Not Buying It- A Consumer Holiday 2016

Larumbelle

chirpycheap wrote: »

4) This is the hardest one. I am going to try and be proud to be thrifty. My saving secrets are hidden behind closed doors and when colleagues talk about all of the stuff that they have bought I nod and pretend that I have a clue what they are talking about! There is an element of embarrassment and worry that people will think badly of me. Which is ridiculous as I should be proud rather than ashamed that we manage well on a lower than average income and still manage to put some money into savings. So I will try not to be embarrassed to admit that my clothes are second hand, that my shopping comes from discount supermarkets and I like a rummage in a skip! This thread (and last years) has really helped me as I feel that there are other people out there who are proud and unapologetic about their thrifty ways!

Awww I feel you, I really do. I think that when you say you should be proud that you are thrifty, part of you already is - but the bigger part of you worries what people think. At the moment thriftiness is a necessity for me, but it did used to be a choice, and while I was never ashamed exactly, I did used to worry what people would say. In the end, when I 'came out' as thrifty there were very few negative comments, and I was surprised that people didn't just accept it - they admired it! And some of the biggest spenders were the most admiring, because they knew that I had built up valuable skills that they didn't have. I ended up with a lot of them asking me for advice, some of them secretly, but some of them eagerly embraced it and got as competitive about their moneysaving as they had been about their expensive lifestyles:rotfl:

I do hope that you have positive experiences, I think you will be surprised by how people will view it - saving money is really not a negative thing anymore.

FoxFace

I am very openly thrifty, am very proud of my frugal ways and could give a fig what people think about it... if I had a fig in my stock and it wasn't going to cost me money

I agree with Larumbelle... most people are actually really positive about it... most people say to me that they wish they had my skills for watching the pennies... or to have the skills that being frugal has taught me, like cooking from scratch or sewing and knitting.

Own your thriftiness, I think you should be very proud of yourself!

tooties

For me this year is all about going back, in time i suppose.
Making do and getting DH to make or repair what we have.
Cooking from scratch and shopping locally, i am going to try shopping in my local aldi instead of asda where i get distracted by homewares and clothes that i dont need.
I am going to make a determined effort at menu planning and sticking to a shopping list.
Amazon is also my biggest weakness so that is going to be possibly the hardest thing for me.
I am also planning on switching to an e-cig.

Here goes

regards

RicardaRacoon

Evening everyone

Went to my knitting group today, so spent was coffee and a muffin. We had a lovely time as usual and one of the group members had her 5yo daughter with her who was so cute and well behaved.

Now made everything ready to go back to work tomorrow, although I'm now just reached the point where holidays could go on for weeks as I have so many things I want to do...

Just managed to avoid the first unexpected spend for this year. My flat is very damp and I have problems with a small patch of mould in the living room. Tried to dry it out a bit but nothing helps. So I now decided to get a dehumidifier as I'm really fet up with it. Talked to my sister about it, she said she had one standing around and I could borrow it. that saves me from buying one and the hydrometer to check if it helps comes from my sidejob where one stands around unused for years, so borrowed that one now. No spent besides the electricity to run the dehumidifier.

Pathoffreedom; we had a discussion about New Years resolutions in my knitting group today and we all said that we have to buy less yarn and deal with the stash we already have instead...

Jackie, I can understand what you need with more time for yourself, but then when I read about all the things you do I think it is the perfect life for an elderly lady! I know so many elderly people who just sit at home being bored and don't know what to do with their time and say that they have noone to spend time with, but next door another elderly person is lonely too and they don't even come up with the idea of socialising.

For all of you who want to go out more this year and meet people; Meetup is a very good way to find lovely groups. I think any bigger town nowdays has a couple of meetup groups. I found my knitting group like that and have met so many people and spent so many nice hours due to that.

