The pumpkins are outside and there is frost on them...
We left our jack-o-lanterns out, like we usually do, after Halloween. (Not lit up, of course). I hate to throw them away after just one night.
That's the thrifty part of me coming out.
I was brought up with the philosophy of "waste not, want not" and it is a very good philosophy - it works. Mostly...
I will keep the tiniest scrap of paper (grocery lists), any waste paper from work that was only used on one side (colouring for the kids or printer paper for rough work on the computer), cardboard boxes (build "cars" for the kids and/or kindling for the fire), newspaper (kindling for the fire), zip lock baggies (I actually wash them out and re-use them!), plastic grocery bags (to carry absolutely anything, liners for garbage cans), etc.
We recycle as much as possible, too.
There is a recycle bag for bags, a bag for plastic containers (eg. yogurt, household cleaners, shampoo) , a bag for styrofoam (now there's a big one we could do without), a bag for cardboard food boxes and the list goes on...
When a bag is full, we simply take it to the recycle bin at the same time we take the garbage.
We don't have the luxury of garbage pickup included in our taxes. We could pay to have it done by a private company, but we choose to do it ourselves. It all ends up in the same place.
During the colder months we burn as much as possible (and as is healthy) in our woodstove.
The only thing that we don't have at this time is a composter, which is the next thing on our list.
I have asked Santa Claus for one...
Your household sounds pretty close to the one I grew up in - except we had a composter! Mom would even cut the tops off of milk bags and wash those (to which the Americans say, "milk bags?")
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