My Dizzy Life Blog

I Have Moved Site

2010-09-07T17:03:00.006+02:00

Just to say I have stopped writing on this blog but you are free to visit my new blog, which is more of a life blog than about frugality, organization etc:

www.myrollercoasterkindalife-Gisele.blogspot.com

2010-07-05T15:59:00.010+02:00

As promised, I am trying out a new system whereby I will always have something to talk about. Going by a keyword for each particular day of the week:

Monday is for Meals
Tuesday is for Time
Wednesday is for Wardrobe
Thursday is for Thankful
Friday is for Frugal
Saturday is for Straighten
and Sunday is for Super

This will cover all the aspects I usually talk about and will assist me in ideas on what to write about as, say, if I come online on a Tuesday my mind will immediately start brainstorming on that one word Time and what it brings to mind. Am so looking forward to this new posting-method and really curious to see what images each day will conjure.

My Home versus My House

2010-07-03T13:03:00.010+02:00

When I was young, my parents owned a house that was big enough to have a study room for my brother and I, seperate from our bedrooms. So all our books, files and general mess to do with school was confined to that room. The washroom acted as a play room so there were all our toys, boxes of them, and my brother and I would go upstairs to play. Meanwhile, our bedrooms were always clean and tidy, the beds made, the shelves full of soft toys, knick knacks and books we never touched, bedspreads that matched our curtains and furniture that had been chosen by grown ups, not by the young children sleeping in them. I used to grumble about this, the big boring wardrobe with its definately grown-up design and colours I despised, and the shelving's main use was to practice a weekly ritual of removing all the items on them in order to get the dust off.

So when I got older, I rebelled by leaving my room and area in the study in a mess! I would have endless arguments about the state my stuff was in with my mother so that when I moved out and into a temporary house with my husband, it was a relief to just leave everything where and how I wanted it to be! Till the house we were in ended up in such bad need of organization that inviting someone over meant hiding all the stuff away! But I honestly never took to the place we lived in, which we were only using till we got our own house sorted. So I accepted the mess and lived with it!

The day finally came when my husband and I moved into our own little maisonette and the pride of owning my own house took over, so that every weekend I put all my energy into washing the floors, making everything look spik and span, and generally never finding the time to rest as a result, till Sunday evenings I would drop from exhaustion, grumpy about going back to work on the morrow without a rest. So in time I adjusted to taking some time to myself or to spend with my husband, even if it meant leaving things undone. Enter google to provide me with endless tips on how to organize my house, my schedule, my life and suddenly everything started falling into place.

Roll around the pregnancy and the effort of even trying to get everything done meant I would later sit down to regret the aches I felt all over and hoping I had done no harm. And a few months later, after being hospitalized with a serious chest infection, I realized the importance of putting myself before the organized life which had become my passion. But the love for order remained and I got frustrated if anyone trying to help put things in a different place than I would, washed my floors in a different way, or didn't put a lid on the saucepan whilst cooking for me. I looked forward to having my baby, and continually said I'd get my energy back then. Only to find a baby would take up all my time, little allowing me the chance to cook let alone keep the cushions on the 'right' side of the sofa or my bills all filed! It's as much as I can do now to remember to pay my bills on time and I only get a look at my diary once every few days.

Needless to say, once my son was born everyone wanted a look, and one time I got a phonecall from an auntie to say could she drop by. Unlike all the other times, I had no early warning about this visit, as she phoned up the same day, and she arrived at my house to find it in dire need of a clean-up. So the first chance I got, I sent her a message through facebook to excuse the mess. Once I'd done that, I totally forgot the episode and stopped worrying about it. But when I next went into my facebook I found a reply that started off with 'Hi Gisele, My dear, that is a home not a house.' She went on to tell me how my family is way more important than a tidy home and that 'if it is not in a mess something is terribly wrong' as a home is for living in. Which reminded me of that little girl, trying to reason with her mum that isn't her room the space she should feel comfortable in and use?

A Quick Update

2010-06-12T15:29:00.003+02:00

5 months since the last update, very bad poster huh? Only I'm justified in having a 6-week-old baby to take care of, so all's fair right? I won't be able to post much till I settle into a routine but do hope you'll bear with me. Meanwhile been thinking of a more disciplined way of going about this blog, which would help me keep posting routinely as well as give me ideas as to what to talk about. So will ultimately come up with a schedule of days of the weeks and corresponding topics, which will include cheap meals/quick meals, books worth reading, organization-related tips, frugality in practice. And anything else that's of interest I guess.

Budget Bunch versus Joneses

2010-01-08T08:00:00.004+01:00

The all-too-familiar 'catching up' with the neighbours is today's topic, though in truth I am not obviously talking about my neighbours (who's surnames I don't know but am pretty sure is not Jones!)

With Christmas now past, we're into a new year with all the resolutions that brings with it and I find very few people make this one resolution: to stop over-spending!!!

My budget for presents is pretty low, as it is directly proportional to our savings (what savings?!) And still, it does put a dent in our pockets. Why is that? Because it happens once a year, so: a) the cost is not spread out (I added presents to my list of things to budget for monthly now and b) because presents are an 'extra' to the list of necessities that we always make sure to have money for.

