Miss Thrifty

This is one of those posts in which I say “stuff it”, and cast all modesty aside. Media intelligence company Cision has published a list of the Top Ten UK Personal Finance Blogs – and I’ve made the cut! I’m pretty chuffed.

Here’s the list in full:

THE TOP TEN UK PERSONAL FINANCE BLOGS

With the UK in a deepening recession, it is no surprise that blog readers are in favour of money saving tips. Our Top 10 Personal Finance list indicates the keen interest in personal stories through this recession, with FruGal, Recessionista and Miss Thrifty all offering their own accounts of life on a budget while offering useful advice.

Combining visitor, search and social metrics with in-house expertise, Cision identifies the most read, most discussed and most influential names in the UK personal finance blogosphere.

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Kathryn Vercillo is a writer for Promotionalcodes.org.uk, which gives away free discount code deals and also publishes a blog.

Summer is upon us. It’s a great season for spending more time with the family. Many people use this downtime to explore their own towns and to enjoy events in the area that they normally don’t get to visit. Unfortunately, this can lead people to spend more money in the summer than the do during other times of the year.

Follow these tips for reducing summer activity costs:

1. Make a summer activity budget. Knowing how much money you actually can afford to spend will allow you to get the summer off to a good financial start and to keep it that way.
2. Create a calendar of free events. Find out when all of the free events are in your area and build your summer activities around those. This may include music in the park, outdoor movie nights, street festivals, farmers’ markets and free admission days for museums. (more…)

Ah, I remember when I picked up a Ballantyne cashmere top and a fitted, 1970s velvet jacket for mere pennies. I even bought my 1920s wedding dress from eBay, for around £25. The influx of buyers means that those salad days are long gone, but the increased traffic to eBay has had another, wholly delightful result.

There aren’t just more buyers; there are lots more sellers too. It means that if you press the right buttons (quite literally, in this case), you can dig out some super-spesh bargains in seconds. And this is what I do:

When I’m searching for items these days, I rarely search using brand names. Honourable exceptions, as detailed in a previous post about buying fashion on eBay, are a few labels including Tristan Webber, Boudicca, Elspeth Gibson and Ben de Lisi.

The rest of the time, this box is my friend: (more…)

We were driving back to Yorkshire this afternoon, heading back home on a sunny Bank Holiday Monday, when we got caught up in one of those traffic jams that are so lengthy and interminable, everybody gets out and strolls about on the central reservation, chewing the fat. (Apart from the lorry drivers, who stay in their cabs and eat Pot Noodles.) Eventually we were shepherded down an obscure side road, on an impromptu diversion.

As we slowly made our way through several small villages, scrabbling to find our place on the atlas and thanking our lucky stars that we hadn’t been in the wrong place at the wrong time on this particular occasion, I switched on the radio to get the travel updates and ended up listening to the end of a Radio Four documentary about the life of Roald Dahl.

The documentary described in detail the “Writing Hut” (above) in his back garden, where Dahl sat every day and wrote some of his best-loved books and stories. (more…)

We ran out of floor cleaner so I’ve started making my own, out of some of the old-fashioned tricks and treats that now grace my cleaning cupboard. It costs pennies and works just as well as the relatively expensive, chemical equivalent. The tiled floors also seem to dry more quickly, although I don’t know why that is.

Here is the recipe (if you can call it that): (more…)

Thanks to the Chiconomise girls for pointing me in the direction of this one: from now until 11 June, you can get 20 per cent off online purchases at Karen Millen by entering the code cosmo9 at checkout. You can also get the discount in the real-life store, by taking in a copy of this month’s Cosmopolitan magazine.

My advice: make a beeline for the silk shifts, the stretch satin numbers or this very Zac Posen-ish taffeta top (left). Steer clear of the one-shoulder tops (which are all over Karen Millen right now and looked dreadful on everyone last time around) and those billowy cotton dresses that resemble crumpled tea towels hanging on kitchen pegs.

Here are the discount details.

It may have seemed like a quiet week this week, but trust me: it’s been manic. Priorities sprouting and deadlines looming left, right and centre; I’ve been getting four hours kip a night, Margaret Thatcher style, and musing that work:life balance is pretty much work:work balance right now.  

Not that I’m complaining! In the current climate, it’s jolly nice to be rushed off my feet – and I get to keep my husband in bonbons for another month. The end is in sight and normal service is set to resume.

In the meantime, do you remember that a while back I wrote about shopping in the local pound store with a credit note? (Gosh, I’m classy.) I came away with some eggcups, £1 books and a hanging plate bracket – and wondered if I hadn’t gone off shopping altogether.

I underestimated the power of those eggcups (above). My husband thinks they’re the best thing ever, and I’ve been dining on lots of boiled eggs and soliders ever since.

Pound stores (and credit notes) rule.

This is the best competition ever!

UK residents aged 18 or over can enter this News of the World competition, by sending in two of the tokens published in the newspaper today and over the next two Sundays. The winner receives a cash lump sum of £75,000, to fund a year of trumped-up bills and decadent living.

I just e-mailed my husband, who is beavering away making custom guitars in his workshop today:

Miss T: Hello. Can you pick up the NOTW on your way back please, so we can collect the tokens and enter the “Live Like An MP For A Year” competition?  Ta.

Mr T: Yes, sounds brilliant. Can I be a rowdy back bench rebel?  Can I buy pay-per-view adult movies?  Oooh, and two toilet seats?

Miss T: Only if they’re glittery toilet seats, like John Reid’s.

For the benefit of the 35 per cent of Miss Thrifty readers who are based outside the UK, perhaps I should explain. (more…)

As the proud owner of the 24-year-old Thriftymobile (above), I was naturally interested – nay, excited – when the UK Government announced a “cash-for-scrap” car scheme in the recent Budget. The scheme aims to plump up the wilting auto sales industry; in a nutshell, cars aged 10 years or more can be traded in by their owners, who will then receive a £2,000 discount off the price of a new car. Of that sum, £1,000 is contributed by the government; the other £1,000 is contributed by the car company.

Much as I love the Thriftymobile, a £2,000 discount is not to be sniffed at. However, the first seeds of doubt were sowed in my mind when car ads began appearing in the newspapers, touting the new initiative.

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I love Marc Jacobs “Daisy” fragrance and usually have a good old spritz whenever I happen upon a stray tester bottle. Sadly like many bottles of coloured, smelly water, it’s a bit dear: around £50 for 100ml, in SpaceNK.

The solution? I think you’ll like this one…

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