Put away your purse & become debt-averse

foxgloves

Well, CCL, I always think April's a good month for new starts. It's not as grim as January, it's Spring (though you wouldn't think so today) & it's the month we can usually start knocking down our heating bills x

foxgloves

Morning all,
The rain has just started lashing at our windows & I can see this is not going to be a gardening day. Indoor jobs it is then, & I shall prioritise a big one that's been falling off the end of my list for a little while now. I am going to unpack all my summer clothes onto the bed, add everything from my wardrobe & try on every single garment. My clothes need a bit of input but I want to take a really coherent approach to this, so that I don't end up buying things which don't work as well as they might. I would like all my tops to go with all jeans/trousers, ditto skirts, so that I get maximum wear for minimum effort. Ditto dresses. I like a dress with a little cardi, but ideally. I want stuff which mix & matches into multiple outfits.
I can't guarantee I will absolutely love every garment I keep, so it will fall short of full KonMarie by a long way, but I have a charity bag ready for clothes which I get no pleasure from wearing/no longer like.
I can't replace things all at once, only gradually, but my aim is to have fewer items & for them to work better together, rather than try to replace on a 'like for like' basis.
So as the rain is really coming down now, I shall have a quick tidy up, then crack on with the wardrobe blitz.
Stay dry everyone. Back when I was spendy, I was walking to work from the car park on a very rainy day when a van went through a big puddle & absolutely soaked me. What would I do now? I'd proceed to work & try to dry off the worst of it using paper towels, the hand dryer & the radiators. What did I do back then? Of course I queued for the shops to open & bought a whole new outfit, didn't I? And I only kept the jeans about 3 months. Didn't like them, so gave them away!
F x

foxgloves

Morning Campers,
Well, I have to say that the Wardrobe Blitz went really quite well. You sometimes just have to get everything out on the bed & try it all on systematically, don't you? Results as follows:
*Two pairs of brand new knicks & a pair of new unworn black trousers found. Had completely forgotten about those, so it was like having some new purchases without having spent anything!
*Two big piles of garments that I either no longer wear (or do wear but they do nothing for me, so may as well NOT wear) washed, folded & ready to pack for the charity shop.
*One much-liked top repaired & will now do another summer.
*Facing stitched down on a jacket I do like, but don't wear because of the facings flapping around all over the place making it look weird. Took about an hour. Now happy to wear it, so feels like a new item.
*Old summer skirt (bright pink) looking a bit faded but still a useful garment on hot days - put aside for dying purple. Will buy machine dye next time I'm in town.
*Dress altered because the neckline had stretched a little meaning too much of the boob department on show. Remembered my Mum's method of taking a neckline in & it worked! Wore dress last night. Boobs behaved. Result!
*Tried to alter the front of another dress - pinned & tacked it, but when I tried it on, I noticed the front had stretched lower than the back & also found 2 small holes. Accepted dress is a gonner (loved it with my leather jacket, but it was an old one) but as it's from a brand where you can exchange an old item of their clothing for £10 off a minimum purchase of a new item, I've popped it away in case it's useful as hard currency.
*Only two garments are too tight to wear - one is my big winter coat, which I shan't need now until November, & my weight is at least heading back in the right direction, the other is a slinky tunic which would need reinforced scaffolding underneath it if I were to venture out in it now, so ditto the above, keep working on slowly shedding the weight I re-gained while everything was so sad & chaotic last year.
*Assess what would be useful additions to my wardrobe - 1 black tunic-type top, 1 new denim skirt (my current one is starting to look shabby not in a good way) & 1 dress to make up for the one I had to ditch. I get a lot of wear from dresses as I try to choose something I can also wear with a nice piece of knitwear across multiple seasons. I've written these 3 items in my notebook, so next time I'm confronted with a sale rail when I'm out & about, I can remind myself what would actually be most useful. I would rather buy these 3 garments full price than reduced prices on things I don't need.
I also still have some very eye-catching fabric I bought from the local market last year plus a pattern to make a top. I might leave that until after my hand physiotherapy though, as I would find it painful to use my dressmaking shears at the moment - it will get made though......I'm a demon kitter, but not confident at sewing, despite making quite a lot of clothes for myself when I was in my teens.
Oh well, time to get back to my job list.
Hope all my readers are well & doing great with the debt-busting.
F xx

