As The Workhouse Approaches....How To Do Everything To Avoid It, the Old Style Way

Looby_Lou

I normally lurk but I wanted to say thank you! I've discovered a food co op locally which I'm joining, I would have never thought aabout looking for one if it wasn't for the discussion on here.

re glass jars asda have some that are reasonable, I think packs of 3 small ones were £2.50, medium £1 each and Large £2. So far the quality has been ok as I use them in my pantry. I guess I'll need to get some more once i start ordering from the co op!

freudianslip

Looby_Lou wrote: »

I normally lurk but I wanted to say thank you! I've discovered a food co op locally which I'm joining, I would have never thought aabout looking for one if it wasn't for the discussion on here.

re glass jars asda have some that are reasonable, I think packs of 3 small ones were £2.50, medium £1 each and Large £2. So far the quality has been ok as I use them in my pantry. I guess I'll need to get some more once i start ordering from the co op!

Could you help me understand what a food coop is at all?

mrswive

It seems as if many of us are having to take OS to a whole new level.
Finding a good bargain and buying reduced food used to be a welcome bonus and give us a few extra luxuries but now it's a necessity; if there isn't any meat reduced we don't eat meat! People who used to buy in charity shops are now finding them too expensive, as many posters have mentioned, and are now buying from car boots and jumble sales instead. Buying things from CS now seems to be a lifestyle choice! We live in an affluent town with 7 CS and the prices are getting silly.

On a lighter note, great moneysaving yesterday - our library is having a book sale and I got some great books for the old mother and me for 10p each. I think I'll wander down again later and see what else I can find as they're putting a load more out today.

TudorRose

lizzyb1812 wrote: »

I had the Bernadine Lawrence book as well - 1st job after uni and on "apprentice" wages.

There's a book, sadly out of print, called "Round About a Pound a Week" that looks at the family lives of poorer working families in London in about 1890. Not the poorest families - these had work and earned about a pound a week which had to pay for everything. Not at all comparable to today but very interesting. For instance, a lot of income went on insurance to pay for medical bills. One woman was a kitchen assistant or something similar before her marriage and knew how to stretch her food budget - as a result her kids were less likely to be sick, ate better and thrived.

I love what I call social history - the lives of real, ordinary people are fascinating.

Lizzy

My 1st chance to catch up with everything this morning & have just ordered this book for 1p on Amazon. Looking forward to reading this as I love socialhistory and my late Dad was born in London in 1906 and lived there until WW2.

In 'making' mode today. Have homemade yogourt on the go - 1st time I have used my Easiyo - and have a sundried tomato loaf in the breadmaker. Love feeling I can make things for myself that are healthy and know the ingredients that have gone into them.

anguk

I get all my glass jars from Ikea, I normally pick a couple up every time I go. I've got a few of the sweetie type jars for teabags & coffee:
http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/catalog/products/00030262

I like the clip top ones for other dried food:
http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/catalog/products/40065867

You can pretty the jars up with nice labels too:
http://www.i-do-it-yourself.com/?s=jar+labels
http://www.eatdrinkchic.com/archives.cfm/search/?term=spice

tessie_bear

hi...with regards to comtainers from ikea i have had a few from the bargain corner bit...the flip type cereal ones reduced to 50p...would not be much use if u want all the same but may be worth a look

Dee5565

I have finished my curtains for the kitchen, from free fabric from a neighbour.
Hm bread cooling, chill and rice tonight for tea. Have started to knit a couple of scarfs for me from wool I have here in the house.
Also reading a book from the library called Low Cost Living by John Harrison. getting a few ideas.


Dee

bargainhunterss

freudianslip wrote: »

Good Morning

Oh to get rid of labels! My cupboards are full of brightly coloured fonts. It shouldn't bother me but it does because each of those labels has been designed with greed in mind 'buy me, buy me so my makers can make money out of you!' There's something fair and innocent about plain packaging. You have spurred me on to get my grains, beans, pulses and cereals in containers.

Is Ikea any good for cheap containers? I've a trip planned for next week anyway. I know you can get kilner type jars for pence as I am after two so I can buy bigger supplies of sea salt and pepper corns.

I'm going to collect my reserved copy of Kath Kelly's 'How I lived a year on just a pound' I'm sure it will have a couple of ideas in there that I can adopt or adapt. Thanks for the heads up

We had some heavy rain overnight and happy to report we have more pea pods growing, blackening blackcurrents, redcurrents are starting to turn (strawbs a disaster this year ) flowers on toms and on blackberries, broadbeans are eventually starting to come through, neighbour has too many broccolli so getting a couple of those to plan and I have leeks to go in today Also my current cuttings I took last year have rooted which i'm thrilled about. I'm going to plant them in the front garden and plan to put strawbs in there too if the runners root.

Gardening for me has become purposeful and enjoyable. I enjoy reading about it and learning. My strawbs are driving me insane though, we've had flowers but no strawberries forming. I posted on green fingers that I thought it might have been because I planted them near a shaded fence but I just don't think it can be that, there's got to be something wrong. I'm wondering if I've bought last year some bare rooted plants that were coming to the end of their fruit producing life? As I say they fruited last year.

Anyway, I'm encouraging the runners from now on to hopefully get some new plants.

I'd best sign off, get my little people ready and dodge the showers to get to school. Looking forward to see what we discuss today

I always tend to stock up on jars and things when I go to IKEA because they tend to be quite for things like that

bargainhunterss

mrswive wrote: »

It seems as if many of us are having to take OS to a whole new level.
Finding a good bargain and buying reduced food used to be a welcome bonus and give us a few extra luxuries but now it's a necessity; if there isn't any meat reduced we don't eat meat! People who used to buy in charity shops are now finding them too expensive, as many posters have mentioned, and are now buying from car boots and jumble sales instead. Buying things from CS now seems to be a lifestyle choice! We live in an affluent town with 7 CS and the prices are getting silly.

On a lighter note, great moneysaving yesterday - our library is having a book sale and I got some great books for the old mother and me for 10p each. I think I'll wander down again later and see what else I can find as they're putting a load more out today.

I love it when you find a section like that in the library! I haven't been for ages though (partly because I've loads of books at home I still haven't read!)... I need to get bargain bok hunting!

catznine

Another interesting social history book is called "Working class Wives their health and conditions" by Margery Spring Rice written in the 1930s and similar to Round about a pound a week, shows the diets and conditions of living for many before WW11 started. They say that in these cases, rationing (the sort of food available) improved peoples health! Less fat and more vegetables I should think!

WheneverI feel down and worry about this economic crisis, I pick up this book and realise just how lucky we are!

Today I am trying to think past the wedding to how we can re-coup some of the costs over the next few months! I need to find the courage to sell some stuff on ebay. Menu planning, using up leftovers, checking insurances, cutting our fuel usage, maybe upping my hours at work if possible!

I don't begrudge the money spent on the wedding, we only have 1 dd and she hasn't gone too mad, we have gone online for discount vouchers (for the dress) used discount warehouses, poundland and ebay a lot (for sweetie table and table decs) and made a lot from scratch (bunting, fabric hearts, confetti, place names) I would have made the favours but dd and her dh wanted to get breakthrough charity pins in memory of those loved ones who can't be with us on the day, which is a lovely idea that I hope everyone understands, hard luck if they don't really!

DD had the choice of today or next thursday for the wedding, really glad it wasn't today as the rain has been torrential! Fingers crossed next thursday is better!

Right off to flylady again! It really is making an incredible difference!:)