Do you Freecycle? & why I’m just getting my birthday gift in September…

In reading blogs I sometimes come across things that I have no idea what the person is talking about and Freecyle is was one of those. DIY Del Ray kept mentioning how they’d gotten things from Freecycle and am so glad I learned about it. Essentially freecyle is a method of recycling things you don’t want and ensuring (hopefully) that they don’t end up in the dump. For my purposes I have only used Freecycle to give away, listing an “offer” and within an hour I have been greeted with several (21) emails for people who wanted something that had no useful value to me.


In addition to offering you can post a want. I don’t know how that works out, but should I decide to use it for that purpose I’ll let you know.

But onto my “item that had no useful value to me” also known as things I purchased but didn’t really need item 1 million and 1. So every year I make New Year’s resolutions and one thing always on there is to lose a little weight. I ALWAYS decide on some crazy diet and this year was no different, I decided “juice fasting” was the key. Now I must mention that I was actually interested in water fasting but after reading about it decided that a short term water fast followed by a weeklong juice fast was going to be more doable to me, rather than a full 30 day water fast. I know what you’re thinking and yes it does occur to me NOW that for someone who loves to cook and also EAT the food I make a liquid fast of any type might be a little stupid, but you know.

So I have this crazy idea and I know it’s crazy but I REALLY want a juicer. I have this little game I play with myself when I know I am about to embark on something truly absurd I make myself either earn the money or wait until my birthday or a holiday so I can ask someone else to purchase the item I surely don’t need for me. Luckily enough right around this time my birthday rolls up and OMG if Grandma Howard (who I absolutely love) doesn’t send me my birthday check. And if it isn’t right around the amount I need to make two purchases:

Oh when I purchase these two items at Target I cannot contain my glee. I embark on my two day water fast like my life depends on it, consuming NOTHING but water for 48 hours. Does this sound dull and unappealing? Well it should because it was. So then after talking to Jedd who thinks this is absolutely the worst idea and after getting a call from my friend who I haven’t seen in three years saying her and her kids were unexpectly in town I decide to allow myself one meal before the juice fast. That meal was a hamburger from Ted’s with peanut butter on it, but let’s not talk about that. So that night I get home and I make some juice and by some I mean A LOT. I make pitchers and pitchers of juice, we juice everything; carrots, grapes, strawberries, a whole freaking melon. I must juice $30 worth of produce in preparation for the seven juice fast which is to begin the next day. Well the next day I drink some juice, a lot of juice, but then that night I decide juice and water fasts are stupid and I start eating real food again.

Plus I really don’t like juice much; I have to be in the mood for it. Fast forward to Labor Day weekend and I realize I have no space for the juicer and it’s hard to clean. So I freecycle it but then I’m telling Jedd about it and he’s like “you basically just wasted Grandma’s birthday money”. Well every year I send Grandma a letter telling her what I did with my birthday money and I’m realizing now that I’m a horrible person because I didn’t write her that letter this year because I was too busy. Thankfully I’m a horrible person because now I can use the money for something else and I wasted my own money on a juicer (these are the little games I play with myself).

So honey when I come home today with some shoes or a purse you swear I don’t need just remember they were gifts from Grandma Howard.