make do and mend for tougher times

Evie74_2

Hello and welcome Pips Mum :wave:

We're a friendly bunch so pull up a chair...!

I am also a novice knitter and there is no way I would attempt socks! Squares, dolly-sized blankets for my DDs and scarves are about all I can do too One day I may feel brave enough to tackle an actual pattern...

Evie xx

ginnyknit

Been out into the Cheshire countryside today, realised we had to pass tatton park where the RHS show was on so decided if the traffic was bad we would turn round and go elsewhere. We have sat in the traffic jam many times over the years as we have terrible timing and always forget when the show is on. When we got to Tatton, no traffic, no queues no sign of people going in - it said last night in the paper it was a mud bath. Those poor people depending on selling at the show and it being a failure - think there will be a few who depended on it saving their business's. Looked at a lot of crops in the fields while we were out there and they looked sickly and stunted and there were very few farms selling veg from the farm gate, we usually load up while we are in the area.

Welcome Pipsmum, hope we can help and support you. So sorry you are struggling, if nothing else you will have a laugh on here with all the witty wonderful people.

We took a picnic in our new picnic basket( gift of DS's girly) with my polka dot butty box from dotcom gift sale and whoopsied bread rolls and custard tarts, strawberries - this is the life :rotfl: A slice of cake, though Hm and yummy looking, in the cafe was £2.30 a slice :eek: Then we went to a farm that made ice cream and it was £1.20 a scoop, it was only £4 a litre tub but we treated our selves to a scoop each. Did spend a little in a bead shop - very reasonable prices and a little more in a crafty card shop but all in all a cheap day out - think the canvas shoes I wore were a mistake tho!!!:o

mardatha

Just make sure you pull the yarn tight when you cross over from one needle to the next.

monnagran

May I join you? It's taken me days to read all your posts and I've finally caught up.

Some of your stories horrify me and how you are surviving I can't imagine.
I'm fortunate in being old enough (over old enough if we are being honest) to be getting my state pension. It's hardly a fortune but at least it turns up regularly every 4 weeks. There should have been a private pension as well but that sort of shrank until it was almost invisible and it's no longer worth their sending it every month so I get a miniscule amount every quarter.
I share a house with a friend and the house goes with her job, which is a blessing. I do have a house and my DS2 is living in that with his family. So you see I am very, very fortunate.

However, I still have to watch the pennies but that is nothing new. I was born before the war (told you I was old) and grew up with rationing and austerity. During the early 70s I was bringing up 2 small children and had a husband who thought I was wildly extravagant if I bought a packet of soap powder - I should have been down at the river bashing our washing on a stone. Then I
was a single parent bringing up teenagers.
That is my background and I have stretched every penny until it screamed in protest all my life. Those are my credentials.

I now help in a church-run Drop-in centre for those in need. Not just the homeless but sofa surfers, people who have a flat or bedsit but have to chose between electricity and food, or people who have just reached the end of their tether.
The Benefits system stinks. It makes my blood boil when the benefits are suddenly stopped for no reason and not started up again for a couple of months or someone answers the door to the bailiffs because their housing benefit had been stopped and the rent not paid for 3 months and they had not been told,( he was told that THEY had no obligation to tell him anything.)
Some officials are quite good but I think some are power-crazy and seem to delight in humiliating their clients.

That's enough ranting for now.

My DS1 wet the bed until he was 13, poor love. I took the boys away for a camping holiday and broke the news that I was divorcing their father. DS1 never wet the bed again. I'm not advocating divorce as a cure for bed-wetting but it worked for us.:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Evie74_2

Hello and welcome Monnagran :wave:

It sounds like you have had a lifetime's experience of living thriftily - so I hope you'll be well at home here It's amazing how resourceful these toughies are; I learn something new every day!

Evie xx

GreyQueen

:hello: Hello Monnagran and Pip's Mum. Good to have you aboard the ark with us.

Not good that so many of us are having such grim times. At work, I see people coming off JSA and into "self-employment" which obviously makes the unemployment stats look better. Oft times, it's sales jobs on commission-only. Plenty of people are s/e but still earning so little that they are on HB and CTB, just not on the JSA stats. The foodbank is the busiest place in town.:( I never thought I would see such days..........

I'm exhausted but dragged my carcase up to the lottie after work and started to pick peas and broad beans. It has been raining all day, everything in wringing wet and in the overcast damp evening the snails and slugs were everywhere.

:mad: I killed 94 snails and slugs on my crops and could have killed as many elsewhere but my back was killing me. It's like a horror movie as they're about every inch or so and they're eating my crops down to lace. There's so very many that I almost feel like chucking in the towel but that's just hormones talking and I will kill and kill and kill the barstewards. Gawd help us, if that lot overwinter and their eggs overwinter, they'll eat everything else in the country out of house and home.

