DEAR BLOG DIARY

And now for something completely different…I received this useful tip in my inbox this morning so thought I’d share this with you.

CLICK HERE to use latest GREEN technology to clean your computer screen.

A lighthearted blog recording the struggles on how to live on less and try to be a bit greener. Warning: contains bizarre money saving tips, recipes and thoughts.

DEAR BLOG DIARY

On the frugal & green scale we are just middle of the road in our family. We still buy too many potato chips (although nearly always on special offer), drink too much ‘bought’ wine (but we do make a few batches of our own every summer) and could be a lot greener if we knuckled down to it but we are trying to make small changes as we meander along..trying to do without and use a little less where we can.

LIVING WITHOUT CABLE/SATELLITE TV

I was in the Irving in Mahone Bay just the other day and I often browse the extensive ‘Ex Rental DVD’ collection to see if a title catches my eye. I found a nice DVD for $9.99 and went to pay for it. The lady behind the counter commented that we must have a good collection of DVD’s by now (we have bought many before) which made me realize that indeed we do have an extensive collection at home. ‘Thats not very frugal’ I thought to myself and estimated that over the last few years we must have spent many hundreds of dollars on DVD entertainment. But actually I then calculated that by spending $50 a month on DVD’s we were actually saving nearly $1000 a year! (Bet you can’t work that one out!)

My calculations went like this for a one year period

Satellite/Cable TV subscription package $1200
Quarterly family visit to Empire Theatres $200
Occasional DVD Rental $100
TOTAL $1500

or

NO TV
NO EMPIRE THEATRES
NO DVD RENTAL
$50 a month on purchasing DVD’s from Wal-Mart Bargain Bins and ex-rentals from Blockbuster & The Irving
TOTAL $600

How can you live without TV? Well we just decided a couple of years ago to not renew our subscription. The children missed it most to begin with and we missed ‘The Food Channel’ especially ‘Barefoot Contessa’ & Nigella Lawson but it was surprisingly quick to adjust. There never seemed to be many good films on TV anyway! The kids still watch quite a few movies on DVD but they definately do more reading and other activities that maybe they wouldn’t do if there were hundreds of TV channels available to them.

Other benefits of only watching DVD’s is that I can become a nerdy expert of movie trivia (or at least the movies from our collection we have watched 20 times)..this comes in useful to annoy the Editor of Lighthouse Publishing, Vernon Oickle, in his ‘Thats Entertainment Blog’ with my excessive movie lovers comments…I knew those DVD’s would come in useful for something!

USING UP THE CONTENTS OF YOUR FREEZER- GET PRESERVING

Now I’m sure I’m probably teaching fish to swim here as preserving and pickling are skills that have not seemed to have become redundant in Nova Scotia. But incase there are a few people out there who haven’t given it a try yet..its EASY to get started so I’ll start right at the very beginning with a basic equipment guide…once you have these things its time to look in the deep and dark recesses of your freezer for those stray peas, the frozen corn cobs, summer fruits, blueberries-you-bought-by-the-box-full-on-special-but-never-got-around-to-using and make them into something useful right now. THEN you give your freezer that over due spring clean and have lots of space to fill it right up again!

Getting Started in Preserving
Equipment Guide

So you want to make jam, chutneys or pickles and don’t know where to start? What equipment will you need? Very little is the answer- certainly for those early attempts anyway! Having been a regular jam and chutney maker on and off for several years and a few years ago actually venturing into supplying a small shop, I have all my stuff on its own shelves, makes life a bit easier!

What’s the basic preserving procedure?

You take clean jars with clean lids and sterilize them by submerging in hot water and boiling or placing jars on tray into moderate oven until jars are piping hot.

Next the hot jars are filled with hot jam, pickles or chutney to about 1/4to ½ inch of the top and lid tightened (but not too tight)

Finally the jars are submerged in a large pot of hot water called a canner and boiled for around 10 minutes to complete the sterilizing and sealing process (some low acidic vegetables, tomatoes, soups and sauces have to be processed in a pressure canner). Most jams, chutneys and sweet pickles can be preserved using a water canner but always check first.

