Want to save money on your water bill? Tired of buying gallons of water from the grocery store? There are many things that you can do to save water. These tips will help you and your family save water when there is a drought and water is scarce.

The United States Environmental Agency (EPA) has plenty of advice on how you can save water. Did you know that when you skip a shower, you save 17 gallons of water? When your yard skips a shower (meaning you decide not to water it), you save 25,000 gallons of water. The EPA says that when in drought, ever drop counts.

In the Bathroom:

Take short showers instead of baths. Turn off the water to brush teeth, shave, and soap up in the shower. Fill the sink to shave.

Repair leaky toilets. Add 12 drops of food coloring into the tank, and if color appears in the bowl one hour later, your toilet is leaking. Install a toilet dam, faucet aerators and low-flow shower heads.

Laundry:

Run full loads of laundry. When purchasing a new washing machine, buy a water saving model that can be adjusted to the load size.

In the Kitchen:

When cooking, peel and clean vegetables in a large bowl of water instead of under running water. Fill your sink or basin when washing and rinsing dishes. Install faucet aerators.

Only run the dishwasher when it’s full. When buying a dishwasher, select one with a “light-wash” option.

Only use the garbage disposal when necessary (composting is a great alternative).

Outdoors:

When mowing your lawn, set the mower blades to 2-3 inches high. Longer grass shades the soil improving moisture retention, has more leave surface to take in sunlight, allowing it to grow thicker and develop a deeper root system. This helps grass survive drought, tolerate insect damage and fend off disease.

Only water the lawn when necessary. If you water your lawn and garden, only do it once a week, if rainfall isn’t sufficient. Avoid watering on windy and hot days. Water the lawn and garden in the morning or late in the evening to maximize the amount of water which reaches the plant roots (otherwise most of the water will evaporate.)

Posted in: How to Save | Comments (0) | Join Discussion

March is National Frozen Food Month. Frozen food has been around for a very long time. According to National Today, the first commercial ice-making machine was invented by James Harrison in 1851. He was a British journalist who had emigrated to Australia. In 1924, Clarence Birdseye is credited with inventing the quick and easy freezing method we know today.

Your family can participate in National Frozen Food Month and start anytime in March. Here are some ideas.

Plan a Frozen Dinner Night

There are a variety of ways you can make this happen. Pick up some frozen “TV dinners” from the grocery store, and use that as the main portion of your family’s meal that night. Use up the “leftovers” from a night when you made too much food and had to put some in the freezer. Those frozen foods will stay good for a long time (if you stored them properly).

Freeze Fresh Foods at the end of their Season

Fresh foods are wonderful. Unfortunately, if you bought too much, the fruit or vegetables might go bad before you could eat them. One way to prevent this is to buy the fresh produce at the end of its season and freeze some of it. You can thaw it when you need it.

The National Frozen & Refrigerated Foods Association (NFRA) tweeted: ““Did you know that Frozen Food Day was proclaimed by President Ronald Regan on March 6, 1984?”

Easy Home Meals has easy home meal’s recipes, tips, and more. These include a video of “Shortcut Meatball – Soup – March Frozen Food Month 2022 Show”, a recipe for Creamy Cheese Tortellini, and more! You should be able to find some recipes that include frozen food that your family will enjoy.

Easy Home Meals is currently offering a March Frozen Food Month coupon giveaway. You can enter by filling out a short form that wants your email address – and for you to confirm your email address. You could end up with a coupon for frozen food!

Posted in: How to Save | Comments (0) | Join Discussion

The covid pandemic has caused many changes to how we used to go about our lives. Things are different now in many ways. Is it still worth it to collect and use coupons the way we did before? The answer to that question largely depends on how and where you shop.

Shopping for Groceries

Do you prefer to do your grocery shopping in-person? If so, then you might be able to save some money on the offers that connect to your grocery store’s loyalty card. Load virtual coupons onto that store’s loyalty card. Watch for the discounts that are only offered to loyalty card users while you shop.

