Pinching Pennies

I read this post about paying off $35,000 in debt (as linked to from here), and this quotation really struck me: "I committed myself to living like a poor person because — and this is something many people with debt don’t understand — that’s exactly what I am."

We have some credit card debt, as well as student loans, which we are working on aggressively paying down (hopefully off!) over the next six months or so.  I don't consider us "poor" by any means, but we do live leaner so that we can pay our debt off, and I'm sure many people would consider some of the things we do to be "living like a poor person".

So, instead of my weekly coupon shopping post this week, here are some ways I've been pinching pennies lately:

Using coupons. I didn't do much coupon shopping this week, but I did use a free drink loaded to my Starbucks card to save $4.63 on my mocha. I also used a few printable coupons to save $6.50 off of two big bags of M&Ms at Target.

Making homemade turkey broth. We had a turkey for our Christmas dinner, and after Jesse carved it, I put the carcass in my big stockpot with some leftover veggie peels and ends, and let it simmer all evening.  I was able to get 13 cups of broth, plus 2 cups of cooked turkey pieces that fell off the bones, which I'll use for soup.  This was all free from something that would have just been thrown out anyways.

Air drying laundry. Almost every week, I air dry at least one load of laundry.  Each load costs $1.00 or so to dry, which adds up over time.

Mending pants with a sock. Matthew had worn through one knee on his sweatpants, so I was trying to figure out what to patch it with. I had some sport socks that I had pulled out of my drawer because I didn't like how they fit, so I cut a rectangle off of one and sewed it underneath the holes in the knee. 

It's a soft material, so he won't notice a difference, and he'll get some more wear out of his pants. I also fixed his winter hat, my sweatshirt sleeve, and a few t-shirts with armpit holes.  This gets us more wear out of clothes that are mostly fine, so we don't have to replace them.

Emailing potential blog sponsors.  I sent an email to a company that has sponsored a blog post in the past, both in an effort to get a free product for myself that I will use, and also to get new content for the blog (and maybe a giveaway for you!). It doesn't take too much effort to send an email, and I figure the worst that can happen is they'll say no and I'll have to purchase the product if I want it.