Onebrokelady

Loving your wardrobe sort out, I haven't looked back since I did mine,I now only have things to wear that look good and that I enjoy wearing,I can just open the wardrobe and pick something straight out, I have seriously streamlined since last year, I am noticing I do wear the same things over and over again so there might be more being ditched in the not too distant future

foxgloves

Well, I haven't exactly gone minimalist with it or anything, OBL, but I'm definitely opening the doors now & thinking 'Right, I'll wear this, this & this' instead of feeling a bit over-faced, really, with the amount of garments in there previously which I didn't get much pleasure from wearing. And the three garments I've identified to buy will give me lots more options, as lots of my tops will go with a denim skirt, a black tunic style top will go with all jeans/trousers as well as all knitwear, jackets, etc, & if I choose the right dress, I've got lots of stuff I can wear with that. I have spent so much of my life spaffing money on impulse clothes purchases, esp from sale rails, but I just seemed to end up with heaps of clothes that didn't really go together so tended to live in the same handful of outfits. It actually feels quite empowering to say 'OK, my wardrobe is now going to work for me' & to know I can go & buy those useful items without the ton of shopping bags I'd have come home with in the Spendy Years, when I could go into the city centre for a skirt, & come home with new boots. trousers & two tops...... then go back for the skirt next time! Am now a real convert to having fewer clothes, but making better choices.
Mr f now talking about sorting his wardrobe out, so I shan't tie up the tops of the charity bags just yet.
F x

foxgloves

Morning Campers!
I can tell when my psyche has really clicked over into 'Spring Mode' when I walk into the conservatory & think how nice & bright it looks & that we should be bringing it back into regular use. Today was exactly that day! So I've taken all my veggie plants babies down to the greenhouse & potted up the cucumbers & aubergines, which were very much ready. The nights are still chill so they are still under my home made recycled bottle cloches. I can now use the table to sort through my conservatory plants, give them a trim & generally wipe down all the window sills & turn it back into a dining room. Unlike the bad old days when a freshen-up of any room involved inspiration from magazines followed by spendiness, I'm achieving a little bit of a Spring look by dressing a nice piece of furniture brought from Mum's with some different cushions, & a nice bright new table cloth. Actually, this is a rescued item which was nearly thrown away. mr f decided to have a final look through drawers/cupboards before the house clearance charity packers arrived & waved what looked like a big folded piece of fabric at me. I said I'd take it, thinking I could use it for craft, but when I got it home & opened it up, it turned out to be a lovely tablecloth which Mum had sewn herself from some quite expensive-looking material. And it fits our table really well. Obviously clearing out the family home is a sad task - some on here will have already had to do it, it's something which comes to us all in time, isn't it? And it isn't possible to keep everything, but those things my sis & I were able to bring back to our own homes will be treasured. Mum & Dad both loved Easter, so with this tablecloth being such Spring-like colours, I shall get it out to use this time every year & think of all the Easters we shared at home over the years.
And from a purely practical point of view, it's a bright cheery new look for zero spend. How many times over two & a half decades did Mum say to me, "You can't spend what you haven't got?" Well, let's just say if I'd popped a £1 in a jar every time she said it, there'd have soon been a UK coin shortage!
Well, that's my coffee break finished, so I shall fire up the Dyson & carry on with my job list.
Wishing everyone a pleasant & frugal Friday,
F x

foxgloves

Evening all,
Well, pleased to say we have just successfully swerved sending out for a pizza. I hadn't budgeted for one, so feel pleased we made a different choice.
An incredibly busy day today. Up at 6.15, left the house at 7.30 for a 150 mile round trip to our old family home, which as you know we've been busy clearing & sorting since we lost Mum last autumn. Today was a huge cleaning & garden tidying day before house goes on the market this coming week. We met family there & everyone mucked in with tip runs, scrubbing, tarting up, weeding, lawn mowing, vacuuming, etc, until finally we felt we can do no more. It is what it is. A much loved & lived-in family home which needs the upgrading you would expect in a house owned by two octagenarians who had lived there since 1971. It is in a nice location & fingers crossed it will find a new family to take it forward.
Anyway..... back to take-away temptation..... by the time we'd driven back & unloaded the car, I was already mentally assessing the local indie pizza place's toppings menu. But after a hot bubbly bath & a much needed coffee, we tuned back into Budget FM. There is, after all, some of Mr F's lovely chilli in the fridge & plenty of potatoes for turning into jacket wedges. So we are having that. Then Mr f said he wasn't actually that fussed about missing out on a pizza, as what he actually fancied was (of all things), a home made rice pudding topped with my blackberry & apple jam! Well what can be simpler than that?? Dish. 50g pudding rice. 1tbsp sugar, 1 pint of milk, pinch of nutmeg, a few little dots of butter. Oven. Blob jam on. Scoff!
So...... Pizza swerved. More budget-friendly choice made.
Now all I need to do is try not to fall asleep into my food. After today, I'm feeling very seriously knackered.
Feeling quite positive about the new week ahead though.
Love F xx

crazy_cat_lady

Today I will be making rice pudding. I love it and often forget about it... thanks.
And well done swerving pizza.

joedenise

I sure what you had foxgloves was far better than a shop bought pizza! Have to say I'm not tempted by pizza particularly would rather have an Indian - not had that for a long time either!

Denise

foxgloves

Joedenise - I can unfortunately be tempted by almost anything in the takeaway line! Since discovering our local indie pizza place, we never use the well-known pizza chains now. The local place makes really nice pizza, lots of choice & is so much cheaper.