When our girls were old enough to move into a normal twin size bed we were looking around at the local furniture stores and were amazed at how expensive kids beds are! For the basic bare bones nothing fancy bed we were looking at shelling out over $300!

NO WAY!

My wife’s family had an old bunk bed set beating around the houses. One half spent a few years in a shed and the other half in a brother’s attic. We got a hold of the set and went to work. First I scuffed up the clear varnish and patched or filled any major gouges and holes. Then I painted everything with a sturdy white primer/finish coat.

Then came the fun part, for a couple of dollars at the local craft store we bought some wooden plaques or apliques, painted them the accent color and my wife decopouged decopagued, doco… well she clear shellacked the kids names with sparkles on to it.

The most expensive part were the new mattresses and the bedding. We splurged on that because, really, the beds them selves cost less than $50 total! Can’t go wrong there.

Here is one Happy Customer.

Peace!

Monday’s post about Changing your mind elicited a comment from The Adventurist about rummage sales that I thought I would capitalize on. One of the biggest ways to save money is to buy USED! No kidding. Thats right, something someone has already used and decided they don’t want any more. If there is still life in the thing, use it!

Kids clothes are the best example of this, especially little kids clothes. I am trying to think back about how many new, full priced outfits we bought for the girls and I’m coming up with a very slim number. I know when my wife first found out she was pregnant, she bought a couple super cute outfits to surprise me at work with. I also know that when we were travel ling and I forgot something I would have to buy something quick… maybe a nice new dress for Christmas or something, but really there hasn’t been that many.

Then I see folks at Children’s Place, Baby Gap …um… those kind of stores (Sorry, I don’t make it to malls very often) buying hundreds of dollars worth of clothes! Come ON! They are kids. Spend that kind of money to watch them spill juice, barf, grass stain those clothes? WHY?!? Hit a few garage sales and get hundreds of dollars of clothes for your kids with $5.

We have also been absolutely blessed with my cousin. She has two girls as well, the youngest a couple years older than my oldest. Every couple of months they send another box of clothes that they have grown out of. They have been doing this for the last couple of years, and it has been an absolute life saver. Right when we are thinking “Oh boy, she’s outgrowing this stuff…” there is another box on our stoop! Do I mind that they are used?

You should know me better than that!

Acquire used, go to garage/rummage sales. Put that money to something more useful…

Peace!
Tony

The biggest part of being frugal is looking honestly at what we need versus what we want. When I was working and we didn’t have kids it was pretty easy to go out for dinner a couple times a week. Having a butcher right on the corner and a new grill made for a very expensive summer of ‘99.

I try and remember back to that time and I don’t think that me would recognize today’s me. We have had to cut back on a lot of the stuff we thought we needed in order to make the budget work. I look at how some other folks spend money and often wonder if they are being honest with themselves. Stopping at Starbucks every morning eating out for lunch and dinner then complaining about not having enough money to make the house payment seems foolish to me.

They need to change their mind. If I recall my college days correctly (always a challenge considering my hobby haha) they call that a “Paradigm Shift”.

My advice to folks is to take a step back and look, really look where your money goes. Every time a wallet or purse is opened, look at what its for. Then decide do I need this. I had the perfect example just this morning. The girls and I were at the local Target and they had Rock Band for Wii. It just came out. It looks really fun. We would have a blast playing it!

It retails for $169.

While I had the box in my hands and looked long and hard at it, jaw slacked, I knew we didn’t NEED it and that is a LOT of money for a game, even if it comes with drums, guitar and mike and cool rock tunes…

I left it on the shelf. (This time.) The point is instead of just picking it up and rolling with it I stopped and thought whether the cost was justifiable. At this time it wasn’t.

Change your mind.

Peace!
Tony

One of my favorite money saving tricks is to re-use those fancy foaming hand soap dispensers. Once the original product is emptied from multiple hand washings or preschoolers pumping it all over the counter it is really easy to refill the thing.

Simply put about a quarter of an inch of your favorite dish soap and then fill the rest up with water. Give it a shake and its good to go. Amazingly I find those pumps with soap in them at the store for up to $3.00! By refilling it a few dozen times you are saving huge money on buying new each time.

The pumps do eventually break down and become sticky, but replacing them after a few dozen fillings is a pittance versus replacing them each time.

Finding the right dish soap balance is something that might need tweaking as well, but it only takes a few times to get it figured out. My favorite lately is Dawn Apple antibacterial. No one in this house likes overly scented stuff, so when I tried using Palmolive Oxy it got vetoed after the first round.

Good luck!

Tony

Dad on a Dime has been an ongoing thought bubbling in the back of my head for a few years. We tried to make a go of it over at the now defunct Dadcenter, so I thought it would be a good thing to try with Skinnymoose Media.

I am a stay home dad of two little girls, three and five. My wife works in the health industry with computer software. Since we are living on one income I need to find ways to pinch every penny that comes through my grubby fingers as best I can.

I have been home from day one and have discovered some easy ways to make things work and I’d like to share them here. I will also use this venue to update folks on my family and any other little parenting tidbits I happen to find worthy of sharing.

Welcome to Dad on a Dime, I hope every one enjoys it!

Tony Treml, aka BrewDad