Shrinking Footprint

This is our trash - for a week.

I've always been a recycler and a yard work junkie, so when we moved in to our new neighborhood I was pleased to find out that there was once a week curbside yard waste pick up, garbage pick up, and recycling pick up. It's pretty intricate compared to other places I've lived because without the separation of these things, well in to the trash everything goes for most people.

In the last few months I've decided to start including our banana peels and apple cores in with the yard waste. I'm a yard work nut so there's always pine tree droppings and the like that I get rid of every week. Well now we mix in most food products like egg shells, unused fruit or veg, and things that have gone bad or unused like bread or cheese. 

This has significantly reduced our garbage needs.

We also recycle religiously. Which in itself recycling is a great way to teach your child about materials and identify the associated types and textures of glass, metal, and plastic. And yes, we recycle everything plastic straws, cup lids if we've stopped and gotten a drink on the go. Anything that we can recycle we will.

It leads to an interesting dilemma though. My garbage bag is less than half full for one week of household waste. That parts not the dilemma though. The dilemma is that the garbage bag is mostly filled with plastic bags from product packaging. I dont believe it's recyclable but I need to find out. I suppose I could start collecting it and put it in the bag recycling bins found at some grocery stores - but I dont know if it will be reused or tossed. 

My next quandary is how to dispose of cooking grease in a way that is more friendly. I usually soak it up with paper towels then throw it in the bin. We're not giving up meat, so I need to find a better way to tackle this issue. Bones from meat are also an issue. I know they are biodegradable but because of our neighborhood cats and raccoons, I'm afraid that they'll knock over the garbage and choke on a bone. My innern einer frau just comes out at the weirdest moments....

After watching a video about a zero waste household, which only produced 1 quart of garbage a year - I though, I can do better.

Zero Waste Family

The family also has a blog on blog spot!

http://zerowastehome.blogspot.com/

Purchase Research

Have you ever paid for something and the moment when money from your hand goes in to the cashier's hand your heart sinks a little? Ok, well I do. This summer is mostly being spent in preparation for the accelerated night class I'm taking for the summer B semester, it starts this Thursday, and most of all Fall where I will be taking a night class and my son will be starting kindergarten. For these events we both have material needs that need to be bought. Let me say it's daunting to see the full price cost of items. A new graphing calculator is 109 dollars at Walmart. A book for my next class with an online code 231 dollars at the college book store. School uniforms for my son, each shirt full price is 12.99, shorts 12.99, pants 14.99. Eesh!!! 

No wonder most Americans are broke!

If I paid full price for everything I'd have no discretionary spending left or even grocery money at the end of the week. Something I've been getting better at is not paying full price. I coupon, I clearance shop, I barter, and I do a lot of work myself. Another way to save is to buy used and save the difference. I do this by looking at alternative retailers and sellers. It takes some research, but you save so much on your purchases. So here are the items I saved on this week and how I bought them. 

My neighbor and I were talking and she suggested I look on Craigslist for a used graphing calculator. Bingo!! 80 dollars, and it's a Silver Edition TI-84, this is like chrome for geeks. 

A used text book with online code at the competing non college operated book store across the street from campus 124.98. The same 'package' was over 200 dollars at my campus bookstore.

Gently loved uniforms on sale at my son's school, 5 dollars a piece!! The tops and bottoms are embroidered with the school name and logo, so they have to be bought at a particular store with a set price list. This store offers no discounts, sales, or coupons. I was able to buy 15 different pieces at the schools resale and didn't have to pay tax! Score!!

Savings

Book 231 - 124.98 = 106.02

Calculator 109 - 80 = 29 (plus tax)

Uniforms 194 - 75 = 119.85 (plus tax)

Total Saved = 254.87

Full price = 427.98

My price = 254.87
Percent Saved = 40.5%

Sometimes people see a price and think, this is the cost, I must pay this. But goods and services can be obtained for less than the original asking price. So if you're short of ideas on how to save money on a particular thing talk to a friend. My neighbor helped think of places to look for a used graphing calculator. The enrollment counselor at my son's school mentioned the uniform sale. My girlfriend suggested Amazon when I told her the price of the book. It never hurts to talk to people about things, often times they have great ideas. 

