The Waiting Game

Our computer is still soooo slow, thanks for all the tips but we are waiting on BT to clear up the problem, seemingly we are not synchronised!!  

 

This is obviously why we do get the occasional bit of use and then it all vanishes, like the amateur synchronised swimmer we are occasionally in time with the music and each other, but most of the time we are splashing about and disappearing under the water. Good old BT are trying to fix the problem at their end and we have to report any improvement (ha...that would be good) on Monday afternoon when they are phoning us to check on progress.  As Lovely Hubby works on computers for most of his working day to come home and find that his own is playing up is not amusing to say the least.

 

So while we are waiting on normal service being resumed we are also waiting on homemade soaps setting and hardening off ....

 

 



 

.... and homemade bread rising and magically filling it's tin ready to pop into the oven.

 

 

 

It's all a waiting game, but we know it will all work out in the end.

 

Sue xx

 

Bad Language Alert !!

I apologise for the bad language, but my computer is driving me MAD.

All week it has been soooooooo slow, hence the lack of Blog posts.  I apologise for that too, there are so many ideas for posts running around in my head I think there's a chance they'll start popping out of my ears like steam in an old cartoon.

I haven't even been able to list anything on Ebay, pictures simply won't download for me, so I'm saving them for next week instead.

So frustrating.

  Instead I am going to make another cup of coffee and see if I can read a few of your Blog posts to keep me sane....well it's worth a go!!

Sue xx

Visitors

Glancing out of the office window yesterday, enjoying the sight of the washing blowing in the sunshine I spotted a little visitor to the bird feeding area.

 

 



 

Not a bird at all but one of the hundreds of squirrels we see usually dashing about the highest branches of the trees in the woods that surround our little patch on two sides.

 

A cute little fellow that seemed to be on a mission.  All at once the 'Mission Impossible' theme tune started playing in my head just as he began scampering around, having the time of his life.

 

 

 

 

Duh duh duh duh, duh duh duh duh, duh duh duh duh, duh duh duh dur, der der der, der de der......

 

 

 

"Ooops.......spotted!!"  He seemed to say.

 

 

"I'll send in an accomplice.......

 

 

 

.... while I look for something sweet to finish the meal ...

 

 

 

... nope nothing here.

 

 

 

Mmmmm....perfect!!  Although I think I'm being watched......

 

 

 

..  I'll move back to higher ground to be safe. "

 

 

Once he was out of reach I let out the dogs and they barked and ran after him and caused a big disturbance.   I don't mind the odd squirrel calling by but I really don't want him to spread the word that our bird feeding station is easy pickings, it'll cost me a fortune, Lovely Hubby has a soft spot for feeding the wildlife!

 

Sue xx

Buying, Selling and Saving

 

 

The buying is most definitely reducing to almost minuscule levels and the selling is increasing, the right way round thank goodness.

 

Yesterday whilst in the village posting off the bags I sold on EBay last week I called in the health food shop for some Oatmeal as I wanted to make some oatmeal biscuits, so that was two things being sold off and one thing bought.

 

 I managed to make a profit of £16.11 on the blue Laura Ashly bag and £11.80 on the green  Hotter bag, so I was really pleased with the outcome. I guess at a car boot sale I would have been lucky to make more than a couple of pounds each for them.  I say profit because I have been carefully working out how much things are costing me to post and how much the charges for selling are, it does need to be worthwhile all this wrapping and posting things off.  And I do try and combine the drive to the Post Office with other reasons for visiting the village to keep fuel costs down.

 

Ebay is proving to be good for things like the bags that have well known names, but Amazon has been brilliant for Dvd box sets and selling books, especially a lot of my diet type books.  I put six more books on there yesterday and two sold within minutes, I have to find four things to put on Amazon this afternoon to keep up with my weekly challenge of listing 10 things each week.  It is going pretty well so far.

 

I will have to update my '£2012 in 2012' challenge page in a minute to get it up to date and see how much my shortfall is at the moment, it would be lovely to complete this challenge properly.

 

On the back of my mind at the moment is my plan for our Blog subtitle for next year.  You may have noticed that each year it varies slightly.  Up to now we have had (as listed way down in the sidebar) -

 

 

Our Blogging Years

2009 - From Townies to Country Folk

 

2010 - Pigs and Chickens

 

2011 - Our Year of Living Simply

 

2012 - 'From Simple to Frugal....and Beyond'
(one couples journey to jump off the consumer bandwagon and live more simply)

 

 

I have a definite idea for next year and it's all linked to the Sealed Pot Challenge and what I intend to do with the money (when I see how much it is).    I guess I'll let you all know what our Challenge is going to be when I open the pot on 3rd December, it's a date firmly marked in my diary.  If you want to know more about the Sealed Pot Challenge pop over to Sft's Blog  HERE and have a read.  I have already signed up for next years Sealed Pot and once I open mine up this year and remove the contents for counting I will be resealing and re-using the same pot again.

 

 

It would be criminal not too, it's lovely and fits in with our kitchen beautifully.