Which brings me to the thought that originally set off this monologue in my head - the recurring phrase in my mind from a comment heard less than a month ago... which went something like 'It's Christmas so I spend a lot'. I said whether it was Christmas or not, I could only spend what I'd earned, right? To which the reply was that the Joneses would only live once, so they'd go into debt at Christmas time, then struggle for that reason in the later months. Erm, excuse me, but wouldn't it be easier to just not go into debt? I'm not talking about a house mortgage, or even a car loan (though I have a friend that said she wouldn't take out one and saved up every penny necessary till she bought the car in cash... great going dear!) But a Christmas loan? To be paid off for 11 months for the sake of a couple extra dining experiences, for that one extra indulgence that's cost a pretty penny (that sounds better than 'pretty cent'!) or for the outfit that looked so lovely in the window but was as pricey as a model's wages and you probably will never get to wear it again in the end.

I could name many virtues of keeping off that extra meal but it would be a topic in itself so I leave it instead for you readers to think about.

The Dangerous Effects of Perfume

2010-01-07T13:47:00.003+01:00

After reading over and over how harmful these beauty products are and experiencing for myself numerous breathing problems as well as ending up in hospital for 2 weeks because of a chest infection resulting from exposure to fragrances, because other people plainly refuse to respect the fact that I am allergic to the products (read... would have asked gently over and over!) that I decided it was time to write an article about these harmful and for me despised, bottles of liquid.

I do wonder why people who harp on the fact that cholesterol can ruin your life, that a high sugar level is something to avoid, that exercise is paramount in order to avoid health problems, would subject themselves willingly to all the side-effects listed in the following articles, also causing the same problems to those around them:

http://hubpages.com/hub/side-effect-from-perfume

http://hubpages.com/hub/THE-EFFECTS-OF-COSMETICS-AND-PERFUMES-ON-OUR-BODY-HEALTH

http://www.herc.org/news/perfume/sweet_poison.htm

http://www.bukisa.com/articles/15344_side-effect-from-perfume

These are only a few of a multitude of articles about the issue. It was interesting to find an article about a very well-known brand, with a catchy phrase saying that its effects are truly 'timeless' (read to your health degeneration).

Also not mentioned in the above articles but very dangerous is the following side-effect... did you know that smelling perfume in pregnancy can cause the baby to have asthma (for life as a result of other people's inconsideration). Also another side-effect to the unborn male fetus is the possibility of fertility problems for the Little One when, later in life, he opts to have babies of his own.

So to anyone that's reading this and maybe a perfume-lover... if you keep spraying yourself I guess it means you don't really care about your own health or that of those around you, do you? And as a final reminder... do you remember the poor boy who made headlines worldwide for dying from spraying deodorant in a small closed room? Maybe you should give that a thought, may he rest in peace.

And Mid-November Already

2009-11-17T20:54:00.002+01:00

Here I am, marvelling at how many weeks just passed me by as I lay first in one hospital than another, and now still recovering at my mum's, but all that is beside the point and just my reason for being away so long. It's two days now to the doctor's verdict of when I'll be good to go home and to work, both of them fuzzy in my mind after all this time... it will be a chore in itself going back to housework and all the hours at work though I can truly say now that 'There's nowhere like home' and I can't wait to get back now. Pampering is fine and my mum's more than done that but my mind's finally getting back into gear and I can't help thinking of all the things piling up for my return. I heard my darling husband's kept the house in total order but that niggling feeling that there are bills yet to see to and that in my wardrobe still hang summer clothes instead of the cosy clothes of one month before Christmas have me in a bit of a panic. I feel like Rip Van Winkle, only sleeping in a hot and summery October and waking up after the rain and cold have set in though I have been told today was such a sunny day outside it was like summer all over again.

What else can I say? I've barely done anything at all for a month, unless you count being so bored I decided the tv was a better companion than none when mum was at work. Now that my head doesn't hurt all the time, I've also started reading again, though the mysteries I found in my brother's library are nowhere near as intense as the Nicci French book I unsuccessfully tried reading in hospital. In the end, as I got slowly better, I did manage to finish off that thriller, which I'd started way before getting ill and consequently was curious to see how it continued. It's one of those unputdownable books but thanks to the fever I must have closed the book a dozen times till I got to the end. Anyways, it's called 'Beneath the Skin' and probably French's best yet, for those that might be interested in having a go at it. Don't pick it up when you're pressed for time though, as French's books are the kind that will get you past midnight for not managing to put it down!

I guess that's all I can say, seeing as I've done nothing else to talk about! I never thought I'd say this but I actually miss being busy and able to take care of myself. As they say, it's when you lose something that you notice how valuable it was in the first place. So here's to dirty laundry, dirty dishes, and dirty floors, hehe!

And October it is

2009-10-04T10:48:00.003+02:00

A very quick hi... just an update to avoid feeling guilty really (so knackered most of the time I honestly couldn't think of anything to talk about!)

We're now on to the tenth month and summer seems to have breezed away though the storms seem to make this island even stickier and hotter! So we're still wearing summer clothes in the rain though I've given in and am wearing socks already! Nice to get into some comfy trainers though after all the back-hurting never comfy summer sandals that my feet seem to hate. At least in winter shoes are comfier most of the time, though it's still a chore to find the right size as my feet don't seem to conform to standard sizes. So one nightmare coming up is looking yet again for a pair of shoes that won't hurt, won't be too high-heeled, girly enough to wear with a skirt but yet again not fashionable enough to hurt with every step (why don't they make feminine shoes that are comfy?!) To be honest it's got to the point where I'm thinking of having a pair made. Would definately turn out less of a chore!

What else is up with the month? Well, seems like Chirstmas is now less than 3 months away already (boy, I can still remember the post I wrote last Christmas, have all these months passed by already?!)

With the heat not so bad, even cooking seems nicer as soups come back into play so I can always count on them when I've no idea what to cook! It's also easier to stay inside when it's not so hot so weekend evenings in front of the tv seem preferable to going out, making 'what film to watch' an easier problem then 'where can we go that's not expensive, will be enjoyable and not the usual yet again'.

