Hank’s handy, frugal paint holder makes painting projects more enjoyable.

Joan, an honorary Fiercely Frugal Savage Sister, recently gave us a great idea for do-it-yourself painters. Husband Hank set out to touch up the fence, but the full gallon of paint was too heavy and awkward for him to manage. He and Joan looked around for a smaller container but could find nothing suitable.

Joan handed him an empty milk jug with the suggestion that Hank could cut part of it away, leaving the handle for easy grasping. The idea was clever, but the milk jug was too flimsy. Hank searched for another type of jug and came up with an empty vinegar bottle. He cut part of the top off, leaving the handle, and voila!–a terrific paint container he could hold onto with one hand.

The best part was no cleanup. When he was finished with the fence, he simply poured all the unused paint back into the can and threw the jug away.

When you’re done using this tip on your own painting project, be sure to visit Joan’s blog and relax with her evocative posts about nature, travel, and growing up in the woods of Washington State.  Read more about Joan at www.RainsongPress.com.

Written by Fiercely Frugal Savage Sister Diana
Photo by Joan Husby

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© 2010, The Savage Sisters

I’m da champ in this bathrobe and slippers with a frog motif. Mommy found them on eBay for half the price of what Babies R Us charged.

Within days of losing my job last year, I was shocked to learn I was pregnant. After fourteen years of marriage, my husband and I had assumed we would never have children, and many family members had completely given up hope for such a blessed event.

Although we had been following sound financial principles for some time and had an emergency fund, no debt, and live on a budget, we were not prepared for the expense of a pregnancy and baby. However, I’ve always been a bargain shopper. Here are strategies I used to save money on maternity and baby items:

Thrift stores:  Thrift stores are excellent sources of maternity and nursing clothes, toys, and books. Because stock shifts constantly, it’s good to visit frequently. Pregnant women usually wear maternity clothes for just a few months, so these items often arrive at thrift stores still in excellent condition. The same holds true for children’s clothing. Watch for sale days in order to save even more.

Garage sales:  Although the selection at yard sales can be hit-and-miss, the prices are generally the lowest you’ll find anywhere. Visit as many garage sales as your schedule will allow before the baby is due. If you arrive at the end of the day on the last day of the sale, don’t be afraid to ask for special deals, as the sellers may be wondering what they are going to do with all the items that still haven’t sold.

It’s easy to sleep when I’m surrounded by so much love. Mommy’s friend gave her the onesie, another friend made the bib, and a third friend gave us the hand-me-down swing. Mommy keeps me warm with a snuggly thrift-store blanket.

Consignment stores:  Many consignment stores cater to babies and moms and can be a treasure trove for the frugal shopper. Let the shop owner know what particular items you’re looking for, and she can alert you when she receives those items. Also, watch for end-of-season sales and stock up several months or even a year in advance.

Baby stores and departments:  After my husband and I registered for baby items at two stores, we had a much better idea of pricing and were able to pick up many more items from used sources. We knew a great deal when we saw it, and we knew what brands and styles appealed to us. When we saw these items at our favorite secondhand stores, we also could note how well they had fared with regular use.

At Christmas, Mommy dressed me up in a Santa suit that she and my uncle and cousin each wore when they were small. I like to help her recycle.

Friends and family:  When we announced the pregnancy to friends and family and mentioned that we would gladly take any hand-me-downs offered to us, some family members began shopping for us at secondhand sources. Their locations in other parts of the country greatly increased the selection. Once I knew what brands and sizes worked best for me, I passed along that information so they could shop more knowledgeably. Other friends began offering everything from clothing to baby gear to information about free magazine subscriptions. I have graciously accepted everything offered, and if I later find I cannot use something, I pass it along to someone else who can use it.

After utilizing all of these sources, I washed and sorted my son’s clothing by size before he was born. Now I am able to “go shopping” in his closet each time he outgrows his current clothing size. And as I see what particular items he lacks, I add just one or two pieces to my shopping list to round out his current-size collection. When he outgrows a size, I also have the option of taking all those clothes back to a consignment store where I can earn cash or store credit.

Recently my husband found a news article that stated that a middle-income family can expect to spend $221,000 on a child from birth through high school.  We look forward to providing for all our son’s needs and living a wonderful life with him at a fraction of the cost!

