We’re back with our second episode of Frugal Four!
We wanted a way to share the frugal tips and tricks we’ve picked up over the years. The aim is to provide a brief summary of a few little hacks we’ve enjoyed using in the hope it inspires you to save some money yourselves!
We recently made our first large baby purchase, buying a bedside cot from Aldi! Shortly after that, the opportunity arose to buy some second hand reusable nappies. In this article we’ll explain why we decided to go down the frugal reusable nappies route and the potential benefits it can bring.
Preparations
As we continue to prepare for the arrival of Baby Way, we’re thinking about what we will need to buy. Our intention is to continue to live as minimalist a life as possible.
As new parents, there is severe pressure from advertisers to
buy all sorts of gadgets for your baby, playing on your vulnerability and
willingness to provide the best start for them.
We’re convinced most of the conventional baby purchases are
unnecessary and we’ll continue to question these decisions at every stage.
In Creating Good Habits we discussed the importance of creating habits that last. We also gave examples of some of the areas in our lives where we’ve utilised good habits to change for the better. In this post, we want to take more of a practical look at HOW you create good habits.
There are various tricks you can use to make a new habit much more likely to stick. But if you approach it in the wrong way, you’re setting yourself up for failure.
Welcome to our first 2020 spending post! Our January spending was quite good, totalling £1,789. We’re aiming to stay below £2,000 on average throughout 2020 which should be achievable if we carry on like this!
There’s an increasing will among the general population to ‘live a better life’. But how exactly do you achieve that? Creating good habits is at the center of achieving your goals and making changes that last.
December was yet another expensive month for us. Our kitchen was the last room in our house left to overhaul, having moved in nearly 5 years ago. The update was much needed and we’re really happy with the result. It doesn’t make the spending any easier to stomach though!
As we head into 2020 we’re looking to get back to normal and settle around our desired £2,000 per month spending level. See this post for more detail.
I had been avoiding the fact that my car was on its last legs for far too long. It had done a respectable 165,000 miles!
A couple of weeks ago I accepted it was no longer safe to drive and the repair costs far outweighed the value of the vehicle (£1,000 on repairs for a car only worth £200!) – I needed to buy a new one – and quick!
I begrudgingly rely on my car for my work. Due to the peripatetic nature of my job, it unfortunately isn’t always possible to cycle to all my work destinations. Over the last month I’ve used the train where possible, but it can be an expensive alternative. Ideally, we would love to be entirely car free, but this is not an option right now.
We started our month-long adventure in Nairobi, having completed the 2-leg flight from the UK, via Dubai.
First impressions weren’t great as we stood in the immigration queue for 90 minutes. It was a warm, stuffy place and the queue was a battle! Other passengers didn’t seem to have the same ‘personal space’ values as we do!