Put away your purse & become debt-averse

Tescodealqueen

Pixiehouse55 said:

I've got loads of craft punches and really don't use them all, border punches as well. I'm starting to have a clear out of all my craft  supplies. Beginning to downsize and I don't do so much papercrafting as I used too. X

Me too Pixiehouse55. Hoping our local charity shop opens in the new year ( we are still in tier 3) so I can pass them on to someone who will use them

foxgloves

We're in Tier 3 too, Tescodealqueen, but as non-essential shops can re-open, I'm hoping this will include charity shops...... not least because I want to see the back of a big pile of declutterings that Mr F has stacked up in our spare bedroom.
F x

foxgloves

Hello Treasures, 
Another of those days which disappear in a twinkling of a flash of a moment of an eye. It seemed that no sooner had I had my very civilised morning coffee break with a (gifted) magazine to flick through & a slice of the cake I baked the other day, I was suddenly drawing the curtains to shut out the night! Spent the morning cleaning the house & tidying, then aa it was still quite sunny, I put this afternoon's time & effort into sweeping the courtyard, weeding pots & a bit of secateur-wielding. Mr F has been off today & has painted the new tiny utilty room. He says he's intending to wax the shelves too, after dinner so I will soon be able to put everything back & arrange it all properly.
Tomorrow is my Big Budget Day, so I shall want to be bright-eyed, bushy-tailed & raring to go to get that all finished with plenty of day left.
Back in Tier 3, but that is exactly where I thought we'd be, so I'm just looking forward to being able to go in a few extra shops. Simple pleasures these days! 
F x

Pixiehouse55

Tescodealqueen said:

Pixiehouse55 said:

I've got loads of craft punches and really don't use them all, border punches as well. I'm starting to have a clear out of all my craft  supplies. Beginning to downsize and I don't do so much papercrafting as I used too. X

Me too Pixiehouse55. Hoping our local charity shop opens in the new year ( we are still in tier 3) so I can pass them on to someone who will use them

Hi tescodealqueen, I sale a lot on fb groups that I go on. I am going to re open my declutter  page on there and put stuff on there. We are downsizing possibly next year so I determined to sale anything we don't need. No spending as we don't need anything and save as much as we can to pay a chunk off of our mortgage.. We are tier 3 in North Somerset.  I don't know where today has gone, blinked and I missed it ha ha. Washing done, managed to get most of it dry. Sat and done more of my knitting.  Keep safe everyone XX 

foxgloves

Hello diary friends, 
Have survived my Big Budget Day, though it did take longer than usual because I needed to reconcile Christmas present spending so as to transfer the correct amount of money from my Presents Pot. I usually finish each big monthly budget session by deciding how much we can afford to add to savings. I haven't done that this time. There is definitely money to save, but I want to give more thought to which pots need topping up, so that I can alao pay into our general savings too. I will do this though. I won't fritter that surplus bit of money because it's just sitting there. I didn't have time to get all my paperwork checked & filed because my time was engulfed by a lamb shoulder. Mr F took the shopping list to work with him this morning as he wanted to call & get our groceries on his way home. I'd put lamb or beef chunks on the list. I want to make a lamb curry next week & told him if the lamb is a lot more expensive, to buy beef instead. Well he used his initiative & came home with a 2kg+ lamb shoulder. It was yellow-stickered & priced at £1 more than the quantity of lamb chunks required for the curry. So I have cut it up & it has provided the curry meat, but also a big container of spare chunks for the freezer so they will make a nice stew another week. That was a much better deal & the bones are simmering away in the slow cooker for stock. 
Sausage casserole tonight & I'd better see if it's ready to dish up before the Beloved starts chewing his own leg!
Take care m'dears,
F x

savingmore

Well, Savingmore, what about those little hole punches for crafters which punch out different shapes? I have a cat one. My Mum, who was a very keen crafter had some Christmassy themed ones which she used to punch out tiny shapes for making her gift tags.
It's funny how the little presents we received stick in our minds. I remember being given a pretty notebook with a little silver pen which had a chain dangling from the top with my initial on. It swished around pleasingly as I wrote & made me feel very grown up. My Gran once bought me a pencil sharpener where you turned the handle to sharpen the pencil & I remember taking it to school aged about 10 & only letting classmates I liked have a go.
F x

oh yippee, that’s a brilliant idea, and my littlest ggd would love that!  I will shop from home and see i feel I have a spare one or two I could give her that I don’t use anymore, as I just finished buying her her xmas presents this week.     we are in tier two, expected, but rates rising in parts of our county, so am hoping that people will be sensible so we don’t go up.   