What equipment will I need?

If you are just starting out its best to make small quantities and try and use pots and free jars you may have available. Certainly when I started making jams and chutneys I mostly used recycled jars & lids from store bought equivalent and my biggest pots in the kitchen were sufficient to cook small batches in as well as process in boiling water.

Small batches/ first attempts

One large pot for cooking
One large pot for processing (big and deep enough to cover 6 small 250ml jars- standard jam pot size)
Small pot for keeping lids hot
Recycled pots and lids from store bought jam and chutneys
Ladle and wooden spoons

Large batches/ regular preserver

Large stock pot with lid (big enough to cook at least 12x 500ml jars worth)
Large hot water canner (basically big pot with lid that holds around 12 jars depending on size)
Mason jars or new preserves jars and new lids
Ladle and wooden spoons

Canning tools that make life a lot easier

* Tool for removing hot jars from water
* Tool (magnetic) which lifts lids from hot water
* Jar funnel to keep sticky jam and chutney from splashing onto the rim and down the jar
* Ladle for mixture
* Tool to poke down into jar to release air bubbles.

AND SOON I REALLY WILL POST MY MOVIE ON MAKING FREEZER JAM!

DEAR BLOG DIARY

FRUGAL & GREENISH THOUGHTS…Greenhouse gases. If all larger people like myself who ate too much ate less would this reduce greenhouse gases? Lets face it the more you eat the more you fart and deposit the other stuff on our good earth. I guess all living land dwelling creatures must produce methane..I know the cattle industry itself produces vast quantities of methane but I think that is mainly through liquid slurry storage. I digress..I guess eating less and farting less can only be doing good if not for the planet then the other occupants of our household!

On that note its weigh in day at work on Monday. I haven’t really got off to a good start but will put the effort in on week two so hopefully will see some results then.

PITTA PIZZA – Quick, Frugal & Low Cal
$1.20 per pizza – 250-300 cals per pizza

If you haven’t much time, want something scrummy that is pretty low cal, here is a recipe we use in our household quite often and I have to say they are delicious!

INGREDIENTS FOR 5

Pack of wholewheat pitta $1.50
1/4 can crushed tomatoes (mixed with herbs, garlic and salt) 25c
Mixed veggies such as onions, mushrooms, peppers $1.50
Mozzarella light 1/3rd block $2.75

TOTAL $6.00

I always try and buy ingredients on special offer. The sweet red pepper for this one came from Mainline Market for only 99c lb.

FRUGAL TIP: Ever bought one of those fruit platters for special treat? Don’t throw the container away, wash it out then use it as a sectional storage container for chopped ingredients and grated cheese when preparing pizza!

METHOD

1. Prepare ingredients, chop into fairly small pieces as your pitta pizza will cook quite quickly. Mix your tinned crushed tomatoes with a pinch of basil, oregano and a little garlic salt (or salt and some chopped garlic)

2. Get your pitta breads

3. Spread the crushed tomato to how you like it

4. Top with veggies and cheese (if you wanna splash out you can add some meat or some soy weiners as my daughter has done when preparing hers in the photo)

5. Remember to recycle old containers. This old fruit platter makes a great prep tray for pizza ingredients

6. Cook at 220 centigrade or 420 F for around 10 mins or so. My daughter has been a veggie for several years so smothered her pizza with chopped soy weiners to get her protein!!

READERS RECIPES

I had a great tip in by e-mail this week for not only a frugal & low cal recipe but one that is great for those who wish to stop their tummies rumbling when trying to lose weight.