I should be off now as there's a list of things I should be getting done... which reminds me of one bad point about Autumn... my husband is back in trousers and shirts at work so the ironing piles up more often... off to do it now! Till next time!!!

Reward Lover... a must-check!!

2009-09-18T20:33:00.004+02:00

Wow, finally a cash-back program available locally :-) Check out the link just below the hit counter on the right side of this page, a rewards program where you get cash back for buying through particular sites that include Play.com; Wallis; iTunes; New Look; Next and so many more! Same site caters for UK, US, Australia and Malta but also accepts residents from other countries subject to certain conditions (check out the Terms & Conditions in such cases).

Mid-Summer Update

2009-08-21T13:00:00.002+02:00

Temperature's gone up again, making many Maltese wish for the winter, though I personally prefer the long daylight hours and light clothing to wearing lots of layers and trembling throughout the winter months. I must admit though, winter brings with it a cosier atmosphere and nights in front of the tv rather than homes so hot you really can't afford to not get out in the evenings.

Trust our metal fan to break down in mid-August, too, after how often we told other people it's so good and will let us sleep the night with its powerful blades swishing the otherwise hot air around us. And the daytime's pretty bad too, just the thought of housework and spring cleaning (yeah, I spring clean slowly throughout the year, whatever the season!) sound like much bigger chores that will get you all sweaty just for thinking about them. Which is why on a day off I'm chilling in front of this screen.

But I must be off now to face the heat as I try to tackle a few more chores at a snail's pace, hehe! So off I go, till next time!

Highlights in my Everyday Life

2009-08-07T07:44:00.008+02:00

I had three days off work this week and still didn't manage all the things I keep saying I don't have time for! So here I am on my second day back at work, thinking of all the things I haven't found time for! Starting with scrapbooking. Each time I look into the cupboard I see the photos piling up and every time I just leave them there! Which has to stop now, so I'm going to make it a point to dig out those photos the first time I have some free time on my hands (easier said than done - about having free time!) And I should also get around to choosing which digital photos I want to get printed for my still inexsistent scrapbook.

But enough about what I haven't managed to do and on to the interesting stuff. Which brings to mind out tenth anniversary. My hubby and I started dating over ten years ago now, which makes me sound so old, hehe! On the day he couldn't take the evening off from work so instead I went to his workplace myself and watched the show he was helping put up. This is by no means an advertising site but allow me to say, the historical plays/musicals happening at MonteKristo Estates are an attraction not to be missed, both by the locals and people visiting Malta.

Now that was last week, so on to this week's hightlights next: one definate highlight was getting a break from work! It was the first time this year I managed to take a few days off at one go to chill. Which made them even more special. So a Monday morning shopping for some things I needed to get with a very dear friend, an evening at said friend's including a yummy dinner, and going to sleep with no thought of getting up early on the morrow, hehe! Tuesday was pretty uneventful, other than to show me what it must be like for a housewife to wake up and know she can calm down because there's all day to do the things that need be done (something quite unusual to my schedule!) Then came a lovely Wednesday, getting up an hour earlier than required due to a mishap with the alarm clock, and then off on the long drive to Cirkewwa and the ship to Gozo, for a fun-filled day of meeting family (currently on holiday at the island), being pampared with an English breakfast to follow my earlier unappetizing cereal, shopping and relaxing and a board-game later, we sat down to a meal prepared by my sister-in-law's chef husband (two dinner treats in a week!) and then a small slice of an extra-sweet birthday cake - my father-in-law's birthday is tomorrow!

So anyways, here I am on Friday morning, for a second day at work (and already Friday, how cool is that?!) All I can say is, it was a truly great time, can't wait to do it again, maybe I should think about winning the lottery to afford such a luxury every day! :-P

Saving Time, Money and the Environment

2009-07-27T07:44:00.013+02:00

I've lately been thinking of how some small adjustment in our life (I mean very small adjustments) can make such a difference to more than one area of our life. Some of these things we might do automatically, whilst others we might not even think of.

As I looked at the sink in my kitchen, it beckoned me to start washing the pots and pans that were waiting. But my mind fast-forwarded to what was going to happen only a couple of hours later: namely, I would cook and put even more things in the sink! Which decided me. Doing the dishes later would save me time (washing everything together rather than in two seperate lots), it would save me money (use the same water for more items, as over here in Malta we pay per use) and it would save the environment (again, less water usage). So my life was the better for leaving a few dishes in the sink rather than giving in to the urge to clean, clean, clean! Another thing I would have to mention which is much on the same lines is dishwasher usage. We are told repeatedly that it wastes electricity and why don't we just do the dishes by hand? But has anyone ever googled tips relating to saving water? The dishwasher will appear in more than one site as an alternative to handwashing that wastes even less water! Because the dishwasher isn't switched on after every meal, so it is useless to compare usage with one standing at the sink... make that, hmm, I believe my dishwasher takes 15 servings (which makes it more like 25/30, seeing as we don't take a first and second course!)

Wow, that was one long paragraph! I am off now to start work but keep in mind what I said - the little things can make a big difference!

My So-late Update!

2009-07-02T15:07:00.041+02:00

I have absolutely no excuse good enough for not writing for so long! So this will be a short one just to keep in touch, as now I honestly don't have the time but don't want any more time to elapse.

As usual, I will be writing about organization and frugality, and giving an update to how they've affected my life of late.

