The Prepping Thread - A Newer Beginning ;)

GreyQueen

Tell the lady wife that this wumman called GQ online has sides-to-middled a tea towel before now and has also halved and hemmed partially-worn out face flannels, to get maximum benefit from all that tufty goodness. She is Not Alone!

Si_Clist

GreyQueen said:

Tell the lady wife that this wumman called GQ online has sides-to-middled a tea towel before now and has also halved and hemmed partially-worn out face flannels, to get maximum benefit from all that tufty goodness. She is Not Alone!

Having done the tea-towel ourselves before now but not the flannels, we bow low before your impressive frugality

GreyQueen

Si_Clist said:

GreyQueen said:

Tell the lady wife that this wumman called GQ online has sides-to-middled a tea towel before now and has also halved and hemmed partially-worn out face flannels, to get maximum benefit from all that tufty goodness. She is Not Alone!

Having done the tea-towel ourselves before now but not the flannels, we bow low before your impressive frugality

  I bought 4 plain burgundy face flannels for £1 in Poondlandia in either 1998 or 1999. Fab quality, much better than the 8 for £1 pack available in the same place at the same time. They are in constant use and have worn really well. But they do tend to eventually go a bit baldy in the middle, while the edges are still good. Hence halving them and binding the raw edges with tape.

My original MSE tagline was Every Pound a Prisoner, and it's something I still hold as a truth. Although, in the interests of interests, and in reviving the charity shop sector economy, I am itching to run amok therein as soon as my favourite chazzer places are re-opened. I'll be in there, coins jingling in my pocket, and shopping like a crazy woman.

thriftwizard

Can I play? I chop up dying towels with my overlocker to use as flannels/facecloths/make-up-removal pads for the girls - does that count?!

I now have raised-bed envy, thank you, missychrissy... mine will do, when I finish it, but won't look nearly as good! But the plants will be happy - they're in need of a more spacious home now. The greenhouse still hasn't materialised; I've asked for my money back (and haven't heard anything, though they're clearly still trading) but there's now a 10-week wait for any of the alternatives, so it looks like I'll have to haul the dying half-polytunnel across the garden into the sun & use that instead this season. The only problem with that is that DD1 has adopted it as her outdoor reading room & sits out there in the evenings, in a floppy hat, nose in a good book, looking for all the world like an inspirational illustration. But that's where the raised bed is going, alas; it does get the sun in winter & spring, once the leaves have fallen. Thoughts of constructing a "reading shelter" with a seat, shelves, cushions & solar fairy lights/moroccan lanterns, from pallet-wood have been wandering across my mind but I'd better get the practical bits done first!

missychrissy

Thriftwizard - My youngest son sourced the wood. They are unused railway sleepers apparently, 2 together make them 18in high. I had this triangular piece of grass I decided to put to better use. Good luck with your plans.

greenbee

@thriftwizard - my greenhouse was delivered, but not all the right bits... I've had some additional glass, but even that delivery wasn't right, so am awaiting more glass and some bits so I can fit it. Typically, I need to do the apex. And I'm not paying for another day of the fitter's time. Or waiting for him to be free. 

If you can get hold of a frame, I have enough spare horticultural glass (new greenhouse has toughened glass) for a 6ft x 8ft greenhouse (there may be the odd pane missing, but most of it is there - the frame was too damaged to reconstruct) which you are welcome to, and I'm about an hour from you. It might be worth a FB 'wanted' post, as there are certainly plenty of abandoned glass-less greenhouses round here!

thriftwizard

Thank you, greenbee, that's a lovely offer, but the reason that only a few models are suitable for us is because ours has to be polycarbonate; the only spot that gets enough sun year-round is under a large, very ancient & productive apple tree! Only a 6' x 6' or 8' x 4' will fit the space without colliding with the garage or over-running the path. Even then, we may have to replace (or cover) the roof with conservatory twinwall; some of those Blenheim Oranges are big. Luckily it's not shaping up to be a mega-productive year on that tree, as it excelled itself last year & we ended up donating 15 sacks of windfall apples to a young farmer friend's pigs. But the Russet looks like it's going to make up for any shortfall...

Some of last year's crop:


Never mind the quinces...

jamanda

Prepping is a bit of a challenge when the supermarket either don't send you what you have ordered or send something else completely out of the blue which you have never even considered, noticed or like.  I imagine the order pickers are under pressure but someone, somewhere, has a sense of humour.

greenbee

@thriftwizard - I got mine from thegreenhousepeople.co.uk. But as their polycarbonate options in your sizes seem to be out of stock you may have tried them! t took ages to locate something with the doors in the long side, so it’s 8ft wide with double doors and 6ft deep. The main problem seems to be that e.g. 6ft can mean ‘anywhere between 6ft and 7ft’! So checking dimensions in the details is important.

Hopefully I’ll be brave enough to get a bit more of the glazing done today...

thriftwizard

Jamanda, DD1 works in a supermarket & is constantly baffled & amused by what the computer suggests as "substitutions" for things! Sometimes a slight similarity in the spelling seems to be the only rationale...

Greenbee, I ordered a Palram Harmony 6' x 6' back in April from Gardensite, which will fit the space; it said they had them in stock & delivery would be 4-7 working days. They contacted me the next day & said they'd made a mistake, that model had gone out of stock but there was a different, slightly cheaper, model the same size in stock, so I opted for that instead & they did refund the difference. Since then - nothing, apart from a "We're chasing it up" mid-May and a "We'll be in contact very soon" after I left a negative review at the beginning of June, having emailed several times with no response at all. They have upped the delivery time to 20 working days (without mentioning this to those of us waiting for deliveries, to judge by other reviews) but we're well outside that now; more than 30, allowing for bank holidays etc. I'm not normally an impatient & demanding customer, and I know the circumstances are unusual, but it was supposedly IN STOCK when I bought it, and it's not as if I live in the boondocks so have to wait on special delivery arrangements. It's taken years to get the whole family to agree I can have a little greenhouse, & there are now plants spilling over the whole garden that are unlikely ever to fulfil their potential in the cool & damp, if they don't keel over with the blight or get eaten by bantams - we're under a blight warning now! I've covered what I can... frustrating! 

Anyway - off to move the mostly-deceased polytunnel now to give a few more plants half a chance... sorry to moan!