Due to the extreme heat Melbourne has experienced this week, I was unable to get to my laptop to post this week's frugal tasks. It was just too hot to open a curtain so I could see the keyboard to type away.
Our outdoor deck was finished during the week and Darren spent many hours getting it all painted. We also had new furniture delivered yesterday during the 44 degree heatwave. It was a toss up between resting in front of the tv and staying cool or getting hot unpacking the new furniture and setting up our bedroom. We did a bit of both but thankfully a cool change came late in the afternoon to make things easier.
Here's a couple of photos of our week and I'll be back with lots of frugal tasks next Saturday
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| Almost finished |
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| Darren painting the handrails and slats |
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| New bedroom furniture |
What frugal tasks did you complete this week ?
Hi Wendy,
ReplyDeleteYou're new deck and furniture looks lovely. How exciting!! This heat is oppressive, it is hard to get motivated. This week I managed to do a lot of cleaning, cooked from scratch and not bought anything. I am treating myself to a coffee out with a friend today. I find joy in simple pleasures.
I saw on nine.com.au that Miracle spray had a feature article. Many were sining it's praises in taking off the soap scum. I've had trouble buying Eucalyptus oil as Woolies and Coles only stock the water solvable type so I started to search and found that Bunnings has a 250ml bottle for $10.20. That's a $1 per batch of spray. Bargain! It can be found in the cleaning isle the brand is Glitz Green. That would keep us in miracle spray for around a lng time! So excited. Have a great week. Keep cool. Rachel:)
Oh I love your new bedroom furniture it’s gorgeous. Don’t blame you for having a shorter list the hot weather makes it very difficult to do many household chores. We are in Tassie and have had hot weather and a lot of smoke it was so thick yesterday that even going outside for a short time meant your clothes smelt of smoke. We spent most of the day with the house locked up sitting in front of the a/c. Thankfully it’s not as bad today.
ReplyDeleteAlexandra
Some parts of Australia have been unbelievably hot and It is understandable the there bare minimum is done. I am still recovering form hand surgery is even hanging the laundry out is more of a chore than usual. However, most of the time we are being mindful to keep our electricity consumption down so life plods along as it normally does. I have made birthday cakes, cooked for a family barbecue and made sure to use the air con wisely.
ReplyDeleteWendy I so relate to the heat being oppressive of late we have had temperatures of 34 - 39 oc most days but thankfully had a late storm yesterday and the day before. The deck is looking great as is your new furniture.
ReplyDeleteLast weeks savings added up to $162.77 :).
Blessings -
- We finally got around from our estimate around 5mm of much needed rain to partly fill our rain tanks and water the dry ground.
- A friend who has too many eggs gave us 1.5 dozen which we will put to great use in our home.
In the kitchen -
- Made a 1.02kg batch of chocolate fudge from condensed milk made from our food storage and other items we had in our grocery stockpile saving $55.67 over buying it in the shops (fudge is running out at $3.50 per 60g to buy :O ).
- Made a 2.2kg pie from meat from roast chickens we purchased on special on Christmas Eve and tinned mushrooms and corn saving us $36.15 over buying it from the supermarkets.
Listings and finances -
- Paid another extra small payment on our home loan to save interest and time on the loan.
- Using a free listing promotion on Ebay I was able to list 43 items free of charge saving $70.95 on usual listing fees.
Water Preservation -
- During a recent storm where the rain came down heavily I put out rain barrels to catch the rainwater going over gutters and rain water tank sheds. We have been using this water to fill drink bottles, hand washing water buckets and water our potted fruit trees and herbs rather than using town water.
- We saved grey water from our washing machine to water ornamental plant pot plants and used our grey water that was pumped from our grey water tank to water 2 mulberry trees rather than use town water.
Hope everyone has a wonderful week ahead :).
sewingcreations15 (Lorna).
Looking great -hope the next week is better weather for you
ReplyDeleteVery exciting things happening at your house!
ReplyDeleteLooks lovely, too.
Hope it cools down soon.
Deborah
Try to stay cool and not overdo.
