Resourcefulness: The budgeter's friend

foxgloves

@AnotherNewDay - I am fine, thanks - just haven't spent much time online for the last 2 or 3 days. 
F

foxgloves

Thanks for all your comments, which I always enjoy reading.
@kayannie - Thanks for thinking of me re your spare sock yarn, but I have now had a proper sort through my stash & I am going to have sufficient for that couple of extra pairs. I do use 4-ply for Mr F's preferred socks, but as they are knitted on 2.5mm needles, the fabric knits up nice & thick. Could you use your yarn oddments to knit a pair of socks to give as a gift? Just thinking, it's a free present if you have a spare 100g for a pair?  x

@2Scratters - It's amazing how well leather comes up with a polish. I use dubbin on bags as well as boots every so often. It protects them from rain too, so it's worth doing. 

@PennysIntoPounds - Yes, it must be really frustrating not being able to work from a feeling-useful-brain-using point of view, as well as regular income, of course. I look forward to you reaching the top of that silly list asap. It can't come soon enough. I have to admit, I'd mentally got your occupation down as some sort of freelance writer......you do have a turn of phrase & a wonderful acerbity, you know!

@badmemory - I don't think you'd be excluded from survey sites because of your age. I have noticed that on PA, since turning 60 last year, I have started getting the occasional study which seems to be targeted at the 60+ age-group. It might be worth a try if you feel like earning a few quid. I hadn't realised there was a waiting list until @PennysIntoPounds mentioned it a while back.

@Baileys_Babe - I hadn't thought about donating a % of each month's PA earnings to the Savings Pots. It is something I may decide to do in future. At the moment, as I already donate smaller (& more sporadic) earnings from other surveys sites to them reasonably frequently, I think I'd like to see a one-off chunk hitting the Pots spreadsheet from PA. Now I just need to build up the chunk.....so it is a proper one & not a chunklet.
F

foxgloves

A quick weekend update - I don't think I had my laptop on at all, hence radio silence from Foxgloves Manor. I do sometimes update using my phone, but I prefer typing a full post on a full-sized keyboard.
Anyway, went to see Ben Elton on Saturday night. Very funny & incisive. And £1 to park! So much cheaper than parking for city centre gigs. 4th time I have seen him live right from the days of his 1980s glittery 'Sellafield suit' to last weekend. On Sunday, we finally had our 3 times postponed city centre trip. Just thinking if there was anything to report from that.....Oh yes, actually, we did managed to use offers/deals on a couple of planned purchases. I used a 15% discount & a £5 loyalty voucher to get my moisturiser reduced from £18 to £10-ish, & as we both needed undies, we used a 20% off Sp*rks offer plus £6 loyalty vouchers, so that was a decent reduction too. Remember that giftcard I lost & was just about going crackers over? Well, I put it towards something in the Marine Condiment shop. I only went in for a browse while Mr F was doing geeky muso shopping but I wanted this garment (long denim coat) as soon as I saw it, & when I tried it on, I had a rush of nostalgia as I used to have a velvet coat in the same style back in the 80s which I wore with a squishy velvet hat (people of a similar vintage as myself will remember these), shawl, lots of earrings & boots. There is no way I could justify buying it from the Clothes Pot, even without our 2025 commitment to Project Surbiton, but I fell in love with it (a bit like in the bad old days but with the difference that it fits nicely & I love it & no longer finance my life from the bank's money!) so I used my giftcard (which was a Christmas present) & have paid the balance from my Personal Spends (Including a £50 transfer from my Reserve Spends). That was Sunday.......Oh & I also finished sorting out the spaghetti junction which was my sock yarn stash, including taming a hideous lime green bird's nest into a neat ball of yarn I can now use. Halved everything up & have cast on a pair of socks for Mr F for the presents bag. Also sorted part-skeins of posh artisan yarns I've received for gifts & cast on a pair for myself. Green & purple stripy cuffs & toes - the main part will be knitted with an ombre mauve/grey/bluey colourway. I shall wear those with my new denim coat. Anything else? Oh yes, Mr F's new phone arrived. We were able to use the £10 off code I was sent from JL so there is a tenner more left in the Tech Replacement Pot than there would have been.
Think I've caught up now.
Today's budget-friendly activity:
*Sorted dry laundry. I have had to leave a few bigger items on the heated airer but will be checking them again shortly so that I'm not paying for more electricity than needed.
*Easy nosebag tonight, using the last of the lovely whole Indian spiced chicken Mr F cooked on Sunday (from Madhur Jaffrey's Curry Bible) Intend to stir-fry the leftover meat with sliced onions & extra spices & pack it into pittas, served with salad & coleslaw.
*Made tomorrow's packed lunch & breakfast.
*Did slightly belated Monday morning budget updates. Quite a bit to do - grocery budget, Personal Spends & paying transactions off our credit cards. Strong start to Feb's grocery budget, even though we went to Al*i for an additional shop - a pantry stock-up on various items we like.
*Cleared a load of emails our of my inbox. I needed to check a few relating to financial transactions to ensure they had now gone through our account. 
*Did a couple of surveys.
*Small rack of bacon ribs into the slow cooker first thing with a few aromatics, leek tops, etc. Intend to strain the stock imminently, remove the bacon & these will be used for tomorrow's planned meal which is lentil & bacon soup with home made focaccia bread. 
*Today's daily hour of looking after our home: Finished cleaning the last corner of kitchen tiles, washed down the boiler cupboard door (all the top run of kitchen cupboards now cleaned), washed the plate rack & cutlery container & scrubbed the kitchen scales. Enjoyed listening to my current audiobook while was busy being Ms Mop.
*Entered a competition & a prize draw.
ERNIE decided that we at Foxgloves Manor were not worth bothering about this month. He needs to have a word with himself on whether he actually does WANT to help us relocate to Suffolk when Mr F retires & if so, to understand that while there are still a good few years to go, the time limit isn't finite. So think on! 
OK, time to have a final check of PA, then distribute cat treats before getting my pinny on to deal with those bacon ribs. I'm surprised Ash isn't clamouring by the slow cooker, as he likes a tiny taste of bacon (which he gets very rarely because of it being so salty). Soot isn't keen but will not miss an opportunity to try & score an early dinner.
Hope you all had a good weekend,
F x

