Paperless Grocery Lists - Online Resources That Help

I strongly believe that when you are trying to get your finances in order it is helpful to organize the rest of your life as well. It’s hard to keep your bills and bank statements in order when you can’t find anything in your house. Because of this I will be writing several articles on organizing other aspects of your life while still saving money. I will also be adding in some “green” options where I feel like it can save you some extra money.

There are so many wonderful resources online to get yourself organized. Once I started this article I was overwhelmed with how many different tools are out there to do just that. I subscribe to a number of RSS Feeds and in many of them, there were people raving about a certain product or tool that they have been using. What I decided to do was look into all of them and pass along the information. Some will be more helpful than others depending on what you are organizing and how big the project is. Just pick and choose what is the most useful for you. So without further ado, here are some organizing tools!

The first one is a very basic way to make lists online. The service is called TaDaList. When I say basic, I do mean basic. There are no bells and whistles when it comes to this service. If you are someone who spends are good amount of time on the computer this could be a good option for you. I always have at least one to-do list going at a time. It’s hard for me to keep track of the list when they are written down on random pieces of paper. This will solve that problem. It takes literally 10 seconds to start up and it’s very easy to do. I don’t spend enough time on the computer to utilize this myself but I use a similar service on my Blackberry. This leads me into the next one.

MaraTick is just like TaDaList, except I use this on my phone. You create an account, which again is simple, then start creating your lists. This comes in handy for me when I need to make a grocery list and I’m not in a place to grab a pen and paper, and also to create a packing list for vacation. With Maratick it actually shows you your progress so you can see just how much further you need to go to complete your list. Both of these options are also green solutions. How? No more wasted paper. You’re not needlessly using paper and then losing track of it, just for it to be thrown out because you already created another list. Now everything is concise, in one place, and easy to use and get to.

The next service to mention is FlyLady. I have to say that this one is much more involv then the two previous ones. If you are focusing on getting your home in order this is the site to go to. There are numerous resources to use and they also have forums, newsletters, are on blogtalkradio, the list goes on. One feature in particle this is good, especially if you are trying to declutter your home, is called flyzone. Each week they focus on one part of your home and tips on how to get yourself more organize. There are five different zones and at the end of the month they start over. I think this is a great feature because getting your house in order can be an overwhelming task. This is one way to simplify the task at hand. I will say that the site is a little “loud” for my taste but if you can get past that there are good resources at your disposal.

There are so many great resources out there on the world wide web. If you’re in the need of some order in your life, go online and see if you can find any services to make your life a little easier. If you find something you think really works, tell me about it in the comments below.

Cleaning 101 - 4 Ways to Save

I strongly believe that when you are trying to get your finances in order it is helpful to organize the rest of your life as well. It’s hard to keep your bills and bank statements in order when you can’t find anything in your house. Because of this I will be writing several articles on organizing other aspects of your life while still saving money. I will also be adding in some “green” options where I feel like it can save you some extra money.

This may seem like a random article to have on a personal finance website but I think that there are so many different areas in our lives that we can save money where we don’t even realize. Cleaning products is one of those areas. I actually used to clean part-time right after getting married. I wanted to get a part-time job but wanted to set my own hours. This was a great option for me. I love to clean and had worked for an aunt of mine years earlier who has her own successful cleaning business. One issue that I had though with wanting to keep everything clean all the time and buying supplies to clean others homes, was hoarding supplies. I would buy anything that I thought I would want to use or could eventually use. I love different cleaning supplies and would try anything new that came out. But, it is not necessary to have a whole shelf full of cleaning supplies. Even Mr. Clean knows the importance of not having 10 different cleaners for everything you need to clean in your home. Those commercials are trying to reach the audience who is tired of constantly buying different supplies that you may or may not be happy with. Below are some options you may want to try if you feel like your cleaning supplies are getting out of control.

