Resourcefulness: The budgeter's friend

Cheery_Daff

Thanks for the fudge recipe! It looks utterly delicious, although I'd best not make it as I adore fudge and I'm missing enough teeth as it is 🙈

I did laugh at Mr F including taking his trousers off as part of his list of the day's achievements 😂 I'm all for adding stuff like that to the list so I can tick it off 😂

teapot2

Cheery_Daff said:

I did laugh at Mr F including taking his trousers off as part of his list of the day's achievements 😂 I'm all for adding stuff like that to the list so I can tick it off 😂

Made me laugh too.  Mind you I sometimes add things I've already done to my 'to do' list just to make myself feel like I'm achieving 🤣🤣

Elisheba

Thanks for the recipe.  I have saved it and will give it a go in the New Year.  I'm with Mr F - anything to add an extra tick to the 'To Do' list    

Baileys_Babe

Thanks for sharing the fudge recipe @foxgloves I am planning to now make some to give OH's at Christmas, I will probably save it for a day when at least 1 child is around to do the beating for me to save me cause further pain in my shoulders 🫤

Moorviews

foxgloves said:

@Moorviews - Sorry to hear you've been struggling with health & energy this year.
Re marzipan trimmings, I must say that Nigella was over-generous in her suggested quantity of marzipan required to cover large Christmas cake, so I was on those trimmings like a fat piglet who had just been informed there's about to be a world shortage of said golden loveliness!
F

Thank you Foxgloves. 

😂 It’s a good job we don’t live in the same house and have to fight over those trimmings!
Also, thank you for the fudge recipe. It had me rootling in the cupboard and lo and behold, a tin of evaporated milk 😊 That will be another girdle busting make to add to my list. Sometimes I have had failures when I haven’t managed to dissolve every sugar crystal before it boils so I shall try to be patient. My Scottish grandmother used to make tablet for us and I always ate rather a lot of it. Amazingly my teeth were okay despite this. 

foxgloves

Afternoon Diary Readers,
I'm pleased to hear that some of you have found the fudge recipe useful. I've found that all recipients to date have enjoyed it, so it's a useful affordable homemade gift.
Pleasant long weekend - a mixture of busy & leisure activities. Been getting back to normal today. Frugal activity as follows:
*Only 2 garments required ironing. 
*Made tomorrow's packed lunch & breakfast.
*Easy-peasy cheapo nosebag tonight as have defrosted some of the butternut squash curry I batch-cooked a while back, so will only need to heat that & cook some rice.
*Added a few items of birthday wrappings salvage to my stash.
*Lots of financials to do this morning - slightly belated Monday morning budget updates, followed by reconciling my Dec CC statement, then did my regular mid-month budget check-in. No nasty surprises - in fact the sum of money I budgeted for some planned eating-out expenses plus Mr F's requested bday take-away actually stretched to covering an additional occasion plus subsidising another. I did initially have an anomaly as ended up with around £40 more than I was expecting,. All my figures were accurate but I finally spotted that despite doing all the maths, I hadn't actually paid a £30 transaction off a CC. Now sorted out & the final £10 turned out to be some petty cash Mr F requested for sonething at work (he can claim it back) but then decided he didn't need it after all. 
*Did a couple of surveys.
*Cut a bunch of holly, ivy & fir from the garden, tied with a silver ribbon & wired on a few fir cones & red pound shop baubles. Now hanging on front door.
I'm going to have an hour of shawl knitting time now with the tree lights on. This time next week, we will likely be girding our loins to tackle the North Circular (shudders.....) but plenty of stuff to do before that. Baking planned for tomorrow.
F x

Makingabobor2

sounds like another productive day.  Glad you got your finances to tally in the end. 

badmemory

One of the joys of living in a household where no-one goes out to work - my iron hasn't been plugged in since the week before lockdown

foxgloves

@Makingabobor2 - It'a good when the error suddenly leaps out & can be corrected. Much more annoying to be combing through everything but still.not spot it.

@badmemory - It's a good while ago that I took VR, but I still don't like looking 'un-ironed'. I like cotton jersey-type dresses over chunky tights so not much ironing from those. Defo more in Summer as I like linen. My Grandma used to love ironing. She used to say, "It smoothes all my troubles away". I just find it tedious.
F

foxgloves

Morning Frugalistas,
I bet this time next week I'll already have eaten at least 3 chocolates!
Just finishing my coffee, then off to begin some kitchen witchery. I have an audiobook to finish & Mr F has put all the Christmas CDs on the dresser so I will be able to play some carols & have the fairy lights on.
Should defo be an NSD as I don't need to go out & Mr F has taken packed lunch & breakfast. Online shopping doesn't provide the same level of temptation for me as real shops, which has probably been a helpful factor ever since the LBM.
Right.....coffee slurped, let's get baking.
F x