Resourcefulness: The budgeter's friend

foxgloves

Are your alliums 'Purple Sensation', @EssexHebridean? If so, they are generally pretty reliable & do return each year.
F

AnotherNewDay

@foxgloves now i'm curious what are the questionable things being bottled in the US?

EssexHebridean

foxgloves said:

Are your alliums 'Purple Sensation', @EssexHebridean? If so, they are generally pretty reliable & do return each year.
F

I'm honestly not certain - next time I get the seed box out I will try to remember to check! I certainly hope they behave and grow as I'm expecting as the picture on the packet looks wonderful!  

foxgloves

@AnotherNewDay - Flour.

foxgloves

Afternoon me hearties! (listen to me & it's not even 'National talk like a pirate day!. Must be the genes from my sea-faring ancestors)
Useful day so far & we are only halfway through, which is a bonus. Today's small budget-helping positives:
*Put a colour on my yukky roots as couldn't stand looking at them any longer. I only buy my hair colour when it is on offer & always wonder what on earth it would cost me nowadays if I was still going for 6-weekly colour, cut, blow-dry..... & delving back even further into the spendy past, 3-colur highlights & a spiral perm! Hurrah for home colour!
*Made a batch of chicken soup using the stock I made yesterday & some of the leftover roast chicken I divvied up.
*Sorted a mountain of clean laundry & ironed only what needed it. 
*Central heating thermostat now set & switched on. I wonder when the outside temperatures will fall sufficiently to trigger the radiators to come on. We did save money from the tweaks we made last year in the run up to the horrendous bill increases, so we have kept the timings broadly similar, except for weeknights. We aim to be in bed for 10pm then, as we are both early risers & Mr F has a 26-mile commute to work, so we have knocked off half an hour of heating on those nights, with it timed to go down to 14 degrees at 9.30pm. It will be very unlikely to come on overnight at that temp - we are thinking of it more as a frost-setting. For the rest of the time, the temperature has been kept at 18 degrees. If we have a colder snap, we can easily increase it to 19 or use our stove for a couple of hours in the evening. 
*Ordered another Christmas present.
*Sorted out a problem from one of the presents I ordered yesterday. Despite a message appearing (from the payment platform) which said "We are unable to process your payment at this time, please try again later" (which I successfully did), I then discovered that BOTH orders had gone through & been charged! Oh deep joy! These things can be a faff to sort out, but I emailed the company (a small indie) & have now received a reply informing me that a refund has been issued back to my credit card. It's not showing yet, but I will look again tomorrow to make sure it arrives.
*No effort nosebag tonight, as I have the last container of chunked up roast chicken, which I intend to make into a speedy curry with some of the batch-cooked curry sauce I made a while back from some of our homegrown tomatoes (Hairy Biker basic curry sauce recipe). I have promised Mr F I will bake a pear cake this afternoon, so a slice of that will do for dessert.
Dentist tomorrow....not my NHS one, the private one who did my recent surgery. I am soooooo hoping the stitches can come out, but it is really difficult to see how things are looking, despite all the gargoyle faces I was pulling in the mirror earlier.
Hope everyone has seen at least a little bit of this lovely sunshine. Off to make that cake now.
F x

badmemory

Isn't this why people didn't want to accept the US goods.  With the example of chlorine washed chicken.?

Moorviews

Fingers crossed 🤞 that your stitches will come out tomorrow. 

I did a few spendy years having my hair dyed, following a lot of years with the home dye kits which also gave great results. The cost of salon colouring is beyond me and eventually having too much white for the home dye to work well meant I transitioned to not colouring at all. Despite sometimes feeling like I might look older as a result, I truly enjoy not ever having to think about roots again. 

It’s been a lovely day for being out in the garden here, barring the odd shower! I was hoping to emulate some of your kitchen witchery but the sunshine called!
 It will be interesting to see how we all go with keeping our energy bills down this autumn and winter. Let’s hope it isn’t too harsh a winter and your thermostat isn’t triggered too often. 

rtandon27

In theory I dye my hair once a month, but just realised I forgot last month! Only the cheap box dye mind you - a quick all over colour which results in unintentional highlights due to the bits that are now white!  I truly feel better doing it, in a similar way to a slick of cheap nail varnish - it's a treat, a bit of self care 😀

Hope all goes well for you at the dentist FG!

Tescodealqueen

Hope the dentist goes well. I used to spend a fortune on cut and colour when I was working then decided enough was enough and went to home kit. About five years ago I decided to stop altogether. It is odd but  my grey hair seemed to be focused around my hairline and hair on top is my natural colour, my five younger brothers are all almost completely grey. Very weird.
 

rtandon27

TDQ - my grey pattern is much the same - I was once told they are called witches/wisewoman streaks!