2024 Frugal Living Challenge

Frugaldom

Very quiet in here, perhaps you have all gone on. Mid-term break. I'm juggling the declutter with catching up with accounts, wading through old paperwork with much of that being turned into kindling for the fire and managed to navigate my way through the contents of the freezer, which was long overdue a defrost. Excavated right to the very bottom, evicted a few polar bears and then reached the contents. The remainder of this month (and possibly into next month) I will be eating 'use it up' meals. At Frugaldom, there are several new feeding stations for the wildlife and watching that has now fully replaced TV for me. 
4 bin bags of clutter filled and binned or sent to recycling.
Next up will be sorting out old footwear and clothes, some of which are ok for charity shop and possibly some for the womens' refuge and the rest to the clothing bank.
This week brought another opportunity for Olio so meals over the weekend have almost all been free. Lucky choices this time, with cooked ham, eggs and milk. Now I've just remembered I was planning on counting up the grocery spends. Oops! 

fionaandphil

I've been doing what you are doing and decluttering, prepping for winter and putting bits of the garden to bed - not as well as you though.

The freezer is getting summer BBQ bits used up and the harvested veg is now making its way in, big batches of pasta sauce ready for the winter.  Logs are cut and the ones for next year and beyond are stacked and drying off.  Yesterday I almost finished my greenhouse, took out all the tomato plants, cleaned it up and put it to bed for the winter.  There are a few cucumbers left on the plant which is where the almost has come from, though I'm not particularly wanting to use it up in salads right now with the cold weather.

Decluttering inside not going as well but I'm trying to convince myself that I will do it over the winter while I am stuck inside - i try that every year ;o0

Good to hear from you

Viking_mfw

Start of term for me so busy at work. Major frugality is our freegan October challenge although it's been an expensive month for other things and pets don't do freeganism! Well the dog probably would but it's not really good for her. 

Poddling along with decluttering and trying to figure out what the kids need in order to make their Christmas lists...

Frugaldom

@fionaandphil Don't let me kid you, I'm still in this for the long haul for good reason... There's so much to declutter and that's just inside. 

Viking, I like the sound of your freegan October, Ido try to use up any free food stuffs and if you were Lise by, I'd freely share. There seems to be aglut of bananas so our ponies and goats are getting freegan style rreats.

My posts will be sporadic but I'm trying to keep them as regular as possible in order to make myself accountable and quit procrastinating. 

Income projects... I'm still on the fence about whether or not to continue allowing campervans to park overnight but this month has seen some income improvements as  mucro business, if anyobe had a set aside area big enough for parking up to 5 campervans at safe distance between each, it can be very rewarding and interesting meeting new people. We need a few more to make it properly viable but we only charge £5 for an overnight stop. Most who visit, however, leave a little extra after meeting the ponies & goats, finding out about Frugaldom anything and seeing the badgers and pine nartens ourside their vans at nights. This month should see it financially self sustainable and still almost 12 weeks left of this year. If anyone is interested in opening a UK based 'aire' please feel free to message me and I can pass on the details.

Finally, for this morning's blabberpost, I did make a start on my self assessment tax return last night - woohoo! 

mandy47

The only thing on Olio in my area seems to be bread of every type.I make my own sourdough which we prefer and is very cheap to make. 
Good and bad results with the garden this year. Runner beans and courgettes in abundance. Cucumbers were fantastic as were the chillies. Unfortunately the tomatoes were late and the bulk of them haven't ripened. Radishes went to seed before forming anything like a radish. Spring onions were ok but a bit thin. Aubergines were awful. Grand total of 3. 2 of which had been burrowed into by something nasty. Carrots were small and stunted.
Lettuce ok. Herbs good. Beetroot was great. Hopefully we'll do better with our winter crops.
Filled the wood store the weekend. Hopefully we won't use as much now DD has her own place. She did tend to keep throwing logs into the burner. 
Hope everyone is preparing for winter. Don't leave it too late. X

RateTartExtraordinaire

Hi all, 
Good to read all the posts. 

