Monthly Archives: June 2011

Walking back to happiness.

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A very serious looking, post walk Froogs wearing - LA Gear t-shirt £1 charity shop, Per Una jeans BNWT ebay £8 and Reebok trainers from the Sally Army shop for £2.

Thanks everybody for your supportive and encouraging remarks and comments yesterday. So much came out into the open yesterday that I’ve spent today reeling. I’ll come to terms with it all when I can. In the mean time, I’ll just keep the door, lines of communication, my mind and my heart open.

I’ve always found exercise to be a great stress reliever; if I’ve had a tough day, then a 3.5 mile walk up and down the hilliest hills I can find leave me a lot less worried. I thought I would use this blog to share my weight loss up date. I have kept going, as best I can with a few hiccups, with my frugal weight loss journey. I’m itching to spend some money on a gym, or at least on some sports clothes but I’ve just not got it sensibly to spare when every penny is needed else where. I go out and stride (I don’t like ‘power walking’) in a pair of jeans and a tee shirt. Now though, I’m doing it in a size 14 pair of jeans and size 14 tee shirt. The jeans are still a little too small and I like them to be more boot cut, but as I have hulking great legs and cankles, they look like skinny jeans!!! They will be my photo me and measure me jeans so I can look back and see ‘where I was’. My weight has gone up and down a bit recently but it’s settling at 12′ 8lbs and I hope to get it down to 12′ by August!

For those of you interested in the Dukan Diet, I’m back to making sure that no carbs go any where near me and it’s no surprise, but when I eliminate them, then I go back to losing weight. It works and I’ve just got to stick to it!

Thanks again everyone, we’ll get through this somehow……………and the diet!!!

Until tomorrow

Really cheap and low calorie lunch

frugal food, frugal weightloss

Thanks to everyone who left messages to cheer me yesterday. I’ve done what I can to do as much school paper work as I can, and I’ve done as much to the garden as I can and as much to the house as I can. Good food brightened today.

For lunch today, I made a tomato, courgette and finely diced shallot omelette for both of us. Dearly Beloved had some homegrown new potatoes with his and we both had steamed green beans (courgettes, beans and shallots were home grown). I made a dessert from some lovely rhubarb that I was given yesterday. Before I ate any, being a follower of the Dukan Diet, I checked the ‘stats’ for rhubarb. 21 calories per 100g, high in fibre and vitamin C and K and calcium and potassium, 4.5g of carbohydrates of which on 1.1g sugars, so in Dukan terms - it’s a winner. (Technically it’s a vegetable, not a fruit as the sugar content is so low and it’s 96% water)

I diced and cooked the rhubarb in a tablespoon of water until soft, allowed it to cool and added ‘Splenda’ to taste, I didn’t want it to lose its sharpness. I then mixed it with a pot of almost fat free cream cheese (you could use Quark) until there were no cheese lumps and then poured it into small bowls and we have two portions each. I left it to set, it is what we call a Rhubarb Fool, you can do the same with raspberries, blackcurrants or strawberries. Fantastic English summer desserts. It was really, really nice.

I’m feeling vile about myself as my weight has gone back up to 12 stone and 12 lbs, but I’m being very careful about calories intake and making sure I get an hour’s exercise a day. It’s going to be hard if it gets hot but I’ll try and split it into 30 mins in the morning and then the same in the evening.

Until tomorrow,

Froogs xxxx

Crazy rain and crazy plants!

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The garden spent most of May parched and I saved every drop of water available to get anything to grow. It has rained for days on end and everything has grown incredibly quickly. The potatoes needed more light, so I’ve moved them onto the patio. They have doubled in size in a week. I think we’ll have to start eating them. As you can see, it’s a jungle

The plants in the poly tunnel have suffered from days without light. They are being fed and fertilised and yet they still look yellow. I’m going to have to limbo dance the sweetcorn outside, it’s doing really well!

What thriving and what’s suffering in your garden with our crazy weather?

Until tomorrow,

Love Froogs xxx

Frugal Queen’ll Fix it!

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The bottom of my fridge kept filling up with water, so I turned to my trusty guide book which helps me fix any thing and it is called……………….Google! I simply searched “Why is there water in the bottom of my fridge?” It was one of two things. Either, the drainage pipe to the collection tray is blocked. (I ran downstairs, pulled the fridge out and had a look……clean pipe, no gunk and no blockage…….back to Google!) or the drain hole inside the fridge is blocked. (After coming back up again, I wizzed downstair, pulled out all the shelves from the fridge, found the drain hole and it was blocked!!!!!) I unblocked it and gave the fridge a good clean with some hot water and bicarb! Everything is good and working again!

