Splashing The Cash For a Change..... & a Bargain !

 Wednesday was such a lovely day that we decided to visit Bridgnorth and stretch our legs a bit in the sunshine.  I always like a good browse around the charity shops there too, although things are so pricey lately that I rarely buy anything.  They have a Trespass Outlet shop too and I popped in there, not really expecting to buy anything.  However....👀 I spotted this fleece on the sale rail.....

There was only one left in my size and it fitted perfectly but crikey look at the price!  £68.99 😨

I checked at the till and the price came up as £27.59  Now that's more like it.  It's well finished and made from the kind of fleece which really keeps the cold out so it just had to come home with me.  I haven't bought any new clothes for ages so I had enough money to pay for it......

As expected, the charity shops had some lovely china and bric-a-brac but it was all overpriced and I wasn't tempted at all.  I did, however, spot this T shirt at the end of a rail on the way out.  It would be good to wear around the house with jogging bottoms for comfort....

It had been on sale for £5 but reduced to £2.50 so that found it's way into my purchases! I traced the brand online and their T shirts retail around £30.   Although the size label says XL it fits me and I'm usually 14/16.  I'm wearing it right now and it's very comfortable......

Have you found any charity shop bargains lately?

Thanks so much for popping in.  Stay safe and well wherever you happen to be,

Angie 💗

A 22p shop and a Thank You

 Thank you to everyone who followed my life story over the last three blog posts.  I'm amazed at your staying power! I appreciate every one of you and every single comment.  It was fascinating to read snippets of your own stories too.  Thank you 😊 

I've mentioned before that I complete online surveys for vouchers, and sometimes cash too.  Last week I reached the threshold for a £25 voucher and chose M & S.  They are a bit pricey but £25 worth of free food is not to be sniffed at so,  after a good browse around the food hall, I settled on the food shown here because it would make several meals.....

The chicken made 2 meals ( a roast dinner and fajita wraps) utilising veg & salad bits from the fridge, 

The sea bass made 2 portions served with little roast potatoes and some peas,

 The haddock fishcakes were eaten with chips and salad including half the tub of coleslaw

 and

 The pizza base made a meal  for two, topped with sliced tomatoes and grated cheese laid over tomato puree, then popped in the oven for 11 minutes. It was served with the rest of the coleslaw. 

I know the cherry pie was a bit indulgent at £4.50 but it really was delicious and served 4 portions.  The red seedless grapes were very tasty too and became dessert for 3 days.  Graham loves satsumas so I left them all for him to snack on.  I can't find the receipt but the total cost was £25.22 meaning that all I had to  part with was 22 pence for enough main meals for 5 days.  Now that is my kind of shopping 🛍 ☺️ 

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I hope you are all well and enjoying the last couple of sunny days if you live in the UK. It's been a gorgeous day today with a clear blue sky but, at this time of year, I guess that means frost tonight.  Wrap up the seedlings!

Thanks for popping in and stay safe and well wherever you happen to be.

Angie 💗

75 Years in a Nutshell~ Part 3

 The Saga continues! ..........

2009 onwards

In 2009 it became clear that self employment was not working.  It was getting harder and harder to find work and our house needed to have money spent on it.  Money which we didn't have.  The previous year, we had lost my mum so I felt free to do what I liked, and live where I liked and we put the house on the market.  It sold very quickly and in 2010 we moved to a lovely new park home on a quiet site overlooking the canal......

 It had LPG central heating and was beautifully warm and cosy.  It was a lovely, friendly community within walking distance of a lovely little village with 2 pubs, a post office, butcher's shop and a little Tesco.  We bought a motorhome and went off on a trip every few weeks.  Just a few months later it was my turn to be made redundant 👀

Gray took a job in the gardening section at B & Q, we sold the work van, and the motorhome and rejigged everything to replace them with a caravan and a car to tow it with.  Then followed several years of exploring the UK on a budget, confident in the knowledge that friends watched our park home for us whilst we were away.

In 2018 Graham's health began to fail.  He has a spinal problem which no-one seems to know what to do about.  The caravan had to be sold as he could no longer tow safely and our little holidays ceased abruptly.

In December 2019 we sold the park home and moved to a new build semi.  It was beautiful.  A small tidy garden, enough storage space and within easy reach of shops.  The neighbours were lovely....apart from one....and she lived NEXT DOOR 😡 She was hell on legs.  I'll say no more.

To save our health and sanity, in September 2021 we moved to a shared ownership bungalow in a lovely quiet area.  We don't see the neighbours apart from a quick wave if they pass in their cars but it's better than sleepless nights due to noise and swearing right into the early hours and beyond......

The bungalow is not cheap to live in due to paying rent on the proportion we don't own but it's warm and comfortable now we are in our twilight years. We've been here over 3 years already and it's so much easier not having stairs to climb. I think we'll only move again when one of us pops our clogs. I've said before that if I go first then Gray would have enough coming in to make ends meet (just) but if I'm left alone I won't have enough income. This is why we've put aside enough money to pay the bills for a year to give the one left time to decide what to do next.  Hopefully, that will be a while yet. 

