Plan a No-Cost Party
Doesn’t everyone like a spontaneous party or potluck meal? One way to have one is to invite neighbors or friends to your home.
Tell them the One Rule: they must not spend any more money on food or supplies than they’d already planned to use, not even for paper goods. If you or they do not have paper goods in stock, tell folks to bring plates that can be washed before they go home. That’s even the more ecological way!
Learn Survival Skills
Do you ever wonder how you would manage if for some reason you couldn’t stay in your own home for a period of time? What if there were an earthquake or fire? Could you and your children find ways to take care of yourselves?
It can be fun (and very wise) to plan what you would do in such an event. Check out library books about wilderness survival or city survival. Learn about edible plants. For example, did you know dandelion leaves are not only edible, but also good for you?
Learn where your community resources are. Take a trip to the fire department and ask them to teach you what citizens need to know in the event of a fire or natural disaster. If you live in an earthquake-prone area and you don’t have an emergency survival kit for your home and your car, create one.
Use the Public Library Services
Do your children know how many great things are available free at the public library? With your children, go to your library with pencils and notebooks in hand. Pretend you are on a treasure hunt and jointly make a list the treasures you find there. You may all be surprised.
Plan a Spend-No-Money Day or Weekend
For some people, this is a challenge. For others, it’s easy. Make it a game to see how long your family can go without buying something. Do you have things sitting in the cupboard or refrigerator that you can cook and eat? Are there toys that have long been neglected? What about reading a book together rather than renting a movie?
| It is…fun to have things, but more to make them. |
Of course, please don’t take this to the extreme. If someone needs medication, special supplies, or special food, be sure you take care of their real needs.
Have a Scavenger Hunt
It can be an amazing adventure to find what’s out there in the world that either nature or people are finished with, like plastic containers; nuts, bolts, and pipes; cardboard boxes; bottles and caps; furniture pieces; shells, feathers, and seeds, and so forth. Then see what you can invent with your found treasures. Plenty of artists make sculptures with “found objects,” and you can get ideas on the Internet or from books in the public library. What could you and your children create? Add your own ideas for no-money-needed fun.
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