Put away your purse & become debt-averse

foxgloves

Humdinger1 - Thank-you for your kind comments. I do enjoy writing & really should be finishing my novel instead of regaling my readers on here with tales of past spendyness & my great reformation into a bit of a budget diva. I just hope it lasts, although I can't see that I'd fall back into my old ways now. I've been reformed for a long time. But I still think of myself in a "Hello, my name's Foxglvoes & I used to be Very Spendy" kind of way. I very much enjoy life's simple pleasures these days and wouldn't trade greater financial security or leaving smaller environmental footprints for filling my home with lots of expensive stuff.
I think we all come to a time eventually when we know whether we are on the right or wrong path, don't we? My old spendy behaviour hindered me in so many ways.
F x

foxgloves

And now I'd better get today's post on.....
It started in the way of all early mornings here at the moment. Got up, bravely twitched the curtains aside to see if today's offering was 1. Rain 2. Big Rain 3. Mega Rain 4. Absolutely Unbelievable Quantities of Mega Rain.
And what did I find? It was dry!! As in NO RAIN!!
Mr F had a half day today so he got some porridge going, which we had topped with the last of the home grown blackberry & pear compote I froze in the autumn, while I jumped in the bath........& when I got out, I wondered why I'd bothered, seeing as it was so obviously going to be a gardening day with mud a-plenty!
I spent about an hour & a quarter outside in the garden. It is amazing what can be done in that time. We do have quite a big garden & little & often is the key, not spending three days in a row doing everything then barely being able to creak my way off the sofa for the next week. So I baled out the half butt of water which had collected from the shed roof & gave our ancient apple tree a big drink - I have been told that it is quite likely our apple tree has been here as long as the house, which means it is 1930s - & I'm hoping all the rain down to its old roots might help with a nice big crop this year....we'll see......probably have a late frost now which will bug*er all the blossom! Then I set about clearing my smaller flower bed, cutting down, weeding & digging over as I went, followed by a no-holds-barred pruning for a buddleja (pretty & v insect-friendly but it terrorises my french beans) & a weed of the lorry tyre up in our veggie garden as I intend to devote that to growing mint (it's right next to my herb bed). So just those few jobs filled 3 trugs - well worth doing. Nice to see 4 lots of frogspawn in our wildlife pond already - I just hope that our naughty heron hasn't been doing any aerial viewing this week, as he is not averse to a bit of froggy caviar breakfast.
I've got a batch of bread rolls in the oven, just starting to smell a bit 'warm-bready' and I've a pizza base proving, just ready to be topped to eat tonight. I'm going to do a hot veggie one, with some of our homegrown jalpeno chillies from the freezer, some sweetcorn & other bits & bobs and I shall do a mixed salad with that. I've cut the last of my winter lettuce today. We haven't had to buy lettuce for ages, but will need to now, as I haven't even sown any salad seeds for the new season yet.
Hope everyone's had a productive day. Just seeing a glimpse of blue sky & sun is spirit-raising after such a soggy month, isn't it?
Cheers all,
F x

foxgloves

Hello Wednesday diary readers, 
A cold bright morning so decided to make the most of it & cycled to the local garden centre. I stuck to the single item I went there to buy & didn't get side-tracked by the coffee shop or potential new planty friends. So £1.99 for a packet of seeds & a bit of much needed exercise on the way.
I have shopped all flower seeds from home this year, apart from cosmos. I did save some seeds but they went mouldy - first time ever, but Autumn was very soggy, wasn't it, so unsurprising. I grow cosmos every year. They are easy, pretty & great for filling in gaps mid border. I've chosen a lovely variety I hadn't seen before called 'Cupcake'. The flowers look like little frilly bun cases! I'll get them sown next week & see how I get on with them.
Tomorrow is my Big Budget Day so I shall be number crunching at my desk reconciling this month's budget & setting all my targets for March.
Oops, someone at the door... 
Bye, 
F x

PurpleFairy26

I’ve just googled those flowers, they look lovely. 1 variety is called chocolate which is a dark purple/brown colour which look fun. Hope they bloom beautifully. 

moving_forward

I only ever knew chocolate cosmos before the bright pink ones you get free with magazines.  Must not keep looking at all these "posh" plant suggestions - I will bankrupt us!!

foxgloves

Purple Fairy - The chocolate cosmos supposedly even smells of chocolate..... it doesn't here, though, as it is one cosmos variety which doesn't seem to grow for me. The 'Sensation' mix is easiest & 'Seashells' is pretty too. If you can get a dry spell, the seeds are fairly reliable to collect & sow for free the following year.
F x

foxgloves

Moving_forward - Back in the Spendy Years, my 2nd home was the garden centre & I used to buy a lot of plants. Now I buy very few. I propagate from & divide what I have, & grow most things from seed. What amazes me since becoming much more frugal, is how often I see plants in catalogues, at garden centres, etc, priced at £5.99 per pot for things which just self-seed like weeds in our garden. I actually saw ONE verbena bonariensis plant priced at £5.99 in a catalogue this week. They are easy from seed (& will cost pence per plant), they self seed & as just one would look a bit sparse, it would take a minimum of three plants to make any kind of 'splash' so that's £18 before you've bought anything else to go with it!
And £5.99 for a single foxglove plant! Just find a neighbour who has some & offer to take a few self-sown plantlets off their hands! Other things which self-seed everywhere in my garden: alchemilla mollis, posh poppies, poppy 'tangerine gem', forget-me-not, wild violets, primroses, tricolour dwarf comfrey, sweet rocket, native hellabore, vervaine, marigolds & aquilegia. So really, my purse has no need to be coming out for additional planty friends anytime soon. I will admit I do get tempted though!
F x

Blackcats

Foxgloves - you are very knowledgeable on your plants.  I've also spent sooo much money in garden centres - In my ignorance I usually bought plants that were in full flower and only lasted a few weeks.  Another terrible thing I did was buy so many plants at one time  that I didn't even get round to planting them before they withered and died in their pots - horrific.  

moving_forward

Yes i agree about the cost of plants. I get much more satisfaction growing things from seeds or propagating cuttings. I regularly provide spare seedlings to friends or even divided plants. When we moved i took alot of expensive plants with us and grew some on from cuttings. We are building up shrubs and the bones of the new garden so grow alot of seeds to bulk out at the min. I have a couple of rooted cutting taken from a friends shrubs that are growing nicely in the greenhouse and even have some houseplants grown on from the same friends plants. Theres something nice about growing and giving. Last 2 years my spare plants given to a neighbour resulted in being given huge cartons of strawberries still warm fron the sun from their garden. I mainly grow perennials at the min but once gardens bulked out i will allow more luxuries of annuals. The garden borders were full of plants but we widened them as im not one for 2ft wide borders round a huge lawn 

moving_forward

Foxgloves - I would like some advice please from a fellow compost connoisseur, I have Dalek who gets fed and produces love lovely compost.  We have a hot-bin composter on our wish list on YNAB as that would be able to go on hard standing and is the same size as the dustbins which would take up less room.  The advice i'm after is on wormerys.  I attempted to make one out of some black lidded storage containers when we first moved here and it was a huge disaster. I know you are an expert in them so would appreciate any advice regarding set up running etc etc.