I thought they would be a great addition to all the kitchen supplies I’ve been collecting for my studio apartment.  They only cost $19.99 as well, which means I could actually afford them.  However, while at Target earlier this week, I came across this seven piece ceramic canister set at an even more affordable price:

It is made by Room Essentials, who make a lot of affordable products mainly aimed at young poor college students like me.  These canisters are perfect – they are white (so they match everything), they create a great airtight seal so nothing inside will spoil and they come with sleek stainless steel scoopers.  And seriously, those little ones are so cute I may not even put anything in them but keep them out on display anyway!  And it all only put me back $15!  Nice!  Here they are in my mom’s kitchen:

The best part about these is that for a tiny bit of cash, I have bought a quality set that could possibly last me the rest of my life.  I can’t get enough of quality at low prices and since they are a neutral color, they will never go out of style.  If you are need of some canisters, you should consider these because they are a great buy at a great price.

What has been your best purchase lately?  Have you bought anything that has outlasted its worth based on the price?

Note: No brands or products mentioned in this post are affiliated with this blog.  I could not get enough of the great quality and super low price of these and couldn’t wait to share it with all of you!

Being a college student has caused me to learn many things besides just the things I have learned in the classroom.  Because I go to college a couple hours away from where I grew up, I have had to be self-sufficient in many ways, from financing my day-to-day living to being able to go places and do things on my own.  One of the biggest things I have been learning is how expensive it is to start from scratch.  When I say this, I mean buying things like cooking, cleaning, decorating, and other supplies that you cannot always take with you when you move out of your parent’s house.  I have learned to remedy this by buying everything as cheaply as I can, but that doesn’t mean I necessarily skimp out on the quality.

This weekend, San and I made a day of garage saling at a city wide garage sale in a suburb of St. Paul.  We got up bright and early, treated ourselves to really unhealthy but tasty breakfasts at a gas station and set off.  It was a little stressful only because it was freezing out which led to some snow, rain, and a tiny bit of hail, but other than that, I got some amazing deals that I will be able to use in September when I start school again.

My first great buy was at the first garage sale we stopped at.  They had lots of brand new items selling for less money.  Because we went on a Saturday and most of the sales started on Friday, we found many that had reduced their prices.  I tried to haggle on this brand new T-fal 10 piece cookware set, but the seller wouldn’t budge.  I bought it anyway knowing that I was getting a good deal.

This set is listed at $79.00 according to Amazon and I paid $40.  This seemed like a lot to me, but for a brand new set, that is a really good price and I saved about $30 if I were to buy it in stores.  I did not want to buy a lot of used cookware, so this was a winning situation for me.

The next item I bought was a George Foreman family size grill with two drip trays, the manual, and a recipe book.

I haggled this one from $10 to $8.  I see these all the time at garage sales, but this one was in amazing condition with little ware and a great price.

I scored a set of brand new steak knives for $3.50 and a brand new rug for the kitchen for $1.  It’s great to find brand new items at garage sales for only a fraction of the retail price!

I picked up an ironing board that needs to be recovered for about $2, a beautiful decorative decanter and vase for $1.50 each (I haggled this down from $3 each), and two gorgeous plum colored pillow cases for free!

The pillow cases were listed at 10 cents a piece, but since San and I put our purchases together, they offered to knock off the extra 20 cents, meaning I basically got them for free.  They will work perfectly with my color scheme I am working on for next school year!

My last buys were two cork board squares for 25 cents each, a workout DVD by a brand I really enjoy for $1 and an assortment of folders, a 1-subject notebook, and a 5-subject notebook for about $3, all of which I would have needed to buy for school next year but now can check off my list.

I am so happy with all of my purchases!  San and I will be heading to another city wide garage sale next Saturday where I hope to buy more items for next year (the more I buy now the less I will have to spend in retail stores later on).  I have also added moving boxes to the list since I am going to have to haul all of this back to my parent’s house for the summer before bringing it right back in the fall.

So, there you have it!  I scored some amazing deals and will use every single one of these items, so I couldn’t be happier.  Anyone else working on stocking up on things they need from garage sales?

