Frugal Friday..

So, we have started washing our own cars, stopped giving money to Costalot Coffee shops and their high-priced brethren, and are dutifully carrying packed lunches to the office most days, the next place to turn attention might well be the stuff that you don't think you can make a difference to - how about those pesky utilities and household bills? This cold weather, where the dark evenings make time spent huddled indoors, are the perfect time to think through some of this stuff, and re-plan budgets...

Electricity and Gas - first step is to read your meters and submit the readings online if you have the ability to do this, otherwise call your suppliers with them. That ensures that they have the correct details and that you are not paying for fuel you've not used. Once that's done, time to start reducing the usage...
- Go from room to room - check what is plugged in and decide whether whatever it is needs to be.
- Laptops and anything with an inline power-adaptor uses power even when powered down if it's plugged in and the power is flowing. Switch off from the socket when not in use.
- Likewise TV's and stereo's on standby - standby still uses power - use the off-switch instead!
- Are you on Economy7 electricity? If so a timer-switch is your new best friend. use it to set washing machines, dishwashers and tumbledriers to run overnight if your living arrangements allow.
- Don't tumbledry if the weather is good enough, and you have the facility to dry outside. Even quite a small balcony will take an airer, and you can dry a surprising amount outside on one of those on a warm sunny day!
- You can also use your airer indoors of course, but be cautious of damp developing.
- Turn your heating down - if you're in short sleeves, indoors, in December, then you can turn it down quite a long way once you've popped a jumper on!
- If you're using the oven try to cook several things at one time.
You might find you can acquire one of those energy monitors that attaches to the meter out-cable from your energy company free of charge, or some libraries loan them out - it's astonishing what things you can track down as power-guzzlers! Remember also to turn out lights when you're not in a room, and consider changing regular light bulbs for low energy where you can - with table-lamps though be careful that the fitting is suitable - otherwise they can actually use MORE power!

Water - are you on a meter already? If not, Money Saving Expert Martin Lewis recommends that if you have more bedrooms than people living in your home, then most will definitely make a saving by switching to a meter, same number, and it's worth considering, less, and savings are less likely if you're in an area with average priced water rates. HOWEVER - and this is the biggie - when you take the decision to switch, you have 12 months to then change your mind at which point you can revert back to a rated bill, no problem. For most people that could be a bit of a win-win situation! If you are in a flat with one central main pipe coming in, then you may not be able to revert.

Telephone - Analyse what sort of user you are - we for example make most of our calls from our mobiles, or communicate with friends and family by text & email, meaning that a basic land-line package with standard inclusive free weekend and evening calls is great for us. If you are at home a lot during the day and making calls one of these packages could be expensive for you though, you might be better with one that includes daytime calls as well for a fixed additional cost. it may be that you feel you don't require a landline at all - although if you take this step you MUST be sure to have a fully charged mobile handy in the event of needing to make an emergency call, and if you want broadband many providers require you to have a landline too.

TV/Broadband/Telephone packages - sometimes these are cheaper, but not always. Are you paying for a TV package that you simply aren't using - for example if you only watch films once or twice a month there is little point in paying for Sky Movies, you would be better with a pay-per-view postal DVD or download service. Likewise Sports channels - we remove our sports package from the bundle over the winter months as the sport we use it for - speedway - isn't on then. Paying for it for only seven months of the year can save as much as £100! How about your broadband - if you're constantly being charged extra for going over your download limit it might be worth checking how much extra you would pay to go to an unlimited deal.

Mobiles - ah now this is a good one! I was on a contract for years - it gave me masses of free minutes, more texts than you can shake a stick at, and the same package now would include 500mb of data a month. The only problem was, my £20 a month was being wasted as I didn't use that many minutes, and barely made a dent in the text allowance! When I bought the iPhone I switched to Pay As You Go - my provider trebles whatever credit I put on, which makes my calls & texts free for a month, and they also give me a free 500mb data-bundle as a thank you for topping up £15 at a time, so that's a months-worth there, too! the second month I add a data-bundle and a text bundle - at £5 each, and the whole process gets repeated for month 3. So from £20 a month on contract, I have dropped to an average £7.50 per month - quite a saving! Obviously in my case the phone was a big expenditure, however I've now had it for three years, my contract over the time would have cost me over £700, whereas PAYG has cost just £270 - so as things stand the phone is effectively cash neutral. It also gets used for business as well as personal use of course.

