My husband: King of the dumpster divers

A few weeks ago, my husband scored us free rocks. It was pretty unbelievable that he was able to do that because, as I’ve learned, decorative garden rocks can get to be quite pricey. Who knew?

Anyway, since then, I’ve really started to notice how much free stuff my husband comes home with. It’s quite fascinating and honestly, kind of fun because I never know what kind of reject is going to wind up salvaged and functioning in my home. Here’s a sampling:

• Wall art. A neighbor of ours was moving out of his house and was getting ready to throw out a fairly nice, rather large framed black and white photograph. My husband noticed it and asked if he could have it. The neighbor said sure and now, that picture hangs on the wall of our den.
• A lawnmower. My husband works for a very small private company that’s in the middle of renovating their entire office building. As my husband in responsible for overseeing a large part of the renovations, he had cause to canvass the grounds. While doing so, he noticed 3 lawnmowers. He then asked his boss if he could have one of the lawnmowers. To which his boss replied “Take all 3. I just want them gone”. We now have a new to us lawnmower (which is great because ours was quite sickly) and my husband is thinking about selling the other two.
• A 24” television. So it’s not the biggest TV on the block. But it works for our bedroom. This was another reject from my husband’s work. When the company replaced my husband’s monitor, they told him he could take the old one, which, conveniently also functions as a television. Since the current one is my grandparents’ old television, built circa 1982, it was time for an upgrade. We didn’t want to pay for a new TV since the ancient one still works but when a free replacement falls into your lap, it’s hard to say no.
• Food. The amount of free food that my husband comes home with is ridiculous. I’m not just talking a few pieces of cake here and there. I’m talking wraps, pizza, crab balls, chicken, sandwiches…in fact, last week he came home with so much food I didn’t have to cook for 2 days. It was really nice for our food budget and honestly? The break from cooking and meal planning was outstanding. (Oh, yeah. This food came from his work as well. I don’t know what goes on at that place but I am so glad he works there.)
• A Barbie doll. Like most 5 year old girls, my daughter is obsessed with Barbie. In fact, Barbie has taken over my house with her clothes and car and house and accessories and whatever the hell else is attached to those dolls. I had declared a moratorium on new Barbie dolls until…we were walking the dogs and my husband, expert dumpster diver that he is, noticed a brand new, unopened Barbie doll in the idiot’s trash. So he took it out. And my daughter is as happy as can be with her salvaged Barbie doll.

 
Anyway…I’d say overall, my husband saved us around $1000 last week just by rescuing what other’s perceived as garbage. I’m not going to lie to you; this is kind of a hard thing for me to accept. I’m not used to literally taking things out of the trash (except for the food. That was never actually in the trash) and then putting them to use. But I guess the point is if I don’t tell you it had a date with the trash heap, you’d probably never know.

And quite frankly, I’m glad I didn’t have to fork over money for a lawnmower. Those things are expensive pains in the ass.