I’m convinced that one of life’s little pleasures is being able to look at a freshly cleaned sink. A shiny sink can really bring a lot of satisfaction for the few minutes you spend scrubbing. And that’s why I always keep a little bottle of my homemade sink scrub under my kitchen sink. It makes it super easy for me to get that Clean Sink Happiness, and my frugal side loves that it costs just pennies to make too! 2 Ingredient DIY Kitchen Sink Scrub I use my homemade scouring powder almost exclusively on my stainless steel kitchen sink. (I prefer my homemade lemon soft scrub for my bathroom sink ..read more

Did you know that’s it’s really quite simple to make homemade pudding from scratch? Yes, you can make your own pudding with just a few ingredients and only a few minutes of your time! The strategy I’ll be sharing here is a homemade chocolate pudding recipe, because chocolate is probably the most popular of all the pudding flavors, and it’s my most favorite too. In the past, I often relied on my homemade pudding mix, but this time around I wanted to also have an easy way to make pudding even if I didn’t have any of my DIY mix. After a half-hearted search through the internet looking at pudding ..read more

I love having lots of strategies for moisturizing my dry skin. I always keep ordinary lotion on hand, but in addition to that I often make my own glycerin moisturizing spray, and every so often I make my own lotion bars too. And that’s because lotion bars are very quick and easy to make! Ordinary lotions are usually an emulsification of oil and water, often with an emulsifying wax mixed in too. Lotion bars take the water out of the mixture and instead can be made by just mixing an oil and a wax. The end result is a soft bar that can be rubbed on skin for softening and moisturizing in a form t ..read more

A frugal hack that I’ve used for many years is this quick recipe to make your own garlic salt. It’s a super simple two ingredient combo anyone can whip up that lets you make garlic salt with garlic powder and salt that you probably already have in your pantry. Once you learn this trick you might never buy the premade garlic salts again! My Garlic Salt Recipe Ratio My homemade garlic salt recipe uses a 2:1 ratio of salt and garlic, meaning it uses 2 parts salt to each one part of garlic powder. Many other recipes online use a higher ratio of salt (and the store bought garlic salts probably hav ..read more

Combining your pantry spices into handy homemade mixes can be a great money saver and a simple way to make quick homemade gifts too. Today’s recipe for a mexican fiesta dip spice blend is a perfect example as you can make a frugal batch to keep for yourself, or you can combine these fiesta dip mix ingredients to use as a festive little jar gift too! How To Make Your Own Fiesta Dip Spice Blend To make a homemade seasoning mix that can be used to create a dip with those southwestern fiesta flavors, you’ll just need a few common spices. I use these eight spices in my blend: Dried Parsley Dried ..read more

If you’re looking for a cookie recipe that’s just a bit different than the usual, then I think you’ll love these soft and cake-like pumpkin spice cookies. They’re a fun way to use my homemade pumpkin pie spice blend, and they have a drizzle of a tasty icing on them too! Mixing Together the Pumpkin Spice Cookies I always begin any cookie recipe by mixing together the dry ingredients. But in addition to the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt in this recipe, I also add in 3 teaspoons of my homemade pumpkin pie spice blend to give these cookies their spicy fall flavor. This pumpkin pie s ..read more

I learned many years ago that you could make your own pumpkin pie spice blend by just mixing together four common household spices. I started off by just making 1 teaspoon of DIY pumpkin pie spice at a time, and then increased it to a 1 tablespoon size batch of DIY pumpkin pie spice. And now finally and at long last I decided to make homemade pumpkin pie spice in a larger batch that I could keep on hand for using in a few more recipes. How I Make My Own Pumpkin Pie Spice Mix This new larger version uses the same four spices as my other smaller batches. It’s a simple combination of cinnamon, n ..read more

If you have many areas in your home with hard floor surfaces, chances are you might also have a handy mopping tool called the Swiffer Wet Jet that helpfully squirts out cleaning solution onto the floor as you mop. I bought a Swiffer Wet Jet Starter Kit several months ago and so far I’m finding this mop very helpful! But it was going against my frugal nature to have to keep purchasing the disposable pads and the refill solution. It was time to see if I could make my own homemade wet jet pads and refills! Homemade Wet Jet Solution The tricky part of making a DIY wet jet refill is actually getti ..read more

Do you like to make your own planners? If you do, then you probably like to have a printed calendar somewhere in your planner too. I’ve made my own planner for several years now and I know it’s a nice option to have a printed calendar in it too for helpful longer range planning. That’s why in addition to my free weekly planner pages, I also like to offer these free printable calendar pages that help you see a month at a time or the whole year at one time! Printable Monthly 2024 Calendars The first option available are these printable monthly 2024 calendars. You can print a full size monthly c ..read more

For several years now I’ve been making my own planner, and I love it! It’s been a great way for me to have a simple system where I can write down the things I want to keep track of. And keeping track of things in a weekly format has always worked the best for me. If you feel the same way, then perhaps you’ll find one of my simple and free weekly planner pages to be just what you’re looking for too! I’ve been publishing these printable planner pages for several years now and perhaps you’ve stopped by in the past and found something that worked for you. This year I’ve made a little change and d ..read more