Thanks to Garnette B, Western Shore for this one

I took 1 box of chicken broth (Walmarts brand $1.00) and added all kinds of veggies  no potato, corn or peas as they are starchy . I use red green yellow  peppers ,green bean ,carrots , onions,turnip ,herbs and anything else  I can think of . If I get hungry through the day I have a bowl. I also make a french onion soup, using a box of the beef broth, lots of onions  and let it cook until the onions get soft. I take a piece of ‘weight-watchers’ bread or body wise and toast it . I then cut it up and put on soup and add a little shredded cheese,then put in microwave to melt. It is then less than 2 point on ww diet. Did you know that 2 slices of wwbread or bodywise is equal to 1 slice of regular bread. You can also get it at the Bens thrift store in Bridgewater cheaper than in the stores

NOTE: If anyone has any frugal or green tips please send them in as I’d love to include them in this blog!

DEAR BLOG DIARY

Have been rushed off my feet and subsequently had no time to make eco friendly and frugal cleaning products this weekend. I have never personally had a problem with highly scented cleaning products (but I had a friend Sandra (hi!!!) back in the Uk who said she couldn’t walk down a shopping aisle without an adverse reaction from the heavy chemicals used in cleaning products) but reading the labels of said products can really make you think whether all this constant contact with chemicals like these are detrimental to health, long term.

Subsequently I try and use/buy as little of the stuff as I can..infact my cleaning cupboard consists of a bottle of ammonia and an old can of polish that has been there for 3 years. I’m certainly not some scarey puritanical eco warrior….infact far from it (I’ve used copious amounts of Lysol in my time like the best of them) but I think it doesn’t hurt to question what the majority quietly accepts..I think this more and more as I get older (help!!)

EATING LESS

Well it looks like 17 work colleagues have signed up for a healthy eating plan for 12 weeks with a weekly weigh in..I am one of them! I’m the biggest of the bunch but I’ve had many years to get used to all the weight that piled on with having babies…now that two are well into their teens I think it high time I bring this back into line. Have struggled with this for several years though but by far the most successful attempt to lose half my body weight (and save a whole bunch on the grocery bill) was when I attempted to live 100% on wartime rations. If you have two or three hours free a day to cook, cook, cook this really works. As well as cooking, time travelling is an obsession with me….living history & social experiments a firm favorite so I think this was one of the reasons that I NEARLY suceeded with this particular attempt. Well I am hoping that this year I can just keep going, push past the point of blobbiness and hang in there until the jaw line returns…..it will be wonderful to walk and run for miles like I used too!

MORE STUFF FOR FREE Being frugal isn’t always about doing stuff cos you have no money…Even when we were lucky enough to live comfortably and not worry about paying the next bill there still was a sense of achievement about ‘making something out of nothing’ and recycling objects that would just be thrown away. I painted pots and made hand painted house signs and David would root around the old barn to see what he could retrieve from the trash to make something for our home….these are now the most treasured objects we possess..

See below….an old ships chest made out of pallet wood and old baby milk formula tins which David burned the paint off, cut with pliers and bashed to within an inch of their lives to form into straps and latches. Pallet wood was stained with tea and waxed. I always wanted a Grandfather Clock, alas, despite at the time having the funds to purchase one it just seemed far too much money to spend. David went to work in the barn and with pallet wood, off cuts and some architrave from the bargain bin produced a whole set of clocks for me…we called them BIG BENS and he even made a MINI BEN for somebodies wedding in the village that we lived in.

Sometimes the nicest things we have are the ones that have a story behind them..I wouldn’t swap these for the world..

Below is one of the clocks

RECIPE

Hey I haven’t forgotten a ‘frugal recipe’…for fun I recorded a 5 minute film in the kitchen on how to make freezer jam last summer…its quick and easy and a great way to use up frozen fruit in the freezer and there is NO COOKING involved..

I’ll post the movie file shortly!

DEAR BLOG DIARY

Have been rushed off my feet and subsequently had no time to make eco friendly and frugal cleaning products this weekend. I have never personally had a problem with highly scented cleaning products (but I had a friend Sandra (hi!!!) back in the Uk who said she couldn’t walk down a shopping aisle without an adverse reaction from the heavy chemicals used in cleaning products) but reading the labels of said products can really make you think whether all this constant contact with chemicals like these are detrimental to health, long term.

