Thrifty Thursday: Shop on eBay.com

Yes, I'm a bad, bad blogger for neglecting my site for weeks at a time. But let's just gloss right over that for now, shall we?

The amount of money that you can save by looking for things that you want on eBay can really vary, depending on what you are buying. So, ymmv, as they say.

Everybody's heard of eBay, but I think that its awesomeness is grossly underestimated by most people. If you are an eBay-underestimator, I strongly encourage you to give it a chance. You can buy literally anything that is legal to buy on eBay (and probably some things that aren't legal, if you know how and where to look, but I'm Not That Kind Of Girl). From coupons to golf clubs to accordions to RVs. It is insane!

My incredible savings today was on slipcovers. I told Chris months ago that for my birthday present this year I wanted slipcovers for our living room sofa and loveseat, and I had already picked out the ones that I wanted and was planning on ordering them from Walmart a week or two before my birthday. Being uber-excited about our upcoming move (we move next Friday! We got the house we wanted! God is SOOO good!), I was looking at the pretty pretty pictures on Walmart's website, when it occured to me that maybe I could find them cheaper somewhere else. The main reasons that I was going through Walmart in the first place were a) they had the pattern I wanted, and b) free shipping with the Ship-to-Store option. Before taxes, the cost of both slipcovers from Walmart would have come to $149.92, which I think is a pretty reasonable amount to pay for something that will completely change the look of my living room. But! Then I remembered eBay!

Chris always remembers to look on eBay for things; I never remember to look on eBay for things. But today, when I happened to look for my slipcovers on eBay, I found the exact ones that I wanted, brand spankin' new, with 4 hours left on the bidding and not one single bid had been submitted yet. The starting bids were $19.99 and $14.99, so I bid $20.00 and $15.00, and when the auction expired I was still the only bidder. So for a grand total of $35.00 plus shipping (which may be as much as $10.00), both of the desired slipcovers are mine! That's less than one-third of what I would have paid at Walmart. $100.00 less than I would have paid at Walmart! Muwahahahaha!

Ahem.

Anyway, the moral of the story is, remember to look for things on eBay. Sometimes you will lose auctions, and that's disappointing, but sometimes you can find exactly what you're looking for at a substantially reduced price. If you know what you want and are willing to be patient, it will pay off in the end.

Thrifty Thursday: Make Your Own Dog Food

Weekly Savings: $7.00
Monthly Savings: $22.00
Yearly Savings: $436.00

This is my dog, George.

He is an English bulldog. Absolutely the best dog I have ever had, hands down. Great with kids, very loyal and affectionate, and even though he is a total push-over, he looks threatening enough that people don't want to mess with him.

Unfortunately, English bulldogs don't have a very long life-span. We're looking at 7-10 years, assuming that no major congenital health issues crop up along the way. And after doing a lot of research, we are convinced that by feeding him "real" food instead of pre-packaged dog food, he will be healthier, happier, and hopefully reach the maximum end of his life-span.

My basic home-made dog food recipe with costs is as follows -- I buy the meat in bulk when it's on sale, so this is an average estimate based on our normal sale prices:

• 5 lbs. ground beef ($7.00)
• 3 lbs. frozen veggies ($3.00)
• 1 lb. raw brown rice ($2.00)
• 2 quarts chicken broth ($2.00)
• water if needed (negligible)
• Total Cost: $14.00
  

This basic recipe gets us through a little over 2 weeks. I could probably make it for less if I was really pro-active about stocking up when there are sales. As it is, we're already spending less than half as much as we were on the "good" brand of packaged dry food that we had been using. Now that we're really getting into the swing of things with home-made food, I plan to start branching out from this basic recipe and giving him more variety... maybe some chicken & turkey as well as beef, apples as well as vegetables, and yogurt and cottage cheese occasionally. This may cause his food costs to increase slightly, but I am still expecting it to remain significantly less than the $50.00 a month that we were spending on his bagged food.

An unexpected perk to switching to home-made dog food has been how much better George smells! English bulldogs are gassy beasts, and... oh my, was it ever rank! Now that he is eating the food that I make, without unnecessary grains and fillers that his body can't process, the super-stinky gas is GONE. He also has much sweeter smelling breath than he did before. And we're probably saving another $5 - $10 a month on air fresheners! :-)

In all seriousness, it is well worth the time and effort to really research what you are feeding your pets and make more conscientious decisions about what you put in front of them. We were shocked and horrified by what we learned when we began looking into what goes into most dog foods, and the additional time and effort that it takes to cook for George (which... maybe an hour of hands-on work every two weeks? Not a big deal!) is well worth it, knowing that he is eating food that is really good for him. I've only been making his food at home for two months or so, and we could see benefits almost immediately... certainly after the first week. There are tons of websites and books out there with information about how and what to cook for your pet, so making the switch is really quite easy.

Thrifty Thursdays: Cancel Cable

Weekly Savings: $10.60 + tax
Monthly Savings: $46.00 + tax
Yearly Savings: $552.00 + tax

I love TV. More than I should. Waaaay more than I should, truth be told. And that is one of the reasons that we do not currently have cable. Even before the whole HD switcharoo (did that finally go through? I stopped paying attention since it didn't really apply to me), we weren't able to get the major networks, because we live in (what tries really hard to maintain its reputation as) a small town. Anyway, I haven't had access to immediate television gratification since October of 2007, and although it has definite benefits, sometimes it's kind of a bummer.

