How to Get Through The Tough Times The Old Style Way.

maryb

Door seal went on our washing machine one weekend when I had let DH go away for a boy's weekend. He arrived back on Sunday evening looked at the results of the flood and went Hmm!
Next morning he had to fly out to Oz on business.

He never seemed to really cotton on as to why he was in brownie point deficit!

gillst_2

I purchased a book at the weekend for just 20p from a jumble sale. The booked is titled "All Good Things Around Us" written by Pamela Michael and is "A beautifully illustrated cookbook and guide to the recognition and uses of over 90 wild plants and herbs" Have had a quick flip through and it looks like it will make interesting reading. The introduction indicates that this book is not meant to be about survival or how to live off the land, but rather it is a guide for using herbs and wild plants much in the same way as our ancestors did, before we lost the knowledge and came to rely on shops for our food, drink and beauty preparations.

Following on with the topic of home brewing and making wines, I have found a recipies in this book for Oak Leaf Wine, Lemon Balm Wine, Bilberry Wine, Sloe Wine, Bog Myrtle Ale, Blackberry Wine, Coltsfoot Wine, Crab Apple Wine, Dandelion Wine, Dandelion Fizz, Elderflower Fizz, Elderflower wine, Elderberry Wine, Fresh Elderberry Drink, Elderflower milkshake, Gorse Wine, Hawthorn Flower Wine, Hawthornberry Wine, Lime Flower Wine, Meadowsweet wine, Meadowsweet liqueuer, Rose Hip wine, Rowanberry wine and Nettle wine.

There are other recipies for soups, teas, cakes, shampoos, and loads of other weird and wonderful things

coolcait

brandeberryj wrote: »

Why? I have never heard of either catching fire......EVER. No doubt they must have done but risk should be measured proportionatly and what may I ask is the point of smoke alarm? So I can be on the safe side could you give me a place on the internet where it says this.
"not recommended by the fire brigade." What is? Chip pans were the biggest household fire hazard by long way they never said don't use them. By the way they are cutting fire stations/firemen because there are so few house fires (relatively) today. Oven chips have save 100s of lives! Central heating also (the wiring on those old electric blankets left a lot to be desired). Then we come to the smoke alarm an absolute nuisance in a small house but when the log I put in the wood burner was a little to large for the opening so I left it hanging out till it burned down a bit..........pity I fell asleep Oh well I never did like that hearth rug!! not that it was that damaged the smoke alarm saw to that.
So how are washing unsafe to use at night or is it when the everyone has gone to bed? And why?

In the past few months, I have seen a fire safety advert here in Scotland which (personally) I found pretty harrowing. It starts with a distraught woman being held back from trying to enter a house on fire.

It winds back from that moment, showing her getting into bed, kissing her son as he sleeps, coming upstairs (you get the picture), and ends with her putting the washing machine on.

You are right about smoke alarms, and I hope that everyone has one. However, fire prevention should always be the starting point.

Washing machines do go on fire, as do tumble driers, dishwashers. In fairly recent times, before I became greener and more MSE, the motor in my dishwasher overheated, and went from a strange acrid smell to belching smoke in the space of a couple of minutes. Luckily I was in the kitchen at the time. Even with a smoke alarm, I shudder to think what might have happened to my family if we had all been tucked up in bed.

A friend once put on her washing machine before popping out to the shops. She got downstairs (she lived in a block of flats) and realised she had forgotten something. When she opened her front door, the flat was full of smoke. Foolishly (but many people will relate to it) she went into the flat to get her dog. They both got out OK, but she was given oxygen to be on the safe side.

In the west of Scotland, over the festive season, there was a shocking increase in the number of fatal house fires so, sadly, it is still an issue (as is alcohol).

You don't seem to realise that you had a lucky escape in the incident you describe. You seem to be quite unaware of the fact that washing machines can catch fire, and the attached risk of using them at a time when everyone in the household is asleep.

The person who triggered your sarcastic riposte was actually quite correct. If you and others wish to take the risk, then that is your choice (factoring in the risk to others in your household, and your neighbours, if your property is not a detached one).

But it quite agree with anyone who flags up the fact that there is a risk.

ceridwen

born_blonde wrote: »

If times get tough, tougher I suppose we'd go back to the hierarchy of needs. I may have forgotten but is it food. shelter and then clothing?

I know I'm OK for shelter and it's not so much that food would be tough but that expectations would take some time to reconcile to what was available. Not just mine but also my Husband and son.

I suppose it's change and most people don't embrace change.

We get it to degree now as household income has dropped by two thirds and we all hark back to what used to be the norm rather than what is necessary now.

