One of the consequences of having a octogenarian grandmother who is all fancypants and computer-literate, is that you end up getting a lot of email forwards. Yes, Frugal Grandma: I’m looking at you! The jokes, the funny pictures, the PowerPoint slideshows and other dodgy attachments – the lot.

Anyway, this one landed in my inbox the other day, and I thought it was worth copying here:

THE GREEN THING

But isn’t it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn’t have the green thing back then?

I read Frugal Grandma’s email and nodded sagely. “Hmmm”, I thought, “maybe there are some good points here”.

And then I remembered…

…Popping round another relative’s house…

…And spotting this lovely “shoe crate” in a spare bedroom:

It amused me some: in that house, everything goes in the bin as apparently the council in that area “doesn’t do recycling”. Looks like the young’uns shouldn’t be copping all the blame…

Top image credit: epSos.de.

I know we don’t go all out for Halloween on this side of the pond, but in America the decorations have already gone up – and I can’t resist sharing the picture of this fully decked out Halloween house.

These window decorations were made by a couple who have just moved into the house, and who had lots of empty cardboard boxes kicking around… They cut the monsters out of the corrugated cardboard and painted them black. The monsters’ eyes were made from a little tissue paper and sticky-back plastic. The backlighting is the normal house lighting – and with the curtains closed, the monsters can’t be seen inside the house.

These recycled cardboard decorations cost next to nothing – and don’t they look great? I’d happily keep them up all year round, irrespective of what the neighbours would think…

(Via reddit.com.)

Take a bottle of water, some bleach and make a hole in the roof…

I’m not sure how much use this one is in the Western world, but isn’t it the best kind of thrifty idea? I love it.

[Full video]

I promised this recipe in my recent Summer Naturals post. I make a bottle at a time, and it lasts just as long as the supermarket’s chemical equivalent.

You will need:

An empty spray bottle. Ideally, wash and reuse a supermarket kitchen or bathroom spray bottle. But if you don’t have any empty bottles, you can buy them new from the gardening section of the supermarket or haircare section of Boots of Supermarket. They cost £0.99 from the gardening section of Morrisons, for example.

White vinegar. I get mine from Summer Naturals.

Borax. Again, I get mine from Summer Naturals.

Washing-up liquid.

Essential oil. I prefer lemon: it makes the house smell clean and fresh. But really, anything you have knocking about will do.

To make the multi-surface cleaner, add the ingredients to the spray bottle in the following quantities:

- a heaped teaspoon of borax
- two fingers worth of white vinegar
- a tiny dab of washing-up liquid
- 2-3 drops essential oil
- fill up to the top with warm water

That’s it! Screw the lid back on, and away you go – use it just as you would a store-bought cleaner. You’ll find that the homemade version cuts through the grease, grime, limescale etc. beautifully. If it doesn’t, add some more of the white vinegar. In case you are wondering, the esential oil is supposed to stop your kitchen and bathroom whiffing of vinegar after a clean. Either way, essential oil smells so much nicer than bog-standard cleaning chemicals…

Answer: my latest delivery from Summer Naturals! It seems to follow on neatly from this week’s cleaning theme…

I’ve been a Summer Naturals customer for more than three years now. The company sells bulk quantities of natural (and frugal) cleaning products online. I found them after fruitless and time-consuming missions to real-life shops to try and find what I needed. I like Summer Naturals because it stocks everything I need in one place, the pricing is fair and the orders always arrive very quickly. The 5 litre bottles do weigh a lot though, so to keep postage costs down, I tend to bulk order my bulk products. This lot should last me the best part of a year.

So, let’s see what we have in the box…

WHITE VINEGAR (2 x 5 litre bottles)

At the time of writing, a five-litre bottle of white vinegar is £4.64. This is white spirit vinegar, brewed from molasses. Apparently it is food grade but, erm, I wouldn’t. You’d think it would pong more than it does.

How I use it:

Homemade Floor Cleaner (ingredient)
“It costs pennies and works just as well as the relatively expensive, chemical equivalent. The tiled floors also seem to dry more quickly, although I don’t know why that is.”

Fabric Softener
“A cheap, eco-friendly alternative to those expensive bottles of pastel-coloured, sweet-smelling gloop that are piled high on the supermarket shelves.”

Homemade Leather Food (ingredient)
“This keeps the leather just as soft and supple as Leather Food does – and costs next to nothing.”

I also use white vinegar as an ingredient in homemade multi-surface cleaner, and homemade bog cleaner. Apparently I have never written about either on this blog – which amazes me, frankly – so I shall endeavour to correct these oversights and update this post with fresh links in the very near future.

BICARBONATE OF SODA (2 x 2 kg bags)

This is the same bicarbonate of soda you buy in the supermarket in name, but not in nature. Firstly, it isn’t food grade and you won’t find it in the Home Baking section. Secondly, it comes in bags the size of an intercepted cocaine shipment, rather than those piddly little pots. A 2 kg bag of bicarbonate of soda currently costs £4.09.

How I use it:

Cleaning Dirty Ovens (this continues to be one of the most popular posts on Miss Thrifty)

Rescuing Ruined Saucepans
“Have you incinerated its contents into a black, crusty glaze that is resolutely soap-proof? Don’t chuck it! Help is at hand.”

