Happy Fall all!!! Hope this find you well on this Tuesday and first full day of fall here in the northern hemisphere! Fall equinox has arrived. The daylight hours get shorter every day - ugh. I really like my daylight - but this is part of it.
It is a very damp morning here. Dew is dripping from the trees, and it was extremely foggy at daybreak.
We got rain!!!!!! Yesterday we had about 8 hours of a soft rain - no downpours - just nice soaking rain. I am sure the grass and plants enjoyed it. Today is to be dry, so I have a few errands to run. Rain comes back tomorrow, then the week will be dry and pretty after that.
Waste not, want not - we have all heard that phrase. It is really very true! The more you can use of what you already have and find reuses for, the better. It saves you money.
ALSO, the more skills you have, the less money you spend or need. Learn to fix, mend, reuse, and get creative and you will save $$.
We all know leftovers can be re-invented into new meals and new dishes. Don't let that precious food go to waste. It is like throwing money away.
It isn't just leftover food, but scraps as well. You can make flavored vinegars with fruit or veggie scraps. Fruit scraps can be added to plain liquor to make flavors. Think jelly, syrup, extracts, etc. from scraps. Flavored teas can be made with any leftover fruit. Flavored waters or ice cubes. Dehydrate and use to flavor all sorts of things. Adds a little nourishment as well. When all used up, compost if possible.
Even old bags can save funds. The plastic ones can be used as trash can liners, poo bags, sorting and storage bags. I use them to collect my harvests.
Old furniture doesn't have to be thrown out. You can reglue, scrape, paint and make like new items. Recover, restuff, paint, new handles (those can be creative too). Make some new and fun furniture pieces for your home for pennies.
Fabrics, whether scraps or old clothes can be remade into fun new items. They can be decorations, pillows, quilts, throws, aprons, hot pads, you name it! You can actually make 'fabric' with scraps - big sheets of scraps, then make whatever you want with the fabric. There is no limit to what you can do.
Saving money is only limited to your imagination. Be positive in your ideas. Get creative - all things are possible.
When life throws you a curve ball, and your funds are low or cut - it doesn't mean that you can't still have nice things or eat good (and recycle at the same time). You can truly live a good life and have fun with it all at the same time.
Waste not - want not.... it sure is true.
Have a grand day all. Smile and say kind words!
Great ideas for stretching the dollar! The apron is especially cute. I'll have to look through my stash to see if I can recreate this. We live just off Rockville Road and when we head west to do some shopping, there are restaurants aplenty. We are always amazed at the parking lots, crammed with cars. Don't people eat at home anymore? Years ago, I would collect dried weeds and bittersweet to make flower arrangements. I save all the shopping bags and the produce bags, including the mesh ones.
ReplyDeleteEverything looked damp when I got up (not as early you do!). Looks like some serious rain tomorrow.
Thanks. I think I can do the apron - may d that for a Christmas gift.
DeleteIt is amazing how full the restaurant and shopping center lots at all hours. I stopped at a strip center at 9:45 AM this morning and the lot was full. It amazes me too.
I used to do that with things I would find along country roads years ago.
It was damp for sure. Yes mam, more rain for tomorrow. Got my running done today!
I can sew and knit following patterns but I’m not creative like my mom. I’m looking at a patchwork pillow she made of the barn, old well and yard adjacent to our old New England house. Of course she used scraps. She took a night table I got free from a friend and refinished the top (cherry) and painted the rest black with gold accents to make it look New England country. I have so many of her creations - pillows, paintings, painted furniture and small sculptures - and I treasure them. It makes me cry when I think of these things because I miss her so much and I’m so alone.
ReplyDeleteI hate to say it but I’m at the point now that I just don’t need more decorative stuff so I donate cloth, yarn, fake flowers etc. and only keep a very small amount. There is a fairly new store here that sells scraps and leftover art supplies very cheap so it is a good place to donate leftovers I know I’ll never use.
I love creative people. What treasures you have that your mom made. Those are priceless.
DeleteI think we all get to that point - but I still love hand crafted items - most are very treasured items. Now I am trying to make new ones for the younger family.
Nice of you to donate
I've kind of been doing this with my candles. When they get too low to light, I have been placing them under my candle lamp and it melts the wax and still gives off plenty of fragrance. I then pour off a little wax each time I use the lamp on it, until nothing much is left to safely warm. I'm using up every bit of that wax! Haha! So glad you got a good rain.
ReplyDeleteGood for you! I chip the pieces of wax out of the bottoms of candles and use in my wax melters. It doesn't go to waste. That stuff and candles are too expensive to waste!
DeleteSuch a great blog. Love you!
ReplyDeleteSMILES - thank you!
DeleteGlad to hear you also have gotten rain. We've gotten about 2 inches in the last couple of days with more coming this afternoon. Things are already looking a little better. Have a great day!!
ReplyDeleteGlad you got some too. I don't think we got as much as you - but tomorrow is another day! Even the air smells better!
DeleteI'm happy to hear you got some rain and not a deluge!
ReplyDeleteWe've done away with the plastic grocery bags for the environment's sake. While I used them as garbage bags, as well as for cat litter, our landfills were overrun with them. It wasn't unusual in the spring to see bags discarded in the winter hung up in trees. Not good!
We now use cloth bags which will break down in the landfilli'. I don't tend to use them for garbage bags but others do. I use them over and over again, folding them and putting them in the back of car for the next grocery/shopping trip.
Stores here still use plastic bags and very little paper. I like using my cloth bags - but once in a great while I forget to take one in with me.
DeleteI never heard of using cloth bags for trash - I have a bunch and have always re-used them.
I save bread bags to use when our grandcat comes to visit as they make great kitty litter cleaners, scraps of fabric are used to make quilts, totes, and other small gifts (some will be used to make some double oven mitts). Scraps of yarn are used to make mittens, or blankets, and now even used in my weaving. Bits of thread are saved and used to sew on buttons or fix a small seam.
ReplyDeleteLife is good if one just realizes that so much can be accomplished and not waste.
God bless.
That is a great idea for the bread bags. They would be great for those that walk their dogs as well.
DeleteI love all your crafty ideas. There are just so many things that we can use and re-use in new ways and it save a lot - not just money but the environment as well.
Yay, you did get some rain! We got a little bit today too. I watched a video the other day where a lady made compost heap jelly using all her fruit peelings. It looked pretty good too. Waste not, want not is so true.
ReplyDeleteSo thankful for the rain we got.
DeleteI have made jelly from apple peels and cores, corn cobs, and peach skins. Use it all up - sure does help to not waste.
I love the idea of turning something old into something new, such as an old set of curtains into napkins or an apron or those cute earrings. Even old dresses into blouses or as we used to do...turn old jeans into cutoff shorts (just not too short, these days) haha. This is how most of us were raised and then something shifted, didn't it?
ReplyDeleteYes indeed. That is how most of us were raise. I remember cut-offs and back in my day, we even made long skirts from old jeans with material added for a 'hippy' look!
DeleteSo many ways to recycle things into something new.
Thanks for more ideas.