Battening down the hatches

Oh no! Could not manage without my credit card, though I do pay it off every month. That way it works well. Yes, I know I'm lucky I can do that. Hardly ever use debit card, rarely carry cash.

Make a weekly menu and shop to your list. We've also found that by shopping locally and in season we get better quality and, what really surprised us, better value. I think it's not have isle after isle of tempting goodies and no money off deals tempting us to buy stuff we don't really need.

Use Quorn mince instead of meat in lasagne and shepherds pies, it's healthier and tastes the same.

Keep a small notebook with you and write down EVERYTHING you buy. It's like keeping a weightwatchers record - slimming for the purse.

Supplement lurcher dogs feed with left overs - it'll save on pet food and s/he'll love you for it.

(Merlot we have to pay £80 for our chimney to be swept and the multi burner serviced so I suppose £60 is probably about right.)

I have a budget as suggested earlier, worked out with brutal honesty. I know exactly how much income has to be put away, and how much can be spent or saved.

I shop at Aldi instead of the big supermarkets, and I'm another one who waits a day or two after the fortnight ends, to do the next shop. Eventually a pay day comes along with no big shopping to be done.

i have hens, so my eggs work out cheap, even considering the laying pellets. I add weeds to their feed - free of course.

I make soup from cauli and brocolli stalks (I cut them and freeze them till i have enough) with added onion and herbs. I use a crock pot for this.

I grow herbs and fruit and vegetables. We have terrible soil here - stony clay - so i make compost and grow the stuff in that. Next doors give me their veggie peelings for my compost bin, and the other next door gives me her lawn clippings, so the compost soon builds up.

I buy meat and fish in bulk and freeze it all. This means I never have to pop out to the shop for something for dinner. I also do egg meals sometimes, and other cheaper meals, such as tinned mackerel in noodles and cheese sauce.

I use public transport, and use my pensioner card wherever possible. We do have a car, a small three cylinder Daewoo, which my husband drives when forced by necessity (He's agoraphobic, but I no longer drive so he has to)

I enjoy 'inventing' things in the garden, which cost nothing. For instance. I needed a container for liquid manure (made from chicken poo contained in a porous bag made from an old lace curtain), so i found an old very large bucket and made a lid for it from a conflute sign left over from the last election.

I found an old metal frame about to be dumped, and use it as a raised garden beg after surrounding it with recycled chicken wire and filling it with dead leaves topped with compost.

I have a metal single bed which was unuseable as the frame had twisted a bit, so I also use that as a raised bed, with sides made from more old chicken wire.

I keep the bags the chicken laying pellets come in, and fill them with old leaves until I need them for another raised bed.

Of course, i also recycle polystyrene boxes from the greengrocers for planting boxes. There's lots more but you get the picture.

Having an agoraphobic husband helps the budget of course - he rarely wants to go out and never at night. I meet up with friends once a week at U3A: we have lunch and a good natter.

It keeps me sane - well, sort of relatively speaking.

My goodness, Joan - you are an inspiration! Good for you!

Gosh Joan - I do admire that, but can't quite do it myself! You've turned re-cycling into an art form.

I did unearth a pair of shoes this morning, brushed them up and put in white laces. They almost look like leather keds, which I can't get here!

Gawd - I'm not an inspiration - it is all necessity! Well, necessity in the sense that I lead a somewhat restricted life, same as all people caring for a loved one with health problems.

I need to use my brain, and I need to be outside a bit, so thinking up things for the garden helps. We are on the basic pensions - disability pension for my husband and carer's pension for me. With a tiny amount from the UK, we manage to eat well and keep the house air conditioned.

Eating well is not the same as eating expensively of course: like most of us on here, I know how to cook without using processed food: I go by the idea that if my own gran would not recognise the food, or it has to be made in a factory, it is probably not worth eating. Basic foods are cheaper and healthier anyway.

My other method of warding off insanity is writing - that costs almost nowt as well.

And of course the equivalent of gossiping over the garden fence, ie this forum.

Well my advice is the same as the others really. Shop at Aldi or Lidl, cook from scratch, make your own bread, soups, casseroles etc. I cant beleive people pay for a little plastic box of carrots cut into matchsticks - just get the carrots!!

I put away clothes I dont wear then after a while go through them again. I have started wearing my hand knitteds I made years ago and had put them away as I thought they were frumpy. Now I am enjoying them again (and getting compliments!)
On cold evenings I go to bed early with an electric blanket and save on heating bills. Free bus pass is fantastic - I can get out and about.
Good luck - it's a challenge. Reminds me of my student days when I lived on porridge and baked beans!! (well, not quite!!)

Something which gives me great pleasure (sad old dear) is reviving either a garment I haven't worn for ages and suddenly seems quite right, or rescuing a pair of scuffed neglected shoes, giving them a good polish and a few days on shoe trees and rediscovering why I bought them in the first place! After a couple of years in the suitcases in the loft it's almost like having a new wardrobe. The idea of the white laces is an inspiration, rather like my mum's way of changing the buttons on a jacket or cardi to give it a new lease of life.

Joan I think you are inspirational and I can recognise good old Yorkshire common-sense coming through in all you write!

I agree 100% on your well-made points about about grans' non-recognition of foods too! My dear old Mum fed five of us children on what she could make or grow and we ate well if plainly. I still dream of her home made bread - oven-bottom cakes were a particular treat - A Yorkshire delicacy! (with home-made gooseberry jam - yum!)

I pay off my credit card every month and stop buying as much as possible if I notice I have spent over budget. I try to shop a day later every week, mainly online with vouchers, and sometimes live out of the freezer and store cupboard to get spending right down. I buy some things in bulk when they're on offer, like dog food, toilet rolls, and cleaning products.

