Layout:
Home > Archive: June, 2007

Archive for June, 2007

Free "Toy" for Dogs

June 30th, 2007 at 10:26 pm

Here's some free entertainment for your dog, if he's anything like mine:

Throw your dirty clothes on the floor.

Let dog roll around on dirty clothes, in utter bliss.

The stinkier the clothes are, the better, apparently.

Now, if only I could get him to pick them up off of the floor and carry them to the laundry basket ...

Freecycling

June 27th, 2007 at 04:51 pm

Last weekend I posted a few items to give away on Freecyle. They are items that did not sell at my garage sale, that I held back from the donations pile, and that I was unsuccessful selling on Craigslist (and they are too inexpensive or bulky to list on Ebay).

I love the idea of Freecycle, but I have to say that it is quite a bit of work. For some reason, people respond to postings really promptly saying they want something, but then either don't reply to arrange a pickup or take their sweet time coming to get things.

I will probably accumulate some more things that I will Freecycle just prior to my move, but I will post everything on just one day when I am going to be home all day, and I will stipulate that things must be picked up within the day. Anything that doesn't get picked up, will be donated to charity.

For anyone interested in Freecycle who is not familiar with it, here is the web site: www.freecycle.org

Herbicide!

June 24th, 2007 at 01:03 am

Crime: Herbicide
When: Sometime during the night
Prime Suspect: Bambi and his cohorts

Looks like the deer discovered one of my patches of Rainbow Chard. [Not hard to figure out which side of the patch they munched on, is it?] I'm glad I had gone through and harvested a bunch of it just 3 days ago.

Now that they have discovered it, no doubt they'll be back. Bon appetit, Bambi and friends!

The Longevity Game

June 19th, 2007 at 05:07 pm

Here's a site where you can answer a few simple questions and come up with a rough estimate of your life expectancy:

http://www.nmfn.com/tn/learnctr-lifeevents-longevity

I'm sure it's not perfect, but it does give you a number you can plug in to those retirement calculators when asked to enter your life expectancy ... Probably a better number than just guessing, tho' my number from doing the game was the same number I had been guessing (90 years).

Half.com - Wow!

June 14th, 2007 at 03:14 am

After averaging 2 or 3 books a week for months, I suddenly sold 6 books in the last 2 days! And I know wyozozo and koppur have been getting good book sales as well. Anyone know what's going on with half.com? Have they been advertising? Sending out subliminal messages? Or is it just that the only stuff on TV right now is crap, so everyone's hitting the books harder than usual (as I have been doing)?

Whatever is going on, I hope it keeps up. And if anyone has been waiting to list books, I'd say jump in and do it!

Have any Colette Peters Christmas Books?

June 13th, 2007 at 02:05 am

If anyone has a Colette Peters book on Christmas cake decorating lying around that you don't want, you may want to list it on Half.com. You should be able to sell it for at least list price, and probably more. Of all the books I've sold on Half.com, it's the one that sold for more than I paid for it.

Loving Fresh Herbs!

June 10th, 2007 at 07:00 pm

We are loving having pots of fresh herbs right outside our door. I've done 2 harvests so far. Last weekend I thinned the herbs and chopped up what I yanked out and mixed them in with scrambled Egg Beaters & goat cheese ... really delicious! Last night I snipped a big bunch that I chopped up and put on top of scalloped potatoes. Not only did it add a bit of color & flavor & nutrition, a big bonus was the wonderful aroma coming from the oven as the dish was baking.

Both times I used mixed herbs, just grabbing any old variety that looked like it was ready.

I am a newbie gardener, and I highly recommend fresh herbs to anyone who doesn't have experience gardening but is interested in trying. They are really easy to grow, grow so well in containers, and fresh herbs are SOOO expensive from the store.

I bought just one seed packet which was a mix of herbs, started them inside in egg cartons, and then transplanted them outside in larger containers when they got big enough and the weather had warmed up. I didn't buy any containers, just used what I had on hand. I even scrubbed out a no-longer-in-use trash can, had DH drill holes in the bottom, and ... voila! ... instant garden container.

If I can do it, anyone can!

Best Children's Birthday Party Game (Good for Yarn Hoarders & Spiderman Fans)

June 3rd, 2007 at 10:51 pm

Reading posts about childrens birthday parties and yarn hoarding, combined with the fact that Spiderman 3 is in the theaters now, jarred my memory of a really terrific and frugal birthday party game my mom did when I about 7. She took cheap little "prizes" and wrapped them up, one for each party guest. [I don't remember what the prizes were; the game itself was the main point, not the prizes.] Then she tied string or yarn around each prize and wove a gigantic "spider web" throughout the entire house, crossing and twisting all of these balls of string/yarn around each other, furniture, staircases, etc. Each piece of string/yarn ended at the front door (with little balls remaining for unraveling). When all of the guests arrived, each one got a little ball of yarn, and we had to then untangle and unravel the web until we reached our prizes. Imagine 10 little girls climbing through this giant web of yarn to get to a little prize ... Oh my, we had so much fun and we got good and tired doing it, which probably made the rest of the party easier on my mom! Smile

My parents did lots of other great, fun, and frugal party things (cupcake decorating contests, picnics in the park, etc.) but the spider web game was definitely the most memorable!

Pre-Relocation Sell Off - Results Through May

June 2nd, 2007 at 05:34 pm

Well, since I already announced that the results of our garage sale mid-May pushed me over my goal of $3K, this is a bit anti-climactic, but here it is.

In May I netted $1,061.07 from selling off stuff (mostly at the garage sale, but also a bit on Half.com and Craigslist, plus my DH sold a few of his books to a local shop) and earned $11.28 in interest on proceeds from the stuff I've sold.

My grand total is now $3,181.69.

I am going to continue selling things, but probably won't report again until just before our move in September.

My focus has shifted from raising a certain amount of money to seeing just how much I can pare down and still feel comfortable. I've spent quite a bit of time thinking: "How small of a house could we live in without feeling cramped." I definitely don't want to feel squeezed in; been there, done that, don't ever wanna do it again! But I know that a smaller house means not only a lower purchase price but also significantly lower upkeep costs and monthly expenses (especially in Texas where AC is so necessary yet expensive), not to mention that it is better for the environment. The house we choose is going to have a big impact on my goal of becoming "Balance Sheet Affluent" by age 60 ... It all ties together, doesn't it?

----------

And to completely change gears, I have had a really rewarding month in terms of my business, both emotionally and financially. After sending out letters to my clients that I would be closing my business, I was overwhelmed and gratified to receive many phone calls, Email, notes, and even one boquet of flowers. They all said how much they were going to miss me; it was really surprising and touching. My husband commented: "Wow - This is almost like attending your own funeral, isn't it?" And he was right. I've also had quite a few people decide that they want to use my business one last time before I leave, so I have been very busy the past couple weeks and my schedule is very full right up to my last day of work. To be honest, I had expected just the opposite, that people would start looking for someone new when they found out I was leaving. The extra income is going to be a nice boost, and I am glad that I've already done so much pre-relocation-sell-off since the next few months are going to be busy with work.