So here goes something positive: my wardrobe is in excellent order, with like items all stacked together, both hanging items and the ones sitting folded on the shelf and in the drawers. It gives me so much satisfaction to be able to find whatever I need with minimal effort and not have to go through all my tops to find something right for the occasion!

Now on to the frugal aspect: only to say I've lately neglected it some :-( But I did make a little headway just the same though one time of shopping without a grocery list cancelled out all the good work with a mega-bill at the till!) But back to the positive side: I bought some new cloth napkins for dinner-time, trying to reduce on disposable napkin consumption. And also remembered the cheap price of a particular own-brand pizza margerita (saw it advertised on the supermarket's monthly magazine) and bought four of them instead of the more expensive options (as the pizzas we used to get previously are from a shop we can't buy from currently due to road works in the area). After all, hubby likes to top the pizza himself, even if there is a frozen topping already!

That's all from me for now, as I really must get back to what I was doing, but felt ever so guilty about not posting. Till next time!

Wonderful Weekend

2009-06-08T21:00:00.008+02:00

It's Monday night already as I write this but thought an update to my life would still be appropriate, after all not 24 hours have yet passed from a truly wonderful and relaxing weekend.

This weekend, I threw my organizational self to the wind and made my 'life' my first priority. So Friday night I decided there was still time to start the weekend cleaning and dedicated my hours instead to relaxing.

Saturday morning I then woke up with energy to spare and started on the house-cleaning with so much more than my usual zest. Thanks to my mum-in-law I was spared the cooking so all I had to do was wash up the remaining dishes that were still in the sink and didn't add any more to them! So by the time my best-friend picked me up for a girls' night out, I had already done so much more than usual and could look forward to a more-relaxed Sunday on the morrow. The evening was delightful, a walk along the Sliema promenade with the best female company (my dearest friend and her young daughter) and food at Surfside (never tasted a better closed pizza). The evening offered an excuse to put some make-up on, get my hair blowdried (again my best friend's doing) and wear a pair of my favourite high heels. My husband and I don't go out as a rule so it feels fantastic to be dressed-up.

I slept like a baby throughout the night and also most of the Sunday morning (shame on me!) and then as usual, miscalculated the luncheon's preperation time, so that we ate later than we should have (oops, really need to work on this skill!)

An afternoon movie with popcorn and Kinnie (not something I drink usually as I'm into healthier drinks) and by the end of it I'd finally seen 'The Da Vinci Code', years after it's release, thanks to a fear of watching it (thought the dead-body with the painted symbol would be too scary).

The evening started with a short walk (wearing cute sandals that hurt badly and which I really need to stop trying to wear). And once back home, whilst I did the ironing for the week, my darling husband saw to dinner - chicken nuggets and sausages together with the left-over salad from lunch-time.

You might be wondering why I'm wrinting all this. Well, for some the weekends are a weekly ritual of going-out, eating-out, and spending time with family. With our enforced hectic lifestyle, finding the time to truly relax has become an ordeal and this weekend gave me a glimpse of what life should be like. Pity we live in a country where being a stay-at-home-wife is, out of necessity, a thing of the past.

Revamp

2009-06-01T16:35:00.001+02:00

Just wanted to excuse myself for any mismatched colouring on the blog, as I am slowly giving it a revamp. Hoping you like the new version even better :-)

Life Life Life

2009-05-24T12:06:00.003+02:00

Once again a new post without any idea of what I'll be writing about! I think it works best if I just think back to the things recently done and comment upon them, therefore unconsciously giving my views about whatever's going on.

One of the highlights of this month was returning home to find a beautiful coffee table on our living room carpet, which was made from scratch by my darling husband and a friend of his (thanks lots to them both, I owe them!). I had mentioned already, I believe, buying the wood for this latest piece of furniture. Which goes to show - our coffee table cost only around EUR37/EUR38 and is totally wonderful, as compared to the ridiculously priced tables we were seeing in the shops, costing even EUR200 and more! What a wasteful country we live in!

Another of this month's highlights would be becoming good friends with a fellow member of a message board I am frequenting. It is so lovely to share what you know and get more knowledge and tips back in return. Sort of like bartering, isn't it, but the cool thing about it is that you don't help out friends expecting something back, and it's just a bonus when that happens.

That covers frugality and something about my life, so it's now on to the organizing part, which is what drives me nuts for lack of time to be organized. And since the time factor is my biggest issue, I'm taking my meal-planning a step further. First it was planning the menu for one week, and then this month had to plan for 3 weeks at a strech due to not being sure whether I'd have to do overtime at work, therefore reducting my time to prepare food and get all the groceries I needed. It was a bit of a hassle, considering I did have to change around some items due to circumstances (whether husband and I were eating at the same time, whether it was something I could reheat if not, etc), but overall it helps a good deal. Then this last week I noticed we were low on groceries and with my husband dealing with exams as well as his 4 jobs, it turned out I would have to make do with whatever groceries I had already, unless they could be purchased from the corner shop or the veggies shop close to home. Which pointed out to me another useful reason to make a long-term menu plan. Imaging knowing all you need for the month, wouldn't that automatically give you an outline of your shopping list? So there's another good reason to be doing this menu-planning - it meant I could easily figure out how to use up things I had already and showed me what else to buy. In turn, that leads to a lower grocery bill in that I don't have to buy a little of this and a little of that 'just in case' I use it this month in some recipe. So my rule now is - I buy only what I need + maybe one extra of things I use often, just in case I need to change my menus a little or else don't get a lift to the supermarket before my current menu gets exhaused and I need to re-plan.

