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What brilliant posts.
Thank you katieowl for starting this thread.0 -
So yeah, it will never make me rich, but I feel that although I struggle sometimes I am passing something worthwhile onto my children. How to make do and mend, recycle where possible, use as little energy as possible, cook from scratch (my daughter is just 11 and is already a really good cook...she was born to it), how to grow your own veg, and still have fun without spending wads of cash to do it.
I guess they are also learning that what we think we need often isn't a need at all, but a want, and the world isn't going to end, if you don't have it right now.
I think that is a really valuable thing to pass on to your kids. Mine are all very, very good with money, because they know it's hard to come by. Both the girls cook and rummage for reduced food in the supermarkets! The oldest even dumpster dived pizzas from the local supermarket when they were broke, and froze it all...Son is still at home, but he can cook, and appreciates the bargains as much as I do.
I forgot to add my other thought earlier. We've always been on a very low income, probably a lot of the time below 'the poverty line' by official standards, but I think we've always lived reasonably well, and I don't think the kids went without too much while they were growing up. But that great frugality was was one of the reasons we were able to sell up and move here...we knew we could get by on very little. So even if OH hadn't been able to get work, or me, we knew we'd survive on whatever we could scrape together.
Kate
Also little bit weird, a lot of hippy...:p0 -
Yes lovely post, I think sometimes we fogect what we are saving with not buying the odd magazine here or there or buying that item from chairty shop. Im sure if I did add up would feel more proud of myself in the long run. Maybe next year will save up my " I could have spent that today" in a jar and see how much it is. Im not talking about saving on everyday stuff just the extra treats that you dont really need but give into tempation with!0
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All your posts have made me think really hard about what OS things I do (and why) - nowhere near enough, but I'm making consistent efforts.
I grew up with hardly any money, with parents who were war babies from poor-ish families, so when I married at 18 I felt able to manage on just one income, even though we've had a few near misses over the years! Our older 2 children don't often live by our example, but at least they know how to shop, cook, etc., and the 19 year old still at home is quite penny-pinching! :rotfl: He's most keen that I get a SC so he can experiment with cheap meat cuts - bit sad for a young chap with a GF! :rotfl:
My sister and I are making each other's Christmas presents - I've raided mum's fabric stash which goes back about 50 years for a kick-off! :rotfl: I'm ashamed to admit to feelings of pride (very sinful!) when we do stuff like this - re-using stuff in original ways, especially when it's got history behind it.
To reply to the original point - if I'd not been OS all my life we'd be in debt, unhappy, stressed... I think we're better off like this as the mental work involved in all things OS keeps us alert, with an active imagination (how many mince recipes do we know?), and many skills as we won't/can't pay for stuff!
A xoJuly 2024 GC £0.00/£400
NSD July 2024 /310 -
If I'd not been old style, I'd be retired, worrying about mortgage payments and paying back debt like many people my age. I was a SAHM when my children were small and I learned a lot about making the pennies stretch.
I'm retired, mortgage and debt free and very content." The greatest wealth is to live content with little."
Plato0 -
BitterAndTwisted wrote: ».<< The others are mattresses and the best quality shoes you can afford. >>
Spot on there my late very wise old Mum used to say years ago that if you spend on anything its got to be shoes or a decent bed as if your not in one your in the other and she was so right.
katieowl I think you have summed up very nicely why so many of us are on here ,learning new skills and tricks to streeetch our cash a bit further and passing on any we have picked up along the way.
My children have always called me Frua Frugal since they were young and they're both in their 40s now..But both have picked up bits from me handed down from my Mum, and hopefully they will pass it on to their children .My youngest DD has five children who know that Mum has sometimes to do the impossible with her cash, and they are sensible kids who don't expect or ask for things they know just won't happen.
My eldest's children are of a similar mind, and my DGS Danny is brilliant with his money and at almost 21 owns and runs his own car, buys his own clothes and pays for his holidays away with his super girlfriend.
He doesn't earn a great deal of money and a large chunk goes on fares to London every week (£110.00 +) But as he climbs his way up in his job he will earn more eventually.
His sister Holly is at Uni but works part-time two days a week and went to Uni locally so she has no HOR to pay for.
I am pleased that my family have grown up knowing the value of money and none of them so far have felt the need to live on 'tick' I look around at my home which too is not full of designer stuff, and my settee was made by my friends husband in 1973 and will definitely see me out and I'm glad I was brought up with a sense of humour and the ability to 'make do and mend' no doubt influenced by war time rationing and seeing my Mum work 'miracles' with what she had.
I wouldn't want it to be any other way really I am happy with what I have and I can sleep at night knowing the wolf will not knock on my door at anytime in the future.
