Mending a Duvet

We have a double duvet which has a very high tog rating, 15 rather than the usual 13.5. We've had it a few years and it is very handy for very cold days or particularly chilly guests. A few months ago we noticed that the thin cover, which keeps all the filling in place had split. I didn't want to through away the duvet so had a go at mending the cover by hand. The tear just got worse as the new stitches pulled on the thin cover material. I knew that it really needed machine mending, but I couldn't wrestle a double duvet under the food of my sewing machine. So I just left it in the cupboard and every time I took it out a bit more filling escaped.

Then I had a brainwave. What it really needed was a new cover. Perhaps an ordinary double duvet cover would do. So I found one and tried it out. It worked a treat. Only problem was that I only keep 2 sets of linen for each bed so now our bed was one duvet cover down. This works in the Summer when washing dried quickly on the line but would not work later on in the year.

Last Saturday at the jumble sale I found the perfect replacement cover. The duvet is as good as new, the new cover only cost £1 and we have our duvet cover back. We have also saved the cost of a new duvet and saved a mass of filling from landfill, a definite win-win. The scouts also got £1 !

Homemade Granola

Mr Shoestring is enjoying some homemade granola as part of his weight loss plan and finds it much more interesting than porridge. It is really simple to make, you just have to watch that it does not catch in the oven.

My recipe comes from 'The Tightwad Gazette' but you can find lots of others if you search. The good thing about it is that you can stir in lots of additions once it is cool. At the moment we're adding poppy and sunflower seeds and some coconut , which adds a few health benefits as well as taste.

Do you make your own breakfast cereals ? This one costs under 50p to make nearly 1kg, which is a big saving compared to granola in the shops.

Checking your Tyres

We have started checking our tyres every time we drive the car. Last month we had a nail in one of the tyres and had to pay for a new tyre at short notice, this cost just over £115.00 and was money we had not budgeted for. We have an emergency fund so no harm done but we realised that if we had checked the tyres we would have seen the nail and not driven the car. That way we could have planned for a tyre replacement and had time to shop around for the best deal.

There are other advantages to checking your tyres regularly as shown in the graphic above. Having your tyres correctly inflated will save on fuel  costs and checking the tyre depth will increase safety and possibly save you a large fine. It takes seconds to do it and can save in many ways !

Shopping at Lidl

This month I had picked up a £5 off a £40 spend voucher for Lidl out of the Metro paper. The voucher expired on 30th September so I decided to do my October grocery shopping 1 day early to take advantage of the discount. The only problem with that was that it meant that I would have to go late in the evening after work on a Friday.

What I discovered was that this was a quiet time to go, which meant that I got round the shop faster than usual. However, it also meant that they were out of stock of a number of items which I had been planning to get, most particularly, chocolate and meat. In the end it was alright because I just substituted the missing items for something else. In all cases the substitutions were cheaper than the original items so I was able to give my second money saving voucher to the people behind me in the queue. They were delighted and I was pleased to help someone out at a time of the week when everyone is tired.

I was very pleased that the whole shop came to under £50. So I was able to go and buy a few organic items somewhere else this month and have some surplus for any unexpected bargains later on !

Jumble Sale Haul

I went to 2 jumble sales over the weekend and was delighted at the number of good books I got at such a good price. At the first one the books were 20p each and I bought 3 good ones for the commute, much cheaper than a paper or magazine for the train. The entry fee was only 20p as well which is much cheaper than normal round here. 

At the second one, in the afternoon, I arrived a bit later and they had just reduced the price of the books to 10 for a £1. I had not planned to buy so many but at that price the challenge was on to find 10 that I would read. One of the books was this less well known one by Trollope which I have not read. I like Anthony Trollope, as although his books are quite wordy his observation of people is so accurate that I think the stories remain relevant today, so I am looking forward to reading that one. Since the price was so little I was also able to take a chance on a few more popular books which I otherwise would not have bought.

I've also been to the library this week, so no chance of running out of reading matter this week !

December Travel !

If you are thinking of visiting family and friends for the festive season this week and next are when the cheap advanced tickets will be on sale. We usually get a ticket from Watford to Glasgow return for under £40. However, this time when I tried all the return tickets at the cheap prices were gone ! So Mr Shoestring will be going up one day and down 2 days later in order to make sure that the fare is still a cheap one.

I wanted to warn other people that these tickets are selling fast or else they have made fewer of them available so don't miss out ! For us booking the cheapest ticket was a saving of £85 this year making the train as cheap as driving and much quicker !

The Reckoning !

I have been updating the accounts last week and now it is 1st October can see the final results for September. We underspent on food a bit since Master Shoestring thought that he would eat more school lunch than he did. This is good news as it gives me a few more pounds to spend on meals which are not school lunches. Not so good were the over £500 worth of medical bills, a visit to the chiropodist for Mr Shoestring and my annual visit to the national specialist for my eyes. Without those expenses we would have done fairly well at sticking to £1500 for all our expenses which I would be pleased with as we are spending over £200 a month extra commuting into London. This should mean that eventually we can stick to our monthly budget for early retirement. That is encouraging as at the moment the figures look way out ! Roll on January when we shall go back to spending less on transport again !