I’m feeling very clever as Dearly Beloved thought we need a new fridge! No way! It is only six years old and we’ve got to get a lot more wear out of it!!!

So my lovely frugallers, what have you fixed recently and kept going for another day???

Until tomorrow,

All my love, Froogs xxxx

Hey big spender!

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After a week of being so frugal I squeaked when I walked, today loosened up my wallet a bit! We walked into Liskeard this morning for a charity shop mooch. I bought this lovely blue top for £3 in the Hospice shop - excuse the mess in the back ground, I really should tidy up.

£6 - a bit steep but I haven’t spent any money in ages.

Later, we had a look around a second hand shop in Callington that specialised in furniture with some accessories too. I bought the lovely little harbour scene print, because it reminds me of Polkerris, although the real harbour wall doesn’t have a light house.

£4 for the butter dish; I think it’s really pretty!

I also bought this spotty butter dish. We don’t eat butter but the soya marg tub fits inside perfectly. I promise I’ll go back to my frugal ways and not spend any money on pretty things! Have any of you ‘wasted’ a few quid recently?

The NHS, Tescos and Bank charges!

Saving money

I can not and will not complain about the NHS! I got to see my GP today, got the treatment I required and paid the entire sum of £7.40 for a month’s supply of medication! It did result in me losing a day of work as I had to wait to get an appointment, but, the clinic are fantastic, kind, caring and saw me within a reasonable time and no money changed hands, which always pleases me! A massive hooray to everyone in the NHS, they are paid disgustingly low wages, they work unreasonably long hours and their dedication, which always amazes me, is often uncelebrated. (My sister is a nurse on the cardiothoracic unit in Treliske! A precise specialist working with people with lung cancer - all hail the nurses!!!!)

I will however complain voraciously about the see you next Tuesdays who run banks! At least Dick Turpin wore a mask! These people are bare faced robbers! When I paid off my overdraft I was waiting for a clear financial moment to change to a fee free account. They charge £17 just to use the bank account and then £5 on top to use the over draft facility, when not one penny in their hands is earnt by them! £264 a year to use an account, and not to gain from any of the ‘products’ that came with the account was not a good deal to me. On top, my taxes, your taxes and every other suckers taxes bailed out gross negligence and incompetence whilst they sipped champagne in Monte Carlo. We paid for the fat b******s to Lord it up! Today, when I had some spare time in between waiting for the local clinic to tell me they had an appointment to see me, I got on top of some financial matters that I needed to change for quite a while. I changed my bank account to a fee free bank account. I will now be £264 a year better off. That’s a month’s groceries, or the car insurance or one of the other bills that I’ve struggled with. Best of all, is knowing that I’m not giving those oxygen robbers any of my money! **** them! Yesterday Lloyds Platinum, today Lloyds Classic - all the services that I use and no bank charges. If we all did this, they wouldn’t make the iniquitous profits that they do!

Finally, it doesn’t seem much, but I sorted out my Tesco points and exchanged them for ‘rewards’. I use Tesco filling stations as they have the cheapest diesel I can buy and I then save the points and treble them into rewards vouchers. Today, I cashed in £10 of ‘money’ to spend in Tesco to £30 of money to spend in Cafe Rouge! I’ll give them to Dearly Beloved and he can whisk me off on a date some time in the future! So all in all, a funny old day of waiting around for an emergency Dr’s appt (no, don’t worry, Brits will know I am not dying but it’s the jargon used for an appointment ‘on the day’ without prior notice!) saving £264 over the next year and getting a free lunch from my Tesco reward vouchers. A frugal day? I should say so!

Just so scary!

debt free

Hello everyone,

Thanks so much to the responses on my blog on Tuesday. You make me feel heard, listened to and certainly not alone in my debt repayment journey. As you were so kind then, I thought I would share my massive life shift today, and a guilty secret and how I’m going to put it right.

Dearly Beloved and I each have a debt repayment schedule. I have put some of our individual debts together onto 0% interest credit cards, which we have tarted from one to the next for quite some time. We are both using them to get rid of unsecured loans and interest baring credit cards. On one of DB’s credit cards, the last payment went out on the 10th of this month. It was a snowballed debt payment, of all the payments he was previously paying and he is now personal debt free. I pay the big share of the big debts and I feel that I’ve got them in hand.

