Do I Still Do the Things

I've been asked a couple of times if I still do any of the things I used to post about on my various Challenge blogs and on here ... well the answer is a resounding YES  :-)

As you can see from the top photo I religiously check after I have shopped at Asda to make full use of their Asda Price Guarantee thingy.  They don't advertise this anymore either in store or on the receipts, but it is still very much in operation.  Nine times out of ten I get a voucher after I check my receipt online.  

We still get our Tesco Clubcard vouchers, and make good use of them to buy things that we can't grow or produce ourselves.  Although we have now cancelled our Tesco credit card and use just one credit card to keep things simpler (of course paying it off in full every month).

We went out to buy Alan some new jeans the other day as he has lost weight and was having real trouble keeping his jeans up, at the checkout we were given this voucher along with our receipt ...

... when we got home our latest quarterly Marks and Spencer's vouchers were laying on the doormat. 

So if I put one with the other and I will be able to get £35 worth of food for just £15.  Yes ... a little happy dance was danced :-)

Oh and although I have stopped buying this magazine on subscription, I just couldn't resist this offer when I was in Tesco the other night after the Trelawnyd Flower Show,  I must have had growing things still on my mind.

But I just couldn't say no to almost £24 worth of free seeds and a free dvd (which isn't brilliant but I did get a good recipe from it for Cucumber Pickle).

Inside the magazine was this, now the question is  ... can I resist the thought of another £36 worth of seeds and three copies of the magazine for just £5 ?  You just have to be very careful to cancel the subscription before they take the next payment out, something they are relying on you not to do.

So as this all shows I am still a sucker for coupons, vouchers and freebies ... but as hobbies go this isn't so bad  :-)

Sue xx

Are We Still Scrimping and Saving

The last few posts since my unexpected foray back into Blogland have been about growing and sowing so I thought on this bloody chilly indoor job day (Hands up who ordered arctic wind with it's cousins, hail and snow for April?) I'd just write a post to answer a few questions that have popped up quite a few times in my email inbox recently, namely ... 'are you still frugal/money saving/clearing/the clutter/setting yourself challenges', and then there is THE BIG ONE  'has Lovely Hubby retired from the day job yet?'

We've recently had some large expenditure to equip LH's workshop with the machinery he needed for his future enterprises, so the bank account went down quite a bit.  Why is the 'needed' in italics I hear you asking .... well I'm a girl.  Who really needs a lathe and a big sucky up thing for sawdust or whatever, and different types of saws on different types of stands that all weigh a bloody ton and take up so much room, surely a Vitamix would have been better  ;-)

Then to top off everything we decided to do something that is long-term sensible but immediately shock inducing ..... we bought our future retirement property.  There will be a day in the future when this hillside five acres will be too much for us to either be able to manage or to want to manage. When that day comes we now have waiting a brand newly built ground floor 'semi detached apartment' ...that's a flat to you and me ... but I love the brochure description of it.  We completed last week and it's now officially ours.  Between then and now it will be rented out long term, firstly to pay off the small mortgage that we had to take out against our house to pay for it and then to give us an income to supplement LH's pension.

In true Challenge style we've given ourselves just TWO years to pay this mortgage off. 

SO to answer the questions .... yes now our splurging is done we are back to frugal living, yes we are money saving in every possible way and boy oh boy are we clearing the clutter.  If it's not nailed down and in reasonably constant use it is going to be sold at a car boot sale this year.  We will pay off this mortgage as quickly as possible, just as we paid off the last one, so that the rent from the flat will be in our account and helping us to keep our heads above water.  Because to answer the final question, Lovely Hubby has now reduced his working hours by one day a week and will be going down to a twenty hour working from home week at the end of June. 

Okay I can hear you asking "why the pictures of pastry and pasties?" ..... well it was just one of the money saving things we did at the weekend.  I took one of the four yellow stickered packs of pastry out of the freezer on Friday to defrost, made an enormous pan of vegetable stew on Saturday, we both had some for lunch, then strained out some of the vegetables and added them to a chopped onion that had been fried with some curry powder to use as a pasty filling for that nights tea, and then whizzed up what was left of the stew for soup on Sunday.

I can see lots more meals like those coming our way, but then it's always been how we like to eat ... and if it means that we can be mortgage free 'again' in two years or less it's very good in my book.

