This post should probably be headed Five Frozen Things instead of Five Frugal Things!
Lord, it has been freezing here this week! It is the coldest, snowiest time I can remember in a long while. Getting to work each day has been an adventure in itself. I don’t have the type of job where you can work from home. We are expected to make every effort to get in.
I am glad the week is coming to an end. Fingers crossed for better weather next week!
I am sure many of you in the UK are experiencing similar conditions so I hope you are safe and warm where you are. I feel I have done little but struggle to work and back! However, I still managed my five frugal things.
Keeping warm with free wood
The boiler has been playing up all week. Fortunately our plumber is also a friend and has popped out at short notice twice to try to fix it. It is limping along, but may need surgery at some point. It hasn’t cost anything so far but it might, so I am tightening the budget in preparation and hoping we don’t have to use the emergency fund.
The wood burner has come into its own this week. It is great to have a back-up heater. We have had to huddle round it a few evenings to keep cosy.
Currently we are burning free wood. Mr S and his brother cleared some fallen trees for a local care home and got to keep the logs. We have worked our way through a lot of these this week.
Plugging the draughts
The Beast from the East brought a freakishly cold and strong wind with it. It was whistling through our front door, making the hallway feel very cold. I have been meaning to get a good, heavy door curtain for ages. In the event, Mr S came up trumps by pinning a blanket up against the door. It made a huge difference!
He also temporarily blocked up the vent in the bathroom as it was a bit draughty having my bath.
Warming winter stews and soups
We have been going for comfort food this week. Easy stuff to fill and warm us up. I made some more veggie soup to take to work. Last night it was a simple stew: sweet potatoes, carrots, celery, peas and Quorn with some tinned tomatoes, stock and herbs. We had it with some rice and it went down a treat.
This type of food is economical and fuss free. Who wants to spend hours cooking after fighting through traffic in the freezing cold?
Free coffee
I mentioned in last week’s Five Frugal Things that I had made my own spelt loaf, which is lower in gluten than a standard wheat bread. It was pretty good and I will be making it again.
In the meantime, we popped into Waitrose at the weekend to buy a couple of their spelt loaves for the freezer.
Now, are not usually a Waitrose shoppers, as you know, and generally go to Aldi. However, we thought that whilst we were in there we would sign up for a Waitrose card. This entitles us to a free coffee or tea each time we shop there. We can get some of the cost of our £2.50 loaf of bread back!
You also get a free copy of the Waitrose Food magazine and if you buy a newspaper they give you the cost of it back when you spend £10 or more. This seems like a card worth having! You can sign up on the Waitrose website.
An eBay bargain
I have just managed to buy a second hand roman blind for the lounge for a bargain price of £10 including postage. It is a neutral fabric affair from John Lewis originally. I love eBay!! I am looking forward to this arriving.
If I had purchased it new I could easily have paid quadruple this price.
Have you managed five frugal things this week? It’s actually a lot harder to spend money when you avoid leaving the house as much as possible …
I’m linking up with Cass, Emma and Becky in this week’s ‘Five Fabulously Frugal things I’ve done this week’ linky. Click the links to see the five frugal things others have achieved.
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Margaret Powling says
We have been holders of My Waitrose cards for several years now, and it’s worth while. They are also tailoring offers to individual holders of the card so eventually, in the post, you will receive offers on goods that you normally buy – I recently had £2 off flowers (which I always buy) and £2.50 towards a magazine. I actually saved, if I remember, £11.50 on shopping that particular week, as well as the free coffee. We always try and save some goods to buy on a Saturday so we get the ‘free’ Saturday Telegraph with the magazine, etc, but the freezing weather will prevent us going for it tomorrow. Yes, we have to get the car out and drive about 5 miles (round trip 10 miles of course) to get the paper but we treat this as an outing and as we only drive around £3,000 miles a year now, we don’t mind doing this.
Re your door where the wind whistles through: is it the door or because it doesn’t fit well? Husband bought some weather strips from Ironmongery Direct (a very good online company) in the summer and this has done away with draughts from the ill-fitting front and back doors. He also changed the keyholes for keyholes with escutcheons so that we remove the key (once the door is locked) and the little brass flap covers the keyhole, result no draughts at all from our front and back doors. We have Venetian blinds at the windows in the doors, too, which helps against the cold. The large hall window (wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling) has thick, lined curtains. Yes, expensive many years ago (2002) but still looking good today.
We have been having soups and stews, too. We have also kept the heating on 24/7 while the weather has been so cold, in the day the central heating at 21C and at night 17C. As pensioners we were given £300 fuel allowance, so why not use it for the intended purpose? We can economize in the summer when it eventually arrives!
Margaret P
Julia says
I think your last sentence summed it up for me – “It’s actually a lot harder to spend money when you avoid leaving the house as much as possible …” 😀
Apart from my normal weekly groceries I did buy a new bag and some baking trays, but the trays don’t fit the oven, and the bag doesn’t look as nice in natural light – so both are going back again!
I also found the deodorant I get for DD and myself were 75p each cheaper in Sainsburys, so the 3 I’d bought 10 minutes earlier in Asda will be going back too! 😀
At the end of this month I’ve also managed to squirrel away over £350 into savings too! I love short months!!
[email protected] says
Well done!
Gillian says
slo’ cooker in constant use here just now! I have draught strips around my front door & a curtain, but find that they are not quite sufficient when we’re getting the Scottish blizzards – will def try the blanket as a temp measure if it gets worse again. thankfully the winds have calmed today and we appear to have a bit of blue sky!
funnily enough, we have deep snow lying in the backgreen, but none of the children in our tenement have built a snowman – what’s wrong with them?! as a youthful 55 year old, I have been resisting the urge myself but i may have to succumb to the temptation!?!?!!!
[email protected] says
Do it! It will be gone soon enough. Already melting a bit here today
Frugal in Essex says
It has been flipping freezing. The heating has been on non stop and all curtains and blinds closed for long periods of time. Roll on spring.
[email protected] says
Are you on the coast? Heard Tendring was awful
Lesley Halliday says
Just a wee note to thank you for the Music Magpie info. I made over £40 from compact discs which were no longer required.
Lesley H in snowy Livingston.
Margaret Powling says
The sun has been shining here in Torbay – well, we are the English Riviera, after all! – and the snow has all but melted in our garden and drive, and traffic is now back to normal on the roads, so I hope that is the last of the winter weather! I trust this milder air will now spread northwards and eastwards and you will have similarly mild temperatures before long.
Margaret P
Becky says
OOh that Waitrose card sounds ace
Cass Bailey says
The best thing about this last week’s weather has been the soups I’ve made ha ha