There's a Whole New Generation of Frugal Living Folks

The Frugal Bank

Hello to my frugal friends, family and fellow money savers. It's been a while since we discussed household finances - too long, in fact! It's now come to my attention that I've been living this frugal lifestyule for so long that I've forgotten that an entirely new generation has joined us, many of whom haven't, yet, discovered the joys of frugaldom. But what, exactly, do I mean by 'frugaldom'? Read on and find out for yourselves.

What is a Budget?

A budget is probably the most important thing you can have, as far as your finances are concerned,. It is your budget that dictates the lifestyle you can comfortably afford to lead. It's as simple as looking at the overall amount of money you have coming into your household and deducting all of the regular payments you have going out - everything from your rent or mortgage to repaying debts, paying household bills, food shopping, holidays and everything in between. If you add up all your out-goings (be brutally honest with yourself about this) and deduct them from your overall income, whatever is left is what you can realistically afford to save or overpay any debts to clear those off first. If your regular out-goings are higher than your regular income, then the bank of you is broken and needs some emergency repairs. It doesn't matter if you have savings in the bank - if you are eating into those just to live from day to day, rather than for emergencies, then you need to stem the flow of cash and balance your books.

What to do if your bank is broken

1. Stop spending immediately
2. Prioritise - essential household bills and debt repayments need paying first
3. Make a list because lists are very versatile and help you focus
4. Needs not wants - you need food and water to survive so think survival! You don't need tobacco, alcohol, cosmetics, expensive toiletries, 1,000 TV channels, takeaway mealsm big brand names or the latest gadgets.
5. Reassess your budget in a more meaningful way - keep a spending diary and record every penny spent. Your role has now become that of accountant and manager of your own home, no matter what form your home takes.
6. You need to count in all costs - from the cost of living to the cost of working - have you ever counted up how much your job is costing you? Are you wasting money on travel, coffee breaks, lunches etc?
7. Look at ways of generating some emergency income - extra work, sell stuff you no longer need, decluttering your space can declutter your mind.
8. Analyse your overall debt total to start chipping away at that, paying whatever is commanding the highest interest rate first.
9. Become a frugalista in the kitchen and adopt a zero tolerance for waste. Believe it or not, it is still possible to live on an average of £1 per day for all your meals, based on £365 per person over the year. I'm not saying that it is easy and you may need to find your nearest food bank, community larder and Olio food hero, plus find a friend prepared to share so you can take better advantage of offers - it can be done.
10. Learn to make and love porridge, soups, stir fries, stews, curries and strange concoctions of leftovers.

How can I save money?

Get creative. Consider what you do as your daily and nightly routines: how much fuel, electricity or gas are you using, how often do you socialise, how far do you travel, what paid hobbies do you enjoy, do you buy takeaway food... the list is endless. Pay attention to how you feel and why you feel that way about giving up anything that is eating into your funds. Think of alternatives: do you like art, writing, blogging, reading, walking, cycling, crafting, gardening... anything that can get you through the toughest of times without costing you money. Keep warm with wool or fleece and a hot water bottle but keep your home aired to prevent condensation and dampness. When you boil water, fill a flask with any extra to use later. Cook from scratch, search this blog for simple soup recipes and challenge yourself to create magic meals from leftovers, free food or home grown fruit and vegetables. There are so many ways to save money so I hope you will spend some time reading past posts while I do my utmost to bring this blog up to date. I can only apologise for drifting but it's been full on chaos trying to keep up with everything since the Covid-Brexit combination saw off our Frugaldom volunteer exchange students and lost us previously agreed foster homes for rescue animals that still remain in our care. 

Find some like-minded friends who understand your financial situation by joining us online - just look for @Frugaldom on social media or search for '2023 Frugal Living Challenge' in the Moneysavingexpert.com forums. Together, we can fix this. 

Find your frugal living mojo and life may never be the same again.

10 Small Business Ideas for People Who Love Nature

Almost anyone can be an entrepreneur; the only thing missing for many is a great idea. The best place to find a great business idea is to look into something about which you are passionate, for example, if you’re passionate about nature, there are plenty of business ideas with which you can run!

1. Adventure Club

A great idea for those who know the area around them and aren’t afraid of a little excitement is an adventure club!

These clubs usually consist of a leader (that’s you!) taking members on outdoor adventures. The element of excitement is really up to you and your adventure-seeking customers. These adventures could be as simple as hiking an easy trail together or as exciting as white water rafting, depending on your expertise. 

Your profits will be even higher if you are teaching your club members something they don’t know. For example, teaching people how to rock climb might come with a higher charge than group hikes.

2. Outdoor Cleaning Service

You probably already know that cleaning service businesses are profitable.

While it might take a little more time than cleaning a bathroom, you can also take a cleaning service outdoors. You can keep your services as simple as cleaning up litter in a backyard to as involved as construction clean up or even graffiti removal. Depending on the area in which you serve, one type of cleaning service might be more popular than the other.

3. Landscaping

If you love the outdoors and have a bit of a green thumb, consider starting a landscaping business. A landscaping business helps people transform their yards, gardens, or other sites into something they love and even boost kerb appeal.

It’s important to note that a landscaping business typically requires some level of education. After all, you have to know how to analyze a site, plan out a landscaping blueprint, and become familiar with local and national building codes and ordinances. It’s also important to know how to not only make a site attractive, but also how to make it safe and effective. For instance, you will need to consider factors such as stormwater management.

4. Run a Horse Stable

If you love horses, you could always make a living working with them. Simply owning horses won’t really earn you a living, but if you have land and farm buildings, then you could offer a boarding service for other people with horses. 

Alternatively, you could also teach riding, subject to the appropriate qualifications, licensing and insurances. This will give you the opportunity not only to spend time outside with your favorite animals but to share that love with others as well.

5. Small-Scale Farming

If you want to make a name for yourself at your local farmers' market, you don’t have to turn around acres of crops. Instead, you can turn your garden into a space for growing some veggies and maybe even fruits. You can earn extra by offering products as well as raw crops. For instance, if you know how to make jam, you can sell this for a higher price - again, subject to the necessary certification.