Sorry I have been very quiet. Probably because had two big unexpected bills coming up: one to HMRC I need to pay by next month and another for the car I need to pay this month. But they cannot be helped. There is nothing I can do about the bills so I decided to raise as much cash as possible via money saving and frugalism! Something that is in my control.

Frugal things done in September/ October.
Decluttering - I've listed a few things I don't need that as just taking up space. I've been doing this for the last 3 years...I'm getting there slowly.
Shopping around for printer ink and haggling on my insurance. Saving £30 on ink and limiting increase on insurance to £10.
NSD - as many as possible
Earning cashback (MOT £4 and Bank switching £175) and using referral codes (Energy provider £50 and Bank £70) with family and friends. 
Working smarter not more hours - I'm self employed and I have had to increase my rate very slightly from September. I also started to branched out into another area that pays better in March this year with one client. I built up the resources to provide the service. I got a good review and now the majority of my work is in this area - there is just more demand so the work is more reliable.

Once I've paid off HMRC and the work to the car, I will feel lighter - mentally. I feel like it is weighing me down at the moment. 

Frugaldom

@RateTartExtraordinaire, try not to get too bogged down, you are doing a fantastic job. I'm really impressed by your bank switching and cashback acquisitions.

The weather has returned to rain here so it's not quite as cold but the lig store got filed up today, just in case. The log burner has been lit at the Frugaldom hut and it has been a rather busy day of animal care, looking after grandchildren, feeding neighbour's cats and tidying up. I raked out all the remnants of hay & haylage from the store and scattered it over the paddock. It will rot down, add more organic material to the land and many of the grass seeds will germinate and grow next year. 
At the project, we have had help developing and expanding on another frugaleur idea for our visiting wildlife watchers. We now have badgers and pine martens visiting nightly and visitors have been donating fresh eggs, peanuts and peanut butter. Visiting photographer has been building more feeding stations that can be easily photographed from the huts and seeing the wildlife visit in the very first night was a sheer joy! Enjoying nature and the great outdoors is such a frugal pastime.

Viking_mfw

It is starting to get colder. Everyone has a blanket on their beds and the youngest, who has a habit of climbing out of all bedclothes and getting cold so waking up, has the heated clothes airer in his room to take the edge off. OH did try to dry clothes outside yesterday on the basis it wasn't raining but I don't think he understood what mist is...

KajiKita

Viking_mfw said:

It is starting to get colder. Everyone has a blanket on their beds and the youngest, who has a habit of climbing out of all bedclothes and getting cold so waking up, has the heated clothes airer in his room to take the edge off. OH did try to dry clothes outside yesterday on the basis it wasn't raining but I don't think he understood what mist is...

Drying clothes in mist ….? Oh dear 😉😂

KK

Sweetbriarrose

Cold and damp here, its rained everyday.
 Frugaldom, I watch your videos of the badgers and pine martens, its very relaxing, thank you for sharing.
Given up on Olio as only bread available here,  I’m gluten-free so not suitable for me.
 I make pancakes and batter pudding to replace bread as GF breads are expensive.
now retired so preparing for short and cold days, I get SAD so always try to get out for a walk to lift my mood it makes a huge difference.
started knitting again not done any for years so making dishcloths to get my hands used to the feel of the needles before I try knitting socks and fingerless gloves for the first time. 
busy cutting back garden, pulled up tomatoes plants, lots of Toms but none ripened, some will make chutney and others I am hoping will eventually ripen on windowsill, moving plants to different areas of garden, filling compost bin for free soil next year, I find the shop bought compost is full of bits of plastic, large sticks and expensive.
made compote with windfall apples and various fruits from the freezer, lovely on my porridge or HM granola. This will make room for more batch cooking meals of low cost that take a longer cooking time, using cheaper cuts of meat and lots of veg. These will only need to be reheated saving on my energy costs.
My gutters full of vegetation and bay has a leak from squirrels pulling up the lead, water running everywhere, now found a roofer who turns up and is not charging the earth.