Getting organised: five frugal things

I hope you have had a good week. It’s time to for getting organised here. It’s feeling a little chaotic for some reason and I can only take so much chaos. I need order!

Getting organised and tidying up

I had this idea that when I left work and became self-employed I would have a super tidy and well organised house. This has definitely not happened. In fact, I would say it is much less tidy with me in it all day…

This is partly because of the nature of the work I am doing – selling stuff on eBay. I am not at the point where it makes financial sense to hire a space to store stock, so it is either in my little office or in cupboards around the house. Some of it is in bin bags in the lounge and spare bedroom too.

Another reason for the decline in tidiness is that I am out of my old routine. I knew I had limited time to get household chores done when I was out of the house working full time, so I had set slots to get the cleaning done.

Now I think, “I will just get this pile of stock sorted/washed/ironed/listed, then I will clean the bathroom.” Then what happens is I get so involved and absorbed in what I am doing that it is 6 pm and I am still going.

I need a new routine!! Fridays are going to be my new cleaning and shopping day so that’s today sorted and my plan of action.

Anyway, onto my five frugal things round up.

Selling on Vinted

Another part of my getting organised mission is to sort out five bin bags of clothing that I bought in bulk and decided to list on Vinted  rather than eBay. I have been successfully ignoring it for a couple of months. It has felt as if I should give eBay priority as I am selling slightly higher value items on there.

However, this week I started to get a grip and prep stuff. I washed and ironed loads of things and they are now on hangers waiting to be photographed. That’s a job for the weekend.

The steamer/iron I bought from Amazon a while ago is proving to be a real time saver. You can steam and iron stuff whilst it is still on a hanger! It’s brilliant and well worth the small £40 investment. It’s even cheaper now – £34! I don’t even bother with my old iron now and just use this.

If you fancy trying to sell on Vinted, here is my refer a friend code. Once you are on, you can also refer friends and get £5 when they list their first three items, then £10 when they sell.

Fake Febreze

Having a bottle of Febreze can be handy when you have two stinky cats and when you are bringing lots of second hand items into the house!

However, I am still trying to reduce our plastic consumption and I’m not a fan of lots of chemicals, so had been putting off buying a new bottle.  Then I came across a very simple recipe to make your own from Cass at Diary of a Frugal Family. It works a treat and I reused my old plastic bottle.

Making money online

I am always looking for easy ways to make money online for myself and my three daughters. They all like doing little surveys and competitions, so when I came across a site called 20Cogs we all signed up.

I earned £5 just for doing the first survey and got a £5 bonus as well, so £10 for about five minutes effort. The plan is to do a couple when I have a break and a cup of tea.

Free eye test

Mr S is in denial about needing glasses. He insists he doesn’t need them, then pinches mine to read the small print!!

Anyway, I spotted that Specsavers are currently offering free eye tests until the end of October, so I have booked us both in. You have to print off a voucher to take in with you or show them it on your phone.

I used to get regular free eye tests at work, so this was handy. Sadly, I think we will probably both need to spend out on new glasses, though!

SHOMOS update and a freebie

Last week I mentioned that I was off to the SHOMOS UK Money Bloggers Awards. If you missed it, here is my report of the event.

I was very excited to be given a Keep Cup by Yolt, one of the sponsors of the event. It is an eco-friendly glass cup with a silicone lid and you can have hot or cold drinks in it. It’s not too big either, so can easily fit in my back pack.

I also wore a different dress than planned as I came across a red linen one in the charity shop. I really like it. Here I am wearing it with the other UK Money Bloggers doing our bit for #SecondHandSeptember!

So that’s my round up of five frugal things and my efforts at getting organised. How has your week been?

As ever, I’m linking up with this Cass, Emma and Becky in this week’s ‘Frugal Friday’ linky.

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