Frugal Friday

Another busy week, but 'tis the season for that! Here's how we did with a few frugal wins here & there.

Saving on things we buy

• Nothing comes to mind this week. 

Earning money

• The teens got relatively big paychecks, particularly Nick, who was only around for one week. Sam's was close to double that. They are both thrilled. 
• I sold a sports bra on eBay & made $10. 

Avoiding spending

• Took home six individual Chobani yogurts from work, after they were destined for the trash

Eating what we have

• Sam unexpectedly was home for dinner on Friday, and our idea to do some returns fell through (one of the items we needed hadn't arrived yet), so we were at home without a plan. I found a package of 2 grilled burgers in one corner of the freezer, and then a lonely solo burger in another. That turned into dinner, and I defrosted a bun for Sam as well. I had my burger over a salad. 
• Made Sam dinner before work on Saturday, which he doesn't ask for but I mostly enjoy doing, and also gives me a way to use things up. He had one of the Chobani yogurts + granola, grape tomatoes & some chicken. I also made him lunch earlier in the day, because I was starving after a hike. We both had cheese quesadillas (ingredients leftover from tacos a week or so), a pear & chicken noodle soup. 
• I picked two jalapenos from our garden for the chicken fajita rice dish (which included rotisserie chicken saved from last weekend), and also cut green onions from the garden as well. I also added two containers of chicken broth from the freezer. I skipped buying the tortilla chips, but mostly because I can't be trusted with tortilla chips. The freezer is starting to look pretty good!
• Ate lots of leftovers, as we didn't have time to make anything new during the week. 

For others:

• We do almost all of our donations through structured charities, as those are the most bang for your buck, but I always retain some amount for private (anonymous) one to one donations. I hadn't found anything yet this year (to be fair, I've spent almost no time looking), so when I stumbled across a friend of a friend who had the death of a parent, a major medical crisis and a premature baby all within the same year, leading to medical bills and time off of work, I knew it was the one. It always feels nice to help someone directly, even though it doesn't scale. 

• I have Hyatt globalist status & that comes with awards you can use yourself or gift. We didn't have many Hyatt stays this year, so I had some awards to gift that would otherwise expire. I gave away a bunch on Buy Nothing, and it was so fun to hear about their travel plans & give them the various awards (club access, suite awards or guest of honor - which is basically full globalist benefits). Everyone was thrilled. 

What about you? Any wins to share?