Tips on Stretching your budget. Please share yours as well!

This one I've been doing for years, since I started working as a teenager.  By that time (through adoption) my family was 12+ & I hated dry milk & was tired of my little brothers drinking up the milk I bought in a day.   One of my brothers caught me in the act a couple of years ago & was shocked when I told him, he told the rest of my siblings & of course they were shocked as well. 

Full milk can be watered down 3-4 times. 2% once.  Save your gallon jug & do one par****er & one part milk.   This works with Orange juice as well.

Replace cooked rice in place of crackers or breadcrumbs for meatloaf.

Use a tablespoon of vinegar to make buttermilk.

Replacing water for milk in pancake & cornbread ready mixes do not impact the consistancy or taste.

Aldis is the STOCK UP store!

Buying clothes?  Inspect it thoroughly.  If you find a flaw, tear or blemish you can correct or live with ask for the store manager, point out the defect & ask for a discount.  Don't be afraid to haggle a little!

Shop clearance first!! Shop clearance racks for clothes & clearance endcaps/ clearance sections.

Need shoes?  Great time to buy is during BOGO sales, such as Payless, Shoe Carnival & Famous Footwear.  BOGO applies to clearance, which makes these sales even sweeter!

Need spices?  Dollar General (their brand 2 for a $1) & Big Lots (under $1 ea) are great for this.  I do not suggest getting spices at dollar stores unless they are hard to find (i.e. marjarom or saffron) or are bulk size.

A lot of dollar stores are selling refrigerated foods along w/condiments or ingredients that are much more expensive at normal grocery stores..ie. pie fillings, olives, roasted peppers, steak sauces, coffees, dry cereal.....

Save money, make your own ****tail sauces, bbq sauces & pasta sauces from tomato paste or ketchup.

Shop at stores who will price match their competitors. 

You can usually stack a store's inhouse coupon with a manufacturer's coupon for additional savings (i.e. walgreens, target, cvs)

Save receipts & pricetags, if something goes on sale, take it back & ask for the price difference.
 

Girl,you are always on the ball,The softsoap dispensers,when mine are empty,I use the shampoos from hotels we collect and put it in the dispensers in all my bathrooms and in the laundry room I fill one up with laundry detergent and use for hands,same with the little lotion bottles,I also use all my soap when they get real small in a container with water and let them melt and use it in dispensers also.I have six grands and I am a fanatic when it comes to washing your hands.LoL I am from Jersey and of course in Atlantic City qiute a bit and have quite a collection of shampoo and lotions.Oh yes and the conditioner is really good for shaving those unwanted hairs if anyone has that problem.I know I do.LOL

Hey Marilyn, great tip about the hotel toiletries.  I generally stay at hotels that use the name brands i.e. Hilton for Eveylyn & Crabtree, Wnydham & some Holiday Inns for Bath & Bodyworks, Some Hyatts for Aveda.   I will rumage the maid's carts for the body lotions & body washes if they're not there & if they are, I will tip them nicely to give me several bottles.  Then i will take them home & use them as part of my toiletry kit for future trips, as they are the right size to meet the TSA requirements for carryon liquids.   This kit also includes the free sample sized toothpastes & deodorants that we get.

I will also use the bodywashes to fill up old bath & bodyworks bodywash containers.  Summer before last, I had so much Evelyn & Crabtree bodywashes, I filled up a 160z container twice, gave several away & still have some left now, all for a $5 tip!

I have also used these to make up nice toiletry sets as gifts.

I will also use the shampoos in the soap dispensers or as a bodywash as well.

Save gas by filling all the way up....no half stepping...take advantage of discounts by using club cards...like Sam's and Giants (grocer in our area). With enough points I have saved up to .40 per gallon

Buy Bonus Books for entertainment and meals out...take advantage BOGO coupons.

Pull out coupons that you KNOW you will use out of the newspaper otherwise you are really throwing the money away

As you lose weight, find a very nice consignment shop....wear the clothes as long as they fit and then reconsign once they are too big...get most of your money back.  I found one....a lot of clothes still have price tags on and are very fashionable.

Purchase a "b" used smaller vehicle so that you can get the multi-car discount on insurance...put the wear and mileage on your "b" car and keep your "a" in better shape and keep value with less mileage and nice condition at trade in. 

That's all for now. Good thread...I will be peeping.  

   

Awesome post!!!  I have a few tricks.  I no longer buy paper napkins and also buy paper towels. Lots of people do, but I now only use paper towels. They are stronger and serve multiple purposes.

Also, I have a tons of uses for the plastic shopping bags from the grocery store.  I use them as trash bags in my smaller trash containers in the house and I keep a few in the car for when we have trash to get rid of.  Why buy trash bags when you can reuse the plastic bags from the store.  They're great for little kids at the church Easter egg hunt or at Halloween for candy.  They are also great for disposing of dog poop in the yard or on a walk.  They are great for lining diaper pales as well (if you do it the old fashioned way like I did and have a diaper pale and not a diaper genie:) I always hated when people put nasty baby poopie diapers in the trash in my kitchen!!! Ewwwe! 

I also water down fabric softener.  Using the same technique as the milk container, I save an old softener bottle and dilute it half water/half fabric softener.  I find that the new scents are really over powering and this really helps with that as well.

I regularly hit the dollar store for dusting spray, dish soap, bleach, baby oil ( I use in the shower) and as fast as the cookies get eaten my house, especially when my daughter boyfriend is here,  I buy the mega bag at the dollar store.  I stock up on spices and some canned good there as well.  Every little bit helps.

Gigilani, I thought this was a great post! I popped in to read it, but happily have been doing them all except one! i.e., paring down whole milk 3-4 times, 2% one time!!!! That's something I truly never thought of doing, and it's a really good thing! Especially since now my NUT wants me to use Skim Milk only, BUT my husband hates anything fat-free, sugar-free, caffeine free, you get the picture. So instead of buying two different kinds of milk, I can buy one. Oh and by the way, 

ALDI'S rocks! My go to store, plus it's in walking distance too....Whoeeeww.... 

PS: have you ever tried their Fit&Active line of foodstuffs? I love their water, the Mango Tropical is light tasting, but the lemon, strawberry, and cranberry, I mix it with water and that makes having 2 bottles instead of one, for 59 cents!



 

Girl, as long as you don't let hubby catch you doing it, he won't ever suspect a thing. :-)

I've tried the dried fruits & the rice cakes & the pizza pockets, all good.  I'll have to try their water.