6. Dog Care

Maybe you still want to take care of animals but large animals are a little too much; maybe they aren’t your preference or maybe you don’t have enough land. However, there are plenty of animals that you can take care of while living a smaller, more frugal lifestyle.

To spend time outdoors, you can start a dog-walking business. This is a great option because there are many people who can’t take time in the middle of the day to come home and walk their dogs.

If you want to push this business to a more profitable level, you can board dogs as well. You can be selective in the dog breeds you choose to board to ensure you don’t end up with an untrained dog in your house for a weekend.

7. Start Your Own “Green” Shop

If opening a retail shop or purchasing a franchise is a bit too much, you can easily start small by opening an online store. You can also sell products that you make to a small following. You can link up with sites like Giving Assistant to help earn you a following and boost sales.

Your love of nature comes in with what you make. Maybe you want to make your own, homemade tea blends or make everyday products through a greener process. This is your chance to use your love of nature to create something of which you can be proud.

8. Open a Beauty Salon

Creating your own beauty salon doesn’t quite sound linked to nature, but it can be, with a little creativity. Think about it this way: When you visit the beauty salon, how many chemicals and ingredients damaging to the environment do you see?

As an alternative to this, you can start your own beauty salon that uses safer products. There are plenty of hair products and skin care products that you can make with completely eco-friendly, vegan ingredients.

9. Eco-Consulting

Do you already dedicate your life to green living? Is recycling and composting a part of your daily routine? Are you greener than the average person? If so, then you might be the perfect person to start an eco-consulting business!

Many people don’t live or operate their offices in the most eco-friendly ways. In many cases, these people simply aren’t sure of where to start and where to go. This is where you step in: Your business would be to help these clients transition to more eco-friendly businesses, operations and lifestyles.

10. Green Housekeeping

As we pointed out earlier, many people are willing to pay for cleaning services—inside and out. However, much like we mentioned with beauty salons, these services usually include an alarming amount of harmful ingredients to nature—and humans!

Regardless of the type of “nature” business you choose to start, there are plenty of options available. With a little creativity and hard work, you can turn your love for nature into a healthy living—in more ways than one. 

You should always check that you have any essential qualifications, permissions and/or insurances necessary for carrying out your chosen business ventures but there is bound to be something you can do that combines your love of nature with income generation.

2017 End of Year Round Up

Looking Forward to 2018 After a Very Busy 2017

A fast forward through the month of December with this photo blog showing some of the things we did during December.

The children started decorating a tree at Frugaldom
reusing the baubles and tinsel  from last year.

We had some old clothes to recycle so we made Mr Scarecrow,
giving him an old football for a head, a flower pot for a hat
and a broken rake to help prop him upright. He's stuffed with hay.

For extra tree decorations, we used toilet paper tubes
and salvaged food wrappers - these are our Hovis crackers!

Making bells for the Christmas tree from
old tin foil, egg cartons and wool

Our start was made from cardboard covered
in gold foil from a tomato puree tube

It snowed!

Frugaldom looked lovely in the snow,
especially around the new ponds

Frankie loves rolling in the snow

Our American visitor returned for her Christmas break
and got her first ever experience of sitting on a bareback,
barefoot, bitless pony - Willow in her winter woollies.

It was very pretty at the caravans, even if
this first lot of snow only lasted a day or so

Most of the snow fell on the Galloway hills.

The decorated tree in the mist at Frugaldom,
standing among the tiny native trees planted
as part of our World War 1 Centenary woodland

The wild-seeded Sitka Spruce at Frugaldom
came in handy - we carefully selected a lovely,
small tree and lit it up by the caravans,

Pippin the pony walking on ice!

The gorse by the roadside between Frugaldom and
the caravan park is beginning to flower in the snow.

December flew past and most of our time was spent preparing for Christmas. The budget was kept well under control and the challenge spreadsheets were totalled up for the end of the year, allowing for one final small investment in seeds and an Argos voucher for spending on bonus items that were afforded by exra scrupulous budgeting practices throughout the year. :)

 Olivia, our American student who was with us for a few weeks during summer, returned to spend Christmas with us at the caravans and then she headed further north.

Christmas shopping was done as carefully as ever, affording us a big supermarket shop and the many bargains that were available through MuscleFood. (This is my friend referral link that will also get you some meaty freebies.) And then there were all the Christmas leftovers to freeze for later use. The homemade clootie dumpling was, as always, pidding of the day and allowed our guest to sample some traditional Scottish cooking.

We spent Hogmanay at the holiday park, listening to the piper piping in the new year and watching the fireworks display.

For those of you with an avid interest in number-crunching, here are end of year results. I began the year with the customary £4,000 and spent the following from each category:

• Groceries - spent £942.83
• Toiletries, laundry & cleaning products - £43.27
• Electricity - £932.83
• Coal & logs - £40.00
• Mobile phone - £20.00
• Telephone & Internet - £574.60
• TV Licence - £145.50
• Footwear & clothing - £41.84
• Gifts - £321.48
• Travel - £365.00
• Postage & deliveries - £21.17
• Insurances - £312.99
• Pets & livestock - £189.55
• Misc other - £50.50

Total spend on household-related expenses = £4,000.60

Left in the 'EEK' (Everything Else Kitty) £50 Argos voucher,

Gifted Amazon vouchers, Topcashback balance (accrued from Christmas shopping online), Nectar points and a tub of loose change.

Progress at Frugaldom has come on in leaps and bounds with resurfaced tracks, drainage runs cleared out, the yard completed, more fruit trees planted plus 1,000+ more native tree saplings planted around the place. Frugal Breaks launched, offering you the opportunity to come and  visit for a short break (or longer stay, if you choose) and the bulk of the penny-pinching savings were poured into a tiny, one-bedroom cottage, complete with an out-building and a plot of garden land. The cottage is now part of our Frugal Breaks holiday lets enterprise, but more on that in a later blog post, as there's still quite a bit of work to be done.

That's it! We're now up to 2018 and the start of a brand new year. Good luck to all and please do consider joining us in our new  private group on Facebook for the 2018 Frugal Living Challenge. Don't forget to let us know if you are interested in the money saving, money making or frugal breaks when joining. 

