Non-Food Consumables

[Marianne]

I get bread wrappers from friends. Also get plastic grocery bags from them to use as waste basket liners. I finally have gotten to the point where I can get by with a waste basket in the kitchen.

Oh, I get newspapers from friends, too. I use them for fire starters and to clean up messes that have the 'ewwww' thing, then follow up with rags.

And I give my friends eggs as a thank you.

You really have gotten a lot.

 

[cabinchick]

You are the queen! Keep those ideas coming, I am in awe of your creativity!

 

[Leta]

Wannabefree- I know! I hate running to the store. I actually hate most shopping, period. Rambling through a farmer's market, thrift store, or antique shop can be fun because of the unexpected nature of things, but I have to be in a pretty specific mood for that. I would truly rather stay home and make soap than venture out into RetaiLand to buy some.

This is part of why my ultimate goal is to buy everything non-perishable online. As soon as I figure out a way to do it all cost effectively, I'm there, baby.

What's the scoop on homemade dry pet food? All the recipes that I've read have been for wet food. I did buy a few cans with Qs, but we just keep those around because they have a longer shelf life than bagged dry food, so they are our emergency supplies.

Marianne- That is a great idea, getting bread bags from friends. I will mention this to DH.

I cannot wait until I can give people eggs as a thank you!

I used to use plastic grocery bags as can liners, but then the city switched garbage services, and now we have to buy specific bags. They also eliminated the community recycling center, grrr. So we have to buy specific bags for curbside recycling pick up, too.

We only have three trash cans in our whole house, and I do use grocery bags in the two smaller cans, but that's just to keep the cans from getting gross. I have to put the full grocery bags inside the "approved" bag and tie it off. It is so frikking irritating. I can't wait until we move someplace where we don't have to have trash service. (I have it all planned: DH can take recycling, include plastic bags/wrappers, to work, metal will go in the scrap yard pile, we'll compost EVERYTHING, though we'll need separate piles/containers, and the tiny amount of actual trash that's left will be burnable- like those paper towels that have been used to clean the cast iron.)

I guess the good thing is that we barely bring home plastic shopping bags anymore. I've had the canvas shopping bags since we got married in 2003- we lived in a 3rd floor walk up with no elevator, so I needed something I could pack a lot into in order to not make eight zillion trips from the parking lot to the stairs. Back then, cashiers and baggers looked at you bug eyed when you tried to hand them cloth bags, LOL. But we'd still get plastic bags on little trips to the hardware store when we wouldn't think to grab the huge, stuffed tote full of cloth grocery sacks. I spent $5 on two nylon bags that stuff inside their own tiny, attached sack (think of something smaller than a change purse) and clipped them on our key rings with a carabiner. That has helped a ton- I honestly can't remember the last time DH or I brought a plastic grocery bag home.

Thanks for the compliment, cabinchick. I'm trying. I'm sick of spending $100/mo on stuff that *we throw away*, so that has motivated me considerably. You know what they say about necessity being the mother of invention.

 

[Wannabefree]

Dry dog/cat food is just basically baked in an oven until dry. kind of like dehydrating. If you do a search you should be able to come up with a ton of recipes on here for homemade pet foods. I am going to start doing it more for my big oaf of a dog. Sick of hauling those big dang sacks home from the feed store. I have enough to carry in already Thank goodness it has all slowed down since Spring though!!!

 

[Leta]

An Update:

I reviewed my price book/master shopping list from August 2009 and I have managed to cut the non-food items down by about 1/4. To be specific, there were 117 things in the Non-Food Consumables category, and I have managed to cut 26 of them completely out.

Some things, like cotton pads. Qtips, and cheesecloth, I wasn't able to replace completely with a durable version, but I was able to cut our use down by 80% by investing in a comparable durable good.

And many, many things I have been able to replace something cheaper- for example, I was buying Clorox 11, Cascade, and liquid Oxy Clean to remove stains. I switched to the Tightwad Gazette formula of equal parts Wisk, ammonia, white vinegar, and water. This works better than anything else I've ever tried, Wisk has coupons out all.the.time, and the "32 Loads!" size lasts me a 6-12 months and costs me about $3-4. So I've replaced three things with one cheaper, more effective thing.

