What's your best OS moneysaving tip?

beautiful_ravens

I use the baby bath for the kids until they are literally too big to go in it. DD who is 8 now has showers, but DD's age 3, and 4 still have baby baths!! So much less water is used, even compared to sharing a normal bath, and I can do them both in the same water with only a small amount of hot water top up.

So, I tried to make liquid soap from a bar of soap last night -:rotfl: LOL! What a mess! :rotfl: Turns out that 1 litre of hot water is not enough to water down a bar of soap, I should have used a gallon of water!!

I bought 4 bars of 'Pure' (veggie) soap yesterday for 76p at Mr T, thinking I'd have a few litres of liquid soap - but, no - make that 4 gallons!* Still in the process of experimenting. Used it on the dishes, they are clean. My hands are very clean. The soapy stuff cleaned some dirty socks VERY well. Looks promising!

*1 gallon is just over 5 litres!!

anguk

EagerLearner wrote: »

Salt is a great weed killer - around £0.20p for 1 kilo and better for the environment, might need two sprinklings, but works.

Also homemade washing up liquid is just £0.10p per litre and fewer chemicals, plus use of less plastic as you can keep refilling your original container. I use old milk plastic bottles to store the washing up liquid and then I decant into a smaller squeezy bottle for use.

Homemade handwash / liquid shower soap works out at even less as you can make 3 litres for around £0.20p. Again saves money, uses less ingredients that are chemical and you can add your own oils / essential oils.

Click my username and check out my blog for the recipes for these items - a few other ideas too that you may find useful x

Does the homemade washing up liquid make bubbles like shop bought liquid? My OH has a thing about bubbles, he thinks if there aren't lots then it isn't working so won't use it. :rolleyes:

Trinny

gt568 wrote: »

Menu planning would be mine! Thus only buying what I need.

Still new here - havent got round to the menu planning section yet. My all time best tip is to - grow your own food - even with very little space - it costs practically nothing to buy a pack of seeds - even get bulk packs in £land and B&M.

Whatever you can grow will save real cash - its fun to do, and we are quids better off.

On the subject - foraging for windfall apples and blackberries is great too - we managed to pick enough to get us through the winter with pies and crumbles every fortnight - ( there are two of us)

As long as you know what to look for and can safely identify stuff - wild food is great.

Trin

Andybez38

What would your best tip be?

Raspberry_Swirl

For me, what has saved me the most money is a weekly menu plan. It not only saves me money when i'm shopping but also saves me throwing away half a fridgeful of waste at the end of each week.

Pink.

Hi Andybez,

Mine would be mealplanning too....it saves a fortune. I've added your thread to an existing one on single tips but these threads might interest you too:

Obvious tips

Great Tips... one liners

Top Five Tips -Food Shop

Weirdest tip ever?

Pink

Slopalongplacidly

Become completely determined not to waste anything, more aware of what you have in your 'fridge, cupboards, etc. and cut the consumption of everything like toothpaste, shampoo, dishwasher, etc. by half. Tea bags really do produce two good cups of tea. But remember not to know the cost of everything but the value of nothing.

katiecoodle

I learned this from haggling in the markets in marrakech, where everything is overpriced & you're expected to haggle.

When you're buying something consider what its worth to you. Consider the retail price & NEVER EVER be tempted by "sale" or "40 percent off" or "half price" signs - but go with what you consider to be its true worth.
So often I see things which at first glance appear to be a good buy but have been grossly inflated previously.
I must admit that since I've been doing this, I've refused point blank to buy a lot of things because I think they're overpriced. Saved myself a fortune.

janey_uk

Old fashioned approach, but I've gone back to buying veg at my local greengrocers/farm shop as it works out loads cheaper. I only buy what I need so don't end up with excess that you get in supermarket packets, there is less packaging, most of it is local so has less airmiles and it supports the local economy.

I buy from the local butcher too, but sometimes multi-packs from the supermarket are cheaper.