Resourcefulness: The budgeter's friend

EssexHebridean

My top layers of hair are still more of less my natural colour albeit probably a little lighter than it used to be. Underneath is peppered with a fair few random greys which all seem to be a rather lovely silver at the moment - long may THAT continue! Anyway the upshot is that it's really not visible that there is much grey there at all right now. I LOATHE dying my hair - I always did find it remarkably tedious so gladly relinquished any feelings that I "should" do it some years back now - wonderful! 

More crossed fingers from here that your stitches are being removed today Mrs F! 

foxgloves

Hello m'dears, & thanks for all your comments. I too find hair-dying very tedious, but it does feel like a bit of a lift when it's done. If I am organised, I know I can get it done in about an hour so best thing for me is to tackle it first thing in the morning. My hair has virtually none of its natural colour left. I will eventually let it go 'au naturel' & have a purple streak added at the front, but I don't feel quite ready for that yet. My hairdresser is already quite excited about doing the purple bits though!
The stitches came out this morning. I got there half an hour early (Mr F off today so he accompanied me, which is good as am a bit of a dentist wimp) as it's a trek around the outskirts of the city centre (in order to avoid a clogged rat run diagonally across the centre itself). Dentist was free, so saw me immediately! All looking good apparently. Dentist nerves replaced on the way by running out of petrol nerves. Mr F forgot to fill up on the way home yesterday. We were almost at the last accessible petrol station before getting onto the ring road when the low fuel light came on & soon started flashing insistently. I asked him how many miles worth we had left & he said '18'. I misheard & thought he said '80'. He went past the useful petrol station thinking there'd be others. If I had known he'd said '18', I'd have told him that the only other one on route to the dentist is on the wrong side of the carriageway. At this point we were 12 miles away from the dentist & would still need to travel a couple of miles from there to the nearest petrol!! So my nerves were more concentrated on sitting at the side of the road with an empty tank & missing my appointment than they were on teeth! We did get to the nearest petrol with maybe 2 or 3 mile's worth to spare. He never forgets to fill the car up but he'd been in a 'weird meeting' yesterday afternoon, apparently.
Anyway, today's small budget-helping (ish) positives:
*Did NOT end up having to pay our breakdown provider to come out with a can of numpty petrol.
*Dentist said that as all looked to be going well with my new implants, I can email him a photo in a month's time so he can just check up on progress, rather than another 35-mile round trip.
*Went for post-stitches & nearly no petrol scones & coffee at our favourite garden centre on way home. Paid from Personal Spends, so budget-neutral. Did not succumb to garden centre temptation.
*Did October's master meal plan, focusing on home grown produce & freezer contents. Picked a week's worth of meals for next week.
*Wrote shopping list.
*Ordered Christmas turkey. Why so early? Mr F received an email from Waitbl00m this afternoon to say that they only had 3 slots left on Christmas Eve at our local branch for turkey collection. I said I thought that sounded like nonsense as surely they wouldn't want to limit amount of ordered turkeys sold by having so few collection slots (which are timed by the hour). Well, honestly, if I had told him that there was a particularly hungry zombie army marching on Foxgloves Manor right that instant against which we would realistically only be armed with the bread knife & a pile of large courgettes, it would not have worried him more than the thought that we might not be able to go & collect our flippin' turkey on Christmas Eve morning!!!! He duly booked us a collection slot between 10 & 11a.m......which meant we needed to order it today. Not intended at all, but tbf, it gives us a ballpark price, we don't need to pay until the day & I suppose we don't need to think about it again. It also gives me a little longer to augment relevant money off vouchers which is kind of the money-saving-ish bit. 
*Added our September PA earnings to our personal Spends spreadsheets.
*Did 2 surveys.
*Checked CC account for that refund but still no sign of it. I will give it to the end of the week, then query it with the vendor. I have used the business before & haven't had any problems so it's probably just a slower process on their payment platform.
*Easy cheapo dinner tonight - pasta bake using a round-up of veg, one of the tomato pasta sauces I batch-cooked & froze from our glut of tomatoes, some home made pesto & topped with cheese.
*Aim to crochet a couple more granny squares tonight. Not sure what I will use them for yet, but it is all yarn i was given by my friend so it's a freebie project.
Oh dear, that was a long post. Must get a move on.......
F x

Humdinger1

8 years ago, I worked out that cut and colour was costing around £800 to £1000 per year.  That was about the same amount as the bus to my daughter's school...I spray my blonde hair every couple of months (J*hn Fr**d*) and have a cut 2-3 times per year at home,  £40 per throw. I have never had more compliments on my hair...when I sat down and totted up the cost, I fainted clean away.

Glad to hear that your teeth are in fine fettle @foxgloves!

Moorviews

Good news that your stitches are out🎉 I hope everything will be more comfortable now. 

Likewise I shall be adopting the purple streak when I have to go shorter with my hair, there’s still plenty of fun to be had! 

It’s great that we can all find our own ways with our hair without it costing the earth. 

Turkey at Christmas is obviously of great importance to Mr F!

Blackcats

Good news on the mouth healing well.
you've made me think about the cost of my hairdresser colouring my hair.  Well actually when I had a cut and colour last week which cost £70 in my own home with my shampoo, water, towels, tea etc MrBC reminded me that during lockdown he helped colour my hair and did an ok job so I'm trying to think of a polite way to say to the hairdresser that I'd just like her to cut it and I'll colour it. 

marionmgcars

Oh I feel your pain regarding the fuel shortage, have often run on fumes leaving rural areas - I never learn and feel physically sick until I get petrol filled again xx 

ladyholly

I was a redhead in my younger days and was advised not to colour my hair so I never have. It must have saved me a fortune over the years. Now like many redheads I have a mixture so from a distance it is more strawberry blonde. At least thats what I kid myself it looks like actually there is now probably more grey than anything.

So glad your stitches are out and you seem to be feeling a bit more like youself. My dh used to regularly run out of petrol and more than once he has had a long walk to the nearest petrol station. Having your turkey on order means you have one less thing to think about in the run up to Christmas.

PennysIntoPounds

Well done on the mouth healing, what a nice celebration treat to be able to go for a scone.
And well done to Mr F for almost certainly deliberately taking your mind off the dentists' 😁

Cheery_Daff

So glad you've had your stitches out Foxgloves!

Eek to the fuel shortage though. I confess I am quite paranoid about such things, and it's only gotten worse since we moved to the middle of nowhere. Mr Cheery does like to live life on the edge sometimes though! 😱😂

badmemory

It is definitely a man thing.  My friends car has almost 100 miles left when it starts & we have driven over 85 miles back from Wales with it bleeping every so often.  Drives me crazy but he doesn't seem to notice & I am the one on the deaf side.