Our friends belong to a group of couples that host an “Amish Night” once a month. It’s modeled after the Amish custom of “barn raising” where all the families come together to do some sort of construction project. Each month, it’s someone’s turn to use the free labor to accomplish a home repair or improvement. They save money on labor, gain a lot of expertise from the various members, and it’s also a lot of fun to do the project with friends! They’ve done everything from painting rooms to plumbing fixes to installing wood floors.
Mary C.

Three of the cheapest household cleaner you can buy are alcohol, hydrogen peroxide and vinegar. There’s hardly anything you can’t clean with one of these products. Vinegar is a great cleaner for glass and other hard surfaces. It also kills a lot of bacteria (up to 90%), so it makes a wonderful kitchen and bath cleaner.

Alcohol is a solvent and cleans many things you wouldn’t dream possible. I spray it on my 25-year-old couch every so often and wipe it down to get off grandkid-goo. I don’t let it soak in. I just spray and wipe.

Vinegar and peroxide are safe for food surfaces. I spray peroxide on that nasty hinge on the toilet seat. It foams away the crud just great. If you hate the smell of vinegar, you can add a package of lemon Kool-Aid. Use two pints water and no sweetener of any kind. This is good for urine stains on mattresses or by pets. Check for colorfastness.
F.

We make yardsale rounds late on Saturdays. People will sell you all they have left for a very low flat rate if you take it all. Then, once per month, we hit the flea market and sell it. You will triple your money or more. Plus, this is a fun thing to do with the whole family!
Karen
 

Recently, I’ve discovered the large-capacity washing machines at local laundromats can save me money and time! Some of the machines can hold 3, 4 or 5 loads of laundry at a time. If you have even a medium-sized family, you know that it’s easy to accumulate that many loads in a week! The trick is to not sort too much. For instance, put your lights (such as khakis, grays) and whites all together, including towels if you want. For your darks, you can throw in denims. Instead of spending more money using three washers, you can spend less using the large capacity machine, and an added bonus is that they usually use 1/2 the amount of detergent!
Claudia from Broken Arrow, OK

I was a stay-at-home mom of four boys. When the they were young, I gave up my sleep (a few hours a night) and did several paper routes. Dad was home with the kids, and when his job took him to work early, I took the kids with me. It took some wear and tear on my body, but the boys have never seen the inside of a daycare, and the extra money was there for other things that were needed.
Amy of Marysville, WA

I learned the hard way to check about the prepayment policy on “no interest.” offers. I had purchased a mattress for six months with no interest. When I sent a check for 1/6 of the total, I was stunned to find out that I was charged a sizable “convenience charge” for making a payment that was less than the total.
Marjorie

A professional recently told me that a great spot remover and stain remover for carpeting is to spray it with Windex. I went to the store and bought the original Windex window cleaner. I used the original Windex on several stains in the carpet, including a stain where my cat had gotten sick and I could not get all the stain out before. It came out easily! I used a plain white paper towel to rub out the stain where I had sprayed the Windex. It worked great! Just make sure you test your carpet in an inconspicuous area first.
Dianna B. of Williamsburg, Virginia

Recently, my husband and I went to a National Monument. During our tour, we shopped in the “gift shop” and I admired several prints that I would have loved to have purchased. However, the cost was prohibitive and I really don’t need nor have room for another big print. Instead of purchasing one of the expensive prints, I found a package of postcards that had the same print I admired. So I bought the package of ten postcards for $5. I took them home and put them in a picture frame that held four of the postcards. I have to say I get a lot of compliments on my postcard picture, and I did it for so little money! The print I had looked at was in the $100 range (unframed)! Now, if I get tired of the “look,” I can take it down and not feel guilty. Plus, I can mail the postcard out!
Jonnie C.

