Every week (ish) I share five frugal things that I’ve done during the previous 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.
Hey! 👐
1) I’ve been desperate for a hydrangea plant for years but I never got one as I’d read somewhere that they attract bees which under a normal circumstances wouldn’t be an issue but master frugal has always been scared of bees after a reaction when he was stung as a young child.
For that reason I pretty much avoided planting any flowers in my garden as much as I would have loved to and as much as I’d love to have helped the bees.
This summer I realised that I could finally get my hydrangea bush.
They’re not cheap though, are they?
I looked at lots of different websites to compare prices and visited a few of our local garden centres but there was so much choice that I was a little bit overwhelmed, especially with the prices that I found.
So when I saw a small shop in a little village near us selling young hydrangea plants for £2.50 each, I decided to take a chance and buy a couple…
I’ve left them in their pots for now and I’m going to see how they go.
2) Remember last week when I was joking that I got custody of the omelette maker. 🙂
Well it’s actually quite an important gadget to me and I’ll tell you why – with diabetes it’s really important to eat the right things at the right times and one area that I really struggle in no matter how much I tried to plan is lunches.
An omelette is genuinely the perfect lunch for me as it’s filling, low in carbs and can be switched up depending on what ingredients I add to the omelette mix so it’s not like eating the same thing every day.
And yes, I do understand that I can make an omelette in a pan without a gadget but I’m old enough to accept that this isn’t a skill I have. I could probably learn but this little gadget cost me less than a tenner a few years ago and it makes mess free omelettes in minutes. This is the one I have.
Anyway, let’s get back to my point which was to tell you that this morning, I batch cooked enough omelettes to feed me for my lunch every day this week. I basically whisked all of my eggs with some almond milk, cheese and black pepper and then did a couple of different flavoured batches.
I added chopped cooked broccoli and peas (leftover from tea last night) to half of the mix and the other half got some chopped cherry tomatoes and ripped up baby spinach leaves (about to be past their best from the fridge).
Omelettes freeze well as I know from my mini omelettes that I used to make in the oven so my idea of making a batch this morning was to use up some leftovers and some stuff from the fridge that needed using up and to save even more time through the week so I can enjoy a yummy lunch which will still leave me time to go for a walk or have a nap if I’m a bit tired.
4) I’ve started buying my eggs from a little honesty box stall at a nearby farm.
We pay £1.50 for six large eggs which is definitely a saving on supermarket prices and I love the idea of knowing that I’m supporting a local business at the same time. They’re also much tastier in my opinion and I usually take my egg box with me and transfer the eggs into that, leaving the farm with a box they can use again.
5) Do you check the prices of petrol in your area before you fill up? This is something I have got into the habit of doing every time because if I can save a little bit each week when I top up then I’m winning – even if it’s just a small amount then it’s better in my pocket that someone else’s.
The petrol station nearest to our house is currently 137.9p per litre for diesel whereas the next one down the road (literally two minutes away) is 135.7 so a cheeky couple of minutes in the car, when we’re more often than not going that way anyway will save me 2p a litre.
But there’s another petrol station that is pretty much on the route of a drive I do weekly is known for it’s cheaper prices so I follow them on Facebook and if I know I’m going to need diesel then I’m going to try and get it when I’m there if it’s going to be worthwhile. AT the moment, it’s 133.9p per litre.
I have a 60 litre tank so empty to full will save me £2.40 on a full tank if I was to get it from the cheapest petrol station rather than the nearest. We drive quite a bit as I work 25 miles away and live 20 miles away from the kids so comparing prices saves enough to make a quick 30 second check on an app well worth it.
And that’s just based on the nearest one to where I live which is actually still cheap based on the prices I am seeing on the app I use each week. The two most expensive near me are BP petrol stations and they’re 139.9p and 146.0p – the second one is on the main road so I would have expected that one to be more expensive and would never have used that one but the first one is just an average town centre petrol station so if you don’t compare the prices you could be paying £3.60 more than me per tank which isn’t a huge amount on it’s own but depending on how much diesel you use, it could add up quite quickly.
One tank a week would add up to £187.20 a year, one tank a fortnight would mean you paying £93.60 a year more and even if you’re a light driver with just one tank a month going into your car, you’re still going to be paying just short of £50 more than I am.
Totally avoidable if you check the prices. 🙂 I use an app called PetrolPrices which has an orange icon on the app store but there’s lots of others out there.
So, there’s this week’s five frugal things!
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