Are these posts getting boring? (Don’t answer that question.) I seem to keep coming up with things to write about!
(Perhaps I also feel the need to counteract my recent post about frugal losses.)
FREE PARKING
When I was at a hospital in Halifax recently, I was delighted to learn parking is now free for visitors. While I would have gladly spent $20 for access to the parkade, it made me happy to know that it is free. I’m sure it removes a big financial burden for many families.
LIBRARY BOOKS
It’s been a while since I’ve talked about the money-saving side of using my library.
I save thousands of dollars a year.
THRIFTED ITEMS (X4)
I’ve been on the lookout for two things.
- A long, sleeveless vest. I live cold and while these are decidedly shapeless, when I see them on others, it looks like people are wearing a giant sleeping bag and sleeping bags are warm and cozy and I AM HERE FOR IT.
- A long black coat. But Elisabeth, you might be thinking, didn’t you thrift a long black coat a few years ago. Why yes, yes I did. And do you want to know what happened to that coat? It was stolen by my teenage daughter. She would be running out the door to school in the morning and ask Where’s OUR coat. Considering her frequent derision of my fashion choices, I considered it high praise and decided to let her wear it.
I was delighted to find both items I was looking for at a children’s consignment store where I had credit to use! (I had actually gone in to drop off a bag of donations.)
I have also been looking for larger hoop earrings and these pearl ones caught my eye at a different consignment store. They were $7, and I had $6.50 in store credit.
And…I have been looking for a few more pairs of thrifted jogging pants. I was down to a blue and a green pair, but was really hankering for black. Out of principle, I didn’t want to buy new but I was having zero luck locating something second-hand (the women’s section of athletic wear seemed full of skin-tight leggings). On a whim, I went the men’s section of a local thrift store and guess what: men’s athletic pants are predominantly loose-fitting jogging pants. I managed to find two pairs that fit and am absolutely delighted.
GAS
I can’t believe I’m admitting this, but I drove for at least ten kilometers AFTER my gas warning light came on. Can you believe it? What monster am I becoming?
I’ll explain.
Gas prices went down and I had about half a tank. Because of the type and distance of driving I had to do, it made sense to get my tank a bit lower so I would be filling up at a better price.
In other words, I looked fear straight in the eyes and refused to back down.
Phew. I was legit nervous I was going to run out of gas and was already debating whether I would be brave enough to admit it publicly on the blog after all my talk of it being a point of disagreement in my marriage. Thankfully I made it to the gas station in the nick of time and it became a frugal win instead of an embarrassing admission.
Bonus frugal points because I gassed up at a station that gives cash coupons at the bottom of the receipt. I got ~$6 off my grocery order later that night!
BIRTHDAY LUNCH
A few years ago I decided the best way to celebrate friends’ birthdays is by taking them out for a meal. It’s a wonderful experience, no one has to do any cleanup, and the only thing left at the end is a full belly and memories of great conversation.
Back in October I was set to take a friend out for her birthday lunch when she got sick. On her birthday. It was very sad…and it meant we delayed our meeting for over a month.
Last week we went out to the restaurant of her choosing—a Lebanese spot.
It was delicious. The servings were huge. Everything was incredibly fresh and delicious and it was CHEAP! My enormous portion was $13.99 (kale, roasted chickpeas, tomato, green onion, pickled turnip sticks—they’re famous for these—brown rice, and chicken shawarma) and my friend’s go-to on their menu was only $11.99. Um, SOLD. I couldn’t believe it.
I did end up having a little gift for her—this particular friend really appreciates getting something to open. I always buy her an ornament each year (right after Christmas of course, when they’re on clearance). I also gave her a cute wooden tray I had found at a thrift store for a few dollars.
A DIME SAVED…
We don’t have pennies anymore, but when I came out the door of a thrift store, I spotted a dime on the ground. You bet your bottom…dime…I picked it up!
THE ATLANTIC
A few years ago I bought John a subscription to The Economist for Christmas. Because I worked for a university at the time, I was able to get a deeply discounted educator rate.
This Christmas, I wanted to get my dad a subscription to The Atlantic (he ADORES David Frum). I was waiting for a sale (no luck over Black Friday/Cyber Monday) when I realized if you have a high school e-mail address you can get a heavily discounted subscription. So, Belle and Dad are now sharing access to a subscription of The Atlantic and it saved me almost $100!!!
AND, in case anyone has any interest and happens to be American and has a high-schooler, they can get free access to The Atlantic.
Here’s the link with all the relevant information, with their rationale: “It’s critical for as many students and educators as possible to have access to informed, independent, fact-based journalism,” said Megha Garibaldi, the chief growth officer of The Atlantic. “An informed citizenry is essential to our democracy. As we continue to grow The Atlantic, and the resource-intensive reporting and writing we publish, we want to ensure it’s available to new generations of readers.”
