Being frugal, we tend to save a lot of things that other might think are a waste of time. And, you know, sometimes they are right.
This past weekend, I went down into the basement to do a little organizing. We still have boxes on shelves from our move as well as tons of kids craft supplies and workbooks that need some better organization. One thing I realized is that we are just overflowing with paper, card stock and cardboard. How did this happen?
We get a ton of paper from my son’s school. Most of the time, the paper is only printed on one side or is only printed on a fourth of the page! We reuse this paper for scrap paper or all sorts. I write grocery lists on it, I write notes on it and the kids use it for drawing and scribbling. Many times I have enough school paper from a single week to form it into a notebook for the kids.
We have another ton of paper from when we moved. Because we were in a crunch time, and frankly, I was too lazy to worry about cleaning newsprint off of our breakable items, we purchased a roll of packing paper. When I unpacked, I saved a bunch of that paper for the kids to use. The paper is nice and large. It is just right for spreading out on the floor and coloring murals together.
We have a stack of card board, mat board, card stock and other scraps that are just right for home made signs and to use as building materials for the kids crafts. We tend to collect the stuff from new purchases, as well as left over from our household use.
When junk mail comes in, it very often has a lot of usable paper (not to mention envelopes), so we tend to collect paper that way as well.
But as I looked at the neat stacks of paper, I realized that at least half of it had to go, so off to the recycling bin it went. And I vow to use up most of the nice paper first, before I go saving too much scrap paper.
Mary Ann Romans writes about everything related to saving money in the Frugal Blog, technology in the Computing Blog, and creating a home in the Home Blog. You can read more of her articles by clicking here.
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