Down Mulberry Lane

Frugal Idea Number TWO...

Something I did for years, but stopped because it makes garbage duty a bit more costly with time is to not use garbage bags but rather use the plastic sacks you get from shopping. I have recently begun using bags again.  I have an abundance of plastic sacks, so figured I should use them up.... it would save space from storing all those sacks that only seem to get used for snow boot liners.  (Another use for plastic store sacks). 

This works well using smaller garbage cans or what I do is put two into my 13 gallon sized garbage can and I don't have to change them quite as often.  I use one of our larger 32 gallon cans to throw all the little bags into and then dh will take that out to the garbage trailer for a later dump run once the trailer is full. 

Another thing to save money on dump runs is to put as little trash as possible.  During the winter, I burn as much paper waste in the wood burner.  If I was much better with time, I might consider recycling the cans and jars for our once a month recycle visit.  But until I manage my time better, this isn't a good option for us, as dh says if we miss a month, then we have to store all those cans and jars another month. We tried it once and my garage was full of cans and jars as we would miss it by minutes running it down to the end of the lane or miss the day altogether as we misunderstood the pickup date schedule.  Running all those jars and cans down a 1/4 mile especially on windy days makes for a mess and alot of work if they don't show up or don't pick up.  So, dh says... don't worry about it.  I guess you have to figure what creates more stress on the family... is it trying to find a home for all the recyclables and washing them all and keeping the dogs out of them... ah, for us it is just too much work.  If we had a weekly pickup, it might be more worth it as you can try again the next week and the stock pile would not grow to enormous amounts. 

Anyways, that's my trash tip for saving money. 

Warmly, ~Melissa