NOT BUYING IT! 2015 - A consumer holiday

Aril

I could have written your post Vulpix. Looking at my life from the outside nobody has a clue how I live...I choose carefully and dress well. My home too is full of second hand treasures, freecyled items etc. We eat well with home cooked food but I'll be the first to admit I love a takeaway now and again. My 16yo works at a charity shop aswell as doing a paid job at the weekend [he's doing his AS exams] aswell as being a young leader for scouts and doing lots at college like the college council. He buys new clothes all the time but it's his money and he likes to look trendy.Perhaps it's also a reaction to having had a fair number of second hand clothes when he was younger. His core values are good though. Please don't think he's a saint- we have our moments with him just like any other parent!
Arilx

suki1964

Woke with the toothache very early this morning so spent the past couple of hours reading this thread and would like to climb aboard

I live a pretty frugal life already. I gave up full time work back in 2000 due to ill health. Since then I've taken on lots of different types of part time jobs to keep some money coming in. Now hubby isn't working at all I need to be more frugal and teach him to stop spending

Christmas is sorted prezzie wise, I saved up all year and came in £70 under budget:T. The few cards I have had to post were last years leftovers and the stamps were from my post office surveys

Food wise, the biggest expense will be the turkey, although I'm hoping the chicken factory shop will have plenty in this week. I don't buy loads of extras as we don't really ever find time to eat them. Mum still goes mad and buys tins of sweets and piles of cake, which she is then still stuffing at Easter. She thinks I'm mean with the food shop cos I only buy what's NEEDED, she buys what she fancies, and then it mostly gets chucked. But it's her money so I let her get on with it. Life is too short to be rowing with her daily


So my aim for 2015 is to get hubby on board more. To get him to stop wasting money going out spending cos he's bored Which really came about when he was working away from home and stuck in digs. Sundays were spent moseying about the shops and spending. The result is we have a house full of stuff. His wardrobe is twice the size of mine and is full of designer tags.. He has at least six watches and enough new underwear to last into the next century!!!!

Anyway I've just started to work at a charity shop a couple of days a week so I'm hoping to rope him into giving a few hours there. He also has the veggie garden dug out now so he will be having to plan that out. Hopefully mums shop will be busy next week so he will be needed there doing deliveries, just got to keep him busy and off ebay and out of the shops

FrugalinShropshire

I saw a quote the other day and thought it suited us here on this thread perfectly

The best things in life aren't things!

[Deleted User]

Great to see how we are all coping ,especially as the t.v. and media are doing their best to part us all with money we can't afford, to buy stuff we don't need , to give to people that if we're honest we're not that keen on anyway
My cards this year have been drastically cut back,what I didn't make, I didn't send.Plus I worked out that I'd rather send £9.00 to the Sally Army, than £9.00 on postage for cards to people that I probably haven't seen or spoken to for over a year.My card list has been whittled down accordingly.I sent to my family overseas in Australia ,Canada,Mexico & France and what I couldn't deliver by hand just didn't get sent. I am not a mean person by any means but the card giving has got out of hand I feel .A lot of people I have emailed or texted and told what I did instead of sending a card and the responce was pretty good .Everyone who replied said that the Sally Army were far more deserving of the cash than the post office
My youngest DD buys four cards at Christmas one for her sister and family ,one for me ,one for her DD who lives away from home and one for her in-laws. She has never bought into the idea of sending out piles of cards ever and she says those who get offended are not really ones she's bothered about anyway.Plus she has enough to do with four boys to feed and get bits for at Christmas.She is a strictly family only lady :)
Glad that everyone is getting a great 'light-bulb' moment for the New Year already .My only big expence I have to pay out for is two car ferry tickets for our next August Holiday on the Isle of Wight.Our holiday house is already booked and paid for thank goodness
Well done chums
JackieO xxx

GreyQueen

Morning all.

It seems like there are a fair few of us here who like the good (simple) life, with the finest things like fuzzy jammies, books, hot drinks and chocolate.

You could see why this would need to be mocked by the Marketeers, can't you? Not an awful lot of profit being generated from my personal leisure activities this weekend. I am about to head out on foot to my allotment, to pick up my wheelbarrow and toddle over to the common to get some free horse manure from where the travellers graze their ponies on tethers.

This is one of the many Arrangements in my life which make things easier, and suits both the travellers and the allotmenteers and has been quietly going on for decades. All it costs is sweat equity and a bit of time.

You can get ready-bagged horse manure for free or a quid a bag out in the countryside, but that requires more transport than I have access to (only got a pushbike and the ME limits my range these days). I have had it delivered in the past, but at £50/ 5 tonne tipper trailer, it's beyond the purse atm, plus I still have to barrow it from the track to the plot as the tipper can't get around exactly to my plot.

Think of me, if you like, getting very real with the nuts & bolts of life - it's all down to rot, decay, muck and magic. Gosh, there will be people in the city centre doing their Christmas shopping, gawdelpthem. Poor beggars.

vulpix

Ahhh CHRISTMAS,I love it.My house is decorated with second hand/homemade treasures,and though I say so myself it looks lovely.


Christmas cards I stopped sending 15 years ago.We have sent about 10 to OH's collection of old Aunts and people from where he used to live.Bought last January.