I suppose what I'm saying is it's harder to get your head to the right place than to stock your store cupboard.

Here y'are - the Hierarchy of Needs pyramid - with the most important at the top and the least important (ie the ones we have to deal with first:mad:) at the bottom:

http://angiereyes.files.wordpress.com/2010/12/maslows-hierarchy1.jpg

schumie

JenniO wrote: »

Thanks! All I did was watch the following 2 videos from youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJiS2rz1Le4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9CIpIh3III

(it's a part 1 and part 2). I just used 2 colours that would go with my tea pot and with the kitchen decor to keep it simple. It's basically 2 squares (or in my case it was rectangles) and then put them together around the spout and the handle. I did do her 'drawstring' idea as well with the chain stitch using both colours I had used as one big chain stitch and tied it in a bow. It came out great and took 1 day! Good luck!

Thank you. x

ceridwen

mardatha wrote: »

Or a daily shower ? We grew up with weekly baths and we lived and did not smell LOL!
Basics toothpaste is fine, its the brushing that cleans not so much the paste.
Maybe buy shea & coconut butters and use them on skin and hair and kids.
Don't buy wipes and use bits of old towels, does exactly the same job.
Would go mad without the internet though .....!

I can/sometimes do make my own cosmetics anyway - MUCH cheaper than the level of cosmetics I would buy otherwise:eek:. "Basics" toothpaste - errr...nope...I expect its got fluoride in - so I suppose I would make my own toothpaste in that event (as I still would refuse to use fluoride).

Could do without:
- stuff like wipes - just use rags
- the Internet

Things I simply would NOT do without:
- healthy food
- being warm enough
- comfortable footwear
- the barest possible minimum of keeping clean (I know the LEAST I could possibly "handle" would be making do with a shower or bath every other day - I've tried to go longer than that - but I cant handle being dirty/smelly/greasy-haired .....).
- a pretty high level of "peace and quiet"/privacy in my home
- never working again after retirement (unless its work of MY choice)

I've tried to see if I could manage without the above things personally - and..the answer is "NO:eek:. Impossible - I'm "glued" to them". Some changes I could personally make if I absolutely had to - but those would not even be "up for discussion". My personal "non-negotiables":D

redlady_1

I cannot escape from Maslow!!!! That bloody bloke haunts me. Who would think you would be taught it in accountancy?? (yeah I know so please dont remind me)

Just to let you know my local Lidl have a gardening event today. Cloches, fruit trees and bushes, cold franes the whole jolly lot!

I have just bought a 16kg sack of bread flour after staring at it for long enough.

ChocClare...thank you so much! Can't wait to get sorted

redlady_1

Cerwiden -give up cosmetics??? :eek: Not a flipping chance in this house

ceridwen

brandeberryj wrote: »

I expect you have done this already but if not how about the balance transfer for the CC?
Something I do all the time is change CC every year taking out a new zero intererst spending card and useing it instead of cash and putting the same amount in a regular savings account. The aim was not just to get the interest but to be able to meet unexpected bills. IE take the money out of the regular saver account and pay the bill and if I can't pay off the CC then just do balance transfer bit. As it happened it worked my neighbour wanted to sell me a small peice of land for £2400. I would have had to borrow from the bank at something like 10 or maybe 12% interest. I didn't even loose the interest as I was almost at the end of the year long account. Went into the irrelavant there but you get the gist if you can get the balance transfer.
PS is that £250 house insurance for the year?

A small piece of land for £2,400 - now I really AM positively bright green with envy. Will now spend rest of day - at intervals - pondering as to how big a piece of land I could buy in "my neck of the woods" for that - probably about 10 square metres of designated woodland perhaps? Top of wishlist items is - nice piece of land nearby (of ANY description). The nearest bit I've seen was a longish bus journey away from me and cost about £5,000 and that was pretty darn small and I thought it must have some major problem to cost so little for this area (I was so astonished at seeing ANY land at all on sale at a price I could manage that I nearly got on that bus anyway - just to have a look...).

de1amo

im fed up because we just had our january gas bill and it was only 20 quid but the electricity bill has gone up over 50 pc due to my daughter using a 3 bar in her bedroom because her rad isnt working--i have been asking my wife for 2 months now to ring a plumber to fix the radiators--they need balancing due to work done in the summer--apparently my daughters quilt got singhed last night ---my wife claims she has so many jobs to do but she can go off for hours with friends or to the hairdresser--i cant deal with plumbers due to the lingo but i do pay all the bills and charges willingly--my rant over!! Greg x