So how much do you reckon you could save? Or maybe you've already done these work-throughs, and can think of a few extra ideas for people to try?

Robyn

Lovely OrkneyFlowers has joined in with Frugal Friday again this week - click her name to read the post!

Getting Competitive...(Part 2)

Here you go then, time to share another couple of the pics I've entered for the photo competition over on the www.southuist.com website. I'm extremely flattered that my pics seem to be getting quite a bit of attention - far more than I expected!

North Uist:

This is probably my personal favourite of the pictures I've entered. For a start I had to really work for the shot - this was taken from the top of North Lee - 263m of uneven ground with a long walk-in. Of course the long lead in means you know you've had a walk by the time you even get the base of the hill.... As you can see from this though it was well worth the scramble! I realised part way up that the ferry was due a short time later, and was utterly determined to make it in time to see her come in.
The link for this pic is here: http://www.southuist.com/photos.php?action=viewimage&pic_id=732 - If you'd like to give it a vote in the competition for me you need to go to the buttons below the pic on that link, and either "share", "Like" or "Tweet" to give it a vote.

South Uist:

This was taken on a lovely walk at Lochcarnan, South Uist. Initially the light seemed distinctly unpromising, but as we approached this abandoned cottage all of a sudden the clouds shifted and presented a scene just begging for a bit of mono-moodiness. This is one of those places where there are ruins next to ruins too - just to the left of where I was standing was the ruins of what was presumably the family's blackhouse, which they had obviously left to move into the one pictured.... although the entire settlement has now been abandoned. 

The link for this one is http://www.southuist.com/photos.php?action=viewimage&pic_id=726 and the same thing applies, to vote, click on the link, then on "Like" "Tweet" or "Share" below the image. 

Thank you!

Robyn

ps - there appears to be some issues with links on Blogger at the moment so the links here appear in full in case they are not clickable.

Frugal Friday

Last week we talked about "The Mindshift" - when you start actively seeking to change the way you live - this week is all about "The Downshift" - the bits that come next.

Deciding you want to change the way things are is almost the easy bit, in some ways, when it happens, it's not necessarily a big flashy lights, chorus girls and fireworks type thing, it's more likely to be a quiet realisation of the fact that you're ready to move to a new phase. How to go about that though can be far more difficult - when we first started we had no idea how to go about making the changes - we just knew that we wanted to see actual money in our accounts at the end of each month, not simply have our pay returning us back to zero again! Tackling one thing at a time can be the way forwards - for example:

- Stop throwing the car keys to those nice chaps in the supermarket car park and paying them to wash it. A sturdy bucket can be bought for £1, as can a pack of large sponges, and car shampoo is not much more (in fact I bet 99p stores do that, too!) - doing the job yourself gives you a chance to check for any scratches or knocks to the paintwork, too. Don't be tempted to economise still further though and use washing up liquid - it's appallingly bad for the paintwork and will prove to be a false-economy!

- While we're on the subject of the car - think about fuel economy. Empty out any rubbish you've got hanging about in there, and sort out the clutter in the boot - do you really need everything that you're carrying about? Remember that heavy acceleration and sharp braking is not only poor for economy, it's piss-poor driving too, so cut it out - a little bit of looking ahead will make you far better and safer driver. If your car has one of those trip computers that shows the Miles Per Gallon set it to show this on the dashboard - that will make you think. My 1.5 litre diesel can do 65mpg on a good day! Think about your speed too - if you'd usually drive at 70mph on the motorway, cutting back by 5mph will make almost no difference to your time of arrival, but quite a lot of difference to your pocket.

- Stop heading into one of those faceless big-brand coffee shops each morning out of habit. If a number of you in the office are doing this why not agree to club together on buying a coffee machine - those that take the "pods" can make a seemingly endless number of different styles of coffee at a fraction of the cost per cup of buying from a chain. Alternatively there is the option of a cafetiere or one of those little stove-top espresso makers, if you have facilities for such a thing? If your walk to the station or bus is short enough why not invest in an insulated mug and make your brew before leaving home - lovely to have a hot drink while you're standing at a nippy bus-stop or on a damp platform, too!

