now that im in my "gazelle" mode, i am questioning everything...as i should.


my question - is being nutty about the lights, water, utilities really show a big $$ reduction? i guess what i mean is, my household doesnt give second thought to the lights, the heat/ac and the water. if i really start watching it, is there really a huge savings that is noticable or are we talking a matter of 5-10 bucks here?

when i changed a few lightbulbs to the energy saving flourecent bulbs and started turning off un-needed lights, and not using the a/c as much as we used to, we noticed a $50 drop in our energy bill.

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stay at home mom to my crazy toddler with sensory issues

Yes! Because it is apart of an overall philosophy and habit of thinking. A bunch of little changes DO add up. Even if they didn't, it serves us to be conscious about what we're doing and make a decision to not waste our resources (natural or financial or otherwise) 'just because'. Once we start focusing on the 'little things' it becomes much easier to focus on the big picture and the difficult decisions.

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"I've been rich and I've been poor but independently wealthy is where it is at."

I would also agree that it helps- maybe you will not notice the first month- though it does make a difference. We just changed our water heater to tankless (we needed a new one and wanted the extra space in the house)- just doing this has saved a good amount on our gas bill.

I have been really god with lights and extra applicanes being turned off- for some time so I can not give you the amount we save though- every little bit helps in my mind

Water, I'm not sure... we pay so much each much as a base, which includes so many gallons, which, we don't usually use all of, so we pay more if we use more, but don't get a break for usin less.

The floresent lights... I replaced the living room celing fan lights (3 of them) with the compact bulbs, and our bill has dropped dramatically. We changed our electric company from Reliant, to TXU, and even though I've had the AC higher during the day but much lower at night this year than last, and my bills are about $40-70 less a month during the summer!! I know that's a combined thing of the lights and the AC up higher during the day as well as the lower rate, but it's really been nice. Also, I can tell the monts that rains a lot, and I have to use the dryer (gas) to dry clothes, it tacks on at least $20 a month for 2-3 loads a week.

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"And the state of his bathroom -- I'm not one to gossip, but there are things crusted on his sink that have not simply developed intelligent life but have in all probability by now evolved their own political systems." Cain describes Abel in in SANDMAN #70

Yes, it really does make a difference.

When we moved into this house in 2005 we had to pay the same rate as the people before us. They were also a family of 4. The rate would adjust as we used more or less water and electricity.

We changed all the light bulbs to energy saver ones (most of them were burnt out when we moved in).

We changed our water heater to a 40 gallon (from their 50 gallon).

We turned down the water heater to 110 F.

We installed low flow shower heads and low flow kitchen nozzle.

We put a rain barrel in the back yard for watering the lawn and garden.

And within two months, the electricity company literally showed up at our house to replace the meter because our use had dropped so much. Turned out it wasn't broken. Now we pay less than half what the people before us were paying. It was a bit of an upfront costs but it all paid itself off within the year and now we're saving serious money.

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Do you have a special barrel or did you kind of do it yourself? I have several "jugs" that I keep outside to collect rain, but unless we have a great storm they rarely do much. Then, by the time I need to use them they have mosquito larvae, etc and just don;t seem to be as great an idea as I thought they would be. I would love to take advantage of the rain we have in the summer since I refuse to water the lawn when we are in a drought, but do water our garden.

Shutting off your a/c unit(central air) from the circuit breaker when not in use saves about $10 a month in the winter.

A couple years ago, I started watching the lights and A/C, etc. My electric bill dropped probably $10-15 a month.. but I have to always watch.. which really sucks!

I've been getting on the kids about turning lights off when they don't use them.. It must be working because last night, we had two lights on in the LR and dd asked if they would make the electricity go up. I said yeah, so she went and turned them off. LOL What a sweetie! DS has even started turning things off.

Turning off lights I've noticed does make a difference in our electricity bill. Just making sure to turn of lights when we leave rooms dropped our electric bill almost $30 last winter.

I didn't know about turning off the AC at the circuit breaker though - I'll definitely be doing that this winter!