The Non-Consumer Advocate

1. My husband needs to take daily walks as part of his physical therapy, so I grabbed a free coffee coupon that’s been on the fridge for at least three months. The two of us walked the ten blocks to the cafe and ordered a latte to share. (Okay, okay, I drank most of it, but only because my husband had just finished a cup of coffee at home. Are you happy now?) I did throw a buck into the tip jar, but it was still an impressively cheap date. I brought my thrifted ceramic travel mug from home, as I hate to create unnecessary garbage.

2. We then drove to a Goodwill where I scoured the shelves for unrecognized Faberge eggs and original Picasso paintings. I had no luck in this quest, but I did buy a pair of Timberland boots that’ll clean up nicely for resale.

3. The next stop was a 4:15 showing of The Post at a local second run movie theater. I had a two-for-one coupon, which brought the price down to $4 for both of our admission tickets. I also brought two Dum-Dum suckers along as our treat, which were freebies from a restaurant meal that was my father’s treat during my sister’s visit.

   The movie was amazing, although at one point I leaned over to my husband and whispered that “I would have watched this movie for the vintage telephones alone.” After all, my dream job is to be a set decorator or prop master. Which kind of explains why my house looks like it time traveled from a previous era.

4. I finally used up some groceries that I bought for specific individuals while they were home for spring break. This included a bag of pre-chopped broccoli and a one-pound bag of bean sprouts. It takes a bit of forethought to use up random grocery items, but roasted broccoli was a perfect side for a small salmon fillet and the bean sprouts added a nice crunch to last night’s stir-fry. It kills me to not use the food that we’ve paid for, so I do all I can to keep on top of this goal.

5. I didn’t buy a Lear Jet or a vulgar gold-plated apartment in the sky.

Now your turn. What frugal things have you been up to?

Katy Wolk-Stanley    

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

{ 99 comments }

1. I picked up a $10 Waldorf wooden play stand at Goodwill with an eye for resale, as they’re more than a hundred dollars when bought new. This item was not on my radar, (I’d never heard of it before) but it was in the background of a photo I’d posted on Instagram and a couple of my savvy followers were quick to point it out. I don’t have any interested buyers yet, but my experience is that parents of small children are willing to pay a bit more for the type of quality products not sold at Toys R Us.

   I did sell the Thule bike rack that I’d picked up a couple of weeks ago. The used bike rack shop had declined it as it turned out to be an older model, but I still found a buyer through Craigslist.

   I’m scheduled to work three 12-hour hospital shifts this week, which is good since I’ve taken the last two weeks off to spend time with my kids and then my sister and her family while they visited from New York. I’m in an scheduled on-call position where I don’t accrue vacation time, so this was all unpaid. With the recent spring tuition payments and looming taxes, these are lean times at casa Wolk-Stanley. 

2. My husband filled the crockpot with a huge batch of pinto beans, which we’ve been using as the base for multiple meals over the past few days. With the addition of rice, veggies, tortillas and such, we’ve been enjoying a number of frugal, filling and flavorful meals.

   The two of us walked to the grocery store yesterday, and not only did I find a dime and two pennies for my Found Change Challenge, but we enjoyed some cookie samples, picked up a 99¢ half-gallon of milk as well as the Kroger Friday Freebie, which was an date/nut energy bar. I’d planned on picking up some 19¢ Trader Joe’s bananas earlier, but the store was so busy that I couldn’t even enter the parking lot. So yes, I forked over the money for full price bananas!

3. I listed a hairbrush on my local Buy Nothing Group, as it’s one that I never use. (It was a gift.) I try to not own unnecessary duplicates of household items, and the Buy Nothing Group is the perfect way to put my extraneous things into the hands of people who will use them.

4. I took my sister and her son to the Supercuts training center for free haircuts. My sister had expressed interested in getting haircuts while in Portland, so I made the appointments. Their family is on a strict budget at the moment, and both were completely satisfied with the results. The inexpensive salon in my sister’s neighborhood charges $40 for a cut, so this was a slam dunk.

5. I didn’t buy a Lear Jet or a vulgar gold-plated apartment in the sky.

Now your turn. What frugal things have you been up to?

Katy Wolk-Stanley    

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

{ 86 comments }

1. I sold a large macrame wall hanging through Facebook Marketplace that I’d picked up at Goodwill. I immediately put the money into the credit union, as there’s reason to have cash sitting around the house tempting me with its anonymous allure. (I like the trackability of using my debit card, as I can follow exactly where my money is going.)

