I am ALWAYS trying to find some easy, simple ways to Save money on everyday things. As you all know I use Coupons on anything there is a coupon available for. From groceries to retail shopping, restaurants, appliance shopping and even things like my oil changes and home improvement/repairs. You would be amazed as to how many coupons are available for all sorts of things in life.
I also cut back on monthly bills. We reduce and remember to do things like recycle (this allows me to get the .05 deposit I pay per bottle of soda). Read more on how to save money on your monthly utility bills HERE
My husband and I also try to save money by DIY (doing it yourself). We saved money in the years past by painting our own home, installing our own new toilet, and more. Check out some creative ways to save money by DIY HERE
Now let's get to why I created this post. LOL. I have even more SIMPLE ways to save some money in your daily life.
TIP #1
We live in a condo, which means that we have to share our laundry facility and we also have to pay $1.25 per wash and per dryer load. For a family of 4 (with 2 very active children), that money adds up week after week. There are times that the laundry adds up and a load here and there gets put in that might be a bit too large for the dryer or sometimes our dryer tends to not dry clothes in one cycle. So that also will make our "laundry" bill a bit larger. If you wait for the dryer cycle to end and then notice that your clothes did not dry completely you will have to pay an additional $1.25 to run the dyer again for 55 minutes. BUT..if you check on your load of clothes before your 55 minutes is up you can add an additional .25 and it will add an extra 10 minutes to your dry time. As long as you don't let the dryer time run out completely you can save money by just adding an extra quarter, which you most likely would only need that extra 10 minutes of dryer time to get your clothes completely dry. This tip may not be needed for everyone, but for those of you who use the laundromat, this tip may help you.
TIP #2
This next tip is something I am surprised as a seamstress I didn't think of a long time ago. I have 2 young children and it gets rather expensive to buy them new pajamas season after season cause they have outgrown the ones from the year before. What I do now is I take their winter cotton pajamas, ones similar to Disney PJ's or even Carters or Gymboree PJ's and I cut them. I know sounds crazy right, but here is what I do. My daughter is currently in a size 5 and she still will be a size 5 when its time for spring/summer pj's. So instead of me going out to buy her pajama short sets. I just take her already loved long pants and long sleeve shirt winter pajama sets and cut them into shorts and short sleeve shirts. Then I just sew a hem on the sleeves and shorts and we are good to go. Don't get me wrong, we do buy new clothes for the kids, but doing this means I just have to buy less.
TIP #3
What do you do with your ratty old t-shirts? Do you just toss them out? Well your throwing money away! We use them in this house as rags to help clean around the house and I even cut them up and use them to clean the inside of the car. Which is great, especially in the winter, cause it would take a whole roll of paper towels to clean the inside of our mini-van. Cut up all your old t-shirts, instead of tossing them and put them to good use. Soon it will be spring cleaning time and you won't have to worry about using up your last roll of paper towels or having to run out to get some.
TIP #4
I love birthday and Christmas time! Not just for what's inside all those gift boxes and bags, but its the actual bags and tissue paper that are great. Saving tissue paper you receive inside gifts will save you money in the future. This way you can use it to wrap all those presents you will be handing out throughout the year. I have a large bag in our pantry that has various gift bags, ribbons/bows and tissue paper that we have gotten and will re-cycle and re-use to give to others.
If you just utilize 1 or 2 of these simple tips you can save yourself at least enough money for a great family dinner out, but I am sure you could save alot more.
