As you’ve said before, don’t brew your own beer to just to save money, but if you do it because you love it and love beer, you will wind up saving a lot, incidentally, eventually.

Thanks, Great post!

http://cheese.about.com/od/howcheeseismade/f/rennet_faq.htm has some details.

Gosh, it’s been just ages since I made cheese and yohgurt at home. I may have to do that again.

I’m a knitter and stitcher, so those projects absorb my weekends. I also want to do some painting around the house before it gets too cold this fall. And getting the yard/garden ready for winter will take up some time.

But the cheese making ! I guess no it’s not cost effective,guess those factories buy milk in huge quantities that’s why they get it much more cheaper than we do so it’s gonna cost even more to make cheese at home,Am I right?

But, honestly the ABSOLUTE BEST cheese in the book is the chevre, and it’s the easiest too. sooooo much easier than the mozzarella. makes a ton from goat’s milk and still cheaper than buying it in the store. tastes much better too.

So if I could get some sort of compost going, I could start building the soil *and* keep the stuff from just filling the landfill. OTOH, my back won’t allow such things as “turning” a compost pile with a pitchfork. This sounds like a reasonable alternative. So, details, please?!?

like the others have commented – the cheese making idea does look really great. It’s nice to find different ideas for doing things around the house. It give you something to look forward to instead of the same old thing that only reminds you that you are trying to save money.

Sometimes it’s the simple things in life that are the most fun!

I would also suggest trying worm-composting, especially since you have little ones. I was a worm-composter for about a year, then we moved out of state and I haven’t gotten back to it yet. It is quite fun, especially if you like to get your hands dirty. With little ones, it might be fascinating for them to see all the worms and watch the food waste become “black gold” as its often called. Its a GREAT way to get rid of food scraps (not meat, dairy, etc) and turn it into compost quickly.

Along the idea of projects…my grandma and I have always been close (she is also my frugal role-model and always had projects for us as kids – many, many projects were making Christmas presents for our friends (think yarn octopuses)). I moved away and haven’t been able to see her but a couple times a year (used to be every other weekend or so). We hit upon this fun idea to write a book together – just one that we appreciate, not for publishing. So I write a page or so and mail it to her; she writes a page or so and mails it back to me. We will be putting the bulk of it on a personal website, so that we don’t have to spend the money sending the whole thing back and forth, but we can still re-read what we’ve written so far. We will continue, however, to handwrite because we feel closer that way; however, this could be a completely free project if the writers used email.

I love those weekend Project. Either one particular project & it’s accomplished,or over the course of four weekends.

Tackling a new section in our organic garden, orchard etc…