Going to the Give & Take

Saturday was finally the day of another Give & Take event in our borough.  I've talked about these events a lot over the last couple of years, because they have been the main way that I've been donating a lot of the 'stuff' that I've decluttered over the last few years.  I do send better quality items to the charity shop, but for regular run of the mill items, they mainly go to these events.

For anyone new to reading this blog, the Give & Take events are recycling events organised by our local council.  The idea is you take things you no longer need or want at 11 am, they get set out on tables etc. according to category, i.e. household, clothing, books, etc. by volunteers and then at 12 noon the event opens proper for anyone to come and take anything they want for free. It's a great concept, especially for low income families, who can't necessarily afford to buy everything they need, and for people like me with excess 'stuff' they are only to happy to give away.

As I've mentioned, I've been attending these events for a few years now, usually with a car full of stuff, but I have taken items home with me on occasion too, although not so much recently.  I decided that at this particular event, I would try to come back and look around to show you how it works.

Before I got there, here was the pile of stuff we had to put in the car.

This is about the usual amount for me lately, but hopefully not for much longer as the house is feeling much more clutter free now.

All of this stuff has been sat on the bed in the spare/sewing room for the past 3 or 4 months.  I'm was so looking forward to taking it, so that I can have the room back and get on with some sewing. As you can see from this photograph, I've got a pile of cushion inserts awaiting the making of new cushion covers.  I'm looking forward to getting on with them.

Here's how the room looks now:

Almost normal, although still a bit cluttered.  I need to really go through this room and declutter some of my crafting supplies at some point in the near future.  For now I'm just enjoying seeing it emptier though and more accessible.

Anyway, back to the Give & Take, I enrolled OH and LB's help this time and got them to come with me because it's so much easier to unload the car when there's a few of you.  This event was slightly different to normal because it was held in the park under marquees.  Here's an overall view of the event at the beginning being set up:

Here's where you leave your donations.  This marquee is where you Give & Take from.

There were other marquees at the event, where you could learn to fix broken items and mend your own clothes,

or fix your bike.

There was also a food stall encouraging less food waste, where they were making free food to give you ideas of how to use food that was nearing it's due date.

We dropped off our donations, parked the car and then went for brunch at a local café before continuing down the path through the park to the market.  After a mooch round, we came back the same way to get back to the car, so I popped back into the Give and Take tent, you can see how busy it is.  Much of the stuff had already been taken by 12.30 pm, with people pulling trolleys full of it home.

There wasn't really anything that I wanted or needed left in there, but I did come away with these books,

plus an A_Z of  Birmingham for LB (not pictured), as she's hoping to go to university there.

Normally these events take place in schools or community halls and it was the first time I've been to this one in the park, so it made a nice change.  There was plenty of footfall from people out in the park or heading to the market. In all a great event.

The Week So Far and a Flylady Update

Well, the week got off to a bit of a surprising start when OH decided to buy us an air conditioning unit. Now, we are usually the last people to do such a thing, I hardly ever use the air conditioning in the car, preferring to open the windows and our house tends to stay pretty cool even in the summer, but the recent heatwave was taking it's toll on us, (32 degrees C here on Monday) even though we weren't spending much time outside in the heat of the day.

OH, who was feeling particularly uncomfortable in the heat, decided to have a splurge and invest in a mobile AC unit for use around the house. He ordered it online on Monday morning and I picked it up from B&Q on my way back from the gym.  It was interesting to note that virtually every customer I saw in B&Q was buying some sort of fan and they had sold out of the remaining AC units, so we obviously weren't the only ones suffering. Anyway, the unit was a little larger than we expected and quite heavy too, but now we've got it up and running, we are really appreciating the benefit of it.

It supposedly costs 12p per hour to run, but we'll call that a conservative estimate, as it probably costs more. At the end of the day, I'm not going to argue. OH works from home every day, so he's the one who suffers most when the house gets hot in a hot spell.  If he wants to splash out, let him I say. I'm sure that we'll all benefit, especially me being a woman of a certain age who gets very hot these days and the dog, who is also struggling somewhat to keep cool. On walks we're having to go out as early as possible and stick to the shady side of the street/park.