- As above - buying lunch each day could be costing you the earth! Even the cheapest of the supermarket "Meal deals" is around £3 a day - in the course of a working year this could mean you parting with over £700! The simple switch to buying packets of rolls and sandwich fillings to put in them, or a pack of cup-soups to eat with them, could save you a fortune. Buying multipacks of fruit with your weekly syhop is cheaper than buying individual items each day - you could always take them all into work on a Monday and leave in your drawer.  A friend has recently started taking those "Add water and leave to stand" flavoured couscous packets for her lunches and loves it - fab to have something hot in the middle of the day, and if its raining, you don't even have to go out and buy it!

- If you and your friends/family/workmates all buy assorted magazines each month why not organise a swap? Each person buys one mag that they would have bought anyway, and you all swap about - the same reading material for a fraction of the cost. Also remember the free magazine - at some supermarkets, railways stations etc. You never know what you might learn!

- If you are going to be travelling somewhere by train, try buying your ticket in advance via Red Spotted Hanky or a similar site. Even our little short-hop into London can be booked the day before at a saving, and the more notice you have of your intended date of travel, the higher the saving can be. Remember my recent trip to Sheffield and back for just £6.50 return?  Also think if you are travelling any distance whether a train ticket booked in advance like this may even be cheaper than using the car? MrEH and I are off to Manchester next year - we have booked train travel there and back for just £48 for the two of us - it would cost us more than this in diesel!

Things to remember...
- A little planning goes a long way
- The sooner your finances get sorted out, the sooner you can resume some of the things you are giving up - if you want to, that is!
- Life without "stuff" can be so much more pleasant!
- Don't confuse "Frugality" with tightness, or meanness of spirit. Neither are attractive traits and they stand out a mile in those suffering from them!
- There will always be those who don't wish to join in - live & let live. They will either come round or, in ten years of so, will be suffering a serious case of the green-eyed monster.
-The meals you make, for yourself, from scratch, will always taste better than anything that required you to "pierce film lid" before cooking.
- home made bread is one of the nicest smells in the world.
- It is much, much nicer, to know that there is money in the bank to cover an unexpected bill, than to have to panic that one might arrive.

Robyn

Getting competitive! (Part 1)

I rarely enter photo competitions, in spite of people regularly telling me that I "should". In part it's the knowledge that actually, put up against people who take time over setting up shots, getting to the location at the crack of dawn to get the right light, and working out all their settings with a technical precision, my stuff is little more than snapshots. Partly though - and, if I'm honest, probably the greater part, is that I simply can't be bothered. Mostly it requires sizing shots precisely, having taken them in the right format in the first place, or worse, getting prints made and sent off - ugh! However, recently I came across an online competition on one of the Hebridean Island sites that even I could muster the enthusiasm for. The rules were basically - upload your pics - one per island across 8 islands, then plug them shamelessly to get folk to "share" the pic. the five with the most "shares" from the site page at the end of the competition will be declared winners. Of course not being up there, with lots of friends and relatives who are using the site regularly, is leaving me at a slight disadvantage - however, what I DO have is you lovely lot - so who fancies giving me a hand? First off though you need to see the shots of course.....I'll share a couple per post over the next little while, and tell you a bit about each one.

Benbecula:

One of our favourite walks this - a fairly gentle hill, Rueval is the only real high point on Benbecula but with the rest of the island being fairly low-lying this means it affords some simply amazing views. The path you see winding its way through the picture is another great walk - nice and flat for the most part, with reasonably good footing, and it goes out for miles with great views of all sorts of wildlife as you go - we did one of the local RSPB's "Raptor Walks" out there one evening this year with the lovely Stuart who was great fun and very entertaining. We didn't see many Rapors but it was a nice wander nonetheless.

The link to this one is here: View of Benbecula from Rueval - If you'd like to give it a vote in the competition for me you need to go to the buttons below the pic, and either "share", "Like" or "Tweet" to give it a vote.

Eriskay:

This is the rather lovely Princes Strand - said to be the landing place of Bonnie Prince Charlie - Charles Stuart. This shot was taken from a rather convenient viewpoint just along from the ferry terminal. This is one ferry trip that it's WELL worth turning up early for as you can stroll along the road and take a look at one of the most beautiful views on the islands.

The link for this one is here: Princes Strand, Eriskay - and the method is the same as above.

All votes gratefully received, and I hope you like my choice of photos!

Robyn

Searching...

