Before                                                              

After

We all know I like to take on home improvement projects that are just too big for me sometimes. That’s just my personality. A few weeks ago, I decided that I was sick and tired of our living room and having it feel like a cave. I wanted to brighten up the room, so I decided I would paint, especially before we replace the flooring. Using the Points I had accumulated, I redeemed them for a $50 gift card to Home Depot. I went there, picked out my primer and paint, and went home and got started.

I spent many, many days off working on priming, taping, sanding, trimming, and finally painting. It took me a few weeks with me working off and on, but I love the end result. The best part for me? I didn’t have to spend anything out of pocket. Using my bank’s rewards program and my own time didn’t cost me a penny. Also, I reused everything that I had existing: curtains, pictures, decor, and lamps.  That was really inspiring to me.  I decided on a light neutral color because I wanted the room to feel open and airy.  The only windows in this room are pictured here, and they sometimes don’t provide enough light.  Now the room feels so much cleaner and bigger! Next project up is replacing the flooring!

Do you like my frugal transformation?

At our house, I’m the handywoman and I take care of most home renovation projects.  I’ve learned many things, from how to paint to how to install hardwood flooring.  A month and a half ago, I decided that our master bedroom needed to be painted and updated.  I primed the room, painted the walls, and stopped.  The trim in the bedroom includes crown molding, trim around the windows and doors, and a large bay window that extends the length of one wall.  My project has stalled, and I’m tired of sleeping in the guest room.

photo credit: formatbrain

Today at work I ran into two painters.  I got one painter’s number but I’m not sure I’m going to call him.  I just can’t justify paying someone to do something I can do.  It’s just something I don’t want to do.  I’d rather spend my time on things that are more fun!

I’ve thought about calling to see if he’ll give me a free quote and then going from there.  If it’s not too expensive, it probably would be worth it!  I’d rather spend a little money and save the headache.  However, if it is more expensive than I think is worth it, I’ll end up painting it myself.

I think it’s funny that I’d even consider using a professional when I’m so focused on saving money.  I think there are times when it’s worth spending money to save sanity.

Have you considered hiring a professional versus doing something yourself even though you knew how to do it?

One of my favorite things about owning a house is being able to make it into my own. I’ve spent the last three years painting, replacing flooring, tiling, and doing all the other fun stuff that’s necessary when you own a house. I’ve just now been able to start decorating and making it feel more like home.

The only problem that I’ve run into is that a lot of home goods are expensive!  Wall art is probably the biggest piece of the puzzle as far as bringing a room together.  It’s just not in me to spend $50 or $60 on a piece of wall art.  I try to make do with what I have and come up with creative ways to make my house look good without raiding my bank account.

This weekend I went through my fabric stash and decided I was going to use some of it to make embroidery wall hoops.  I did have to go buy the embroidery hoops (they were $1.00 each).

I took the fabric, stretched it over the embroidery hoops, trimmed it in the back to go around the hoop, and glued the pieces over the edge in.  It was so simple!  I think they go well with the quilt, which is a handmade quilt from my aunt.  The only thing is that it took me forever to get them on the wall right!

Mr. Money is undecided on whether or not he likes them.  I just think they may be too girly for him.  I’d love to have your opinion!

Do you like my frugal wall art?

If you’re interested in how to make shampoo, you’ve come to the right place!

If you’ve tried the No Poo Shampoo Method and it just didn’t work for you, don’t worry. I’ve got the perfect shampoo recipe you can make yourself that’s all natural and won’t break the bank. This is a tried and true recipe; Mr. Money uses it exclusively and loves it!

Ingredients

• 1 Bar of Soap (I used homemade but you can use something like Dr. Bronner’s or Ivory.
• 1/4 Cup of olive oil
• Your favorite essential oil (I used peppermint)
• Water or tea (I used mint tea)

Directions

Grate your bar of soap on a cheese grater. Mine looks suspiciously like cheese. It’s not; I promise it’s just beer soap.

Put your grated soap, olive oil, and a little bit of water in the blender. I started with about 1/4 cup of mint tea.  Add in about 10 drops of your essential oil.

Blend until it is the consistency that you’d like. You may need to add more liquid.

(Ignore the bubble that looks like a butt. Bubble butt!)

When it’s the consistency that you like, put it into an old shampoo bottle. I like to use a funnel. Now you’ve saved money by making your own natural shampoo and you’ve also kept a bottle out of the landfill.

That’s it! It’s so simple.  Lather, rinse, repeat as usual. If you don’t want to go through the trouble of making your own shampoo, the most natural brand I have found out there is Aubrey Organics.  I love their Egyptian Henna Shampoo.

