Every week I share five frugal things that I’ve done during that week just to show you that the small things you do all add up to a great frugal lifestyle where you can learn to live a fabulously frugal life.
Before I start though, as always feel that I should say that being frugal to me is about getting the best value for our money – it’s not about doing without for us or about not having nice things. We all have different financial situations and we’re all frugal for different reasons. 😉
1. I’ve been getting back into the habit of making homemade bread
A good six months ago, I had a kitchen sort out and moved a lot of my kitchen ‘gadgets’ into the garage to get rid of the cluttered feeling in our kitchen. One of the things I re-homed was our breadmaker because I’d got out of the habit of using it and it was just gathering dust on the shelf.
I brought it back in with the intention of making some speciality loaves of bread after being inspired at the local Farmers Market. My first attempt at chocolate and chilli bread was a huge fail as was my second attempt and I almost gave up but then I decided to just make a plain old boring white loaf using a pretty standard recipe that we’ve always used in the past for bread and pizza bases.
It was so good that we’ve been converted back to the joys of homemade bread and the breadmaker has been well and truly welcomed back into our kitchen. A loaf of homemade bread costs around 40p when I use the Tesco own brand flour (1.5kg for £1.00) and the Yeast sachets that Asda does (52p for 6).
I’ll share my recipe on Monday because a homemade load of bread smells amazing and tastes even better and it really is the easiest thing ever to make.
Also, I found some bread flavour sachets in the baking section in Tesco that you just add to your usual bread mix to make a speciality loaf – so far we’ve only had the garlic and herb flavour but it was so tasty. They were about 50p each so more than the rest of the ingredients put together but not too bad for a cheeky treat!
2. I ordered myself two free tickets for a Christmas Fair
I was really excited when one of my followers DM’d me a link they’d come across for free tickets to the Country Living Christmas Fair which is taking place in London, Harrogate and somewhere else that has completely escaped my mind. ;-0
I’ve no idea if the tickets are limited or only for set days or locations but I signed up to the newsletter, got my free ticket code and managed to get two tickets for the fair in Harrogate so I’m looking forward to a lovely free Christmas day out at the start of December although I’ve no idea what to expect – it could be a washout but I love Harrogate anyway so if it is then we’ll just leave and head into Harrogate for the day instead.
3. I upcycled my dining room table
My dining room table is definitely looking a bit worse for wear which isn’t surprising when I realise how long we’ve had it – this is the photo of it when I shared it in a ‘five frugal things’ post back in 2016. I bought it from a friend who was selling it for £40 and then managed to sell my old table for £30 so this one cost me just £10 really.
I loved it when I bought it and the dark wood went really well with our shelves at the time but since then, we’ve revamped our kitchen and the dark wood looks so out of place that I’ve had a series of tablecloths on it for the last couple of years. I was tempted to treat us to a new one but this is such good quality that we’d have to pay a fair whack to get something similar – especially if we wanted one that extends to seat up to 8 as this one does.
Last weekend, after much deliberating, I finally decided to be brave and give the table a bit of a revamp – I shared my post about the makeover on Tuesday if you want a look but here’s a sneak peek of what it looked like halfway through…
The paint and the varnish cost £20 so it was an absolute bargain!
4) I used a cheap blanket to recover my dining chairs
Again, more information on my chair makeover is in Tuesday’s post but because the chair makeover was a bit last minute, I didn’t get chance to choose some fabric for the seat pads (see here for how I re-upholster my seat pads on a regular basis) so I had to be creative.
I used a cheap fluffy blanket that we had in our blanket box to make our chairs super snuggly and super stylish!
5. I gave the dogs a haircut
I know I’ve said this before but Monty, our two-year-old Bichon/Shih Tzu cross hates the dog groomers so I had to give myself a crash course in dog grooming or have a very hairy dog on my hands.
Last weekend, he had a good old haircut as did Buddy, our old man dog. They both had a lovely pamper session which ended with me and my living room carpet covered in white fluffy hair and the dogs sulking with me for a good couple of hours afterwards. Poor Jen popped in halfway through the haircutting session and thought that a cushion had exploded in our living room it was that bad!
Being such fluffy dogs, dog grooming salons charge between £25 and £40 a time for a doggy haircut so by doing it at home, I save Monty lots of stress and myself a fortune!
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I’m linking up with this Cass, Emma and Becky in this week’s ‘Frugal Friday’ linky.
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