I've been going through lots of old Hebrides photos over the last few weeks, searching out entries for an online photo competition I decided to enter. It's been good fun - so often the temptation is to take the shots, then post some on here, maybe get them printed into a photo book, but then just leave them gathering virtual dust on a hard drive. what a shame this is, and how much I would mourn some of these old shots if they were lost, was brought home to me recently.

Having taken the decision to replace the rather tired, never-worked-terribly-well laptop while there was still a wheezing semblance of life left in it, it naturally followed that the Desktop PC decided to die a few weeks later. There was a slightly worrying whine, a sort of whirring noise, and then the machine quietly shut itself down. I think it was quite a peaceful death, however it did leave us with a quandary. I'm pretty good at backing up photos - stuff from the laptop gets copied to the external hard drive, things get duplicated from machine to machine, and everything of any particular personal value (Hebrides stuff in particular) gets kept on memory cards, too. I did realise at that stage though that I am more shoddy than I should be about backups for other things. More vital things, some might say, like work records and my tax spreadsheet. That sort of thing. For the last 6 weeks or so it's felt as though EVERY file I've wanted has been on the hard-drive from the old machine. The inaccessible hard drive. There has been foot-stamping. Finally this week we got around to ordering the bit of kit that would enable us to access everything again, and this has lead to much going through old pics, remembering back to old holidays and the things we did.

The shot above was taken on Benbecula, the year I first started playing with Canon's bundled editing software and discovered "Photostitch" - a surprisingly good panorama creating. There were a good number of pano shots taken that year! It was the first year we spent a full fortnight up there too, so lots and lots of photos!

Oh, and lesson learnt - the first job when we got access to the old hard drive? To copy everything across to the new machine, of course!

Robyn

Frugal Friday...

I've mentioned before I think, that a few years ago circumstances meant that with little warning I found myself taking the plunge into becoming self employed, and our household income fell by a third, overnight. Thankfully, three years before that we had (with the aid of a good friend) found Martin Lewis' fantastically helpful  www.moneysavingexpert.com  site, and it's excellent and informative forums, had overhauled our finances and started overpaying our mortgage, but most important of all, we had adjusted our mindset. This was what made the drop in income easier to bear in some ways. As things stood, we were paying around an extra £300 per month to the mortgage, and stashing a good sum into savings too - once those were taken into account, the drop in income didn't actually need to affect our day to day standard of living to a great extent, particularly as along with the drop in income, there were also some drops in expenditure - notably me no longer doing around 1000 miles each month commuting to and from my old workplace.

As commutes go, this one would be OK...

For anyone in debt and struggling to get out of it, looking to bring your household expenditure down to a level which more closely matches your income, or simply looking to improve your monthly cashflow, save some pennies, and learn about budgeting,  I couldn't urge you more strongly to visit MSE if you haven't already. There you will find everything from hints and tips for minimising fuel use in your car, to suggestions as to how you might live more cheaply, to advice on how to find the best price for home, pet or car insurance. If your concern is debt-related, then the Debt Free Wannabe board on the forum is your first port of call, this is just a massive fund of really REALLY good advice, from people who understand your situation. I pop in there occasionally even now - it does no harm to remind yourself from time to time just what true hardship is - there are people posting there in utter desperation, having been in many cases left knee-deep in debt through no fault of their own, but as a result of a partner leaving them unexpectedly, or even, in some cases, through bereavement. Some of the tales are truly heartbreaking - I've been left in tears on many occasions and your heart just goes out to these folk. All though, have finally found a place where not only will they be listened to, but where also they can get excellent advice on what to do - and in some cases more importantly what NOT to do - next.

We truly are fortunate. Yes, our combined income is still some way below where it would have been before, but we are still able to make that - for us - all important overpayment to the mortgage each month. It's not massive, it's true, but it's sufficient that if we continue at the level we are, we shall hope to have the mortgage cleared by this time in 2018 - having paid it off in 15 years rather than the scheduled 25. Saving these days is tricky - there is little spare at the end of each month, but what there is gets stashed away into savings, and we make a point of setting money aside each month towards Christmas, car repairs, and the all important Hebrides trips. We refuse to compromise on the food we eat - I've said before, we will not put processed crap into our bodies simply to save money. Nor will we eat foods that we know have been produced more cheaply by economising on the quality of life of the animal they originate from - so this means no battery eggs or EU pork. We have all we need, and a good many luxuries besides. We don't say we "can't afford" things - as mostly, we could, if we wanted to, but we choose to spend our money elsewhere.