Subsequently I try and use/buy as little of the stuff as I can..infact my cleaning cupboard consists of a bottle of ammonia and an old can of polish that has been there for 3 years. I’m certainly not some scarey puritanical eco warrior….infact far from it (I’ve used copious amounts of Lysol in my time like the best of them) but I think it doesn’t hurt to question what the majority quietly accepts..I think this more and more as I get older (help!!)

EATING LESS

Well it looks like 17 work colleagues have signed up for a healthy eating plan for 12 weeks with a weekly weigh in..I am one of them! I’m the biggest of the bunch but I’ve had many years to get used to all the weight that piled on with having babies…now that two are well into their teens I think it high time I bring this back into line. Have struggled with this for several years though but by far the most successful attempt to lose half my body weight (and save a whole bunch on the grocery bill) was when I attempted to live 100% on wartime rations. If you have two or three hours free a day to cook, cook, cook this really works. As well as cooking, time travelling is an obsession with me….living history & social experiments a firm favorite so I think this was one of the reasons that I NEARLY suceeded with this particular attempt. Well I am hoping that this year I can just keep going, push past the point of blobbiness and hang in there until the jaw line returns…..it will be wonderful to walk and run for miles like I used too!

MORE STUFF FOR FREE Being frugal isn’t always about doing stuff cos you have no money…Even when we were lucky enough to live comfortably and not worry about paying the next bill there still was a sense of achievement about ‘making something out of nothing’ and recycling objects that would just be thrown away. I painted pots and made hand painted house signs and David would root around the old barn to see what he could retrieve from the trash to make something for our home….these are now the most treasured objects we possess..

See below….an old ships chest made out of pallet wood and old baby milk formula tins which David burned the paint off, cut with pliers and bashed to within an inch of their lives to form into straps and latches. Pallet wood was stained with tea and waxed. I always wanted a Grandfather Clock, alas, despite at the time having the funds to purchase one it just seemed far too much money to spend. David went to work in the barn and with pallet wood, off cuts and some architrave from the bargain bin produced a whole set of clocks for me…we called them BIG BENS and he even made a MINI BEN for somebodies wedding in the village that we lived in.

Sometimes the nicest things we have are the ones that have a story behind them..I wouldn’t swap these for the world..

Below is one of the clocks

RECIPE

Hey I haven’t forgotten a ‘frugal recipe’…for fun I recorded a 5 minute film in the kitchen on how to make freezer jam last summer…its quick and easy and a great way to use up frozen fruit in the freezer and there is NO COOKING involved..

I’ll post the movie file shortly!

DEAR BLOG DIARY

Carrying on from my last blog diary entry a few days ago and before I move away from the topic of SAILING in my next blog diary entry this weekend I thought you’d like to see ‘something that can be made out of nothing’ for your boat…

In this case its a boats foldable table which incorporates an inlaid chessboard and drawer for chess pieces. If one was to have a table like this made it would cost 100′s of $$$ and way out of our range for non-essentials however one should not lose heart. By looking around your immediate environment or those of friends and neighbours it can be quite possible to obtain materials for FREE or at very little cost. With patience and some self taught skill it is quite possible to produce some beautiful and practical objects…

David says: ‘The chessboard is made from Angelique and Black Locust, the table itself is made from Angelique, the wild and uneven colouration in the wood (angelique) mellows down a lot after exposure to sunlight, even now, the table looks a lot darker and even. This table was built from recyled shop offcuts (hence the different patterning). She measures 28 inches by about 18 inches and the flaps, with fiddle rails, fold down neatly on the sides and underneath one end, there is a small drawer (for the pieces)’…

Coming this weekend- antiqued pine planked chest and grandfather clock made for FREE and also HOW TO make your own cleaning products in the kitchen and avoid all those nasty chemicals!