To make all of your pots, pans, etc. non-stick, try this! Pour white vinegar ($2.09 a gallon) in your pan to the appropriate depth. Bring vinegar to a boil. Boil at medium heat for five minutes. Allow the vinegar to cool to room temperature. The same vinegar can be used several times until the smell becomes weak. Make sure you have adequate ventilation as the fumes can be irritating to your nose and lungs. When doing larger pans, don’t forget to toss in all of your metal utensils, bakeware, BBQ racks and accessories! Even your old skillets and saucepans will be non-stick for up to two months depending on usage and washings.
B. M. of Belfast, ME

I used to have a problem storing food containers. I solved it by using only one or two sizes of container and buying multiples. I chose to buy the Ziploc small square containers that hold two cups. I have about 50 of these containers because I commonly cook meals and portion them into individual servings for lunches at work. This made life easier since all my containers are now the same, they all nest, and they all have the same size cover. My upright freezer is also more organized since the meal containers are all the same size so they stack well in the freezer. I get them at Wal-Mart for $2.50 for a package of 5, so each container and lid combination only costs 50 cents each. If they get damaged, I can throw out only the container or only the lid and know that I still have the other half of the set and it will not go to waste.

I also bought a set of 1/2 cup round containers, which were also made by Ziploc. I use these for sandwich condiments, salad dressing, and snacks like pumpkinseeds that don’t need a larger container.

I do have a few other containers for the rare occasions when I need to store a larger quantity. However, all my plastic containers now take up less than half of the space that they used to take up, and I can always find exactly what I need since the plastics cupboard is so much more organized than it has ever been.
Karen G.

 
It’s easiest to do this at the beginning of the season, but I take chicken wire and lay it down in the flowerbed. I cut holes as necessary around existing perennials and cut holes out for the new plants as I plant them. The chicken wire has small holes that keep the cats from being able to dig. Their claws will hit the metal, and when they figure out they can’t work a spot well enough to use it, they will go elsewhere. This works great, it’s inexpensive, and you really only have to do this once as the wire will last for years to come.
Cinda in Oklahoma

I had a west facing window and no tree to shade it. I was given a “solar curtain.” It already had the rod holder, but I feared it would tear. Instead, I taped it to an old rollup blind’s roller! It works like a dream and the amount of heat it blocks is amazing! These curtains are still offered by many mail order catalogs and they are making them sturdier.
B.

Put the top bed sheets in the freezer and take them out just before bedtime. They feel absolutely fabulous after a day in the hot sun. I highly recommend it!
Dianne R. of Louisville, KY

I went to a bridal shower last weekend. The most cost- effective gift I saw, which is going to save the bride and groom honeymoon bucks, was one of those coupon books for the area they are going to honeymoon. People tend to buy these books for their hometown spending. But most people don’t eat out much or sightsee when they’re home. When they’re away on vacation, that’s when they eat in restaurants and look for things to do and see. And that’s when these books really come in handy. If you look up the city on the Web, you’ll often find the books for sale.
Maria M.

I’ve been experimenting on how I can make my fresh herbs (when I’m not growing my own) last longer. I’ve been doing the same thing with kale and broccoli, and I’m sure you can do this with most anything that has a stem on it. As soon as I get home from the supermarket, I take my kale and broccoli, cut the stems at the bottom diagonally, and put them in a big glass of water, maybe 3/4 full of water. Then, I put them in the fridge. They will keep up to two or three weeks.

I was losing them when I just put them in the refrigerator in their own packages. Things like cilantro, Italian parsley, etc. that always went bad within a week or so keep for long periods of time this way. You just put them in the glasses like you would a bouquet of flowers and put them in the fridge.
Michele Y.

Think not just about having less toxic cleaners, but also how to store those potentially dangerous things you do have. I know a family who stores all of their cleaning supplies in the cupboard above the refrigerator, instead of in the traditional below-the-sink place. This is accessible for adults but certainly out of the way of toddlers.
H.R.
Gary Foreman
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The Dollar Stretcher
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