Three steps closer to meeting all the needs we have for August!

School Supplies, Check

And the school supply shopping is done!! 

I stocked up last year on all the sales and freebie items I could get, patiently putting away extras. Last night was the culmination of my sales shopping last year and two shopping trips this month. Full price everything on the table spread is about 84 dollars plus tax. I bought store brands for several things and couponed and sales shopped some others, so my total was less than that by a good deal. I'm still amazed at how much the school system asks for. 

When speaking to friends on Facebook about the back to school supply lists we all commented how they were very lengthy. One mother said it was her belief that schools will ask for more because they know some parents wont bring in supplies. So for the parents that do, they're compensating for the parents that dont. I thought about this long and hard and found myself in agreement with my friend. Some parents are in a difficult place to provide. As a single mother it's not easy to spend discretionary money on school supplies when there are other wants like going out and treating ourselves, but I choose to see school supplies as a need not a want and know to differentiate between the two. Much like parenting is a choice, parents must further choose to commit themselves to the education their child is receiving, and help and enable the school and teachers to do their best. If me providing these items helps with the goal of providing my son and his classmates with the best environment possible to learn, I feel it is my duty to willingly provide them with a kind heart. 

Now that the supply list is double checked and packed in bags ready for delivery there's still more to do! All documents and coppies of medical records have been submitted, all paper work has been signed - registration is done. Check. School supplies bought. Check. Entry testing done. Check. Now to buy school uniforms and the agenda his school requires. This is a public school, but some public schools here have uniforms. To save on the cost of uniforms we're going to the school shop where they resell uniforms for 5 dollars a piece. My mother encouraged me to go as soon as possible because when they're out of his size, they're out. So that's on my agenda this week. After dropping off the supplies and buying the uniforms and a school agenda, my next goal is to pre pay for aftercare and school lunches for a month or two. 

Being a mom is a lot of work!!!

Decluttering

I've been quiet lately. I've been busy lately, and I've been tired lately. I finished my night class a month or so ago and I was completely burned out. Being a single mother, working full time, maintaining the house and yard, cooking, cleaning, groceries....it's all on my plate. Would you believe it if I said sometimes I wish I had a little more help and a lot more relaxation?

I chose the name for my blog because I was inspired by another blog Blissful and Domestic, and from that website I realized I could do a lot more with what I had. Maybe I had lacked the creativity or determination I needed, and I would read and see Danielle's posts about how she makes the most of things and I felt inspired. I thought I need to build on my own bliss. I have a wonderful little boy, two furchildren, a great house, a great job, and some great friends. Things are pretty good for me, I just have to choose to see them that way. 

Something that creeps up on me however is clutter, and the more it builds the less I like addressing it. Last week I decided to thoroughly clean one thing a day or night. Last weekend I went through my son's closets where we keep toys, books, VHS tapes, and DVD's. There were some books that weren't donation worthy and some toys that were broken, those landed in the garbage or recycling bin. Some he has grown out of with age those are in a bag for me to bring to a coworker with a younger child. The rest are neatly organized. The DVD's however were a real problem. There were so many there was no way I could really fit them in the bookshelf with the other media, they had to be on top in large piles, unorganized and just waiting to fall over and make a mess. 

I read an article once that explained it's unfair for parents to clutter a child's room with hand me downs, too many gifts, too many clothes, too many things, and then expect the child to keep it meticulously organized and clean when it really appears less like a child's room and more like a hoard of junk shoved in a clown car. I'm fairly sure my son's closets were heading to the circus. We had 100+ DVD's. It was just too much. I bought a binder and got to work!

My oldest child was on the scene to help. <3

This picture doesn't even show the entirety of the collection. Some boxes had two or three DVD's. It was insane. As much as I love the cover art. The collection needed to take up lass space physically. 

There were still a few more cases I emptied after I took this picture. It's strange parting with them all. But the amount of space we've regained in my son's room is amazing and worth it. Why cling to containers when the good stuff takes up so little space?

The final product. A binder with a capacity for 97 discs. It had three and a half pages of space left, this means I put 91 DVD's in this thing. Talk about a space saver. I left some Disney movies in their cases....because well, Disney. LOL. I'm not perfect. But in the last week I feel better for making out living space more livable and getting rid of things that clutter instead of enhance our space.