"But I'm HUNGRY! Really I am!"

We are well above the poverty or "survival" line - if you are in doubt about how much survival would cost you, then write down all your absolutely necessary expenditure - the things you HAVE to pay - rent/mortgage, council tax/service charge if you pay it, water, electric, gas. If you have central heating then reduce the figure you currently spend on heating by half and go and put a jumper on. (We spend a combined total of £45 per month currently on gas & electric - and bear in mind our heating is electric too - this costs more to run for the same amount of heat than gas central heating. I refuse to allow the house to get so cold that damp starts forming - this is no good for either the fabric of the building or your own health)  Food - we spend £150 per month tops on food for us and HRH The Cat, and cleaning materials - if needed this could easily be reduced to £100. Travel to work needs to be included, as do basic toiletries - and by basic, you can buy a basic set of deodorant, toothpaste, shampoo and shower gel for under £2 from the supermarket value ranges. Insurances too - failing to be insured correctly is a false economy. Finally if you *need* to run a car (in our case our work commute is far, far cheaper by car than it would be by public transport - in fact, we run two cars for a fraction of the cost that public transport for our commutes would cost - we always joke that in effect MrEH's car is "free"!) then the cost of tax, insurance and a basic maintenance/depreciation budget.  Add the lot together - that figure is your survival budget. You can leave out telephone (a cheap PAYG mobile used for essential calls only would be far cheaper than line rental on a landline), TV (the license alone is £12 per month, before you think about the cost of cable or satellite), internet, any travel beyond that which HAS to be done, makeup, new clothes (Charity shops are excellent these days). All these things are nice to have,  and even the most hardened voluntary frugalista is unlikely to actually give up all of them, but none of them are actually essential.

Categorically NOT a luxury!

Next time you find yourself saying "We can't afford...." or "we can get by, but only just, it's a struggle" stop and think - are things REALLY that tough? When you actually have money, but are choosing not to spend it on "stuff", then frugality is little more than a game, essentially. It may be a means to an end, enabling you to save money on mortgage interest, save for things you want, or simply in order to live more simply, but be careful to make sure that you keep realistic and are prepared to acknowledge that, in fact, poverty and real hardship is a long way off. Apart from anything else, failing to do this is nothing short of a downright insult to those for whom life genuinely IS a financial struggle!

Robyn.

Farne Islands...part 2.

As I mentioned previously, well, some months ago when I wrote the first of these two posts, the seals were only part of the wildlife we saw on the Farne Islands trip recently. The Farnes are also home to a vast number of seabirds, from Guillemots and Razorbills, via Terns & Kittiwakes, through to the adorable but extremely strange looking Puffins of course...

Although they are National Trust Islands, the regular boat trips only really run out there during the breeding season - May, June & July, allowing people to visit, and photograph these amazing birds when the largest numbers of them are present on the islands. The majority of the Puffins are resident on Staple Island (the one we visited previously back in 2008 - see the album on the main site for photos from this) while Inner Farne (where we landed this time) is the main place for the Terns. Indeed, on coming ashore from the boat one of the first things we realised was that you REALLY need to watch your step - the things are everywhere!

There were Terns on the walkways, fences, gateposts.....wherever there was something to perch on, there was a Tern. Some of them were rather young and helpless looking, too - this one for example cried steadily for food all the time we watched - periodically Mum or Dad would arrive, ram something into the waiting beak, and then fly away again, at which point the cries resumed!

There were a good number of Puffins about, but nothing like as many as we saw on Staple Island on our last trip. Those that there were seemed content enough to pose for photos though thankfully...

Mostly though this trip was about the Terns - it's only when you see them close up that you realise how stunningly beautiful they are...

Fabulous colouring, and that amazing almost transluscent wing structure. They're feisty little devils though - in the main breeding season you are advised to wear a cap and old clothing as they have a habit of dive-bombing and pooing on people...thankfully by the time we got there they had remembered their manners and mostly behaved, except for one which took a dislike to MrEH and went after him. No photos I'm afraid - I was laughing too much. 

We certainly want to make further trips to the Farnes, and hope one day to manage to do both Islands, although as things stand we well and truly got our moneys worth from this trip, getting much MUCH longer than you usually do on the Island itself, and a fabulous cruise round in stunning weather, too. 

Robyn