Five Big Frugal Things!
by Katy on May 17, 2025 · 8 comments
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I stopped by Safeway for a couple of items this afternoon, specifically cheese. However, $11.99 is an uh oh price, so their “Member Price!” was hardly a bargain. However . . . I’m a true Oregonian and Tillamook brand cheddar cheese is a must. I reluctantly put it in my cart, but then noticed that eight ounce packages were priced at $1.99 apiece. The limit was four, so that’s what I bought. Last time I checked, $7.96 is better than $11.99 for the same 32-ounces of cheese. $4.03 better!
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My husband and I drove across town to run a few errands yesterday and made sure to stop at a Starbucks for his free birthday drink. We chose their biggest size so we could split it.
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I finally found the missing charging cord for the rechargeable Black & Decker vacuum cleaner that my youngest used in their college apartment. It’ll now go to my daughter, whose ex-roommate stole hers. This was a thrifted vacuum and although I don’t remember exactly how much I paid for it, I do remember that I bought it from the Albany, Oregon Goodwill, which is one of my favorites. So probably a real bargain.
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I went to the last half hour of the neighborhood cleanup event where everything was free and brought home 33 fuchsia starts! I’d deliberately kept my backyard whiskey barrel unplanted as the area is shady and I figured that something would present itself.
The best part is that the barrel was free from Buy Nothing, the potting soil was free from Fred Meyer and now I’ll have a beautiful pot of free fuchsia!
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I also brought home a huge Ball jar for food storage, a variety of organic Burpee vegetable seeds, an organizer bin with four pennies in it and some jar labels — all for free! We also donated a men’s bicycle and a computer travel bag.
Katy Wolk-Stanley
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”
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{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
So many good finds! And a good reminder that the largest size isn’t always cheapest.
1) I hadn’t checked my points in awhile on the Safeway app, the health portion. I have it linked to my fitness tracker so I earn points every day for meeting my step goal and then Safeway lets you redeem them for certain free items or money off. I used my points to get a free jar of peanut butter, a free bag of frozen corn, and $2 off two separate types of cheese sticks.
2) My neighbor texted me saying that her son had a formal event the next day and she just realized he had nothing to wear. She asked if she could borrow any dress clothes from my son. I brought over a bag and she found a button up shirt, blazer and tie that all fit him and was so happy, both to save the money and not have to rush out and spend time looking for these things. We have the same age kids but reversed genders (so she has an older girl and a younger boy and I have an older boy and younger girl) so she has helped me in the past by giving my daughter clothes that her daughter outgrew. I’m so happy to help a neighbor, and happy to share dress clothes, since they barely get worn much anyways, makes more sense to share them!
3) We just finished dogsitting for my uncle, saved him money and free entertainment for my kids who enjoyed walking her and taking turns feeding her and refilling her water bowl. They are now advocating for their own dog but I think we are still in a dogsitting phase of life right now.
4) We went to the library to refresh our book supply. They have a 3-D printer there set to make little toys and they rotate what it can print. Right now it’s Star Wars so my son got a 3-D printed baby yoda and my daughter got Chewbacca. My son also discovered that he gets 25 free prints a day with his library card so he was looking up train pictures and printing those out. As another bonus, there was a dog in the children’s area, as part of a program for kids to read to a dog. Neither of my kids wanted to read to the dog but they did enjoy petting him (the theme this week seems to be enjoying other peoples dogs for free rather than getting our own!)
5) I’m not much at sewing but a pair of my son’s pants have a hole in the pocket and he’s refusing to wear them because of that (he doesn’t put things in his pockets, he just doesn’t like that there’s a hole there) So I’m going to try mending the hole, at least it won’t be visible so it can look ugly, just needs to close the hole.
So good to lend out the “formal” clothes!
And yes, the inside of the pocket doesn’t matter.
I’m currently working a lot of overtime this month. Eating leftovers, avoiding eating out, and just hanging on until things get a little more normal.
Dh fixed the door latch, a.c. and shift tube on my farm truck. Hopefully we can make it to 300,000miles.
Our garden is coming along. The hens are laying. I will order meat birds soon. Most will be sold but I will order extra to raise for home use. The chicken shelter needs some work but I have the materials on hand. Now, to make the time to make the repairs…
Wore a thrifted dress and shoes to a friend’s wedding.had a blast!
@Laura MO – I think we’re all in for a long wait for things to get a little more normal.
1. Every year our local university sponsors a “Truely Free” sale. For the first two hours of the selected Saturday in May, people (not just university affiliated folks) can drop off items to give away. Volunteers arrange the items and then a few hours later the masses are allowed in to take what they want. The number and variety of items is mind boggling. Today the riches included any small kitchen appliance you might desire, as well as an almost new washer and dryer combo, bikes in various states of repair and disrepair, furniture, vacuums, lights, TVs, DVS players, clothing, books, packaged food items like ramen and cans of soup…the list goes on. No haggling, no money exchanges hands and at the end of the day the leftovers are taken to Salvation Army or, if too yucky, to the dump. I think it is one of the most wonderful community services the university performs. You give and you receive to whatever degree you want or need; hundreds of people show up and many of the items are thing college kids might throw way if not for this event. We don’t need anything but I did pick up some puzzles and an unopened package of tea my husband likes that sells for $53 a pound (!?). I buy that tea as a treat for him by the ounce, not the pound!
2. Has four doctor appointments between the two of us this week. Came home with free drug samples of meds we already take but will happily accept free ones; our docs know what we are like and one of them said frankly a lot of the samples get thrown away after sitting in the supply room for a year.
3. Also came home with four bottles of water, one from each visit. I will not turn away free water that I can add to our earthquake supply area.
4. Someone offered freezer burned salmon on the free FB site. I took it for the dogs, although it looks pretty good so I might see what humans could consume before the dogs get it. I am not too proud to eat dog food if it is okay. (Which reminds me that when I was a kid my grandmother was thrilled to find canned meat for stew…yup, she could not read English and depended on the picture of meat on the dog food can. No one died, although I think it only happened a few times before my father figured it out. Luckily one of the firs things they teach in English classes is words like dog and cat!)
5. Took on a USPS mystery shop because I had a package to mail. They don’t pay much but they do cover the postage and a bit more so are worth doing.
Much like your cheese score, I discovered that the smaller bags of dog food are cheaper than the larger ones this week, due to a sale. We go through about 120 pounds of dog food a month, so we took advantage of the sale by
buying 300 pounds of dog food. We had just had covid boosters, so we each had a coupon for 10% off our bill. We made sure to divide the food up to use both coupons to the max. We also got a lot of fuel points for future gas.
5.
I look forward to seeing pictures of your fuschia plants when they are full grown and wow, love that moss on your patio stones – gorgeous! I am a mason jar fan – love that huge Ball jar!
Sorry for those CAPS in my name above- it seems like I am screaming it.
1. Went with my sister on a free tour of our Federal Reserve Bank as part of Doors Open Minneapolis. Free parking as well.
2. Used up a geriatric jar of horseradish in homemade veggie dip.
3. Received 32 hamburger buns from Buy Nothing. Froze them and have been pulling them out for sandwich bread, toast, French toast, croutons, breadcrumbs and veggie burgers.
4. Made a strange (even for me) sandwich out of the last piece of sourdough bread, bean spread, some starting-to-wilt lettuce, the remaining steamed asparagus, and some shredded cheese, broiled until melted. Actually pretty tasty.
5. Spent $110 to fix a free lawnmower, so we still came out ahead. (Tip: If you need to get rid of a nonworking lawnmower, see if your local hardware store will take it. While my husband was waiting for our mower, someone came in and donated theirs for parts.)