 

 

 

Lovely Hubby drilled the hole in the top ....

 

 

 

... and last year we managed to save £258 in it, not a bad little haul.  Here's hoping for similar (or even better) this year.  Every penny is earmarked for the Challenge and nope, we won't even need to go to the bank to change it into notes!!

 

There....have I left you suitably mystified or have you guessed what we are up to?

 

Sue xx



One Saving and Three Treats

We are starting to scrape the bottom of the fresh foods 'barrel' now and I'm using up whatever I find lurking in the salad drawers of the fridge.  On Friday morning some of the tiredest carrots, the limp centre of the oldest bunch of celery along with a couple of onions and a whole bag of 'Country Vegetable Mixture' (25p from Approved Foods) along with some tomato puree, the last of the Veggie Stock Pots and a couple of pints of water all went into my large stock pot and made us a wonderful pot of Vegetable Soup.  I worked out, rounding figures up in every case, that it cost me just one pound to make.  So that's ten good portions of lovely homemade vegetable soup for just 10p each.  A bargain .... we have eaten two portions each and there are three more two portion packs in the freezer (and yes, I remembered to add it to my freezer inventory).

So that was a 'saving', lovely soup for pennies a portion and this photo shows my only shopping for last week including a couple of 'treats'. 

I bought plain flour, because I had run out completely, a single yogurt to act as a starter for some homemade yogurt tomorrow, two packs of biscuits for just £2.50 to take with us when we went up the motorway to Manchester on Saturday, the first treat (you can pay that per biscuit at Costa Coffee).  So it works out much cheaper than buying biscuits or cakes to go with our Lattes when we stop for a break, yes, before you jump in, we do buy Lattes sometimes when we are travelling, we both absolutely love them and no matter how frugal we get in some areas, a treat of just what you fancy does you the world of good now and then.  Something we both agree on.

The second 'treat' was some ready made Quiche bases, I know I could have made them sooooo much cheaper, especially using the flour I'd bought, but we like to have a ready meal lurking in the cupboard for emergencies and if I have a little stack of these tucked in the cupboard I can take a couple of our own hens eggs and a handful of cheese or leftovers and we have a healthy meal in around 30 minutes anytime we don't feel like really cooking.  As they cost just 65p each I can make up a quiche for around a pound, which gives us three portions, one each for an evening meal and then usually one for Lovely Hubby to take to work the next day for his lunch.  So although I see it as a bit of an extravagance in reality it is still a real money saver, especially if you look at the cost of a fully made bought quiche, which would not have the same quality ingredients that one of our homemade ones has.



The final treat was the Christmas edition of the Sainsb**ys Magazine.  Bought because traditionally I always used to buy lots of Christmas magazines, but last year I decided to knock this little extravagance on the head and now I just buy one.  This one came with a free Calender, so already a saving as we use two calenders in the kitchen, one on the wall for reminders of general things (bins, cat and dog flea treatments, appointments etc) and one for dating our egg boxes each day which lives with the boxes and stickers ready for use.  (We will get our other calender free as well hopefully, as we usually get given one at the Farm Supply shop when we pick up chicken food in December.)

This magazine turned out to be excellent value as lurking inside were a sample pack of Bisto and also a sachet of Baking Powder.  There was also a 50p coupon off something, I forget what it was, as it was something we do like, but not something we needed, so I threw it away before temptation took over!!

So my total spend for last week including all these extravagances was -

Plain Flour - 52p

5 Quiche Bases @ 65p = £3.25

Yogurt - 58p

2 Tubs Biscuits/Flapjacks - £2.50

Magazine - £1.60

Total Spend - £8.45

and 4 Lattes at services (2 journeys x 2 of us) - £11.96

Grand Total of Spending for the Week = £ 20.41

It just goes to show that it's the treats that add up to the big spends!  Good job we don't do it every week, but then if we did it wouldn't be a treat!!

Now I'm off to make up the meal plan for this week, I think I'll do it sat at the kitchen table as the kitchen is a lovely toasty, aromatic place at the moment as there is a tray of Chocolate Muffins cooking alongside the Mediterranean Veggies for tea and you can't beat a warm kitchen complete with yummy cooking smells on a cold November evening.

What do you see as extravagances but enjoy having anyway?

Sue xx

The Bag Lady

 

 

Who on earth is the bag lady you may ask yourself, well to be honest it used to be me.  I used to love my bags, I had one for every occasion, one to match each and every pair of shoes and boots I owned(not that many shoes and boots really, I was a BAG lady not a shoe-a-holic), but you get the picture.

 

When I lived on my own after parting from my first husband I rented a lovely little house in Barrow in Furness town centre and of course I had a bedroom all to myself for the first time in 24 years, so on one wall I hammered in lots of nails and ALL my bags were displayed directly opposite my bed.  I think I took comfort in seeing them all there, all my books were packed away in boxes as I had no shelves and I had yet to discover No-Nails so I couldn't put any up (and my ex had custody of all the power tools ...... and all the furniture and everything else actually!) and I think my bags took their place for a while.

