FRUGAL LIVING CHALLENGE part 3, July - Dec 2010

Frugaldom

Hi Lynda I've never had any problems before with all my assorted livestock mixing, but you should have heard the hens the first time I let the rabbit out into THEIR garden. I'm surprised you didn't hear them from there. They're my guardhens & ducks - they do the same when a stranger arrives at the gate. :rotfl:

Kittikins

Irritatingly, just as I was seriously considering giving up my TV licence and just watching on iplayer/DVDs, I read this this morning - Ministers are considering making you pay a licence fee to watch iplayer....

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1297660/The-internet-licence-fee-Viewers-watch-TV-charged-year-hints-minister.html

NualaBuala

Hi everyone :wave:

Great to hear that so many of you are doing without TVs. :T

I followed up with the Irish TV licence people and sadly, if you have a set, you must have a licence. No exceptions. So what I think I will do is lend the set to my ex for a month or so and see how I get on without it. If I have serious withdrawal symptoms then I'll get it back. I'll keep the licence money which I have been saving over the past year to one side just in case. I guess if I haven't gone back to having TV by Christmas, I can use the money for that. Not that I spent much at all last year as I cancelled presents with nearly everyone - we all agreed it was the best thing ever; no unwanted "stuff", no stressful shopping, no strain on the purse-strings. So I will be doing that this year (except for cousin's little girl and possible another couple of children).

I really enjoy reading about your life aeb and if you ever find time or inclination to pen your life story, I would buy it!

Hey Erme, the book is called "How to live for free: 80 ways to slash your spending". It's by Stephen Giles. I haven't read it yet so can't tell you if it's any good. I find with some of these books most of it is stuff we know already from MSE :T:money:but there are sometimes a few new ideas, or at least you get inspired to try a bit harder.
You made me smile at the idea of you defusing the hospital TV! Hope the flashbacks have gone, or stop soon, must be awful. I admire your attitude so much Erme, you never give up and you have a great sense of humour. :T:T:T Big hugs to you.

I've been over on the Preparing for Winter thread - I highly recommend it. It might seem a bit odd to think of winter in July but unless you're organised from last year, now is the time to plan ahead - either buying things like warm rugs cheaply as you see them on offer, sewing, knitting, sourcing fuel/kindling, saving for chimney sweeps etc. I feel quite inspired after reading through from the start.

Hope you all have a great day and hugs to anyone who'd like one.

grandma247

Just a quick note to say if you live near any Asian shops go and check them out as Ramadan starts on the 11th August and they are doing lots of brilliant offers on foodstuff over the next few weeks. I always buy my flour sacks and rice sacks at this time of the year. I bought a 10kg sack of basmati the other day for £11.99 and got 6 large cartons of juice free. They are doing great trolly deals from this friday too so I will be in there again.

lyndasharp

Kittikins wrote: »

Irritatingly, just as I was seriously considering giving up my TV licence and just watching on iplayer/DVDs, I read this this morning - Ministers are considering making you pay a licence fee to watch iplayer....

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1297660/The-internet-licence-fee-Viewers-watch-TV-charged-year-hints-minister.html

All we've watched recently has been Dr Who, so I suspect if they did start charging for iplayer we'd just have to go without it, we could probably buy the series on DVD for less than a licence fee! I wasn't that keen on the new series anyway...

cw18

But how can they prove someone is watching on iPlayer????




I'm a little upset tonight, as it looks like I may have 'lost' another fruit bush - and am going to have to keep a careful eye on the others.

I got 10 bushes from A!di earlier this year, but only 7 survived my planting them out. I last checked for fruit on Friday evening (have been getting a few raspberries now and again), and went out tonight to find one of my bushes - not a raspberry one, but not sure which it is as they weren't labelled and I'm no good at identification until fruit appears ) has lost just about every leaf. On investigating I discovered a few small green caterpillars on the container and on the soil around the plant. I also found a few on the container either side of it (both of which are raspberries), so have removed all the caterpillars I could see and removed the badly damaged plant (they're each in individual containers, so easy to move away from the other plants).

I'm just not sure what I need to do in order to minimize damage to the other bushes now, or whether there's any chance at all of the stripped one recovering

ceridwen

NUALA BUALA

Wasnt it you thats interested in that?

I've just seen this and thought I'd share:

http://livingthefrugallife.blogspot.com/2010/07/simple-solar-cooked-meal.html

I wonder whether this would work in a particularly shiny stainless steel mixing bowl I have actually.....:cool:

grandma247

CW they are likely to be sawfly caterpillars and they love gooseberries most of all but will attack other plants.
http://www.gardenseeker.com/plant_pests_problems/plant-pests/gooseberry_sawfly_caterpillars.htm

http://www.which.co.uk/documents/pdf/gooseberry-mildew-and-gooseberry-sawfly-151784.pdf

cw18

Yep - sounds like what I have as they've left the 'midrib' on all the leaves (and one of the bushes amongst those I bought was a gooseberry - plus it's a thorny bush that was stripped, which seems to match up with the image I've just seen on Wiki)

Thanks for that - at least I know what it is now

chika

Hi everyone,

I've been MIA over the past few weeks as I got a job that I couldn't turn down. I've been working as a nanny for a wealthy family - we have been travelling on a cruise and I'm just copming to the end of a week in Cannes! It's been great seeing the world and experiencing how the other half live but I cannot wait to get home. My new house is ready on the 3rd so I will stay in London with a mate for a week until I get the keys. Frugally it has been fantastic as I have had no living expenses and been paid quite well.

Hugs to everyone that needs them Erme I hope you are better and you manage to get away somewhere even for a couple of days. Thank you for the tip Grandma. I'll check out the Asian shops in Manchester when I get back next week. That amount of rice would last ages and the price of Basmati seems to be going up loads. I bought 500g of it the other day in a small supermarket here in France and it was 2.50 Euros - I almost fainted!