organic – where the journey takes me 2

I hadn’t intended to have a blog break, but I have been busy and haven’t really wanted to stop the momentum by blogging about it. So the days have been a flurry of activity, but the long, cold evenings have been a welcome rest and snuggled under my throw I have taken to watching Bleak House and marvelling at Charles Dickens, such a wonderful story teller, inspired by real life, and in particular the names he gives to his characters – Guppy of Kenge and Carboy (you couldn’t make it up so well as Dickens did), Miss Flite, Lady Dedlock, Krook and Smallweed; all their names suit their characters.

So at present, I am thinking of myself as Miss Moneythrift as it is that time of year to overhaul the financial situation here.

Many moons ago, I decided to plan each month of the year around one aspect of my life and it went something like this – January Finances, February Health and so on…. as I remember it worked very well for the first few months but fizzled out towards the second half of the year, but the more important things were covered. A whole year is a lot to plan for at once so, after a lot of thought recently, I decided I would split the year into 4 quarters so that my plans only stretch to cover the first 3 months and I would combine this with focussing on one aspect.

The first being finances.

I have at last documented all the receipts for December that didn’t get done before Christmas, balanced the statements and paid any outstanding bills – there are few of those now as most things are on direct debit. Thankfully, I am left with a healthy balance and as the advice of Mr Micawber in Dickens David Copperfield – “Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen [shillings] and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery”.

Once all the savings interest is updated I shall be able to run the year end reports that will tell me exactly where we spent our money and what our passive income is. I can then adjust our budget for this year, although I will probably break some of this down into 3 month periods too.

I can already see that we managed to get through Christmas without breaking the bank, but…and there is always a but, this is a heavy month for us with the cars – insurance, car tax, MOT and servicing all to be done in January. To cope with this I save a little towards it each month in our bill account throughout the previous year.

As January is also a long month for the housekeeping money I have been grocery shopping at home (rather than going for our weekly shop at the supermarket). The pantry is well stocked since before Christmas with dry, canned and packet foods, so a plentiful supply of ready cooked lentils and beans, coconut cream, passata, pasta and the like. We have been using these up together with the vegetables in the fridge. The freezer is also well stocked with bread and rolls to last us until our next shop so all we had to do this past week, to keep us going, was buy a few extra veg and some fruit for breakfast.

We were snowed in on Friday and had a treacherous walk to the village for milk, potatoes, carrots, broccoli and a courgette to top up. I also bought 2 bananas and a pack of raspberries – altogether it came to just under £10 but it will keep us going until Tuesday, our usual shopping day, and it means we have saved around £80 this week already.

As readers may know, we have for a long time always bought organic food and although it is much more expensive, we still prefer to do this and save money in other places.

There have been a few programs on TV last week about the food we eat. One of them comparing how much of our income is spent of food now to in the 70’s. I was quite shocked to find it is substantially less. In the seventies it would be on average 30% of our income and now only around 11%, this isn’t a reflection on the price of food either but the choice of food – low quality, highly and ultra processed with cheap ingredients, or even no recognisable ingredients like in Pot Noodles and strawberry smoothie.

I decided a long time ago that I would only buy quality food, those that have the least processing and without lethal preservatives or pesticides and grown in naturally fertilised soil – it made sense to me as it is something we are eating 3 or more times a day and should be a pleasureable part of life. So if you were reading my blog for any frugal tips around food, then it will not be about skimping on quality.

Where I do save money is by only buying groceries when on offer and stocking up with them if the dates are suitable. If there are vegetables on offer we buy extra and make soup and stews and alter the weekly menu to suit. We minimise waste by cooking only what we can eat to ensure an empty plate and keeping any of the tougher parts of a vegetable, like broccoli stalks, to add to the soups we make, so nothing is wasted.

In and amongst the adding up and balancing bank statements I have been doing a bit of house clearing whilst it has been too cold to go for any long walks, and now there is a nice little pile to leave our house – bags for the charity shop, recycle and a few items to return to friends and daughters.

I spent a whole day in our craft room cum office sorting out paper. It mounts up quickly and every so often I need to tame the pile. I think this year I have not used very many of the craft papers for cards, but aquirred more from somewhere (though I think it breeds secretly when I am in bed!). I really need to get down to some crafting and sewing, but I know it will not be this week as we have mum’s celebration party next weekend and Master Freddie’s party the weekend after. There is also the cost of mum’s celebration to take into account as well as two major presents….could be bread and jam for the rest of the month!!

