It was a week of bits a pieces here at the Gower Abundant Cottage. A few bargains, some baking, gardening and general frugalness.
Here's what we got up to -
* Gratefully received a small bag of cherry tomatoes from a friend. We've had such a bad growing season for many things in our veg garden. The tomatoes were a real blessing.
* Baked three loaves of wholemeal bread with extra goodness. I used recycled bread bags to freeze the bread.
* Dried all the washing on the line and clothes horses outside.
* Used the solar lanterns each night instead of turning on a lamp in the loungeroom.
* Turned our hot water temperature down a little. We haven't noticed a difference when using the shower. Hopefully we'll see it reflected in our next gas bill.
* Made a double batch of ANZAC biscuit dough. Some was baked for our snacks and the rest of the dough went into the freezer. I gave Megan a few biscuits for the boys to eat. She took them as snacks to the movies and I heard that Luka and Bryson were excited to have them.
* Made 1.5 kilos of brown sugar from scratch.
* We picked raspberries, pears, tomatoes, beans and blackberries from our garden. I collected 4 eggs this week.
* Our local $2 shop is closing down due to shopping centre renovations. I grabbed a few items when they had 25% off. The next day I wanted Darren to have a look to see if he needed anything. That day they had 50% off. We bought a few hardware items, greeting cards ( for Darren to give me @ 33 cents each ), craft ribbon, liquid hand soap ( good brand too ) and a few items for Luka and Bryson's Christmas stockings.
* We ate leftovers from Bryson's birthday dinner ( the next night ).
* Fed bread crusts, an old cucumber, grass and weeds to our chickens.
* Saved the shower warm up water and washing machine water.
* Most days we didn't need any heating or cooling on. Usually I have a few doors open to let a breeze through. One morning was a bit cold so I turned the heater on for 1 hour.
* Made leftover mashed potato into potato cakes and cooked it for lunch the next day.
* Cut open and scraped out a hair conditioner bottle.
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| Potato cakes for lunch |
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| Making brown sugar |
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| Scraping out a conditioner bottle |
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| From the garden. |
My mother likes her takeaway sushi etc., to this week I have been pushing eating at home and using things up. I am managing to make a tank of petrol last around the fortnight. I am also trying to buy fuel at its lowest price points. On a pension these higher figures truly are making life difficult.
ReplyDeleteIt's still up in the high 30's here in Perth, we live in such a large country, hard to believe you are using heaters already, even for only an hour, don't often comment but thank you for your blog, I enjoy it very much. Deb.
ReplyDeleteIt's so lovely when people share excess fresh produce like the little cherry tomatoes you received, Wendy. We have a produce swap in our area which is awesome! This week, we saved money in lots of little ways:
ReplyDelete* homemade meals, no takeaway
* made big pot of bolognese sauce and pan of fried rice then froze extras
* made large potato bake with heavily discounted bag of organic dutch creme potatoes - eight serves.
* baked cake, cookies for snacks
* meal planned for week
* chose cheapest fruits at greengrocer - got 1kg bags of black plums, small red gala apples and granny smith apples. I look for fruit under $4 per kg. Also got bag of Odd Bunch pears from Woolworths.
* saved shower warm up water and tipped into wash machine
* made rags out of an old ripped sheet
* used Petrol Spy to find cheapest fuel price and topped up car
* combined errands to save fuel.
I am going to stew granny smith apples today and make 2x apple crumbles. One for the freezer!
Meg