In 2009, when we sold this house, and found one we wanted to buy a tiny cottage. We went back to our mortgage provide - Santandarseholes, who wouldn’t give us a mortgage, SMALLER! than the one we had as we had borrowed too much money, on personal and unsecured loans! So, the house sale fell through and we had to really take our debts in hand. If we wanted to downsize, then we had to do something about it. I embarked on a truly, madly, deeply frugal journey that has reshaped my life. By the early few months of 2012, we will have paid back in excess of 45K!

Now if you wonder what all of this meandering is for, now is the time for my guilty secret. When we bought this house is 2007, we mortgaged ourselves to our armpits and could only afford to have an interest only mortgage. Now believe me, I have done some utterly stupid things in my life but taking out a mortgage on a house I could not afford is the most stupid thing I’ve ever done! Today, in a huge leap, we’ve begun to put it right!

After the 10th, we contacted Santander and have made arrangements to change our mortgage to a repayment mortgage. Even though we are tied into a 6.5% interest rate until the 9th of September 2012 (when our tied in mortgage term ends), we would still be able to pay off £9000 of mortgage capital before we move house. The more we pay off, the bigger the equity and the more money we’ll be able to put down. We are aiming to buy a small house and pay for it in five years!

So, today we lept into the abyss and have signed the repayment mortgage agreement that DB will drop into the local branch of the building society in his lunch break tomorrow! We’ll also be able to over pay up to 10% of the outstanding balance of the mortgage every year! Sometimes, admitting you’re wrong and putting it right is scary. My interest only mortgage was the silliest thing I’ve ever done and now is the time to put it right!

The Frugal Future?

debt free

Do you get a mortgage statement and pension statement in the same month? I seem to do so. As I am a year and a bit away from trying to sell my house and downsize, I’ve become a price comparison website nerd! I go and look at investment plans and have come to the conclusion that Suze Orman, Martin Lewis and Dave Ramsay have sussed it all out for me. There is no point in paying into a savings fund as long as you have a mortgage. The interest will cancel out any saved gains. So watch this space. I’m locked into a mortgage deal until 3/9/2012! Or I have to pay Santander almost £8,000 for the pleasure of changing my mortgage deal. In the meantime, post debt repayments, I will pay off as much mortgage capital as I can.

Now, you may well window shop. I often look at tents on eBay, or even browse around charity shops and often think of what I might like in the future. Wood burning heating? Solar or PV? In fact, I just want to pay for my new house (which will be compact and bijou) and then think of saving, or solar, or a ground water storage system. Until then, just because I’m nosey, I’ll keep looking for the best deals, whether for energy, utilities or mortgages.

Do you keep an eye on your ‘future finances’ even though, maybe like me, you’re not there yet!
Until tomorrow,
Froogs xxxxx

Scrimping in the warm and dry!

frugal food

As I type, the wind and rain is lashing at my hill top house. The rain is being blown down from Bodmin Moor and in from the sea at Looe and Liskeard, in the middle is being deluged. And, do you know what? I bet everyone here is loving it. Fortunately, my poly tunnel is protecting my veggies from the elements and the rest of my garden is getting the soaking it desperately needs. My water butt is filling up and I’ve put the dust bin outside with the lid off (and a huge stone in the bottom) to catch any rain it can. I’ve also left two buckets out as well (also with stones in so they don’t blow away) to catch the water.

It’s a bit chilly so we’re back to socks and wooly pullovers and in true Widow Twanky style, my house has laundry hanging to dry from every available space. It’s tough gettting work clothes clean and dry for Monday in weather like this!

I’ve had a dig round in the cupboard and found some more scone mix (bought a while ago from Approved Food) and a half full pack of sultanas and I’ve rustled up some scones for the freezer. They only take 15 minutes to cook in a hot oven, so economical on energy too. I baked today and yesterday in my mini-oven, and although I had reservations about its baking abilities, they have come out quite well. I’ve got loads of school prep to do today and I’ll be in the lounge by the big window to get any light there is, under a snuggly blanket as sitting still is not good in this weather.

Is anyone else thankful for the rain?

Until tomorrow,

Froogs xxxxx

Busy Saturday and nothing spent!

