Living the Frugal Life (Semi-lighthearted) ?

Grow-your-own attempts being made here.
OH says my finger length butternut squash is a joke!

I use a Maybelline foundation in a glass bottle with a pump action dispenser. When it is no longer pumping any out, I prise the top off with a knife and get many more applications!

We have stopped the delivery of our daily newspaper and are saving £20 a month. I now walk to the local shops to get it. Probably will regret it when the weather turns nasty.

I always cut toothpaste tubes and skin cream tubes in half when you can't squeeze them any more and decant them into small pots kept for that purpose. They can last up to 10 days or more!

I do that too FairFraise , it’s amazing how much you can get out of ‘empty’ moisturiser tubes etc

I still cannot bear to throw away the last sliver of a bar of soap. I don't save them up either, I spend ages tying to soften them and stick them on to the new bar! Which is then lumpy and uncomfortable to use at first. I probably get about another 3 washes out of the sliver..............

I buy supermarket own brand dishwasher tablets and snap them in half. I find the dishes still come out perfectly clean with just half a tablet.

Tesco and Aldi own brand are good and half the price of the premium ones.

I wash sandwich bags and freezer bags, line dry and re-use.

We collect free wood to dry and then burn, Mr B also collects all the unwanted free newspapers on a Tuesday and makes them into paper bricks to burn. Me, I am having one lump of sugar instead of two in my coffee

Given that this is humorous, for me, bellowing at my DD to 'Turn the bl**dy tap off!' when she's doing anything and just leaves it running. Grrrrr

Yes, wash plastic bags and use the last sliver of soap. At least we're not boiling them down and making new bars, the way my granny did Baggytrazzas!

Maximise the oven being on and cook anything that is liable to need cooking over the next 24/48 hours. Can always reheat in microwave.

I do most of these. If I am peeling potatoes and they have decent skins, I make potato peeling crisps. I drizzle them with oil and sprinkle whatever spices I have on them and cook in the oven when I have the oven on for something else. A nice snack.

Always do my daily walk with a poly bag in my pocket (and secataurs). I have picked 6lbs of blackberries already.

Blackberries can be found town or country, whereever there is untended land - and local councils are leaving more and more urban foot paths untended. I was walking in a modern estate of a local town, this week, threaded with footpaths and brambles.

I also look for other chance crops: apples, greengages, hazelnuts, walnuts and, later crabapples and sloes (makes cheap gin taste phenomenal)

To save water I have compiled a list of “nice young men”,” with whom to share bathing.

And also to save water, brushing my teeth with chilled white wine.

I have found the perfect answer to a cheap water bill! I live next door to a bachelor. When the water board fitted a water meter it would appear the meter has been attached to his house not mine! I have only just found this out so have been fairly careful with water…..but not half as careful as he is! ?

Just to say I will be putting the water board right!

joannapiano we read the newspapers on our I pads on the press reader app. It’s through our local library and it’s free. You can also get magazines and on the Borrow box app there are books and audiobooks.

My frugal tip is if using a small amount of kitchen paper I cut it in half and use it. Learnt that in lockdown! Sounds really miserly but cuts waste too.

FannyCornforth

I do that too FairFraise , it’s amazing how much you can get out of ‘empty’ moisturiser tubes etc

And me.......I detest waste and the thick creams cling to the side of the tubes. don't they? So annoying!

I make my own soap. Fun and cheap!

I do all of the above.

I also put the washing machine on to do an extra spin (12 minutes) so that clothes are quicker to dry, outdoors if it’s fine and in the conservatory if it’s wet.

I’ll never recoup the cost of putting in raised vegetable beds as frozen veg are fairly cheap, so next year I will be growing flowers to cut from seeds given to me by family, water is from the water butts, hopefully it will rain and refill them over winter.
I still have a sack of organic fertiliser to spread over the ground in the winter, it’s 3 yrs old now and shows no sign of emptying. Sigh.

Cutting will be taken from Geraniums, for next year.

TBH we are fairly frugal anyway, some things are so automatic that to me it’s just common sense rather than an ‘oh my I must do that too’ .

Maybe there is something else I can do but at the moment I can’t think of anything.

However, Midgey and Maw have given me a couple of ideas.

I’ll keep watching this thread.

MawtheMerrier ????

MawtheMerrier don't be a tease...who is on your list and would you consider sharing thats super saving water!

MawtheMerrier - ????

Do you remember 1976 and the lapel badge which said “Save water- bath with a friend”? Think there might be a flood if I tried that now.

Kate1949

I use a Maybelline foundation in a glass bottle with a pump action dispenser. When it is no longer pumping any out, I prise the top off with a knife and get many more applications!

I do this with my double wear foundation, I use the pump tube to go around the inside and I have had at least 10 more applications..