A New age of Thrift

In honor of my friend's fabulous blog ( http://thedebtfreelife.blogspot.com/  ) I am posting some ideas I just thought of for how to SAVE.. and believe me switching to a vegan diet is a little pricy at first. Eventually I will be all stocked up with the pantry essentials to be able to live healthily within a reasonable grocery budget. But in the meantime I am still searching the aisles for things like Arrowroot, Buckwheat, millet, and seitan. New produce I used to never buy includes eggplant, tamarind, fresh tomatoes, celery, red onion, tofu, zucchini, cantaloupe, & fresh herbs.

I figure the price increase is a viable trade off for the increased health benefits. 

OK, some ways to SAVE:

1. Never Buy Media again- Seriously, so much gets wasted on this pursuit. 

• Listen to music for free on pandora.com

• Listen to & Watch Free podcasts on iTunes.

• Share music/movies/books with friends (the good old fashioned, legal way)

• Go to the Library! Its fun when you take home 12 books and 2 movies for free!

• Shop Amazon- Why buy a book for full price when you can pay $3 or so?

• Watch TV on hulu.com or similar site-- Never pay for cable again. We seriously don't have a tv plugged in at our house and don't have a cable bill.

2. Check Craigslist! So far I have bought a great used car, found an independent caterer for my wedding, hired a stylists for my wedding updo, sold furniture, notified the public of a garage sale, & found contract design jobs for my husband and I on Craigslist. Not to mention some laughs at reading the rants and raves.

3. DIY or don't.. DIY projects are all the hype right now but when we painted our entire house we spent almost half of the quote in buying all the materials and tools we didn't have, not to mention the entire week we took off of work. If I could go back I would find some experienced, independent contractors (yes craigslist) to "help us" and pay them an hourly rate..

4. Watch the hobbies- This is the advice I'm giving to myself and have yet to follow..Stick to 1 project at a time! Look for coupons from Michaels and sign up for emails at your favorite craft store. 

5. The Art of Re-gifting & stock-piling- Thats right, this is quite taboo but alot of Americans are already doing this and saving alot of $$. We currently have a big box of "gifts" ready to go at any moment. Some of these are gifts we are given directly and don't know what to do with, but mostly are stockpiled from things given to us from work or items we buy when we catch great deals on clearance. I recently found something I was given years ago that I never used and can't wait to give it to someone I have in mind who will love it.  

6. Do the Un-Popular- I've been a mad woman searching for all the vegan specialties at the grocery store and recently went to my nearby run-down Kroger. Turns out in this poorer area it is not popular to be vegan! Great for me because almost everything is being put to Clearance and still has several weeks left of shelf life. Yippee! Look for ways to apply this logic in your life too. 

7. The near Free Date- It seems like I can never get enough alone time with my husband.. and when we do have time, we don't have money to go "out." So these are some of our free dates we have done in the past:

• Walk (or run) in the Park

• Go Swimming- find a friend or nearby apartment to sneak into ;-) (Helps if you run to the apartment complex, then it doesn't look fishy when you get out of your car)

• Play a new game together

• Go to Barnes & Noble and look at magazines

• Look for Free festivals, concerts, & events

• Go to the Farmers Market

• Cook an adventurous meal together

• Do a double date! (We recently did this and each made our own custom pizza. Tons of Fun!)

  • Spontaneous Road Trip- We once drove 3 hours in search of Water Falls, we ended up finding several waterfalls, a lake to swim in, & some crazy kite flyers. 

8. Reduce, Re-use, Recycle- I've started to look for ways to re-use some common everyday things. GLASS JARS can become vases, food storage, pantry containers, candle holders, future gift holders. BOXES can be "wrapped" to be used for office supplies like those expensive Container Store boxes. I currently save all my gift bags and tissue paper I am given. Gift Cards can be reused by cutting the cover off and gluing it to construction paper.. add your own creativity to it.  Clothes can be swapped with some friends. Sweater arms can become leg warmers. I wasn't sure what to do with Aluminum cans, but here is a link: http://www.aluminouspublishing.com/index.php

Any more ideas for re-using things?

9. Don't wear makeup when your home alone- I do this just because I'm lazy, but think of all the money I'm saving!