Redneck or Resourceful?

Hey friends.  Here I am, laying on the couch like a beached whale after meeting my husband at an all-you-can-eat pizza joint for lunch (can't pass up a coupon!).  And I ate a LOT. OF. PIZZA.  Right now, I am miserable.  My pants are unbuttoned, I look 8 months pregnant, and I'm moaning like a dying animal.  Therefore, I'm a dying beached whale.  I'm pretty sure a whole watermelon is sitting inside my belly.  SOO....enough about my distressed stomach and digestion tract, how's YOUR day? 

You might recall me saying my husband and I are living off of student loans and my meager art lesson earnings.  So we live frugally.  We have small eating-out budget, so whenever we can, we use coupons to make that budget stretch!  And today's coupon was for an all-you-can-eat place--which are always bad news.  Hence the eating-out induced coma I am presently experiencing.  Darn coupons!  We can't pass up a good deal.
 
I grew up living frugally, so it's no big deal to me.  My husband is the price comparer, the deal watcher, and the coupon clipper. (He's gonna give our kids math genes, since I drew pictures and cried through every math class since 6th grade.)  I, on the other hand, use my creativity to save us money.  Why go buy something new, when you can rig up something AWESOME?  Duct tape, ingenuity, and being poor can go a long way to kindle the inventor's spirit.

Some might find some of these "creative solutions" a bit ghetto or redneck.  They can scoff--I say we're resourceful!  Here's a few examples of jimmy-rigging to the rescue.

I was tired of trying to get wipes out of the container with one hand while the other hands held on to the ankles of my wiggling, poo-covered baby, trying to keep him from pitching off the side of the changing table.  SO, I could buy this Infant Table Top Organizer (which actually looks pretty sweet) for $25 online...OR I could get creative.  

I mostly cared about the wipes container, so we just used ribbon to secure the wipes container to the changing table.  VOILA!  Saved 25 smackers.  We just put refills into it, and we're good!

Where the heck do you keep the tray to your high chair so that it's easliy grabbed when you're buckling in your babe?  Nothing a little carabeener can't handle.

What if you have a broken dishwasher?  Instant, babyproffed storage for cleaning supples!

Storage! Woo!

This is how I quietly open and close the door when I check on my sleeping baby.  It's an old t-shirt I cut up, no sewing involved (I could have made it all cute and pintrest-y, but I lack the skills and desire to sew)...and it works like a charm!

The door to the fridge that came in our apartment was missing a metal rod thing to hold the  condiments on the bottom shelf, but who wants to put money into fixing an older fridge that they don't even own?  This called for duck tape.  A little duck tape can go a LONGGG way.

My hottie hady-man!

Good as new!  Well, ok it's not the most beautiful solution, but it's still going strong MONTHS later!

For the last pic, first you need to know that I am a lazy bum.  If something isn't extremely convenient and accessible, it usually doesn't get done.  So, I try to read from the scriptures every morning for about ten minutes, before Hayden wakes up and I was keeping them on the kitchen table so they were really accessible.  Patrick didn't love my pile of books always sitting on the table, but I didn't want them taking up counter space and I didn't want to go grab them from another room (there's the lazy bum coming out).  SO.  We figured out a great solution.

We bought one of those file organizer things at a trhift store for, like fity cents, then Patrick bent some brackets, and fired up his drill, and...badabing! Instant sripture holder, under the table like those old-school desks in elemetary school. 

Cool, huh?  I can fit my Bible, my Book of Mormon, my study journal and a pen.

This one costs like 40 bucks.  My version?  Like a buck. 

Folks, let's have pride in our jimmy-rigged and our makeshift.  After all, look at McGyver!  That guy the coolest.  Who cares about super powers when you are SUPER HANDY!?

What do you think?  Are these makeshift solutions ghetto or genius?  Redneck or resourceful? 

What jimmyrigging have YOU done?  Come one, be proud!  Tell us about it!   

ANd here's some more redneck invention pics for your viewing pleasure (I'm glad we haven't yet sunk to this level):

Gives new meaning to the phrase "dumpster diving"!

Roastin dogs, family style.

No trees to hang your child's swing?  NO prob!

House boat=luxury.

Look on the bright side...at least when you total your car, you can get a porch swing out of it!

Awesome, huh?!  Which is your fav?  I TOTALLY want to try a rake weenie roast.  Alright, barbaque at my house tomorrow night!  All-you-can-eat hot dogs!  

Um...nevermind about the all-you-can-eat.  I only have two couches, so we can't ALL be miserable beached whales.
-Amy

Ps. If you enjoyed this post, please "Like" or "Share"!  Thanks.  :)

*Photo sources: http://www.sportsmanagementdegrees.org/blog/2010/45-lifestyle-of-the-rough-and-redneck-photos/ and http://niknak79.tumblr.com

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