On Monday afternoon, I did the last little bit of work I needed to do at the allotment to bring it up to scratch for the inspection on Tuesday. It was looking pretty tidy and fully cultivated when I left it, so at least it should be easier to maintain now. Please note the bare soil allows space for large plants and perennial fruit bushes to grow. Here's a final photo:

As it was still forecast to be in the 30's on Tuesday and Wednesday, I decided I would wear my cut off jean shorts to the CS. (Please note they're not short cut off shorts, just knee length).  It made such a difference not to wear full length jeans. (I can't wear a skirt as I cycle to the station on my bike which has a crossbar) and I felt more comfortable all day, although still way too hot.

The manager came back from his holiday and I didn't mention cutting my hours, as I didn't want to bombard him on his first day back.  I'll try to speak to him next week.  One funny thing this week, was that someone left two bottles of Cava outside the shop for us on Wednesday.  A strange donation, but very welcome.  We will enjoy drinking it at an upcoming staff party, for one of the volunteers who has been there for 10 years later this year.

Anyway, on Thursday it was nice to stay home and be able to get on with my own stuff.  I did my usual class at the gym and then afterwards, used the morning for an Errands and Anti-Procrastination Day. (Flylady speak!) I did a couple of jobs I've been putting off for months i.e. taking some rubbish to the tip and dropping some bags and boxes off at a local CS and then I had to take my library books back and pick up a parcel from the Post Office Depot.  It felt good to get these things done.

This afternoon, I harvested some petit pois from the garden, pottered a bit and then did some financial stuff that I've been neglecting lately. I'm currently trying to get a statement on a couple of preserved pensions, that I earned whilst employed for a few years in the Civil Service and the NHS. I've been making enquiries with the relevant bodies, so that I can calculate what I need to put aside in the next 15 years pension wise, in order to ensure I've got enough to live on in retirement. I'm hoping to get a response soon.

Friday, I had another stay at home day, it's the cheapest option when I'm on a tight budget.  If I go out, I will spend money. I made it my Flylady day and cleaned Zone 4, our Master Bedroom. I focussed on cleaning the shelves on OH's side of the bed and found a few things to donate. I then wiped down all surfaces, vacuumed and mopped throughout, before working my way down the stairs and through the house for my Weekly Home Blessing. I did it a day early this week, so I'm free to go to the Give and Take today. I still need to clean out the linen cupboard on the upstairs landing, but should find time to do that tomorrow afternoon.

This month's Give and Take event is in a park near to a popular local Saturday market, so we're going to drop all our donations off when it opens at 11am and then go for brunch at the market.  I will then return to the event after 12 noon, when you can help yourself to items that have been donated, have a look around and hopefully take some photos to show you what these events are like.

I'm so looking forward to giving all this stuff away, but sometimes, in my enthusiasm to offload all of the stuff I've decluttered, I forget to take any photos, so please bear with me if I fail to do so again.

Freebies, Frugal Measures and Frugal Fails 9

Frugal Fails this last week or so include:

1. I didn't pick up a free travel sized tube of Cordosyl toothpaste when I visited the dentist this month.  I was too embarrassed to ask, which isn't like me.  As I won't be going again for at least 6 months, I missed an opportunity, albeit a small one, as they are great for travel and when you run out. (In all honesty I was a bit distracted at the time and didn't book my next appointment either.)

2. I succumbed to buying a new pair of flip flops in a CS near to the one where I volunteer. The reason I couldn't resist them is that a) they were black and b) they were my favourite brand of flip flops, namely Gandys. They only cost £6 and are brand new. I've mentioned this brand before, as they raise money for orphans in Sri Lanka, after the founders were orphaned themselves in the Boxing Day Tsunami. I've wanted a black pair for a while, so at a bargain price, I'm very happy. Here's a picture.

Frugal Measures and Freebies lately have included the following:

1. I used a £4 off a £30 shop at Tesco voucher on my grocery shop this week. In effect, this just about paid for some small Father's Day gifts for OH, which I hadn't really budgeted for this month.