My resolutions for 2016... Well, being mindful, buy less, make do more and be happy with what I have. I guess that is the resolution for everyone on this tread...
Then doing more in generel, read more, craft more, just do more things instead of just hanging around. I can quite easily waste a whole evening just pottering about while not doing anything and then I'm annoyed at myself because I could have spent the time doing something better.
Oh and "decluttering" my weight would be nice to....

Have a nice evening everyone!

candygirl

My mate came round last night, initially for a takeaway, but I had several curries in the freezer, so bunged a couple in, along with a few samosas etc from Icel@nd.We both enjoyed it, had a a laugh, n a few proseccos.Bargain:beer:

patentgirl

Can I please join in again this year started really well last year but dropped off a bit latter part of year:( Last year managed to pay off our mortgage so this year concentrating on building up savings for retirement hopefully in 5 years and two holidays booked later in year that need to be paid one by April eek!! Meal planning keeping to list and making effort to go to Aldis will be first on my list, tomorrow going through all standing orders and bills to see if can stop any or get better deals, then going to open a new account to save retirement money so more research to see what's paying best interest. Will try not to have any unnecessary spends including giving up my magazine habit !! Which I will find tough but been spending in excess of £12 ton£15 a month which on paper sounds horrendous.

chirpycheap

Larumbelle wrote: »

Awww I feel you, I really do. I think that when you say you should be proud that you are thrifty, part of you already is - but the bigger part of you worries what people think. At the moment thriftiness is a necessity for me, but it did used to be a choice, and while I was never ashamed exactly, I did used to worry what people would say. In the end, when I 'came out' as thrifty there were very few negative comments, and I was surprised that people didn't just accept it - they admired it! And some of the biggest spenders were the most admiring, because they knew that I had built up valuable skills that they didn't have. I ended up with a lot of them asking me for advice, some of them secretly, but some of them eagerly embraced it and got as competitive about their moneysaving as they had been about their expensive lifestyles:rotfl:

I do hope that you have positive experiences, I think you will be surprised by how people will view it - saving money is really not a negative thing anymore.

Thank you that's a really positive and inspiring message.:D

Bigjenny

patentgirl if you belong to your local library, you may be able to download some of the magazines you read, if they are available.

Aril

Day 3/365 Small spend on a book which is on a theme close to my heart and an area I want to personally work on. I checked the local library online catalogue first but they didn't have it so have bought it from a certain well known site. Second hand copy for a penny.

Weather didn't play ball so stayed chez nous and have been rounding the leftovers up. Mr GBT didn't reckon I would be able to use up the dribble of double cream and bit of condensed milk which were from the dessert he made for NYE. I love a challenge so mixed the two, added lemon juice to cut the sweetness and threw in some of the frozen raspberries from our crop this summer. Now bunged it all back in the freezer so shall see what the end result is like!

Have been out for a walk this evening as it was dry - photos of the pretty remaining festive lights taken. It's the small details that cost little or nothing that bring me most pleasure.

Arilx

pm2326

Uggghh work tomorrow

Have kept myself busy today, haven't been outside since Thursday and getting a bit stir crazy, it's also a tough week ahead as it's 3 years since my dad died.

I tidied a couple of kitchen drawers this morning, only thing I decluttered was 4 small herb jars. I'm gradually changing them over to larger jars so I can buy the bags from an Asian supermarket rather than those tiny refill boxes which are expensive. The bigger jars are empty square jars that both me and mum buy with chutney in from aldi so it's not actually costing anything to replace them.

I've also made a red lentil, chickpea & bean stew for work lunches, it started out a soup but it's too thick, I don't normally add beans but wanted to use a tin of baked beans that were OOD last week, they're asda smart price and tasteless.

Have also made a batch of 10 oat pancakes with cinnamon & nutmeg for breakfasts. I wanted something different but easy that I could heat up, not in the mood for actual porridge, have tried 1 and they're nice. I'll just pop 2 in the toaster in the morning to reheat.

Hopefully with breakfasts & lunches sorted there won't be any need to go near a shop again this week, in fact I'm going to leave my purse at home!