This week I have successfully built on bliss.

Banana Nutella Muffins

I was reading through the new issue of All You Magazine and came upon an interesting twist on banana bread, a banana Nutella nut muffin. I had some ripe bananas and I knew it was a good time to give this recipe a whirl. 

BEFORE

AFTER

I couldn't find the recipe on the website, so I've typed it out. But to get more recipes from the magazine just take a look! All You Magazine

Banana Nutella Muffins, Recipe from All You Magazine

Ingredients: 
1 cup all purpose flower
1 cup whole wheat flower (if you dont have use all purpose flower)
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
8 tbsp (1 stick) butter softened
3/4 cup sugar
2 large eggs
3 ripe bananas (~1 1/2 cups)
1 tsp vanilla extract
2/3 cup chopped walnuts or pecans (optional)
1/4 cup Nutella

Instructions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Line 12 cup muffin tin with paper liners, or coat pan with cooking spray.
2. In a bowl, combine flours, baking powder and sale.
3. In another bowl, mix butter and sugar lightly for about 3 minutes. Beat in eggs, mashed bananas, and vanilla until smooth. Gradually stir in flour mixture. Fold in nuts
4. Divide batter among muffin cups. Spoon 1 teaspoon Nutella on top of each muffin. Swirl together Nutella and batter with a knife or tooth pick.
5. Bake until muggins are golden, about 22 minutes. Let cool in pan for 5 minutes, invert on to wire rack, turn muffins right side up and let cool completely.

Nutrition: 350 calories per serving, 15 grams fat (6g saturated), 52mg cholesterol, 3 grams fiber, 5 grams protein, 40 grams carb, 173 mg sodium. 

Shrinking Our Foot Print

I've posted about water harvesting, changing and updating water related fixtures to stop leaks, taking Navy showers, and reusing brown water in my yard. Well....what's it all add up to?

This is my water bill. If you look on the right hand side you'll see the water usage every month. 1 unit is equal to 1,000 gallons used. This past month we scored a 2, about 2,000 gallons. The month before 1,000 gallons. If you look back to about a year ago you can see the bill was 8 and 10,000 gallons of water. I bought the house in May of 2013. So in the last year, we've been able to reduce our water usage footprint by 1/10th to 1/5th of what the previous occupants were using.

Some months were higher, you'll see an uptick in November and December when family visited and stayed with us. But overall my son and I use about 1 to 3,000 gallons of water a month. Very small considering only two people lived in the same house and used about 10,000 gallons of water in one months time. And no, they weren't watering the lawn. The lawn was watered, but using the old well which isn't counted in to the water bill.

Water is about 25 dollars for every 1,000 gallons used. My bill this month was about 50 dollars. The previous people for a month using 10,000 gallons would have paid roughly 250 dollars. That's a car payment in water.

Some of my friends think I'm extreme. But I see it as taking a shorter shower over the course of a month can lead to an extra 250 dollars in your wallet. I can't ignore those kinds of savings. What would you do with an extra 250 a month? 

Tie Dye Easter Eggs

All week long I've been seeing tie dyed Easter eggs in my news feed on Facebook and decided to give it a try. I finally had an excuse to buy food dye and while it was on sale! Being a couponer we already had plenty of shaving foam. I also read that you can use whip cream instead. So whatever is handy in your pantry. To start we boiled and cooled the eggs a few days ago. Then tonight we got to dying them. 

First, I put shaving foam on the plate and let Trevor twirl it until it was frothy. Once that was done I let him add a drop or two of dye and mix it with a butter knife. If we do this again I would mix less. When the colors thin out you dont get as many unique stripes on the eggs. Instead if the dye is over mixed you get a very pale shade of color. We redyed some of the pale eggs a second time. 

Next we put the egg gently in the foam and slowly and softly rolled it where the dye was thickest. Then placed them on a paper towel to rest and let the dye soak in for a few minutes, try three or four minutes. The longer it sits the more it soaks in and you get deeper colors. 

Then wash off with water and presto! You've got colored Easter eggs!! We'll be doing this again in the future =)