Living frugally can be quite the endeavor, but with
some imagination and lots of helps and ideas from close friends it certainly
can be done – and be fun! Over the past
several weeks I’ve been trying to find new ways of saving us money and living
below our means. This will, of course in
the end, allow us to pay off our student loans and mortgage faster – and that
is a good thing. It will also allow us
to start investing into home improvement projects and into homesteading.
One of the families at our church has begun to move
away from paper products as much as possible and so have we. Most people already know that we use cloth
diapers, but over the past few months I’ve been cheating and using
disposables. It seems like we’ve been
hit with sickness after sickness (colds and Sofia had the German measles) that
laundry has been piling up – so disposable diapers were much easier. Charlotte is potty training and using Gerber
cloth training pants during the day and a disposable pull up at night. So far she is doing such a great job with minimal
accidents throughout the day.
Obviously toilet paper will still be a must – and in
our new house it MUST be septic safe.
This is great for us because it means we are forced to use less of it so
that we don’t clog up our septic system.
It was hard at first to teach my almost 6 year old that she didn’t need mounds
and mounds of toilet paper to wipe after using the bathroom, but she caught on
quickly. However, we do not “need” paper towels or paper napkins. I bought several
packs of basic terry cloth wash clothes from Walmart – 18 clothes for $4! We are using those for napkins and I use them
to wipe down the counters and clean just about everything – including my
floors! Yes, I get down on my hands and
knees and scrub the floors with a wash cloth.
I actually enjoy it because I can make sure the floors are getting
cleaned instead of using a mop that just smears dirt everywhere. When I’m done I just toss the wash cloth in
the washing machine. It is super easy
and I like the manual labor – I’m noticing muscle tone in my arms! These are also great for wiping sticky hands and faces - just keep a damp wash cloth rady at the dinner table and after everyone is done eating wipe faces and hands.
Yesterday I took the time to make my husband some handkerchiefs. His seasonal allergies are raging and he
usually goes through an entire roll of paper towels in a couple of days! So, I bought some flour sack towels from
Walmart – 4 for about $2 and used those to make his handkerchiefs. (One towel
made 4 handkerchiefs) They turned out
really nice and he loves them! I plan on
hand embroidering his initials on them to add a special touch. I’m going to make myself some as well, except
I will use some crochet tread around the edges to make them more feminine.
Soon we will put up a clothes line and I will begin
drying clothes out on the line. This
will help to keep our energy costs down as well. I’m thankful for a husband who is savvy on
appliances as he bought me an energy star washer that uses less water per load,
saving us money on energy and water! I
was skeptical at first about the new fancy machine – but I actually love
it. Our clothes are cleaner and it uses
under half the amount of water as a traditional washer.
So, there you have it. Some ways that I’m learning to save us money
by cutting out unnecessary paper products.
More tips to come soon!
Serving God and My Family,
Crystal <><
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