickens.  I composted coffee grounds, tea bags and the suckers I trimmed from our tomato plants.

We had enough rain that I only had to water the lawn once and the garden twice last week.  It was also cool enough to go without the A/C.  I kept the house cool by opening the windows and back door early every morning, then again after the sun went down and using our box fans.  We were quite comfortable.  I also did all my baking in the garage using the convection toaster oven from our old RV.

We gathered up all the sticks and bark that had fallen from the trees after the wind and rain we had.  I used that and our shreddable junk mail to start a fire in our firepot on our deck.  We sat outside on Friday evening and enjoyed the fire, grilled some hamburgers on our little grill and ate our dinner.  It made for a wonderful evening.

We watched a few programs for free on YouTube.  I watched a program on Amazon.  We also listened to music and watched a sustainable living documentary on YouTube.  On Saturday I watched a NASCAR race on YouTube while I did some projects and cleaning around the house.

The girls caught the corner of the rug in the vacuum cleaner.  I repaired it by grabbing a big needle and re-stitching the thread that was pulled out.  Took me only a few minutes.

I did a marathon of projects around the house Saturday.  I cleaned and re-organized the storage area in our garage.  In the process I was able to fill up the big garbage bag we had started a few weeks ago with donations.  It feels so good to be able to purge a little more.  I finally installed the two mini blinds I had bought on sale back in September for the laundry room and kitchen windows.  I was finally able to wash the filthy mini blind in my bedroom (it was seriously grossing me out).  It looks so good now.  I washed all of the downstairs windows, windowsills and cleaned the living room.  I also washed the mirrors.  I polished all of our wood furniture.  It felt great to get so much done and be super productive, but I was really pooped afterward.

How thrifty were you last week?