Cutting costs with my food shop.

For the longest time I've been reading about frugal living. The ladies in the states seem to have it down to an art form. I've seen women go shopping and get money back by simply using coupons.  Unfortunately in the UK couponing hasn't quite caught on yet. But when it does I will be ready!

So in my quest to save money I've been looking at ways to cut down on certain things. One of those ways was the my food shopping. I cannot tell you just how many times I've nipped into the corner shop just to get "milk" and have come out with totally unnecessary stuff.  It quickly adds up. So this month I decided to change up my shopping.

I set aside £40 a week for food and told myself that no matter what comes, that would be our budget for the week. I decided to shop weekly until I had figured out what worked for us. I also changed where we shopped. I love Asda but man I do get a headache just trying to choose stuff in there and I always over spend.

Enter Aldi.

I have always ignored Aldi for some reason. Don't ask me why I don't know.  But I had heard of people cutting their shopping down by half by simply shopping there. So I gave it a go. The first time I shopped there was last week. And gosh was it good. I calculated that my £40 shop would have been worth about £70 in Asda. And Asda is supposed to be the cheapest place to shop from the Big 4.

£30 a week saving makes a huge difference y'all. It is not a figure to be laughed at! It adds up!! Their vegetables are an absolute steal and I know that we are eating healthier now than we were before shopping at Asda simply because veges are far more affordable. 

Now I know some people will complain about the lack of choice but you know what? I love it. I shop quicker and I'm happy with the option they've given me. And the food tastes great. Taller hasn't complained once and neither has Smaller. We are all rather happy :-)

I hope I can find other ways to save but for now this is a good start!

D.I.Y. Memory Jar

Anyone who knows me, know that I love crafty things. I love to use my hands. I love figuring out how things are made. It's always so exciting. So today I bring to you my first ever DIY project! Serious respect to those ladies who churn out a 101 of these each year. It's work photographing the irrems! 

A little while ago I saw Memory Jars on a few blogs. I loved the idea and wanted to have a go at making my own. What you do is, each day, you write a happy memory that you would like to remember at a later date like New years eve for example. It's a bit like family journalling. Smaller won't be able to add his memories just yet so it's up to Taller and I which is fine! 

This is my jar. 

Materials you will need:-

A Jar (can be plastic or glass)

A piece of card to name your jar

Glue or Gluesticks/gluegun

Decorations (buttons/ glitter/wooden letters...whatever you have on hand)

I started with my jar top. It's made from cork so I decided to use a wooden heart and button to make it look pretty...

Glued the back....

And voila! Pretty pretty!

Took me a few goes to decided what I wanted the writing to look like. 

The paint was a complete disaster! So I opted for simply using a marker pen. 

I had some green ribbon stashed so I put two patterns around my jar with some glue dots.

Added my label and I was done. Very very easy and a great way to have some memories to remember and look through on New Years eve!

With our notes included.

Let me know if you give this a go. Happy Monday!!!!

Smaller.

QOD:- Can you teach your child something you do not know?

I love to ask questions. I'm curious about way too many things but I also love to hear what others think. 

So my Question of the day is this:- For those of you with children, can you teach your child something you do not know? 

I guess what got me thinking was that I am in the process of implementing some sort of discipline for Smaller. He has a fiery character and will not give up if he thinks he can get away with it. How then, will I be able to teach him patience and self control and discipline if I myself have not got or mastered them yet? 

The bible says, "A man without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls." (Proverbs 25: 28). I don't want my son to be like a city broken into. I don't him to be influenced by something that will not do him good. But someone needs to teach him how to be that way. And we know that kids learn by what they observe. What do you think? 

Smaller. 

Build your stockpile (with a downloadable list!)

Following on from my last post, a few people asked for a bit more information about how I use my folder. One of the things my household folder helps me with is my stockpile. A stockpile is simply an accumulated stock of household goods or materials.

This is part of my current cleaning stockpile.

When I first started reading about stockpiling I thought it was a brilliant idea. And then I had my "duh" moment when I realised that my mom (and a whole lot of Zimbabweans for that matter...) had been doing it for years. (Another story for another day.) I honestly don't why it took me so long to do. Stockpiling can save you money, save you from doing multiple shopping trips, help you to bless someone in need and just come in handy should an emergency happen. I guess the only down side of having a stockpile is that it does take up space, which is something we don't have a lot of in the UK. 

You can start as small or as big as you like. It really is quite flexible as there are no hard and fast rules. I've included a basic Stockpile list that you can download here in PDF format or here in Word format. Let me know if you do use it! 

