Thrifty times call for thrifty measures

In these hard times, I have begun to look for ways of saving even more money. Tonight I finished up a quick project that should save me $12-$24 per month. I made my own re-usable Swiffer Wet Jet pads. For the price of one month's worth of disposable pads I was able to buy the materials to make six re-usable pads. I tried to make them very sturdy by serging the edges and triple stitching the Velcro strips. The website where I got the pattern and material list said the homemade pads would use more cleaning solution, but to combat that expense, she figured out a way to refill the solution bottles with a homemade cleaning solution. The pad I used tonight worked great and I did not feel any extra solution was used but I do have my parts ready to refill my bottle! The only difference I saw, actually felt, was my pad did not glide along the floor as easy as the disposable pad. But I felt like my pads cleaned better. I would have shared the "after" picture of my first go around with my new pads but I hated to deepen your already firmly ingrained mental picture of my dusty house with a picture of a dirty mop head. So, I share a front and back view of two re-usable pads proudly displayed on my sewing machine.

My next attempt at saving money will be to make washable nursing pads for my friend Danielle. She is due May and now that the cat is out of the bag, I can share that project too with all of WWW land.