2. I picked up a groovy vintage suitcase with an eye to upcycing it into a side table. I already have a big bag of vintage brass-tipped tapered legs, and had been looking for the perfect suitcase. The inside features a strong mildew odor, so I cleaned it with antimicrobial wipes and then treated it to a generous spritzing of vodka. I’ve read that vodka is an excellent solution for musty suitcases, so I figured I’d give it a try. (We already had a leftover bottle in the freezer.) I’ll do a full post in the future and let you know if this trick actually removed any stank. I’ve also read that leaving a container of cat litter in a closed suitcase helps to absorb the smell, so I’ll try that as my next step. (I assume they mean fresh new cat litter. 😂🐈)

3. I gave away five bags of unopened Easter candy to someone in my Buy Nothing Group. This woman is always happy to receive candy as she’s a middle school counselor and makes it available to her students who are having crappy days. Which, as I recall, are most days in middle school. (I’d previously given her our unopened Halloween candy.)

   I then accepted a pair of iPhone earbuds from someone else in my Buy Nothing Group, which was perfect timing, as my functional earbuds seem to have been lifted by a certain sticky fingered college student. I like to listen to podcasts while puttering around the house, yet have $0.00 budgeted for anything unnecessary at the moment as we just paid for spring tuition, April rents plus looming taxes. When it rains it . . . holy hell, is that a monsoon?!

4. My sister and her kids have been visiting from New York this week, which in the past has been an expensive endeavor as it entails frequent restaurant meals and bonus touristy activities. However, we’re both budget motivated at the moment, so our excursions have been simple and in the black. Eating meals at home might seem dull, but we’re all in it for the company we keep, not the strangers we impress.

5. I didn’t buy a Lear Jet or a vulgar gold-plated apartment in the sky.

Now your turn. What frugal things have you been up to?

Katy Wolk-Stanley    

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

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Yesterday was the sad last day of my kids’ spring break, so we drove our youngest back to his apartment and bought a Greyhound ticket for our oldest. Thinking we were being clever, we bought the ticket to originate from Eugene instead of Portland as it saved us $42. However, it turned out that the bus had broken down outside Eugene and the timeline was vague at best and featured the line “we’re hoping to get a mechanic up there within two to three hours.” We bit the bullet and offered to drive the extra three hours to get our oldest all the way back as there was the pressing issue of Monday morning classes. Unfortunately, I had convinced my sister and her son to accompany us on our short road trip with promises of fun thrifting/hanging out on campus.

So yes, my sister got to luxuriate in an extra six (six!) hours of driving in addition to the four she signed on for. (My nephew hung out in Eugene with his cousin, and we swung by to pick him up around midnight.) And though the town of Ashland is nestled beneath a beautiful mountain and the main street is filled with adorable shops and delicious restaurants, it was too late to enjoy the amenities and definitely too dark to appreciate any scenery.

How does this remotely fit within the category of a “frugal thing?”

1. I was able to get a refund on the bus ticket, as well as the $70 I spent on a bus ticket last week after my college senior decided to accept a late minute ride. Even though I’d been told that a refund wasn’t possible.

2. We had approximately ten minutes in a Eugene thrift shop before I received the phone call about the broken down Greyhound bus. And in that ten minutes I scored a groovy vintage globe for the perfectly acceptable price of $4.99.

3. We ate a late heavy lunch and didn’t have an appetite for dinner. We did run into the grocery store for snacks, but kept them simple with fruit, carrots, beef jerky and Chex mix. However, we all seem to have what’s now known as a “Chex mix hangover.” So! Much! Salt!

4. Yesterday was Easter, and although I’m Jewish, the Easter bunny still visits my house. I was able to buy all the treats for my kids and their cousins using Goodwill gift cards I had in my wallet. (Before you get too grossed out, our Goodwills have a big ol’ shelf of brand new candy and treats at the register as impulse items.)

5. We didn’t charter a Lear Jet, although I was sorely tempted.

Now your turn. What frugal things have you been up to?

