GREEN & THRIFTY THURSDAY-Being Frugal AND Green

I'm starting a Series of Thursday Posts here on "Don't Read This; It's Boring!", called GREEN & THRIFTY THURSDAY.

It will be a Post with a small tip on things you can do to save money AND help the environment. After all, being frugal is great but saving money & time is not so good, at the expense of our Planet!

The 1st Tip is about ink, paper and waste.

Since I've been printing coupons from the Internet, I found that I've had ALOT of paper waste and I run through ink like I'm bathing in it sometimes. I do use recycled printer paper as that's better for our world, or the Green Option, but it's NOT the Thrifty Option. Not having to use as much paper & ink IS both the Green & Thrifty thing to do.

Some sites print 1 coupon per page, some sites fill up the page with recipes or ads for the product below the coupon, & some sites will print multiple coupons on each sheet of paper. I like the last kind of coupon site, not so much the first two. But sometimes you just don't have a choice if you want certain coupons.

Here's what I do to save some paper and ink.

Most coupons/sites let you hit the back button and print each coupon twice. If I am only printing 1 coupon on a sheet of paper, after it prints, I put the sheet back in the printer turned upside down, so I can print another coupon on the blank bottom of the page. That way, I get 2 coupons on 1 page.

I also watch as the coupon is printing. If the printing process gets to the point where you can tell that the actual coupon has finished printing, but the printer is still now printing an ad(using all your expen$ive colored ink!)below the coupon or a recipe you have no desire for, hit the CANCEL PRINTING button to stop the printer. Your paper should immediately come out and you've saved both the bottom of the page to print another coupon and you've saved all that precious ink!

If all else fails and you find you can't avoid ads or recipes & waste of partial sheets of paper when printing coupons, don't throw those scraps of paper away after cutting the coupons out.

Here are some ideas for reusing those leftover paper pieces.

*Tear or shred paper scraps to compost with your kitchen scraps.
*Use it to make homemade paper if you are crafty. Google 'making homemade paper' to find some instructions.
*Shred it and use for small pet bedding(like hamsters, mice, etc.)
*Cut the paper scraps into notepad size sheets and use the clean backside for writing notes.
*Give paper scraps to your small kids for coloring or doodling.
*Any other ideas? Please leave them in the comments section below.

Sluggy