2021 Frugal Living Challenge

Frugaldom

Good morning to all, I hope the stormy weather has now passed and hasn't left any lasting damage. It's still pouring rain here do I'm off to face another soaking. The joys of working outdoors, eh? Hopefully, our visitors / volunteers will arrive today and I'm also expecting the windows to get fitted in the hut and stove to get sealed in finally making it wind and watertight, cosy and habitable.  😊🤞

AnimalTribe

I found the only way to dry paper logs was in the greenhouse, with canes to separate each layer so that there was some airflow.

I read that Starbucks, and Morrisons, give away free coffee grounds for people to use in their gardens. I'm not sure whether either of these schemes is still in operation though.

I finally have some sunshine and the dogs are back to top form - although I'll finish giving them the antibiotic course. The only thing on my 'to do' list today is to transfer some wine from the demijohns to some bottles.

[Deleted User]

Good Afternoon frugal friends,

I hope everyone is as safe and well as can be given the wild weather we have been experiencing. We were without power for 9 days thanks to Arwen… not much fun truth be told but we have got through it and I am so very grateful each time I turn a lamp on!

An update on us – I am no longer working and therefore each penny has to do the work of 10. This was quite a struggle a few weeks ago when a couple of appliances gave up the ghost, DD needed some new school uniform and a couple of other essentials needed replacing. It sent me into my overdraft for the first time in a very long time, I am not in it now and have cancelled the OD facility on my bank so I can never go there again

Below is my budget for 2022, I hope it is useful to some, I am of course happy to answer any questions. A few side notes first:

• Income is low and variable. I sell a lot of bits and pieces on second hand sites, sell our hens eggs and will do bits of cleaning for friends when I am able to.
• I choose not to run a car. This can be tricky at times, but overall I am very happy with this choice.
• After the kerfuffle with the energy industry in recent months, I now pay for my electricity on receipt of bill; we are LPG in a tank for gas. This has just been filled up.
• We don’t have a TV licence. We don’t watch live TV nor do we watch iPlayer.
• There is no food waste here. The veggie scraps go to the hens, and the wider plan is to get a couple of pigs next year who will certainly help on reducing waste.
• Electricity consumption is kept right down. Water is boiled in a camping stove which constantly sits atop the woodburner. The slow cooker is used regularly, and I also boil veg on top of the stove. Very rarely hoover – I choose to sweep instead. Same for mopping – no fancy floor steamer here.

Budget for the year - £3,800 (excluding mortgage/rent and council tax):

-        Internet - £542.88 (due to our location we need to use a 4G hub – no fibre at all)

-        Netflix - £71.88

-        Gas - £500

-        Electricity - £600

-        Logs - £300

-        Food - £1,200 (this includes paying for school dinners for DD, she loves them and they are excellent quality so I am happy to pay this)

-        Clothing, included school uniforms - £200

-        Gifts, travel, postage, trips out with the children - £250

-        Leftover slush fund for the odd treat, boiler service, DIY items etc - £135.24

 

I really hope this is useful to some of you. You have to have a very strong “why” for doing this – my “why” is that being at home, looking after my children and being with our animals, plus all of the manual work that comes with this sort of life, is far FAR better for my mental wellbeing than anything else I have experienced in life. This contentment cannot be bought. It isn’t always easy, trust me I have cried tears of frustration on occasion when I am cleaning out chicken poo in the freezing weather and I drop the eggs, or when my blade snaps whilst chopping wood. But that sort of bad day is still better than any good day in my old, consumer driven life.

Love to all, and huge thanks as ever to our leader and inspiration, @Frugaldom xxx

 

balabooberlies

Lovely post Sparkly.

Hats off to you.

bala

x

Jellytotts

Great post Sparkly.  I had the same attitude whilst ours were growing up, I was far happier being at home and doing the manual day to day stuff and running the home than I would have been at work. As long as you're willing to cut your cloth accordingly it can be very rewarding.  

Well we had really high winds last night and lost 2 big trees from the woodland behind us.  One had fallen into our holly tree and looks a bit precarious but it's been raining most of the day so I've not been able to get out for a proper look.  The second tree has taken a few branches off one of my beech trees and is now blocking the access into the woods.  Luckily we have a friend who is an ex tree surgeon and he'll happily come and chop things up for a few mugs of tea and a ham roll.  I can get everything else cleared for now and he can cut the trunks down for us.  The landowner of the woods is happy for us to use any fallen trees for firewood (means he doesn't need to deal with it and we get free fuel). The cats were most put out that they needed to climb over tree trunks to get to go hunting.  We had a huge badger through the garden yesterday morning who will probably object too.

I was a bit "oh no, so much mess" doom and gloom first thing when I saw the carnage but it's all free firewood so it's a good thing. No one got hurt and none of our big nice trees got damaged.

balabooberlies

Jellytots

must remember to move to a house in front of a woodland !

 

bala 

weenancyinAmerica

Our local McDonald's will also give out free coffee grounds. My roommate brings them home for our garden.

Topher

Hi there, I’m responding to Asparklyblonde’s post, but it’s so long since I’ve been on here I’ve forgotten how to comment properly or the method doesn’t look familiar. I wanted to say, well done for getting such a good overview of your finances, I was in a similar position some 30 years ago. The two children I brought up in the way (financially) that you propose are now independent and manage their finances very well with the skills they picked up from their past with me in really tight circumstances. They are very resilient. At the drop of a hat, I still recommend to anyone on a similar journey, the book “The Tightwad Gazette”. If you pick through the fact that it’s American and dated, you can still find ways and means, skills and above all attitudes that either support the attitude etc. that you’ve formed yourself, or add to any guidance you may be looking for. Particularly as not all society finds these ways palatable or easy to understand and sometimes you will find you’re under pressure to conform to the new (to me) conventions that make you a consumer, not a citizen. 
Good luck.
Topher

Frugaldom

@Deleted_User that looks like a great budget to follow. I will, once again, be following suit but with my usual £4k to include having a car. We've no publuc transport here and the project is 20 miles from the house, which is why I ended up using a caravan for the past 5 years. 

@Jellytotts, the free wood is brilliant, no mater what way you look at it. If there was no serious damage done then it would be a bit like winning a prize!

Mini challenge from here - kitting out the hut with a budget of ' not very much at all'. The volunteers are making a kitchen space and friends coming tomorrow to set up the donated stove. Another friend is sewing up bunting for hanging inside and out. Exciting times and I'll share photos as soon as I can. Another friend has rescued an old chair and a wall cabinet so she has given them a makeover. I love my frugal friends - every one of you counts as we are all in this together, stretching the pennies and making the most of all things and situations. Thank you for all being her! 

Tanya12345

Hello All, has been a while....
asparklyblonde that's such an inspirational post ! Thank you, it has relit my Frugal Fire XX
Have been catching up with y'all and loving the burning thing theme (close to my heart as we have a woodburner !)
It's still blowing a hoolie here but so far our power has held up - everything crossed !!
It's the time of year for me to reflect and make new plans so I love spending time on here as it is a huge font of knowledge and experience.
Stay safe and warm everyone