Thursday 29 May 2014

Approved Food Because We're Skint

Having spent the whole of this weeks budget and fuel  money on the Approved Food website http://www.approvedfood.co.uk/ , we now have overflowing cupboards but little to make a meal...lol  Every 2 or 3 months i do an order , I find theyre not always big on healthy but for dried goods its great . They do get some big brands , gluten free and obscure quality lines with short dates or past the date . It does tell you on the website if you hover over the items . Now i know that some of these things can be made from scratch cheaper , but im a working mother and granny with a lot of hungry mouths to feed. In an ideal world I could just pop to the nearest shop , but im 15 miles from the nearest foreign supermarket or large supermarket so it makes it easier to order in even with the cost of delivery .  If 2 or 3 of you club together it could be a weekly order the stock changes from day to day .  99 items , because some are case deals it nearly ruptured the poor delivery man


Monday 26 May 2014

A Week of Thrifting and Ebay

So my weekend has been a total wipe out , ive just been grumpy granny and the munchkin has been so vile that he hasnt been fit for public viewing ..lol.  No gardening done due to the floodwater still receding but ive got on with my hexi quilting  and took lots of photos of ebay rubbish .
Even with a very good week on ebay im still struggling to put fuel in the car mainly due to a huge Approved Food order ive made , the trouble is that you have to get it while they have it and this week they had it..lol  Last week was a busy real work week so not a lot of thrifting , ive two more days of busy this week then it dies off again , the joys of a zero hours contract im afraid .
Have you noticed that things come in clusters when you find them , everywhere i go I seem to be picking up dolls at the moment .


So heres this week Sindy clone posing in a very appropriate 70s maxi and souwester , not an expensive one and she has really scary eyes so she may stay and model for me for a while , shes propped up here by a lush bit of 70s Brixham Pottery , I love the colours but it chips far to easily to be of any practical use , I think my daughter bought this for me at some stage and who doesnt have half a 60s OXO tin kicking around their office?  Then theres grubby baby doll made in Hong Kong and a whole 50p  shes getting on in years and has a celluloid head , A thousand and one nights illustrated by Benvenvti this was stopping the drawers of the filling cabinet shutting ..lol  Now for the puzzle bits , the vase is Tanglewood Pottery , its been around a while because i havent found any information on it . Finally Little Ted , hes old and rather strange so if anyone has any ideas id be grateful


Ive been debating giving away a few small books  from the Home for Rescued Volumes , would this be of interest to anyone or am i the only crazy person who rescues things like that?

Saturday 24 May 2014

Stuck for Words

What can I say ..Its another miserable wet holiday weekend , so all my plans are out of the window . This is usually one of the biggest boot sale weekends of the year and we have torrential rain , the gardens flooded . Its even been so bad that the boys have come home from their fishing expedition...maybe it flooded the tuck box?


Plus ive had a bad fatist experience , I went to Asda  (aka Walmart ) the other day , to stock up for the fishing fest , lots of vile boy food . Sausage Rolls, Pork Pies , Crisps soda etc etc etc in fact a trolly load of nutritional time bombs all paid for by them . So Im trotting round a very crowded supermarket and bat ears here overhears this shop assistant who was stacking shelves talking to her mate . "Thats the sort of person im  talking  about , they make me sick , why should people who look after themselves have to look at that " then I realised she was talking about me and my trolly load of bad grub. Now I realise i'm the size of a disney Hippo and theres a lot of people who it offends , but im hardly in denial . Then I just realised that stuffing a full Asda trolly up her skinny backside would not score me brownie points or get me a discount at the checkouts . I was so gobsmacked I just kept on walking . 
Now on reflection , i should have run down everything with a green uniform and hurled a couple of pork pies at her .  Asda North Hykeham your staff are ill mannered !!!!