I like your kind of thinking as it so mirrors mine .Seeing the sun rise this morning over the River Medway that I can see from my house is priceless, and I wouldn't swap it for anything else, and my youngest DGS Mikey telling me late this afternoon that I am the "best Granny in the world as I make the best toast,(cos I cut the crusts off) and he loves coming home from school as I'm there to give him milk and hot buttered toast and it makes him feel nice and warm"
Cheers JackieO xx0 -
I'm OS cos i want to write a post like Lilac Lady's in years to come.
Strictly speaking i don't have to be, but I like it. Like Grey Queen said, there's environmental issues to consider - not robbing from subsequent generations. SOmeone said recently that, as we ask about how generations before us could condone slavery or boys up chimneys will people in years to come ask how we could have used resources as we do, knowing they were running out (and i am as guilty as most regarding that)
I also love the challenge of getting something for as little as possible and, although I am not "artistic" I am "creative" - so cooking, sewing, knitting are my way of relaxing. My kids the other day said that they weren't bothered too much about going out to eat in places like McDogrels or the southern fried chicken place as the food they got at home was far superior. COmpliment indeed.
My other favourite compliments of recent years were from two friends, who said independently of each other, that i "wasn't at all materialistic" and that I "wasn't a shopaholic". The second of those friends is a bit of a shopaholic but doesn't have the money.
So i sit in my paid for house, in my bargain Joe Brown's jumper (£6 in a sale in the middle of summer - reduced from £36 :eek:) having had my HM soup and HM bread for tea. We eat out using Tesco vouchers and have days out using Tesco vouchers and 2 for 1's. We walk and cycle for leisure partly cos they are free and partly to be outside, we holiday in our caravan mostly where we cook our own food. I only have ready meals in the house when they are whoopsied - and even then it has to be a good reduction on something we can use. Most of my clothes have come from ebay or are out of season bargains.
I'd better stop, cos i think i'm sounding smug
My guilty secret, though, is that every couple of years we have "once in a lifetime" type holidays. Our last 2 years ago was to California and the Grand Canyon and the next one, next year is to New York and the East Coast.
Oh - what was i saying about resources?:o:o:o:oI wanna be in the room where it happens0 -
I'm loving the posts in this thread, my kind of people!!BitterAndTwisted wrote: »Do you really wish that? In my opinion furniture is one of few things that it is worth spending good money on. The others are mattresses and the best quality shoes you can afford. Quality is expensive but it lasts, so often ends up much better value than buying cheaper.
I have to agree with you BitterAndTwisted, I was brought up in a very OS way (making do and mending) but there were things that my parents did save up hard to buy, none of it on the "never never" and I am in a lucky position now of being in possession of some classic furniture that has well stood the test of time including a 1930's chest of drawers that originally belonged to my grandparents, a 1950's sideboard that my parents bought new, both of which are still in great condition because we were all brought up to respect and take care of things, they also store loads of stuff :j.
The sideboard polishes up lovely and ok it has one or two marks and worn areas but I think that all adds to the character of it - (there is also a baby photo of me sitting on it taken in 1959 :rotfl:)
One of the things I inherited from my father is "soft feet" as a result I cant get away with buying cheap shoes cause I just end up with blisters, cramp or unable to walk any distance, so as a result I have not scrimped on what I spend on footwear. But in saying that the shoes I have are wearing well and lasting years longer than the cheap and cheerful ones I wasted money on when I was younger - I was also taught that "shoes worth wearing are worth repairing" so spending money on getting them re-soled etc is money well spent.
In saying that I am being thrifty in other ways and a fair percentage of my wardrobe is from charity shops or passed on from another careful owner. Today I spent an hour or so dyeing an old sun bleached curtain, lining it with a cheap cosy fleece to make a great door curtain for my back door - "simples"
Tomorrow a rather old, sad & flat duvet will be taken apart to make a couple of "sausage" draft excluder's.
I'm finding it so satisfying and the house feels warmer already.Jan - June Grocery spends = £531.61
July - Grocery spends = £113.010 -
My guilty secret, though, is that every couple of years we have "once in a lifetime" type holidays. Our last 2 years ago was to California and the Grand Canyon and the next one, next year is to New York and the East Coast.
Oh - what was i saying about resources?:o:o:o:o
I don't see that as a guilty secret, my OS ways, scrimping, doing without for years allowed me to finally indulge a dream I had for years of going to NZ to meet cousins (descendants of my grandfathers brothers family, he immigrated in the 1920's) that I had never met before but had corresponded with for years.
Managed it without any loans, overdrafts or CC debts - just some good old MSE rules.Jan - June Grocery spends = £531.61
July - Grocery spends = £113.010 -
katieowl.
the world we live in is frugal, nature wastes nothing, it recycles everything from fallen leaves to us.
The current economic model however, depends for its survival on waste, so we have constant pressures to consume, discard and replace. It was not always so.
It is slowly changing, and I think it may change in sudden lunges from time to time as the odd crisis arises.
Everyone else is slowly joining as we do what we have always done, re use, recycle, make do, mend and hopefully not have to do without. For some it is a difficult journey, for most of us on here it is just as it has always been. Normal.0
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