Ultimate Frugal Calendar

It is time to think about a new calendar for 2010. Most years I go to the mall after Christmas and get a new calendar on sale for 50% off. I never buy a calendar at cost. They always go on sale.

Here is the most frugal way to a cfind a calendar for 2010. Did you know that there are only 14 combinations of monthly days and dates that would have to be saved (half account for years with 365 days, the other half for leap years).? Mathematically this is true.

There is a website at Time and Date that allows you to enter the desired year and calculate which alternative years would be matches. Now hoarders and collectors could make some extra money posting old calendars on EBay. Let’s say you want a calendar for 2010. The years 1897,1 901, 1915,1 926, 1937, 1943,1 954,1 971, 1982, 1993, 1999 could all be reused this coming year! One of these years happens to be the year of my birth (no it isn’t 1897!). Just think, if my mother had saved a calendar the year I was born I could reuse it this year!

What a fun thing to hunt for while rummaging yard sales, flea markets or antique shops. An old calendar could become a unique gift and a conversation starter. A few holidays have changed dates over the years as a convienence but basically this will work.

So think about saving that special calendar with the exceptionally great pictures and using it again in the future. Just calculate what year the formula will come up again and you can reuse it.  I happen to love calendars with pictures of dachshund puppies.  Instead of letting them go at the end of the year, I could save them and use them again.  I do have visions of boxes of calendars being piled up in my living room and having to make pathways through the hallways but I promise myself not to get obsessed over this new idea.

This Christmas I found a calendar at Michael’s that had places to insert your own pictures for $1.00. I bought two. One I prepared for my Mother with pictures of our home town. The other I helped the kids next door prepare as a gift for their mother. The four year old, Luke, really likes to come to visit me and use my digital camera. We have discovered he has quite an eye for photography. Together we picked out 12 of his favorite pictures then we printed the name of the month using a Picasa right on the bottom of the picture. I emailed them off to a drug store that was offering a deal on printing. The pictures were fit into the calendar to create a memorable gift. Luke’s mom loved it and Luke was so proud of himself.

We could have printed out a calendar from the internet but finding one all printed for a buck was a steal.

 Thanks to Frugal Living for the inspiration and links about using old calendars.  Also I recommend Greenpaper Typepad as a fabulous site for vintage paper and collectables.  I just love looking at this site and all the things that have been done with vintage articles.