Wow, that was one long chunk of writing, which goes to show how the trick to good and effective writing is to just go with the flow and not be doing any conscious thinking at all. Boy, wish I know how to head my own advise when it comes to story-writing. I'm such a planning-freak that I can't seem to believe I can write freely instead of having this whole points plan to stick to like when we were in school (why is it that so much stuff is taught the wrong way!)

So I'm off now, as my break from housework etc is over but I do hope this post gives you something to think about. Feel free to adopt any of my ideas and do remember what I mentioned above - don't take store prices to reflect a realistic valuation of how much something costs. When you're faced with a too-high price for something, think of my coffee table and don't give in to the blood-sucking stores.

My Belated Update

2009-05-10T01:21:00.002+02:00

I am such a bad blogger! Couldn't even remember what the topic of my last entry was about since I was away from the blog for so long! Maybe from now on I should blog more frequently even if I don't have the time to write a long post about something specific.

So here it goes, as I didn't have time to plan my next entry and don't want more time to lapse before posting! Seeing as I don't have a plan to this one, I'll start by giving an overview of the latest 'money-saving related' thoughts:

- Green peppers are in season or will be soon, so this time I'm going to be buying some extra and freezing for when they get expensive again. It won't be good for eating with salads but at least I can still make mushroom/pepper sauce for pasta without it costing so much to buy peppers. I looked on the internet how to freeze and came up with the following: 'Wash thoroughly, cut into two halves and empty from seeds. Wash again. Cut into pieces and put in freezer bag.' So when I see the price is low, I'll be buying way more than usual. It will also be a time-saver since I can wash/cut all of them at one go and then find the portions ready chopped when I need them. Works for onions too but with those you have to first freeze on a plate and then only after all the pieces have been frozen individually can you put in the freezer bag or otherwise they will all stick together. This is not only a time-saver but means I only get to cry and snifle once and voila' have enough cut-up onions for many meals. Again, only good for cooking!

- I've started thinking of and buying Christmas presents already. And greeting cards for throughout the year. I know I once said it's cheaper and more meaningful to make cards but I'm not that good a card-maker to do it every time, only have limited ideas. So instead I buy them cheaply at a store that sells 4 for EUR2. I think forward to what events will be coming up that I need cards for, and buy them in bulk, so to speak. Then if I do have the time and ideas to make them myself, I just keep the store-bought ones for some other time. But at least this way I'm not caught without a card I need and then having to buy an expensive one from whichever 'lifesaving' shop I find. Once I have a proper office (limited storage space as it is) I will also start hoarding wrapping papers from the same shop. They're selling them at 8 for EUR2 whilst I bought 2 for EUR2.34 last time I urgently needed some wrappers!

- Am trying to orgnaize myself better. Had started a Franklin organizer a while ago and that helped but now I researched some more and turning my organizer into a much better one than it was, and hopefully it will help me save money in some ways like – by writing down ideas I get for home-made gifts so that I do get around to buying them instead of forgetting all about them, and by keeping track of what groceries are on sale so that I ensure to stock up on them when we shop at the particular store.

That's all the tips I can think of right now and seeing as it's past 1am I will allow myself to stop here, happy to have given at least a tiny update. Till next time!

The Frugal and The Miser

2009-03-26T07:51:00.002+01:00

This winter turned out to be so cold we made our internal doors a top priority. So we started the saving game once again, and seeing the money add up slowly gave me a certain adrenaline, and a will to stop all those small purchases that I could do without.

Then something cropped up: we needed a carpet in the living room, once again because of the extreme cold, and armed with a coupon for 20% off the reduced prices at our chosen carpet shop, we made a good deal. But drained part of our savings. Just next to this shop is the place where we’d bought both the dining table and chairs, on separate occasions. Missing a coffee table, we decided to take a look at the new stock and lo and behold, there was my dream sofa just in front of me. And guess what, it was selling at a really advantageous introductory price. We got hold of a salesman, put down our deposit and voila, a week later the sofa was in place. Not finding a coffee table we liked in the correct colour, we decided to make it ourselves and even bought the wood. No need to tell you, our savings account went down to almost nil!

So I then started to feel guilty. Because there was nothing left saved up. I’d gotten so used to seeing a rising figure in our account that I guess I’d become a miser! But what was done was done so I started thinking about the stuff we’d bought to convince myself it was worth it. And guess what, when I did that I realized they’d all of them been frugal choices and all of them things we needed. So now I guess I see the meaning of frugality much more clearly. It’s not how much physical money you save but how good a deal you can get on purchases you were meant to make.

A Promise of an Update

2009-03-13T08:27:00.002+01:00

Just a very quick hi to say I haven’t forgotten about the blog, only life has been sooooo busy and eventful! Will be back with news and tips as soon as I can manage it. Till then, see ya!

A Rough Patch

2009-02-18T13:30:00.003+01:00

When people say they’re going through a rough patch, they’re usually referring to their relationship with a partner, friend or family member. In my case right now, I am having a rough patch with life or, more specifically, with ‘no time for a life’!

Planning my menu for the week ahead did help, as does co-ordinating errands so that I only have to go to one town or area once. But still it’s not enough. I invariably get home in a rush to get dinner cooked, make the bed, sort out anything that seems out of its place, write down all the money transactions that occurred throughout the day like shopping for groceries and bus rides (this is helping so much with keeping to a budget!). But by the time we’ve eaten, there’s pots and pans in the sink and used plates and glasses on the table so it’s back to scraping plates, setting the dishwasher, washing pans and lunchboxes to be reused before the dishwasher is full and switched on. I know already there’s this whole pile of things on the drainer, waiting for me at home when I get back. Because sometimes there’s not even time for that in the evening! But I know also that if I take the time to clear the mountain of washed things then I’ll probably have no time left to wash today’s share of dirty dishes. Vicious circle prime example!