ReplyDeleteYour deck looks great, as does you furniture. It's amazing for me to think of you being so hot over there, as it's winter where I live. Even though I don't have snow, the cold, rainy, foggy weather warrants a nice, warm fire every day to keep us cozy! I'm sure that though is repulsive to you right now! I hope you cool down a bit.
ReplyDeleteI've been cooking quite a bit, using up bits of this and that from the freezer, canning cupboard and pantry. I went over my grocery budget a bit in December, and am right on track to be under this month, to even things out. Although that is a great benefit of using things I've stored, the main reason I embarked on this challenge is because I need to be sure to rotate the items in my stockpile before any would go bad. It's also a good time of year here to use things like beans, roasts, etc. because warm, cozy food is wanted.
I've been able to work on a couple of sewing projects as well, and much of what I'm using for one of them is fabric and supplies I've had for a long time. It's a baby quilt for my husband's nephew and wife's upcoming child. I only bought what I needed to complete it, and will go back and get more of the correct cloth if I absolutely have to. The other project was a pair of pajama pants I made for my nephew from a remnant of fabric I got on 1/2 price the sale price before Christmas--a frugal birthday gift and a print he really likes.
This week I brought up dry beans- pinto, kidney and black- from buckets in my basement and put 1/2 cup into each of 16 pint jars and,after adding hot water and 1/2 teaspoon of salt, pressure canned them to replenish my supply of beans that are ready to open and use in salads, soups, etc without any long prep time ! That has saved me so much time and money and added a great inexpensive source of protein into our diets! And it’s rotating beans that have been stored in my basement for 20 years. And they come out tasting perfect- not crunchy, not mushy!!
ReplyDeleteFinished dehydrating chopped celery (a 5 pound bag, already chopped was $1!!!). One more mason jar filled and vacuum sealed and another one started! So handy when I need celery in a dish I’m cooking up!!
I bought a 50 pound bag of potatoes for $5, so I grated the first 8 pounds and dried them for hash brown potatoes! Those are so handy when I use a recipe calling for fresh or frozen hash browns because when potatoes rehydrate, they end up tasting just like fresh potatoes! So compared with store prices for frozen hash browns, so far I used 80 cents worth of potatoes to get the equivalent of 4 bags of frozen hash browns ($2.19 each) $8.76!
Which means I saved $7.96 or about 90%! Plus they sit happily in vacuum sealed mason jars on the shelf rather than taking up prime freezer space!! And much less space at that! I’ll stsrt another batch this morning and this afternoon, I’ll turn some into frozen French fries! Yum!!
Our little side business brought in another $115 this week so we are happy! This week, Scrappy Bags with sewing/crafty ladies were what sold well, last week it was Microwave Soup Cozies that sold about the same amount! Interesting to us to see how one week, one item is really hot as far as sales and the following week it’s something else! Just grateful that there always has been something we make that sells well each week. As Dave gets ready to retire in 4 months, it’s been a great way to sick away extra money into savings as well as pay down his surgery bill!
Made peanut butter cookies using my DIY cookie mix.
Do, all in all, a pretty productive week!
Gardenpat
HandmadeinOldeTowne.com’
Hi Wendy
ReplyDeleteWow your deck looks fabulous and what lovely new furniture. It is so nice to get some brand new furniture. Last year we did the same as we had mostly second hand furniture that had been given to DP and the same with me and when we moved in together almost 13 years ago it all was different. We made do for sometime but decided that it was time to get matching furniture.
I do hope the heat has settled down for you. We have had constant rain here sine lunchtime on Australia Day. Our river nearby is on flood watch with all the waters coming down stream but so far all good.
We got our electricity bill the other week and what a massive surprise we had. It was our first summer one since moving last year. We saved nearly $400 as we don't have to constantly have the air con running and as this is not ducted we can just turn on the individual air cons in the part of the house that need it. But as the bill is paid weekly and we are always in advance we only had to $200 to go towards it and that was easy to do.
School went back this week so there were lots of home baked goodies done to go in the lunch box saving lots on those packaged treats that are not often used
Hope everyone is having a wonderful week
Take Care
Aly xx