Oldstyle 'witnessing'

potsofmoney_(I_wish)

Hi all,
I'm usually to be found on the ebay forums but do read quite a bit on here.
I was wondering what you've found other people's responses to be when it comes up about doing stuff OS. It came up in conversation the other day at a bbq when someone | hadn't met before asked me about making my own cosmetics. I also mentioned the cleaning stuff I use which is vinegar, lemon juice and EO for fragrance. Her face was a picture and then she looked at my kids and said that "I guess it's good for their immune system being exposed to dirt." I was pretty gobsmacked and more than a tad offended.

My kids are always spotless and my house is always clean, I just do things a bit differently. Most people seem to think that if you don't spend a fortune on cleaning products then you must have a mucky house. Not the case atall.




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Pink.

Hi potsofmoney,

We have an older thread on peoples reactions to Old Style so I've added your thread to it to keep all the replies together.

Pink

beemuzed

Hi potsofmoney
thanks for resurrecting this thread - I've enjoyed going through it! My Mum was OS through and through until failing health has made her rely more on readymade meals etc, and I think my sisters and brothers are also fairly OS. Certainly all aware of this site! Some friends definitely not - think bargain hunting and charity shops terribly beneath them. Charity shops are to be donated to, not bought from! I never let on when complimented on clothes from the charity shop - just waiting for someone to say they used to have something like that!!!!! Colleagues vary - some clearly bring in home-made, but others have supermarket sandwiches. Mad!!!

potsofmoney_(I_wish)

oops sorry, I'm still getting used to this forum thing, I must say you're a very effecient lot.

Thistle-down

A relative told me I was "cheap" a while ago based solely on the fact that I buy the .13p washing-up liquid.

We had a big debate about it - he argued it was false economy as you had to use at least twice as much than you would of a better brand, like Fairy (which is all they buy) I pointed out that I would have to use 14 times as much for it to not be cheaper than Fairy(Smart price = .13p litre, Fairy = 1.85 litre) and that I often bought things using that rational - toilet paper is another - I buy cheaper paper which you do sometimes have to use more, but it is cheap enough that even with using more you are getting better value. Nothing but Charmin touches their bums in their house...

He just didn't get it - and then proceeded to ask for £20 to buy some petrol and ciggys as they had no money until the next pay day. :rolleyes:

I no longer have those sorts of conversations with them - it winds me up too much! As someone posted above - if it sounds like any effort at all is involved, they don't want to know, but they don't mind making the effort to make fun of my "cheap" ways.

buxtonrabbitgreen

This week I got a lobster phone and 1p ryanair tickets. I get" how do you get that then" And I say" MSE of course"
Dh has come round a bit to it now. Whenever he thinks of buying somthing I say "hang on, let me go thorough Quidco/pigsback". I keep losing the stardrops as he had found out it's myriad uses and keeps naffing off with it.
Just made 24 choc cookies with stuff I already had in. So am preety popular with the kids.

poppie,s_dream

all my friends are used to me now with money saving tips and old style cleaning a few of them have me on their phones as "tips" instead of my real name lol. a newly married friend often texts me for ideas i feel quite proud actually of my "text tips"

mioliere

I, too, find peoples' reactions to OS strange. A newish neighbour said to me recently 'you always look nice- where do you buy all your clothes?'. When I said 'charity shops' she said 'are things that bad, then?'!! Of course, I had to tell her that, no, things were not that bad but that I just don't want to spend good money on new clothes when I can get just as good stuff for just a few pounds and recycle and support a good cause all at the same time.
Only the other evening we invited her and her husband round for a meal and I used one of the wonderful recipes I had found in the indexed collections, a lovely dessert and HM bread, made using a BM I had bought from a charity shop for £7.00! She was most impressed when my DH boasted on my behalf and said it was all cooked from scratch using fresh ingredients - nothing convenient. I worked out the cost of the meal per person and it came in at about £1.20! She was even more impressed when I said that, for the past two weeks, we have been eating 'free' food because I have put myself on a freezer and store-cupboard challenge and that I had spent about £14.00 at the supermarket and some of that was spent on bicarb, soda crystals and white vinegar!

I do find that more and more of the people I talk to about MSE are showing more interest in it but some would not dream of going into a charity shop (not even for fancy dress clothes - another friend's daughter spent £30 hiring an outfit and my DS2's GF went to the same fancy dress party in a costume I had made up from charity shop clothes for about £3.50!)

Anyway, long live MSE and OS, I say!

Queenie

mioliere wrote: »

I, too, find peoples' reactions to OS strange. A newish neighbour said to me recently 'you always look nice- where do you buy all your clothes?'. When I said 'charity shops' she said 'are things that bad, then?'!! Of course, I had to tell her that, no, things were not that bad but that I just don't want to spend good money on new clothes when I can get just as good stuff for just a few pounds and recycle and support a good cause all at the same time....

When I made a trip to New York back in Feb 2002, my dd and her b/f were having a good old giggle behind my back imagining me scouring the US thrift stores for bargains :rotfl:

I don't think I actively go about telling people I'm "Old Style" as such ... :think: ... but, like the other week when two of my friends who I'd met through college were discussing clubbing together to buy a *huge* box of washing powder, I declined on the basis I can make it and save more money. That tweaked their interest (every likes to save a bob or two). They already knew I bake my own bread from the times I'd taken in chelsea buns to share out for coffee break. They knew I had a chicken (although one of the group assumed that meant I didn't eat chicken meat of any kind ).

Don't think I've come across a negative attitude or "down yer nose" attitude .... the greatest contention has always been when I admit to being a stay at home mother (and that was mainly dh's friends/colleagues) - as if I was some kind of lower life form without a brain cell :rotfl: But when dh and I worked it out, I could *make* as much money being at home as I could going out to work and all the costs that entailed (work clothes, child care fee's, tax, insurance, travel costs - time restrictions which would mean less scratch cooking/more convenience foods etc., etc.) Plus, I had the (modern day 'luxury') of actually *being* with my children and enjoying them .. something else which is becoming quite alien in the modern age. But that's a whole different thread :laugh:

Simba_25

We went shopping with my mum the other day as we were having dinner at her house and she had absolutely nothing in at all! She was going round picking all these pre prepaired things and asking if i fancied it. She picked up some new potatoes, you got about 8 in it for a £1!!! My 4 year old turns round and says.... Mummy wont have that, she makes her own, tastes lots better too.... then went and picked up a bag of potatoes. Soooo proud :oD

Mum was gobsmacked, she just said, well its only a quid. She couldn't believe i could make the whole meal for not much more then that! She has a lot to learn lol