I have adventures to plan! 😁

Thanks so much for reading our story. 

How many times have you moved home so far?

Stay safe and well wherever you happen to be, 

Angie ♥️

75 Years in a Nutshell~ Part 2

 Thank you to everyone who commented on my last post.  I have really enjoyed reading about your own experiences 😊 Now I will continue....

1982 onwards 

In 1982 Graham was offered a good job in Toronto.  We thought long and hard about the upheaval and the exciting opportunity for change, and he accepted the job.  We went through the very lengthy emigration process, sold the house and most of the contents, and in June tootled off with the kids to Canada with a mix of trepidation and excitement. Our sole possessions were in 1 suitcase each.  We moved into a rented unfurnished apartment on the 6th floor as a temporary measure whilst we got ourselves organised, and the kids started school just a short walk away.   

After just 4 weeks Gray was laid off as recession hit the industry.  We were devastated to say the least.  He tried desperately to find work but to no avail.  We could see our savings being chipped away so decided to return home.  We already held return flight tickets as they had been cheaper than one way flights (thank God) so we had until the middle of October to wait it out.  The weather was gorgeous. Hot, sunny and wonderful.  We spent the summer exploring Toronto, Niagara Falls, The Science Centre etc spending as little as possible whilst enjoying all the experiences we could lay our hands and eyes on.  We had the most wonderful summer.

In October 1982 we landed with a bump (in more ways than one) at Birmingham airport in chill, damp and mist.....

We managed to find a small semi to buy and began our lives in the UK again.  This house was close to a good school for the kids and was cheap to run.  Again, there was no central heating; a gas fire in the lounge and a tiny heater in the third bedroom which was over the garage and quite chilly.  Winter was not easy! The kids and I walked everywhere. But Gray managed to find another job quite quickly and we saved to buy a better home.  Four years later we moved to a lovely detached new build home not far away so that the kids could remain at their current school.  We lived very happily in that warm, centrally heated house for almost 25 years. 

Things changed again when, at the age of 56, Gray was made redundant from his job as a patternmaker.  By then the kids had left home and bought their own homes so there was just the two of us to worry about.  He went to college and retrained in Horticulture, becoming self employed for the very first time while I worked part time to make ends meet.  Mum was becoming frail, demanding and difficult, and I was struggling to care for her, work and stay sane.  It was a very difficult time.....

More in my next post if you can bear it 😊.....

Has anyone else upped sticks and moved to another country to work?  How hard was it to settle in?

Thanks for popping in.  Stay safe and well wherever you happen to be,

Angie 💗 

75 Years in a Nutshell ~ Part 1

I was awake early this morning , and it got me thinking about my life over the last 75 years and how we coped with the change of seasons to Winter each year, with all the challenges it brings.

1949 onwards

I was born in 1949.  The first 2 years of my life were spent in a council pre-fab home with my mum, dad and 10 year old sister.  Those pre-fabricated homes were built post war as an emergency stop gap to help house the population during the housing shortages after the war, and were meant to last 10-15 years, but many years later they were still there and being rented out by the council.  At the age of 2 though, my family was lucky enough to be allocated a brand new brick built council semi on a big housing estate built on what was previously farmland, and there my memories begin....

I remember the house being roasting hot in the summer and freezing cold in the winter.  The only heating was an open fire in the kitchen and one in the front 'best' room.  We basically lived in the kitchen as it was smaller and, in theory, easier to heat and only lit the fire in the front room at Christmas and even then only if we had guests! There would be frost on the inside of the bedroom windows and I recall not wanting to get out of bed in the morning to get dressed.  The phrase 'heating or eating' hadn't been coined at that time but I'm sure my mum made the choice many a time during the winter months when she had no money for coal. I would go to school without having eaten breakfast or even having a hot drink because she knew I would get a small bottle of milk at breaktime in school. By the time I was 4 and a half I had a baby brother too.  Dad worked in the metal industry and mum was a housewife so there was just one income.  I don't ever remember feeling deprived and we were always clean and tidy. A boiler situated behind the open fire heated the water when the fire was lit so a bath could be shared if we were lucky! but it must have been difficult for our parents at that time.

I remember the chimney catching fire on more than one occasion leading to panic and great lumps of smouldering soot landing on the rug with a thump, to be scooped up on a small shovel and heaved outside 👀 The chimney sweep cost good money so dad would borrow a set of brushes to sweep it himself, often with dire results like the brush getting stuck and we kids would be dispatched outside with instructions to yell if the brush appeared at the top of the chimney.  Those were the days!

During the late 1960's mum gave in and saved up for a gas fire to be installed in the kitchen. No more cleaning out the grate or trying to get the new smokeless fuel to 'catch' by holding a newspaper to seal the opening and 'draw' the fire, only for the paper to catch fire first, then a panicked crumpling of said paper was initiated to put it out 😅

Mum lived right up to the end (aged 91) in the same house with no central heating....