That’s all the frugal things I can think of right now. Your turn:
- Any frugal wins lately?
- Do you get any online or print magazine subscriptions?
- How many books do you think you buy in the run of a year? I’d say I average 2-3?
Discover more from The Optimistic Musings of a Pessimist
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
what a great idea of taking friends out for lunch on birthdays! those are cheap restaurant meal prices these days! And yes to opening gifts!!! I don’t enjoy wrapping them but I know the anticipation of the receiver so it’s worth it.
great idea of finding the jogger at man section. I’m sure you had more options to choose from.
I don’t like browsing shops anymore so I mostly buy online and try/return at home. just ordered some sale clothes for work, hope some are good. they are relatively cheap.
It makes for a fun birthday event and I get to enjoy the “present” too 🙂
No frugal wins- I am spending all the $$$ for basketball gate and concessions. And the gas it takes to drive there!
No more magazines or newspapers here; I might pick up old magazines from the library if I’m going on a trip. Reading material but if it gets lost No big deal.
I buy 20-30 books a year- ebooks of hard to find series, paper copies of favorite authors. If my kids are on a reading streak, I might buy more. (When I was single, I spent so much on books: go to Borders, buy a few books, listen to live music; hit the used book stores; walk the mall and buy a book o r two.)
I try to buy favorite authors if I know I can share it with someone else ( just did this with Louise Penny and the Black Wolf).
Sports are expensive on so many levels, but also such a fun thing to share with a child!
What a great plan to buy with the understanding you’ll be able to share them later!
I briefly thought it might be smart to keep a spare can of petrol in the car… then I googled it. Turns out it’s a pretty bad idea unless you’re crossing an actual wilderness. So much for that plan – good thing you’re dialled in to your fuel levels!
Great job on hunting down the joggers! They look great! Maybe there were too tight fresh out the wash but on the photo they fit you really well.
Our neighbours are on holidays at the moment and their weekly newspaper keeps landing on their doorstep. So yes… I’m “helping” by reading it for them. 😄
Hooray for a free newspaper!!
I need to know the name of the Lebanese place – that looks so good. And I went in search of a longish warm hooded winter coat, found one at Frenchy’s in New Minas for about $8, navy, and fully down-filled! I didn’t know the brandname, but a quick Google told me their coats are all in the $200 range – love it!
It was just Mezza in New Minas. It’s a chain but was delicious and I was very impressed with the serving size for the price.
What a great find!!! Congrats. Can’t wait to see the coat in person.
That’s a good frugal haul! I was technically a university student for 10 years because I was in a symphony chorus that was affiliated with the university. I definitely took advantage of the student discounts.
My frugal win is that I got my vaccinations yesterday – flu, COVID, and shingles because if I’m going to feel achy from one shot I might as well feel achy from all three shots at the same time. Not only did insurance cover everything, but they gave me a $10 off for spending $20 coupon and I’ll get another $5 kickback for the flu shot. You better believe that I left the store loaded up with $20 worth of lotion and deodorant.
My dad shares his NYT subscription with me and I’ve had good luck with getting heavily discounted Washington Post and WSJ subscriptions. When they end the promo rates I cancel the subscriptions, which so far has gotten me the discounted rates again. I would not be willing to pay full price! I’ve looked at the student deals since I live with two university students, but so far I haven’t seen anything worth signing up for through them.
Student discounts are often overlooked; they can be pretty epic!
Woo-hoo! What a great job on getting the vaccines AND getting paid to do so.
Your lunch looks yummy! Love Lebanese food. The only books I buy now are for my Bible study, so. 2-3 per year. Otherwise, it’s the library for me!
Bible Study books are pretty hard to source second hand!
I’m excited – a new stack of books has arrived at the library for me. Heading there shortly to collect it and it includes some Christmas books to browse (not really for ideas, just for the fun of it). I’m also hoping to have time to really burrow into a comfy chair over the holidays and get some dedicated reading time.
I saw this on the frugal woods blog and wanted to share it here! I designed a regular postcard on Vistaprint as our Christmas card and got them printed, 100 for $20. It is not the fanciest but it gets the point across and is a fraction of what we usually spend. Not so frugal… I think I’m getting some people experience gifts (like play tickets for grandparents etc) this year which ends up being $$$ but it’s great for low clutter gifts.
the “our coat” makes me LOL- I would’ve done that as a teen. Hey, you have great taste!
We use Vistaprint too! It’s great! I think the library is about my only frugal win lately. That and cooking dinner last night instead of getting take out even though my youngest had a stomach bug, poor kid.
