Miss Thrifty

Yes, I know I’m really late to the party. I’d read all about Freecycle, which reduces waste by encouraging people to post their unwanted items online, and pass them on. But I hadn’t really paid much attention, because (a) Freecycle always popping up in those same rubbish “recessionista” features in the women’s pages. You know: those round-ups that tell us all to go out and stuff fallen fruit into our Lulu Guinness handbags, and take our clothes to “swap parties”. Also, (b) I’d presumed that Freecycle’s domains were eco-trendy places like Islington and Brighton, rather than my creaky Yorkshire backwater.

But lo! I looked Freecycle up, and it turns out that the little place in which I live (pop: 13,000) has its own, thriving Freecycle group. (more…)

I’m surprised the mint and parsley have lasted this long, in their big fired pots out on the patio. But as the days get shorter and colder, both herbs have faded.

So I have now picked the nicest leaves and put them in the freezer. The mint goes in a water-filled spare ice cube tray; I don’t bother making parsley ice cubes, but chop the herb and chuck it in a freezer bag instead. I can pull the herbs out when I need them, and I expect that they’ll last until my fresh mint begins growing again and I can grow some new parsley from seed.  

I like the mint cubes in mojitos!

Who’d have thunk that Woolies would be a magnet for frugal gardeners? It really shouldn’t surprise me - after all, that shop sells everything - but since discovering that it sells good gardening products at rock bottom prices, I’ve become a fan.

If you’re a super-organised gardener looking ahead to your Spring beds, I’d recommend that you check Woolworths out. The plants themselves are hit and miss - a forsythia I bought last year has done diddly squat - but the bulbs and seeds are great value for money. Cheaper than the supermarkets and discount stores, even. (more…)

Our new composter arrived today. It looks like this:

We have put it out in the garden, behind the shed. You dump the peelings etc. in the top, and scoop out the resulting compost through the sliding hatch at the bottom. This is a family-sized bin and it’s massive: I think it will take us a year to fill it!

Not only is it eco-friendly, it only cost us £20.00 including delivery! Our county council (North Yorkshire) is subsidising the costs of all home composters purchased by residents.

We bought it from the website recyclenow.com; if you are reading this in the UK, enter your postcode into the site’s homepage to find out if you can get money off too. You can also enter a competition to win £100 of gardening vouchers.

Five composting tips: (more…)

I’m about to blaspheme.

I have found fault with the Women’s Institute.

There’s a feature in The Times captioned Old-Fashioned Home Economics: As household bills soar, the Women’s Institute offers some valuable lessons in thrift. And I’m not impressed!

To put this into context: I’m obsessed, in an utterly unhealthy way, with the WI. Despite their attempts to rebrand themselves as young and funky (see website link above) we all know the truth: it’s about flouncing around in pearls and flowery frocks, making jam, beef Wellingtons and Victoria sponges, and giving rapturous applause to visiting speakers who hold forth on a variety of life-affirming, vicar-tinged subjects. Before I offend any WI members reading this, I should also point out that the idea of wearing pearls and flowery frocks, and making lots of conserves, makes me drool. When we moved to Yorkshire from London, I naively believed that I could finally join the good ladies of the WI and fulfil my ultimate Domestic Goddess fantasies.

Sadly, it was not to be. They meet every Wednesday afternoon at two - when I’m at work (duh).

Even so, my heart did a little skip when I saw this article. I confidently assumed that it would be a cornucopia of thrifty gloriousness. (more…)

I was in sunny(ish) Essex this weekend, catching up with some of my nearest and dearest. I spent yesterday hanging out with my grandparents. Not for the first time, my grandma’s thrifty supremacy had me marvelling. 

“Have some jam, dear”, she said, throwing open a cupboard in the garage to reveal shelves stacked with jars of glinting jams and jellies. The jars have all been saved, and much of the fruit comes from her garden or her friends’ gardens. I came away with marmalade, yellow plum jam, bullus plum jam (never heard of this but apparently it is “nice and sharp”) and a good old-fashioned blackberry and apple.

My grandma then insisted on filling the trunk of my car with a horticultural smorgasbord. She takes so many cuttings of her plants, her garden often resembles a garden centre: laden with plants and pots of various sizes. In went a hundredweight of busy lizzies, geraniums, clematis, a disinterred gooseberry bush wrapped in a damp towel, and more. When I admired a high-climbing jasmine, she set about it with her secateurs and handed me some long leafy stems, telling me that if I set these in earth, they’ll take.

And so to lunch! We had a trout, freshly caught and donated by one of my grandad’s friends, with homemade chips and homegrown veg. Pudding was a homemade creme caramel: fnar.

My grandma has discovered that Snappy Snaps is offering 6″ x 4″ photo prints for just 10p apiece, so we spent the afternoon browsing through her latest stack of holiday pictures.

Frugal Grandma, I salute you.

Do you have houseplants? Don’t bother buying those special leaf cleaning products, such as these £3.99 Leaf Shine Wipes from Betterware.

Just pop all your plants into the bathtub or shower, and spray them from above. It washes dust from leaves, freshens plants up, takes seconds and costs nothing.

Basil: Ants in the kitchen drove me mad last summer - until I discovered that basil is Ant Kryptonite. Buy a pot from the supermarket for £1.99 or thereabouts, put it in a bigger pot and (more…)

Growing your own vegetables? If, like me, you are doing battle with legions of horrid garden slugs, rest assured that help is at hand.

Up until now, I’ve always gone for methods of slug control that are purse-friendly, but primitive. If I catch them anywhere near my lollo rosso, the salt scatters and the brick swings. My husband is horrified by my barbaric behaviour - a display of sensitivity that I find somewhat incongruous, coming from an enthusiastic crustacea consumer. The poison pellets kill hedgehogs (much more worthy of preservation, in my opinion), and the gloopy slug deterrent that I squirted around my patio pots was expensive and soon gone.  Pfffffff to that, says Salad Psycho Thrifty.

Now Weezl, over at Weezl’s Weblog, has come up with a garden tip that’s so darned tootin’, (more…)