Sue xx

Our Busy Weekend

Harry on the tree stump

 

We had a wonderfully busy weekend, three days including the Friday of tidying the place up and moving Chicken World further along the paddock so that they are on fresh grass and getting lots of planting done.

 

 

 

I'm cruel to Harry, I plonk him (yes, I'm beginning to have suspicions that she might be a he or at the very least have leanings in that direction) in the most strange places and he stands there patiently until I get him down.  The others run over to see what's going on.  But he just stands and waits.  Geese don't 'do' climbing, they either walk or fly.

 

 

While we move the electric fencing the birds all free range over the entire 4.5 acres, visiting the house, having a mooch around the shed and going everywhere they haven't been for a while.  It's a good day for them as they find all sorts of tasty titbits not normally available to them.

 

Of course some of them just stay close to home, and this time Caldwell took the opportunity to have a good dustbath in the hole that used to be under the henhouse.

 

A shuffle this way and that gets all that lovely dry soil through the feathers .....

 

... while everyone else completely ignores him and tootles around.

 

"Don't forget me" says Harry

(I did go back and lift him down....the big softy!!)

 

I got lots of turning over of the beds, weeding and planting done and now I have a bit of space in the greenhouse for the next wave of seed sowing.

 

 

Once the fence was back up around Chicken World and everything was back in place Lovely Hubby gave the henhouse roof a fresh coat of creosote, it keeps it more weatherproof and should make it last longer.  Then he set to with his strimmer and got lots of the undergrowth and edges under control.

 

 

 

And after all that hard work we sat down to a lovely alfresco tea, with a homemade loaf, lots of the bits and bobs from the fridge and a bottle of Bucks Fizz that had just gone out of date (well it was bought for Christmas).

 

Sometimes being frugal and using up what you have is so hard .... Lol  :-)

 

Sue xx

 

Miserly March - Thrifty Thursday Tips - Week 1

 

 

I thought I'd start my Miserly March Thrifty Thursday tips with the thing I do the most to save money ...... and that is to use my freezer to it's capacity. 

 

Any freezer works best and uses less electricity if it is as full as possible.  If you have huge air spaces that is what you are paying to freeze ..... air, and you can't eat air.  The minute you open the lid or door you let all your nice frozen air escape and let new room temperature air in so when you close the lid the freezer has to spring to life to chill it all down again.  So it really makes sense to have your freezer as full as possible all the time.

 

If you don't have much money to fill the freezer all in one go, think how you can fill the space.  I always keep all my freezer blocks in the freezer ready for use.  If the freezer was pretty empty I would put my freezer bags in there too, then they are always nicely chilled for when you need them to take them shopping or on family days out.

 

If you want to fill your freezer with edible things, buy lots of cheap loaves and work your way through them in the order you buy them, double wrapped they will last a few months and not lose any freshness.  I always have a sliced loaf in the freezer even though I make my own bread usually, sometimes I just really fancy my favourite seeded commercial made loaf.  Because I only have it now and then when I buy a new loaf I open the bag, loosen the slices slightly then refasten excluding all the air and then pop it in the freezer.  Because the slices are not so tightly packed I can take one slice at a time out whenever I feel the urge.

 

 

 

The first three photos show what I do when I find offers in the supermarkets, I buy in bulk and then as soon as I get home, repack into individual portions.  Although there are two of us I still package everything singularly, after all sometimes we may have different meals or one of us may be away, sometimes we have guests and so would need more than two portions, packed in ones you can take out exactly what you need.  I use 'easy-leave' that I bought from Lakeland a couple of years ago, it has lasted and lasted, but you can help yourself to a couple of extra bags when you are weighing out your fruit and veggies at the supermarket and cut them into sheets, It is exactly the same type of plastic.  If you don't like plastic use greaseproof paper or the wrappers from the insider of cereal cartons, or simply whatever you have that won't stick to your food.

 

 

 

 

Once wrapped I put everything into large freezer proof boxes and label with one of the labels cut from the food wrapper.  This usually gives you all the information about the product plus an approximate date of when you froze it.  The square and rectangular boxes stack nicely in the freezer (I have a large chest freezer).  If you have drawers or a smaller freezer you could just as easily put all your individually wrapped items into a strong plastic bag as this would take up less room. 

