Miss Thrifty

Whew! Thanks so much to everyone who entered the win a handbag competition. Three hundred and sixty-seven of you got your entries – and your handbag essentials – in before the deadline. Now it’s time to pick the winner! So here goes…

Here is the random number generator that I use. I asked it to pick a number between 1 and 367.

And it picked comment number… (more…)

South of the Watford Gap?

If you are in or around London at 6:30 pm on Thursday 24 February, stylist Hannah J is running a Make Do and Mend workshop on Brick Lane. The tickets are £25 each, which I thought sounded a bit dear as you can get a whole new outfit from TK Maxx for that price, but as it turns out you get quite a lot of bang for your buck (in addition to plenty of tea and cake). You get lots of tips and advice; also, you take three “tired” garments with you and are helped to transform them during the course of the workshop. Further information is available here. (more…)

Win a handbag – yes siree. See this one here. You like it? It’s up for grabs.

This competition prize has been donated by ThisHandbag: a new site that stocks one handbag at a time, and sells at heavily discounted prices. The bag on show measures 29 cm by 26 cm, and is available from the website for £9.99 plus £1.50 postage.

To enter, simply leave a comment below, listing one item that you keep in your handbag and couldn’t do without. Apart from your purse or wallet, of course. (For me it’s a notepad: I’m always scribbling things down.)

The closing date is 5 pm GMT on Tuesday 23 February. I’ll pick the winner using an online random number generator.

UPDATE: The competition has closed and the winner has been picked! See here for details.

Last year I got all moody about the jacked-up prices for ordering flowers online. This year Interflora are well and truly back in my good books, after sending me free flowers (huzzah!) and a special Valentines flowers discount for all Miss Thrifty readers:

Discount: 10 per cent.

Code: valblog

Valid from: NOW!

Valid to: Midnight, Saturday 13 February 2010.

T&C: Minimum product value is £25.00.  Discount offer excludes overseas delivery and delivery- included products.

Interflora Website.

P.S.  If you would like to send me some flowers too, please feel free to do so. No really, don’t let me stop you…  I do get offered stuff by PRs these days, but the items are often weird things like a heated coaster or incontinence pads.  So things are looking up, people.

Best Western Hotels is giving away two-night hotel breaks every 30 minutes for 24 hours, from 8 am on Tuesday 9 February. The prizes include dinner, bed and breakfast in a UK Best Western.

This is a Twitter comp. I’m seeing more and more of these; of course, if you’re on Twitter already and you aren’t following me, I demand that you do so immediately! Those who have yet to succumb, however, can enter via Best Western’s Facebook page.

How it works: follow Best Western on Twitter (@bestwesterngb) or on Facebook. Every 30 minutes a question about Best Western will be announced. Find the answer and @reply on Twitter, or submit the answer to the Best Western wall on Facebook. The winner will be selected at random, from all the correct answers submitted within 15 minutes of the question’s announcement.

In case you were wondering, that is indeed a Best Western hotel room pictured above. Earls Court, apparently.

NB. I am not sure if you get to choose your hotel. Let’s hope so, eh?

The January sales have been a Miss Thrifty-free zone this year, partly because (as you may have noticed) I haven’t been around much, and partly because I like to hold off until the last possible moment, when the pickings are heavily discounted.

Some people aren’t keen on sales, because they feel that (a) you can go overboard, splurging on rails of worthless tat; (b) why bother with the dregs that nobody was prepared to buy at full price?  Personally, I am not convinced by these arguments. If it’s rubbish, why buy it at any price? As for the “dregs” defence: this presumes that all the people buying stuff at full price have good taste. Ha! I think not, if the frock horrors falling out of Mayfair nightclubs and WAG boutiques are anything to go by.

Now is the best time to go sales shopping, in my book. Two of my recommendations: (more…)