My daughter introduced me to B and M Bargains, a store that is spreading rapidly around this area, and one has just opened near me. The prices are ridiculously low, and they have lots of things like £1 rhubarb crowns and climbing plants, cheap tins of sweetcorn, half price quilted toilet rolls and suchlike. Turnover is fairly random, so there's always something different in there.

I always have different kinds of flour and yeast in my baking cupboard, and can soon knock up bread, cakes, cheese and onion pies, quiches etc if I have guests. I keep Aldi 70% chocolate in stock, so a chocolate mousse can soon be produced, and cocoa powder and walnuts are always there for a quick batch of brownies or cookies, which the grandchildren like to make.

I find that staying away from local supermarkets saves me money. No surprise there. Now i have milk and eggs delivered, I have no reason to go shopping on a whim, so temptation is removed.

I still can't live as cheaply as my son, who has another year of uni before he qualifies and lives on a bursary and NHS bank work at weekends. He can manage on £15 a week for groceries, is veggie, and eats lots of lentils, beans and pulses, buys from food cooperatives, and picks up a mixed bag of fruit and veg from a friendly asian greengrocer who makes up the bags fresh every day for £2, containing misshaped root veg and the cheapest produce that is in season. A fraction of supermarket prices, and a great idea. They sell as quickly as he puts them out on his stall. Mind you, son's motive for living cheaply is so he can socialise with his mates and be able to buy a few rounds!

Hello everyone, I only joined GN just over a week ago and while I posted a couple of comments I had decided to leave the site as I felt every one was more middle class ,better educated and had so much more self-confidence than me- I have almost none, but having read these posts I realize I am not so different after all.I also have a DH with some memory problems which does isolate me rather and have to budget like others amongst you so a very big thank you I will stay with you.

Stick with us ann60. I've not been posting long either. There's seems to be a great variety of everything and everyone on GN. As for self confidence well it's quite anonymous so try not to worry.

I was interested I your comment that your DH has some memory problems. I'm seriously starting to think my GOM has some genuine problem too. I've been putting his grumpiness down to Grumpty Old Man syndrome, but beginning to think there's more to it than that.

PS sorry .... have wandered off thread. I too like a bargain, does anyone watch Superscrimpers?

annsixty on Gransnet we are all different individuals, we have all experienced different lives..... but we all have one thing in common we all enjoy a natter, a laugh and I hope we have all found comfort from each other if we have needed it, so please stay with us.

Welcome Ann and I'm glad you've decided to stay! Everyone is valued on here and no-one is better than anyone else so please don't be frightened of posting your views, queries or comments. A lot of us avoid the more contentious posts but if you feel up for a heated debate you can find that on here too. You can opt out or in at your pleasure!

So glad you didn't leave us, annsixty. We're a mixed bunch and the beauty of this site is that we have loads of different interests, opinions and convictions and this is the place to air them.

Thank you all so much I did have to wipe a few tears away I hope to feel able to join in to help my feeling of isolation

Welcome, annsixty. You certainly don't have to be middle class or have any particular sort of education to post your views on here. Spelling and grammar don't bother most of us (I use Spellcheck before I post anything) so I hope nobody is put off because of that. I managed to get into higher education as a mature student, but I am still the same person who grew up in the back streets of Salford. (Well, I am more politically aware now, although I do remember singing 'Who said Labour wouldn't win' outside the Labour Party Committee rooms as a young person).

When interest rates were good I used to live off my creditcard, pay everything as soon as it was due each month, but get interest on the money I'd put into the bank. I impulse buy terribly when I do go into town or go to a supermarket and sometimes think I should go shopping more often as I tend to get overwhelmed and buy too much [I always point out to whoever serves me that 'I don't get out much']. Our local surgery has a bookshelf full of really good books for sale so it's always worth seeing what they have on offer. By the way, what are the sort of things that Aldi are good for; I haven't been there for a while. I spend a lot of money on cd's and must learn how to download things, although now I've discovered Radio 6 I prefer listening to that all day. And I've stopped [well, almost stopped ] betting on the horses because I won so little it was costing me more in petrol picking my 'winnings' up than I'd won. Do price comparisons for pretty much everything when policies come up for renewal; it's amazing how many people just pay the same company each year. And, we must support anything to do with petrol prices and utilites bills, because in this country we're being screwed over badly with what we're made to pay.

Hi annsixty and welcome. There's lots of room for every individual on here and plenty of threads to keep you interested. You can start your own, too.

annsixty I'm happy that you've decided to stay. GN is a life-line for the likes of me. I had no confidence. I was lonely and depressed. And then I found Gransnet. I cannot begin to thank the lovely people that I now "connect with." Whatever problem bubbles up from time to time, I have no qualms about expressing my hopes and fears on this forum. You, too, will benefit from the kindness of strangers...

Hello annsixty - pleased to meet you! I joined Gransnet last year and I would be lost without it. We're all different, have different views, but rub along nicely in the main! Don't you be worrying about being lacking in confidence, either - no-one will know! soop has just said that she doesn't have any qualms about bringing up her hopes and fears, and neither do I. Please feel comfortable about talking to us.

Nobody's mentioned the Poundshop. I get all sorts there.

There's a programme about the Poundshop tonight, Secrets of the Poundshop, 8pm on Channel 4.

I like this thread .
I have been invited to spend Christmas with D3's in-laws so there will be 9 adults and 4 small children; presents are to be limited to £5 per person and all are to be obtained at a 'Chazzer' (charity shop) and be suitable/or not, for each recipient. Money will definitely be saved all round and fun will be had - I can imagine present opening on Christmas morning will be hilarious.