Budgeting

It was just a week ago, that at this time, I was wandering around Auray about to go to lunch. Today is just about reality and being frugal and a wee bit eco. Every peeling, shredded newspaper and anything biodegradable goes into our compost, and that is being used to grow our spuds in bags. I use my tea bags and coffee grinds to add nitrogen into our plants. Anything grown in a container needs feeding. I rip open the tea bags and keep the tea and then dig it into the soil and compost around the plants in containers.

Today, has been extremely busy. I shopped at Tesco (online) and my week’s groceries, including pet food, toiletries and cleaning products has come in at £35.75 including delivery. I have lots in my store cupboards to supplement and I’ll be using them up for a while. I’ve also been picking beans and courgettes and they are also supplementing. I’ve baked a fruit cake for Dearly Beloved to take some to work every day and I’m using up a lot of what we’ve got.

Today started with a rigorous house clean. Here in Cornwall, we get a lot of damp and therefore a lot of black mould. I get round this with 21p Tesco value bleach, diluted 50:50 and I spray it on the mould, leave it a while and go back and clean it off. The shower gets mouldy, so do the window frames and corners of rooms, I keep on top of this and usually tackle an area every week.

I’ve also spent time on recycling today. My towelling bathrobe, that I bought well over ten years ago has all but given up, so I’ve cut it up this morning for my rag bag. I usually make wash mittens or dish clothes, but I’ll keep it for when I need it. One of DB’s tee shirts has also given up, so I’ve cut it into strips to add to the knitted bath mat I’m making.

I spent a while this morning compiling my menu plan, based initially on what’s in the house to last us until Wednesday, when my Tesco delivery arrives between 8pm and 10pm. It’s £2.50 cheaper to have it delivered ‘off peak’ and I can’t buy any extras if I don’t go to the shop!!

Here’s the weekend menu plan

Saturday lunch - Chicken cooked in honey and mustard sauce - 3 for £1 from Aprpoved food and part of my spare food stock (next to no sauce for me courtesy of Monsoir Dukan’s advice) with salad - I cooked twice as much last night.

Supper - Corn beef hash for DB (remainder of tin into the fridge to go in his sarnies next week) I’ll have some dry fried courgettes with a dash of garlic, with a tin of sardines (21p Asda cheapies - I have several tins of these stashed away) and we’ll both have green beans from the poly tunnel with theses.

Sunday breakfast - scrambled egg (I just microwave it) and eat it plain, whilst DB will have his on toast.

Sunday Lunch - beef stew made with carrots and onions, some gravy (don’t tell Pierre!) and DB will have some of our early new potatoes with his - I won’t.

Sunday supper - steamed smoked haddock (piece reduced to £1.19 in Morrisons) with spinach (out of the freezer) and DB will have some new potatoes and I won’t!

Monday Breakfast - oatmeal pancakes for breakfast and DB will have cereal and miilk.

Lunch - DB will have corn beef and homemade chutney sandwich with a piece of fruit cake - I’ll have a pot of Tesco Value cottage cheese.

Monday supper - 100% beef burgers with salad, DB will have some homemade oven chips with his - I won’t!!! (simple - we eat the same, I eat less and fewer carbs)

Tuesday Breakfast - both can have a ham omelette.

Lunch - DB will have sarnies and cake, I will have a tin of sardines, some toms and a yogurt.

Diet will liven up then as Tesco order will arrive!

Many people have said very complimentary things about my debt repayments, and my determination to live a simpler life. It does bring its benefits. We eat less so we’re healthier. We amuse ourselves so we are less and less reliant on money and we know we can live on very little. This in turn means we don’t dwell on what we don’t have or might not have in the future. We enjoy the little we have and get on with life. This has had a positive impact on our mental state and we think, as often as we can, about the good things in our life.

I’ve had a really good work out in the house this morning. I’ve cleaned the inside of all the windows and got rid of all the mould around the window frames. I’ve washed all the clothes and bucket by bucket, watered the borders in the garden and even had some spare to pour onto the lawn. I’ve showered and washed my hair, as ever, standing in a big blue plastic box and poured the water into spud bags.

It’s a busy life, but extremely rewarding. The ‘down time’ today will include: getting out with some music and getting at least a three mile walk into my day, reading my library book, catching up on the paper DB found on the train last night and walking the dogs.

Busy Saturday and nothing spent………………what a perfect day!

Until tomorrow,

Love Froogs xxxxx