Recent Frugal Accomplishments

I used to do this weekly, writing about the frugal accomplishments I had done over the past week. But then life got busy, and life got unfrugal, and I didn't have much to write...

And then I started this up again, a few weeks of frugal activities in one post so I looked more accomplished...

But I decided I want to go back to doing this weekly or bi-weekly, and if I don't have such a long list, that's fine. Why can't I celebrate every frugal thing I did with you, and not just a long list? And of course, now that I'm writing the list, since it was only within the past week, I remember more things to write down!

So here's a list of the frugal things I've done in the past week (or two, I'm not being exact):

Free Food

Got free food two times within the past 2 weeks. One time it was a bunch of 1 percent milk. Another time it was a bunch of 3 percent milk, tofu, celery, and cabbage.

Gardening

We got our first real harvest of fruit from our trees! We have 4 fruit trees and only have one that is actually old enough and doing well enough to produce fruit. Last year we got a few measly fruit, but now our loquat tree is chock full of fruit, and the picture at the beginning of this post is the first batch we just picked- just from the tip of one little branch. The rest is still ripening.

Foraging

I picked wild swiss chard aka sea beet from my yard and used it as a filling in my lasagna.

I foraged dock, redbud blossoms, milk thistle stalks, mallow, and hawthorn leaves. (Confession, I taught a foraging class, and these were the plants that I ate while teaching those and a whole lot more.)

Frugal Cooking

Some of my large amount of free milk that I got that didn't fit in my freezer spoiled. I made pancakes with the milk and my kids said it was some of the yummiest and best textured pancakes I ever made.

I made homemade marinara sauce.

I made homemade horseradish sauce with beets, also known as red chrain.

Revamped Leftovers

I had some leftover mashed potatoes, leftover beef roast, leftover mushroom sauce, and an open can of peas and carrots, and I put them together to make shepherd's pie.

I used leftover chicken soup and leftover drippings from my roast to make a new soup.

Frugal Fun

My kids were on spring break, so I took them rock climbing, but specifically looked for a place that had a price for the whole day and not just an hour, with a nice discount for people with disability cards, and got 50% off for three of my kids. So the whole activity was very reasonably priced.

I made my daughter and her friend a mall scavenger hunt when I brought my daughter to hang out with her on break and it was pouring rain, which was free as opposed to the bowling we'd considered doing (which was too packed to be able to go to).

Frugal Shopping

I went to the scratch and dent store and I walked out almost empty handed because all of it was "extras" and not anything I actually needed. Sometimes not buying is specifically a frugal strategy. I bought one box of really, really cheap instant oatmeal.

My son's sneakers were completely destroyed and he needed new ones desperately. He didn't find anything that he liked at the "cheap" shoe store, so we hit up an outlet store and got him 2 pairs of Diadora sneakers for cheaper than at the cheap store.

My daughter needed school shirts and I didn't see prices I liked at the local stores, and knew I could get cheaper online, even from the same company. I ended up buying shirts that generally cost $11.40 each at the price of 6 for $28.50, ending up at $4.75 each!

My other daughter needed shirts so we purchased some cheap ones from Shein, sticking mainly to the ones on sale and then using a discount code at the end.

Wow, a much longer list than I expected this to be! A lot for me to be proud of myself for. Let's see how long I can have my list if I do it in just a week from now!

What frugal things have you gotten up to this week?