Put away your purse & become debt-averse

milann

What a lovely idea to knit small things for an animal rescue, especially using your mums pattern. If they turn out half as good as your amazing mittens they’ll easily sell. 

I’m another who avoids walking on cobbles. Hopefully you’re not as sore and stiff now 🤞

foxgloves

Thanks, @milann. Yes, I'm back to normal now. I think.my knee has covered pretty much all shades of bruise, but it only hurts now if I kneel on it. 
F 

foxgloves

Morning Campers!
Oh, but it's an icy one out there today. Ash sat on the windowsill first thing watching our neighbour scraping his car as though it was a top movie, then of course Mr F had to do the same. Sobering to see the smart monitor showing £3.37 for gas this morning as early as 7.30 am. As it doesn't usually come on until 6.00, when the thermostat rises to 18 deg, I can only assume that it came on in the night, which means the internal temperature must have dropped below 15 deg - the first time we are aware that this has happened. I've moved the thermostat out of the cold spot & am hoping that using the oven this morning, plus the sun moving around to the front windows a bit later on will have a positive effect. 
Right. Plans for today do not involve any spending whatsoever, so that's a positive. I slept well & didn't wake until 5.40 which is amazing for me so off to a good start. Made Christmas cake & it has another hour in the oven before I need to start testing it for done-ness. I always tie a wodge of newspaper sheets around the tin to prevent it going dark on the edges/top......where would we be without newspaper? It has so many uses - I always have a stash in the cupboard under the sink.
I will also do the mending which dropped off my list last night because frankly I cba, make a use-it-up tamale pie for dinner, pick lettuce & rocket leaves, do whatever surveys are available & tackle a big print task which I've been putting off, but need to do within this month's ink cartridge service plan to make best use of it. While not strictly money saving, I also want to do a bit of decluttering up in Foxgloves HQ which needs to have sufficient space to sleep a teenage nephew in 16 days time, so will be packing up a big pile of magazines to give to my friend next week & sorting out my recycled packaging stash which seems (with a little help from Mr F) to have outgrown its designated space & is spilling out onto both a neighbouring shelf & the floor.
There will doubtless be more stuff as I go along, as I do have a fairly frugal (I like to think it is being resourceful) approach to most things these days.
Take care if there are icy pavements where you live today. As you know, I managed to go flying last week on perfectly dry non-frosty slabs, so I dread to think what further damage I might have done had ice also been in the equation!
Time to crank up the coffee machine & find a banana,
Love F x

Makingabobor2

You're right, its way too cold & icy today. Have a good day & keep warm. Bet the house smells lovely with the cake cooking

Tescodealqueen

Wish I had left my cakes til now the oven would Heat the kitchen . I made them during the hottest days of the summer which now seems a bit daft though I have been feeding them regularly and they smell particularly boozy which my family will enjoy! I don’t generally feel cold but even I am feeling it today. We had to defrost the inside of the windscreen which had iced up before going for the weekly shop. It reminded me of the bedrooms windows of my childhood when we only had a coal fire in the living room and nothing anywhere else in the house. brrrr

Makingabobor2

Oh yes, remember icy windows. If that happened these days it would be all over News at 10 with people complaining

milann

Yes, wonder what the newspapers would make of Jack Frost painting the inside of the windows…..which is what I believed 😂😂😂 think it must have been my mums way of making cold winter mornings magical. I certainly didn’t feel hard done by 😂😂
Nothing better than the smell of Christmas cake cooking on a cold day. 

Makingabobor2

milann said:

Yes, wonder what the newspapers would make of Jack Frost painting the inside of the windows…..which is what I believed 😂😂😂 think it must have been my mums way of making cold winter mornings magical. I certainly didn’t feel hard done by 😂😂
Nothing better than the smell of Christmas cake cooking on a cold day. 

No, we didn't feel hard done by as we didn't know any different and everybody lived the same. We used to dry our hair by kneeling down in front of the coal fire. Can you imagine if parents told their kids to do that these days? 

foxgloves

I think we're a damn sight more practical for growing up in simpler times. As I once told a former boss, "No I can't create a sodding Excel pivot table, but when the SHTF, I know which plants will feed me, heal me or kill me". She wasn't too sure what to make of that!
F

P.S We did have central heating from 1971, but guess what.....I still had Jack Frost patterns on the inside of my windows on icy-cold nights. It was one of those hot air column gas CH systems which made downstairs too hot & upstairs freezing!

Makingabobor2

You sound very much like me @foxgloves, I can't make an Excel table either....lol.  Must have been about 1971 when my parents first had GCH as well, but I seem to remember there was only radiators downstairs and we were still cold upstairs.