Makingabobor2

So glad you found something you really like, to spend your GV on, and good that you had enough money in the Personal spends pot to add to it.  Sounds like you've been busy again.  The bacon ribs sounds a good idea. Never thought of that before, but imagine its a really cheap cut of meat and can make quite a bit of soup and stock from it.  I need to sit down and go through my recipes, like I keep promising myself I will do and come up with some new ideas.  Just seem to be busy lately. 

foxgloves

@Makingabobor2 - It's not a cut we'd bought before, but our lovely local butcher does a regular offer of 5 mix & match trays of meat for £20 & there were some really quite big packs of bacon ribs included in one of those deals. Mr F roasted the bigger rib rack & we both agreed that while they were very tasty, this is a cut which would be better slow-cooked. As we were experimenting, we saved the smaller rack & froze it to try in soup. I will be interested to see what it turns out like tomorrow. I shall probably make the soup on the hob rather than slow cook again. I intend to use Rose Elliot's golden lentil soup recipe with some of the bacon zizzed up in it & some saved to add at the end for texture. 
Blimey, I'm still yakking! I am defo signing out now, 
F x

Makingabobor2

foxgloves said:

@Makingabobor2 - It's not a cut we'd bought before, but our lovely local butcher does a regular offer of 5 mix & match trays of meat for £20 & there were some really quite big packs of bacon ribs included in one of those deals. Mr F roasted the bigger rib rack & we both agreed that while they were very tasty, this is a cut which would be better slow-cooked. As we were experimenting, we saved the smaller rack & froze it to try in soup. I will be interested to see what it turns out like tomorrow. I shall probably make the soup on the hob rather than slow cook again. I intend to use Rose Elliot's golden lentil soup recipe with some of the bacon zizzed up in it & some saved to add at the end for texture. 
Blimey, I'm still yakking! I am defo signing out now, 
F x

You don't yak....you talk sense and offer lots of useful tips.  Our butcher was doing an offer the other week, but it included beef and beef mince, which we don't eat as DH has to avoid red meat, as it makes his IBD worse. The deals are normally very good prices though. If the butcher does it again, I might see if he can substitute the beef mince, for some other type of mince and maybe a chicken instead of the beef.  I do love our butcher....especially his sausages, which we have very occasionally for a weekend brunch sometimes. They come in so many different flavours, and are so big I can only eat one. Its the only sausages I would ever buy, hate supermarket ones, so fatty and full of all sorts of rubbish. Also I like being able to take my own containers and not have plastic.  Especially if I buy liver, nothing worse than a plastic bag that has had liver in it!!!  

