The Dollar Stretcher Review

Live Without or Minimize Air Conditioning

2013-05-17T16:39:00Z

I grew up (for the most part) in an old log house. Not the kind of log house you see built now, but the old fashioned, real thing. The walls were at least eight inches thick and thicker in some areas. No insulation - how do you insulate a solid piece of wood? We never even thought of air conditioning. It was always cool in the house in the summer and warm in the winter, just like it should be. After growing up and moving around here and there, I landed in an old house built about the same time as...(read more)

Make Your Own Food... Your Own

2013-05-03T16:05:00Z

I grew up before there was such a thing as boxed mixes and "convenience" foods. Okay, maybe there were a few... but not many. I don't remember Mom every buying any. Everything we ate was made from scratch and that's how I learned to cook, so I do that most of the time today. I will admit to getting lazy now and then and getting a package of those noodles with dry sauce that all you do is dump into boiling water, but not often. When I cook like Mom, I use chicken bouillon cubes if...(read more)

Soap is Soap

2013-04-26T16:00:00Z

I think Amy Dacyczyn said it first: "Soap is soap." Someone else might have seconded that. If so, I will third it. Soap IS soap. It can be dish soap, hand soap, body wash or laundry soap, but it's all soap and its purpose is to clean something. That means that it's generally interchangeable. Okay, you might not want to wash your hair in laundry soap, but you can certainly wash your laundry in shampoo. As long as it's just shampoo - no color added, no fibers to thicken your hair...(read more)

Edible landscaping

2013-04-19T19:32:00Z

When I hear "edible landscaping" my mind immediately goes to flowering fruit trees, then it goes to raspberries filling in an otherwise awkward corner. There are many ways to landscape your yard, both front and back, and grow food at the same time. It's kind of like having your cake and eating it, too. I have determined to not plant another tree or bush that isn't edible. That means I'm limited to apples, pears, peaches, plums, raspberries, blackberries, chokecherries, black...(read more)

Frugal and Natural Landscaping

2013-04-12T20:54:00Z

Last year I let purslane fill in an area where it's hard to grow grass. It's a narrow strip beside the driveway and next to the neighbor's fence, so it's hard to water and to manipulate a mower. Our city is death on weeds and bare spots so I was a little nervous about doing it, but nothing was said. The purslane looked kind of like what it was: a dense, low growing ground cover with tiny yellow flowers. (Nobody noticed or cared that I went out and picked some of the best stems to...(read more)

Make Your Own Potting Soil

2013-03-30T15:18:00Z

Well, I hate to write about the same topic twice (not really), but some of the articles in the coming week's Dollar Stretcher really got me going - about spring and gardening, seeds, plants, dirt... that sort of thing. There are some really good ideas in those articles, so be sure and take a look. One thing I didn't see mentioned was how to make sterile potting soil. One article mentioned using dirt straight from the garden and I've done that. It works, but it has its problems. You can...(read more)

Satisfy spring planting fever for cheap

2013-03-22T16:49:00Z

When spring comes, can gardening and landscaping be far behind? Spring time seems to give us an urge to spruce things up and make changes in our yards, our homes and our gardens. One of the things that most quickly satisfies this urge is to grow new things. Whether that means a new potted plant for the window, a new tree for the front yard or a pickup truck full of compost, plants and seeds, it means you want to grow something! That's all well and good, but it can be expensive even for the smallest...(read more)

Random Favorite Articles on Dollar Stretcher

2013-03-15T16:32:00Z

"Random" is a peculiar word. Dollar Stretcher doesn't publish randomly, by any means, but you can find an awesome variety of topics covered, all dealing with handling your money. This week, as I perused the offerings (I like that phrase), a few of these randomly jumped out at me, so I'll share them along with a few thoughts of my own: 1. I beg your pardon! I don't consider items found at Goodwill and other thrift stores "junk." Okay, so I know that's not what he...(read more)

The Cost of Using a Dryer

2013-03-01T16:45:00Z

Are you still drying all your laundry with a clothes dryer? If you're serious about saving money, here is one place you can cut back easily.

A typical electric dryer uses about 4.4 kilowatts in one hour. Simply multiply that by the cost of a kilowatt hour of electricity in your area. It's 7.8 cents here, so I multiply and get 34.32 - 34 and a third cents every time the dryer runs an hour. How many hours do you use your dryer per week? Multiply that times your cost of kilowatt hours. Mine typically runs an hour or less per week, so I'm paying an extra $1.37 and a quarter of a penny each month to use the dryer. My use is far from typical, so do your own math.

Now, this is per hour, not per load. Most loads of laundry don't take an hour to dry, although some can and some will take even longer. To figure your average cost of drying clothes (not including the cost of the dryer and any repairs, etc.), you'll have to pay attention to the actual amount of time the dryer is on. Try it a couple of weeks and see what it's costing. You might decide that hanging clothes to dry is worth the trouble.

I'm not adding in the cost of wear and tear on your clothes from being tumbled in a dryer and the extra stain remover and bleaching agents you'll need to keep them looking good and I'm not considering health benefits from a little activity and fresh air!

Hanging laundry

The cost of using your dryer

How much does electricity cost?

How much do you save by line-drying?

Drying clothes on a clothesline

Garden Dreams

2013-02-22T15:54:00Z

It's 13 degrees F. and there are 4 1/2 inches of snow on the ground. It's a great time to plan the garden! I said I wasn't putting in much of a garden this year because it's just getting to be too much to take care of. I will have to remind myself a few times because it's coming on: That great spring rush of garden fever. If you garden, you know exactly what I mean!

With each seed catalog, each web page that says "garden," each craving for fresh food, my list of what I want to plant grows a little more.

Tomatoes, of course. Green beans and dry beans, corn, beets, broccoli, radishes, lettuce, onions, carrots... but what about amaranth? And I'd love to grow a good watermelon just once (on the high plains of Colorado!). And I have to plant a few of those amazing sunflowers. Where do I find room for potatoes? And summer squash? And winter squash? And pumpkins?

Impossible! The entire backyard is about the size of a garden I used to have, when I did grow all of those things, and more. Now, I have to be more creative to use the space as well as keeping up appearances.

Enter, edible landscape. Now that's a challenge I can... well, dream about. At least for now. I might have to hire garden help this year. If I can grow enough extra food, that would be frugal, right? Wouldn't it? Let's say it would, anyway.

By the way, that's a six foot fence behind that sunflower. It was a volunteer plant last year. Yes, I saved seeds!

Homestead Fruit and Nut Trees

Farmer's Market landscaping

Edible Landscape

Edible Landscape Design

Do you do edible landscaping?