Bonus: Information sources
Not only did we find invaluable information on pregnancy and child-rearing from all of the above sources, but we also found information from community sources:

• Our county library has a wealth of free information.

• Our insurance company offers a free program that gives its pregnant clients e-mail access to a nurse. Any time I had a question, I could jot her a note, and she would answer within a day or two.

• My midwives’ office offers a Centering Pregnancy group, where instead of seeing a doctor for a short office visit, I went to a 2-hour group session. Each mom-to-be received a regular checkup, vast amounts of information, and could share pregnancy questions and stories with other moms. The midwives’ office also boasts a bookshelf with books on all kinds of pregnancy and childrearing topics free for the taking.

Photos and blog post by Fiercely Frugal Savage Sister Aimee

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© 2010 by the Savage Sisters

The blue plastic box under the stainless-steel table top holds an electric meat grinder for sausage-making. "My husband makes a mean Kielbasa," Carmen reports.

A “Pig” Table
One day Carmen’s husband brought home a piece of stainless steel from a school kitchen because he thought it would serve as a drain board in their own summer kitchen. Carmen’s sister took one look and declared it would make a perfect “pig table.” Since Carmen and her husband have pig roasts once in awhile, that made sense to them.

Carmen used an old, bulky desk for the table’s base. Its mouse-proof drawers work well for utensil storage. Even though the stainless-steel top isn’t fastened down with screws, Carmen says it fits great and doesn’t move around. The metal can also be sanitized easily. A hole allows grease from the cooked pig to drip into a bucket that hangs from a hook below.

At first Carmen set the pig table on an old wheeled bed frame so they could push it around easily, but result ended up being too low for her tall husband to use. She solved the problem by crafting a high wooden base with large wheels.

A Resurrected Folding Table
When Carmen’s folding table died after being packed and unpacked a zillion times to display market wares, Carmen decided to give it a second life.

She removed the legs from the old tabletop and attached them to wood planks in the same manner that she replaced a large wagon’s platform. The resurrected table served at the market for many more years and also accompanied the family on camping trips. “When it died, I had already quit the market,” Carmen says. She made a new top that measured about twelve feet long. She reports that the table’s third incarnation will last a long time because she doesn’t fold the table anymore.

A little creativity and a “nothing ventured, nothing gained” attitude will allow you to create clever tables too out of materials you have on hand. And when you do, be sure to share your success with us in the comment section.

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Written by Fiercely Frugal Savage Sister Diana; photos by Carmen Davis-Stevens

© 2010 by the Savage Sisters

On a recent trip to Albuquerque, Jennifer and I were impressed by what our uncle and cousin had done to maximize the efficiency of the fireplace in our uncle’s home. They’d used common materials and Savage ingenuity to capture some of the heat escaping up the chimney. Realizing that traditional fireplaces waste energy, they first looked into getting an insert, but they decided that an insert would take up too much of the fireplace box.

They used a chassis punch to make some of the holes for connections and for other openings, they used a hole saw. Then they sealed joints with RTV high-temp silicone adhesive.

The cool end of the exhaust pipe runs into dryer exhaust hose.

The other end of the dryer hose enters a wooden box that Uncle Art and Cousin Mark constructed. The box is hidden in a closet around the corner from the fireplace.

Inside the box is a fan that blows air through the tubing system. Air traveling through the flexible exhaust pipe inside the fireplace comes out toasty warm on the other end and helps heat the entire home.

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Our purpose isn’t to give you step-by-step instructions on how to do exactly the same project on your own fireplace. We simply want to encourage you to think creatively concerning your own energy challenges. Thanks to the Fiercely Frugal Savage Brothers for providing the inspiration!

SAFETY ALERT: Of course you’ll want to check your local fire codes before undertaking any fireplace modifications. And since this project entails the use of chemicals, sharp tools, and electricity, and the finished product will be subjected to extreme heat, we strongly suggest that you review our Legal Babble page, too. Thanks!

Written by Fiercely Frugal Savage Sister Diana

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© 2009 The Savage Sisters

Carmen extended the wagon’s life span by replacing its platform with planks she had on hand.

Several years ago, Harbor Freight Tools had a special on large wagons, the kind similar in appearance to classic Radio Flyer wagons, only larger. Carmen purchased two wagons as shopping carts for her farmer’s market stall. Whenever customers bought huge pumpkins or numerous plants, they could use the wagons to haul purchases to their cars.