And that’s how to make shampoo

One of my biggest pet peeves is having all those darn plastic grocery bags strewn all over my pantry.  I also hate that they take up room in the landfill, basically never disintegrating.  When I go grocery shopping (or any other store as well), I always try to remember to bring a cloth grocery bag with me.  Sometimes I forget and I’ll go without a bag if it’s just a few items and I can carry them.  The other day I went through my closet and discovered I had a bunch of old t shirts that had holes in them or some other problem.  I wanted to come up with a creative way to reuse them, and that I did!

I made them into cute cloth grocery bags!  When Mr. Money first saw my finished project on the floor, he said “Oh! There’s that cute shirt I like of yours!” and as I hesitated to respond he noticed that I had cut it up and made it into a cloth bag.  I was glad I didn’t have to give away the shirt because it was cute; plus who wants to wear a shirt with holes in it anyway?  Here’s what I did.  It is so simple, and would be a fun craft with kids.

1. Find an old t shirt.

2. Cut the sleeves off.

3. Turn the shirt inside out and sew up the bottom.

4. Turn back inside out and, voila! That’s it.

Now you’ve got a cute cloth grocery bag you can stuff in your purse, diaper bag, or leave in your car. If you want, you could always sew along the inside of the arm holes for a cleaner look, but I didn’t bother because I made sure I trimmed it up nicely.  Re-purposing items is one of my favorite things to do!

Do you use cloth or reusable grocery bags? 

I had a question the other day from a reader regarding my opinion on dryer balls. Personally we don’t use them any more as we’ve been using vinegar as our fabric softener, but I know there are many people out there that use the infamous blue spiky dryer balls to fluff up their clothes without using fabric softener.  While I do think that they are better for your wallet because you aren’t purchasing fabric softener again, they also have been controversial on just exactly how good they are for you.  In fact, a post on TreeHugger claims:

“What the manufacturers fail to mention, however, is that the the polyvinyl chloride (PVC) material the supposedly “nontoxic” dryer balls are made of is one of the most poisonous plastics ever created, posing great environmental and health hazards in its manufacture, product life, and disposal.

Kinda scary, right? It’s sad you are trying to save money and the environment by eliminating all those chemicals in our water and plastic fabric softener tubs in landfills or recycling centers but at the same time may be harming your family’s health in the long run.  Of course, I’d still rather take the dryer balls over fabric softeners as they seem to irritate my skin with the chemicals being set in my clothing and rubbing against my skin.  To each their own.  You can’t be a fanatic about everything.

There are a few alternatives if you’re scared of the PVC in dryer balls. You can use tennis balls (which may not be any better), or ideally learn how to make wool dryer balls.  Here’s how I made mine.

How to Make Wool Dryer Balls

Materials:
-Wool yarn (I’m a knitter so I’ve got some extra “scraps” lying around)
-Scissors
-Crochet hook
-Old pantyhose
-piece of string

Instructions:

1. Wind your wool into a nice, tight ball to the size of your preference. Use the crochet hook to tuck the end under the yarn.

2. Stick the yarn ball in an old pantyhose leg and tie the string around the opening so it doesn’t get out and fly around your washing machine. Throw them in with a load of clothing you are washing in hot water. They will felt quicker this way.

3. When they are done washing, you can throw them in the dryer with the clothes and take them out when the clothes are done.

4. Let them dry overnight and then wrap another layer of yarn over the felted wool dryer ball. This helps keep the wool dryer ball tighter. Repeat steps 2 & 3.

And that’s it! How simple is that? If you’re ambitious, you can put a sachet of lavender in the middle of your dryer ball for scent. I like mine plain!

What do you use to soften your clothes? Would you learn how to make dryer balls?

Do you remember the flooring dilemma I had a few months ago? I’m almost embarrassed to say that I am just now getting around to solving the problem. I installed laminate flooring into my hallway and bedroom. And I have to say, at this moment I am confident this was the best decision for us.

Not only do I have the peace of mind of having a complete, normal, beautiful floor in my bedroom, but I have the financial peace of mind knowing I didn’t spend $3737.50.  I love the look of hardwoods, but with the dogs I couldn’t justify spending that much money and watching them get scratched.  Going with laminate flooring eliminates that worry.  It’s going to take a lot (knock on wood) for them to scratch the laminate.  Also, I was able to install it myself, which saved us a ton of money.

With the current housing market the way it is, we’ve decided to love the home we’re tied to, and make improvements that fit our lifestyle.  We can afford the laminate flooring.  We actually bought it at Costco and will get 2% back on our purchase because we have an executive membership. Also, I was able to pay with cash out of our hardwood floor fund, and I’ll tell you, when I pulled out my envelope and paid cash for the flooring, it was amazing. It felt so empowering to know that I had been saving for so long to be able to do this, and I wasn’t having to charge it or use my debit card. What a natural high!

