Tuesday tips

Thought I'd throw out some more tips to follow up from Sunday night's post. Comments and ideas appreciated!

6. Teach - I don't actually mean go and get a degree in college and do this, but rather pass on what you know about... whatever! People want to learn, and if you have a talent or skill that's worthwhile (I think they all are, right?), then someone somewhere will pay you to teach them. Are you good at guitar, piano, violin or whatever? Make an ad, spread it around town, tell your friends. Take up students. This is really great if you're good with kids, too, as parents always want their kids to learn to play something (usually doesn't apply to drums...no offense, really). You could do this with art, math tutoring, or anything really. Juggling? Just a thought.

7. Eat what you have before going to the grocery store - this one is our ultimate recurring challenge. Obviously you're going to need to buy more milk, or maybe some meat to go with your hefty pasta supply, or at least something. But the idea here is to just really force yourself to dig into your pantry and eat that rice or jar of peanut butter you've been saving from last Summer's camping trip. This is not appealing. But it does save you money. And it helps you put things in perspective. I can't count how many times I've stared into our pantry full of "side dish stuffs" and said, "We're out of food... I must go buy fried chicken to survive." A lot of people around the world would be overjoyed with our ignored pantries.

8. Try to fix it before you throw it out - it's ingrained into us to just toss stuff out on the curb if it stops working suddenly. I feel like this applies to electronics and clothes more than anything, but I'm sure its applicable all over. Holes in your clothes can be sewn and patched. Scratches on discs can sometimes be buffed out. Sometimes electronics that stop working only require a tube or a new cord soldered on. An example would be my dad and his lawn mower. It's stopped working three times. Each time he figured out what part went bad, spent less than $10 and got it running again, usually for another year. His neighbor threw a lawn mower out. Dad asked for it, figured out it was a spark plug (I think), and viola! He had a new lawn mower. The neighbor had gone through two more by the time my dad gave up on that one.

I guess to get to it--just try not to be wasteful with what you have. It's better for you, the environment, and your wallet.

Do you have any great tips or examples of things you've done to save money like this? Drop a comment below.