by Claire
I’m happy to report that our household continues to exist without the use of papertowels! This makes me so proud! Never did I think we could do this. Initially it never would have occurred to me to stop buying them but with the changes we’ve made and the support from this blog, I considered it and now we have met that goal.
We are always looking for new ways to save and discuss ideas regularly. A lot of them are seemingly far-fetched (but I’ll never say never) like getting rid of one of the vehicles and becoming a one-car family or selling our furniture and see how little we can function with in the house.
Currently an attainable goal is getting rid of ziploc bags entirely. With back-to-school around the corner I’ve been looking into options for the kids’ lunches. Last school year my two kids ate cafeteria food quite a bit. Part of that was the novelty of a full service cafeteria since they had only known a private school “catered” lunch (that wasn’t very tasty). Our school district cafeteria does a decent job of offering healthy options but with the new real food approach in our household we will be doing packed lunches this year. The kids are excited.
I thought I’d share some of what I found out there. I look forward to hearing what reusable options you know about.
Lisa @ www.100daysofrealfood.com has great lunch ideas on her blog. I recently bought the freezer pop molds and the divided lunch reusable containers and we will use this coming week as our first practice week for girl scout camp. Take a look at the link below for some great ideas.
http://www.100daysofrealfood.com/2012/04/19/school-lunch-roundup/
A friend also told me about www.reuseit.com. Wow! I love this website! I really like the sandwich wrap by “waste not” that opens up to a placemat for the kids at lunch. Granted–my youngest might be the only one that loves this as much as I do but I’ll hand it to the boys for being open minded about things. I also like the look of the produce bags on this website. I’m not buying anything right now as I spent $20 on the freezer pops and divided lunch containers and that’s enough for this week. 🙂
Born and raised in Texas. I’ve at least driven through every state in the US courtesy of a roadtrip loving Dad.
I’m single with two children and a good parenting relationship with their father.
I am a “life is just half full of funny” kinda gal. Humor is my saving grace and I am thankful for it every single day. I have a strong Catholic faith and am thankful for that foundation.
I read a lot for a living but still enjoy a good book. I love biographies but in recent years have found the need for fun fictional books–sadly, for a long time I just didn’t enjoy fiction!
I love live theatre of any kind–from local productions to Broadway.
I love to scrapbook and pride myself in my kids’ albums.
I love being a mom but also love my career. I’m blessed to have found a balance allowing me to be at everything my kids need and want me to be at–while also having a career.
Favorite Quotes: Well behaved women rarely make history.
Behold the turtle. He makes progress only when he sticks his neck out. -James Bryant Conant
We have wrap-n-mats that we have been using for a few years now. My hubby will even use one sometimes to take his lunch. We like the Klean Kanteen water bottles and recently upgraded to the BuiltNY neoprene lunch boxes. What I like about the Built bags is that they are washable, insulated, and big/stretchy. As my kids get older, their lunches have gotten bigger! Plus having the bigger, more stretchy bag allows the various reusable ziploc bowls to all fit in without a problem. All of those things I bought on the Reuseit website. They are all still going strong too!
Oh yeah – we also have cloth napkins in the lunch box. I have sewn and found in thrift stores smaller cocktail size cloth napkins for lunch. A friend of mine just uses washclothes as a lunch napkin for her kids.
Good luck on your continued conversion to real food and reuseables. I saw something online the other day about families spending $85 on ziplock bags every year. Not sure where I saw it or if that is the correct number but getting good quality items that last will eventually save you money.
I would also like to add that I picked up a few random forks and spoons from the thrift store (usually 25 cents to a dollar) to use in lunches so that if they were ever lost, I wouldn’t be losing any silverware from my main pattern. Having extras also helps to make sure we still have plenty of clean silverware in the drawer for breakfast and dinner.
I LOVE this! Thanks Sheila. This is Steve’s hesitation with all of these products at the moment…the getting lost factor!
