Put away your purse & become debt-averse

Humdinger1

Blackcats said:

Our remote control ownership is first come first served.  If OH gets it we have to watch things about opal miners, ice road truckers, car restorations and programmes about the universe.  It's quite important to get to the remote first 🙃

Or perhaps there's a documentary that combines all 4?!

foxgloves

Also lol-ing at @Blackcats' partner's programme choice, @Humdinger1......particularly ice road truckers! I can't recall ever encountering a programme about such a thing, although one of my favourite contemporary novels - 'The Quality of silence' by Rosamund Lupton - does feature this subject. I've lost my copy, think I must have lent it to someone so am looking out for a replacement in our local charity bookshop which always has a great selection of stock. Anyway, I'm off to put my pinny on & get some baking done. 
Chat later,
F x

foxgloves

Lol at that, @amber03. I don't recommend the 'Two T-shirts, oh look at me wearing layers' method of using less heating at all! I notice that the rugby shirt has come out now that the weather has dropped a lot chillier & there was a hoodie in evidence today also. I think the double t-shirt for 'massive extra warmth' method may now thankfully have been confined to the dustbin of failed energy saving ideas!
F 

ladyholly

DH had lost his thermals earlier in the week but they are back.

foxgloves

Evening energy savers,
It's defo dropped colder here today, although we haven't had the snow which appeared ominously over our area on the tv weather map this morning. Thermostat still set at 18 deg & won't be budging. Stove not lit. Might light it later, but I want to get all the other mitigating factors in place first before we pay for extra heat......is the curtain drawn over the front door? Are the curtains closed? Am I wearing a warm cardi or shawl? Is it worth lighting it at this time or are we basically going to be heating up a room then vacating it to go off to bed? I'm not going down without a fight where these nasty energy price rises are concerned.
Ok, onto today. Mr F wfh which meant I had wheels! It also meant he could be on builder duty. I visited our village garden centre & farm shop, took a magazine with me & read it over a leisurely scone & coffee, before pricing up sacks of pebbles/aggregates & large planters. Bought a pot of chives, as our clump has carked it over winter & an alpine bright orange geum to replace the one I lost from my little alpine trough. Also treated the resident wildlife to a kilo of bird seed & a new toy mouse for the cats as they have managed to lose almost all their toys......as they have been on 'wet playtime' all day, this is looking like the best £1.69 I've ever spent! So I wasn't very spendy at all.....coffee shop excursions funded firmly via our monthly Personal Spends. 
Other stuff: Mr F mentioned he needed to buy a contribution to a works leaving buffet this week so I offered to bake some Delia cheesy rolls (a family fave) instead, seeing as we had all the ingredients & got on with that. Plenty both for the buffet & for freezing for some Easter BH treats. Also baked a sourdough loaf. Mr F requested a side portion of garlicky stir-fried chard again as he really liked it last week. My cooking night, so I agreed to do it, as long as he went out in the rain to pick it, which he did. 
Only managed one survey today as haven't been online much, but it's good to see that my current month's PA earnings are already at over £8 despite only cashing out very recently. Now that I've decided to cash out on budget day each month, I'm interested to see how much I can earn by 27th April. In the current economic climate, I think we'd all agree that every little helps. Pleased to receive some useful junk mail through the door (for once!) - a new coffee shop opening on the edge of our town has been distributing flyers with 2 vouchers for a free coffee to snip off & use. We have defo earmarked those for the coming weekend, as long as there isn't a mile-long queue of people all waving their vouchers too.
Btw, Mr F has just appeared in a t-shirt (just the one, lol!) but assures me that his hoodie is just waiting out in the hall in case he gets cold. Back on builder duty tomorrow.....hope it goes ok as today they found something which could be a positive thing or a negative one, depending on what it is. If it's a negative one, I am hoping it's not one with £ signs attached as I did not plan in a contingency element when I did the budget for this last piece of work.
Anyway, knitting & TV time now with a lovely hot water bottle tucked up behind my back.
Take care. m'dears.
F x

Onebrokelady

My tv is very rarely turned on at all and I have full control of the remote...sometimes there is a silver lining to being single 😀 I'm actually going to start turning my tv off at the plug and just plug it in if I'm going to use it now that I've got rid of my virgin tv package. I have watched tv once in the last two weeks but it's been plugged in all that time 🥴I used to watch the news in the morning when getting ready for work but have stopped doing this recently because it was all doom and gloom, my day gets off to a much cheerier start now and my blood pressure stays nice and low 😊

foxgloves

@Onebrokelady - Yes, the news is not good for my blood pressure either, but I'm a real news junkie so would find it very difficult to give up my daily rants at the screen.
F x

foxgloves

Morning Campers,
No builders expected today so thus far, my morning has not felt quite so frantic.
However, I'm intending to have a very productive & money saving day, so had better get on with it!
Hope to be popping back later with a list of achievements (so there'd better be some!)
Here's to a frugal Friday,
F x

DawnW

My chives died last winter Foxgloves - it was a lovely great big clump too, that had been there for years! Bought a new one last spring which seems to have survived fine, and I have noticed small clumps in the front garden which must have been seedlings from the old one that died - even though I only ever (intend to) grow chives in the back garden! We live in a terraced house with the house between the back and front gardens, so not sure how that happened.

amber03

We’re currently redoing our bathroom, did get a quote to have it done by a plumber, but as DH used to be a plumber we have decided to do it ourselves. Obviously will take longer but we will have saved around £3000 doing it ourselves. Must admit DH hasn’t done much swearing whilst doing it which is a bonus.

Was just sat in the living room which is north facing and very cold at the moment but no heating will be turned on. So moved to the bedroom at the back of the house that has the sun streaming in and it’s lovely and warm. My living room is lovely in the middle of a heatwave with it being cool but not in a cold spell.xx