 

 

 

Something I've started doing recently whenever I buy bread rolls from the shop is to separate them and pop them all into a freezer box, that way there is never one sad roll left to go stale in the bread bin, you simply take out the number you want for any meal.  Similarly we freeze crumpets and sliced bagels ready for when you want just half a bagel with your morning coffee.

 

 

 

It's not just big things that I freeze, any leftovers are popped into their own boxes too. 

 

Here is half a pack of mushrooms, I'm not really keen on mushrooms unless they disguised in a sauce but Lovely Hubby enjoys them with his steaks and salads, so usually there is half a carton over when he has had a meal and rather than making him eat them meal after meal I will simply slice them and pop them straight into the freezer while they are nice and fresh.  They take minutes to defrost and this is also a good way to use up a 'yellow sticker' bargain if you've been lucky enough to nab one.

 

 

 

Sometimes you can purposely make lots of something to put in the freezer, my regular Scone making sessions are one such event.  Once I have rolled out the dough and cut the scones to size they are open frozen before being put into boxes and stacked in the freezer.  Then whenever we fancy a scone and the oven is on for something else we can take however many we need straight from the freezer, brush them with milk and bake, they take about 5-10 minutes longer than baking from fresh but rise and turn out exactly the same.

 

 

 

I also always have a box of leftover cheeses in the freezer, why let it go off in the fridge when it can be frozen at it's best and be ready for whenever you need it.  This one has lots of small portions of Stilton that I cut up from large cheeses after Christmas as well as lots of other speciality cheeses.

 

 

 

 

But the best and most economical way to freeze cheese is to grate it first.  Once grated if you pack it loosely into tubs and then remove from the freezer after an hour or so to give it a shake before placing back, it will freeze nice and separately so you can remove just the amount you need for any recipe or to place on a sandwich.  If you look at a one ounce piece of cheese as it is and then grated you will be amazed at how much more it looks when grated.  I always have a tub of grated Cheddar and a tub of grated Parmesan style cheese in the freezer.

 

The other thing I always have in the freezer is also in this picture, that is grated breadcrumbs, again they freeze nice and free flowing so you can take out just what you need to top a pasta bake or to cover fishcakes etc.  Never, ever throw your old crusts and half used loaves away, doing this they can make a tasty topping to many a dish, and mixed with some of the grated cheese make a doubly nice topping.

 

 

 

Other things I freeze are surplus crops, when it Rhubarb season I pick and open freeze as much as I can....

 

 

 

...the same with Damsons or any fruit you can gather for free. 

 

Freezing your pickings means that you have them at their absolute freshest and that you can turn them into cakes, pies and meals at your convenience.  It also means you can buy things like Raspberries and Blueberries when they are in season and get some really good deals at the supermarket.  When it's 'Buy One Get One Free', why not have one now and one for the freezer or even one now and five for the freezer.

 

 

 

Something else I nearly always have is lemon and lime slices, whenever I have bought a net of lemons for a recipe or nabbed a good bargain at the end of the day I slice all the excess lemons or limes up and open freeze them, once they are frozen they are tipped into a freezer box and used for cooling down and flavouring my favourite sparkling waters or drinks.  (Absolutely delicious in Pimms.)

 

In the freezer at the moment I also have a large stack of 'stew packs', vegetables chopped up when bought at their freshest and when on offer and then mixed to form the basis of soups and stews. I don't blanch them or anything like that, simply wash, chop and then freeze, giving the boxes a shake an hour or so after putting them in the freezer to keep the contents free flowing.  I use them from frozen and simply cover with hot stock to start them cooking.  (If you thaw them out before using you will find that the potatoes go a bit brown but they still taste fine.)

 

 

 

And of course there is my favourite tip ..... making my icecube trays earn their keep.  Red Wine cubes.

 

 

Homemade pesto cubes.

 You could also freeze the last of a jar of bought Pesto if it is in danger of going off before you can use it. 

 

 All herbs freeze really well and usually at the end of Summer I strip any plants that will not last over Winter and freeze them, either open freezing on trays and then tipping into boxes or by chopping and placing in icecube trays with a little water.

 

 



 

Tomato puree, taken from an open tin. 