Fridge Deodoriser
I keep a little pot of the stuff in the fridge, to absorb all the odours. Apparently you can also use to absorb carpet odours, Shake N’ Vac style, but we have no pets and we only have carpets upstairs, so I’ve never tried that one.

I also use bicarbonate of soda as an ingredient in my homemade bog cleaner – recipe to come!

SOAP NUTS (2 x 1 kg bags)

Soap nuts, which I use in place of laundry detergent, are priced at £12.99 per kg, and each nut can be reused up to four times. Soap nuts work out cheaper than store-bought detergent – even the budget stuff. Soap nuts are sticky: they grow on sapindus trees in China and India. Despite their eco credentials, there is a strangely industrial smell to them. I started with a 100g “starter pack” and have since graduated to these large bags, which last forever.

How I use them:

Cleaning Clothes
“Forget laundry detergent; put a handful of these nuts into an old sock, chuck them into the washing machine and let them do their stuff. They really work! They are eco-friendly too, being reusable, biodegradable and lacking the potential environmental impact of shop-bought laundry detergent.”

BORAX SUBSTITUTE (2 x 500g boxes)

Apparently the only different between borax and borax substitute is that the latter isn’t suitable for pest control. I used to buy plain old borax, but I’m guessing that it was swapped out for health and safety reasons. It’s a white powder, which Summer Naturals sells for £3.09 per kg. It comes in 500g boxes, which is just as well because once the boxes are opened, the powder tends to clump.

How I use it:

Homemade Floor Cleaner (ingredient)
(Incidentally, I just noticed that this recipe from a couple of years ago specifies half a cup of borax per bucket-load of cleaner. I don’t use that much now – it’s more like a quarter of a cup. Perhaps I’ve become more frugal over the years, but half the quantity seems to work just as well!)

Laundry Brightener
I also add a quarter of a cup of borax substitute to the laundry when I’m washing whites. It acts as a very gentle bleach.

Well that’s my box, top to bottom. Now to unpack… If you have any questions, or if you use these products in additional ways to those mentioned here, please share in the comments!

Shiply saves money: as anyone who books couriers knows, it can be expensive to have your gear transported even a short distance. Shiply prices often come in cheaper, because you piggyback. You are matched up with delivery drivers who have spare capacity and who are already making similar trips across the UK and Europe. The delivery companies bid for your work “along routes they already have planned”. According to the Shiply website, you can save up to 75 per cent by using this service.

It is also an eco-friendly solution: the journey had already been planned by your handpicked transport company, and you are using up spare capacity within the delivery vehicle. So the number of required journey is reduced, as are the carbon emissions. Pat yourself on the back.

It’s great for eBayers: this is what really jumped out at me about the service. You know when you see those AMAZING furniture bargains on eBay – art deco cabinets, 1950s chests of drawers or whatever floats your boat – but they are listed as local collection only and the seller lives several counties away? Well, here’s a possible solution…

Apparently there are more than 345,000 registered users of the Shiply site, more than 27,500 registered transport companies and a new quote request is made every 23 seconds. So if you do decide to give it a whirl, you’re in good company.

If you are feeling super-savvy, there is another company offering a similar service, which may also be worth checking out. uShip has a global reach, which includes the UK and EU, and more than 200,000 service providers.

Shiply.com

Buying Cloth Nappies

Everyone knows that having a baby requires work, time, energy, and money. There are so many different supplies needed, from bottles and formula to clothing and nappies. Many people choose to use disposable nappies for their children. Although they may seem more convenient than cloth nappies, the truth is disposables are very expensive. You may not realize how much money you can save by using reusable, cloth nappies.

If you choose to use cloth nappies, it may seem like a big investment at first. Since you are paying more money for fewer nappies, you may think it is a bad idea. But, you must remember that the nappies you purchase up front are the nappies you will continue to use until your baby is ready for the next size up. You can also purchase one-size-fits-all cloth nappies, which save you even more money.

When using cloth nappies, you will need covers that fit over top of them. Many types and brands of covers are available. Since these too are reusable, the money spent will be much less than if you were to purchase disposable nappies. These covers prevent leaks from occurring and help to hold nappies in place.

Recycling Cloth Nappies

Since cloth nappies are washable and reusable, they can be passed on and used by other babies. This is another huge money saver. Just think, the same nappies used for your first-born can be used by your next baby. That just isn’t possible with disposable nappies. If one baby is all you want or have, you can easily sell your used cloth nappies. They have an excellent resale value, provided you take good care of them. The idea of getting money back for nappies that have already been used is an excellent concept.

Washing Cloth Nappies

If you think that it will cost you great amounts of money to wash and dry your cloth nappies, that just isn’t the case. It is really only 1 or 2 extra loads of laundry each week, depending on the amount of nappies you have. The more cloth nappies, the less loads of laundry. It is best to wash your nappies as soon as your pail is full though, that way fresh ones will always be available. When you compare the cost of washing and drying a couple extra loads of laundry each week to the amount you would spend on disposable nappies, it is definitely in your best interest to choose the laundry. You can save even more money by hanging your clean cloth nappies out to dry in the sunshine.