Carmen even used a wagon once to deliver a customer to the bathroom. The woman had MS and was in urgent need of restroom facilities. However, she was quite tall and wasn’t sure about squeezing into the unusual conveyance. Then her sense of adventure took over, and Carmen got her to the restroom just in time.

She even found a way to extend the life of the wagon’s tires.

“I used those wagons to death,” Carmen told us. The metal on them eventually bent and rusted out, but the wheels and supports were still good, so Carmen cut wooden planks and support pieces to fashion new platforms. Because she worked with materials she had on hand, one wagon ended up a little wider and the other came out a little longer. She used Sheetrock screws to attach the wood. Recently, when she had to replace wood on one of the wagons, she found it easy to do because she’d used screws instead of nails on the original repair.

Instead of discarding the old tires, she used “Green Slime” to repair them. (SLiME Tire Sealant is formulated for use in pneumatic tires.) “The valve core on one inner tube was shot,” she said, “so I used the core from another inner tube I had been cutting up for gasket material.”

When Carmen goes to market, she uses a wagon as a shopping cart by placing two wooden fruit boxes on the platform to hold her purchases.

Carmen’s ingenuity inspires us. Now we can hardly wait for the next sale at our favorite cheap-tool store!

Written by Fiercely Frugal Savage Sister Diana; photos by Carmen Davis-Stevens

© 2009, The Savage Sisters

A wire spade, club, heart, and diamond greet everyone who passes by the fence.

When Carmen got tired of looking at a pile of chicken wire that once surrounded an old poultry pen, she tried to squish it into small wads. “‘A Spade Is a Spade’ is what resulted,” she told us. “After that I made other shapes of a card suite and then a wire man.

Carmen was a very lonely widow when she created the wire man. She stood him next to a building and shook his hand on her way to feed the chickens every day. “Half of my creations are useful, and the other half seem to cheer me up and release whatever this is that causes me to…well…to create. My new husband quickly takes old wire off to the recycle center. Not that he doesn’t like my art. He simply thinks I spend a lot of time trying to reuse… garbage.”

Carmen’s “The Driver” project is reminiscent of exhibits at children’s museums.

We Savage Sisters would never criticize someone for recycling wire into art and keeping it out of the landfill. So we are impressed with Carmen’s “The Driver” project, too.

“I salvaged the steering wheel off a riding lawnmower,” Carmen explains.  “It’s screwed to the post with a large washer, a smaller washer, and one large sheetrock screw. Driving a building is not every child’s dream, but children are intrigued by it anyway.”

The wire man extends a hand in friendly greeting. We’re sure he’s grateful that the essence of his composition didn’t end up in a landfill.

She was able to salvage the lawnmower’s seat by attaching it to a heavy plank, which her husband lays across their motorboat. “It gives him back support and helps him fit in the boat better,” she says. They considered clamping it down, but the plank never moves unless her husband moves it.  The plank also serves as a great board for bait cutting while fishing.

The lawnmower-seat-on-a-plank is useful. The spade art cheers Carmen. Maybe the wire-man sculpture ended up being both cheerful and useful. “I wonder how much my wire man had to do with my choosing a six-foot-five husband?” she asks.

Written by Fiercely Frugal Savage Sister Diana
Photos by Carmen Davis-Stevens

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© 2009, The Savage Sisters

Jeanie was heartbroken that her cat had clawed up all four of the beautiful new red chairs. But after Jeanie cleverly repaired them, you can’t see the damage at all.

It really wasn’t the cat’s fault. (Jennifer and I are such feline aficionados that we’ll look hard and long to give a kitty the benefit of the doubt.) In this case, the problem was a scratching post that was falling apart so badly the cat wouldn’t use it anymore. The cat figured the next best thing was to use four new overstuffed armchairs sitting in front of a brick fireplace. As soon as Jeanie realized it, she covered up the chairs, placed barriers at the scratched corners, and puzzled about what had gotten into her normally good cat. When she discovered the scratching-post problem, she had it repaired, but the damage to the chairs remained.

The chairs were upholstered in synthetic leather fabric (aka “pleather”). Each claw attack had punctured a hole and also pulled some of the backing out, leaving tufts of stringy white material. The corners were particularly bad.

