Saturday 6 October 2018

This Week's Frugal Tasks Saturday 6th October 2018

Here are this week's frugal tasks -

*  Made potato cakes for lunch using leftover potato mash from dinner the night before.  They are super yummy and it's amazing how far one large spoonful of potato mash stretches when you add seasonings and a little grated cheese.

*  Gratefully received lots of glass jars from my parents.

*  Juiced a few more lemons and froze the juice.

Cleaned the kettle with citric acid.

*  Baked four loaves of wholemeal bread with extra goodness.

*  Found two cot sheet sets for $5 each from Savers.

*  Decluttered another bag of items,  donated them to Savers and received a discount stamp.

*  Sold one dozen eggs.

*  Dried most of the washing on the line.  Some was dried on clotheshorses and the rest went into the dryer.

*  Gratefully received some water crackers and cheese from a friend.

*  Made up two big bottles of foaming hand wash.  I like to have it on hand ready to refill the pumps if I'm in a hurry.

*  Gifted a jar of homemade jam,  a bar of handmade soap and a candle ( store bought )  to a friend for her birthday.  It's so easy to get presents together when I have these things all year round in my present cupboard.

*  Mended one of Darren's jumpers.

*  Saved the shower warm up water and used it to water the bean seedlings I've been growing.


Birthday flowers from Darren

Flowers from Jessica

Jessica made this for me.  Very yummy  !!

How did you save time,  money or energy this week ?


20 comments:

  1. Happy birthday Wendy! Hope you had a great day. Great list too!
    Kind regards
    Andrea

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    1. I wanted to share with you Wendy that I cleaned my kettle with citric acid and I was so impressed at the results, I just could not believe it! Thanks so much for sharing.
      Kind regards
      Andrea

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  2. Happy birthday to you!!!!! Super gorgeous cake!

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  3. Hi Wendy. Your birthday cake looks amazing. Happy birthday to you! I made potato cakes this week but I used grated potato so they are more like a rosti. Other things on my list:
    * made all meals here at home including a meat-free shepherd's pie with lentils/veg
    * taught my son how to bake two different slices which we had for afternoon teas
    * took our own packed lunch and water bottles to movies
    * happily received a strawberry & coconut cake from a friend & gave her many garden cuttings in return.
    * dried washing on racks undercover of verandah as it's been rainy during week
    * shopped specials for stockpile and saved $37.56
    * planted out 4 zucchini seedlings - one in each of four old pots
    * finished knitting a washcloth that will go in my present box
    School holidays nearly over so next week I'll have to put petrol in the car! Have a good week, Wendy. Meg:)

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    1. That was a wonderful swap Meg. I'm sure you enjoyed the cake.

      I've started knitting the dish cloths again too.

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  4. Hi Wendy and happy belated birthday, I am assuming it was your birthday and I hope you had a magnificent day :).

    You are right that it is just so handy to have a gift cupboard and handmade jams do make the best of gifts for almost anyone. You did well stretching your leftovers to make more meals. The flowers you received are divine :).

    Our savings added up to $152 last week.

    Finances-
    - Listed 32 items on eBay using a free listing promotion saving $99.50 on usual listing fees.
    - Saved more money into our home deposit savings account bringing us to 28.99% of the way there for a new build or 42.17 % of the way there for an established home.

    In the gardens -
    - Picked 1 kg of broad beans, 500 g of snow peas and 23 bunches of silver beet from the gardens saving $99.50 over purchasing them in the shops.
    - Planted 75 heirloom sweet corn seeds in the gardens and then it rained to water them in :).

    Other frugal things -
    - Replaced 2 old falling apart wardrobes in the garage with 2 x 4 shelf stainless steel ones we purchased. I also saved the vintage handles off the wardrobes to sell.
    - Saved dish rinsing & blanching & cooling water to water fruit tree pot plants and newly planted vegetable seeds in the gardens.
    - Used saved grey water from our showers and washing machine to water the house paddock lawns with.
    - Washed out and dried plastic zip lock freezer bags to reuse for other items.

    Have a wonderful week ahead everyone :).

    Sewingcreations15 (Lorna).

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    1. Lorna, I love seeing you home deposit saving goal grow. You should be very proud of every achievement.

      23 Bunches of silverbeet is an amazing amount. Something is eating mine and I'm not sure what it is yet. Cabbage moths are hanging around but haven't seen any eggs yet.

      What sort of things are you selling on Ebay ?

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    2. Hi Wendy and yes that is a huge amount of silver beet indeed. Thank you also for your encouragement on our home deposit :).

      On eBay we sell dried lavender, herbs and saved seeds from our gardens and I design and make homewares such as table runners, table placemats, bread bags, curtain tiebacks, passport covers and luggage tags and pocket wallets.

      Sewingcreations15 (Lorna)

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  5. I love reading how others save. I also love your cake. Happy birthday.

    This week I pretty much managed to stick with the meal plan. This means space is appearing in the freezer.

    We had a family lunch and I gave four jars of strawberry jam and two jars of relish. I also made sure to bring food I could eat as my extended family does not get my dietary needs.

    Our washing machine holds a huge amount so this week I have done two loads and they have been line dried. I need to do a load of dark clothes and the weather is drizzly but I will still hang it.

