Frugal Parenting

I found an interesting concept that I’m thinking about using for my baby shower - the Alternative Gift Registry . If you care about frugality and buying things used, this registry is pretty awesome. I’m not sure how my friends and family would take such a registry, but it sounds like a neat idea.

Some of the things that can be added to an alternative registry include - used baby clothes, babysitting, dinners, cloth diapers, etc. Here is a sample baby registry , so you can see how it works. You can also use it for a wedding registry as well. Pretty interesting concept, huh?

I like it. Because sometimes I think that all this new stuff we’re getting for our baby really isn’t necessary - we would be just as happy with used items. (In fact, just about every item of clothing we have for our baby is either used already by cousins or bought at a yard sale.)

Whether or not I use the Alternative Gift Registry , I really like the concept. What do you think?

A great way to save yourself money is to look for ways to reuse what you already have and make it into something you need. Not only can this save money, but it also helps prevent waste, as you’re not buying something brand-new.

There are so many ways to reuse things. Here are a couple of examples. We just moved into a new house, and there is a small kitchen window that doesn’t have blinds or curtains. We almost bought a new curtain for it, but decided instead to take a curtain we already have and cut it down to the right size for the kitchen window. Easy, and doesn’t cost us anything!

We are also wondering how to decorate our bedroom wall. We used to have a painting that hung over our bed, but we decided it looked better in the living room. Now our bedroom wall is bare. I decided that to save money (and also to be retro and cool), we would buy a few record albums from the local thrift store and find a way to decorate the wall with cool album covers. It will only cost us a couple dollars, and we’re making use of something that already had a use.

We’ve also taken forks from a thrift store and bent them into a shape that makes them good picture or postcard holders. You can also take old clothing such as T-shirts and cut them into cleaning rags, baby wipes, or even baby diapers.

There are endless possibilities for reusing stuff, plus it’s fun to try and make things last longer.  What are some things you like to reuse for different purposes?