I’m not really sure of the reason why I’m writing this all down. Maybe to vent my frustration, maybe to plead with you readers to provide me with comments that might help (please do, if you have any!) Or maybe, and this is the most plausible reason, it’s to attract the attention of any full-time working super mothers out there that might have tips to surviving this problem. I am not yet a mother myself but know there must be mothers out there that have found the trick to coping. And also, I do know there is no way I can reduce my work hours once I do become a mother, if only in order to scrape through the month without ending up with an always bigger negative bank account balance! To be honest, I have no idea how I’ll be able to cope then since I have problems coping now already! So anyway, do post anything that might help before my house turns upside down for lack of time to sort things out!!

Comeback of Tips Posts (Part 2)

2009-02-13T11:46:00.010+01:00

As promised, here is part two to my previous entry:

4 - What’s in a name? Ok, so what’s in a brand name? Sure, sometimes you like the taste of something better than that of a different brand, but this is not because it’s more expensive! Our mind has a habit of sticking to habits! What brand salad cream did your mother used to buy? When you set up your own kitchen, you will probably pick up the same brand for yourself, never even trying other brands. Happened to me. The one my dad used to buy was so yummy I automatically picked it up in the supermarket. When I ran out and was shopping at Lidl instead of the usual stores, I decided to try their product since it was so cheap and hey, I liked it so much better! But, it also happened the other way round with tortellini! The ones my mum used to buy I hated so bad we’d fight any time she made me eat it! So if there was one rule in my kitchen, it was we were never eating tortellini. But then my husband picked out a different, well-known brand at the supermarket – the one his mother used to buy. And I liked it. So much so that we kept buying it. Until I told my mum to try it and she said it was way too expensive! Ok, keep eating your yucky choice then. Oh oh, better not have said that! Because when I tried to lower my monthly groceries bill, I thought of her words and hey, I was paying so much more for this brand name item! So let’s do something – let’s try generic tortellini and if we don’t like them, just throw it out and never buy again. After all, they cost only around EUR0.80 for the same portion I was usually getting at EUR2.10. We tried them and liked them. Actually, I liked them so much I didn’t like the brand name ones any longer! So then I started stocking up on generic tortellini, not always the same brand since I didn’t always find them. And guess what, I liked them all! Only I never bought the brand that my mother used to buy.

5 - Buy bigger packets of anything you know you use frequently. Same tortellini in a new paragraph! One small packet of the stuff weighs 250gr and that’s how much I boil for the two of us. So I would open a packet, throw all the contents into the boiling water, and throw away the packet. But when I read on the internet to buy in bulk, I thought maybe this would be a good starting point. I found a cheap brand that I really liked and looked for the bigger packets. They’re not that much cheaper but since we were eating the stuff often anyway, I bought the bigger packets. A few cents each month, multiplied by however many other types of food I could also buy in bulk, would add up. (Tried this with pasta as well. My husband just wouldn’t change the brand name but since it’s not too expensive, I gave in. Only I look for the 1kg packets now wherever I find, and never buy from the corner store, since it’s the most expensive shop I frequent!)

6 - Don’t buy from the corner store! As in the previous paragraph – these are usually much more expensive than supermarkets. So keep them for necessities like everyday bread and milk, or stuff you need too badly to wait. A price book would help in this regard. Keeping a log of what costs how much from where, you can decided whether you can afford to run out of a staple or not.

That’s it from me for now. There are loads more things I do in my bid at not wasting but as I once mentioned, once something becomes a habit it doesn’t stand out any more and I don’t even notice I’m doing it! But will share any other tips I have in time, don’t worry. Meanwhile, have fun seeing how much you save with the above tips!
Till next time!

Comeback of Tips Posts (Part 1)

2009-02-12T09:24:00.010+01:00

We’re already in February and I’ve only written one entry as yet in 2009. Shame on me! But now I’m back and hoping not to let as much time lapse in between new entries. And I hope that some of the new entries will be helpful in that I plan to start posting more tips and advice on frugality than just rambling on about my own life/experiments. To start off, I have a list of tips I learnt the hard way:

1 - Don’t buy stuff on impulse. You will get home, not even find a place to put whatever you bought, and ultimately regret the money you spent on it! Now I give impulse buys a twenty-four-hour thinking timer. Ok, in my case, it’s more like a week, or sometimes more than that, since without a car I sometimes have trouble going back for whatever it was I’d seen. Which in a way is great, because if after twenty four hours I still want that something, the urge will usually have disappeared after a week. Same thing with stuff I miss around the house. I used to make lists of small things I needed to get, such as a jug for mixing squashes, more utensils, and other such things. Then I realized I didn’t really need a jug for squash, as most times I just mix the drink in the glass. Or else I make two whole litres and put in an empty water bottle. A jug big enough to hold 2ltrs is invariably too heavy anyway. Again with the food preparation utensils – I have one or two of each so why would I need more? Unless obviously it’s because I put them in the dishwasher to be washed with the next load rather than just wash them in the sink.

2 - Always check ‘best before’ dates. A deal is no deal if you get home to find there’s no way you can finish one packet, let alone two, of something with a close date. I went to a supermarket a few weeks ago, to find so many things that were expired or close to their expiration date! Whilst I pride myself on always checking dates on things, I once made an unhealthy mistake! I went to the corner store for some eggs, and for fear of breaking them, I omitted to open the flimsy box to check the date stamped on the individual eggs. I even went home and used up some without checking and just my luck, it was the first time the shop had expired eggs!

