Last Week's Frugal Accomplishments

I am starting something new. Have you read The Prudent Homemaker Blog? If not, you really should! Each week she shares her Frugal Accomplishments and I am always so inspired by her and the other people who share theirs as well.

So from now on, each Monday I will be sharing mine. I am excited to see what I can accomplish. Nathan and I talked about starting to save more money where ever we can so we can start paying extra on our house, car and school loans. We really want to be completely debt free.

Will you join me? I hope so! Just leave a comment and tell me you are in!

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I made a garden box out of old dresser drawer fronts that I found across the street on the sidewalk. I also painted the outside with paint we had leftover from another project. I put landscaping fabric in the bottom and filled it with dirt...this came from my other garden boxes. I will have to purchase some compost to put on top but that shouldn't be too expensive.

I made zucchini muffins using an about to expire zucchini. I shared half of them with my neighbor.

Each morning, we have started turning down the heat to 65 degrees...we then turn it up to 68 at night.

I have been opening the blinds instead of using lights...hoping our electric bill will be lower next month!

I have been recycling - we are down to 1 to 2 trash bags per week! Each are picked up free by the city.

I have been couponing to stock up on items we use all the time. I have saved a ton of money plus all my coupons are free! Nathan's grandmother collects them for me, his mom also shares hers with me and  in our neighborhood some houses get a free wednesday paper (talks about what is going on in the area) that has a coupon insert in each one. I have found these in front of abandon homes so I pick them up off the sidewalk or sometimes the street.

I have also been saving the water when I am heating it up or cooling it down. I watered my plants with this and made some a gallon of tea. It will not reduce our water bill by much but I wanted to see what I was wasting. We shouldn't waste what we have.

Nathan let me purchase a Soda Stream for Valentines Day - I ordered it from Kohls.com - I used a $10 off store coupon, 15% off store coupon, $20 gift card and we will receive $20 mail in rebate and $10 Kohl's cash! Making it $29.99 after all of that! It was originally $139.99!!!! Great savings!

I have been trying to earn points on Swagbucks.com - every 500 points you earn is equal to $5 gift card. I will use these for Amazon gift cards for gifts or school books!

I have also been cooking almost every night. We ordered in last night but split the cost with our friends plus there were a few leftovers!

We accepted a pound of deer meat from my in laws which I used for "grilled" Venison burgers! They were delicious!

I watched my friends kiddos (which one is Hailey's best friend) in trade for an open picture frame to be wired up with chicken wire to make a memo board! I picked up the frame last summer for .10!

I downloaded a handful of books from Amazon for the Kindle - I just read them on my Ipad. They were all free. To find a list, visit moneysavingmom.com - she posts them. :D
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That looks to be everything. Please share anything that you have done! I would really love to hear!