When I started building my stockpile I looked out for deals. Tesco runs these promotions from time to time where you can pick up a whole lot of bleach for example. If you can't buy your stockpile in one go, then put aside say £20 a month that you can use each time you see something you want to add to your pile. That way it's not as taxing on the pocket. 

Another way to do it is to shop at a wholesaler like Makro or Costco. In the UK you need to pay for membership at Costco and you need to be self employed to shop at Makro. Google wholesalers and you will find a there are a fair few online who are quite happy to delivery directly to your door. 

If you decide to buy big consider splitting it up with friends. It could work out to be cheaper for all of you whilst getting you the best price possible.

I hope that helps you a bit. Let me know if you do decide to start stockpiling. Those extra pounds saved could help buy something you really want!

Shorter.

My Household Binder

I like order. I love chaos. It's the creative side of me. I know if I was living on my own then the chaos would rule but alas I have a little one to mentor and a husband who likes orderly things. And for other reasons, it's just the right thing to be more orderly. So at the end of 2012 I sat down and set about my goals for this year. I'll speak more about it in a future post but one of the things I decided to do was be more organised in my home. To help me with this I got myself a Household Binder. 

Here she is. Ain't she pretty?

Now in case you've never heard of a household binder, it is simply a tool that holds important information that will help you run your own home more effectively. And like any tool is is only as useful as you use it. I bought my current pages (electronic format then printed them at home for myself) from Etsy. A shop called iheartorganizing. The lady who owns it is American and has a fabulous blog. In fact if you would like to know more about household binders the American ladies have been doing this for ages it seems. Just google household binders and you will find a wealth of information. 

My binder was customised. This is my front page. I just love the colours!

My binder has 29 customised pages which include:-

* Monthly Finance Checklist
* Monthly Budget Worksheets

* Travel Checklist
* Babysitter Notes
* Pet Sitter Notes
* Contacts

* Shopping List
* Meal Planning Calendar
* Freezer Inventory
* Fridge Inventory
* Pantry Inventory

* Important Dates Chart
* Gift Giving Budget Tracker
* Party Planning Checklist

* Media Inventory 
* Library System Tracker

* Blog To Do Checklist
* Password Log

* Home Maintenance Checklist
* Home To Do Checklist
* Cleaning Checklist
* Automotive Maintenance Log
* Important Home Information Worksheets

This is my own stockpile list. It didn't come with the one I bought.

I got this cheat sheet from one of the numerous free printables online. Fabulous reference to have.

* 12 Month Calendar
* Daily Goals 
* Week at a Glance Calendar
* Task Checklist
* Family Outings Idea List

I need to hurry up and start filling in my April dates cause it's a busy month!

Great place to store this information rather than digging through piles of paperwork.

Very helpful, especially for Christmas.

It is extremely helpful and it's really made a difference in managing my time more effectively. However as I've grown to know what works me and what doesn't I think I might be designed my own even more customised household binder soon. But until that point this one will do just perfectly. 

Is this something you would use? How do you keep your home organised?

Shorter. 

Pretty Pink Pegs

Vintage is all the rage at the moment and I wanted a piece of the action :-) I meet an amazing crafter at one of my regular fairs by the name of Andrea. She owns ButtonWood. She makes these gloriously cute vintagy shabby chic items. (Visit her Facebook page...I promise you won't be sorry!)

So she gifted me these pegs that I had been loving for ages. I just thought they were extremely cute but had no idea what to do with them until she told me I could seal my food bags with them!  Fantastic and I love the hot pink colour. It suits me perfectly!

If you want some pretty handmade homewares, visit her page. She's lovely and very talented. You are sure to find something fabulous. 

Shorter.

Review:- Oven Pride

Um... so the state of my oven was just shameful. I finally remembered to pick up some cleaner during one of  my shopping trips to see if I could get it nice and clean again. I decided to go with Oven Pride. 

I'm sure I paid round about £4.00 from Tesco. It comes with a pair of Nitrile gloves, a massive bag and the solution. The active ingredient is Sodium Hydroxide. So I followed the instructions to pour 3/4 of the solution into the bag and wipe the rest into the oven to allow it to work. Minimum work time is 2 hours each. But they recommend overnight. The solution is very thick and I was quite skeptical about if it was enough to clean the whole oven.

Well ladies and gents, this is the solution working about 5 mins. I was quite astounded. The amount of gunk coming off was ridiculous!

This is after 2 hours. The back is black! How bad were these trays?! Like seriously!! And if you look closely at this picture you can see the gleam starting to come through.

I'm going to leave this to soak overnight and tomorrow morning I will have a brand new oven y'all! Hallelujah!

Are you serious about cleaning your oven? What do you use?

Shorter.