The Frugal Five: #23

-

 The Frugal Five: #23

With inflation on the rise and our salaries not being able to keep up, it seems like we have taken a pay cut and must be more careful with our money.   The Frugal Five is a series where we celebrate our daily or weekly activities that help us live a frugal life.    


1- Birthday Free-Bees   

Each year during my birthday month, several apps provide me with Free-Bees to celebrate my birthday.       Starbuck’s provided me with a drink of my choice and size for free.  In addition, when I purchase coffee at Starbuck, I earn stars which can be redeemed for free beverages.    In addition, Krispy Kreme gave me a dozen of free donuts for my birthday.    It was great to celebrate my birthday with two of my favorite stores.    


2- Packed Lunches Daily  


Last week started school for both my son and me, so I needed to carefully plan our weeks.    I selected easy meals for dinner and prepacked everyones’ lunches the night before, so there were no excuses for eating out.    Two weeks down and a lot more to go…. 


3- Shopped the Refrigerator/Panty


Two weeks ago we picked up a lot of fruits and vegetables that we didn’t finish eating.  So, for the past two weeks, we shopped the refrigerator first and then made more careful selections of perishable foods.    In addition, we attempted to center the vegetable portion of our dinners around what needed to be used up.   Finally, if we didn’t have a solid plan for these items, we used our freezer to prevent waste.    Unfortunately, we did have some waste.      


4- Kicked the Vending Machine to the Curb


My husband was hitting the vending machines at work for about $10 a week, so we decided to pick up a few items that were on sale to eliminate that expense.    Bottles of Diet Coke were on sale 4 (6 packs) for $12.00.  Considering that he was paying about $2.00 per soda, we picked up 2 cases and he took a case to work.   In addition, he took a bag of almonds and a box of crackers to snack on.    Since he doesn’t drink a soda every day and the other snacks are fairly cheap, this investment will last at least until November.   That expense is gone.    


5-Homemade Snacks

I have a teenager that eats a lot on a regular basis.    He loves sweets and requests typically a large number of sweet snacks.     For the last two weeks, I made jello and cupcakes and picked up a few on-sale snacks to have on hand.   In addition, I portioned out these items so it would be easier to eat a few.   By portioning them out and placing the extra sale items downstairs, we stretched how long the purchased snacks would last.   


Please leave a comment below with your ways of saving money this week.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Keeping Cool Without an AC- Part 5

-
Image
  The news is full of headlines indicating that energy shortages are on the horizon for most of the world. Over the decades, we have become reliant on the coolness of our air conditioners and have forgotten how we survived without them. It is now time to rediscover how to stay cool without our AC. Our 5 part series provides ideas on how to beat the heat this summer without the AC.     House Adjustments- Part 2 By placing house plants, such as English ivy, ficus, and spider plants, throughout your home, you can drop the overall temperature of your house by 10 degrees. In addition, house plants are air purifiers and add oxygen to your home.     For quick relief, create a personal mister to help drop the temperature of your skin: thus making you feel colder. Some people combine a spray bottle and a fan to create a cooling effect. However, I use just the spray bottle with cold water throughout the day and it keeps me cool. In addition, we use coo...
Read more

Frugal 5: #26

-
Image
  The Frugal Five: #26 With inflation on the rise and our salaries not being able to keep up, it seems like we have taken a pay cut and must be more careful with our money.   The Frugal Five is a series where we celebrate our daily or weekly activities that help us live a frugal life.     ** Sorry for the lack of pictures. My week has been really busy and I just didn't get around to it. 1- Fall Garden Harvest    With the weather turning cold, we harvested the tomatoes that were left and made dice tomatoes out of them.   This will come in handy for making our taco soup and chili in the upcoming weeks.   In addition, we are able to add a few jalapeno peppers to the dishes.  Our dried mint was placed in containers for making tea this winter and fresh clippings were added to the drying rack.     Finally, our seeds are dried and ready for storage for next season.      It was a lot of work but worth it....
Read more

The Frugal Five: #88

-
Image
  The Frugal Five: #88 With inflation on the rise and salaries not increasing, our ability to make ends meet keeps going down.    Therefore, we must be more careful with our money.   The Frugal Five is a series where we celebrate the daily or weekly activities that help us live a frugal life.     This week I am exploring how to keep costs down during busy weeks.    Keeping dinner on the table instead of eating out is one of my strategies to get the job done.    Here are some of my tips and trips.    1- Free-Bee Pick Up  Over the last month, we have been blessed with several Free-Bees.  First, a friend gave us a dozen eggs from his chickens.  In addition, we picked up several photos with discount codes from Walgreens and CVS.   Next, we used our local grocery store coupons for several free food items such as seltzer water, ice cream, etc.   Then, we picked up toothpaste and eyeliners from ...
Read more