No Effort is Ever Wasted

by Katy on January 6, 2010 · 21 comments

Sometimes the tasks of life can loom so enormously, that it hardly even seems worth starting up on them. This can be everything from cleaning out a basement, losing weight or simply getting through those dinner dishes. (The downside of this whole “cooking from scratch” thing.)

My sister Jessica recently moved houses, and since her husband’s in an intensive graduate school program, the task of packing up fell solely upon her. Her old college chum Lisa did take pity on her and spent an afternoon lending a hand. And when my sister wailed that “I don’t even know where to begin,” Lisa offered up this simple, yet sage advice:

“No effort is ever wasted.”

And you know what? This holds more truth than a thousand words of wisdom. It’s not like I haven’t heard this little nugget a million times before, but my sister’s telling of this tale became an ah-hah moment for me.

No effort is wasted.

Sometimes I look around me at what I should be doing, and I just want to crawl into bed with a book. There’s just no way I can complete what needs to be done with the time/energy that I have available. No freakin’ way. But I can get started. And even if I don’t complete the task, I’m still better off than I was before. And often times, the hardest part is just getting the momentum going, at which point I can sail through to the end.

This idea that “no effort is wasted” is probably not anywhere close to new to normal people, but you have to understand that I’m a little behind the times.

Is my ah-hah moment a duh! moment for you? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

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Coin-Girl Meets Dave Ramsey-Girl

by Katy on January 4, 2010 · 6 comments

The following is a reprint of a previously published post. Enjoy!

My regular readers know that even though I masquerade as Katy Wolk-Stanley, mild mannered labor and delivery nurse, I am actually better known as Coin-Girl. Staunch supporter of dropped change and defender of the the under-appreciated copper penny.

But Coin-Girl appears to be suffering from multiple personality disorder, as she is quickly morphing into Dave Ramsey-Girl. Staunch supporter of gazelle intensity reduction of debt and defender of the emergency fund.

I’m holding a garage sale this weekend, with the goal of raising $1000 for an emergency fund. I am fully aware that this goal is most likely unattainable, but a girl’s gotta dream, right? (If I can meet this goal in a two week period, then I’ll be satisfied.)

And all my profits will go into a savings account.

I’m working both tomorrow and Friday, so I wanted to get myself organized nice and early. I started yesterday by bringing some clothing to a consignment shop. They only bought a pair of sandals, but they’ll price them for $20, which means I’ll make $10. This super-cute pair were a $3 Goodwill find that never really fit me, so I consider this to be pure profit. I also sold a trail-a-bike for $25. (Part of Coin-Girl’s powers is to sell a few choice items ahead of time.)

Today I returned an extra packet of clothespins and cashed in bottles and cans. When leaving the store, I glanced at the Coinstar machine, (which I always do, as they’re often a source for free money) and found a whole handful of change. Granted it was mostly Canadian coins, but who am I to turn down a handful of cash? I found four pennies, one of which was a 1930 wheat penny.

Coin-Girl’s powers are awesome and almighty!

In all, I raised $32. This amount is now deposited into my savings account/emergency fund. (A pittance to some, but a fortune to Coin-Girl.)

So who am I? A girl who will stop traffic at the mere glint of a fallen coin, or a girl with laser intensity for an emergency fund and debt reduction?

Let’s just say I did wear a cape while depositing a lot of loose change at the credit union today.

And nobody bat an eye.

Are you working towards a juicy emergency fund? Please share your stories in the comments section below.

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

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How 400 Nickels Can Spell an Afternoon of Fun

by Katy on January 4, 2010 · 7 comments

Today was the last day of Winter break, and unlike years past, we didn’t really do anything extra or fun. This was due to the combination of house guests, work schedules and, let’s face it, inertia.

I was feeling bad about the lack of snowy fun days on Mt. Hood, so I proposed to my son and his friend that I take them to the nickel arcade. This idea was greeted with much pleasure, and I rang my husband at work to share my idea.

“But what about band practice?” was his response.

Oh . . . right, band practice. My son’s yet unnamed band was meeting at the house for a practice at 2:00 P.M. Crap. However, we came up with the plan to start practice early, then drive to the arcade. This would satisfy those who take the band very seriously, (my husband) and my need to feel like I had provided something fun and out of our routine.

After an hour of rocking out, we loaded up the mini-van, negotiating the seating assignment like world class diplomats and turned the key to start our adventure. Or not, as the battery was dead. Double crap.

