Frugal Friday on Monday

This will be my last Frugal Friday for a while so I thought I would list a few things instead of talking about just one thing.

1. Save a little from every pay check. I started doing this when my boys were little and our budget was super tight. Every pay check I would take 20.00 and put it away. It may not seem like a lot of money but do the math. If you never put money away then at the end of the year you have nothing. If you put as little as 40.00 a month away by the end of the year you have 480.00! that is nothing to sneeze at. Even if you only have 10.00 to put away do it. It will make you feel like you are doing something towards savings.

2. If you get an extra pay check during the month use that to pay down bills or sock away. We never put extra pay into our everyday budget.

3. cooking from scratch. This may seem obvious but so many people don't feel that they have the time. I say, make the time. I look at cooking from scratch as not only healthier for my family but frugal. I have even started to make a lot of my own mixes, laundry detergent and (soon) soap.

4. Use your bread maker- dust off your bread maker and use it! I use mine almost everyday. It really helps to stretch the bread budget and I can make different kinds for pennies. The other day I made cinnamon raisin bread and it was a big hit. It would be nice to make that and then slice it up for home made french toast.

5. Dry milk. I might have posted on this before but dry milk can at least save you trips to the store. It is a little cheaper than regular milk.

6. With spring coming, I am itching to plant flowers. Last year, I realized I just could not afford to spend a lot of money on flowers only to have the deer eat them. My plan is to change out my pots to perennials that are deer resistant. Every year, I add a few more perennials and hopefully by next year I wont have to by annuals unless I really want to.

7. Take care of what you got. I know this may sound silly but sometimes we dont stop to take care of the things we have therefore we end up re-placing them. If we had just taken the time to do some maintenence we would not have had to re-buy. I have a pretty expensive play set in my yard that is in need of re-staining. As soon as the weather gets warm I will take the power washer out and clean it-then begins the process of re applying the stain. It is a lot of work but it is worth it. Same goes for cars, sewing machines, mowers, etc..... We learned this lesson the hard way last year. We failed to get the gutters cleaned and after a big rain one of gutters came off the house, causeing major damage. Had we just gotten the gutter cleaned...............

Well, that is all I got for now. I have enjoyed Frugal Friday-it keeps me on my toes and helps me to remember to be frugal when possible. When I come across more tips I will let you know!