Miss Thrifty

Hey! My post about our forthcoming Thrifty Roadtrip has just made Editor’s Pick at the 35th Money Hacks Carnival!

Thanks to My Two Dollars for organising a great carnival this week, with lots of pictures of steam trains. You can’t go wrong with the Old West.

Also in the carnival: I really enjoyed Lisa at Condo Blues’ post about budget-friendly household cleaners. Lots of white vinegar, baking soda - and crystal clear instructions on cleaning floors, counters and dishes. This tip was new on me:

Vinegar in the Jet Dry container of the dishwasher. Vinegar works to keep spots off the glasses just like Jet Dry, Cascade, or a store brand-sheeting agent. Actually, I think vinegar has better sheeting action and keeps water spots from forming on my glasses. Who knew?

Dear Sainsburys,

I made the following observations, while walking around your supermarket today: 

1. I like your pouch of fresh hollandaise sauce for 99p. It is freezable, so I can pour the contents into an ice cube tray and it will keep us going for a while. This works out at good value. 
2. Talking of your fish section: can you cut the prices, please? The battered haddock at the fish and chip shop is cheaper than your woolly-looking fillet selection. Still, I suppose you’ll argue that your haddock is line-caught and the fish and chip shop’s were trawled in alongside innocent dolphins. Grumble grumble.
3. And no, before you ask: I’m not going to stoop to the economy salmon fillets. I have enough doubts about the provenance of regular-priced salmon fillets, thank you very much.  (more…)

Today is a traumatic day in the Thrifty household. Our statements from our energy provider, Southern Electric, have arrived.

I have been able to scrrrrrrrrrrape my jaw from the floor and regain my composure - but it has not been a pretty episode. We knew our gas and electricity bills were going up - UK energy companies have all shuffled their tariffs skywards over the past couple of months - but we didn’t expect that the rises would be quite so steep.

We do everything by the Thrifty Book: we found the cheapest tariff using uSwitch, and we pay a fixed monthly direct debit, which qualifies us for a 5 per cent discount. We live in a brick mid-terraced house with small rooms, so our usage isn’t that high. For the past year-and-a-bit, we have been paying:

£21 ($39) a month for electricity

£25 ($46) a month for gas

Southern Electric has now written to us to let us know that from this day forth, we will be paying: (more…)

Doesn’t this book look marvellous?

Make Do And Mend was published in the UK in 1943, by the Ministry of Information, at a time when food and clothes were rationed. Every British citizen was permitted one egg a week, a modest cube of cheese and unlimited bread and vegetables. Coupons for clothes were cut from allowance books; enterprising women supplemented these rations with garments cut from curtains, and kohl pencil lines up the backs of their legs, to look like stockings. Their cookware was handed over to be turned into fusiland turned into aeroplanes. (And if all this wasn’t bad enough, their towns and cities were being bombed at night.)  

This frugal tradition continued beyond the Second World War and into the 1950s, when the Manchester Evening News published Take a Tip : a collection of readers’ money saving titbits.

It’s funny, isn’t it? These little booklets have been hanging around for decades, unwanted and unread, gathering dust in attics and mouldering on charity shop shelves while we’ve been out spending and splurging on overpriced frivolites and cheap tat.

Now that we’re headed for a recession - a Depression, even, if the doomiest of the doom-mongers are to be believed - all these pearls of wisdom are suddenly relevant again. With our financial indexes plummeting, our markets in turmoil and our elected representatives banging heads with one another, this seems as good a time as any to revisit some of our forebears’ handiest household hints.

Here are some of my favourites: (more…)

Sabatier makes the most wonderful knives. The metal is thick and the steel blades are strong and sturdy. Holding a Sabatier it is ten times more easy to fillet a fish, carve a roast or fanny around with baby salad vegetables.

I cherish my block of Sabatier knives, and I thought I should really bring it to your attention that the ironmongery chain Robert Dyas is currently selling  Sabatier blocks for just £24.99 - that’s less than half the standard £59.99 retail price.

For your nearest outlet, click here. Alternative you can order online; the delivery charge is £4.95.

The five knives in the block are as follows:

Homemaker Barbi has a terrific tip for keeping the contents of your salad drawer fresh. Stick a clean, dry sponge in there! The sponge absorbs the excess moisture; foods that are prone to mould and mush, such as strawberries and tomatoes, stay fresher for longer.

I love tips that are as deliciously simple as this one.

My tip for wallet-friendly (and lung-friendly) oven cleaning made Editor’s Pick at the latest Money Hacks Carnival!

Thanks to Anna at On a Quest to be Debt Free, who has put a great carnival edition together - one of those ones packed full of useful tips and stuff you didn’t know you didn’t know.

I particularly enjoyed Dear Money Guy’s post on How To Become A Millionaire Selling Blood Plasma For Money; we don’t get paid for donating blood here in the UK, but I can dream on!

I also liked the post from Living Well on Less, about how you can be frugal without giving up the hobbies you love. She is giving hand-quilting a go, and her movie buff husband is renting free DVDs from the local library.

Oh frabjous day! It’s Final Clearance time at House of Fraser department stores - and there’s a bunch of Guzzini stuff on sale.

If you aren’t familiar with Guzzini: it’s an Italian design company. They make handsome plastic kitchenware, and their products tend to be either futuristic or deliciously retro in design. Like Alessi, but cheaper - and better, in my opinion. I love Guzzini. I love it even more when it’s reduced!  

I can wholeheartedly recommend the two-tone salad set (above), reduced from £20 to £16. I have this set in red, and people coo over it when they come round for dinner. (I know, I know - I’m beginning to sound like Betty Draper. I’m an emancipated female, honest.)

I also have my beady, bargain-hungry eye on the slinky jug, which is available in clear or fuchsia and has been reduced from £10 to £8: (more…)

I use the grill in my oven a lot. Result: a really mucky oven! Unfortunately, I’m just not cut out for the industrial-strength cooker cleaning products that you can get from the supermarkets. I try my best: I open the back door, I open the windows and I hold my breath when I spray. But the stuff gets in my eyes and stings, burns my throat, and gets in my lungs and makes me cough. It’s not easy, being a delicate English rose!

So I’ve been trying a gentler solution, which has been working quite well. It’s eco-friendly and lung-friendly - and it’s super-cheap, too. (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…)