Resourcefulness: The budgeter's friend

foxgloves

Hmmm! I am sensing a few cheerleaders for Soot amongst our number. I think the term 'Naughty monkey' would apply rather better than 'Brave soldier'. 

foxgloves

Hello Readers,
Today seems to have flown by & I haven't achieved nearly as much as I thought I might. Never mind however, for there is a day after Tuesday. It is called Wednesday & it is just as good for getting tasks done & generally being a Very Useful Engine. Vaguely budget helping bits:
*Postie brought £15 of CC loyalty vouchers. He also brought Mr F's CC statement which is later than usual & means it can now be perused by the Man Himself before my Big Budget Day, which is imminent.
*Sausage hot-pot in the slow cooker so a bit of prep earlier on, but nothing else to do as intend to serve it with some of the crusty loaf I baked yesterday. 
*Did a couple of surveys.
*Added cream to relevant milk delivery days so that's something I can cross off the festive supermarket list.
*Wrote today's Christmas card quota (6). Found a spare envelope in my stash for a card which didn't have one.
*Cleaned the fridge  - not money saving in itself, of course, but I found 2 items which needed using - one was added to my lunch & the other has gone in the hot-pot. Did minor tomato triage so as to use the ripest ones in tomorrow's curry. 
*Knitted the heel flap & turned the heel on 2nd sock. I need to get these finished in time for Mr F's birthday. He has a wfh day & is also using up TOIL & annual leave atm so he has been around more. He won't be home until nearly 7 tonight so I might get a bit more shaping done when I sign out of here.
*Cast on another dishcloth first thing while I was drinking my coffee - the 3rd one. Very quick to knit, funky colours & I shall enjoy consigning the old grotty ones to the rag bag. No cost, as this is yarn that's been in my stash for about 1000 years.
*Moved yesterday's laundry around the heated airer a few times to get the remaining bigger items dry.
*Filled our Advent wall hanging with sweeties ready for Dec 1st. Back in the day, just before I got together with Mr F, I adopted a big grey tabby cat. How is this relevant, I hear you ask. Well, it kind of is, because that first December, I bought him a cat Advent calendar. For some reason, I forgot to open his little window on the 1st, so on the 2nd, there were 2 to open & 2 treats to eat. Only this cat, as we still say when we are reminiscing about him, had the mind of a criminal genius & he KNEW there were more windows, so he set up a vigil, complete with yowling, trying to jump up, until I gave in & the next day, we opened windows 3 to 24 & he ate them all.......which rather put me in mind of an earlier time in my life when I experimented with the mini-mars bar diet!
Anyway, enough yakk from me tonight, as rounds of sock knitting is what we need here, not tales of past feline companions.
Keep cosy,
F x

Makingabobor2

Mmm, sausage hotpot is just what you need for a day like this. Not had one for a while, must put it on my food plan. Our butcher does the most amazing sausages. 

themadvix

We always need tales of past feline companions, especially when they make you feel less alone in having the world’s greediest cat! Have never had a cat advent calendar - it would need to be kept in the kitchen out of reach of ours and would therefore just be more clutter for me - and opportunity for them to be more pesky than usual!

PennysIntoPounds

The tales are a delight 😊 
Love 'tomato triage'. As I am invigilating this week I bought bananananas to have one every morning so one of my first bleary eyed activities every day is The Assessment to see which has gone ripest and needs eating before it gets to sickly sweet stage

Makingabobor2

PennysIntoPounds said:

The tales are a delight 😊 
Love 'tomato triage'. As I am invigilating this week I bought bananananas to have one every morning so one of my first bleary eyed activities every day is The Assessment to see which has gone ripest and needs eating before it gets to sickly sweet stage

PennysIntoPounds said:

The tales are a delight 😊 
Love 'tomato triage'. As I am invigilating this week I bought bananananas to have one every morning so one of my first bleary eyed activities every day is The Assessment to see which has gone ripest and needs eating before it gets to sickly sweet stage

Don't you hate that, when they all go over ripe together and you end up having to make banana cake.....lol

foxgloves

I always buy the greenest ones I can find! Once they are past a certain level of brown, I can't enjoy them.

PennysIntoPounds

Makingabobor2 said:

PennysIntoPounds said:

The tales are a delight 😊 
Love 'tomato triage'. As I am invigilating this week I bought bananananas to have one every morning so one of my first bleary eyed activities every day is The Assessment to see which has gone ripest and needs eating before it gets to sickly sweet stage

Don't you hate that, when they all go over ripe together and you end up having to make banana cake.....lol

Mine are strictly divided on the counter so they can't sneakily ripen each other!

PennysIntoPounds

foxgloves said:

I always buy the greenest ones I can find! Once they are past a certain level of brown, I can't enjoy them.

Absolutely, would rather wince at eating under-ripened than gag at eating over-ripened!

Suffolk_lass

Don't you freeze them? the bananas, I mean - when semi frozen, peel and blitz them and freeze (or mix with custard and freeze) for banana ice cream.

While I'm on a dessert roll, mention of mini mars bars reminded me of a dessert we used to make in the restaurant. Mars bar, nuked in the microwave, slackened with a little double cream then folded through whipped double cream and into individual glasses with grated milk chocolate on top for caramel chocolate malted mousses (or Mars Bar mousses) - it must be nearly 40 years since I made these for a specials board dessert!