Although the arcade is only a mile or so from the house, I had planned on swinging by the credit union on the way there as actual cash money is required to pay admission.

Luckily, it was not raining, (which I would say was a minor miracle here in Oregon, but actually it was a major miracle) and the boys were perfectly happy to hoof it. We routed ourselves through Fred Meyer and bought huge cheap $1 candy bars and got cash back from the debit card transaction.

Admission for the five of us was only $9.50, (we had one coupon leftover from last summer’s library reading program) and each kid was handed a five dollar bag of nickels, with an admonition to “make it last.”

And make it last they did, as we spent over two hours at the arcade, playing Skee-Ball, air hockey and shoot-em-up zombie games.

The boys combined their prize tickets and then gave them to my 11-year-old son who bought two ceramic pirate theme piggy banks and a stretchy wrist band.

Even though this can’t compare to an afternoon spent sledding and hiking in the snow, to the kids it was probably just as much fun. They got to have their friends along, goof around as kids and eat as much chocolate as their poor stomachs could manage.

And the total cost was only $33.50, which included the candy. And for five people, that’s not bad at all. (And I found 18 cents on the ground, which counts as my entertainment.)

It was flexibility that made this experience possible. There were so many roadblocks that could have derailed our fun, but an attitude of how can we work around this problem made everything possible. Well, that and 400 nickels.

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

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A Guest Post from Beth Terry of Fake Plastic Fish

by Katy on January 2, 2010 · 13 comments

Hi there. My name is Beth Terry, and my blog Fake Plastic Fish (on which Katy guest posted recently) is not only about finding solutions to the environmental problems associated with plastic but also tracks my own personal plastic waste and plastic consumption.

Collecting Plastic

I’ve been keeping a regular tally since June 2007, and have reduced my plastic waste from 12-1/2 pounds of plastic in the first six months of 2007 to under 4 pounds for all of 2009. By contrast, based on EPA data, the average American generates from 80 – 128 lbs per year, depending on how you do the calculations.

I’m not telling you this to brag, but to ask for your help.

In addition to reducing the amount of plastic waste I produce, I’m also trying to find ways to reduce the amount I consume via durable plastic food containers, Teflon-coated cookware, reusable plastic cups and bottles, plastic-packaged cosmetics, and all the many other vehicles by which plastic can leach chemicals (BPA, phthalates, lead, styrene, perfluorochemicals, and other additives) into my food and onto my skin. And that sometimes means giving away the plastic I already own and buying glass, metal, wood, or even recycled cardboard versions to replace their plastic cousins.

(Of course, I’m not interested in replacing my plastic computer, cell phone, bike helmet, or any of the many other durable plastic items that I already own. But I’m not sucking on those things or rubbing them into my skin either.)

Now I’d love to participate in a “Buy Nothing New” experiment like The Compact. I already shop second-hand stores for clothing, dishes, utensils, and other durable goods. I replaced a broken computer monitor with a used one via Craigslist; I’ve used Freecycle to get plastic cat litter boxes and even cat nail clippers instead of buying those things new and ending up with new plastic products and new plastic packaging; I bought a refurbished mobile phone when I switched phone companies as well as refurbished SmartStrip power strips to save energy; and when I wanted to mow our postage stamp sized lawn, I borrowed a push mower from our local tool lending library.

Here’s where I run into trouble:

  1. Travel mug: Thrift stores are full of every kind of mug printed with every cute expression you can imagine: “World’s Greatest Grandma”, “I Golf Therefore I Am”, “Real Bikers Do It In The Dirt”, to name just a few. But when it comes to travel mugs (which I need because I lost my stainless steel mug, and the glass jar I’ve been using is less than ideal) they all seem to be plastic. Maybe folks are realizing that hot beverages and plastic are a bad idea.
  2. Cookware: Thrift store cookware tends to be either non-stick (plastic-coated) or aluminum, both of which are not healthy. Perhaps that’s why, like plastic travel mugs, they are ending up in thrift stores. Stainless steel pots offered on Craigslist were either too far away for me to travel (I don’t own a car) or lined with non-stick coating. Recently I gave in and bought a couple of 100% stainless steel pots from Macy’s because I just couldn’t find any used ones in decent shape (meaning without big pits or burned spots).
  3. Some plastic-free reusable products are so new that second-hand versions don’t exist yet. For example, in an effort to eliminate plastic dry cleaner bags (and by dry cleaner, I actually mean wet cleaner, which is the eco-friendly way to have someone else clean your Dry Clean Only fabrics) we bought a reusable Clothesnik dry cleaner bag. We got new stainless steel ice cube trays to replace their plastic counterparts. We purchased a whole set of ten Anchor glass refrigerator containers, which were the perfect size for freezing our homemade cat food and easier to store since they are all the same size and stackable. And I replaced disposable plastic soda bottles with a Penguin soda maker and disposable plastic straws with brand new glass drinking straws.