3 - Avoid the paper napkins/kitchen rolls. When I read that I could use cloth napkins instead, I thought it sounded gross. We’re talking about a mess, so why should that end up in the washing machine? But when I looked for a way to reduce my groceries expenditure, I resolved to at least clean up crumbs and the such with reusable cloth napkins. Still, this didn’t reduce my usage by much and it was then that I started thinking before I clean up a mess - is it a yucky mess or maybe just a little spillage? I do have a habit of spilling water from the filter as I rush around getting dinner ready. So now when that happens, I just grab a cloth napkin and soak it up. What’s wrong with putting a wet napkin in the machine? Especially when it’s going to get wet anyway! Then I read on the internet that using half a napkin is as effective as using a whole one. Because when you’re dealing with a mess, it will anyway get soggy and squashed. And you know what, it actually works! So it has now become an unconscious habit to tear it up in two and using only half, instead of always tearing it off the perforation. In between all these ‘tricks’, my kitchen rolls now last way longer.

This post has turned out to be so long and I really am not after boring you! So this is it for now, but there’s a Part 2 coming up!

My Start to the Year

2009-01-12T08:39:00.003+01:00

Haven’t written in a while, have I? Well, things have been so hectic in between politely attending lunches and dinners we’ve been invited to (food yummy every time!) and being ill up to and following Christmas, as well as doing a multitude of things at home we usually don’t have the time for, I get exhausted even just thinking about it all!

But now it’s time for the update and here it comes:

My December project didn’t get started till the end of the year! I would be excused if it were due to being ill, since I didn’t want to be dusting and using perfumed detergents with a bad case of sinusitis. But then I was also reluctant to start because it was such a big ugly chore. Unfortunately for me and fortunately for our box room, our washing machine broke down and was delivered to the shop for repairs. Which left me with an emptier box room so I could move things about. It also prompted me to start the room spring-cleaning. So I threw away old shoes and stacked the rest in boxes neatly over our shoe cupboard (as you guessed, a shoe cupboard is never big enough to hold all the shoes). I found a new place for the brooms, squeegees, leftover coving and trunking where I previously had the stack of shoe boxes so that for the very first time I had one free corner in the room. I then moved our laundry chests to this corner to get them out of the way, as they were previously eternally in the middle of the room for lack of space (to give you an idea, the machine takes up a little less than 1/3 of the room and I need an empty floor in front of it so I can open its door and crouch to put the clothes inside.) And this room serves as both box room and laundry room although there is obviously no place to also hang up the washing in the same room.

That project aside, there are many other little things I’m still working on. Like migrating all the clothes to the main bedroom. As stated previously I have a bit of a problem since I have yet to have the rails in the wardrobe replaced since the ones that came with the wardrobe are hollow plastic rods and bending under any little weight.

Also, am looking to find more healthy cheap recipes both for variety and to keep our groceries cost down. And one big challenge I am facing is trying to find stuff I can use as lunch for hubby as he is very picky and doesn’t have a microwave at work. So in the end he is usually taking sandwiches and then buying junk food the rest of the day. I guess I’ll have to start cooking stuff that can be eaten cold – rice salad, couscous, cold pasta. Another thing to add to my list of chores for the day I guess.

Anyway, I gotta be off now but hope to be able to write again soon.

It's Christmas Day

2008-12-25T08:22:00.004+01:00

So we have got to Christmas day and are only days away from a new year. Unfortunately, trust my luck to be sick on my leave so that I'm not really up to doing all the things that needed to get done!

I sit now in my living/study room very close to the sofa, on which are all the presents, packed up and divided into bags - the ones that will be given out in the morning and the evening lot. I always get really paranoid about maybe forgetting to put a tag on one of them, or mix up the tags so that the wrong present goes to someone or other. And the evening ones are distributed by Father Christmas and not myself so it makes it even more important to have the tags on correctly. No, not the real Father Christmas, in case you were wondering! It's always someone from the family, dressed up during the evening party my mother's family throw at some auntie's house. Which I usually look forward to. As you might have guessed, I'm not very much up to enjoying it, what with sniffing and sneezing, hurting glands and watery eyes. But I will try to make it to the party because it's the one family tradition that's always remained the same. Ever since I can remember, the party happened every year. Us cousins got married, some had kids, others changed their boyfriend, emigrated, came back. I always look around me and check who made it and who isn't at this party. My cousin that just got married is going on honeymoon tomorrow, just to ensure being here on Christmas day!

Anyhow, enough about the party. One of the perks of the day is not having to cook as we visit my husband's family and eat together. Thank God I'm not the one having people over, I freak out whenever someone's invited to dinner!

What else can I say? Christmas is the same one year after the next with Christmas lunch and the party and my husband working the night before. And like last year on New Year's Eve, the lights had to go out. At least it was Christmas morning by that time and not the Eve when I stay up a bit late just for the hell of it. Last year I ended up going to bed without the New Year Countdown as my husband was at work, my brother at some party, my best friend at another party, my mum abroad, and me home cooking and eating by candle light and no tv!

I'm off now as I need to take my Cold and Flu pills and then go back to rest for a while longer before getting ready for the day. See ya and may you have a Merry Christmas!

December project

2008-12-10T08:20:00.014+01:00

A while ago I started ‘Operation Wardrobe’, and up to now have not had time to try on those jeans I’d mentioned! So then I decided on a different tactic. If I didn’t have the time to try on clothes, I’d at least separate the ones I was keeping from the ones that I needed to try on. The one prob is that I never manage to get around to trying them on anyway! So I keep loading more and more clothes on the rails, which are bending beneath the weight! We should be changing the rods to some sturdier ones but it all depends on when my dad-in-law finds the time to pick them up from the shop. And obviously now the Christmas shut-downs will be upon us soon, leaving me once again without something I urgently need! Well, when you can’t do a thing yourself, c’est la vie!