Here is another resource that has some great reusable lunch ideas. I just found out about this one, and look forward to saving up some money and getting a few things for my lunch.
http://mightynest.com/
Thanks Jessie. I’m going to check it out.
What great timing! I just read a post yesterday about repurposing other bags for lunches…
http://thepennynanny.blogspot.com/2012/07/save-money-onsandwichstorage-bags.html
With real food, I don’t know how many bags you buy, but hopefully there’s a useful idea in there for you!
Thanks for this Nicole!
Yes! Love this.
I’ve been a great fan of reuseit.com for ages. It’s surprising how the little things add up so quickly.
Andrew–I was surprised to read that they’ve been around for a decade! Such great stuff!
Check out etsy for reusable snack and sandwhich bags. For about 5$ you can buy a cloth bag with a velcro close that you can wash and resue over and over. I bought several a few years ago and they are still going strong. If you can sew yourself, you could probably make them cheaper. What I like about Etsy is they come in TONS of patterns, so you can different ones for each kid. I’m sure if you contacted one particular buyer and said, hey i need to buy 10 they would probably give you a deal. Just a thought.
Shannon–Wow! I love that website! I’ve never seen that but had to just “X” myself outta there fast! Too much fun stuff!!! I’ll be back when I am feeling stronger! 😉
Pyrex! While these aren’t perfect for sandwiches, they nicely contain fruit, chips, peanut butter and all sorts of other lunch item. The serving size bowls can often be found at Marshalls for a bit of a discount or use a Bed Bath & Beyond 20% off coupon.
Walnut–I LOVE B,B & B! I was so proud of myself the other day when I had time to kill in South Texas and I went to B, B & B…for two hours and only bought what I went into the store for (the babycakes cake pop/donut hole maker with which I made amazing whole wheat chocolate donut holes!!!) foor $15 after my 20% off coupon! There were SO many other things I wanted though. I love Marshall’s too…uh oh…I think that shopping monster is trying to come out!
Hi Claire,
My comment isn’t related to this particular post, but just wanted to let you konw I’m looking forward to your upcoming monthly recap. In particular,the effects of the vacation. ie. was anything “saved” while you were away, such as utilities. Perhaps you may not have your billing for this period yet, but it would be interesting to know. Also just a wee suggestion …to save yourself the grief from 50 people asking “why don’t you just pay off that small card”, how bout a small blurb at the very beginning of your update post about your family’s strategy for debt repayment.
Have a great day! I enjoy reading your posts as you have a very appealing writing style. I love the Friday rants as well!
Thanks Freckles! I’m glad you reminded me of this so I can update everyone. I do have good news on that small card so stay tuned.
For lunch containers I use two square sandwich ones for sandwiches, and the rest are ones I save from all the yougurt, sour cream, cottage cheese, and cream cheese we eat. These containers are great for lunches because they come in a variety of sizes, and all but the cream cheese ones stack together and have interchangeable lids. And because they were free and are constantly being replaced, if one gets lost or broken, it doesn’t matter, and if one gets left with something stinky in it, I just throw it out with no guilt.
I also like that I’m saving them from the trash for quite some time. I recently saw an expiration date on one of my containers from 2002. That’s 10 years of use from something most people just throw in the trash or recycling bin, and then go out and buy new plastic to use for containers.
I also use these containers, plus margarine tubs for leftovers and such at home.
This MIGHT be something from my childhood Jenny but I cannot deal with using these containers! When I do start thinking I can make this happen I visit my Mom’s house. The chaos of these containers totally make me insane! One day I may need to worry about addressing this. LOL.
There is something so intensely satisfying about a zero waste lunch. I love reusit.com.
I would maybe caution a little bit again reusing those cottage cheese containers and yogurt containers and such for too long. Plastic breaks down and those chemicals get into what we eat. The non-BPA and food safe plastics have a longer shelf life, but even they aren’t eternal.
Mason jars also make GREAT food and drink containers. They’re glass so they don’t let any funky chemicals seep into your food and are nearly indestructible and are relatively inexpensive when you buy this time of year.