Thursday, 11 July 2013

Laundry, Unmentionables, & Repurposing

Taking a break from some of the adoption blogging to pass on a few recent money saving success stories. 

Laundry on the Cheap
I blogged a few months ago about making my own laundry soap.  I made a batch in mid-March and I’m just now running out in July.  I have 4 people in my family and we do a lot of laundry.  I had always meant to share a cheapie solution for fabric softener, but I never got around to it.  So here goes. 
I have had the same bottle of fabric softener for 4+ months.  It’s about half full now.  I keep a small plastic container in my laundry room filled with diluted liquid fabric softener.  I use 3 parts water to 1 part softener.  I keep a couple of rags inside this container and before I start the dryer, I wring one out and toss it in.  I have no issues with static and my clothes smell nice.  The downside is that it is a little bit messy.  A dryer sheet is neater but my messier method is about one-tenth the cost of buying sheets, so…
 
My cheap laundry solutions have saved me a ton of money and not cost me very much time.  Success! 

Online Shopping
Most everyone shops online these days, especially those of us living overseas.  Don’t get me wrong, its fun to shop in England, but it’s expensive and some things just aren’t the same.  A friend told me about Coupon Cabin shortly after I moved here.  I NEVER buy anything online without checking for an online code.  Through trial and error, I pretty much know which company is always going to have something and which companies never do.  I almost always snag a discount, a freebie or free shipping on whatever I’m buying. 
The site is user friendly.  Just search for your store.  There is a feedback form for bad codes but I’ve never had any not work. 
Major score today – I bought two bras at from Victoria’s Secret online.  I used two separate coupon codes (some sites allow you to use multiple codes) and got: 
          Free shipping
          A free pair of undies
          A free beach bag

Yes, I know not everyone wants to read about my underwear and trust me, I don’t want to provide more detail than that…but come on!  That’s pretty amazing!  The beach bag I don’t need, but Christmas is coming.  The shipping was about $13.00, so it was nice to have that back in my pocket. 
And finally…
Cuttin’ Up
I try to recycle, reuse and repurpose.  That whole green thing, you know.  I recently started flattening and cutting up thin cardboard boxes (think cereal, granola bars, crackers) in to index card sized pieces.  I can use them for anything I would use a notecard for (notes, a list, etc) but I mostly use them for Doodlebug.  These are great to keep him entertained when we are traveling.  He can draw or color and make “postcards” or I can give him a sheet of stickers and he’ll stick the stickers on the card.  I recently bought a bunch of 75% off stickers, so that makes a cheap way of keeping him entertained on a train or plane for about 30 seconds – a little longer if I am lucky. 
So, I’ve saved some money doing my laundry and keeping my kiddo entertained, got a good deal on some new unmentionables and got a little jump on my Christmas shopping.  Life in the frugal lane is sweet.  Cheers!

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