I have a huge bag of beans to pod and a much smaller bag of peas but I am too knackered to tackle them tonight so they'll just have to wait until tomorrow............

Have a good evening, all. GQ xx

prepareathome

Well caught up at last, each time I got to bottom of a page a new one had appeared.......

Welcome to all our newbies, lovely to meet you but not under these circumstances........am so sorry so many are now losing their jobs, just wish I had the answer ( well I do but daren't voice it aloud and most likely wouldn't do any good anyway)

Well I have finally convinced my neighbours I am totally mad - wielding a machete at 4.30am on Monday I got away with as no one was about but out in pouring rain at 3pm digging up potatoes boy did I get looks, people even came out of their front doors to look across the road and check their eyes weren't deceiving them and others walking past just stopped and stared.

Haven't buy any means picked them all, I managed about 15 mins before I was so wobbly I had to come in and lie down for a bit, but managed in that time to dig up enough to totally fill all 10 trays on the dehydrator, and enough to fill a big pan which are boiled been ran through vacumn sealer ( which I had forgotten I bought about 4 years ago from a friend who was trying to build a home selling business, it was only thing she was selling I felt I might want and got it for £10 and was then put away and forgotten about until today).

I have done something wrong though as quite a few of my potatoes are going black - will pop over to the dehydrator thread and ask for help, I think I should have sprayed them with something and I didn't just blanched them and popped them in dehydrator, not sure either if I cut them to thin as ones in top layer are almost dry after only 4 hrs and it says run it for 10 hrs they would be to hard by then I think.

Right will go and ask.....

Hugs, Love and healing to all xxxxx

fuddle

Pips_Mum wrote: »

Fuddle, can't answer your question but think you are very brave as a novice knitter to attempt socks! I am also a novice knitter and daredn't do anything other than squares for blankets or scarfs! :rotfl:

Evie74 wrote: »

I am also a novice knitter and there is no way I would attempt socks! Squares, dolly-sized blankets for my DDs and scarves are about all I can do too One day I may feel brave enough to tackle an actual pattern...

Evie xx

The phrase she's got a screw loose that one comes to mind :rotfl:;) it's not that difficult really, just fiddly having 4 lots of pointy needles flailing aboot.

mardatha wrote: »

Just make sure you pull the yarn tight when you cross over from one needle to the next.

Thank you mar off to go pull it out and start again.

Just cut my hair myself I've been doing it that long now that I know how to cut the layers in well. Don't ask me how, I just manage to make it look alright :cool: I'm back to having a bouncy bob , layered up the back and sides.

Also, I'm onto week 4 of EVOO (extra virgin olive oil) and flannel make up remover and I'm finding that I can knock my evening moisturiser on the head now so I no longer need to buy cleanser, toner, eye-make up remover, cotton wool pads and night moisturiser. I use soap and water on the morning and I've been given a BB cream off my friend that she doesn't like so I'm hoping that i'll like it in the morning and will mean I can stop with foundation and the day time moisturiser. If I still need moisturiser I was figuring on just using sun cream.

I have bought 24p (i think) Asda conditioner to use as shaving gel for my legs. It's worked well tonight. Just need to keep an eye out for skin dryess.

Also used egg white whipped slightly as a face firming ask. Worked well. Used the yolk mixed with a bit olive oil and put it on my hair - that has left my hair lush

Exfoliated with sugar and honey - also really nice effect.

So I've had a pamper session for pennies

Wish DH was back though. I'm so tired but don't sleep when he's away because I'm scared He'll be back tomorrow. Just one more night to get through.

Possession

Hello Pip's mum and Monnogran. Times are tough, that's for sure. But I've learnt so many useful things since joining here, and I'm sure you will too.:)
I have a friend who has lots of plants in her lovely kitchen garden - gooseberries, rhubard, strawberries, raspberries, beans, courgettes, all kinds of herbs, probably much more. Are these the kind of plants which can grow from cuttings? As i'm sure she would give me some. I am very very far from being a green-fingered person but I would feel happier growing some produce for next year I think. Don't like gooseberries but the DCs have devoured the gooseberry jam I made and i've had to hide the other pots as I made them for xmas hampers, LOL!:rotfl:

dragonette

Possession - the strawberries can be split from runners to get plants. Not convinced by the rest. I've only known them grown from seed.

I would love to grow produce, sadly I'm in a first floor flat with a garden we can't do much with as its all drying green. My peppers all failed and I have 1 plus 1 tom plant from my mum.

Any suggestions as to what I could grow/organise myself for growing my own? I think the local allotments are totally full with waiting lists