2. I bought LB's school uniform for next year this week, as I received an offer by email of free postage, which saved me £3.95. I guess this could be considered a Frugal Fail too, as it did take me well over this month's budget. On the other hand, they would have to be bought between now and September and it means I'll be ahead of myself in this respect, if not in a budgetary sense. 

In all honesty, she needs to wear one or two of the shirts for the remainder of this school year, as her current ones are now so disgusting that I don't want her to wear them anymore and can't wait to recycle them for rags. In addition, I avoided the rush of parents buying them over the summer holidays, often leading to them being out of stock and I got them quickly without any last minute panic.

4. I got out the remainder of my travel sized Cordosyl toothpaste towards the end of this month, to try to tide me over and avoid spending another £4 over on this month's household budget for a new tube. This didn't actually last me until the end of the month, so I'm now having to use the regular toothpaste that OH and LB use, but it shouldn't cause me any harm for a couple of weeks.

5. I kept to a very strict budget and list for the last grocery shop of the month to try to limit any overspend as much as possible.

6. I used up the last £1.10 of my M&S voucher to buy a cold drink on the way home from the CS the other day, when it was the hottest June day in the UK since 1976 (when I was 10, incidentally). I had to just add 5p cash to pay for it, but at least I used it all up. Talk about penny pinching!

Weekly Flylady Update

Yes, I'm still hanging on in there with the Flylady system, although I have to admit that it has mostly been put to one side this week, whilst I've been tackling the allotment.

Coincidentally, after my post about last Monday's allotment visit, I got an email from the Allotment Society telling me that there would be another inspection of our plots this today, for the judging of the best plot/site competition, and although I'm not in the least interested in winning anything, we were asked to tidy up our plots and the paths surrounding them, as I guess there is probably a prize for the tidiest/best site or something. 

As a consequence, the plot has received three more visits this week, after which I've completely caught up with the weeding, planted out any remaining plants I had to put in, cleared the paths and just generally brought it up to scratch. Everything took a bit longer than I thought it would and I just didn't have the energy to do it all in one visit, so it's been a bit of an allotment marathon, but it's done now and it's a big relief.

Here are the newly cleared pathways:

My neighbour cleared one of the paths (top picture) and I went over the cracks with a great little paving slab weeder tool I have, to get as much of the weed roots out as possible, which should mean less weeding between them in the future. It works a treat. You can see the tool in question in the picture above.

Just to show the difference, here's one of the other paths between plots not yet cleared:

What, you might be forgiven for thinking, does this have to do with Flylady? Well, I've decided that my allotment has been my other room of choice this month under the Flylady system, and consequently only the bathroom and the allotment got my attention as part of this week's Zone cleaning. 

I did do my normal Weekly Home Blessing on Saturday, which takes care of a quick tidy, vacuum and mop in every room of the house, so I did enough to keep on top of things. To be honest, there wasn't really any build up anywhere anyway, (save for the spare room, which it isn't easy to clean at the moment) so it is looking pretty okay generally. It does make me feel a little lazy though, as I don't feel I've done an awful lot this week in the house.  Maybe that is the point, you don't actually have to, you just have to do 'something' as opposed to nothing, on a regular basis. In any case, I like that the system has the flexibility to include the garden and allotment at all, as both are important fixtures in my everyday life.

Next week, I'll be working in Zone Four, the Master Bedroom. The only part I didn't clean last time were the shelves on OH's side, so this will be the focus and then just a general dust, vacuum, mop and change of bedding.  I will also try to clean out the linen cupboard too, as it is on the landing just outside the bedroom door and needs some attention. (and I was going to do it last week, but didn't!) In any case, it shouldn't be a great deal of work.  From now on, now I've settled in to the system, I'll probably just post weekly or even monthly, as I don't want to bore you all too much.

A Chilled Weekend

It's been a relatively quiet weekend here.  LB had a busy social calendar and was sleeping over at a friend's party on Saturday night and there all afternoon on Saturday too.  She then had another party for another friend on Sunday afternoon, so it was just me and OH around for most of the weekend.

