Top 10 Best Frugal Tips
March 18, 2007 by Karen Weideman
Filed under blogs, cleaning, frugal living, household product, money saving idea
Dawn at Frugal for Life has challenged us to post our best frugal tip. I couldn’t list just one, so here are some of mine. Thanks Dawn for the challenge.
- Save misprinted paper and reuse the other side in your printer or copier.
- Cut brillo pads in half. Usually the pad rusts before you can get proper use out of it, so just cut it in half.
- Add water to hand soap. I can’t stand thick hand soap. It is hard to wash off and it dries out my skin and aggravates my eczema. If you’ll notice, the new “foaming hand soaps” are just watered down soap. I save the container and just refill them with a mixture of soap and water.
- Save old towels and washcloths. They make great cleaning rags. I also use my old towels for my bunny’s cage. He likes to hide behind them and chew them up.
- Refill your swiffer bottle with a mixture of 1/2 vinegar and 1/2 water. Add a tablespoon of rubbing alcohol to help the floor dry faster.
- Wash your hair every other day. I do this because of personal choice rather than to save money, but it does save on the cost of hair products.
- Save old buttons, material scraps, etc for children’s crafts. Give a kid these supplies, along with glue, paper, and scissors and they will stay busy for a long time.
- Don’t use the oven unless you have to. I have a small toaster oven. I use it quite frequently. It does a great job with biscuits, cookies, small pizzas, and more.
- Use less laundry detergent than the label suggests. It really doesn’t take as much as they say.
- Don’t throw out old furniture, accept furniture hammy downs, and/or pick it up by the curb (”dumpster diving”). Sometimes you can find some really great stuff out by the curb. (Ok, I know . . . sometimes you can’t.) I recently heard the story of a man that got an expensive table and chairs set from the side of the road. He used it for years and then sold it for a good amount of money. I know we can’t all be that lucky, but some paint and wood glue can go a long way with making furniture look good again.
Sing it!
Why not save paper for reprinting / printing, including ads and junk mail (non glossy) that comes in the mail, unfolded, in large manilla envelopes?
Champion Cheapskate: Good point, but I don’t get many ads and papers that aren’t printed on both sides. It seems the less credit we use, the less junk we get in the mail. That makes me happy!!!
How do you get your homemade swiffer cleaner inside the swiffer bottle? I am about to throw out my swiffer cleaner because the refills are so expensive.
Good question. My husband refilled it for me. I’ll have to check with him and see how he did it.
Julie: I talked to my husband and he said the Swiffer bottle lid was hard to get off. Naturally, the don’t want you to refill it. They want the $ from us buying the refills. He said he would look at it later when he gets home and see how he got it off.
Thanks for the great tips. I don’t know why I never thought about refilling my swiffer wet jet bottle. I love that thing but sure hate how much it costs!
Julie, Sorry it took so long to get back to you. My husband said that he used pliers and squeezed the cap on the Swiffer bottle to get it open.