1971 onwards

Graham and I got married in 1971 and bought a house on a different estate.  It didn't have central heating either, just one gas fire in the small living room.  We had no money as every penny we had  had been put down as a deposit on the house.  We bought the gas fire and existing living room carpet from the sellers for about £100 (why we paid for the fire which was already fitted is something I later regretted.  They would probably have left it anyway)

The 3 bedrooms were all bare boards and the vendors even stripped out every lightbulb.  The day we were handed the keys we arrived straight after work to take a look.  It was late September and pitch black and there wasn't a single lightbulb in place.  How miserable is that?

After we moved in in October 1971, I remember we rented a black and white TV for 50p a week and sat on the floor with our backs against the wall to watch it as we had no chairs!

For a long time, we lived with furniture that had been given to us by friends and family.  The only new stuff we had was a gas cooker (paid for by us in monthly instalments) and a mattress for the bed and....delight!...a small table and 4 chairs bought by my father as a wedding present. We were incredibly happy. 

These days young couples expect to move into a virtual show home straight away, don't they.... 

We eventually took out a bank loan to have gas central heating installed.  What a difference it made.

Two children and 11 years later we made the monumental decision to emigrate to Canada. I'll tell you more in the next post..... 

What was your very first home like? How much stuff did you actually own at that time? 

Thanks for popping in. Stay safe and well wherever you happen to be, 

Angie ❤️

A Spring Walk & Blue Skies

Yesterday (Monday) was such a beautiful day that all chores were abandoned in favour of a walk in the sunshine.  We drove the short distance to Himley Park, parked up for the minimum time of 2 hours for £3 and set off on the woodland walk.  It was Gorgeous.  The sun was warm on our faces, daffodils were in bloom....

.....and pure white Snowdrops carpeted the ground beneath the trees....

The stream ran cool and clear......

 

....and we were so happy to see that damaged fallen trees had been left to nature....

We couldn't help but stop and admire the beautiful blue sky after the horrible, cold, wet weather we've been having.  The trees are still bare but showing tiny signs of life.....

Spring is definitely here!

After our walk we treated ourselves to a hot drink and a toasted teacake in the coffee shop there.  It cost £9.30 for the two of us but was such a treat. And we do like to contribute to the local economy if we can 😀😉

Have you ventured out this week?  What is the weather like in your locality?

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This morning Graham has been giving the lawn it's first haircut of the year whilst I've tackled the basket of ironing.  Typically, the ancient strimmer has decided to give up the ghost so we'll need to investigate the cost of a replacement tonight. Ouch! money to be spent here I think 👀

Thanks so much for popping in.  Stay safe and well wherever you happen to be,

Angie 💗

Spring Has Sprung and Other News.....

 This last week has absolutely run away from me.  I can't believe that today is March 1st and the first day of meteorological Spring!  How did that suddenly happen??  Today (Saturday) is warm and sunny, after a very cold night and early morning, and Gray has gone to the allotment leaving me free to catch up with chores and a bit of cardmaking. 

During the week I dropped off another batch of 26 cards for the Hospice shop to sell and I've begun another batch as the last lot sold quickly.

As long as they sell at £1 each I'm happy to keep making them until I run out of materials.   As it is, I've spent £10 on some more card blanks so I really can't afford to keep buying bits and pieces in the way I used to when I sold at craft fairs 😌 and I'm using more die cut shapes which I've cut myself to keep the cost down.  It's more time consuming but does use up scraps of card etc

I can also report another sale on eBay in the sum of £31.11 after postage 👍The money dropped into my bank account this morning, so I'll add it to my total now.  

Sell & Save £45.52

This gives me enough cash to buy something for our Daughter's special birthday which she mentioned she would like.  She will be 50 on March 24th.  I don't know how that happened either!

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Next week we have the Gardeners' Guild meeting on Tuesday evening.  It will be the AGM but they are tempting us to attend with the offer of cheese and biscuits😎 and a coffee of course....

Expenses this month include my car insurance which I've managed to get for £170.96, and we've been notified of our rent increase from April 1st of £15.25 per month.  Luckily, this is less than I envisaged but the buildings cover, which they arrange and over which we have no control, is yet to be decided........

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Now that the weather is picking up a bit, our thoughts are turning to days out.  I doodled a list as follows:

Black Country Living Museum

Cosford Air Museum

Bantock Park

Tewkesbury & The Abbey

A Canal trip

Wightwick Manor (we have a free NT ticket)

The Circus

If I don't write these things down I know we won't do them. None of them will be too expensive, especially if we take our own food, although we might buy a coffee at the venue.

As I cross things off the list, I'll share the trip with you 😊 Our best friends are going to Tenerife for 3 weeks over Easter.  They have 3 holidays a year.  We can't compete with that but I can't wait for our day trips to begin......

Have you planned any trips or holidays yet?

Thanks for popping in.  Stay safe and well wherever you happen to be,

Angie 💗