Presents,all done months ago.Older kids £25 each,youngest £100,Mums £25 each plus youngest's Granny.Don't know what you call your husbands deceased wife's Mum.Son's girlfriend £15.My friend of 45 years small homemade hamper.OH £10 limit to stop him panic buying things I pretend to like.

Many of the gifts are consumable,food, toiletries,candles etc and it looks like I have spent a fortune as they are carboot bargains or homemade.

Son's girlfriend is having a beautiful boxed set of M&S glasses from a carboot with a good bottle of wine.

Son 2,I have had his university rugby team photo framed.

Friend has had plain chocolate slab with dried cranberries,gingerbread,elderflower cordial,blackberry jelly,strawberry jam and a little clay cay dish I made when doing crafts with our youngest.She will love it.

My favourite homemade gift is a candle.I melted down candle stubs and remade in a large Marmite jar.Daughter 2 will love it.

Not every one likes homemade though.OH,s Mum doesn't so she's got Thorntons and Shortbread and smellies.

The grannies give money which is useful for those things you wouldn't buy normally.And I tell the kids we don't need presents but if they had to it would be nice to have face cream,bubble bath ,socks etc.No more books,ornaments,DVD's,We do not need "stuff".

I reuse paper and ribbons etc,make my own tags and rarely need to buy new,but if I did it would be in January.

I buy a couple of extra things every week with the food shop so will have no big shop to do.Just need cream and veg nearer the time.

I love having a houseful of people and revel in cooking for them all.I shop in Aldi with the occasional thing from elsewhere that they don't sell.

I love Christmas,bring it on !

:rudolf::rudolf:

CAFCGirl

WOW! Just wow and awe dripping from my face at you wonderful people!

I woke up halfway through the night, tense before I'd even fully woken up at the thought of christmas, the bills, the 'need' to spend, and why do I feel like that? It doesn't make me feel like a good person, it doesn't make me feel like a good wife, or a good mumma to my son..... and it sure as hell doesn't make me happy to my soul. Who made me feel that in order to be 'decent' I have to spend?

In short, me. I fell for it. I've slowly surrounded myself by people and things, that directed me on a certain path, paved with fool's gold.
But I look in the mirror at myself, and I don't like it. I don't even like the clothes I've bought that are on my back, they don't reflect the me I want to be, nor do the things in my home, they don't speak to me on any sort of level, they don't bring anything to the table....

So what do I want to be? I want to be free!
Free of the retail guilt from both angles, for not buying and then when I do buy, from the buying. I want to be free of the shackles of buy now pay forever. I want my son to enjoy what he has now, and not always be forced fed the urgent need for more.
Don't get me wrong, I couldn't go all the way to the extremes, but I do want to live purer in myself. If I buy/spend money, I want it to be without strings.

I'm hoping I can join in with your merry bunch of good people, offer my support to those in need. I'm so far into the 'buying' that I doubt I'll have any sound advice to offer for quite some time, but one day I hope to be

cydney65

Morning,

Well I have bagged up some clothes for the charity shop this morning and will take it down later (and have a browse!).

I'm finding that in the last couple of weeks I've become a lot more content with my life here. I am very shy and have felt a bit awkward up here not really mingling with people in the village. But since walking GD around when she is with us and with the conversation I had in the charity shop earlier this week I'm starting to feel settled and accepted. I'm initiating some interactions now with people in the street; yesterday I stopped a lady we see every day walking her sheltie. We had shelties before our dachshunds and we ended up having a lovely chat about our dogs.

I have also discovered that I love being with the children at the local playgroup, so much so that I'm thinking of asking if I can volunteer to help out. I'm feeling very content with life at the moment.

Granddaughter's birthday pressie arrived yesterday which I managed to get with money off. I'm keeping an eye out for an aqua doodle mat in the sales for next years christmas present...OH thinks I'm mad!

So, for the new year...
1) no new clothes apart from undies-necessary clothes from the charity shop.
2) Things for GD from charity shop or with money off vouchers.
3) Cut down on food spends and try and get veggies from local grocer.
4) Try and be more sustainable.
5) Try to be more active in village life-not a non spending thingy but it will help me to be more proactive.

Have a good day everyone

CydneyX

[Deleted User]

Reading through all our posts I see so many similarities in our thinking, no matter how many diverse ways we have of living our lives or how we achieve those things that we individually consider our needs and no matter what the reasons behind our decisions to live an OS lifestyle there is a thread of actually seeing the reality of life. We seem collectively to have stepped out of the mainstream of commercialism and our priorities and aspirations are virtually the same, no matter which one of us is posting. It's such an uplifting feeling, knowing you aren't the only person trying to keep your feet firmly on the ground when all of society is turning up the wind machine to try to take you along with the spend, spend, spend and if you don't have THIS you've lost your place in the heirarchy feelings that abound in 2014. To see through the hype of the advertisers, the fashion that constantly changes in homes, contents, clothing, etc. is very liberating, to have the guts to stop, reconsider and act to make changes takes some doing doesn't it? The confidence to be different, to hold your own values and to not care what the rest of your circle thinks or says marks us all out as our own people and I'm very proud to be a part of this growing band of pilgrims towards the simpler life, thank you!!!

camelot1001

OK so here I am in IKEA having a coffee while I wait for it to open. I have come for some curtains for the front door, here is the cheapest place to get them as it's such a long drop(window above door). I will not be tempted by anything else I might see, in fact I will not even look. I will keep saying this as I go.
Wish me luck!