Grocery stores are likely to honor discounts that their store offers via the loyalty card. They also have a right to reject certain coupons. For example, the store might be rationing certain items in order to prevent a shopper from buying them all up at once. Your “buy one, get one free” coupon may not apply.

Do you prefer to grocery shop from home? It is possible to visit your favorite grocery store’s website and select the items you want to buy. In some cases, the store may be out of something you wanted. If so, your shopper might contact you to let you know, and to ask if you wanted them to select a substitute for that item.

The drawback of grocery shopping from home is that you won’t be able to use your coupons. Your shopper cannot access your loyalty card. It is customary to tip your shopper after they deliver your groceries to you. The amount of the tip should reflect the amount of groceries you asked for.

Shopping for Take-Out

Shopping for take-out that you want to have someone deliver to you can be good or bad. Start by figuring out if the restaurant that you want to get food from is nearby or far away. The longer it takes a delivery driver to go to the restaurant and bring you your food – the more expensive that delivery becomes!

Sometimes, there will be a discount on the app you use to place your order. The restaurant might be offering a temporary discount on a certain meal. Typically, the app will take that discount into account and charge you appropriately. The drawback is that there is no way to use a paper McDonald’s coupon on take-out that was picked up by a driver.

Posted in: How to Save | Comments (0) | Join Discussion

2022 marks the third year of the coronavirus pandemic. Each year, there have been some people who panicked and hoarded groceries and household goods. You might remember photos and videos from 2020 of people pushing overflowing carts of toilet paper. While hoarding might make some people less anxious – it causes problems for everyone else.

Here are some of the reasons why you shouldn’t hoard groceries:

Supply Chain issues are a big reason why you can no longer easily find the groceries you expected to buy. Supply chain issues have caused major slowdowns in the trucking industry. There is a backup at ports with full containers that cannot be loaded onto a truck.

The result is that your local grocery store has fewer products than it would have had before the pandemic. Seeing empty shelves could cause some people to feel the need to hoard groceries. When the next person goes to that grocery store, they will discover that the hoarders took it all.

There is plenty of food out there. But, it can’t reach the stores as quickly as it used to due to supply chain issues.

Grocery stores are running with a limited work force. Grocery store workers are getting sick with Covid and staying home, or are quarantined after being exposed to someone who had Covid. This puts a strain on the workers who have to work short handed.

Fewer workers means that grocery stores may be unable to restock the shelves with whatever food is in the back. People who hoard groceries might buy more than they need of milk, eggs, and toilet paper. Again, this means there will be less for the next shoppers.

Hoarding groceries is expensive. It means your family has to spend more than typical on food and household items. Continuing to hoard groceries during a pandemic could break your budget. It also puts you at risk of having the foods rot away before you could eat them.

Posted in: How to Save | Comments (0) | Join Discussion

America Saves is a campaign managed by the nonprofit Consumer Federation of America. It motivates, encourages, and supports low- to moderate-income households to save money, reduce debt, and build wealth.

Here are some tips from America Saves that could help you save money:

Save your coins. Putting aside just 50 cents a day over a year will get you almost halfway to an emergency fund. Check with your bank or credit union, and research apps that offer programs that round your purchases up to the nearest dollar and put the difference into a separate savings account.

Avoid purchasing expensive or unnecessary items with a self-imposed 24-hour rule. For any non-essential item, wait 24 hours before purchasing. It is perfect for online shopping where your items can simply be added to your cart to purchase later.

Unsubscribe from marketing emails and texts from the stores where you spend the most money. By law, each marketing email is required to have an unsubscribe link, usually at the bottom of the email or you can reply to any text with STOP, and that should opt you out of their list.

Pay off credit cards in full each month. The miles and cash-back are only valuable if you are not falling into debt or paying interest.

Only use the ATMs of your bank or credit union. Using the ATM of another financial institution once a week could cost you $3 for each withdrawal. That’s more than $150 over the course of a year.

Pay your bills on auto-pay. This ensures they are paid on time, in full to avoid late charges.

Use the library! Libraries offer several entertainment options including classes, e-books, and audio-books. Some libraries even allow you to borrow things like tools and sewing machines.