So ive been in the cut up box and found some Victorian chocolate adverts , well im the size of a hippo for a reason..lol 

Monday 19 May 2014

Vintage Holidays

So today we can blame  http://www.frugalqueen.co.uk/2014/05/how-do-families-afford-holiday.html for this post . 
Now i really agree with Froogs about the cost of amusing the kids during the holidays , I nearly fainted when i found out the cost of a family membership to the National Trust £98 , when the kids were small we did alternate years of English Heritage and National Trust.  English Heritage is £86 but you can take up to 6 kids . Add the cost of fuel to this and you need to be somewhere most weekends just to get your moneys worth . 
All the free play schemes seem to be dying a death due to cutbacks. 
Lincoln itself has a couple of notable freebies The Museum of Lincolnshire Life where the parkings pretty sparse and The Collection which is another museum but more hands on , just dont try parking in the NCP carparks nearby or you need a bank loan , plus Lincoln is infested with Traffic Wardens during the summer months . 
So what did we do in the holidays when we were children..lol I can remember age 5 or 6 being rammed on a potato lorry with some strange man travelling from Cheshire to Lincolnshire to stay with my gran for the 6 week duration , nobody thought anything of it back then . I was the rarity my mother worked as a nurse and back in the 60s children didnt expect to be entertained every day . So for the short holidays i would be farmed out to various households more hard up than us who needed to earn a copper . I had some strange experiences. 
 There was a dutch lady with 2 children , they were so dirt poor but in a proud way that lunch varied between sugar butties and a biscuit sandwich , I never once saw the mother have more than a cup of tea in the 2 years she minded me .
 Then there was a policemans wife , her husband was the most horrible bully , he had her in tears whenever he was home , nothing was ever good enough for him , he was pretty physically abusive as well , but back then it was accepted that what went on between a man and wife was theyre business . 

  
In all my childhood we had only two holidays , a week in a hotel in Torquay that was very Faulty Towers and a week at Butlins Filey 
Butlins was a scary place , i,ve never been a joiner in and back in 1970 you had to join in it was compulsory , there was no escape . From morning till night we were hounded by Redcoats with fixed smiles they were sort of holiday robots "you will enjoy yourself" seemed to be the motto . As a child who preferred curling up with a good book , having to perform on stage in a talent show when you have no talents was exquisite torture that only my mother could devise . 


I found the postcards recently and it didnt bring back fond memories , Mr Bah Humbug suggested we went to an 80s weekend there and I broke out in a sweat , so even in my 50s im scared for life of Butlins!!
 

Saturday 17 May 2014

Fill A Bag For A £1

Today Mr Bah Humbug was my driver on mission cheap food from Grimsby and Cleethorpes , bought an awful lot of food , so now the freezer looks a lot healthier even if the food we bought wasnt on a healthy eating plan ..lol
Here are some i threw on the scanner earlier!!
Being as he was in such a good mood because hed scored loads of Turkey Jerky and tinned meat for fishing , I thought id pop into the Salvation Army at Grimsby they have a charity shop upstairs at The Citadel only open on a Saturday morning , I could have bought loads but managed to fill a bag for a £1 with yet more little bits and bobs of household linen , love the 70s mushroom mat , amazing cutwork doily , 60s Lerner hankie in lawn , hankies just because i like them , crocheted doilies , appliqued mats and of course yet more vintage pillowcases , far more than shown here . Mr Bah Humbugs remark when I came out ? Is That IT , guess he knows me to well
.


Tomorrow has a biggie car boot it gives glorious sunshine, Banovallum School at Horncastle , so up early and off with the munchkin tomorrow , Mr Bah Humbug is off fishing so there will be no witnesses ..lol
Wish me luck !!!

Thursday 15 May 2014

Pippa & Dawn Dolly Thursday

Ok ,ive been suffering from thrift starvation and overwork for 2 weeks , but then i popped in to see the christians in the next village and who do I find its a whole little red case of 70s Pippa and Dawn , teeny tiny shoes and outfits , mini record player wigs , seriously glam outfits. In fact please dont take offence but these are you in miniature Vix right down to the amazing outfits




 http://vintagevixon.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/does-my-personality-look-big-in-this.html

then I have the worrying conversation with the old lady who handles stock  , apparently all the dollys ive bought over the last few weeks , came from a stockpile of jumble boxes from the 70s they found in a church storeroom, as they only sell bric a brac because the shop is just 8ft square!! , they threw dozens of boxes of clothes away ..AAAARRRRRGGGHHH
















Wednesday 14 May 2014

I love my daughter tickets booked, hostel booked and we have a 5 hour bus trip each way...lol 







Wow. London UK The Borderline Show tix going fast. So Grateful. Get yours here.
17
I will be there !!!!!