    I managed to fill the car at the bottom of the price cycle.

    I have purchased a few Christmas gifts and made a list of what I can make out of my stash of fabric. I am knitting doll clothing for my granddaughter.

    Have a wonderful weekend everyone.

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    1. I need to sort out my present list too Suzan. I've bought so many great things from Savers that I now need to allocate.

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  6. Belated birthday greetings - wow! what a cake!

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  7. Oh, Wendy, that cake looks scrumptious!!!
    You’ve had a wonderful frugal week!
    I heard about a 3 day airline sale this week and since this airline had just added direct flights to Houston where our daughter and family live, I thought I would check. Typically it’s about $350 each round trip if I get a good price. We haven’t gone down there in about 3 years. So, I was thrilled to see that I could book a round trip flight for the 2 of us for a total of $330! But as I went to pay for the flight online, they asked if I wanted to get a Rapid rewards Visa card from the airline and use that to pay for my flight. If I did, they would credit $250 to my first bill which would make my flight cost only $80 round-trip for the two of us- $40 a piece!!! I did and so that was my best frugal happening for the week!
    Last Sunday some friends we made when we bought koi from them on Craigslist during the summer invited us back to their home so they could give us 113 free koi since they are getting older and wanted to drain one of their ponds! We were happy to take them - Dave had just found his favorite fish food in large bags on clearance at Lowe’s the week before and bought way more than our 20 fish would have gone through in several months, so we had enough food ready! We gave 3 to a friend with a pond at her new house and she gave us 2 extra blueberry bushes she bought on sale as well as 3 new grapevines! Our friends with the fish told us to sell whichever fish we didn’t want to keep so we will overwinter them and sell off many in the Spring! In our city, there is only 1 fish store and at their prices, the fish we came home with would represent well over $2500!! The only other places to buy koi are 2 hours away so I think we won’t have trouble marketing them in the Spring!
    We sold 3 dozen eggs to one of Dave’s co-workers.
    My little Scrappy Bag business which was just a way to declutter and pare down my enormous fabric scrap collection has now had 40 bags made from it, 32 sold and 4 more orders that I’ve got going ! Every time we think, “We’ll, that was nice to get a little $$ as we clear and organize the sewing room and now we are caught up in orders and it’s probably over”, new orders come in and we are humbled and grateful for this blessing! A friend suggested it was time to re-market our “Softies”- a flannel alternative to Kleenex that are reusable and within a couple of hours of posting, we had sold 6 bundles!
    I found already chopped bags of onions- 5 pounds for $1 and bought the four bags they had. I spread them out in batches on my dehydrator trays and will add to our stock of dried chopped onions that I use constantly in cooking! All with very little effort!
    It’s been a pretty terrific week here! I hope everyone else is having a great week as well! It’s surprising how little things can really add up to major savings!,

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  8. I like to make gifts to add to my stash. I have boxes in my closet that we always shop first for presents. This week, I added a little knitted hat that I made and a tea coaster that wasn't quite my style to a gift my daughter was collecting items for.
    Blessings from Harvest Lane Cottage,
    Missouri, USA,
    Laura

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  9. Happy Belated Birthday Wendy. Your cake and flowers were just beautiful. I just took 3 afghans and 30 ski cap type hats that I made to church for our food/clothing pantry. Now I am making crocheted Christmas stockings which I sell this time of year. I am also working with a lovely young lady (15) who has a passion for veterans. She distributes warm homemade hats to vets to thank them for their service. I live in a very military-centered town (2 naval bases and an army base within 10 miles) and have asked to be a distributor down in this area. So I also see me making many more hats, only this time specifically for military veterans. I had a little shoot that came out of the dead tomato plant, so I have been watering it. I now have flowers and hope for another crop of tomatoes from this too. You never know.

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  10. Happy Birthday. The cake looks wonderful. My garden is really slowing down and will be finished soon. I made more hot sauce with some of the hot peppers from the garden. I also made a huge batch of chili with tomatoes and peppers from the garden. I always add twice the beans that the recipe calls for. It made 16 servings. I froze 3 big containers for future meals. The rest of my week is here: https://mcoia.blogspot.com/2018/10/my-frugal-list-week-of-october-1-2018.html?showComment=1539088890885#c1795325669490281218

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  11. After having the worst August month in my life I needed a few weeks to get my life back on track. I hope you had a wonderful birthday, those flowers were so lovely and the cake looked awesome.

    This week ive been making home made cordial from some free lemons. I cooked our meals from scratch, and made sure I used the leftovers for lunch the following day. I'm making some food hampers up for Christmas so I used a store gift card to pick up some half priced grocerys. I got hit with an unexspected bill for $1100 so rather than use my savings I have paid it and am trying to recoup the money from extra savings. I will be glad when my pay raise comes and gets back paid it wont be much but will be something. I earned $90 last month from surveys and am at nearly $100this month it will add up quickly.
    I have Christmas organised just need to get the presents sorted and wrapped. It's mums 90th birthday on the 18th of December so I need to get my thinking cap on.
    Hope everybody is enjoying the great weather take care all. Leanne


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