Bargains of the floral variety and pie maker type




I love having flowers in the house and when they cost 75p they seem even nicer! the lilies are so beautiful and scent the entire room.

Thats my bargain of the year, a pie maker. It was brand new in the box from a charity shop (electrically checked by them) . I just use the cutters supplied with it, pop the pastry in the fridge and take 2 tops and 2 bottoms out as I go along. It takes 8 -12 minutes to bake 2 pies so I am using very little power and I can just pop any leftovers in a pie for lunches. When I am a little more organised I am going to make and freeze the pastry,cut out ready to go, so I can make a couple of pies when ever I need them. My daughter bought me some greaseproof sheets for a few pennies somewhere so I can interleave the pastry with those.

My trek onto E bay territory has proved worth while we now have a little nest egg for emergencies and I feel happier knowing it is there. I have, probably, another box full for after Christmas but as it is specialist stuff it will sell anytime of the year.

I set my son Gareth a challenge when he asked what I wanted for Christmas - I wanted a book of Amazon but he had to pay less than 50p for it - he did well - 2p which was good as the same book was £5 this week. I really cannot see the point in wasting precious money and my mantra for the New Year is 'keep it in my pocket' I am going to try and stretch my stocks of food and have lots of NSD's. I have a £25 voucher for M&S and a dear friend is sending me a £5 off voucher to go with it so I will search for meat bargains for the freezer with that and use the cash I had for food to buy myself some new yoga pants thus maximising my money.

My Mum has been lucky at the CS she volunteers in, it seems as if someone is slowly clearing out a stash of yarn and donating it. As the shop is mainly focused on furniture and clothes they dont really have time to mess with balls of wool which tends to linger so they have been selling it to Mum for me to use in my charity work. Its quite surreal as I get a bag one week then a few weeks later another one and the wool matches in the bags so its obviously the same person. I am very grateful for this bounty as yet again it saves my pennies.

Going to have a nice simple and quiet Christmas and look forward to a pennypinching New Year - hope you all have a lovely time spending Christmas however suits your own family.

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