Katy Wolk-Stanley    

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

{ 89 comments }

1. My sister and her kids are in town for their spring break, which overlaps a couple of days with my kids’ spring break. This means we’re a large group of people which can get expensive pretty quickly. However, our mother was generous and treated everyone to lunch yesterday, so I offered to host everyone for last night’s dinner. At first I drew a blank for the meal, but then I realized that the black beans which had been simmering in the crock pot all day could transform into the basis for a “burrito bar” meal. (This was an especially good idea since we have a couple of vegetarians in the family.) I was tempted to run to the grocery store to fill in some holes, but instead I made do with the groceries I already had on hand.

   I cooked up a mess of carmelized onions and then sautéed three-for-a-dollar red peppers I’d previously grabbed from a clearance bin. I grated cheese, chopped lettuce, sliced avocado, threw rice into the rice cooker, assembled tortillas from the fridge and freezer and gathered various salsas and hot sauces from the fridge. In the end we fed eleven people quite nicely and there were no complaints from the guests or my wallet.

2. We made our final double payment for our kids’ university tuition. Our oldest graduates at the end of spring term, (although there are two classes to be taken this summer through Portland Community College.) Our youngest is finishing his sophomore year, so we’ll have two more years of tuition and living expenses for him, but after the two years of both kids in college at the same time, this should be a financial breeze! It’s been a lean few years coupled with maximizing all income opportunities, and I look forward to seeing fatter bank accounts, as well as starting back up on paying extra towards our mortgage.

3. I loaded everyone into the minivan for a Goodwill trip and bought nothing more than a package of underwear for myself. I do have underwear as an exception on my buy-nothing-new list, but thrift stores often have new underwear whose only flaw is that they’re in messed up packaging or are missing a pair. And since this four-pack was $3.99 instead of the $19.99 they’d normally cost, this was a no brainer. Buying from thrift shops not only stems the tide of insane over manufacture of consumer goods, but it keeps my family on budget.

   “Debt free living in thrift store underwear” might have to become the new tagline for The Non-Consumer Advocate!

4. I turned down the brightness on my cell phone, my husband and I finished watching the first season of Star Trek: Discovery using a 30-day free trial of CBS All Access, (so good I might need to rewatch the series to catch the nuance I missed the first time around!) I renewed all my library books, I signed up for another month of hospital shifts, I’m arranging the sale of a groovy macrame wall hanging that I picked up at Goodwill, I had water at lunch even though my mom was paying, I cut flowers from the garden to cheer up the home, I filled out a short application for an hour long panel that would pay $125 and I brought home a pretty chair that a neighbor had put out for free.

5. I didn’t buy a Lear Jet or a vulgar gold-plated apartment in the sky.

Now your turn. What frugal things have you been up to?

Katy Wolk-Stanley    

“Debt free living in thrift store underwear.”

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

{ 70 comments }

1. My husband, son and I caught an afternoon showing of Early Man, which is the most recent stop motion animation film from Nick Park of Wallace and Gromit fame. The admission price was $4 apiece, although the three of us got in for $8 as I had a 2-for-1 coupon. My families loves Wallace and Gromit, and will see anything from Aardman studios. Of course, we always wait for movies to come to the second run theaters.

2. My cousins’ grandmother is turning 98 tomorrow, so I popped a birthday card into the mail for her. She’s always been inclusive with her kindness to my sister and I, and there is nothing more frugal than the cost of a first class stamp from Oregon to Nebraska. Especially since I have a stash of greeting cards that I’ve scooped up from the pay-by-the-pound Goodwill Outlet. Although I do have to admit that I was grossed out to have automatically licked the envelope before remembering that it had come from a Goodwill bin. Blegh!

3. I knew I’d be tempted to take the family out for dinner after our movie excursion, so I marinated some chicken breasts for an easy dinner. I served it over the last of some salad mix I’d picked up at the Grocery Outlet and drizzled it with some of my famous Tea Towel Salad Dressing.©

4. I put together a couple of new Craigslist postings, I’m wearing a cute pair of hand-me-down jeans from my older sister and I lived yet another day with Formica countertops in my kitchen.

5. I didn’t buy a Lear Jet or a vulgar gold-plated apartment in the sky.

Now your turn. What frugal things have you been up to?

Katy Wolk-Stanley    

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

{ 123 comments }

1. My son and I spent the afternoon hitting up a couple of nearby Goodwills. He bought a green sweater and pink dress shirt as he’s been wanting to put together a “Ned Flanders outfit,” and I bought a number of miscellaneous items including:

   – A pair of brand new Smart Wool work socks for my husband.

