Adventures in Debt » Snowflake

Snowflaking Your Coins

Jb — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 21:15:31 +0000

Today I went to the store to count up my change jar. I don’t like keeping much change in my wallet because it gets too heavy. Here in Canada we have a few dollar coins ($1 and $2), so having those plus pennies, nickels, and dimes means it can get pretty heavy pretty fast. So I always keep a few of each coin and then dump the rest in my change jar.

I’ve been using the change over the last few months for a few things here and there (subway fare, a coffee), but wanted to bring it to one of those counting machines to get the paper money from it. I don’t really have the patience to roll up all the coins, plus I like using those machines. They’re fun.

Today I finally remembered to bring the coins with me, and so I dumped them into the machine. I actually wasn’t anticipating much money from the jar, since I’d been pilfering all the quarters over the last few months. I figured it was mostly pennies and nickels. After all was said and done I had over $9! Very cool. And since they only take 9 cents per $1, I ended up with about $8.50 in the end. Woo!

Here’s another $8.50 that’s getting added to this month’s snowflake, that’s for sure.

This is an official post from Adventures in Debt.

How To Save Money With Your Office Supplies

Jb — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 13:40:47 +0000

A few months ago I bought some Pilot G2 pens to use around the office. These ones are supposedly the “best” ones to use, because of their “security” feature: you can’t wash out anything written with one of them. This is a useful feature when signing those cheques or anything else with your signature. The document cannot be used fraudulently. I know this isn’t a big concern for most people, but still, I thought it was a nice feature.

Plus I’m just a sucker for a great writing pen, and these are definitely fun to use.

I had bought a three-pack for around $10 or $12, and I was a little sad to see that they seemed to be disposable pens. Until yesterday.

I finished off the blue one last week, and threw it out. I’m not a huge environmentalist, but I was a little annoyed that such a well-made pen was disposable.

Then yesterday I was in my local discount department store, and saw that they DO make refills for the G2 pen! Hot diggity! So I immediately picked up a 2-pack of refills for $4, not a bad deal. But of course on the drive home I had to remember if I still had the empty pen. Luckily due to my lazy housekeeping skills this week I hadn’t actually emptied out the trashcan in my office, so this morning I fished around in there and found it! I discarded the empty cartridge, put in the new one, and voila! I’m good to go.

What’s the lesson here? Well, it’s that you can save money by buying refillable pens. Sure, they might be a little more expensive for the initial outlay, but in the end you save money with the refills that could be up to one-third cheaper than an entirely new pen.

How have you been saving on your office supplies? Buying printer paper in bulk? Leave a comment and let me know.

This is an official post from Adventures in Debt.

Snowflake Update – February Went Well

Jb — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 00:25:59 +0000

I realized the other day that I hadn’t updated y’all on my snowflaking adventures for February. I’ve actually been doing well so far. I sold my guitar to a friend for $175 which I was happy about. I’ve had the guitar for almost 7 years, and haven’t played it in a few years, so I was glad to sell it to my friend who was looking to get back into music. Plus, the books I had on sale at Amazon.ca did well, so I earned about$25 there. I’m going to try and keep better track of the actual gross amount I earn on the books, as I’m curious. A few weeks ago I blogged about my used books selling, but I noted that I’m probably coming out even on the sales, as of course the shipping costs set me back. But again, like the fact that my guitar now has a new home and will be played, I’m happy to have the books out of the house and into the hands of someone who wants them.

This is an official post from Adventures in Debt.

My Used Books Are Selling

Jb — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 14:15:48 +0000

Last month I talked about one of my new year’s snowflaking ideas, which was to sell my old books on Amazon.ca. And things have been going like gangbusters! I’m up to about $40 now in sales, however of course the shipping costs are eating into that amount so my total profit isn’t that much, but at least:

I’m getting these books out of my house.
Others are able to enjoy them.
I’ve earned about $10 gross so far.

I know that doesn’t seem like a lot, but quite frankly, I’ll take it! It’s $10 I didn’t have before, and I’ve still got a whole box of books still left to go. My original idea was to leave them on Amazon.ca for 3 months, and if they didn’t sell, then I’d take them to a used book store. At this point the $10 I’ve earned is probably more than I would have earned taking them to a used book store, so I’m happy.

How have your snowflaking efforts been going?

This is an official post from Adventures in Debt.

Another Snowflake For January

Jb — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 16:54:31 +0000

Another day at -18C, another snowflake to add to my pile for the month. This one comes courtesy of my friend M, with whom I am doing the change challenge. She owed me some money for our Vancouver 2010 Olympic tickets, and handed over the cheque to me this week. I will be depositing it later on this afternoon. Thanks M!

This is an official post from Adventures in Debt.