In hindsight, I could have bought fewer new items. Here are a few examples:

  1. My new bicycle. I wanted to find the perfect size and style for me or I just knew I’d never ride it.
  2. A new wooden book shelf that was narrow enough to fit into a particular space in our apartment.
  3. A new compost tumbler. I probably could have waited and found one from someone local who’d given up on the idea of composting. It happens all the time. And in my city of Oakland, we have green bins for food waste that is collected weekly with our regular trash and composted commercially, so there’s really no pressure to compost at home.
  4. Several new books when I was too impatient to wait for them at the library or to find them used.
  5. New organic cotton clothing — just because it was organic and I wanted to support that kind of industry. I could have stuck to used clothing.
  6. Brand new hemp purse because it screamed eco-friendly, and I had a brief moment of caring more about looking the part than being the part.

On the other hand, isn’t it worthwhile to support companies that are producing environmentally friendly products in order to pressure less eco-friendly companies to change their ways? Does avoiding all purchases really allow us to vote with our wallets?

I’d just like your opinions and suggestions. I’d love to try a “Buy Nothing New” month, at the very least. But I might need a little help.

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Proud of This, Less So of That

by Katy on January 1, 2010 · 19 comments

Today’s Oregonian newspaper ran an article titled “Oh, the Virtue! Oh no, the sin!” that “asked The Oregonian’s news staff for the best little green habit that actually have  — but also to admit to the ugly little things they wish they could change.” The result was a listing of the different writers’ virtues, such as using the library, vegetarianism, composting and recycling the toilet paper tubes. The sins included such confessions as tossing recyclable containers when filled with rotten food, long hot showers, excessive driving and cranking up of the thermostat.

I really liked this piece, as it highlighted that not one of us is perfect. Yes, we do our best in some areas, but fail miserably in others. We’re all human.

I would like to see what you, the readers have to say on the subject of frugality. What are you proud about, and what are your ugly little things that you splurge on?

Here, I’ll start:

  • I am proud that I’m able to pay so little for clothing, gifts and household items by only shopping at Goodwill.
  • I am proud that my husband has taught himself how to fix the computer, do almost all household repairs and change the oil in our cars by himself.
  • I am proud that I use my clothesline about 95% of the time in the Summer.
  • I am proud that I was able to use my creativity to find a dozen different ways to add money to savings in 2009, without taking even one cent away from our regular income and debt repayment.
  • I am less proud to say that I have been using my electric clothes dryer lately, as our indoor clothesline is in a dark, cold and creepy area of the house. Oregon = cold, wet and dark. (I have however, asked for a nice laundry rack for my birthday which is on Monday.)
  • I am less proud to have sorted through my mending pile, only to find a lot of clothing that that no longer fits my kids.
  • I am less proud to admit that I receive a free public transportation pass through work, and that I have used it exactly three times over the past 14-1/2 years. To buy this new would set me back $900+ per year! Gulp.

Okay now, it’s your turn. What are you proud and less proud about? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

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A Budget-tastic 2010!

by Katy on December 31, 2009 · 15 comments


I have a confession to make. I consider myself to be a financially responsible person. I rarely make impulse purchases, I pay pennies on the dollar for almost all our household belongings and I’m the master of making dinner at home almost as special as restaurant meals.

But I don’t budget.

I have never felt the need to set financial limits on my family’s spending because we do just fine. But do we really? We aren’t debt free, which bothers me more than I’d care to admit. We are getting this paid down pretty fast, but I do feel that a set budget would probably turbo power our goal of debt free living.

So this is my new year’s resolution:

Set a budget and stick to it. Period.

I ran a quick Google search on “how to budget” which brought back 104 million results. Yes, 104 million. So I should do just fine in figuring out the details of how to do this budget thingy.