BUT!

Did you know that virtually any network TV show, as well as several cable TV shows, that you would ever want to watch (and a whole bunch that you wouldn't ever want to watch, ever, ever, EVER) can be found FREE and LEGALLY on www.hulu.com and/or www.joost.com? Not to mention on the networks' websites themselves. This means that I can watch what I want when I want... it's almost like having TiVo, except that I can't fast-forward through the (really quite brief) commercials and there are usually only the 2-5 most recent episodes of a show up at any given time. Being able to watch my favorite TV shows online has not only helped me to use my time more appropriately (no more stopping everything because a new episode of The Office is airing in 5 minutes and I just HAVE to watch it or I might DIE), plus it means that Chris and I can sit down and watch a show together when it works for both of us (which is no easy feat since he works shifts that change every 3 months!), and last but not least, we are NOT spending $46.00 plus tax every month (aka $552.00 a year) on cable.

It's also worth mentioning that you can get just about any TV show that has been released on DVD via Netflix, several of which are available from their "watch instantly" menu... so for the price of our monthly subscription ($13.99 a month, still $32.00 cheaper than cable), I can catch up on, for example, Battlestar Galactica, and finally watch all of the All Creatures Great and Small episodes that I missed on PBS back in the day. And, as I mentioned before, I can watch when it fits into my life, and don't have to fit my life around my viewing.

I know that there are a lot of people who make do without watching TV at all, and I really respect that. But I will almost certainly never be one of them, LOL. For me, it is important to be pop-culturally literate, as long as I can do that without dishonoring God or neglecting my family. And for me, doing my TV viewing online is good stewardship, not just because of the money that we save, but also because it permits me to be a better steward of my time.

Thrifty Thursdays: Make Your Own Baby Wipes

Weekly Savings: $1.24
Monthly Savings: $4.96
Yearly Savings: $59.50

Last October I got in a "crunchy" mood, and decided to try making my own baby wipes. I just recently sat down and did the math on whether or not it actually saves us money, and was surprised at what I found. Even though I'm not a money-saving genius, I did use the word 'thrifty' in my blog name, so here is a thrifty tip from me to you: try using cloth wipes! Not only are they less expensive than disposables, but they are super cute (since you can choose whatever fabric you want for them -- ours have froggies and duckies and Curious George on them), and they also clean poppy bottoms more effectively than disposables.

There are lots of websites that can tell you how to make your own wipes, if it's something that you want to try. But this post is about the thrifty side of doing it yourself, so without further ado, here is what it cost me to make a bunch of baby wipes:

• 1 yard of flannel (made 65 wipes, approximately 5"x6" each) = $2.99

I already had the thread that I used for zig-zagging the edges, so I didn't include that cost.

The cost for making a batch of cleaning solution is as follows:

• 1 Tbsp. baby shampoo (I use Aveeno or Burt's Bees; 8oz. for ~$5.00 = $0.32/Tbsp.)
• 1 tsp. mineral oil (16oz. for ~$4.00; $0.04/tsp.)
• 2 C. water (negligible)
• a few drops of essential oil for fragrance (negligible)
• Total = $0.36 per batch of cleaning solution

Since I use Nature's Miracle Stain and Odor Solution for both soaking the wipes after use and also in the laundry when I wash them, I am including that in the cost. I use ~1/4C. in the soaking solution and ~1/4 C. in the wash, so that's a total of 1/2 C. per batch of wipes.

• Nature's Miracle Stain and Odor Solution (1 gallon bottle for ~$25.00 = $0.78 per 1/2 C.)

Adding up the cost of the wipes ($2.99), the cleaning solution ($0.36), and the additional soaking/washing cost ($0.78), the initial outlay for the first batch of cloth wipes cost me $4.13 cents. That is a cost of approximately 6 1/2 cents per wipe, which is almost twice as much as I was paying per wipe with the disposable brand that I had been using.

BUT!

Those initial 65 wipes that I made will get us through an entire week. So, let's look at the cost of re-using these wipes for an entire month (four weeks). The cost of the wipes remains the same ($2.99), the cost of the cleaning solution is quadrupled ($1.44), as is the cost of the soaking/washing solution ($3.12). Therefore, the first month of using homemade wipes cost me $7.55, or just under 3 cents per wipe. Already cheaper than buying disposables!

Just for fun, six months of cloth wipes costs me $30.35 (almost 2 cents per wipe), and if I use the same flannel wipes for one year, my total outlay is only $57.71, which is under 2 cents per wipe and just under half of what I would have paid for my old brand of disposable wipes over the course of the same year. And these numbers don't take into account the fact that cloth wipes clean better than disposable wipes, so although I can get away with using only 65 wipes per week with my homemade wipes, I would be using probably 100 or more disposable wipes in the same amount of time.

I am really glad that we switched from disposable to reusable wipes. $60 may not seem like that much money over the course of a year, but that $60.00 could pay for an extra date night with my husband, or 25 movie rentals, or a care package for a relative who lives far away, or... who knows? If I found $60.00 in a jacket pocket I'd be thrilled to pieces, so I think it's a worthwhile amount to shave off of my yearly expenses. :-)