Sunday 11 May 2014

Boring Thrifty Sunday + Laura Ashley

So once again i wake up to lashing rain and at the moment a glorious rainbow on the meadow behind the house .this year the Lincolnshire Red Beefburgers are missing from the fields so i presume theyre going to be hay making shortly . Its very picturesque here if nothing else ..lol
Another weekend of no car boots so im reduced to showing you my 50p fill a bag haul from Grimsby , now im not a fabric snob , so i craft with 99% salvage but i had a moment.  id rooted through rail after rail of clothing , the place is very badly lit and i was in a hurry so just grabbed an armful and waited till i got home to have a look. now funnily enough this lady likes to use everything she can from thrifted tems  http://sweetwoodruffs.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/tips-for-thrifting-fabric.html
So heres the big reveal , I accidentally bought 2 nearly new Laura Ashley, medium, glorious cotton full length nighties for the fabric alone..lol I may manage to conquer my aversion to listing clothing on ebay and pop these into the shop , they have cotton lace ribbons and pintucks but that fabric is winking at me if the dont sell

There was more a size 8 Monsoon gypsy skirt that matches a current project and an Essence plum shirt , tesco floral camisole with nice beaded trim that screams lavender bags , and a Lee Cooper shirt for my son that didnt fit , ebay again


theres even more currently in the wash, that i bought on the principle that they are large sizes so have more fabric to use . So in total i ended up with 5 carrier bags full for a whole £2.00 , so this afternoon i may get on with m quilting ....maybe

Thursday 8 May 2014

Ladybird Love

Busy work week means no time to thrift !!!! Grimsby tomorrow so may get the chance ..lol
so heres my solitary purchases, more vintage Ladybird books to hide from Mr Bah Humbug only early 70s matt reprints of 50s editions but theyre in such good condition how could i refuse ?


Monday 5 May 2014

India Indians & Native American Indians

Well todays plans never got started , it turned into a whole day of domestic servitude and cooking for the hoards . sometimes I wonder if it even crosses their minds that I might like to do something I like on a holiday weekend instead of the endless mounds of washing and cleaning they produce . Busy work week next week so in a couple of days the house will look like its been ransacked and the washing yurt will have appeared again . Plus they may even have to do some cooking or buy some groceries poor dears .....can you tell im getting very bitter and twisted again...lol
Meanwhile in ebay land ive finally got round to popping a few of my mountains of 1910-12 photographs on http://stores.ebay.co.uk/katiesrecycle   I thought id add a bit of native American interest , just love this lady , so much character .

Then we have India Indians take a look at this impressive chap

and my favourite the cheeky little chap photo bombing the veiled ladies , it just shows that kids never change whatever the century

Sunday 4 May 2014

Thrift & Car Boot Bargains

I hate the weeks when i have a real world busy work week , this week and next are hideously busy , so ive not had a lot of time for anything . We have another Bank Holiday Weekend , Mr Bah Humbug has been freezing in a tent playing Scooters at Skegness , and  ive been doing domestic servitude .
But I did fit in a bit of thrifting and did the hike round Torksey Car Boot yesterday where there was hundreds of sellers and i spent 50p lol





so once again laugh at the things i buy ... carrier bag full of sari fabric scraps that im sure i can fit into something . A little bag of salvage lace and inserts that are already hidden in the little red shortbread tin suitcase .



Books from the 1870s to the present day , a battered Ladybird Little Red Hen for the munchkin , a pile of 10p readables for me and a rescue volume
2 items off my wish list , a couple of pairs of damart old lady elastic waisted work trousers at 50p each I can live with the fact theyre vile at least theyre not beige
still trying to find something to go to tomorrow .....if i dont i may be reduced to cleaning the house