I’m no stranger to tracking our spending, as my husband and I have made a few half-hearted attempts at Quicken in the past. But we just weren’t that into it. Without budgetary goals, it really didn’t matter how much we were spending. So, we spent $400 on food? Eh . . . .

So starting January 1st, we will not only track our spending, but will also set a budget for all the different categories.

I’m really looking forward to this resolution, as I’ve turned into quite the money geek and I think it will be a fun challenge.

Have you set a new year’s resolution for yourself? Please share your ideas in the comments section below.

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

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The Guinea Pig Diaries: My Life as an Experiment — A Review

by Katy on December 31, 2009 · 7 comments

The end of the calendar year invariably brings out that side of us that wants to look back and make sense of life. How was this year different from others? Was there anything I should have done differently? And most importantly, (at least to the marketing gurus at Weight Watchers and Soloflex) how can I be better in the coming year?

How can I be a better person?

I just finished reading A.J. Jacobs’ newest book “The Guinea Pig Diaries: My Life as an Experiment” which took over an entire evening and most of this morning. In this book, Jacobs throws himself into a number of experiences that run the gamut from outsourcing all the details of life to a company in India, to practicing “Radical Honesty.” (Which saw him explain in all honesty to a female business colleague that he was trying for a sneak peek of her cleavage.)

I had read both of Jacob’s other books, and had become giddy with excitement when I found this new book at the bookstore. I immediately put it on hold at the library and had been waiting with bated breath ever since.

Although Jacobs writes with self-depreciating humor, he’s not above making real and meaningful change as a result of his stunts, (And yes, they are stunts.) In the chapter when Jacobs, a father of three small boys writes about putting an end to multitasking, (he actually wears a sleep mask while on phone calls in order to cut down on possible distractions) he writes about how his focus on unitasking affected his interactions with his children:

His mission is to pour out all the coins and then put them back. Then repeat. His brothers are working on an equally important task: taking DVD’s out of a drawer and putting them back.

Zane invites me to collaborate with him on this project.

“Help. Daddy!”

I clink a nickel into the slot.

“I’m here with my sons, putting nickels into a watermelon bank.”

I say this sentence out loud, per the Bill Murry Method. I have three sons. They are healthy. They get pleasure from putting coins in a slot. I am overwhelmed with gratitude. Maybe it’s the lingering effects of cold medication, but I start to choke up. A real “Cat’s in the Cradle” moment.

Just outside my brain, three thousand things bark for my attention. My book deadline. Worries about the death of journalism. The invoice to the German magazine I forgot to send. But I’ve put up a soundproof wall. I’m going to put nickels in this watermelon with my son — and that’s all I’m going to do.

It is the perfect undistracted ten minutes.

Yes, he’s taking on these tasks for a book contract, but they leave their stamp on him nonetheless.

This genre of participatory journalism seems to be gaining steam. And I can’t be the only one who snaps them up like fat free donuts at a dietetic police convention. Not Buying It, No Impact Man and Helping Me Help Myself quickly come to mind, and I’m sure I’m just skimming the surface.

So did I take any of Jacobs’ lessons to heart?

It’s hard to say, as I dedicated today to napping and laziness, (nonstop house guests from Christmas Eve until yesterday threw me for a loop!) but I do have to say that when my kids crawled into my nap-tastic bed this afternoon, I gave them my full and focused attention. No multitasking whatsoever. Which I believe does make me a better person.

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

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Fake Plastic Fish

by Katy on December 29, 2009 · 0 comments


Click here to read my guest post over at Fake Plastic Fish, Beth Terry’s terrific blog about the effects of plastics on the environment and living beings.

Enjoy!

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

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What to Do When Your Town Has No Thrift Stores? A Reader Question

by Katy on December 28, 2009 · 12 comments


I received this question from Magdalena in the comments section today, and thought I would let you, the readers, weigh in with your ideas:

We now live in a small town in Ontario, without our own vehicle – and there’s no thrift store! We definitely need new clothes, and I may have to either buy jeans and skirts at a local firsthand shop, or plan to hit the big thrift stores on a trip to a nearby city later in the month. I did get new pajamas for Christmas, since pjs, like underwear, are a little on the personal side.

Does anyone else have this problem – living in a place where secondhand is almost impossible? (Rummage sales take place here about twice a year, not often enough to replace worn items.)

