Shoestring days are coming.

emmilou

ooh home made wine like the sound of that (sorry to hijack the thread) but is there another thread about making your own being a bit of a wino I would be interested in making my own lol

rosieben

Good luck Tim! I'm interested in hearing more about your solar oven. What are you building it from etc. Let us know how you get on with it, great idea to have one on the allotment.

lil_me

Sounds fab, wishing you every success with this.

With the DVDs what about those x amount per month and rent as many as you like schemes ? Sure there was one advertised for £9.99 a month. Must say we've just cancelled all the movies etc on Sky, mainly because all the good stuffs now on HD, there is no way I am paying the extra subscription for this aswell as the box price!

What about a water butt, I seen one mentioned on here for £21.99 in Wickes.

chickadee

Hi Tim,

Don't forget to check out Freecycle first if you need anything. People often post 'wanted' ads as well as offering their unwanted items for free. You don't mention whether or not you need anything but it may be interesting to take a look. You may be able to get DVDs or books or something for your allotment. Another website you could try that may be useful to help reduce your travel costs is http://www.liftshare.org/ Basically, you type in your journey and it will check to see if there is anyone else registered in your area who may be able to offer a lift or to share driving. It may not be helpful but worth a try perhaps?

To raise instant cash could you sell anything on ebay? Old record collection, car parts, anything?

As far as the rest of your action plan, it sounds great. Don't forget your girlfriend in all of this though. She might love you but may not want to spend every night snuggled under a blanket watching DVDs! You should still plan some good (free!) days out, especially with the better weather. Have a walk in the park, go to the museum, check out the freebies forum for free film preview tickets, etc. Get a picnic and go to the beach, play frisbee or something.

Best of luck, I hope everything goes well for you!

scrimperjan

Tim, you are an inspiration to us all. Hope you are going to keep us posted and let us know how you get on. It's the right time of year to start, anyway - you'll have a summer of low bills and allotment abundance to look forward to. Best of luck!
PS - Have you looked at the selfsufficientish website? www.selfsufficientish.com - loads of stuff on there you would probably be interested in.

webitha

i too would be interested what bike club/rally as is cooltrikerchick

just came back from leeds lions and for the first time i made nd took my own food o/s and was fine saved me a fortune although i did nearly weaken whilst walking past the hog roast lol

so will be doing the same when at builth wells that near you sammy
and every rally from now on

sorry for going off topic

tim_n

Blimey lots of comments

First - Library scheme is a little different. It is £15 for 14 films AT A TIME (not one or two and having to send them back for the next title). As a subscription service I suspect I'll go through the titles I actually want to watch pretty quickly. As long as you use the online reservation system to get new titles in I can't see it being a problem. This may only be available in Essex at the moment though! I was suprised to see it myself.

Chickadee - Got lots of parts in storage at the moment I've been meaning to auction for a while, but I've been waiting for a 5p listing day and I always seem to be on a course at work during those days. I have some other things I really don't want to go because I love 'em but have no place in my new digs - plus I won't get a good price for them. Tough decisions will soon need to be made! It'll be a bootsale galore!

Oldmcdonald - I'm going to try making some country wines this year. I have all the kit as I used to regularly homebrew beer. I've done one red wine far too sweet for my palet! Unfortunately the girlfriend is very picky with her berries and only likes white zinfendal red wine.

Scrimperjan - yep, I've been on downsizer for ages and whilst reading selfsufficientish for ages too, only just registered on the forum.

lil_me - I have a water butt down the allotment but I can't install one in my flat = )

emmilou - http://www.downsizer.net/Projects/Processing_Food/The_Wine-Maker%27s_Calendar_-_April/

Aril - I wouldn't recommend using that water for drinking depending on your hot water system. I know the flat I'm moving into is fed from a cold water tank on the roof which could have anything in it. Yes boiling it will kill nasties but anything else might be rotting up there! Best to add it to the toilet bucket in my opinion! = )

Anyone considering eating catching crayfish: You need a license from the enviroment agency and be able to identify native and foreign species. The signal crayfish is what I'm hunting for as it is much bigger and some say tastier than the native. It is illegal to eat native crayfish as they are endangered by the signal. If you catch a signal crayfish that you do not intend to eat you have to destroy it on the bank. Transportation is illegal in some counties.

Very easy to catch, just a bit of fishing line, a weight and a bit of bacon on the end (apparently) not yet tried.

Once caught they have to be purged by leaving in a tank of water for a week. Water from the tank has to be disposed away from a water course as eggs may get back into the system. I believe that boiling the water before disposing of it on a garden is sufficient though don't quote me on that.

Sammy_kaye18 - good point on the freezer/fridge - most of our produce is fresh and much will be frozen. I have got a water jug for the frige (stolen from parents) and a bunch of filters.

Did you know that if you put extremely cheap vodka through an old water catridge a few times you will remove the rubishy taste and get a purer smirnoff type flavour? I then crush confectionary and mix in a bowl until it disolves to get a good tasting cheap alcoholic party drink. Used to work best with blackcurrent tunes but now they've gone sugar free whilst tasting the same goes an odd milky colour and seperates if left to stand. Still drinkable just shake up!

Other flavours to try are mint or pear drop. Mmmm...

The girlfriend is er... barmy. She'd have to be to be dating me. We'll make the best of it but to be honest I don't see that proposed life is any worse than anyone elses. She does prefer to cuddle up in front of a DVD rather than go out. We often have our friends round for mexican train dominoes.

Mexican train rules (but not the ones I play...)http://www.compendia.co.uk/dominoes.htm

This game is very popular. I get people ringing me up asking to come round and play or asking when I'm organising the next game. Best £4.99 I spent on amazon. Kits on there now go for double/tripple that now.

Yes, I'm 24, I have an allotment, I have carpet slippers (no pipe) and play dominos with my friends.

Oh dear

Penelope_Penguin

For anyone who's keen to make wine - here are some older threads (thanks to Pink-Winged - pinched them from a thread that she contributed to)

Homemade wine from frozen fruit

Home made wine and stockists of equipment

Homemade Lager/Beer/Wine

oldMcDonald

Also, have a nosey round downsizer.net brilliant site, full of articles and 'how to dos'.

webitha

anohter good cheap flavour acohol drinkd i do is empty a packet of skittles into either vodka or bacardi and leave for a few weeks yummy