Other Reasons to Use Cloth Nappies

If you have ever used disposable nappies, you know that sometimes you run out at the last minute. You go to change your baby in the middle of the night, and you realize the nappies are gone. You then must make a special trip to the drugstore. This uses gas to get to the store, as well as money for the nappies once you are there. This may also make for an irritable, sleepy parent. It is so much easier to use cloth nappies, as you will always have them on hand. Just keep up with the washing of your cloth nappies, and they will be there when you need them.

In addition to saving you money, cloth nappies are also better for your baby. Disposable nappies can contain chemicals that may irritate your baby’s sensitive skin. Cloth nappies are almost always made from pure cotton, which is very gentle. Cloth nappies can also help the environment by eliminating disposable nappies in landfills. In the end, you will find that using cloth nappies is definitely to the advantage of you and your baby.

Guest post from Bailey Harris. Bailey writes for www.carinsurancequotes.net, an American site that makes it easy for consumers there to compare insurance quotes.

Image credit: simplyla.

This post was included in the 18th Totally Money Blog Carnival at Prairie Eco-Thrifter.

Giveacar is a social enterprise that organises the free collection and recycling of any car or vehicle, anywhere in the UK. Cars are either disposed of, and the value of the scrap metal donated, or placed into an auction, and the sale price donated.

If you donate your car, you also get to choose the charity to which it is donated. Seventy-five per cent of any money raised goes to the charity, and Giveacar keeps the remainder as an admin fee.

Giveacar works with scrapyards all over the country. It’s a neat idea, which seems to have taken off in the short time since the enterprise launched.

I must admit, I like the hassle-free aspect as much as I approve of the giving money to charity thing. The cars I drive are never going to coin it in at the scrapyard, so getting rid of them is a palaver-and-a-half. With Giveacar, you give them a call; they come and pick your old banger up and spirit it away. Easy!

Giveacar – The UK Scrap Car Donation Provider from Tom Chance on Vimeo.

Lisa Stickley has a eco-friendly, wallet-friendly solution – and has kindly agreed to let me share it with you. Lisa is a seamstress extraordinaire: her fans include Sarah Jessica Parker and Angelina Jolie, and her homewares are stocked by Selfridge’s, John Lewis and Liberty. (Apparently she is also creating a cheaper range for Designers at Debenham, which pleases me greatly.)

Over to Lisa:

There is nothing more infuriating than a tangle of wire coat hangers. Besides, they are not the best things in the wardrobe to look after your favourite silk dresses. These easy-to-make but extremely functional and rather attractive mini coats for those troublesome wire hangers will have your wardrobe organised and stylishly chic in no time. They are also a great way to use up odds and ends of vintage fabric!

THINGS YOU NEED

2 pieces of light or medium weight cotton or silk, cut to size. (Lisa uses a template for this, measuring 42 cm by 14 cm, cut into a hanger-shaped triangle as below.)

1 wire coat hanger

INSTRUCTIONS

Hem the panels

Turn 5mm over to the wrong side along the straight edge and press. Repeat this for a second time so the raw edge of the fabric is concealed. Pin in place. Repeat this for the second panel. Stitch the pressed hems, stitching as close to the inside edge of the turned hem as possible for a neat finish. Backstitch at the start and finish to fasten the seam.

Join the panels

With right sides facing, place the pieces together so the two hemmed edges meet. Starting at the hemmed base, stitch from a to b. Backstitch at the start and finish to fasten the seam. Then stitch from c to d. Again backstitch at the start and finish to fasten the seam.

Add the hanger

Turn the hanger coat out to the right side and press. Fit the coat over the wire hanger, taking the hanger’s “neck” through the hole at the top. Hand stitch the hole at the top with a couple of extra stitches to secure.

Lisa’s hanger coats feature in her new book, Made At Home, which is published by Quadrille and is out this month. Amazon has it, reduced from £16.99 to £11.03. Actually, in its Frequently Bought Together section, Amazon pairs Made At Home with the Cath Kidston book Sew. I have both books and in my opinion, Made At Home is better.  Sew is a pretty book but I have never been inspired to actually make anything featured in it. (Shhh, don’t tell Cath Kidston I said so.) Made At Home, on the other hand, features a jolly good Basic Techniques section, gorgeous photography by Ben Anders and the designs, which range from an egg cosy to a patchwork bedspread, are as practical as they are stylish. I like it a lot.

1. Take your collection of chipped mugs in hand.

2. Find a little plant pot that will fit inside and fill it with compost. If you don’t have one, fill the bottom of the mug with a few centimetres of gravel or stones, and add the compost on top of that. This will help drainage.

3. Plant your seeds. This time round, I chose chervil. We don’t use chervil so much in this country, but I like it: it is like parsley, but with a slight liquorice flavour (nicer than it sounds). Use it as you would parsley. My chervil seeds, by the way, cost nothing – they came from Freecycle.

4. So it’s easy-peasy, quick and cheap – and the prettier the mug, the prettier the plant pot holder you’ll end up with. Hey presto!