 

 

 

Laura Ashley Leather Bag.

 

 

I don't know when the change came, it snuck up on me overnight and suddenly I began to see them all for what they were....an accumulation of stuff...... and this was way before I started living simply.  Over the next couple of years I gradually reduced the collection, I worked as a Manager of a charity shop during this time and some of them crept back there where I had bought them from.  Some went on Ebay and eventually when I had an almighty clear out I car booted the remainder.

 

Now I am reformed I have one bag on the go and it goes everywhere with me until it either wears out or I find a better version.  I have a couple in my wardrobe, one gorgeous leather slouchy bag that I bought when we went to Rome with Lovely Hubby and Jason a couple of years ago and that is a keeper, and I have my day to day tan coloured leather Laura Ashly bag, my 'perfect' bag, with pockets in all the right places and a colour I love, that I go back to time and time again and at the momentI have my little across the body bag currently in use that cost me just £12 in Sainsb**ys just before my holiday. 

 

 I thought that was it until last week when I went into the charity shop in Pangbourne, and there shining out at me was the bag in the picture at the top of this post. It is as new condition, and mixes my two favourite colours.  When I saw it on the shelf I couldn't resist picking it up, it feels so lovely it is made of the softest buttery leather ever.  I was about to put it back on the shelf, this charity shop charges through the nose for handbags usually and then I spied the price ticket, it was £2.99!!  WHAT!!  I double checked the price and the label inside the bag, it had a small sewn in label that merely says 'Genuine Leather, Made in Columbia SA'.

 

 

 

'Hotter' Leather Bag

 

So I made myself a promise that this beauty was coming home with me and this week I would put the only two bags that I own that do not have any precious memories or reason to stay, on Ebay and that's exactly what I did.  So this week until Sunday afternoon these two bags are listed, and luckily for me one of them is already above the price that I paid for my new acquisition.

 

But now rather suddenly I am starting to ask myself do I even need this new one and maybe this one will end up on Ebay too, we'll see.  I'm not rushing my Ebay selling, just putting 10 items a week to sell either on there or on Amazon.  I'm not doing too badly, I'll never get rich selling things like this but I am making money instead of spending it and that is really good in my opinion.  And step by step the house is getting more simple too.

 

What has been your experience of either Ebay* or Amazon*?   Do you buy, do you sell, do you think it's worth the effort with the postage etc?

 

Sue xx

(reformed bag lady)

 

*If you want to see my items for sale on either Amazon or Ebay, simply click on the appropriate pictures at the top of my sidebar, and you will go straight to my pages.

No- November

 

The day started very promising with a weak sun burning through the mist that was lying low on the paddock.  I rushed to put on a load of washing to make best use of this rare sighting of the yellow orb in the sky, but by the time the machine had finished it's quick economy wash the sun had gone. 

 

 Debating the merits of indoor drying or risking the washing on the line I decided to combine the two and put the airer out on the patio.  This has been the safest way of drying for months now.  At the first hint of rain falling I can quickly snatch the whole thing in and not too much drying time is lost.

 

 

It is the first day of November, I am amazed at how quickly this year gone, only two months left and then we are once again at a fresh beginning.  At the moment we are still working our way through the supplies in the freezers and cupboards so this November is going to be a No-November.

 

No Spending - on unnecessary things.

 

No Shopping - unless absolutely vital.

 

No Stopping - on the clutter busting.

 

No Stopping - on the 10 items a week put on Ebay or Amazon.

 

No Cards - in my purse to tempt me in this season of spending.

 

No Christmas Spending - at all.

 

and

 

No Money - I'm determined to pay off the cards in full and leave ourselves back on track.

(I take out in my purse only enough money for the things I am actually going out for.)

 

*** *** ***

 

The bread is rising under it's tea towel cover and tonights tea is a simple one, Beans on Toast.  We so very rarely have this so when we do it's always a treat, a simple treat but a treat.  Homemade Cheese and Onion bread, lightly toasted then spread with butter and generously topped with Heinz Baked Beans (I have four tins to use up, so tonight I may be generous and we will have two of them, a sprinkle of Parmesan style cheese will add another depth of flavour.

 

For our pudding there is tinned peaches with the last of the bought yogurts.  I will need to shop later in the week to buy a small carton of yogurt so I can start a batch of homemade yogurt off.  I have lots of sachets of Easi-yo to use, more than I thought I had, so there will be tasty homemade yogurt in the fridge for next week.

 

I have this months finances to work out yet, I am holding off from doing the final budget until we get the credit card bills and I can see exactly what I do have left.  I know for a fact there is not a lot, but I don't know yet how little.  A nice surprise today was the Tesco vouchers falling through the letterbox, we have £15.50 this time.  So if I'm a little crafty and turn two of them into 'frozen food' vouchers this will double their worth and mean that I can shop for £20 of frozen food and £5.50 of necessary fresh fruit or veg and not spend a penny!!

 

Happy No-November folks.  What do you have planned for this month?

 

Sue xx