“I tried pulling out the stringy material but it just kept coming,” she said. “I tried shaving it off with assorted blades, but it removed the finish without cutting off the strings. Scissors wouldn’t cut close enough. I finally hit on using toenail clippers. Perfect! I spent a lot of time clipping, but it got the job done.”

The back corners had been especially torn up, but today, they look perfect.

Next she had to smooth out the raised edges of each puncture. Heat seemed like the answer, but she wanted to avoid melting and flattening the pleather’s texture. Burlap and a steam iron did the trick. She used two layers of burlap over the damaged areas to protect the pleather from too much heat. Then she used a very hot iron with lots of steam and plenty of pressure. That flattened the raised edges and covered bits of the strings that remained but left a texture that blended in with the surrounding areas.

The next problem was some dark coloring and bits of white where each puncture had been. Jeanie mixed acrylic craft paint with some fabric paint in various colors until she matched the fabric’s red color. After applying a coat of paint, she let it dry slightly and then placed the burlap over the area again and ironed it with steam and good pressure to maintain the leathery texture. The worst spots required a second coat of paint and more texturing.

The repair turned out so well that even Jeanie can’t find where most of the original damage had been. She’s ecstatic. “I hope this can help someone else with a similar problem,” she told us.

We hope so, too. Now go check your cat’s scratching post.

Written by Fiercely Frugal Savage Sister Diana
Photos by Jeannette Savage Christenson

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© 2009, The Savage Sisters

The converted cook-stove works great in Carmen’s summer kitchen. You can see that the kitchen has plenty of ventilation--a requirement when using propane indoors.

Carmen purchased an old wood-burning cook stove to use in her summer kitchen.* Not only was the stove in need of repair, but she’s also never had much luck in getting stoves to draw correctly without smoke seeping into the room. So she decided to convert the wood stove to propane.

A knowledgeable friend told her it could be done, and she convinced him to accompany her to Home Depot to price components. While he looked through boxes of parts, she spotted a full-sized barbecue on sale for $79.99. “Why can’t we just modify that?” she asked.

The barbecue’s controls are mounted on the side of the stove. Eventually, Carmen will hook it up to a regular propane line instead of the portable tank.

The friend looked surprised, then interested, then intrigued. He spent at least twenty minutes reading information on the box before he agreed it might work.
Now Carmen had all the necessary parts except something to use as a brace for the jets. The friend fashioned a brace from a piece of scrap metal and a few self-tapping screws. He installed it inside the stove and hooked up a standard-sized propane tank.

Since the barbecue came equipped with an igniter, Carmen doesn’t even need matches to start a fire. The high, medium, and low settings work great, and she can cook on the modified stove just as if it burned wood. She hasn’t tested the oven yet, however. The door still falls off.

The barbecue’s burners fit nicely inside the cook-stove’s firebox.

More pieces of the barbecue unit remained, and of course Carmen couldn’t let them end up in a landfill. She placed the now-gutted firebox next to one of her ponds where it makes a lovely contained spot for a campfire. Whenever she’s done using a campfire, she can simply close the lid and walk away without fear of fire spreading.

The barbecue’s wheeled stand was also left over. Since the stand was very lightweight, Carmen cut a piece of plywood to fit the top and fashioned a portable table for camping or to hold supplies when she works on other projects.

The firebox from the barbecue makes a safe, contained place for an outside campfire.

Thanks for showing all of us Fiercely Frugal folks some “hot” new ideas, Carmen. Can we come over now and toast marshmallows?

Safety Alert!
Because propane is a colorless and odorless gas, manufacturers are required to add an odorant that makes the gas smell like rotten eggs or boiled cabbage. If you can smell the scent of propane, a potentially dangerous situation may exist. Extinguish all open flames and immediately leave any area where propane fumes are present. Avoid touching electrical switches or appliances when a leak is suspected. Propane is heavier than air, so the vapor will descend to the lowest point–your basement, for example. Avoid these areas when you suspect a leak, and be sure to seek professional help.

Carmen turned the wheeled barbecue-stand into a handy, lightweight table.

When propane burns, it gives off carbon monoxide, which is a colorless and odorless gas, too. It’s also toxic. Therefore, proper ventilation is imperative for indoor use. Please have your propane system checked if you experience any of the following symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning: headaches, dizziness, loss of muscular control, vomiting, and watering of the eyes. Cherry-red skin is a very late sign of carbon monoxide poisoning.

