Make do, Mend and Minimise in 2017

thriftwizard

Make do: I've boiled up a chicken carcass and made chicken & chunky vegetable soup with any veg that looked slightly past-it's-best. I made savoury flapjacks to use up the odds & ends of cheese and a couple of very muddy eggs from our chickens; somehow the ground in their run still gets damp, even covered over! Muddy eggs are just best used up as quickly as possible. And tonights' tea was baked potatoes with a choice of left-over chilli, leftover lamb tagine or cream cheese with smoked salmon - both packets were lurking at the back of the fridge, left over from the festivities and just about to go out of date.

Mend: Scrubbed up two splendid old baking tins that I rescued a while back that OH had "inadvertently" filed in the garden. One an old-style Spring-Clip cake tin, very much sturdier than the ones you can buy now, and one a fluted flan tin with removable base, again lovely & sturdy. They won't fetch me much, but it pleases me to see good old stuff go back into use.

Minimise: four lovely fair-isle-style jumpers are going off to the refugees in & around Calais; a friend organises trips out with appropriate stuff. (Sadly they are given lots of stuff that isn't appropriate, but they sell that on to fund the trips.) I don't need an entire drawer full of jumpers.

I must be feeling better! I might even try to tackle those curtains tomorrow...

MMF007

'Mended' a lovely, very long skirt that would look good as a dress except that bra shoulder straps and back show. Bought some pretty, wide lace to make shoulder straps for the skirt. Realised that if i attach them using press studs I can use the garment as a dress or as a skirt

Minimised 3 tops into ragbag - very faded, stained with suncream, DH embarassed to be seen with me when i wear them!

Made do with a flask of coffee rather than buying one. I stopped doing it a few months ago so need to make it a habit again.

misstara

Morning all MMMers

Over the past few days, we've minimised various bits from the flat. A coffee table that ended up being too big and some kitchen stuff went to one of my friends, a chest of drawers and comfy chair went to one of OH's friends. The bedroom is beginning to look less like a junk room and we plan to look at carpets for it next week.

I've also minimised my hair, got about 8 inches cut off so quite a dramatic change

I've got a few bits to mend but have no idea where the sewing kit is so will have a look for it tonight.

Hughesfamily

Morning MMMrs


Been reading avidly, posted last year very infrequently and then gave up - can I come back?


This morning minimised food from home for lunch which minimised the chances of me buying from the sandwich van which comes to work


Tea last night was pasta from stores for little one and I played freezer roulette - got out pasta sauce, cooked pasta - it was actually curry but still edible!


Tonight will be minimising the ironing pile and mending the mittens which poked through this morning. Also finishing the cat bed made from too small fluffy PJ's. He is getting on now and needs a comfy, warm bed.

[Deleted User]

Good Morning and welcome to all who are de-lurking Well I popped across to the shops and bought my 'minimal' essentials which I had run out of.eating out of the freezer means I an 'making do' with what I have and 'mending' my ways :):)

seriously its good to see so many folk taking on a great New Year task and becoming as least cosumerist as possible.
The frantic over buying of food because of the weather is as absurd as the over buying spending spree we have every year when the fist bit of tinsel appears
So even if its a few less things you buy it will mean less binning of food and essentials

Last night as I was at gatwick awaiting for my DGS's plane to arrive I was reading a paperback that someone had given me, not a sort of book I would normally read but in my hurry to get down to the airport before the white stuff arrived I just grabbed it quick and stuck it in my handbag Its called 'There's Always Tomorrow' by Pam Weaver and its set in the early 1950s and is about a young woman's life after WW2 and how she copes with all the privations , quite interesting as her OH returns from the war a different man than he went away.He actually isn't very nice at all and she does have a hard time with him ,but the writer has captured how life was so different for millions of women than it is today and their expectations were totally at odds with today's 21st century.Thoroughly enjoyed it so much I finished in bed last night and its gone in my pile to be passed on.Making do and mending was such a normal thing for folk back then,in fact to the heroine going into an hotel or restaurant was to her a sheer luxury rarely experienced.Great little book and a good slice of social history.

No mending to do today at least,but I shall probably do some knitting tonight.Making do with some HM soup for lunch Parsnip and apple which I made using up some wrinkly apples from the bowl.
Slowly minimalising my freezer, but its a long slow job
Onwards and frugally upwards chums

JackieO xx

villagelife

Had to work this morning but due to weather I walked to the bus stop and caught bus ( free for staff). I should do it more often but timings often aren't good. This reduced my spend on petrol and parking and hopefully minimized me slightly as a walk of about a mile to the bus stop.

Making do with a blanket to keep warm instead of the heating. My new slippers (Christmas present) really do help with keeping warm.

Minimised the ironing pile yesterday and know all put away.

thriftwizard

Ooh, ooh, ooh, I've mended my hacksaw! Very happy bunny... I snapped the blade cutting through a blind-tube earlier in the week, went to a big DiY place to buy another & was left with the impression that they were trying very hard not to laugh... I just didn't want a massive one, I'd tried using OH's & it's too big to do small jobs effectively! Anyway, the little local tool store that's grown up from a market stall came up with the goods for 30p per blade, so I'm up & running again, with 2 spares, for 90p!

culpepper

I finally got round to altering the curtains on the big back window.
They've only been there about 6 years.
They were Late MIL's and made for longer but narrower windows..anyway, I took the scissors to them and cut off 20 inches (shh no judging :P) then when I had the two 20 inch strips, I sewed them together and then sewed them to the right hand curtain.
Then I had to tidy up the bottom all along the cut edge.
Last of all and because I am a terrible make doer, I sewed some little pockets in the top edge of the new extension bit just big enough for two curtain hooks . They are hanging up now and the new pieced together bit is hanging behind the wall cupboard and look so much tidier and of course fit the window yay. Hubs and DS will probably not notice the change for weeks.

I've been making soup all week for lunch from peelings and stock and what not but today was so nippy , I had a giant mug of chicken barley stew instead.

Caterina

Make do: well it is not terribly OS but we had a lunch out after meeting our new bank manager and DH was very hungry. The way I made do was that the only thing I could have was a hummus salad (not very big), while DH tucked into a nice plate of felafel, chips and a bit of salad. I could have ordered a second plate of something but decided to make do with what I had, then had a snack of dried apricots and nuts at home.

Mend: I finally sewed the sleeve buttons on my favourite cardigan.

Minimise: from yesterday's declutter we have a large bag of cushions that will go to the local church tonight for tomorrow's jumble sale. I am also about to put my old foot pedal sewing machine on gumtree for free.

Broomstick

I'm used to taking a thermos with me for regular commitments but today I was visiting two libraries and knew that I would be gasping for a cuppa mid-afternoon. My car was parked in a garage between the two sites (so no cost/time limit). I finished in one library went and sat in the car in the garage and had a cuppa in the warm then walked to the other to finish off the work I'd wanted to do. It seemed so simple to be using the car as a sitting room but somehow I'd forgotten it was there. When I go on long journeys in the car in bad weather I sometimes take a hottie plus an extra thermos full of boiling water so that I can refresh it when it goes cold. I've realised that I could be doing that for local days out as well. When things are familiar and local I forget good ideas that I have in place for trips away!

B x