foxgloves

Goodo, Savingmore - I bet you can put a nice little gift of 'crafty bits' together.
Talking of crafting, I'd love to have an afternoon by the fire with my knitting but I need to get a few jobs shifted first, so here goes..... 
F 

foxgloves

Hello Saturday Saving Fairies,
I am feeling quite upbeat today. I think it's probably down to a range of not very exciting things, but we have to take any positives we can get at the moment, don't we?! Useful trip to town. Didn't get side-tracked into extra shopping & posted the last two parcels of presents to my sister's household. Couldn't see any point waiting. We are not able to meet up in any meaningful way (covid + distance) so we thought we may as well crack on & get everything sent. This afternoon I've put everything back in the newly painted little utility room & that's brought the conservatory back into use (which is our dining room), so I gave that a good clean, trimmed & watered all the plants, put a nice clean tablecloth on the table & tealight glasses ready for meals in there. Mr F was suppose to have an afternoon of leisure but decided to empty a compost bin out onto one of our veggie beds for the worms to do their work taking it all down into the soil over the next few months. Then he finished off the pebble borders adjacent to the house on our new patio, as this section had to wait until the builders had removed problem render. It's all coming together & I know we are adding value to our house by getting some of these really longstanding tedious problems/defects sorted out at last.
Well, you'll be proud of me this afternoon. I kind of refuse to buy anything on Black Friday, but I knew there were some good discounts on my favourite clothing shop so I spent ages perusing their website as I have been wanting to buy a tunic-style dress. Well, I had an animal print one in my basket, then out again, then back in it went, out it came again....it just wasn't quite right, so then I started looking at tops, jeans, knitwear......stuff I don't need atm & hadn't intended to buy. You see, it was the lure of that discount code. In the end, I went to another shop's website & bought a tunic dress full price but I really like it. Hope it looks nice on when it arrives. Honestly, my clothes rails during the Spendy Years were littered with sale items which weren't quite right & rarely got worn before being delivered to the charity shop - such a lot of money wasted. I would genuinely rather pay full price these days & end up with something I love, rather than think I've cleverly bought all these 'bargains' which turn out to be not really what I wanted.
No cooking tonight......I made enough sausage casserole last night to feed us twice - it's a nice one too, I've been making it for years, it's cooked in cider. 
Looking forward to the 'Valhalla Murders' or a film tonight, plus casting on another blanket square. I'm on my 10th one now, so have worked through one of each colour/pattern. Lots of work still to do - a long term project, but I'm liking how the colours/textures go together, so I think it will look well when finished.
Enjoy your evenings whatever you're doing.
F x

ziggy2407

foxgloves said:

Hello Saturday Saving Fairies,
I am feeling quite upbeat today. I think it's probably down to a range of not very exciting things, but we have to take any positives we can get at the moment, don't we?! Useful trip to town. Didn't get side-tracked into extra shopping & posted the last two parcels of presents to my sister's household. Couldn't see any point waiting. We are not able to meet up in any meaningful way (covid + distance) so we thought we may as well crack on & get everything sent. This afternoon I've put everything back in the newly painted little utility room & that's brought the conservatory back into use (which is our dining room), so I gave that a good clean, trimmed & watered all the plants, put a nice clean tablecloth on the table & tealight glasses ready for meals in there. Mr F was suppose to have an afternoon of leisure but decided to empty a compost bin out onto one of our veggie beds for the worms to do their work taking it all down into the soil over the next few months. Then he finished off the pebble borders adjacent to the house on our new patio, as this section had to wait until the builders had removed problem render. It's all coming together & I know we are adding value to our house by getting some of these really longstanding tedious problems/defects sorted out at last.
Well, you'll be proud of me this afternoon. I kind of refuse to buy anything on Black Friday, but I knew there were some good discounts on my favourite clothing shop so I spent ages perusing their website as I have been wanting to buy a tunic-style dress. Well, I had an animal print one in my basket, then out again, then back in it went, out it came again....it just wasn't quite right, so then I started looking at tops, jeans, knitwear......stuff I don't need atm & hadn't intended to buy. You see, it was the lure of that discount code. In the end, I went to another shop's website & bought a tunic dress full price but I really like it. Hope it looks nice on when it arrives. Honestly, my clothes rails during the Spendy Years were littered with sale items which weren't quite right & rarely got worn before being delivered to the charity shop - such a lot of money wasted. I would genuinely rather pay full price these days & end up with something I love, rather than think I've cleverly bought all these 'bargains' which turn out to be not really what I wanted.
No cooking tonight......I made enough sausage casserole last night to feed us twice - it's a nice one too, I've been making it for years, it's cooked in cider. 
Looking forward to the 'Valhalla Murders' or a film tonight, plus casting on another blanket square. I'm on my 10th one now, so have worked through one of each colour/pattern. Lots of work still to do - a long term project, but I'm liking how the colours/textures go together, so I think it will look well when finished.
Enjoy your evenings whatever you're doing.
F x

Sounds like a lovely day Chez Foxgloves.  Can't wait to see these squares.

Pixiehouse55

Love it when you look online at your credit card statement balance £0.00 yeahhh Happy Bunny today.... I have cut out 5 "Sleeps till Santa's" ive not sold many this year as I've not advertised. The ones I've done today are 1 for my hairdressers newly born grandson, 2 for neighbours children and 2 for a friends granddaughter's. They take a while to cut out and then put together. I will take a photo tomorrow and put them on here for you to see. I done a bit more of my knitting  today as well. I've still got bulbs that haven't been put in the garden. I might put them in pots if we get a dry day. Hope you've all had a good day? Sounds like you've been busy Mrs F? We had Spanish Chicken cooked in the Ninja and pureed up some for John, putting the stent in has worked and he is doing really well. Friday he goes on to mashed food. Off to read. Goodnight keep safe everyone  XX