Today is the United States Army birthday- 237 years (I hope I did the math right on that one...)!! I'm so grateful for all the men and women over the years who have been willing to serve our country. Our nation owes our very existence to the brave soldiers of the United States Army. So I'm more than proud to wish the US Army a very happy birthday!
In the Hooah spirit of this post, I thought we'd talk about something really cool I discovered at Goodwill- ACU's!! For those of you who may not know, ACU's are the uniform that Army soldiers wear every... single... day. As you can imagine, after a while, they wear out. And those suckers are not cheap to replace! I think the tops are like $30 each and the pants are around the same (I'm speaking from memory, so I may be a little off). Our usual plan of action is to wait until N's clothing allowance comes in once a year and then buy a bunch of ACU's and hope they last. BUT... I got a brilliant idea! Since this is a military town, surely the thrift stores would be flooded with second hand gear and clothing, right? Well, guess what? They are!! This idea actually came to me a few months ago when N needed some pants for his Class A's (dress uniform)- I found some for $4! $4!!!
Back to our story of the ACU's.... I've been checking the local thrift stores every time I'm there to see if they have uniforms in my husband's size. This week, I was able to find two brand new, crisp ACU tops for $8 each- well, actually a little less since Goodwill has a military discount on Tuesdays. I was hoping to find some with the right color tag to get 50% off, but $8 compared to $30 is still a huge savings!! Now, I've got my eyes open for some gently used boots...
The moral of this story is to be open to ways to save money. When we first got married, N was totally opposed to thrifting (even though his mom and dad are awesome at finding great deals at thrift stores!) for himself. But, after the $4 Class A pants, he has been hooked. It's a great way to save money on something you HAVE to buy.
I will admit it took a little work- I've visited a couple of different stores over a period of a couple of weeks, and I had to look through a whole rack of uniforms just to find two tops.... but it's so worth it! And who are we kidding? It's not like I hate shopping and it's a huge trial to me! ;)
I hope that this will inspire you to keep your eyes open and think about ways to save money on items that you need- AND that this proves that thrifting isn't just for blogger type girls who dress a little kooky sometimes! ;)
Happy Thrifting!
-J
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