PennysIntoPounds

Spot on, I am 'some sort of freelance writer', a skint one!
Good for you using your gift voucher on something you fell in love with. I'm very much enjoying the 90s fashion revival and the cowboy look being in, great being super on-trend by wearing the denim I always wear anyway 😁

foxgloves

@Makingabobor2 - We sometimes substitute turkey mince when we can get it at a reasonable price. Our market butcher who has an amazing range of stock doesn't sell it so it's a supermarket buy for us if we want any. Mr F does a really nice turkey mince chilli, also a spag bol & he keeps saying he'd like to try his lasagne recipe but substituting the meat for turkey mince, so I shall remind him next time we see some at a decent price. 

@PennysIntoPounds - Ha! My instincts were correct....though I wish you weren't a skint one. Though that's a lot further advanced than me......I'm an 'aspiring' writer......who hardly ever writes anything! And when I do, it is never finished & just added to a folder of other unfinished things which will almost certainly remain that way for ever & never be completed & sent off anywhere. Ridiculous, I know but procrastinating on this has become such an ingrained habit, I doubt it will change now. Mr F gets exasperated with me for (in his words) having abilities I don't use, but it isn't as exasperated as I get with myself. 
I must admit I can't remember what 90s fashions even were, so that probably shows that I just carried on wearing whatever I fancied while maintaining up my 24-year old overdraft to pay for it, of course. I couldn't go back to that!
F

foxgloves

Good Afternoon Wednesday Pence-Wranglers,
I'd have posted sooner, but my laptop insisted on installing a load of updates I thought I'd finished last night, which seemed to take longer than usual. Anyway, today's budget-friendly bits & bobs:
*Did meal plans for next week - all from stores apart from fresh veg.
*Made lentil & bacon soup for tonight's meal, using meat from the bacon ribs I slow cooked yesterday plus most of the stock. It's certainly tasty. Have frozen 2 small pots of leftover stock as they will add ooomph to something else, including gravy.
*We have run out of yoghurt & as I wanted to use up an annoying amount of leftover mixed peel, I made a batch of fruit scones. We can have one of those for dessert tonight & I've added one to Mr F's packed lunch for tomorrow. Will freeze some too.
*Only 4 garments to iron so I was very speedy. Not much electricity used there.
*Pleasant sunny afternoon so cracked on with garden clearing & managed to get another 3 big trugs plus 2 bundles of stuff into the garden wheelie after Mr F had rammed the contents down for me to make more space. I really don't think I can get any more in there so will have to leave cutting back & clearing the more troublesome stuff until it has been emptied next week. Felt I'd had a good free bending & stretching session though.
*Not a lot of survey activity but I did do a YouGov & a Taste Nation. Hopefully there might be more around tomorrow. Tbf, I haven't spent much time at all on my laptop.
I didn't do my daily 'Looking after the house hour' today because the job I decided to tackle next is going to take longer than an hour & I don't want to leave it half-done, so I have lined up a 2-hour session tomorrow morning for that. I am going to take everything off my big kitchen dresser (lots of vintage china), wash & dry it then clean & polish the dresser before putting it all back. I shall be listening to my current audiobook so it should be quite a calm, pleasant task. I don't have as much vintage stuff as I used to as stopped visiting antique/collector fairs when I first began debt-busting. Going to vintage fairs to spend lots of the bank's money on lovely old things was one of my favourite weekend activities back in the day. I do still have some of them, but have gradually got rid of some of my less favourite buys over the years. We live in a town with a lot of antique businesses (& a huge fair which sometimes features on the lunchtime antique-hunting programme) so I wisely stay away in case the old temptations arise phoenix-like from the ashes of old spendyness. But back to my dresser - a housewarming present from my parents when I bought my first house - it now has only things on it which I really like, but regardless of this, they still get dusty & tomorrow's the day!
Sending you all a virtual scone as I can't drop round a real one,
F x

badmemory

Were midis late 80s - always hated those as they seemed designed to make anyone who wasn't a tall matchstick look fat.  Guess who isn't a tall matchstick.  As for 90s can't think of anything memorable.  Now the 60s the first time I got married I wore a mini skirt but travelling on buses was not fun, they were not like the ones now are.