Brown bag your lunch. The reason you hear this tip so often is that it works! If buying lunch at work costs $5, but making lunch at home only costs $2.50, then in a year you could afford to create a $500 emergency fund and still have money left over.

For more information, visit the America Saves website.

Posted in: How to Save | Comments (0) | Join Discussion

Do you enjoy decorating your Christmas tree – and the outside of your home – with colorful Christmas lights? If so, then you should consider using LED lights instead of the regular lights. It turns out that LED lights use less electricity. Switching to LED lights could lower your energy bill.

According to Reviewed, the financial and energy savings that could be gained from switching from traditional incandescent Christmas lights to more energy-efficient LED Christmas lights is a good idea. Doing so could save you money on your electric bill.

The Christmas Guys, a company that provides commercial and residential lighting services for Christmas decoration, prefer LED lights to incandescent lights.

“In past years, it wasn’t worth paying the extra for LED Christmas lights, thankfully now that the technology continues to get better the pricing has made it a no brainer to use LED lights over incandescent lights for holiday decorating. The Christmas Guys now exclusively use LED lights and are unable to provide incandescent lights to new clients.”

The U.S. Department of Energy says that lighting accounts for around 15% of an average home’s electricity use, and the average household saves about $225 in energy costs per year by using LED lighting. If you are still using incandescent light bulbs, the Department of Energy recommends you switch to energy-efficient lighting to cut your energy bills.

According to the Department of Energy, the cost of LED bulbs has decreased dramatically since they entered the market and prices are expected to come down further as more products become available. While LEDs are more expensive than traditional incandescent bulbs, they still save money because they last a long time and have very low energy use.

If you haven’t begun decorating the outside of your home with lights yet, now is the time to switch to LED bulbs. You can also find LED bulbs for your Christmas tree. You can have a merry Christmas and save money at the same time.

Posted in: How to Save | Comments (0) | Join Discussion

Christmas can be an especially expensive time of the year. But, it doesn’t have to be! This year, consider having a frugal Christmas. You can get great gifts for your loved ones without going into debt. This year, there is an ongoing shipping problem, and you can avoid that hassle with these money-saving tips.

Visit the Thrift Stores

Thrift stores can be a really good place to shop for gifts. The prices will always be reasonable, and that’s great for people who don’t have a lot of money to spend.

Thrift stores are good places to look for comfy sweaters for relatives who get cold very easily. You can also find interesting books for readers, old records for music lovers, and bolts of fabric for the crafters in your life.

Consider the Dollar Stores

Dollar Tree offers a wide variety of Christmas ornaments for a dollar a case. It also has some ornaments that cost $1.00 on their own. They also have a selection of Santa hats, Christmas headbands, and Christmas stockings. You can buy necklaces that have LED bulbs on them that look like the lights one would put on the outside of their house.

Having guests over for a holiday dinner? Some Dollar Stores sell holiday tableware that is decorative and festive. One case of 12 plates costs $1.00. A case of mugs also costs $1.00. No one needs to know where you got them from.

Regifting is an Option

The kitchen appliance that you received as a gift – but never used – could be just the thing that a friend or relative would love to have! Dig it out of your closet or garage, dust if off, and wrap it up. The purpose of gift giving is to bring some joy to someone you care about. The price of the item doesn’t really matter.

Posted in: How to Save | Comments (0) | Join Discussion

Is there a special toy that your child desperately wants to see under the Christmas tree? Do you have family members across the United States that you want to send gifts to? Don’t wait until the Black Friday sales to start shopping. Those items may be sold out long before then.

According to CBS News, there are supply chain problems that are delaying the shipping of products to stores. The reason is because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Products that used to swiftly move from one country to another, and into stores, may now be held up at ports – indefinitely.

Shop local. Start shopping the stores that local to where you live. You can cut down on shipping fees, and the time it takes for a product to ship to your home.