Inbetween, we have hair and dental appointments (more expense) and the car is booked in today for the MOT and service…and of course it is the bigger of the two services (they alternate yearly) this year, which is always an extra £100 on top – lets hope they don’t find any fault to remedy as well.

I will leave you now as I continue my hunt for a suitable birthday card with 100 on it.

Have a good week,

Back soon x

Home once more and we are truly into Autumn now; but hasn’t it been a glorious month – apart from bouts of heavy rain (my sympathies go out to anyone that has been hit by a flood).

The words of the poem ‘Sing to me, Autumn’ are a perfect reflection of this moment and encapsulate the beauty of the season – the sunlight streaming onto the garden this morning was so beautiful – casting deep shadows whilst highlighting the crimson red berries of the cotoneaster… I reached for my camera but it is so hard to get a good photo. There is an abundance of berries down by the seat – we have left it out a little longer as it is such a nice sheltered place to sit and admire the last of the season’s flowers.

Our blinds are being drawn earlier each evening and some of the solar lights left out in the garden are struggling to stay on for very long. I am looking forward to all that the dark evenings and cooler weather brings – after the ‘gathering in’ time it is beginning to feel like the ‘snuggling down’ time.

As usual, after the wonderful slow life at the cottage, we hit the ground running once we are home. I have a long list of lunch dates to fulfill and phone calls to make – there are finances to catch up on and the garden still needs a bit of TLC. I won’t even mention the housework and cleaning that is obviously needed.

Oh and have you thought about Christmas yet?

…….No, ….. very sensible…..I would normally shriek at the very mention in September….but I feel this year that I want to get ahead as I am finding, in the more recent of past years, that everything gets so hectic and stressful the closer we get to December and I try to pack in far too much in those last 3 weeks. So rather than rush through it I would prefer to savour each moment and enjoy the concerts and Christmas events (that I often miss through lack of time) having completed all the necessary preparations in good time.

I have made a start and though I said I wouldn’t, I relented a few days later when in Tesco… right in front of my nose the new Country Living Christmas magazine appeared – (of course I blame Sadie at Notes from an ordinary life for persuading me as I noticed she had also bought a Christmas magazine and that made me feel so much better!). I kept last years too so hopefully they will spark off some new ideas.

I am mainly thinking about the gifts (we don’t have many to buy or make) – our family takes part in a ‘Not so Secret Santa’ – though I have a feeling this may change again this year – my daughters, who say they have everything they need, have expressed a preference for having a family gathering or event that gives us memories rather than any gifts, so this may be our step towards a no gifts Christmas within the family other than the young children. I will await the whole family vote on this but I personally would find it a lovely idea and support it.

So it is mainly just a few friends who like to receive my homemade offerings -though I could be wrong and be like Ella of Thrush Green in the Miss Read books, giving horrendous handmade gifts that people then give away as fast as they can – I haven’t as yet knitted any ties… wonky or otherwise!!

I also enjoy making the décor, keeping it as natural as I can and of course the Christmas cards (I am thinking another lino cut this year as I enjoy doing those) and perhaps now is the time to start looking at sketching out a few design ideas rather than sitting down on the first day of December and saying today I will make the Christmas cards and then not having a clue as to what I might do.

And what a stroke of luck to find Sainsbury’s are celebrating Organic September (never understand why it is not Organic October – has a better ring to it) and those who know me well will also know I eat organic food most of the time so our Christmas cake is naturally an organic one. Anyway, Sainsbury’s have reductions across their organic range so I filled my trolley with the fruit for my cake and the nuts for the nut roast. I am well pleased though it bumped my shopping bill up quite a bit.

Whilst in Sainsbury’s I bought this snuggly top. I have bought very little throughout the year – it has not been quite ‘a no shop’ year but close – this little top will be ideal for those chilly days at home or when visiting my friend for coffee, who has minimal heating on and I do find it a bit cool at times so tend to go in a few discreet layers.

Remember I collected a few flower heads and petals to press at the caravan – well they are now quite flat and ready to go. The only means of pressing them at the caravan was to use some kitchen roll between the pages of a notebook so the textured pattern of small dots on the kitchen roll has imprinted onto the petals but I quite like it! I have bundled them into some cellophane bags to protect them. My favourites must be the delicate blue campanula, the white daisy heads of the chamomile and the vintage hues of the hydrangea petals. I just have to find a little time to turn them into some cards and tags.

For the rest of today I will be attending to the last of our cooking apples from the cottage garden. I am thinking an apple loaf would be just right and maybe a crumble using the blackberries for tea.

Have a lovely day x