Bread bags, I did something similar. I started using gallon size ziplocs for bread, but some of our baguettes were too long, so I bought 10 two gallon size ziplocs at the $1 store ($1 for 5, so a $2 investment). I can reuse these, which I could not do with twisty tie breadbags. They are washable. I'll have to reuse each 2 gal ziploc 100x to equal a box of breadbags, but if they hold out that long, I'll have saved $38 and kept 990 bags out of the landfill.

I finally had the "come to Jesus" conversation with DH about his plastic wrap use. He has gone cold turkey, and I am so proud!

There are only two things left on my list that I think I could replace with a DIY version: pet food and cough drops.

The quest continues!

 

[moolie]

Curious about the bread bags--I've never seen them for sale (listed as "bread bags" anyway) and we've always just grabbed a few extra produce bags at the grocery store when we've needed bread bags. And we re-use them several times (till they inevitably get torn) before recycling them

 

[Leta]

We buy them from a restaurant (we are friends with the owners). They cost $40/1000. We tried produce bags, but we do big bakes and then freeze things for a good while, so the produce bags just weren't cutting it in the freezer. They work fine for fresh, never frozen bread, but we have a rule against cutting into a fresh loaf- it's so tasty that it disappears way too fast! We are carb addicts as it is, so we really have to watch it.

That's a good reminder, though, because sometimes if I make fresh tortillas and there are leftovers, a produce bag would be a good way to store them.

 

[Living the Simple Life]

Curious about the bread bags--I've never seen them for sale (listed as "bread bags" anyway) and we've always just grabbed a few extra produce bags at the grocery store when we've needed bread bags. And we re-use them several times (till they inevitably get torn) before recycling them

The "day old" bread store usually has bread bags for sale by the roll. They are crazy cheap around here (like 75 cents for a roll).

 

[MyKidLuvsGreenEgz]

Going to watch this thread with great interest. I spend WAY too much money on everything.

 

[dipence71]

An Update:

The biggest switch I've made since the original post is that I have started couponing. On Mondays, DH and I go on a dumpster diving date and rescue newspapers and inserts. I resisted using coupons for years, because most food Qs are for garbage, but then it occurred to me, "I use coupons for toilet paper!".

Since the couponing, I have amassed a year's+ supply of toilet paper. We are almost all cloth, but we keep paper napkins around to clean the cast iron. I realized that, with Qs, paper towels are actually cheaper than paper napkins, and for whatever reason, paper towel Qs are much more common than paper napkin Qs. In order to keep us from the "whee, it's on a roll" phenomenon, I bought the smaller size paper towels and pulled them all apart and keep them in the tupperware container that I kept napkins it (one small size paper towel is the same width as two napkins). So we go thru about one roll of paper towels per month this way. I found Qs for some paper napkins, got three packages, and two 8 packs of paper towels, so we have about 18 months worth. Altogether, I spent about $30 on the paper good stockpile.

I also got three 6 packs of paper towels for nearly free, so I played paper towel fairly with three of my neighbors. That was fun.

I have amassed a year's supply of toothbrushes, toothpaste, and floss for under $10. I have come to realize that I need never spend more than 25c on any of these items ever again.

First aid supplies also consistently have good coupons, so good that regular price less coupon is cheaper than generics. You don't even have to wait for a sale to save a little money.

I got two huge containers of contact solution for $8, and that should last me a year if not two.

I also found good Qs for zip top bags. I spent $29, but I now have about 400 quart and gallon size bags, which will get us through the next two or three years of harvest.

I want to know how anyone can use coupons to get stuff free or nearly free. All I can do is save .50 on a name brand product that if I buy the generic is $1 cheaper anyway...I wish I could figure out how to do it because boy I would llllllllllloooooooooooooovvvvvvvvvvvvvvveeeeeeeeeeeee to!!!!!!!