I used Saturday morning to catch up on all my cleaning for the week, doing the Weekly Home Blessing and zone cleaning the bathroom.  I scrubbed the floor and cleaned out the extract fan as I mentioned I wanted to. I did a load of laundry which I line dried and after that I was finished, so I headed out to complete the weekly shop at our local Lidl - I'd done part of it on Friday at Tesco.

I'm finding that I prefer to grocery shop on Friday/Saturday now instead of Sunday/Monday. It can be a bit busier, but once you start to change the day, you run out of food by that day the next week so you have to do it. I think I got into a habit of going shopping after the gym, but Sundays were so busy in Lidl that I started to hate it, so it's nice not going to the supermarket in my sweaty sports gear for a change, not having to fight my way round and looking a bit more civilised.

On Saturday evening, OH and I decided to head to a pub on the canal for a drink and a burger.  It was nice to sit outside with a shandy and the dog and just chill watching the world go by. On the way back, we popped into the allotment to water everything, on account of it being a scorching hot day.

On Sunday, I went to the gym as usual and then was able to relax and potter for a change, as all I needed to do was change the bedding, do a white wash and to do the ironing. I managed the former two, but as it was way too hot to iron, I gave that task  a miss and instead I spent some time sitting reading a book I got from the CS last week, entitled 'Clutter Free with Kids' by Joshua Becker. It might just help me decide what to do with more of LB's old toys. I'm enjoying it so far.

I'm hoping that weekends will be more like this in future, now the Flylady system is starting to work it's wonders. How was your weekend?

CS Update

It's been a while since I did an update of life at the CS.  This is probably because it's just been moving along without too much drama. The manager has started taking another day off each week, which he is entitled to, but just couldn't take for the first six months, due to lack of volunteers. 

The difference recently has been that we have both more volunteers and also that we have had two full time interns, who can be left in charge on his days off, one of which falls when I'm at the shop.  It has been working well for the few weeks it has been happening, but he's away this week for a long weekend, so the system has got disrupted for a couple of weeks.

I have to say, that I'm actually currently rethinking my volunteering.  I do enjoy it, but recently I seem to have been stuck on the till far too much.  Don't get me wrong, I enjoy meeting the customers, talking to them and doing till work, but not all the time, both days I'm there, week after week.

I should really say something to the manager about how I feel, but I don't like to cause ill feeling and the interns need to learn about the management of the shop, which they probably don't do so much on the till, so I've just let it go. I am a volunteer at the end of the day and should just go where needed, but it does get a little boring sometimes to do the same thing, especially when no one really even offers to swap for a short period to give you a break from the monotony.

In any case, that is not the main reason I'm reconsidering my position, there are a few.  One is the travel.  Although financially compensated, the hour it takes each way is a drag. I don't like travelling on the train, (although it's better than the Tube because it is direct and air conditioned) because it's quite crowded and there's always a bit of a scrum for a seat, if you get one at all.

I don't know what it is about public transport in London these days, but it seems to bring out the worst in people, me included probably, although I do try to be considerate of anyone needing a seat more than me, to the extent that whilst trying to offer my seat to someone the other day, someone else jumped into it!

To be honest, I now remember why, when I looked for a job after first moving to London to study, I chose to work outside of the centre, so I could drive out to work and not travel in for it. I hated the stress of commuting then and I'm feeling the same now after a year of it.

The second reason is that, as with all charitable businesses I guess, targets for sales and gift aid sales increase year on year, and this puts pressure on staff and volunteers to meet these targets. I'm not suggesting that this shouldn't be the case as not to do so would be going backwards, but I can see that the pressure to perform, does affect the behaviour of those responsible for the targets and sometimes the way they speak to you. That's all I'll say about that. I don't know if this is a countrywide issue, or whether it's a London thing, or just the shop I work in thing, but it seems to seep in every time and kind of chips away at the experience for me, as I try to do my best, whatever the target.

In addition, I'm finding two full days per week, quite a big commitment in the summer months.  LB will be breaking up for the summer holidays soon and I'd rather be at home with her, even if she's out with her friends, at least I know where she is and what she's doing. The allotment too, is a big commitment for me in the summer months and although I'm currently managing to fit work there in, it is to the exclusion of doing other things I want to do.

