Category Archives: saving water

Saving water to save £1000 a year

Saving money, saving water

Hello Dear Reader,

Our water bills are iniquitously expensive. Un-metered water for my house costs £1400 a year. The rising costs of energy and water means that a deep hot bath is a distant memory. I can neither afford the water or the gas to heat it. The boiler is off and we’ve thrown away the bath plug so we don’t even think of a bath. Since moving to our current home five years ago, our energy bills have doubled and our salaries have reduced, mine by choice and Dearly Beloved by having his salary reduced by 10%. It’s not unusual for families with two working people in the UK to have to count every penny due to the rising cost of living. I have though reduced my water bill to under £400 a year.

Here are all the things I do to save water:
1. Keep a bowl in the sink and use the hand washing water to flush the loo.

2. Shower standing in a stacker box or baby bath and use the water to flush the loo.

3. Use floor washing water to flush the loo.

4. Use a bucket and soapy water to scrub the steps and patio instead of a hose pipe.

5. I make sure clothes are actually dirty before I wash them - I only use a short wash programme.

6.I don’t use our hot water system - there’s no running the tap to wait for hot water - there’s no hot water!

7. I only boil one cup of water at a time - saves electricity too.

8. We wash the car with two buckets of water, one to wash, one to rinse.

9. I get my hair wet in one bowl of water in the sink, with the hot water from my kettle, wash it and then rinse it in the shower.

10. We use a shower timer and have four minutes.

11. I only use my dishwasher once a day or less to only use it when it’s full.

12. I scrape the plates and dishes so they only need the minimum wash time.


I don’t consider any of this to be a hardship, instead, I just see this as the way it is. There’s no point in complaining or feeling resentful that in some areas of the UK, water is part of council tax or in certain areas you can fill a Olympic swimming pool for forty quid. I have no choice but to be shafted sideways by the local water company (South West ‘eckin’ Water) but I will do all I can to give them as little money as possible!!

Here are a multitude of ways you can save water and money.

Visit the OHOP website for more saving water tips


I hope you found this useful. Over to you Dear Reader, any one else saving water to save money. How many cubic meters of water do you use a quarter or a year? We use 200 litres of water a day and I wonder if we could cut it back further?

Until tomorrow, Love Froogs


Our Home, our planet paid me to place the infographic, but I can assure you that saving water will save money and it’s a valuable global resource and we shouldn’t waste it. I will use the money to help pay for my utilities.

Using free winter water

saving water

Hello again Dear Reader,

The weather is fantastic today. It’s chilly but dry and sunny. Again, I was able to get outside to do ‘garden jobs’. As I said yesterday, I don’t like the gym or what seems like pointless going no where exercise, but I do enjoy hard work. I must have had a good upper body work out, both today and yesterday as my triceps are still aching, so good work went on again in the bingo wing area! I should patent this work out. Today’s is called ‘scrubbing the step’.

First of all, get an old broom handle, that snapped half way and you couldn’t repair and run it up and down the cracks between the paving slabs and get all the moss and grass out! This makes the triceps ache!

Now your slabs are moss free, get some water from your butt! No jokes please! We’ve all got gallons of it sitting there, nothing to water in the garden. So now’s the time to get the soap and scrubbing brush and get your patio, steps, deck or paths a good clean.

The weeds before my very sophisticated broken broom handle weed remover tackled them.

Get the water onto the step, or where ever needs it, give is a tiniest squirt of bleach and washing up liquid and now put your back into it, get those shoulders working and get scrubbing.

Now rinse, when you do so, keep scrubbing, it’ll keep cleaning it.

I’ve only done a small section today, but will continue to do a bit more each week, using the water from the butt and not the tap. We also use this water for rinsing the car when we wash it. It also got bucketed in (whilst I remembered) and a couple of buckets are by the loo to flush it. That’s another work out I should patent………carrying buckets!

Now my lovelies, here’s my challenge to you………get out and use up the water in your butts……….let me know how!