I am taking the coat as a compliment because she is a regularly critic of my wardrobe… yet seems to be borrowing quite a few things 😉
Ooooh. That’s a great idea! 100 for 20 is a great deal!!!!!! I am tucking that idea away for next year!
I love getting pajama pants from the guys section: the flannel is warmer and they fit a little more relaxed. Makes sense the athletic pants would be too, must remember this going forward 🙂
We don’t want to think about how many books I buy in a year … and I’ve actually cut back, oops? To be fair, I generally buy books the library does NOT have, unless it’s one I really need for my collection. Exception being BOTM books that the library ends up getting, but they’re a good discount from the regular list price so I don’t feel as bad about that, haha
Wait! I have never even thought about this with PJ pants (though I remember doing it as a teen). Gah! I am now so excited to look for some more PJ pants.
If you love reading, books are a great investment! I seem to be able to get most of the books I’m interested in from the library. But I also know that sometimes I miss books I WANT to read because I can’t get them for free, so maybe I need to be more spendy in this category.
These posts definitely aren’t boring! Keep them coming, please!
Great find on the coat!
Frugal win lately is that we had two couches in our living room and we really didn’t need the second one/it was a big dumping ground for laundry and was taking up sooooo much space etc. I did want a recliner there, and I sold the couch for exactly the same price as the essentially brand new recliner I found secondhand. It was a very pleasing arrangement!
Pleasing indeed. Win, win! More space, and no excess money needing to be spent. Gold stars, Maria <3
I love Lebanese food and this just made me miss a restaurant in Calgary that had the best food. My favourite was the Mouh, which was a mouhmassa sandwich with roasted eggplant and zucchini. So good. Also they would have one of those dip platters, and if there’s one thing I love, it’s a dip platter.
O the upside, the library here has that thing where it shows how much money you save (Calgary didn’t have this, so it’s still new to me!) and so far I have saved $2768.97 this year. I love that!
Oh I would love to have that feature at my library. In the new system it tracks how many books you take out and I love that!!!!
I’ve debated about getting Phil an Atlantic subscription. Maybe we need to use my nephew’s HS email address and get him a cheap subscription. He would be more in favor of getting it for cheap.
I feel like my life is the opposite of frugality these days. I feel like I am BLEEDING money. But it’s money well-spent as this is the time of year to give people in our lives a little extra something to show how much we appreciate them. So I will just plug my ears and sing ‘la la la’ when the cashier rings up the total for the hundreds of dollar of SBUX gift cards I will buy today… Phil keeps commenting on the size of my Amex balance and I’m like – “annnnndddd??” Tis the season and we can afford it so I am just shrugging it off.
But I do use the library A TON! We check out hundreds of books each year so I save a lot of money that way. I do donate to the library each fall to show my appreciation. It’s one of our top charitable donations since I feel so strongly about the services it provides and since we can afford it, I’m happy to support their mission. But our donation is a fraction of the services we enjoy throughout the year!!
It you use your nephew’s address you’ll get a FREE subscription, Lisa. Hard to beat that price.
Gifts really do add up, but what a blessing to be able to afford to give and you know how much it will be appreciated so all the gold stars to you for prioritizing it <3
I think you are super talented at finding lovely items at the thrift store — I never find clothing I like. Genius to look in the men’s department; something I’d never have thought of.
I always do a birthday lunch with my local besties!! It’s our thing and I always look forward to it as there’s nothing better than time spent together.
I can’t imagine a hospital would charge for parking; that’s insane!
Next up is the men’s section for pajama pants! I used to do this as a teen but until a reader suggested it in the comments, it completely slipped my mind!
Our hospitals all charged for parking until recently!
I’m having trouble leaving comments again, Elisabeth but hopefully this one will take. I will never get tired of reading about the ways you save money! We don’t have pennies here anymore either, but I will always, always pick up spare change I find laying around. It’s fun to put them all in a jar and see how much I find in the course of a year. I don’t use my library nearly enough, but I have so many “unreads” on my shelf that I only borrow from the library if it is a brand new release I can’t wait for! Between the library book sale, yard sales and thrift stores I buy a lot of books every year but I don’t pay very much for any of them 🙂
Oh no. Something is going wonky with my blog again (I swear there is always something) and a few things aren’t working properly. *Sigh*
This comment came through just fine, though. Hooray <3
You’ve been so lucky that you found all that you were looking for at the thrifstore. I am amazed! The subscription hack is also fantastic. I used to get print magazines and I kinda miss it but I don’t know which magazine I’d really read front to back these days.
I love, love, love that you’re taking your friends out to lunch or dinner. I think quality time spend together is one of the greatest gifts as we get older!
I love that this “gift” doesn’t leave any wrapping paper or collect dust, just memories!!!