It's STILL tough and not getting better - so how are we coping?

mum26

narabanekeater wrote: »

Gigervamp - Weve 4 children and 3 adults at the moment plus often at least 2 extra children come to play. So 12 loaves is a good week really. I try and keep our bills down as much as possible but I worked out that toast is a cheap and filling snack when your feeding up to 6 children at a time. I wont even start about Weetabix consumption or milk as im thinking of moving a cow into my back garden LOL
I have 2 children myself, my brother who lives with us due to his marriage break up 2 (who eat like theres no tommorow and this really does need addressing, and at least 2 children im either looking after for a friend or who have come to play.

I have six children and I find own brand cream crackers work out pretty well for lunches and snacks, Sainsburies and Tesco sell them for about 25p per pack and you can vary the toppings, nutella is surrisingly yummy for a sweet treat!

ginnyknit

Think we need a new thread now - ' how much tougher can it get!- seems like everyone is suffering other problems due to slow payments by goverment departments, council tax etc. Im waiting for some money Im owed and apparently its because theres no one to open the post :eek::eek::eek: I will happily go in the office for free and open the post and sort it for each department, for goodness sake Ive been a business manager for enough years. You have to be a certain rank to open envelopes - Im not kidding.

So hugs to all of those who need it and I hope everything sorts itself out for you

Botany

mum26 wrote: »

nutella is surrisingly yummy for a sweet treat!

What is surprising about that?
Nutella is not yummy... It's heavenly :heart2::heart2::heart2:

lauren_1

Botany wrote: »

What is surprising about that?
Nutella is not yummy... It's heavenly :heart2::heart2::heart2:

Also the jars make good glasses for drinking or storing small amounts of leftovers in the fridge.

I used to take my cous cous or pasta to work in a nutella jar too.

ceridwen

yep - I'm noticing the news about the likely increases in wheat prices some peeps have mentioned... and trying to remind myself that I'm doing a lot better than those Russians who have had fires going on near their homes...so life could be one whole lot worse....

Anyways - I have a shelf full of packets of pasta I was out buying a couple of weeks ago - having sat down and thought "Such and such an amount of pasta x about a year = that is what I am likely to eat over the next year or so and then hopefully wheat prices will be back to 'normal'...". You should have seen the "interested" looks I was getting from fellow shoppers as they saw me load err...quite a few...packets of pasta onto the conveyor belt. So - I'm also thankful that none of them actually asked me just why I was getting so many - as I honestly couldnt have explained why at the time....I just knew it seemed like a good idea at the time...

One thing I have noticed - looking at the prices some posters have been paying for readymade sliced bread - my thoughts are "But - I'm paying less than that for my homemade bread - and its got all those expensive ingredients in - like organic stoneground flour/olive oil/honey....". Cor...some of those food manufacturers DO add a lot onto the price for their "labours" then....as my bread is much better quality than that..but is costing me less...

I think it would probably be possible in extremis to make bread from just plain Value white flour/dried yeast/cheapest salt and a bit of cheap sunflower oil to ensure it would keep a bit better and it would work out a lot cheaper than the standard price readymade breads and still be healthier than them...I havent tried it...but that is my thinking...

Anyways - back to the topic of "grow your own" - as I've been putting a bit of my own stuff into tonight's dinner again:D. I am still experimenting/learning what I'm doing here - but it certainly is possible to make a reasonable contribution to the "larder" even from a very tiny garden. I'm still working on getting this down to a fine art - to maximise what I can get out of my tiny garden...practice makes perfect as they say.

Anyways - a coupla role models here on this. I derived a lot of inspiration from MSE's Mrs M originally - when she ran a blog for a while featuring this heavily:

http://potioappotment.blogspot.com

and I had a bit of a look-round at the videos Katholicos has posted on her blog and she is turning out an impressive amount of food from a tiny garden if you have a look at the videos on her blog:

http://catholicconvert.wordpress.com/

mama67

pagangirl wrote: »

Culpepper - sorry to hear about you cat hunny, big hugs

Cheapest place for sugar atm is faarm f00ds 59p. Bee n Emm was 59p Tuesday, gone up to 69p by Thursday :mad:

Hugs to all who need em, have a good weekend all.

I paid 59p/kg bag in In$ore on wed

mardatha

Also the jars make good glasses for drinking or storing small amounts of leftovers in the fridge.
*********
For some really mad reason, my brain read this as "storing small animals left over in the fridge " :eek:

lauren_1

mardatha wrote: »

Also the jars make good glasses for drinking or storing small amounts of leftovers in the fridge.
*********
For some reallly mad reason, my brain read this as "storing small animals left over in the fridge " :eek:

:rotfl: its not that bad yet that i have to catch small mice for dinner

Broomstick

Just popped in to catch up and wanted to offer (((hugs))) far and wide to all that want them.

If anyone wants/needs a temporary but very funny MSE distraction from the current situation and hasn't already seen the O/S disasters.... let us share... thread

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/290130

it really is worth a read. Post #179 is my all time favourite :rotfl:

B x

ceridwen

mardatha wrote: »

Also the jars make good glasses for drinking or storing small amounts of leftovers in the fridge.
*********
For some reallly mad reason, my brain read this as "storing small animals left over in the fridge " :eek:

...cough...now admit it Mardatha...you've been out hunting for some "small animals" - having read about squirrel starting to be available to buy now for eating.

Having a bit of an idea just what a nuisance grey squirrels can be - I do have some sympathies of one way to deal with them being to "get your own back - eat them". I couldnt bring myself to do so personally...as I find the idea of eating ANY sort of meat repugnant now...but I do wonder about them...