Although I was worried about the resale value of the home after installing laminate, I realized that was a silly concern, as there are more serious problems going on that are making my home value go down right now.  We love our house, and although it’s not where we’d prefer to stay for the rest of our lives, it’s where we need to be right now, and we need to make it into a home we can love.  We’ll just have to keep making frugal renovation decisions and realize that anything’s possible if we put our minds to it.  After all this is said and done, I can look back and realize that sometimes the most frugal decisions are the wisest ones when we are pushed to our limits.  I’m thankful the flooring is done in my bedroom, and now I can relax.  Or paint the living room…

This “fall back” daylight savings thing is kicking my butt!  It’s only 6:40 P.M. and I’m almost ready to go to bed.  Lame!  I hope you had a wonderful weekend.  I spent mine doing home improvements but I am really glad I did, because I feel so much better about staying in this house!  Here are some posts I enjoyed this week:

Kacie @ Sense to Save is cancelling her cable. I think this is great! I would love to do this, but I’m afraid I’d miss TLC and HGTV too much! I could probably do without if I could watch the shows online.

Pinyo at Moolanomy advises people not to cash in your 401k. I personally wouldn’t do this but it’s a good reminder to those who are thinking about doing it not to!

Ashley at Wide Open Wallet talks about building a wardrobe. Sometimes I get the urge to purge my closet but then I realize that would be stupid. I think adding one piece at a time is a great way to build a wardrobe!

Mrs. Micah reminds people what we really own in stocks: shares, not dollars.

Tricia at Blogging Away Debt asks the time old question: Can money buy happiness? I don’t think it can. I think it can make you feel good for a little while though!

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Ever since we started growing our own vegetables in our garden, I’ve been addicted. I’m addicted to the taste of my fresh organic vegetables, and I’m addicted to all the money we save by not having to pay for as many vegetables.  We’ve started drinking green smoothies to help incorporate more greens into our diet, and while it costs us more to buy more produce, we spend less on other junk food and crap and I think we end up saving money.  I am bummed because our garden isn’t as fruitful as I wished, but I’m trying to come up with some remedies to that.  I’ve come up with a few ideas.

• Buy a membership to Costco.  The one thing that is holding me back is the $50 a year for a membership.  That is a lot of money!  Right now we’re using a friend’s membership when we want to go, but that gets inconvenient, especially with the amount of greens we consume. We do buy our dog food there because it is a lot cheaper and is good dog food, but my cost savings would be in the bulk vegetables.  Of course then I also wonder if we’d use them before they went bad, and also if I’d go over board and be tempted to buy other things while I was in there.  Sometimes I think if it’s a good deal I will buy way too much.  Of note: I haven’t had to buy body wash in over a year.
• Plant a fall crop. This is realistic.  I just need to figure out when to plant it.  Maybe that will be one of our weekend activities!  I want to plant lots of leafy greens like spinach, kale, and swiss chard.  I’m afraid of mustard greens because I tried those in my smoothies once and it was spicy!  Talk about gross.  This option will be the cheapest and easiest.
• Plant a hydroponic garden.  This is something I’d really like to do in the winter.  I’m also going to research planting some greens down in our basement.  My only worry is that we’d have to buy expensive lighting and that would stink.  Of course, it may be worth it. 

What do you think we should do?  Is there anything that I’ve missed?

To Can or Not to Can: that is the question.  Yesterday I wrote how we save money by growing vegetables in our garden. I decided today to take it one step further and can some of the tomatoes that were overgrowing the garden. Please call me crazy.  I am still not done and I started about three hours ago!  This takes a lot more time than I thought it would.  This is an actual picture of one of our tomato plants.  It is over 5 feet tall!

I anticipate getting more tomatoes off these plants.  There are some green tomatoes growing currently.

Look how big these tomatoes are!!  I’ve never seen any this big.

This was my process: dip the tomatoes in boiling water for about 1 minute, shock them in an ice bath, remove skin and seeds from inside, sterilize jars, put tomatoes in jar, make sure there was no air in them, seal, and put in canner.  I know it sounds easy, but trust me, it was a lot of work!  Honestly I don’t think this was a money saving endeavor, but what can I do?  (pun intended)  The first batch is sitting in my dining room and I hope they seal.  If they don’t, I’m going to have to put them in the freezer, and I really don’t have all that much space in the freezer.  Plus, all the time that I spent on doing this would be wasted!

I think I would have saved (or made) more money had I taken them to the farmer’s market this morning.  If I would have done that, I would have saved time and energy.  I hope that my efforts are not fruitless come winter, and these canned tomatoes are better than any other tomato I’ve eaten.  I can make spaghetti sauce, chili, and a whole lot of other dishes.  Plus, they are in glass jars versus aluminum and I like that.

Do you think it’s worth it to can your own vegetables?