Money Challenges in January

• #Frugal Living
• #Money Saving
• #Household Budgets
• #Money Challenges

 

It's almost the end of the first month into our 2016 frugal living challenge - how are you doing?

 

 

My garden is a shambles with nothing more than the last remnants of the perennial herbs and none of them looking like the photo above - lush, green and colourful. No, instead they are looking sparse, woody, twiggy and in bad need of some care and attention. Elsewhere in the garden, some of the garlic cloves have sprouted and I found a few rogue potatoes when scrounging for some spinach the other day I was out there.

 

Every new year brings us new challenges but it still never ceases to amaze my how others perceive 'our lifestyle' as we pursue our frugal living goals. I don't even think of it as a peculiar life of deprivation or self-imposed poverty. We live in times of austerity that have been brought on by what would appear to be a complete and utter lack of ability for some people to add, subtract, multiply and divide! Simple arithmetic should surely provide just reason for living within one's own means after working so hard to achieve total freedom from debt. What I see, I own - it is mine. It doesn't belong to the bank, it doesn't belong to a credit company, hire purchase, lease or finance company, it is mine to do with exactly as I please - so I do! Shame on anyone who can't 'get' why they have overdrafts, credit card bills, bank loans, long-running contracts, mortgages and insufficient (if any) savings if it's down to their money-spending priorities being at odds with their household incomes. Putting you own wants before the security of home and family is, in my opinion, a very selfish thing to do.

 

Back to the finances - we had a debate in the frugal forums about whether or not there were any benefits to paying BT's annual linesaver this year, as prices had, once again, increased. In my situation, where every penny counts, I found that the 10% savings made by paying in full at the start of the year led me to having an extra £21.54 at the end of the year, along with the added £1.94 that represents the 1% cashback I'll accrue from paying by credit card and clearing the balance before any interest is added. For those of you who have been with Egg card since we began our cash-back savings, we still get up to 1% cash back each year from a fee-free card, we just no longer get paid interest on any credit balances - more's the pity.

 

So how is the annual challenge budget looking? From a starting point of £4,000, I have already spent £500, with £194 of this going to BT and my usual 50p per day into the savings pot. Telephone and Internet account for a huge proportion of the budget but let's not overlook the fact that these are luxuries that most of us prefer to have. It now costs around £10 per week for personal communications equipment of whatever description you use - landline, Internet, mobile phone - and that has to act as part of our social activities, as we are all so busy communicating that some of us have no time left to actually interact with real people outside of work or home.

 

The other big burden on budgets is energy costs - these account for about 25% of my annual budget, or 20% if I include council tax. Has anyone else noticed how similar in amounts council tax and energy use have become, or is that just in my old stone cottage with it's single glazing and no loft to insulate? It's like the price of petrol - it used to always run about parallel with that of cigarettes with much of those costs being tax of one form or another - anyone know if it is still possible to buy a pack of cigarettes for the price of a gallon of petrol?

 

Many thanks to all my regular frugal friends for continuing to pursue a life of frugality and for setting a good example to those around them - living in frugal debt freedom IS the new rich - like it, live it, love it! For those who disagree, you can lump it!

 

Feel free to join any of our many money challenges free in the www.frugalforums.co.uk New for 2016, we have the THISTLE POT CHALLENGE,  a brand new challenge to save those pennies into pounds and come to our Frugaldom meet-up in May 2017. It's going to be our first ever frugalfest!

Frugal Living for Newcomers

By NYK in Frugaldom

• #Frugal Living
• #Recipes
• #Money Saving
• #Household Budgets
• #Food on a Budget
• #Money Challenges

A daily dose of frugal living to help our new members cope with the trials and tribulations of living on an ever tightening budget. Don't spend rainy day money unless it really is essential - stop, take stock and prioritise your spending now.

20 servings of home soup for around £2.00
December is one of the most expensive months of the year if, like many others, you leave Christmas shopping until the last minute and then discover you have overspent on the food budget throughout the year, leaving yourself potentially skint over the festive period. Worse still, you may find an increase in visitors, unexpected presents 'needing' to be bought and family or friends expecting to be fed and entertained during the holidays. My number one tip is MAKE SOUP!
Soup can be made from almost anything and costs just a couple of pounds to make sufficient for up to 20 servings. I store mine in recycled margarine cartons, which hold two portions, or in the plastic screw cap jars, which can hold 3 servings. The plastic screw cap tubs cost about 65p each and come filled with instant hot chocolate powder! Bonus! (Never bin anything that has reuse potential.)
EASY TO MAKE HAM AND LENTIL SOUP

• 1 pack cooking bacon (currently around 65p from supermarkets)
• 500g lentils
• 4 chopped carrots
• 2 chopped onions

Simmer the meat in water to make the stock- I do mine in the slow cooker for at least 3 hours and this also contributes to the overall heating of the kitchen - and then strain the meat and fat from the water. Separate the meat from the fat (if you are health conscious) and set it aside while making the soup. You can either add this later or use it in other meals, like ham and pasta bake, carbonara, pie or even eat it on sandwiches.
Add in the lentils and chopped vegetables then simmer until ready - add more water as required.
Once cooked, season to suit your own taste. You can add in the leftover bacon to turn the soup into a luxury, meaty broth that can be served as a meal on its own, probably followed by pudding, if you are anything like us here in Frugaldom, but when the budget is really stretched, I recommend using the bacon for something like pie-making so you get another meal out of it.
SUDDEN LOSS OF INCOME
Thankfully, this has not happened to me this month but it happens to people all the time - pay offs, lay offs, redundancies, illness, accidents and even, in tragic cases, sudden death. There are any number of reasons for a sudden change in circumstances and we cannot always be prepared for them. So how can we best cope?
First, no amount of panicking, shouting, tears or tantrums will instantly resolve the problem and despite being a very difficult fact to absorb, we have to remain level headed for the sake of our own sanity and those around us.
STOP - TAKE STOCK - PRIORITISE
Tough choices can mean tough love! I'm focussing on income here, so for the purposes of being prepared, frugal living means maintaining a basic supply of essential foodstuffs, like salt, flour, pulses, dried and tinned goods suitable for emergencies and budgeting to run the household on less than what you normally average. I'm not talking about extreme preparedness, only a basic common sense approach to avoiding empty cupboards when we most need them to be full and paying the bills without bankrupting ourselves, while still setting aside something for the future. THIS 'SOMETHING' DOES NOT NEED TO BE MONEY!