As a  child, my dad and I would go garage saling in search for the best deals.  I would come home with all sorts of things – cds, books, games, toys, jewelry – but there is one thing I wouldn’t go near: clothes.  I loved buying everything else secondhand in good condition at outrageously low prices, but no matter how much my dad tried to persuade me to look at the clothes, I wouldn’t budge.  Boy, am I kicking myself now!  Now that I am buying 100% of my clothes I realize how expensive they are.  I wish I could go back because buying secondhand clothing would have saved my parents a good amount of money (sorry Mom and Dad!).

Even after I started hitting up stores like Goodwill and Savers for decor items during the past year or so, I still would steer clear of the clothing.  Over time, however, I started to realize that making money isn’t easy and although I like clothes, they are too expensive to buy brand new at full price or even sale prices.  I asked myself if the clothes I was buying were really worth full price when I could buy equally nice clothes (or nicer) secondhand for a small fraction of what I would pay in stores.  What really changed my mind about secondhand clothes shopping was when I started to read Jen’s Frugal Fashionista posts.  I began seeing that there are tons of great options for buying secondhand but that it requires work, yet work that will be a major payoff if done right.

Over my spring break, I went thrift shopping and found that the local Savers is a jackpot for clothing.  I went through every single rack in my size and tried on hundreds of things before narrowing it down.  I bought majority of my summer clothes and some other clothing for about as much money as two pairs of full price jeans cost that I used to buy (and I’m not talking designer jeans here, people – think JcPenny or Aeropostale or maybe even cheaper full price jeans).  I went two different days, and on the second day brought in a bag of clothes to donate and received 40% off my purchase!  As if they don’t offer great deals already!

I want to show you four outfits I put together using mostly thrifted items.

1) This is a typical outfit I would wear on a spring or summer day.

• Cardigan: $5.99
• Gray tank (which also has gray beading on the straps): $2.99
• Jean shorts: 40% off of $5.99 = $3.60

2) I am trying to make myself wear more skirts and dresses.  When I saw this skirt I knew I had to have it even though it was a few sizes too big.  You can’t really tell that it is rolled up three times at the top in the picture, but I plan on not only taking it in but shortening it to the length shown because originally it hit below my knees which is not flattering on a petite person. 

• Shirt: 40% off of $4.99 = $3.00
• Skirt: 40% off of $4.99 = $3.00
• Brown Pointed Heels: $5.99

3) This gray dress was one of my most “expensive” items, but I couldn’t turn it away.  I don’t plan to get much use out of it now, but it will be perfect for once I start teaching and am in the more professional world.  It fits my petite body perfectly – what a score!  The cardigan was not thrifted but came from Target for $20 (still not bad).

• Dress: 40% off of $12.99 = $7.80 4) I fell in love with this dress the second I put it on.  It seems vintage, although it’s not, and is exactly the kind of dress I would love to wear every day.  I added an inexpensive belt from Walmart.
• Dress: $4.99

The best thing about thrift shopping is that you can buy so much more with your money or you can purchase just a couple necessary things and have a ton more money left over.  I am definitely addicted now, but I plan on only feeding this new addiction when I actually need clothes, otherwise it becomes pointless and I will end up spending the same amount of money as before.

And I hope this post doesn’t lead anyone to think that there’s only secondhand clothing for young, small adults because there are great options for all ages and sizes – you just have to dig.  I had to, too, trust me!

So, are you a fellow frugal fashionista or do you value buying brand new clothes at full price?  I’ve been in both boats and am curious to hear where you all stand.

I’ve made them a few times, with the help of my trusty pastry chef boyfriend San of course (he is better at making burgers than me), so when we made them a couple weekends ago, I was sure they would turn out perfectly.  Boy, was I wrong.  Although they tasted good, we did almost everything wrong, so now I am here to tell you just exactly how NOT to make turkey burgers.  I’m a firm believer in letting you all see the harsh realities of what goes on in my kitchen as well as all the good stuff.  Let’s get started!

Step #1: Buy the wrong kind of ground turkey. This is the perfect way to have a catastrophe of a time making these burgers.  I have no problem with the brand pictured for casseroles and other recipes where you break up the ground turkey, but I try to avoid it when making turkey burgers (you’ll see why shortly – it is too sticky).  I recommend, if you want to know how to make turkey burgers well, you buy some Jennie-O turkey in the clear packaging in the refrigerated meat section, not a frozen roll of turkey as the one pictured below.

Step #2: Notice your mistake and search through your pantry looking for something that can remedy the overly sticky turkey situation.  We went with breadcrumbs.

