Decluttering
Decluttering our house in order to renovate has been such a great surprise. I feel so much better about our home now that we have sold or given away a lot of our stuff. We carried around and have kept so many things over the years. All not needed. Including a 15 foot long wall unit that housed knick knacks, books and a tube tv…none of which we used as it was sitting in our basement.
Some stuff we sold but a lot of it we gave away to people who needed it. The extra washing machine went to a friend in need, the old video games went to a friends children, some old rugs went to another friend that just moved, our lawn furniture set went to friends that didn’t have any, my wedding stuff went to a friend getting married this summer and ended up being such a blessing to her. We really love to make money but we really felt that this stuff should go to those in need and that is way more important to us then money.
Our space looks better and just feels lighter. What a relief but I think the most important thing we have learned is that we will not be doing this in the future. Instead of a bunch of mediocre things we learned that we should save for one nice thing.
Sometimes we forget that something we find worthless is someone else’s treasure…
Make Your Own Body Scrubs
Making your own body scrubs are so easy and so cheap.
All you need is a container, brown or white sugar (1/2 cup), 1 cup of grapeseed oil (or almond oil or olive oil) and some flavouring (lemon peels, lavender, mint, really anything you love and want to rub on your body!) I have even used tea leaves. Mix it all together and put it in a jar for use. My favourite thing to do is make a bunch up and give them away for small gifts of appreciation for people. You can also purchase essential oils to add to the scrubs. You can gear them towards feet and use mint or green tea.
My husband loves the foot scrub
Detatching youself from your money
It is so important to detach yourself from money. You have to detach emotionally, physically and mentally.
People value money differently. This leads to saving, spending and investing. It can cause debt or the ability to live debt free. The management of money is an art that needs to be masterfully skilled in order to succeed in your life.
Whatever your definition of success may be. It may mean paying off your house, it may mean quitting your job to care for your children, it may mean freedom 55. We all have dreams, goals and ambitions but need the skills and self-control to get there.
I talked in great length previously about not feeling deserving of your money because that usually always paves the way for over spending.
I worked so hard this week so I am going to go to the mall and buy a new outfit. While you are there you see 4 other fantastic deals that you just can’t pass up. You are out $200 you probably don’t even have and wasted time doing it too!
The key to all saving is planning it out. Whether for clothes, shoes, groceries or a simple lunch out. I am not saying never buy anything again but what I am saying is think about it before you do it. Most of the time it is a passing phase.
Extreme Couponing Canada Part 2
The last post I shared was about my personal thoughts and experiences with couponing. I really do think that it depends on the family if it works for them or not.
Since we started our journey to being a green family and a green home a lot has changed. Including the way we eat food. Packaged food is out. Organic produce, meat and dairy is our staples. I make soups and salads for lunch, make my own breads, snacks, bars, almost all our meals and food. I find it hard to incorporate couponing because of this. Also add in the fact I make all my own cleaning products and all of our skin care and personal hygiene products are all natural and some handmade.
Would I take a bottle of windex for $.50 with a coupon? Sure I guess but the vinegar and water solution I use is actually cheaper.
I like to incorporate the couponing into our meals and generally save anywhere from 7%-10% on our groceries just using coupons.
Big savings come from price matching flyers.
I only grocery shop twice a month. How? Easy. General produce staples in our house are potatoes, sweet potatoes, apples, oranges, bananas and they all are long-lasting. Then I stick with sale and seasonal which gets eaten first in our house. In the summer my extremely small town of 500 people has a market I shop at for organic berries and once a month I get a Good Food Box delivered to a local church for $15 with all seasonal fruits and veggies.
Everything I do is planned. I have menus and for example after grocery day that’s when we have things that require buns. I then will do two meals with buns to not waste them. Our favourite is homemade meatball subs and pulled pork sandwiches.
Planning, Planning, Planning is the key to saving time and money. Weighing out all of your options is a great way to start.