MAKE LISTS
I did a quick freezer inventory while the soup was cooking and listed every item this lifesaving ice box contains. In saying that, it is only lifesaving while there is electrical power, so I prefer not to cook any meats before freezing them just in case they defrost and need to be cooked before refreezing. Ready cooked meals are done on a surplus to immediate requirement basis, so a batch of Bolognese sauce or lasagne would be OK, along with the frozen stewed fruit that gets used up over the winter months after the growing season has ended. Soup is always available and gets replenished as soon as the last tub gets used. I have several recipes and posts about homemade soup, feel free to read those, save them or share them.
During my inventory, I discovered enough food to last us the remainder of the year, excluding Christmas dinner. I could manage a celebratory dinner on what's here but have family visiting who expect a bit of tradition, so we're preparing the meal between us.
List your overheads and prioritise your necessary spending - rent or mortgage, council tax, essential utilities all need to be paid. Review contracts, if you have any, to find out which can be cancelled. As a general rule, frugal living means saying no to all contracts, so things like mobile telephones, satellite television and subscriptions of any description are an absolute no-no! Many don't realise the damage these can do while there's money flowing in, it's only when the contractually agreed payments get missed and start accruing debt at an alarming rate that we suddenly realise the hidden dangers. No more contracts - get rid of them as soon as possible and learn to live without whatever luxury it is they were providing.

CHEAP, HOME-BASED HOBBIES
This is my knitting project that I started yesterday. It will eventually become a multi-coloured, multi-textured, warm, woolly blanket made from all the odd balls of wool that others often discard at the ends of their own projects. Both the blue and brown mottled wool are from unravelled home knits made by others. I am not a knitter but these plain (or garter) stitch strips are a dawdle to knit, even for the most inexperienced of us. This and the fact that there are fewer squares to sew together at the end of it make it a much less arduous and almost therapeutic task. Relax and unwind your yarn this winter.
ENTERTAINING KIDS
My own kids are now grown, one has kids of her own, so my kids are grand kids. Children of all ages demand to be entertained, amused, fed, bathed, clothed and pampered - so do some adults, come to think of it! Money does none of these things - people do! A child can have just as much, if not more, fun playing outside with those responsible for their welfare and, contrary to belief, getting dirty isn't a life-threatening situation. As long as you have the time to spend with children doing simple, cost-free activities, children will be happy. If it's cold indoors because you can't afford heating on all day, wrap them up warm, get them out into the fresh air and then wrap them in home-knitted blankets until the house warms up a bit.
Many of us still don't have double glazing, insulation or central heating and nor can many afford to burn electricity in the absence of gas. Coal costs a small fortune and log drying can be next to impossible during the prolonged wet weather we endure here, but making the smallest room in your home acceptably warm shouldn't be impossible, even if it means converting your living room into a bed-sit come dining come games room. It makes family time seem fun all the time. If you're a telly addict, get headphones rather than bark orders to shut up at everyone else in the room who has no interest in what's on at the time. Sorted!
Published by NYK Media (AKA Frugaldom) as part of the Frugal Living blog

The Process of Frugalisation - part 2

Part of Frugalblog.co.uk

• #Frugal Living
• #Money Saving
• #Foraging
• #Household Budgets
• #Food on a Budget
• #Money Challenges

How to become frugal and follow an extremely frugal lifestyle is something I am often asked - how it all started, why I do it and what keeps me pursuing such a lifestyle when I no longer seem to need to do so? Keep pecking away at those debts or adding to the savings, as the freedom to be frugal is well worth it. (Part 1 can be found here.)

Sorry this second part was delayed but I don't exactly work regular hours in a regular place of employment. I'm home based, self employed and slowly developing my frugal kingdom, so it's starting to take me out and about a bit more while preparing for a slight change of direction. Or perhaps it is better said that I'm preparing to add another business venture to my existing writing and publishing work, as I have no intentions of giving that up any time soon.

First of all, I began this lifestyle because I had to - in the grand scale of things, my entire life changed almost overnight and … Read more here

Moneysaving Mayhem

May has been a busy money-saving month of mayhem, so far, but we have managed to complete the barn painting and have another corral, or small paddock, fenced, planted the last of this year's trees, sown seeds and I set up a makeshift wild bird feeding station outside the caravan, where the resident woodpecker is now visiting several times each day. That's my frugal entertainment. Life on site in a mobile home is great!

I'm going to begin this latest post with a quote from John Irving that definitely reflects the mood of the day. The photo is one I took of the nearby loch when it was perfectly calm and reflective. I think some of my long-standing friends and family are wondering if I have taken up permanent residence in the mobile home, now known as my micro-ranch. Yes, it's a far cry from a sandstone cottage, but it most definitely has everything I need and greatly increases the time I can spend working on the Frugaldom Project whenever the weather permits. The field is a mere half mile from here. What isn't there to like? I have luxuries here that aren't available at the house, such as Sky TV, an indoor heated swimming pool, golf, fishing, site shop, various free to attend social activities and all are included within the annual site rental fees that equate to about £40 per week, including WiFi, water and TV. (Swimming, fishing and golf are included in that price.)

The site is not a year-round residential site, but I can spend 11 months of the year here, leaving February as the month for catching up elsewhere, visiting friends and family or getting jobs done elsewhere. With the spare room and living room bed settee here, I can have friends and family to stay anytime, providing a frugal holiday option for many and also less travelling for those coming to help out at Frugaldom. The site has facilities for campervans, tourers and tents as well as renting out chalets, but I think the majority of the caravans may be privately owned holiday homes. To be absolutely honest, I haven't a clue why we didn't look at this option instead of renting an assortment of houses over a 10-year period while saving to buy! It could have saved thousands of pounds! I think I've spent more money moving house over the past 15 years than it costs to buy a decent ex-rental or secondhand mobile home on this site! I'm not being paid to say this, but if I could find frugalers to buy the two plots and 'vans next to me, we could have a great little frugal community going here - I could even provide allotment-style gardens at Frugaldom for food growing.