Anyway, I don't know what, if anything, I'm going to do. I'm still applying for jobs when I see them and I may end up trying to get another volunteering role nearer to home, with less travel involved. I may just carry on as normal or even reduce my hours during the summer months to one day per week. We'll see.

A Bit of Contemplation

I've been a bit contemplative lately. I've been contemplating the last three months on my new strict budget. I can't say it's all been plain sailing.  I do struggle on a day to day basis, wishing sometimes, there was room for me to just go out and blow some cash on a bit of recreational/therapeutic shopping or spending, but there isn't and I can't. Maybe it's just as well, because these are the sort of habits I'm working hard to change.

On the whole though, the new regime is working pretty well.  As usual, I always try to do everything at once, i.e.subscribe to a new life insurance policy, save £100 per month and pay off my overdraft once and for all - instead of taking smaller more gradual steps. I guess the reason for this, is that I feel that at my age, (I'm 50) I just need to crack on with it and get it sorted. No more messing about, I've done enough of that in the past, just do it, as one very famous advertising campaign suggests.

Although challenging in many ways, my new regime is, however, having some decidedly positive outcomes. Whilst trying not to go out shopping and spend money, I've become much more focussed on getting my house in order and keeping it in order, as readers of this blog will have noticed. Okay, it is bordering on the compulsive, but it is making me appreciate what we already have and look after it.  It is also helping to reduce the urge to buy more, because realistically, there's very little we actually need or want.

The allotment has also been another way I have been able to occupy myself rather than go out spending money. Starting to cultivate my new plot has been a bit of a new challenge and is taking quite a bit of energy, but it's keeping me out of trouble and may even save us some money on food when the crops actually grow.

OH often asks me why I don't just pay off my overdraft with savings, and yes, I could do this, but as I've argued in the past on this blog, taking this easy route, doesn't really make me appreciate the damage that overspending and not living within my means actually causes in the long term and it doesn't break the cycle of my behaviour.  I need the struggle to prevent me making the same mistakes, and although I've made them over and over again during my life and even as recently as the last two years, I'm really hoping that this time around the penny has finally dropped, for good. In this sense, this year's struggle is more about forming new habits around money, that don't lead to debt, rather than just paying off debt so that I can build it up again, and I think that as such it is a much healthier approach.

As I've mentioned before, helping me on this journey have been numerous Bloggers (you guys, of course) and YouTubers that I follow. I've enjoyed watching Budget Girl finally pay off over $30,000 of student debt this last month. For anyone, who likes to watch these kind of YouTubers and get inspiration from their budgeting methods, another channel that is also good to watch is Lindsay's Frugal Life, whereby Lindsay, a teacher in the US, is trying to pay down over $80,000 of student debt, accumulated after studying for a degree, a masters and a PhD, I believe. I admire her courage in facing up to such huge levels of indebtedness and just getting on with the process of paying it off.

In addition to the above, I've been doing a lot of reading around the subject of personal finance and I've learned a lot more about money and how to potentially make it work better for me/us.  I was already pretty savvy when it came to spending money, but my problem has always been with restraint.  Everything can seem like a deal too good to miss, even when you can't afford it. I am now trying to practice more restraint and get comfortable with it and it is a challenging process, especially in a world where you are encouraged to just buy what you want, (and even what you don't) whether you have the means or not.

As well as concentrating on reducing my spending, I am also starting to focus on becoming more savvy with regard to investing and saving and it isn't easy, especially with returns as low as they are at the moment. Regardless, I'm working on it here and there and making small improvements on returns to increase my income from investments as best I can.

Like Joshua Becker says about Minimalism, it is countercultural to a large extent to be frugal/intentional and not spend money, some people may and do even go so far as to call it unpatriotic, but is going along with the excess and continuing to buy into consumerism and the myth that we can have it all and more and more and more ad infinitum, a better solution. I think not.

Anyway, I'm slowly learning to develop a new relationship with money, one where I nurture and respect it more and appreciate the difference it can make to your life to be more in control of it and less controlled by it (or the lack of it).