Do you want/need a lifetime supply of toothpaste?
Extreme Couponing Canada
Extreme Couponing on TLC has definitely exposed a whole new world of couponing. It is not the same in Canada as there is not the same amount of coupons available and also they aren’t as high of value. I have definitely gotten on board with the coupon clipping but struggled in a few areas.
As a family we have always tried to eat fresh as much as possible. Meat I usually cut up and freeze but what I mean is that we do not generally shop in the inside of the grocery store. Our diet revolves around breads/grains, fruits and vegetables, dairy and meats. Packaged products have never been on our list. Mostly due to their high costs. Also because I hate cardboard packaging but that’s another post altogether.
Coupons are generally for packaged foods and frozen items. Less rarely for diary. We also don’t drink juice. We have milk and water in our house. I also rarely buy cereal. This is where I have struggled with coupons. Do I collect coupons for things I never would purchase but when on sale with a coupon can get for a great price or free?
For a long time I did not clip coupons. I only price matched at No Frills or Walmart but only made my meals around what was on sale. Of course I saved a ton of money. Besides staples we only ate what meat and produce was on sale that week. That’s how I kept our grocery bill down. Then I decided to start collecting coupons and see where that lead me.
My first big coupon spree landed me with a 10% savings on my grocery bill. Most of that was almost free boxes of cereal and snack bars. How did this work for our family? I paid less than $3 for 4 boxes of cereal and 4 boxes of granola type bars in different varieties. None I would every buy normally. I decided to see how my husband reacted to this. In 3 days all 4 boxes of bar were gone. That is why I don’t buy then on a regular basis.
Organizing and sorting and finding coupons are a lot of work. People that say it’s easy are lying. It takes time to fill out all the questionnaires online to get that $1 off coupon. It’s a lot of work collecting coupon inserts from all your friends and relatives. It is time-consuming checking online every hour to see if somethings been posted.
I have come to this conclusion after trying for a month to get free stuff by couponing – it’s whatever works for your family.
Part 2 next
Having a Green Home Part 3 – Energy Consumption
Here in Ontario we are charged differently for energy use according to the 24 hour clock. In order to be the be the most efficent in our house I do all laundry, oven use (batch cooking) and using my dishwasher after 7pm or on the weekends. How I make this happen is I set my kitchen timer to 7pm and when it goes off I head to start laundry and keep setting it between loads to keep on track. I also pre set my dishwasher at 7pm to go off in 2,4 or 6 hours depending on my laundry needs. I then put all of my laundry away the next day during the day. Once I put this into my routine I have had no problem adjusting.
As a stay at home mom it is not ideal but to save money this is how we have to operate.
See below for winter usage:
http://www.hydroone.com/RegulatoryAffairs/RatesPrices/Pages/default.aspx
| Demand Periods | RPP Time-of-Use Price | Winter Season November 1, 2011 to April 30, 2012 |
| On-Peak | 10.8 cents/kWh | Weekdays: 7 a.m. to 11 a.m. 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. |
| Mid-Peak | 9.2 cents/kWh | Weekdays: 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. |
| Off-Peak | 6.2 cents/kWh | Weekdays: 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. Weekends & Holidays: All Day |
Money Saving Idea #7
I am still on hair. This time it was my husbands hair. About 3 years ago we were in Costco and I saw a men’s hair cutting kit for $29.99. It even had a dvd with it. My husband gets his hair cut once a month. He has a job that requires him to look presentable every single day so it is very important. It seemed like he was always going on his days off and either waiting a long time to get in somewhere or trying to juggle an appointment around. I thought this would be the perfect way to save money and time.
Example kit:
http://www.conair.com/custom-cut-21-piece-haircut-kit-with-case-p-682.html
We bought the kit and I watched the dvd. It was scary the first time. Mostly for him. I thought it was pretty fun. The more I did it the better I have become at doing his hair and now it’s nothing for me to get out the clippers and tidy up around his ears and neck and the back of his hair no problem. Our $30 investment is going on 3 years and we have saved about $15×36 months =$540 and that does not include saved time or saved gas.