Be sure to read our Legal Babble page.

*The traditional purpose of a summer kitchen is to keep the main house cooler in the summer by relegating the cooking duties to a separate building.

Written by Fiercely Frugal Savage Sister Diana
Photos by Carmen Davis-Stevens

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© 2009, The Savage Sisters

The old leather belt works great as a long-lasting door-sweep.

Fifteen winters ago when wind was blowing in under Carmen’s front door, she took an old leather belt with a broken buckle, cut the belt to the width of the door, and screwed it in place. Her door happens to be steel, so she used self-tapping screws. For wooden doors, you could use sheet-rock screws or nails.

“You don’t even notice the leather sweep at the bottom,” reports Joan. “It doesn’t tear and shred like other door-sweeps can. It even keeps the ants out.”

Carmen’s solution for the door’s beat-up interior resulted in a creative totem-pole mural that cheers everyone who sees it.

The doors themselves are also recycled. Where a former slider used to lead to the back porch, Carmen has installed swinging double doors with diamond-shaped window panes. She has used the lower panels for all sorts of creative art projects with her young grandsons. Most recently, Carmen painted the door white with ivy vines creeping up the lower panels.

“She believes in the house serving her purposes, not the other way around,” says Joan.

The recycled front door also has a story. “Years ago the plastic bits that make a steel door look like carved wood fell off,” Carmen says. “I simply sprayed the outside with brown paint. The dents are still there and so are the pieces of plastic rod that attached the phony wood to the door. It now serves as a sign to would-be thieves that I obviously am not worth robbing.”

The inside of the door looked pretty beat up, too. So in a creative frenzy, Carmen cut fabric and hot-glued it to the door to make a Northwest-type mural. She screwed on a wooden frame to hold down the edges. “It was quick and rustic and was more of a fix for my emotions than a tidy solution,” she says.

The Savage Sisters love the added bonus of fixing one’s emotions while being fiercely frugal. It soothes our souls just to hear about Carmen’s creativity. We hope it does the same for you.

Written by Fiercely Frugal Savage Sister Diana. Photos by Carmen Davis-Stevens.

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© 2009, The Savage Sisters

When viewing the chairs side by side, one might not think they would work together as a set.

Six years ago, when I needed dining-room chairs again, I hunted for the right price. Given my tight budget, even outlet-store prices seemed too high. Meanwhile, I put cheap plastic deck chairs around the table. They were too low, so I tossed a pillow onto each one for a temporary solution.

My daughter, Aimee, mentioned seeing chairs for fifteen dollars at a neighborhood garage sale. Fifteen dollars per chair is a great price, I thought, so imagine my joy when I discovered that the entire set was fifteen dollars. My budget smiled, too.

The only problem was that the chairs had a blonde finish, and my dining-room table didn’t. Since I had more time than money at that point, I laboriously stripped all four chairs down to the bare wood and stained them an oak color.

I wrapped fabric around to the back of the seat cushion, pulled it taut, and stapled it in place leaving the top of the cushion wrinkle-free.

But when family crowded around the table at Thanksgiving, I had to again press deck chairs into service for extra seating. A few weeks later, a coworker tried to give two dining-room chairs to Goodwill, but they rejected them due to fabric stains on the seats.

“Can you use them?” my coworker asked. I sure could! Even though they didn’t match my existing chairs, I realized that if I reupholstered all the seats in the same fabric, they would blend together. The two new chairs could sit at the head and foot of the table with the old ones lined up along the sides.

Although the chairs are quite dissimilar at first glance, they blend together as a set at the dining-room table.

Fortunately, Savage Sister Jennifer had recently given me some adorable kitty-themed upholstery fabric. So I removed the seat cushions from the chairs. The cushions on the refinished chairs simply popped out. The Goodwill-rejected seats needed just a few screws removed.

Using the old fabric as a pattern, I cut new upholstery fabric to fit each seat. I zigzagged the edges to reduce fraying, then stapled the squares to the underside of each cushion.

Voila! A “matching” set of six dining-room chairs for a total of $15.00 and a good supply of elbow grease.

Works for me. It might work for you too.

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Written by Fiercely Frugal Savage Sister Diana

© 2009, The Savage Sisters