   – A set of brand new Tommy Hilfiger flannel sheets for my soon to visit nephew. (We’re low on extra twin sheets, since both my kids took sets to school with them.)

   – A pair of Ferragamo pumps to sell.

   – A Thule bike rack, which I’ll sell at an local store.

2. I told my son “we have food at home” when he wanted to drive through Popeye’s (his favorite) while we were out and about. My id desperately wanted to splurge on a treat for him, but my ego was hyperaware of the looming April 1st double tuition deadline. Instead we came home and I sautéed a mess of onions, peppers and mushrooms to create a huge omelette for my husband and son to share. And since the peppers and mushrooms were from the Grocery Outlet clearance shelf, it was a truly frugal meal which ended up winning rave reviews.

3. The Portland Timbers soccer team played yet another away game, as their stadium is being upgraded. I decided to make the at home game is little more fun than usual, so I put together a snacky feast, which I normally only do for the Super Bowl. My plan had been somewhat elaborate, but I slept in and didn’t have time to grocery shop. Instead I served cut apples, carrots, hummus and sausage bits on toothpicks. (Everything’s more fun on a toothpick!) I then set out bowls of dipping sauces for the sausage pieces, which was a huge hit. My husband’s friend was a last minute addition to the fun and there was plenty of food to go around. And the best part was that the sausages were 99¢ per six-pack from (you guessed it) the Grocery Outlet!

4. My husband signed up for a free 30-day trial of CBS All Access so we can binge watch Star Trek Discovery while he’s on medical leave, I’ve been reading a library copy of Goodbye, Things: The New Japanese Minimalism, I’m wearing a 100% thrifted outfit today, (including socks and underwear!) I found two pennies on the ground as well as a cute purple pony tail holder, I saved the plastic bags that the aforementioned clearance shelf veggies came in for my friend to use as dog poop bags and I potted up some spider plant babies which I’d pinched off a plant at my father’s house.

5. I didn’t buy a Lear Jet or a vulgar gold-plated apartment in the sky.

Now your turn. What frugal things have you been up to?

Katy Wolk-Stanley    

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

{ 83 comments }

1. My husband really needed a haircut, yet wanted something beyond the normal buzz cut that I’m able to provide. He’d snuck out to a dude salon a month or so ago which ended up being both expensive and a dreadful haircut. I called up the Free Haircuts Portland, Oregon people who do the continuing education for Supercuts and they were able to book him an appointment that afternoon. My husband was pretty nervous about being the guinea pig in yet another of my frugal schemes, but I assured him that I’d been there before and had received a great cut. In the end my husband received an amazing haircut, which we both agree is the best cut he’s had in years, possibly decades.

   This may seem like a Portland specific frugal tip, but Supercuts is a national chain, which means that your area should have a similar opportunity for free haircuts. Just call your local Supercuts and ask!

2. We stopped at Goodwill on the way home from Supercuts-ish where we both scored a single great item. For my husband it was a fancy fold-up soccer goal for $40 that normally costs $150, and for me it was a $7.99 vintage wrought iron plant stand that perfectly fits a cute McCoy planter that I already own.

3. I’m taking the next two weeks off from work at the hospital so I can enjoy my kids being home from college and then my sister visiting with her kids from New York. I won’t receive any pay, but March was an extra paycheck month, so it’ll kind of even out. The next double tuition payment (approximately $8400) is due April 1st, so I’m keeping a tight eye on our bank balances. (Who am I kidding, I always keep a tight eye on our bank accounts!) I know that there will be a lot of eating out and entertainment expenses during my sister’s visit, so I’m locking down the budget in anticipation of these vague extra expenditures. How does this play out in real life? Tonight’s dinner will be a “burrito bar” which means that I threw approximately 30¢ of Dollar Tree pinto beans into the crockpot and last night’s dinner was homemade pizza with carmelized onions and sketchy freezer pepperoni as toppings.

4. I sold my curbside dining chairs that I’d hauled home and scrubbed to perfection, I sold a huge lot of brand new thrifted shoelaces on eBay that I think I’d had listed since last summer, I brought my own food to work even though the meals were a bit hodgepodge and I’m going to be able to put out free extra yard debris (I’ve been pruning our hydrangeas) while my neighbors are on vacation for spring break.

5. I didn’t buy a Lear Jet or a vulgar gold-plated apartment in the sky.

Now your turn. What frugal things have you been up to?

Katy Wolk-Stanley    

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

{ 91 comments }