Each cube is equal to about a heaped teaspoonful of contents.

 

Of course now and then I actually make ice cubes with water, but some of them will have a pretty flower submerged in the depths to prettify a Summers drink.

 

I guess there are lots more tips and things that I process in some way and pop into the freezer without even thinking about it, but all these are off the top of my head this morning and I really do feel I have rambled on enough for now.

 

So, you never know what you are going to find in my freezer but one thing is for sure it will be as full as possible.  Once or twice a year we will eat our way through the food so we can defrost the freezers and while we are chomping our way through the supplies we are not spending any money on food shopping, so it's a nice cheap time of year, and yes that is this month!!  I always find it is an inventive period, we eat things we may have put off eating for a while and use them in ways previously not thought of, and sometines it's pretty amazing to see what treasures have been buried from sight deep in the depths.

 

I hope you have enjoyed this little recap of some of my favourite freezer tips, some of you will no doubt have seen some of the tips and photos on here before, but I know that recently there are lots of you who have just started reading my Blog and I hope this post helps in some way.

 

Sue xx

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not Spending in September

Last month I was going to challenge myself not to spend ..... it fizzled out through lack of keeping track and circumstances.  I decided to begin again for September and this time I've been keeping tabs on myself properly.

 

 

The Challenge is purely to spend as little as possible from my housekeeping budget for the month and to put all the money I have managed to save towards my other Challenge ....  £2012 in 2012.  Both Pages are at the top of the Blog under the Blog title if you want to follow my progress.

 

 

My Housekeeping Allowance is £50 a week, this is used for food for the two of us and dogs, (I buy them supermarket cheapo mince and tins of tuna, we are trying to wean both of them off  'dogfoods' as such, as Rosy doesn't like them much and always leaves some which Suky then eats ... and she is supposed to be on a diet!!).

 

 



 

So I have £200 for the month of September and my weeks are running Saturday to Saturday as this is when the month started.

 

 

 

I have lots of food in stock as you can see from these photos, tins, jars, packets and lots of dried foods in jars.

 

 

 

There is also lots in the freezers, both of them.  And dried herbs and seasonings to compliment the ones that are still growing happily away.

 

 

  We also still have crops growing in the Veggie Patch, including Spinach, Kale, Courgettes and Cabbages, so there is absolutely no chance of us going hungry.

 

I am trying not to go to the supermarket too much even though that particular Challenge has now ended, (all Jokers were played by 5th September) I still love my High Street shops way to much to just abandon them.  But in an effort to keep costs as low as possible I will be using up all my vouchers and Nect*r points to help pay for my shopping while I am doing this Challenge.

 

The food in the picture at the top was last weeks additional necessities, I spent £22.25 and a voucher at Mr Sainsb**ys.  The small bottles of water are a rare buy for me, we have them in to use for when we are travelling and once emptied they are filled from our big cheap bottles or with diluted squash.  The biscuits were for travelling too, to save us money at the services, (own drinks, own nibbles equals pennies staying in pockets), I could have made some but I ran out of time last week, so they were a compromise.

 

I am going to run this for as long as possible, but the main push is through the month of September, I would actually like to run all supplies right down, I wonder how long it will actually take me.

 

 

 

 

After all not spending at all is the best way to save. So for the foreseeable future I am shopping from my cupboards and freezers and putting the money saved into the Bank of Sue.

 

 

Sue xx

Christmas Tips and Ideas from the Top Tip Team - 1

It's Thursday and time to link over to Angela at Tracing Rainbows for the Christmas Tips and Ideas from the Top Tip Team - Week One.

£21.50 to spend in Tesco (I'll not convert these, just use them for foody treats)

My very first tip for Christmas - don't spend a fortune!!  Well not in cash anyway...

£7.25 to spend in the Garden Centre (more food or maybe a nice Christmassy plant for the house)

Christmas should be a time for family, for friends, time to be together, time to relax.  We've all had a tough year one way and another, why finish on a manic rush around, spend far too much money, and feel guilty for the start of the New Year.  Why dread those credit card bills falling through the letter box in January and start our next year on a bad foot.