I would have never thought of this before but it really is a quick and easy time and money saver. My husband has short hair and keeps it in a crew cut with a spiky front – not sure what that’s called – and I find it very easy to maintain.
Everyone wants more time
Everyone these days seems to complain about wanting more time. More time to read, exercise, see their family, clean, basically anything but work. So many things we do out of habit are time wasters but also money wasters. Shopping is my arch-enemy. I hate to shop. Probably because I hate spending money. I never used to be like that though. I used to shop all the time for nothing specific and end up buying random things I never needed. Once I stopped shopping I had a lot more money and a lot more time.
I replaced that habit with running instead. I run about 4-5 hours a week. If you thought about the amount of time you spent in a week shopping – how much time would that be? What would you do with that time instead?
How many hours a week do you spend going to the grocery store, picking up dry cleaning, getting your nails done, appointments for hair, after work doing a few stops here and there? I bet it would add up to quite a bit. Not to mention the cost in purchases and gas.
Could you not do some of those things?
A lot of stress is self-induced. We make our lives so impossibly busy that we do not have room to breathe, to just be, to take the time to relax.
For me that was a big part of this drastic life style change. I needed time to breathe. I needed time to watch my son grow. To spend the day cleaning the house or not cleaning the house at all. In the process our bank account has grown because all the things we had to have and do before are not important to us anymore.
Sure we still have days where we have things to do get or things to do but I plan and organize every single trip I make out of this house to maximize my time and gas.
We have even implemented spend no money days here. We have days of the week that are dedicated to staying at home and not spending any money.
More time is definitely do able – there’s just some habits that need to be broken first.
It takes some very serious self-reflection.
Money Saving Idea #6 – change hair products
I am back on hair. I used to buy salon shampoo and conditioner and hair products. I spent about $120 a year. I now use whatever is on sale and I have a coupon for and spend about $10 a year instead.
Another really important tip to saving money on hair care products is to use the appropriate amount. A lot of people waste products by using way too much. A general rule is a quarter sized amount of shampoo and conditioner.
It will stretch out the life of your product and makes more sense economically. No need to over use – it it wasteful. Also teach everyone in your house this tip.
It does not work if you are following it but your husband is using 1/2 a cup on his head every shower!
When I personally changed from salon shampoo to my organic grocery store brand I did not find a difference in how my hair felt.
Having a Green Home Part 2 – cleaning products
I used to spend a lot of money buying cleaning products for my house. One of the easiest things to do to transform your house to green is change your cleaning products to all natural and homemade.
All you need is empty,clean spray bottles and containers and something to label them. My favourite cleaning agent is vinegar. I use equal parts vinegar and water. I use it for everything – floors, glass, counters. I use baking soda with the vinegar cleaner for the shower and tub. I use olive oil and lemon juice for wood surfaces.
Lemon juice also added to the mix works nice as well. Vinegar never smells when it dries so there it no problems with that. Fresh lemons also work for stained surfaces.
I also make my own room spray from water and essential oils. I buy the empty bottles from the dollar store or any craft store. I love lavender so I use that.
Really the possibilities are endless with changing over to green cleaning products. Saves time going to the store and money. I save about $150 a year making my own cleaning supplies and it is so much healthier then the chemicals they put in regular cleaners.
About
This is my blog about trading my career in to be a Canadian Christian stay at home mom of one. It is a miracle he is even here today and I am blessed to be his mom. For numerous reasons he will be our one and only.
I am sharing all my tips on money saving, being a green family, personal finances, recipes, dyi ideas, frugal living and anything else I can think of. I have a lot to share.
Psalm 118:24 “This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.”
Follow us as we take the biggest leap of faith by staying home and learning how save money, save time, cook, clean and take care of our house.
We know God has great plans for us!