Right now, I have a hand wash drying outdoors, pegged to the airer, and a tray of raspberry muffins baking in the oven, alongside quiche. It's taking time to accustom myself to a full size gas oven after using the microwave and mini oven for so long, but I've managed not to burn anything beyond use. There's also the fact that the cooker doubles as heating in the open plan layout of the caravan. I'm a few items short in the kitchen department, but am managing fine without having to buy anything else. My total spends have amounted to £4 for a plastic wash basin and a cheap frying pan. My latest frugal visitor was able to provide me with …

Continued here

Frugal Living from Scratch 2

 

Part 2 of 2: Getting right back to basics - Each step forward can be seen as another step back towards the starting line. Each tiny achievement marks the successful completion of part of your lifelong challenge, your quest for freedom. Along the way you will meet many sceptics, cynics and even a few cheats and liars whose only ploys are to get your money. As long as you have your 'get out of jail free' card then you know you'll be back in the game soon.

So here I am, sat in my latest home, looking out the window at a pretty grey and wet day with 'pretty' being the most important word in that sentence. The curtains are quite awful, but that's an easily remedied problem once I get around to making some new ones. Perhaps I'll add a pelmet or even some nets, who knows? I haven't decided yet. For now, the curtains serve the purpose of shutting out some of the cold at night.

Most of my days will now be spent between here and Frugaldom, planting and sowing, clearing and cleaning, plotting and planning and wading through all the meetings that these projects seem to involve. The site where we have the caravan is quite busy with fishermen, so I'm managing to hog the satellite wifi connection very easily from my makeshift office corner. It has great views and has all the facilities I could possibly need.

Buying a bigger caravan and siting in on a holiday park may seem like a major luxury to some - indeed, it has already been commented upon! However, this suits our needs and was within a strict budget. Now my new neighbours will know who and where I am, as this lot's sitting outside the caravan waiting to be built into the new decking. I can't wait to see it completed and then I'll be ready for welcoming visitors. I'm using this week as a trial run to work out what is needed, having come here on Friday with only the barest essentials. There's hot water and a heated towel rail, hand washing items of clothing isn't a problem. (Neighbours, if you happen to be reading this, come and introduce yourselves. Just make sure you get the right caravan, as I see several had decking delivered this week.)

This is frugal living! The little fridge is rather bare but I've cooked up some pasta salad, made some fruit jelly and strawberrry whip for desserts and will waste nothing - anything else is from a packet and most of it is vegetarian until I get the groceries brought over from the house. Meals are interesting! I had a box of individual milk portions at the office caravan that came free with an Approved Food order some time ago, so I decanted all of their contents into a jug and used it to bake some rice pudding with sultanas. Had some for lunch today and can have the rest as breakfast, snacks or pudding tomorrow.

Each of the tiny milk cartons has been washed and will be used to plant a single pea, so I can have some home produce. No point wasting good cartons when they can be put to good use. This is frugal living - waste not, want not. We'll grow what we can wherever we can and hope to have enough produce to swap and share. It's just a little chilly out to expect miracles at the moment.

This is my frugal life! The view of our barn dwarfed by the snowy Galloway Hills on the horizon is an awesome reminder of how small we all are in the grand scale of life. Only we can choose how we live and if we choose to live in a simple way then so be it. We don't own the land even when we buy it, the land ultimately owns us and will dictate what grows where, no matter what. Frugaldom is very much about watching the lie of the land and working out what might do best where and when in the future. Some people choose to spend their money on a big house, expensive jewellery, a luxury car, designer labels or visiting foreign and exotic places - we choose this.

Tree planting on a chilly but sunny day, overlooked by hills and snow, with the sheer joy of this being no more than a short walk from home - for some it is a nightmare they would never want to have but for others, it's their lives' work, investing in a better future.

Just to make sure we truly appreciated these days of walking, fetching, carrying, digging and tree planting, we were honoured by the presence of this beautiful bird in flight as it soared above us on our walk between field and caravan - the Red Kite has reached Frugaldom.

Believe it or not, in the beginning it is quite difficult to stop spending money when you're on a roll - no matter what you buy, it becomes a habit, just like smoking, drinking, gambling, even clothes, shoes, handbags or hobby stuff. We each justify our spending but any manner of excuses but we are wise to remember that the ends justify the means - and I'd rather end up with the freedom to soar wherever frugal life takes me. I'm sure I'm not alone in thinking that, but taking your first flight of fancy into your own future of freedom is like starting from scratch over and over again. You just need to quit spending on stuff that weighs you down, then spread your wings and work like crazy to reach each goal.

Join us in Frugaldom, give up spending on what you don't need and shape yourself a new and affordable lifestyle while you invest in your future.

Frugal Living from Scratch 2

Frugal Living from Scratch

Part 1 of 2: Getting right back to basics - this blog is about frugal living in a way that affords you a simple life of freedom from debts and the luxury to choose how and when you earn and spend your own money. You aren't completely free until every penny is your own. A complete, photo free 'rantathon' to get the penny rolling.

Let's get one thing straight - you don't own your own home if you have a mortgage, just as you don't own your own car if it was 'bought' on finance. It simply means you have borrowed these goods and made a personal pledge to pay over the odds for them while you use them and continue to pay over the odds for them even if you don't. It is a contractual obligation which is meant to keep you making payments that, in turn, bind you to earning whatever amount of money is needed to service the debts and live your life - whatever that may be. Likewise with everything you have in your possession - it isn't your own until you have zero debt and are no longer making payments of any description. It always baffles me how some folks can't see a mortgage as debt.

