My Abundant Life: This Week's Frugal Tasks Saturday 20th February 2016

I tried to have a slower week but it just didn't happen. I arrived home Saturday afternoon from the Aldi Adelaide workshop. I was a little weary from the travelling and all the talking Cath and I did in 24 hours. A big thankyou to fellow Cheapskater Laine who recommended the Aldi baby products to the people in my group. It's been a while since I've bought nappies and wipes.

During the week I worked, Megan got her second part time job, got the car serviced, did a food shop as well as the usual cleaning chores around the house. Here's what else I got up to -

* Made lots of creamed rice to avoid throwing out lots of milk. The use by was about to expire so I had to think of something easy and yummy that uses lots of milk. This is one of Jessica's favourite desserts so she was in heaven.

* Made 11 jars of tomato relish. I used tomatoes from my garden and made the brown sugar using sugar that was given to us.

* Stuck to our $2 per person budget for Valentine's Day. Darren and I spent this amount on each other to buy a little treat. Darren bought four cherries and coated them in chocolate. He found a card in my card box to give me. I bought $2 worth of cashews and bagged them up with a red ribbon to give to Darren.

* Made brown sugar.

* Picked raspberries, beans, tomatoes and a few strawberries.

* Bought crumpets as a treat. They were reduced to $1.12 a packet.

* Bought home the toiletries from the accommodation in Adelaide last weekend.

* Darren cooked up some cherry tomatoes given to us. They have been frozen into meal size.

* Bought 3 large Moccona jars from the op shop. They were $3.99 for the three less 20% discount. I'll be using them as presents filled with biscuits ( cookies ). I also purchased three light green vintage plates for $4.99 together less 20% discount. I found some lovely pink, white and green striped cotton material for $9.99 less 20%.. These will be made into tea towels for my new kitchen, some to give as presents and some to sell.

* Bought some knitting cotton from Spotlight on clearance for $2 a ball I'll be knitting dishcloths for my kitchen, some to give as presents and some to sell.

* Made muesli bar slice for snacks.

* Gratefully accepted a lovely present from Annabel. After the Adelaide workshop she presented me with a pretty box filled with knitting / crochet cotton and crochet hooks to get me started on crocheting. Thankyou so much Annabel. Such a lovely present. You'll be pleased to know later that night Cath got me started on crocheting. I'm still in the very basic stage but I'm hoping to get better.

* Kept the cooling off all week. We did use the fan on the cooling a couple of times but this costs so little to run.

* Cooked from scratch all week and ate out of the pantry, fridge and freezer.

* Saved the shower warm up water to use on all our potted plants and fruit trees / bushes.

* Sold one dozen eggs, one jar of jam and one jar of relish to a cleaning client.