I am lucky, as Portland, Oregon is home to a number of fantastic thrift stores, and finding secondhand goods is a cinch. So this is an issue I have not needed to address in my personal life.

My suggestion would be for Magdelena to reach out within her community and organize a clothing/household/stuff swap. Perhaps even help to start a free shop at her church. Perhaps start small with inviting some friends to her house for a clothing swap.

What do you suggest for Magdelena? Have you been challenged to find second hand goods within a small community? Please share your ideas in the comments section below.

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

{ 12 comments }

Guest Post for Fake Plastic Fish

by Katy on December 27, 2009 · 6 comments

The following is a guest post I wrote for Beth Terry over at Fake Plastic Fish. I worked all day and then attended a family function. I am plumb tuckered and am happy to share something already written. Enjoy!

My name is Katy Wolk-Stanley and I am a diehard member of The Compact, (a worldwide buy nothing new movement) and have been since I joined up in January of 2007. I buy used gifts, I buy used school supplies, Heck, I even buy used sheets.

It may sound like a source of frustration to not be able to walk into a store and quickly grab life’s necessities, but nothing could be farther from the truth. It turns out that much of what I had been grabbing were not necessities, but lots of stuff that were simply wants.

Not buying new has actually freed my life up. Saving not only untold thousands of dollars, but forcing me to make conscious and deliberate decisions about my purchases and how I live my life.

I already considered myself a thrift store aficionado and my house bulged with clutter to prove it. Sure, it was cool clutter, but clutter nonetheless. Cool dishes, cool vintage linens, cool toys, I had it all. Unfortunately I was also buying all the new stuff as well. Combine the two, and something had to give.

A short wire service piece in the local paper in December of 2006 then caught my eye. A small group of San Francisco hipsters had spent the last year buying nothing new and calling themselves “The Compact.” They were shopping thrift stores, bartering and horror of all horrors — simply not buying at all!

“We’re just a rarefied middle-class San Francisco greenies having a conversation about consumption and sustainability.”

I went into The Compact telling myself I would give it a month. What if I needed something? What about family birthdays? A month seemed about right, not too intimidating. I could handle a month.

The first year flew by with very few Compact exceptions. We bought a new glass carafe for our coffee maker as well as gifts for home-stay families that my son and husband would be staying with during a class trip to Japan. Besides that, I really can’t think of much else that needed purchasing.

Not only was I saving money, but I was experiencing a increased awareness of how the buy, buy, buy mindset of society was affecting our lives, our wallets and the environment.

I started to make other changes in my life.

I looked around my house and decided to put a full effort into de-cluttering. I donated to Goodwill a whopping 19 times in 2007, sometimes completely filling the mini-van with the excessive belonging that had been invited into my home.

I slowly began making other changes in my life as well. I began hanging my family’s laundry on a clothesline, I turned my thermostat to 63 in the winter, (which nobody seemed to notice) mixed up my own laundry detergent and make a concerted effort to minimize my driving.

So what does this have to do with plastic? My increased awareness about sustainable living made me take a long hard look at how plastics have crept into my family’s life. Plastics were storing our foods, the kid’s school lunches and drinks; and replacing what had once been constructed from glass, wood and metal. When one of our wooden chairs broke, we were able to glue it back together. But when our plastic lawn chair broke it was transformed into a huge hunk of garbage.

I now try my very hardest to minimize the plastics that enter my home. I send the kids’ school lunches in stainless steel Tiffins, refuse as much plastic food packaging as possible, bring my own reusable bags to the grocery store, (including lightweight produce bags) and have found a local recycler who accepts almost all forms of plastic.

Most of these changes save my family money, but most importantly we’re decreasing our energy consumption, minimizing our plastics usage and living a healthier life. Because The Compact is not about saving money, it’s about sustainability.

Luckily, frugality and sustainability are often one and the same.

Will I ever stop doing The Compact?

Well . . . I’ve actually started buying some new stuff when the big picture outweighs searching out the used. For example, I no longer want to be storing my food in plastic containers. This has meant that in addition to the couple scores of Goodwill Pyrex leftover containers, I splurged on a brand-spanking-new set. But in concordance with my conscious spending mindset, I noted that Pyrex is manufactured in the U.S. using union labor, plus the cardboard packaging was 100% recyclable!

I don’t think I will ever stop being part of The Compact, as my life has greatly bettered and my bank account has mysteriously plumped.

What more could a girl ask for?

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

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