1.) Buy multi-purpose cleaners: There are so many great products out there that do a wonderful job cleaning a variety of items. Look on the back of the bottles next time you buy a cleaner to see just how many items it will clean. Even check out the bottles you have now. A lot of times you’ll be using different cleaners when you really don’t have to. You may already have another cleaner on hand that can clean the whole bathroom.
2.) Buy Sanitizing wipes: These are great because they take three items and combine them into one. Instead of getting a certain counter spray, paper towels, and Lysol disinfecting spray, you can just buy these wipes. They are really cheap and most of the time you can get them at the Dollar Store or buy them in bulk. They are great for kitchen counters, bathrooms and wiping down items like toys and door nobs if someone is sick in the house.
3.) Buy commercial grade cleaning supplies: This is something that I found was helpful when I cleaned people’s homes. The products worked great and they lasted a really long time. I actually found a cleaner at the Dollar Store that was a commercial cleaner and all I had to do was stick some of the liquid in a spray bottle with water. By diluting the mixture you’re making it stretch even further which will save you even more money. And since these products are normally stronger it’s safe to do with it still cleaning your home effectively.
4.) Make your own cleaning supplies: This is a great option if you are going green. There are tons of websites out there dedicated to making your own cleaning products. When I was going out on my own to clean homes this is something that I looked into. I didn’t make my own products then but if I had to do it over again I would have. You can save a significant amount of money by making your own products while being environmentally friendly at the same time. If you need some ideas to get started head over to www.care2.com.

One last thing, before you run out and buy more supplies or make your own use up what you have. Look at the back of the bottles and make sure you’re using your supplies for everything you can. If you run out of an item, take inventory first so you know what you really need and what you still have.

If you have any other ideas or “how-to’s” tell me about it in the comment below.

Multi-Purpose Furniture

I strongly believe that when you are trying to get your finances in order it is helpful to organize the rest of your life as well. It’s hard to keep your bills and bank statements in order when you can’t find anything in your house. Because of this I will be writing several articles on organizing other aspects of your life while still saving money. I will also be adding in some “green” options where I feel like it can save you some extra money.

When you are living in a small space, like an apartment or town house, it is really important to maximize the space that you have. I have been learning more and more how important this little tip is. Even if you do have adequate space in your home, having furnishings that have multiple functions is a great way to utilize the space to it’s fullest and save money at the same time. When my husband and I first moved into our apartment I didn’t have a clue how to go about organizing everything and fitting all of our stuff without spending a ton of money or just throwing everything into a closet. (Well, actually throwing everything into a closet really wasn’t an option. There’s a limited number of those.) We live in a modest one bedroom apartment. We have to be very deliberate about things that we keep and where we store them. This is where the multi-purpose furniture comes in handy. For instance, we have a tiny, little reading nook in our family room. We both really enjoy reading and it was something we both decided would be nice to have. Since we don’t have any excess space I had to figure out how to create a reading spot without cluttering our room up with furniture. I ended up placing a nice, comfy chair in the corner of the room. Now instead of putting the obvious end table next to it, I opted for a small bookshelf instead. I found this horrible looking bookshelf at a flea market a while back. It only cost me $5 and I knew that a quick sanding and paint job would get it looking great in no time. So that’s exactly what I did. I’m fortunate enough that my father-in-law is a painter and could use some of his left over paint for no additional cost. This shelf came in great use for this nook. It’s a great little corner bookshelf that is just the right size to fit beside the couch. Not only can it fit a lamp on the top, like an end table would, but there are the shelves that we can store the books that we are currently reading. In front of the chair we have a small trunk. This is another great find. I got this at Target on sale for around $15 regularly $55. Not only can we use it to prop our feet up while reading, and to place our food and coffee on, but we can also store our throw blankets inside. With just this little reading spot alone we have saved a lot of space and money with just being resourceful about the furniture we place in our home. We could have had an extra basket for the blankets, and an end table for the lamp, and a separate shelf for the books, and a coffee table to put our beverages on, but instead we opted for multi-purpose furniture.
Another place that we have saved money and effectively used our space is in our closet. We do not have a pantry closet and we weren’t sure where we were going to store our food. Instead of buying an extra piece of furniture for the kitchen, that we could put our food in, we got creative with our closets. One the the “closets” is a nook that doesn’t even have a door. It’s right off the kitchen so it made perfect sense to turn that into our pantry. I got a matching curtain to hang as the door and added a large bookshelf into the closet. (It already had one in but we maneuvered another one in for more storage.) This bookshelf is wonderful to store all of our food, while being out of sight and really organized. I can walk in and out of the closet without there being stuff everywhere and the only cost to convert the closet was the bookshelf and curtain.
There are so many other examples that I could give you from our place alone but I don’t want to beat the subject to death. The point is to be purposeful about the furniture that you buy for your place. If you think that you need to buy another storage unit or another furnishing of some type, look around your house first. There may be something that you can use just for that purpose that you haven’t thought about yet. I have rearranged our apartment many times, just with the items we already have. I’m always looking for ways to get us better organized without having to spend any extra money. And one major way that I do that it to use what we already have. Get creative and have fun with it. If you used an item for something other than it was intended for, let me know about it. I’d love to hear all the creative ways you decorate and keep yourselves organized with spending little to no money.