Going green...

and cutting costs. The economy isn't getting any better so in an effort to save money in our household, i've decided I will try my hand at making a few Christmas gifts. Im starting this year by making kid friendly stuff (because they can't and won't criticize my work). We are celebrating a small Christmas with Daryl's family in IL over Thanksgiving weekend, so I need to have a few of these gifts ready by than. I just hope I can get them done in time. wondering what they are? Well, you'll just have to wait! It wouldn't be much of a surprise for the families receiving these gifts since they read the blog.


Amongst other ways of saving money, here's the short list.

• Cloth diapering: I work Wed-Fri so i'm only doing it part time, and only on Isaac. The sitter will use disposables unless I convince her otherwise. It's going well and I can see the benefits and my babies bum looks pretty darn cute.


• Breastfeeding/pumping


• Plastic on the leaky windows (which really shouldn't be leaking, but we opted for the cheaper windows). And turning down the thermostat.


• Setting a very small monthly budget for groceries and sticking to it. I better go tally up my receipts, it's not looking good this month. You should know that I love clipping coupons, sales and making my dollar stretch as far as it'll go.
  
• Menu planning: Which I need to start up again


• Haircuts at home for Max. The first one went OK (hopefully, he'll let me do it again, I did accidentally clip his ear...oops!)


• Re-using anything and everything possible. Check out http://www.realsimple.com/ to learn creative ways to reuse everyday household items.
• Washing the laundry in cold water and setting the load size correclty. Do me a favor, next time you wash a load of laundry, do as you would, let the washer fill up with water, than look and see how much water you actually need....you'd be amazed at how much water those suckers use and what is actually needed for a load. Turning the load size down just a bit saves a ton of water. My dial goes from small, medium and super...what happen to large?

Im sure there's more, but I thought i'd share just a few.