£15 in M&S - possibly food (always a tin of Shortbread - we collect the Scottish scene tins)

You can see from these pictures what I decided to do,.....when did I plan this.... only last month when my M&S vouchers landed through the door, I went to put them in my purse and discovered I hadn't spent the last quarters yet.  So I decided to see what else came my way before the start of December and use whatever it was to finance treats for Christmas.  Just think if I'd started at the beginning of the year how much I would have had.

£11.63 inAsda vouchers off 2 x £40 shops. (Yes - I went round twice when I used them at the start of the week!)

 I stocked up on pet foods and cleaning products ready for our move and used these vouchers, included in my shop was our alcohol supply for Christmas and some chocolates and nuts, bought while they were on offer, no doubt they will shoot up in price nearer to Christmas.

As well as all my vouchers I also amass points on these throughout the year.  As we spent the Nectar points to buy food for our holiday in May this is a lot lower than usual, but just as welcome, so I have invisible money to spend in these two shops.  There's £19.47 on the Boots card, I usually wait for their 'buy 2 get one free offer' to start and make my points go even further on treats for us and £13.02 on the Nectar card which I will use for a bit of useful stockpiling in Sainsburys.

So all in all a good way to spread a bit of invisible 'saving' over the course of the year and something I will definitely be doing ALL next year, as this is the last time we are having a bit of a splurge, we are tightening our belts next year and beginning our quest to save for our 'forever home' once we have moved so all the vouchers will be even more welcome for Christmas 2012..... gosh for once I really am thinking ahead!!

And finally.....

This year, as I  just said, for the very last time we are having gigantic splurge, something no voucher would have paid for.  Lovely Hubby has a top of the range Air Rifle and all it's accessories, ready for his foray into self sufficiency (I call it murder, he calls it filling the freezer!).  He wants  to be self sufficient in things like rabbit, pigeon etc once we start living extremely frugally next year, so an expensive but useful acquisition.  Me......well I'm getting something that is not really useful, not really terribly practical but something I have wanted for years and years and years......we pick her up next week.....I'll introduce you then!!

Sue xxx

Keeping the home fires burning........

Keeping the homes fires burning and the house nice and cosy is a priority at this time of year.  Although this year with this unseasonally warm weather we are only have 3 or 4 fires a week at the moment.

We have central heating but we keep the thermostat down at around 15-16 degrees, if it gets cold in the house it will fire up and bring the house back to this temperature, but it is so much cheaper to chop all the free wood we have all around the farm and use that to warm the house in the colder evenings than to turn the thermostat up and have the radiators glowing hot.  Even the radiators have their own thermostats so we have them set to have more heat in our bedroom and the living room, all the other rooms have them set low just to take the chill off the air and keep the room at a neutral temperature. 

Lovely Hubby went out with his chainsaw last week, and with our landlords permission, cut up some trees that had been felled earlier this year (they were diseased we found out, at first I was horrified to see the tree massacre going on).

We now have stacks and stacks of wood in the barn, drying nicely.

Some already chopped smaller to dry out quickly ....

.... and some still in big chunky logs that we thought might be easier to move with if we can find somewhere to rent soon.

We have a big builders bag full of ready cut kindling, that kept LH busy for hours chopping patiently away at pallet wood.  The bag at the back is full of logs from last year which have dried out wonderfully, I get a few out each day and have finally mastered the art of splitting them.  It's good exercise as I have to retrieve lots of logs that shoot off in all directions.  

The old saying is definitely true that wood warms you three times, the gathering, the chopping and the burning.  Although the dogs think it's very unfair that Mum comes back from doggy walks with lots of sticks that she just won't throw!!

We have been very lucky recently, all through last year when we had pig feed deliveries we were usually the last farm on the drop off list as we live in the middle of nowhere, so by the time the drivers got to us they usually had our ton of feed on a pallet plus a few extra pallets that the previous customers didn't want.  Of course I always made them a lovely cup of tea and then asked very politely if I could help lighten their homeward load by having the pallets.....I was never refused.   So we have quite a stack of good pallets drying out ready to chop up for firewood or be put to lots of other money saving uses.

Although it makes the living room look slightly cluttered with our baskets of wood and piles of newspaper (also free - courtesy of Mum and Dad) I can turn a blind eye, knowing that come evening with the sidelights on and a roaring fire the room will just look cosy.

A good excuse to keep the home fires burning.

Sue xx