The battle cry I hear most often is that I (me, myself, I) cannot be frugal if I can afford to make major purchases for cash. Well, folks, it is by being frugal that we can afford such things in life and they are not so major when you look at the whole picture. I would go as far as declare myself a frugal living expert, having trained in the art for decades, learning by experience and honing my skills. Over and over again, I have show what does and does not work for me. Getting a 9 to 5 dead-end job and living in fear of interest rate or rent increases just doesn't cut it for me and I fail to understand why anyone in their right mind would want to torture themselves enduring that for fifty years of their life only to retire with nothing. Kudos to those of you who enjoy or endure that lifestyle, it's just not for me. I'm neither lucky nor privileged, I simply made a choice in my own life and stuck with it.

Absolute essentials, in my opinion, are shelter, suitable clothing and good basic nutrition that contributes towards your overall wellbeing. If you can get to a point that you can meet these needs with enough of your income left over to service all your debts, you have succeeded in the first step. The next step is to cut out absolutely everything, and I mean EVERYTHING, that you really don't need and start saving to invest in your own future. Some really tough choices need to be made - if you can't afford a car but really need one for work, can you relocate then  walk or cycle? Failing that, can you change jobs to one within walking or cycling distance? I don't really understand sentimentality towards bricks and mortar, it's a stupid concept to me. Yes, by all means love your home, but if it's just a millstone around your neck filled with memories, pack up those memories and take them with you to some place you can afford to relax indefinitely without checking your bank balance every other week.

Why worry about what others think of you? Something like that is learned behaviour and is a rather evil trait to instil in any child, in my opinion. It's also one that is really difficult to free yourself from, but it is worth it in the end. Learning one's own worth based on non-monetary values is far more revealing than finances and fripperies.

Very little money is needed to live my chosen lifestyle. For me, understanding how anyone ends up in debt when earning what I'd consider a small fortune is intriguing, despite having seen the facts and figures for myself. There really is nobody to blame but the individuals who got there in the first place and more shame them if they choose to ignore it or, worse still, pass on that burden to others.

This blog isn't about becoming a superstar, a guru or a celebrity, it's about sharing my own journey to freedom. Knowing where you want to be is the difficult part but once you have established that, everything becomes so much clearer and easier. It's all down to budgeting - knowing exactly what you need every penny to do and making it happen, come what may.

Home is where the heart is and the heart shouldn't give a stuff what friends, relatives or neighbours think. It may be a glorified shed, a caravan, a bed-sit, a tumbledown cottage, a boat or even an underground bunker conversion! For some obscure reason, people attribute worth and status to bricks and mortar, but that's not for the frugalers starting from scratch. Financial riches may come later, but in the beginning, you need to liquidate everything and clear your minds, your schedules and your debts so you can begin again, frugal living from scratch.

There are always excuses for why this 'can't' be done - but I'm telling you it can, even if it means finding someone with a spare room to rent while you work several crappy jobs and save your way out of the red and into the black. Room renting isn't ideal for families, I can appreciate that, but it isn't impossible if it gives you a base from which to establish your plan. Being free to control the vision of your own destiny is paramount to success but I would always recommend seeing much further beyond that, to the next challenge. Frugal living is a skill that absolutely anyone can afford to master - it cannot be bought, it has to be lived!

How long have you gone without buying a non-essential in an effort to pay every extra penny into the debt pot or savings plan?

NYK in Frugaldom

Frugal Living from Scratch

Life on the Cheap in a Small Space

Cheap and cheerful living in small spaces is what many aspire to, which is quite amazing considering what's available to buy nowadays. But for frugal living, we want fun and affordable homes, like tiny houses, cabins or even caravans, camper vans or tents. Well, tomorrow is a big day for me, as I downsize to frugal summer quarters.

As the above sign clearly says, it's only a small drive to paradise, or in our case a walk or a cycle, so bring your bikes or walking boots as well as your gloves and welly boots if you are planning a trip to help out on the 'range' that is now known as Frugaldom.

This will be basecamp for the foreseeable future! It's a good bit smaller than Thrift Cottage and under 385sq feet, so I am hoping that it will prove to be a comfortable and affordable choice, not withstanding the additional benefits of it being so handy for Frugaldom. It basically means falling out of bed and walking to work in the great outdoors. Hopefully, there will be a deck built before this month ends.

This is the view of what lies between here and there (Frugaldom) with the little patch of grass in front of the wall ear-marked to become a micro kitchen herb garden. I may even enter the site competition for best garden plot in 2015!

This is the view from the door, looking in the direction of one of the three lochs after which the site is named. From tomorrow, this is Frugaldom home-from-home. Don't worry, there's still plenty of space for Frugaldom friends and relatives visiting and I should be able to pick up the site WiFi, so I can keep you all up to date with progress and arrange your visits. Apart from that, you should be able to get me on my mobile. (Retro, I'll text you as soon as I get there to check.)

Finally, here is the main garden and work space - from the opposite side of the river and all around the big garden shed, which is actually a rather large barn. (The corrals, new woodlands, quarry and orchard are all beyond the barn.)

As you can see, my outdoor space far, far exceeds my indoor space but this is yet another aspect of the kind of frugality many have when aiming for money saving, lifetime goals. The cost of living in a mobile home can make it a very attractive prospect, even if you choose to pay extra for the luxury of having it on a fully serviced plot with access to on site facilities, but these are all things I'll be blogging about just as soon as I get everything organised.

Moving this close to Frugaldom is one more step closer to fulfilling the dream of creating a woodland wilderness, living off the land and communing with nature. These things can easily be entwined with small space living and modern luxuries. Now to make it all affordable and learn the ropes of cooking with gas. It's a great big adventure ready to happen and I have slashed my budget accordingly.

All going to plan, I should be able to update tomorrow, when I'll be starting a brand new food store, meal planning, scheduling and getting to grips with the cost of mobile home living. I'm thinking of it as an extended vacation!

Join www.frugalforums.co.uk for all the updates and I'll see you in Frugaldom soon.

Scottish Multimedia | Life on the Cheap in a Smaller Space

Money Saving Experts

Are you a money saving expert or are you a frugal living expert? There is a world of differences between the two and both can be crushed by debt. Real frugal living frees you from debt before you start saving any money.

