Miss Thrifty

I found this while Stumbling the other day. These words haven’t aged, have they?

Argos has slashed the price of its budget bedlinen range: this kingsize duvet set (left) is now just £5.99, down from £9.99.

The set is 50 per cent cotton and 50 per cent polyester, doesn’t need ironing and comes as a duvet cover and two pillowcases. You can get it in grey, duck egg blue and oyster.

We aren’t talking mega-luxury, super thread count finest Egyptian cotton here. But it’s decent quality bedlinen for a bargain price.

I bought a packet of soap nuts from the Summer Naturals site, and I’m loving them. Soap nuts grow on sapindus trees in China and India; they are sticky and gooey with a surfactant called saponin. Forget laundry detergent; put a handful of these nuts into an old sock, chuck them into the washing machine and let them do their stuff. They really work! They are eco-friendly too, being reusable, biodegradable and lacking the potential environmental impact of shop-bought laundry detergent.

These sticky little nuts also work out very cheap – which surprised me, because I presumed that they would be relatively expensive, in the way that worthy, hippy-friendly things often are. (more…)

Thanks to Miss Thrifty reader Meg, over at the funkyncheap blog, who got in touch after reading the recent post about ways to make money from your house.

She writes:

One thing I wanted to mention – and am encouraging those who live in and around London to do – is to get the house sorted and be ready to rent rooms out for the 2012 Olympics. Kids can double up for a couple weeks – or if you are really frugal, get everyone to camp in one room and rent out the others.

I figure you can rent a double room for £150 a night. You could provide a breakfast: fresh fruit, muffins, juice, tea, coffee, or homemade granola. It wouldn’t break the bank! Think about it: if you have three rooms that you can rent, that amounts to £6,300 for two weeks. That is what some make in a year! It would take some arranging, such as a posted shower timetable. I would also charge extra to do laundry – say £5 a load… Maybe it would cost you £500 for water, electricity etc. – but heck, that is still £5,800 profit! Slap that down on your mortgage and watch the principle tumble.

Bah! I live 250 miles out of London. But it’s certainly an idea for the super-organised amongst us…

Update: This post was selected for the 185th Carnival of Debt Reduction.

Image credit: Meagan.

I was going to post this as a Friday Bargain, but as it turned out I spent all of yesterday evening up a stepladder, spraying my face with paint as I glumly rollered the ceiling. Oh, the glamour.

We’re redecorating three rooms in the house at the moment. It started, as these things often do, with a modest plan – in our case, to move the door of a fitted cupboard in the main bedroom – and snowballed into a neverending DIY saga that has drawn the guest bedroom and the bathroom into its clutches. Right now half the house looks like a junkie squat: cleared of belongings and radiators, with bare plaster walls and for added effect, a mattress on the floor of one of the bedrooms. The other half of the house is piled high with furniture and the aforementioned belongings, and looks like Mr Trebus’ house from that Life of Grime documentary series. Remember Mr Trebus? He was the elderly gent with a hoarding issue, who ended up living in 10 sq ft of his five-bedroom Victorian villa. And climbing in through the window. And not knowing where his television was. (more…)

I dare you not to be inspired by this greenhouse made from old windows. Apparently the windows were collected from local houses that were being torn down. (So it’s eco-friendly too!) The result is featured on the splendid MAKE:blog, which is fast becoming one of my favourite sources of inspiration for sumptuous moneysaving ideas.

Well, I say “inspiration”. I think I probably mean “aspiration”. I’d love to make something like this, but I’m not there… yet.

If you are visiting from The Sunday Times, welcome to Miss Thrifty! My passion for fashion knows no bounds, but neither does my craving for saving…

I update my blog with all the latest frugal tips and red hot discounts. Some of my most popular posts are listed below; if you like what you read, you can subscribe to my RSS feed (up there on the left). Thanks for stopping by  - Miss T.

The Best of Miss Thrifty:

Fake Wedding Cake – Hmmmm!

Introducing… The Thriftymobile

Bowing to Frugal Grandma

Keep insects away with basil and lavender

Cleaning patent leather shoes and bags

Photo credit: mckaysavage.

If you don’t play Scrabble for free online, you may be interested to know that right now Sainburys is selling the original boxed games at a fraction of the usual retail price. The board-games are £4.84, down from £19.99.

Image credit: patrickeasters.

In a couple of posts last autumn, I wrote about the challenges of trying to remortgage when you are, well, anyone right now. I found that as the weeks passed, lenders’ demands of their mortgage customers became increasingly unrealistic.

Firstdirect wouldn’t lend to us because there are three people listed on our mortgage. Abbey, our current provider, would only offer us a new fixed rate deal with an interest rate of 6.99 per cent, plus a £724 arrangement fee. (Erm, no thanks.) Right now only those with lots and lots and lots of equity in their homes are able to claw the few fixed rate deals that remain.

In the end we decided to sit it out and allow our mortgage to slip onto the standard variable rate once our fixed rate expired last month. This has turned out to be an interesting move: back then (September 2008) Abbey’s SVR was 7.04 per cent. Now it’s 4.51%. In real terms, our monthly mortgage payments have fallen by nearly £200. (more…)

Argos is doing a good deal on this Nicky Clarke Dryer & Straightener Gift Box: £24.99, reduced from £69.99.

The straighteners are ceramic-coated and heat to 200 degrees in 30 seconds; the products come in a matching leather-look box. The set has gained the thumbs up in Argos customer reviews, too.

The set isn’t available via mail order, but you can reserve it via the website and pick it up at your nearest store.