2021 Frugal Living Challenge

StrawberrySuze

Evening all 🙂

@Blackcats I too have lots of recipes in a file, mainly from Tesco magazine, I've cooked a lot of them, your kebab sounds tasty 🌮 I had a big pizza for tea, I always find that pizzas don't really fill me up though, however large they are 😋

I love my hyacinths, I've got quite a few dotted about the garden, I always find they get too tall in the house and flop over, they are fine in the garden.

Sold my old freezer today, that's £12 in the kitty, I got it for nothing last year but did have to pay my van man to collect it. The funny thing is the man who bought it has just put his dogs on raw food too and wanted it for that, that's the reason I had to get a much bigger one, at least 3 drawers are full of meat for the dogs!

I got a load of bonuses for Prolific yesterday, I think they were from someone that I did a series of surveys for, they were really grateful most of us stayed till the end as they spanned nearly 12 months, managed to then cash out over £10.

I too have found that there are less things being listed on Olio now but more on Too Good to Go. I've actually had to buy bread twice which I hadn't had to do since last October!

My washing machine decided to stop spinning yesterday. After googling, you tubing and dismantling I think it needs new carbon brushes. They are now ordered and hopefully that is all it needs, if not that'll be a new washing machine ☹ still taking more steps forward than back at the moment though, just need to keep doing that, at least Cheltenham this year paid for most of my new freezer 😊

MazzieD

I've noticed the same on Olio, far less food listings.  I hardly use it now but still have a look now and again and don't normally read the notifications or messages but did notice one earlier in the week which is worth mentioning in case you missed it. 

It appears that Olio are unable to cover the costs of running the app as they are not getting enough money from the companies who pay them to take the waste food away.  They are launching a subscription service shortly called 'Olio Supporter', details were sketchy but it appears to be £4.99 a month for additional features but food will still be free if I read it correctly (more of a quick skim than a read).  I thought it was only T*sco who were signed up but could be wrong on that, I know someone mentioned Booker Wholesale are joining but they are owned by T*sco now anyway.

Might be worth keeping an eye out for that just in case I've mis-read or it affects your use of the app!.

joedenise

Another one here with recipe files (notice the plural!).  I've got one filled with stuff that I've cut out or printed from internet but not used but also have another which I use for recipes which I've used and want to use again.  That one is a nice decorative one, the other and old one from when I was working which was going to be dumped!

If I find a recipe I want to use but haven't got space for it in the decorative folder it just gets put loose in the front and then I'll slot it into the next month's menu plan if I can - although there are few in there I still haven't got round to slotting into the plan - mainly because they use out of season stuff or very expensive ingredients which I need to find YS, which doesn't happen often as I rarely seem to be at the SM at the right time!

I gave up with Olio and TGTG as there was never anything nearby on Olio and TGTG was only stuff from Costa which I'd never use as I don't really eat cakes which from what I've seen most of their bags seem to be or they'd be at a shop much further away (I live on a island but you have to drive a long way round to get to the places that came up as distances are based on "as the crow flies!").

[Deleted User]

Morning frugal friends,

We are still merrily frugalling along here 😎 still sticking to our budget of just over £40 per week which is to cover everything after the direct debits have been paid. I haven't set foot in a supermarket in months. Because we eat primarily veggie during the week, meat comes from the village butcher which I walk to. Bread comes from the bakery, f&v from either the grocer or the food waste weekly event. Eggs from the hens and I've found a great farm nearby that will delivery the pellets, corn and dog food. A cheeky Iceland delivery once in a blue moon for freezer basics - we do love a fish finger buttie!

We've run out of free wood again, but logs just aren't in the budget at present and in any event the price has been hiked by £15 a bag round here! It's cheaper to put the heating on for an hour if needed to take the chill off. 

Now we have got rid of sky, I need to do a true assessment in the coming weeks of how much live TV or iplayer/itv hub we actually watch. It seems to me that 90% is Netflix or Disney plus, and we watch a lot of dvds too, could we get rid of the TV licence in time I wonder?

Has anyone else done this, any advice?

Take care all xx

Bluegreen143

We are the same re TV @Deleted_User. I’ve kept the license for now for putting CBeebies shows on iPlayer for my kids (I do like that they have some good educational ones) but we are mainly watching Netflix & Amazon prime now.

jak

Hello, everyone is doing so well. I need to get my a@se in gear. My lentil and ham stew was utterly rancid unfortunately but I did pick out all the ham, shred it and we have it in wraps that were about to die with salad that was starting to bend. It was very yum. My lovely boy has gone to his dads for the weekend so I’m eating up all the odds and ends he doesn’t like. I’ve put off our food delivery until wed as we need some fresh stuff. I wish I lived near a shop! It’s very annoying having to spend loads on food when I only need a few bits. I think I’ll get mainly birthday presents from Asda and the rest food bits. At least then I will have put the money to good use. X

MazzieD

@jak we probably all do little bits and pieces each day or whenever particularly when we start our frugal journey, it's just condensed into posts on here and makes us all sound super frugal and efficient!.  Trying to be frugal takes time and practise and we all have the constraints of,work or life and lockdown to contend with even if it is slowly lifting.  

Think I'm realising how much of my time is spent working, I'm up early and start work, take a break for daily stroll and then a full-on day.  Never manage to post here or stay online in the evening as other things take priority.  Think those of us who WFH suffer from not having work colleagues to chat to in communal areas like the kitchen, photocopier or even at our desks. Zoom meetings just aren't the same!.  It's probably different for those with families or children, my cat behaves like a spoilt child and that's the nearest I can get!.

tryingtodobetter

Free downloadable recipe book from Ikea for using up scraps and left overs, it has some great ideas...
https://www.ikea.com/ca/en/files/pdf/a1/bb/a1bb8178/scrapsbook.pdf?fbclid=IwAR0JE8aKg21983F0eTGrKD9j2misgyV2QN96KSUX9ZhYbwUqNP8l0JxW9lE

Frugaldom

Good evening and sorry for being AWOL. I don't know where the time goes but I just seem to get busier and busier with an unbelievable amount of things that need doing RIGHT NOW all of the time. I don't know when I'll be able to catch up with all the posts that I've missed so you'll just need to tag me in if there's anything you want me to see or ask about - I need volunteers but it just isn't looking likely as having visitors staying with us just isn't on the cards yet. 

Olio has been minimal about here but I did manage to get some bakery goods that will keep me going. A$da order came in all present and correct despite several items having shown as unavailable on my original order so that was good. 

Rabbits are digging up my veg & herb garden so that needs remedying ASAP. Potting shed cleaned out and pots stacked at the ready for filling, seeds looked out and browsed through, another 225 trees planted since my last update and more mulching done. Managed to chop up all the hessian I had from a long-forgotten rag-rug challenge, they are now mulch mats, ready for putting around fruit trees & bushes.

Hope everyone is doing ok, I will try my best to catch up at some point but I have both reading and writing to do (work-related) in between looking after the project fulltime.

StrawberrySuze

MazzieD said keeping an eye out for that just in case I've mis-read or it affects your use of the app!.

I've just read that about subscribers, I'd seen it but not really read it! It seems like Olio might not be around much longer. I think a lot of the fwhs are getting quite demoralised with the whole thing and if Tesco are now mainly giving to charities and the other companies are mainly on Too Good to Go, it won't leave much on there, people will stop checking and people will stop posting 😐