Ship soon. The businesses and organizations that you used to ship gifts to your loved ones have created a new deadline for those who want the gift to arrive before Christmas.
United States Postal Service (USPS) recommend that following for most of the United States:

USPS Retail Ground Service – December 15
First-Class Mail Service – December 17
Priority Mail Service – December 18
Priority Mail Express Service – December 23

Check the USPS website for details regarding Alaska and Hawaii

FedEX 2021 shipping deadlines for holiday packages (within the United States):

FedEx Same Day – December 24
Extra Hours – December 23
2Day & 2Day AM – December 22
FedEx Express Saver – December 23
FedEx 1Day Freight – December 23
FedEx 2Day Freight December 22
FedEx 3Day Freight – December 21

December 15 is the deadline for FedEx Ground (US including Alaska and Hawaii) and FedEx Home Delivery. FedEx Ground Economy deadline is December 9.

UPS 2021 shipping deadlines:

Normal pickup and delivery service – December 20
Last day to ship UPS 3 Day Select Packages – December 21
Last day to ship UPS 2nd Day Air packages – December 22
Last day to ship UPS Next Day Air packages – December 23 (for delivery December 24)

Posted in: How to Save | Comments (0) | Join Discussion

Chase Bank offers the Chase Freedom Unlimited credit card. This card has many cash back rewards and benefits.

Right now, there is a new cardmember offer. Earn a $200 bonus after you spend $500 on purchases in the first three months from account opening, and earn 5% cash back on grocery store purchases (not including Target or Walmart purchases) and up to $12,000 spent in the first year.

The Chase Freedom Unlimited credit card award 1.5% cash back for every $1 spent on all purchases. You also earn 5% cash back on travel purchases made with Chase Ultimate Rewards and 3% cash back on dining purchases at restaurants, including takeout and eligible delivery services. Through March of 2022, cardmembers can also earn 5% cash back on all Lyft rides. Cash back points can be redeemed through Ultimate Rewards with no minimum.

Chase Freedom Unlimited can earn 5% cash back on all travel purchases Chase Ultimate Rewards. They can also earn 3% cash back on drugstore purchases. In addition, Chase Freedom Unlimited cardmembers will continue to earn 1.5% cash back on all other purchases.

Card members get a 0% intro APR for 15 months from opening their account on purchases and balance transfers. After the intro period ends, a variable APR of 14.99%-23.74% takes effect. Chase Freedom Unlimited card holders will have no annual fee.

Unlike with some other credit cards, the Chase Freedom Unlimited cash back rewards do not expire as long as your account is open. There is no minimum to redeem for cash back.

It is worth knowing that you can have the Chase Freedom Flex and the Chase Freedom Unlimited credit cards at the same time. The same cash back rewards are offered on each credit card.

Posted in: How to Save | Comments (0) | Join Discussion

Looking for a credit card that gives you cash back? Apple Card does this by giving users Daily Cash back every day. Use your Apple Card to make a purchase, and you can immediately see how much cash back you have received.

When you buy something using Apple Card, you get a percentage of your purchase back in Daily Cash. It’s real cash, so unlike rewards, it never expires or loses its value. Your cash is deposited right into your Apple Cash card in the Wallet app – not a month from now, but every day.

And there’s no limit to how much you can get. Use it to buy things in stores, on websites, and in apps. Make a payment on your Apple Card. Payback a friend in Messages. Or send it straight to your bank account and watch it add up.

There are no fees on Apple Card – not even hidden ones. Apple eliminated fees and built tools to help you pay less interest, You can apply in minutes to see if you are approved with no impact to your credit score. Advanced technologies like Face ID, Touch ID, and Apple Pay give you a new level of privacy and security.

As you may have expected, you need to have an iPhone in order to get an Apple Card. The only way to apply for the Apple Card is to apply for it through your iPhone.

The best way to use Apple Card is with Apple Pay – the secure technology built into iPhone, Apple Watch, iPad and Mac, and accepted at 85 percent of merchants in the United States. Apple Pay is a safer way to pay that helps you avoid touching buttons or exchanging cash.

Every purchase you make using your Apple Card with Apple Pay gets you 2% Daily Cash back. No points to calculate. No limits or deadlines. Just real cash that’s ready to spend whenever, wherever, and however you want.

Posted in: How to Save | Comments (0) | Join Discussion