Step #3: Add some seasoning.  This is a good step to follow when making burgers of any kind.  We went with a Bacon Cheddar Cheese blend.  Some barbecue sauce, brown sugar, or even just salt and pepper would be good depending on what flavor you want the burger to have.

Step #4: Blend everything with your hands, notice how sticky it is, and then add your bread crumbs. If you want to know how to make turkey burgers the right way, you can just mix them with your hands, realize how not sticky the meat is and skip the bread crumbs.  Am I confusing you yet?

Step #5: Realize that the bread crumbs didn’t do anything but add calories, so skip using your hands all together and use spoons to shape the burgers.   Step #6a: Plop them down in an oiled skillet and do a happy dance thinking you made it out on the other side in one piece.

Step #6b: ….But make sure you use a pan with no non-stick coating so you have to scrape with all your might to keep the burgers from becoming permanently attached to the pan.  If you haven’t noticed yet, there is a pattern of things getting too sticky for the burgers to turn out properly.  If you want to make turkey burgers the right way – avoid all things sticky.

Step #7: Place the fully cooked turkey burgers on fresh buns, top them with some cheese, and pair with some yummy fatty chips to distract whoever is eating them.  The burgers didn’t burn, although they were pretty close to it (okay so we ended up scraping the burnt part off), so all we had to do was add some cheese to hide our mistakes and they still tasted good in the end!

What was that?  Things can still taste good even if you mess them up?  Sure!  You just have to know how to mess up in the right way, which I outlined here.  Okay, so I got lucky, but who is really keeping track?

Now, I wouldn’t serve these at a a party this way, but for me and my happy-go-lucky boyfriend who will eat whatever I put in front of him (thank you, God) the world wasn’t over and our stomachs – and tastebuds – were still satisfied.  I just hope I remember this post the next time I go to make these so I can do everything the exact opposite.

All this talk of messing up food has me wondering – what was your biggest blunder in the kitchen and what did you do to remedy it?

This post is a part of Tasty Tuesday over at Balancing Beauty and Bedlam.

Oh boy, do I love me a challenge!  When I saw one of my favorite bloggers, Lindsay @ Living With Lindsay, was hosting a five dollar challenge, I couldn’t hold myself back!  I’m poor, but I have five dollars and love to make crafty things.  How could I resist?

I had a vision in my head of a springtime wreath, but I didn’t want my vision to be too decided when I went shopping since I was limited to only shopping in dollar stores, and we all know how random the selection can be at those types of stores.  I mainly knew I wanted to use my leftover burlap from my corkboard makeover and my leftover green polka dot fabric from my DIY custom flats and that I needed something to wrap them around.

Here is what I found and used:

I used the fabric previously mentioned and purchased a styrofoam wreath, a decorative bird, some twigs, and some fake flowers.  The only thing I used to attach everything was hot glue, which was another thing we were allowed to use if we had it on hand, which I did.  I only spent four out of the five dollars on my purchases, so I came in under budget!  Nice!

I started by cutting a long strip of burlap and wrapping it around the wreath.  I hot glued the ends of the burlap to the back of the wreath, making sure when I started a new strip that the ends were not visible from the front.

I ended up with this – nice!

Then I added the bird by hot gluing it to the burlap – trying to disguise the glue as best as possible.

Then I glued some of the  twigs to the front, just below the bird to make it look like it was standing on them on a tree.  I wanted to incorporate the green polka dot fabric somehow and thought of using it to make little flowers, but it didn’t look good, so instead I cut one piece about two inches thick and flipped it upside down and ran a much thinner piece on top of it.  I wrapped it around on top of the burlap, hot gluing the ends once again. The last thing I did was intertwine some of the faux flowers with the branches to add some more color and “life” since I wanted it to look spring-y.

Here is the finished product:

I am very happy with the way it turned out!  It was so cheap and it’s so happy.  It is a perfect addition to Easter decor and spring accessories as well.  Plus, it’s not too spring-themed, so I can keep it hanging all summer as well.  What do you think – is it worth the four dollars?

If you would like to join in on the fun of the five dollar challenge – it’s not too late!  Entries are not being taken until this Thursday (the 25th), so you still have time to brainstorm and head to your nearest dollar store for some spring time fun!  Just head over to Lindsay’s blog to view the rules and you will be ready to get started.

I hope to see some of your crafty projects then!