50p a day til christmas, healthily?!-Weezl's next challenge (part 2)

gillst_2

Hi all - have got my niece staying with me over the weekend - just been out shopping. Bought loads of flour, marg, eggs and oats and we are going to have a massive baking session of cakes and biscuits tomorrow using the recipies found here. Hope to have a fun day and benefit from all the goodies we produce. Hoping that we do not end up eating it all and that there are some left for the freezer and enough for lunch boxes all week.

ceridwen

cw18 wrote: »

I took it to be 10 feet x 10 feet. 10 square feet would be 5'x2' (or probably in this case just over 3'x3' as it looks pretty square). 5'x5'=25 square feet.

Errr...that garden bed....can I have a bit of clarification purlease? 10' x 10' was my first thought - but it didnt look that big to me...hence I decided that must mean it was 5' x 5'. My own beds are 4 square feet (ie 4' x 4'). I guess I have got my maths right in thinking 4' x 4' is 4 square feet, 5' x 5' = 5 square feet, etc.? My guy I got these beds from assures me they are Square Foot Gardening Beds (ie the 4' x 4' that is laid down in Square Foot Gardening).

EDIT: If anyone else is specifically growing food by the Square Foot method - I would be very interested in their planting plans purlease: ie 5 of this type of veg. in one square and 3 of that type of veg. in another square. I'm wondering exactly what quantities to grow of everything to get exactly the amount I need of each for one person with no "wastage" (well - in my case - food to give away - but you know what I mean).

catnap53

Hi,

1ft x 1ft is 1 sq ft, but
4ft x 4ft is 16 sq ft,
5ft x 5ft is 25 sq ft etc
5ft x 2ft is 10 sq ft

Multiply length X width. This is the area of the square or rectangle

The confusion is because 4ft square means 4ft x 4ft. ie 16square ft

Then if you want to calculate the volume of compost needed to fill it you multiply it by the depth.

If it is 4ft x 4ft and then 2 ft deep, you need 32 cubic ft of compost.

You might then need to calculate the weight needed.

Pat

Tibbie's_mum

ceridwen wrote: »

Errr...that garden bed....can I have a bit of clarification purlease? 10' x 10' was my first thought - but it didnt look that big to me...hence I decided that must mean it was 5' x 5'. My own beds are 4 square feet (ie 4' x 4'). I guess I have got my maths right in thinking 4' x 4' is 4 square feet, 5' x 5' = 5 square feet, etc..........

4ft x 4ft = 16ft² or 16 square foot as I recall from school, but the again that was over 20years ago. Square footage is the sum of 2 adjacent sides multiplied together.

Edit: Catnap beat me to it! And explained it perfectly, just like maths teacher did.

Tibbie's_mum

MRSMCAWBER wrote: »

Afternoon all

......I seem to be stretching food further n further at the moment..everytime I make something I seem to have stuff left to turn into something else :rotfl:
................

I know what you mean Mrs Mac, every meal I make these days seems to
metamorphosis into our next meal. As a kid, my Dad always seemed to have a never ending pan of soup on the stove, must have got the trait of him.

ceridwen

catnap53 wrote: »

Hi,

1ft x 1ft is 1 sq ft, but
4ft x 4ft is 16 sq ft,
5ft x 5ft is 25 sq ft etc
5ft x 2ft is 10 sq ft

Multiply length X width. This is the area of the square or rectangle

The confusion is because 4ft square means 4ft x 4ft. ie 16square ft

Then if you want to calculate the volume of compost needed to fill it you multiply it by the depth.

If it is 4ft x 4ft and then 2 ft deep, you need 32 cubic ft of compost.

You might then need to calculate the weight needed.

Pat

Thanks for that. Errrr....well thats one question sorted.

Next question:D - my beds are 1' deep - so even my dubious maths tells me that I need 16 cubic feet of compost to fill them then. Compost comes in litre packets if my memory serves me aright - so how many litres is 16 cubic feet of compost then purlease?

Believe me - if your maths was as bad as mine - you wouldnt have passed your Maths O Level either;) .

Yategirl

Toonie wrote: »

The thing I have found that helps with budgeting is working out what you would normally have in a month. My BF and I did this last month, so for example we worked out we normally need around 24 meals for a month as I occasionally eat at work, so we said per week we might have
Fishx1
Chicken x1
Jacket spuds and toppings x1
Simple suppers x1-beans on toast/egg on toast
Sausages/burgers x1
Pasta x1

So we bought enough of each main ingredient x 4 and then got worked out the whole meal like veggies/carbs/protein for each one and bought a months worth of food (we have two freezers and a large larder). We also bought a couple packs of mince for mince and tatties/cottage pie, but they are if BF is rehearsing on a Sunday and would like a filling meal when he comes in (like tomorrow).

We also did our best to work out how many lunches we would need-I get lunch paid for at work three days a week and BF buys his own when he's working, so its not a big cost for us.

The only thing we've bought week to week is milk and fruit.

I find it really helps for lunch to do either pasta meals (chuck pasta in, three minutes before ready chuck in some frozen peas/sweetcorn/other veggies and add some sliced ham/grated cheese and it doesn't matter if it goes cold) or prepare some things in the morning, like hard boil some eggs which you can have with some salad/mixed cooked and cooled veggies, diced potatoes or even just a nice egg mayo sandwich.

yes this is what I do - I know that I use roughly say 4 tins of tomatoes a week (say 1 for a chilli, 1 for veggie curry and 2 for 2 large pizza's) so working on a 4 weekly stockcupboard I bought 16 tins etc.. I did this for all my storecupboard items incl's UHT milk, freezer items (bread, store of butter and cheese) toiletries, toilet rolls etc.. and used what I already had in stock to help work out if I didn't need anything etc etc then ordered online with a coupon. Then all I buy each week is fruit and veg from the greengrocers and meat from the butchers.

I use mysupermarket.com to work out who is cheapest that month (so this month asda was cheaper by £30 but last month tesco was cheaper) for the basic's (we only have the supermarkets here for basic stuff). I also look at the offers (this site makes it so easy and tells you if there is a cheaper item (in terms of price/100g) and stock up on stuff we use. All our food is made from scratch so i find a lot of offers don't apply but i can make use of the price differences to help keep costs down.

Yategirl

ceridwen wrote: »

EDIT: If anyone else is specifically growing food by the Square Foot method - I would be very interested in their planting plans purlease: ie 5 of this type of veg. in one square and 3 of that type of veg. in another square. I'm wondering exactly what quantities to grow of everything to get exactly the amount I need of each for one person with no "wastage" (well - in my case - food to give away - but you know what I mean).

I have some info that will help .... will pop on later on and pm you... but gotta run for a shower before we have kiddie meltdown again :rolleyes:

cw18

To convert cubic feet to litres, you need to multiply by 28.32

which means 1 cubic foot = 28.32 litres

so 16 cubic feet = 453.12 litres

shaz_mum_of__2

Oh my .................................what did i start??

10ft x 10ft bed(3m.... ish)

plants were from here something similair to this

http://www.marshalls-seeds.co.uk/?PAGEID=20670&STK_PROD_CODE=1080-5926&CTL_CAT_CODE=M11013

this may help re planting plans

http://www.squarefootgardening.com/
or

http://www.gardeners.com/Create-a-Kitchen-Garden-Using-3-ft.-Raised-Beds/8027,default,pg.html

or

http://www.rhs.org.uk/vegetables/veg3x3.asp

Shaz