This is a quick blog post in my own defence, after my being subjected, once again, to what one may refer to as criticism against my frugal lifestyle. I just want to make one thing clear - make no mistakes, I actually love being frugal! Get it into your head that some of us don't need to be part of the general 9 to 5, or a salaried slave to the system that we call 'normal' society. Some of us actually enjoy our freedom and we will happily go without what others consider to be absolute essentials in order to afford simple living. I have no fear of losing my income or my home, I earn my own pittance and have the skills to create a home from wherever I may be at the time. Again, don't get me wrong, what I do pays very little, as I'm mostly writing and publishing free content, attempting to grow some food from the kitchen garden or assisting those whose budgets (or wisdom)  [prevent them from seeking professionals. I don't mind non-cash payments by way of some pickle, veggies, a bag of apples or a cake. I just need to earn sufficient to pay the essential bills and this is made possible by squeezing them as low as possible and seeing beyond the goal of 'living within my means'.

Some people assume that it is a basic human right to be able to afford certain things that I would consider absolute luxuries, but let's get this straight - paying for all these things as cheaply as possible in order to save cash in a tin, jar or bank while having any form of debt or money worries, in my opinion, is just plain dumb! Absolute debt freedom allows you the luxury to continue following a very frugal lifestyle while saving and investing in your own futures. I know there are other ways of doing things but this is mine and it works for me.

Frugal living allows those of us on low incomes to speculate a little in the hope that we will accumulate sufficient to afford to continue our stress free lifestyle, right through to retirement and beyond. That is not to say that we will ever reach a point when we can easily live off the interest from our savings but at no point will we get into the unsustainable situation whereby we have more going out than coming in - that is the gist of this story. It's about living within lowly means in a way that demonstrates how it is affordable to all and making the most of every penny to grow it into a pound.

Money saving - it is such an ambiguous phrase. Is it money-saving or is it simply saving money? Are you saving by shaving a percentage off the overall cost of what you buy or are you living well within your means in order to save what's leftover by way of cash and other investments. For the past ten years, I have been living a fairly frugal life, primarily to clear debts like credit cards and a couple of contracts I had locked myself into and then to free myself from the rent trap, as I prefer the security of owning over the pressure of earning hundreds of pounds extra each and every month in order to sustain rent payments. Personally, I feel I could make a home anywhere, as it's about how you feel and not the material 'stuff' that's built up around you. Personally, I don't care if what's around me is built from stone, brick, wood or mud. I don't care if the roof is slate, tile, shingle, tin or felt. Affording to feel comfortable, relaxed and secure within that space is what matters, free from the worry of how to pay for it.

So, when someone grumbles to me that their savings are dwindling, their out-goings are far greater than their income, their home isn't worth selling because they won't get back what they paid for it and they are worried about how they will afford to keep the roof over their head in the future, don't expect me to wave a magic wand and say, "There, there, everything will work out somehow." My answer is blunt and to the point - quit spending, quit throwing good money after bad and downsize instead of playing silly games of 'what will friends and neighbours think?'

Yes, I did say it as I saw it and do you know what their utterly disgusted response was, fellow frugal lifestyle fans?

"I could never live like you!"

www.frugalforums.co.uk

Money Saving Experts

Moderation March 2015

It isn't all pie in the sky! Beating down the cost of food in an effort to reduce how much money we waste while grocery shopping can be the easiest place to start saving, especially if you are adopting a more frugal lifestyle while focussing on a healthier diet.

 
Welcome to March, month of mad hares and, hopefully, the final throws of winter for us here in the UK. Hopefully, the temperatures are beginning to drop for our readers in Australia and snows begin thawing for our Canadian frugal friends. We've survived the festive sales, the New Year sales, St Valentines Day and the Frugaldom February Fitness Challenge, now we have Mother's Day and Easter to contend with before springing fully into spring cleaning - or so I am led to believe!


Where last month was about losing pounds, namely the surplus gained over the festive fair season, March is about gaining them, marching proudly onwards in an effort to repair the rest of the damage that could have been done, especially by way of finances. We also need to reclaim cupboard space in preparation for the year ahead. And so through to winter we go, once more. It's that circle of life that gets us from one year to the next until we fall off the merry-go-round.

Moderation: Moderate - Balanced - Reasonable - I am neither over-indulging nor depriving myself of anything, but I will be saving money while enjoying the finer things in simple life, no matter what.

In the Kitchen  

Making savings in the kitchen is the easiest place to start and it needn't result in deprivation, unless you have chosen to deprive yourself of anything specific during the days of Lent. (I do notice quite a few mentions of cakes, biscuits, chocolate, sweets and alcohol when this topic arises. However, as a good non-pursuer of such faiths, I choose to motivate my lifestyle by moderation most of the time, not just for a few weeks of the year.

March has been named as our frugal month of moderation in the forums for all those taking part in the various money saving and lifestyle challenges. I have already looked back at my previous budgets, each having been charted in spreadsheets since bringing my frugal living challenge online officially. The following is from a few of my previous grocery budgets:  

• 2011: Annual grocery spends - £1,298.16
• 2012: Annual grocery spends - £1,227.59
• 2013: Annual grocery spends - £964.80
• 2014: Annual grocery spends - £916.06  

As you can see, year on year, my overall grocery spends have reduced and yet I have still been able to build up a suitable stock pile of dried, tinned and preserved goods. There were three of us in the house during 2011, so a drop occurred in 2012 when the household reduced to two.

For 2015, the new challenge is to hammer down the grocery budget to £640.00, which equates to £520.00 for foodstuffs and £120.00 for toiletries, medications, cleaning and laundry products.  I cannot guarantee that this will be achieved, as it actually works out at just under £5.00 per person per week for all meals, but with food prices continually falling and us now having access to one of the big supermarkets, I think it is entirely possible. It is even possible to include some luxury items, like biscuits, cakes and desserts. In many cases, such things cost less to buy than to make.
 

