Saving money and recycling

One of the reasons I started doing this blog is because James and Jan told me I should. James thought I should put things in here like my soap saving tip. To be honest, I hadn't given it much thought until a friend of mine (and James) were so impressed with my discovery. I bought a dispenser of that foaming hand soap to use at the bathroom sink. When it was gone I put maybe 20% of regular liquid soap and watered it down to fill it the rest of the way. It foams just like the foaming soap you pay much more for. My friend told me little kids wash their hands better when you have foaming soap. Since I don't have little kids I didn't know that.

Let's see, what else? My neighbor and friend, Feenie, is forever bringing me gifts he found in his garage or at the dumpster telling me he knows I can find a use for it. Once he brought me one of those old tables they used to have outside McDonalds and other places. The ones with the swivel seats attached to them. It had no table top, just the metal frame and seats. After looking for barstools for my outdoor kitchen and seeing how expensive they were I decided to make my own using the old seats from Feenie. I bought cheap wooden stools from Lowes ($15.00), stained and sealed them. Next I cut the seats off the metal frame of the table with my Dremel and attached them to the stools. They swivel and everything. The total project probably cost me no more than $25.00 per stool instead of the $200.00+ pricetag I saw on other barstools. I'll post a picture below.

The field toilet that is also pictured below was built from stuff I had in my garage already. We're lucky to have a 4 stall garage/barn with an attic above so we collect all kinds of stuff and store leftover building material. Even the toilet seat was in the attic of the barn. The toilet is in our field down by the river for the use of campers and us since we spend so much time down there. My chicken tractor was also built from leftovers. The majority of it is built from old screens that used to be in this house but were removed years ago and left in the barn attic.

This year I've been lucky enough to have friends let me dig up plants and flowers from their yards to transplant in mine. I'm not planning to buy many flowers from Lowes this year in hopes of saving a little money. I usually buy flowers for my pots on the patio. This year I'm going to plant some of the artichokes and eggplants that James started from seed. They're just as pretty as flowers. I may also put some zinnia seeds in there that James had saved from last year's flowers. Last year I got moss from the woods and put it in my rock/flower garden and it has done as well as the stuff I bought at WalMart.

We had some leftover copper from when our roof was put on a few years back and I've found some uses for it too. I've done a few peices of "art" (and I use the term loosely) for our house and made some earings using a propane torch, old bed springs and other tools.

I'll try to keep thinking of other ways I recycle what I think are interesting things.