I am a cheapskate. Always have been, always will be. It is a challenge for me to see how much I can squeeze out of a dollar without sacrificing quality and lifestyle.
Yesterday morning I cut the top off of our lotion bottle because there is about 1/5 of the lotion left even after you can't pump any out. It seems wasteful to me to throw it away.
I laughed this morning when I came across this article about Extreme Cheapskates and how tightwads like me are hurting the economy by not spending, spending, spending. I wince at quotes like this:
Notice that the article mentions my fellow lotion-bottle cutters:
"cutting lotion bottles in half so she can scrape out the last drops."
Smart gal, if you ask me!
Let's think about this. isn't it the spend-spend-spend mentality that got us into this mess in the first place? Personally I think that if people start thinking more about their spending habits and saving more of their money, our country will be in a much better place. Life is not made more meaningful by having money and things, but it is made better by the quantity and quality of time that we give to those who are important to us. Too bad we can't buy more time. It is the one thing that I would go into debt over.
Some other miserly things that I do to save money are making my own laundry detergent (this saves lots of money!), shopping sales and organizing my menus around those sales, making clothes for my kids, shopping thrift stores and going without. I don't feel bad about any of that and I will continue to do it even after the economy starts going forward again.
Extreme miserly behavior. I like it. There are worse things that I could be tagged with.
What about you? Are you penny-pinching? Do you feel guilty about it?
Please leave your best money-saving tip in the comments. I want some new ideas!