In the meantime, if the ingredients are there, then homemade is always preferable.  Flour can be bought for 45p per 1500g, sugar at 49p per kilo. This morning, I made some luxury choc chip cookies for this afternoon's visitor using the tried and tested 1, 2, 3 recipe:

CHOC CHIP COOKIES

• 100g sugar (5p)
• 200g melted margarine (32p)
• 300g self raising flour (9p)

The above is my basic starting point, to which I added an egg (10p) and extra flour, (3p). You can add about 100g of anything at all, be it grains, seeds, chopped nuts, chocolate, dried fruit... I chopped up a 100g bar of cheap supermarket (30p) chocolate for these. The mix does more resemble crumble but it kneads together like dough. I make the biscuits individually by squeezing then rolling a handful of the mix into a walnut-sized ball and then flattening it, rather than having to knead/roll/cut.  There should be enough in this to get 24 cookies but I opted for making larger ones today, so will probably get only 18. To make them extra luxurious, I added an egg and a little extra flour to bind it all together, baked 12 on a greased tray and have wrapped the remainder of the cookie dough in polythene to refrigerate for later use. The tray was baked for 10 minutes in the middle of the oven at 180C, then the biscuits transferred to a wire rack to cool.  

Total cost for luxury handmade choc chip cookies - 89p - this is assuming you have paid full price for everything, but my margarine cost less than half that quoted and my egg came from one of the garden hens, so my luxury cookies actually cost only 63p. You can, of course, reduce this cost by making plain cookies, as opposed to using the chocolate. As I use a mini oven for baking, the electricity costs are minimal and contribute to the overall heat in my otherwise cool kitchen.

If you would like to follow the progress of this or any of our other money saving, frugal living challenges, feel free to join us in www.frugalforums.co.uk where all the information is fully accessible to members only - not even the search engines get in to the members' only sections.

NYK in Frugaldom.

Join the Spending Revolution

Vendetta Against Debt! It's that time of year again, the time when we are planning ahead for 2015, renewing our vigour for the on-going battle against debt, building up our forces to thwart needless spending and fight for the right to protect our own financial security. This is a war against waste - financial and otherwise. Join us in our quest for financial freedom.

Frugaldom is no fairytale fantasy of mythical castles, dragons and miracles. You play your own part in this quest for freedom.

This is an adaptation of the original 'Living on £4,000 for a Year' challenge, which has been running online since 2007. Some of the NYK challenges date back to the late 90's, so I do have a considerable amount of experience in balancing my own books, while living within my own means, always done on a budget that some consider to be impossible. Utter nonsense! It is entirely possible and is an achievement of which I am particularly proud. I can say with confidence that living free from debt while on a small income is 100% possible. You do, however, need to exercise will power and keep yourself focussed on your plans in order to achieve these otherwise impossible goals.

We have seen many changes over the years, so each stage in the development of our frugal living and working plans takes us a step closer to the good life and beyond. Your budget is personal to you, it should fit with your personal financial situation and it should be something you are happy to achieve. If you can achieve a point at which you spend less than you have coming in, then you are halfway there. Getting to the point that you are spending less than you are earning while also absolutely free from debt is the ultimate goal. You just need to believe it is possible and stick to your plan no matter what.

This challenge is not about self-deprivation or self-imposed poverty just for the sake of it, it is about providing genuine support for those who are prepared to take on the challenge of making a real difference to their own lives while sorting out their own difficult financial situations. Once the debts are gone and you are in full command of your own spending (or not spending, as the case may be), the world is your oyster. Whether you choose to invest, explore, plant a forest, see the world or lead a comfortable life knowing you are financially secure is entirely up to you.

Many former and current challengers have achieved debt freedom and now follow frugal lifestyles in order to stay free from debt while pursuing better lives without the entrapment of credit. Others are tackling debts, including mortgages, while following a frugal lifestyle in an attempt to reach their debt-free or mortgage-free day. Whichever stage you are at, feel free to join us for 2015 and share your journey.
You can join us free by registering a username at www.frugalforums.co.uk

2015 sees the return of the live NYK Chat room, complete with scheduled chats for the purposes of additional support, plus live question time. The new platform has been trialled over the past couple of months within the members' section of our host site at Scottishmultimedia.co.uk and it is hoped that the increased potential for even more real time interactivity can help many more people who want to embark on their own money journeys to financial freedom.

This challenge is about establishing your true cost of living, sticking to your budget, clearing debts (if you have any) and making savings wherever and however you can to enable you to live the life you really want.

Frugal living isn't for everyone, but everyone is welcome to join us. Methods employed by frugalers include batch cooking, stockpiling, preserving, foraging, mending, shopping in charity shops, reducing, reusing, recycling, Local Exchange Trading Schemes (LETS), Vegetable and fruit growing, allotments, keeping hens, using cash-back sites and doing whatever it takes to become self sufficient in managing the cost of living without incurring debt.

For some it is about clearing debt, for others it's about increasing savings, buying property, becoming stay at home parents or paying off the mortgage early. Some choose the lifestyle on ethical grounds, others seek early retirement or self-sustainability. Above all, this is meant to be a fun and supportive way to manage a minimal budget so you have control of your own money.

It's about NEEDS and not WANTS.
Living on a budget = living within our means.

Frugal = thrifty, living without waste

Ideas to help you achieve and/or maintain debt free living:

Recognise the differences between needs from wants
Spend within your means
Set a proper budget
Quit expensive habits
Houseshare or get a lodger
Shop via cashback sites and always price compare
Buy reduced items in stores only if you need them
Stockpile & bulk buy
Batch cooking
Make the most of charity shops
Join Freecycle or other similar waste awareness and recycling associations
LETS trading - become active members of trading & exchange groups
Bartering
Grow your own herbs, fruit & vegetable
Preserving & wine-making
Bread-making & home baking
Card & gift making
Order splitting for better discounts & shared postal costs
Landsharing, allotments & frugal garden systems
Making the most of freebies
Develop your on home-based business
eBid and eBay trading
Monitoring and revising a budget is part of any frugal living plan. Gifts & cards could all to be homemade, livestock needs to pay its own keep, anything else needs to be cash neutral and pets are like people in a household - they need to be budgeted for in a 'what if' manner.

If you would like to be in contact with like-minded others while stretching your money further than you ever thought possible, join us online and be prepared to take the frugal ride of your life.

IMPORTANT

Please respect others' lifestyles and beliefs. We are not here to judge, we are here to support.

Thank you.

Join the Spending Revolution