I can see some progress anyway though, in the form of clothes migrating from the trodden down furniture in the spare bedroom to our main bedroom. (Which is why the rails are groaning under the weight!) As are the shelves too. But that should be sorted out with better support and when I’ve cleaned out the drawers and rotated the winter/summer clothes in them. Cause right now, to empty the drawers in order to clean them out, all the stuff is ending up on the shelves inside the wardrobe!

The box room too, is crying out for attention. As is the poor spare bedroom which is being stuffed with things that just won’t fit in the box room/washing room. Which means that’s my project for December... I have a few days off what in between the 25th and the 1st of Jan and some leave left over that I’m taking this month. So project BoxWash Room, here I come!

Catching up with life

2008-12-03T10:31:00.005+01:00

My menu for all the week is ready, the house all cleaned up (except for the front yard where there have been construction works going on in the apartments above me, leaving dirt all over the place). But by the time I get home during the week it’s always dark, so it will have to wait. Which leaves me with my most important things in life to deal with!!!

So on Sunday (yeah, I know it’s already Wednesday now but I didn’t find time to write before) afternoon we went for a car ride, and then ended up at home watching a dvd, eating mussels and sausages and sipping some fantastic local white wine.

The Monday I used wisely, trying to get the remainder of chores sorted whilst my hubby was at lectures till late. Which meant Tuesday I had no qualms about meeting up with my cousin and our partners and some friends for a one-hour get-together before his big day! By the way cuz, gorgeous invites! Then when I got back home and hubby went to football, I cleaned up the kitchen since we’d left in such a hurry, tidied up our bedroom and actually found time to study (I’m doing a diploma in novel-writing)! How cool is that! I felt like superwoman. (Ok, that’s thanks to darling hubby who’d helped me lots with the cooking earlier so that I had time to start on the other stuff.)

Which means I took care of all the important things in my life this week, which by the way are Family, Home and Writing. I know that’s only three but that’s even better cause it’s easier to give enough time to each of them if there aint’ more!

I have to go now but I thought it would be cool to update my blog. Till next time!

Update to my life

2008-11-25T08:31:00.009+01:00

I failed to make the list this weekend! What list? Oh, so you’ve forgotten it too, just like me. Unfortunately the list of most important things in my life got the backseat on my roller-coaster ride of a long weekend! Which is now making me feel guilty of forgetting to make them my priorities these past days. But I’ll rectify that. It will be my plan for this week. After all, I worked so hard on the housework these past few days I can afford to turn to other things. If only I had time for everything!

It’s scary to think of how many things still need to be done during this week. Starting with my Meal Plan for the whole week, which I’ve forgotten once again. Will try to get that sorted today. And then I need to write an e-mail to my tutor and unpack the new shirts I bought for hubby (I opened one up yesterday so he could try it for size and there were so many pins holding it in place!) And I still need to sort out one of the bottom shelves of our wardrobe by the end of this week. The rest of the stuff can take a backseat now, whilst I concentrate on The Most Important Things in My Life.

Original way of dating

2008-11-21T11:46:00.017+01:00

A 99-Cent Dating Experiment

I have just read this amazing article (link above) and would like to share it with you. It might sound corny to some, or plain cheap to some others, but I thought the author's intentions were good and his reasoning that a date should love him and not the lavish money-spending a true statement. By the way, money-issue aside, I love dates such as the one mentioned. Wouldn't you feel more special if your date left a mark showing he loved you rather than fed you expensive food that ended up in the loo?

More frugality

2008-11-21T10:27:00.010+01:00

By now I’ve exhausted my search for every possible new tip about frugality that I might have found online. But my obsession compels me to keep looking anyway. The good thing is, now that my mind is set to this new mentality, it’s so much easier to control or eliminate waste! As I said in some other post, once I get used to something, it’s difficult to make myself get out of a habit!

Which means that when I look around me I now automatically try to find solutions. Which led me to three other ways of not wasting:

1) I usually send unwanted magazines to recycling. And whenever I need to clean up a mess in the kitchen, I use napkins. So now I keep a magazine on hand and whenever I need to peel fruit and veggies or make a mess, I put a page down on the counter so that the mess ends up directly on the paper. So then I just close up the page and throw into the bin. Voila’ – napkins saved, since the magazines were anyway on the ‘to throw’ pile. You might argue that the paper would have been recycled, but that would have meant throwing the dirty napkins away (and not into a recycling bin!)

2) Before the switch to the Euro on 1st January 2008, I used to buy mobile cards costing MTL5.00, which is the equivalent of EUR11.65. A top-up card used to last me a month and I could swear there was no way of lowering this bill further. With the switch to Euro, Vodafone started issuing cards for the value of EUR10.00 and I found out a card could last me one month anyway, which pleased me no end. So imagine my surprise when I decided to ask for my online password (which I’d forgotten) and wrote it down for future use, to find that using my free daily online messages reduced my bill further. As did checking my tariffs, which lo and behold had been changed back to the standard ones after I’d applied for the ‘Family and Friends’ tariffs. So I changed them back, at no extra cost. And guess what, whereas my mobile service used to cost me EUR23.30 in 2 months, this time around I managed to go for 2 months and 10 days on a EUR10.00 card.

3) I buy pre-packed frozen chicken breast, always the same brand name (which is cheaper than other brands but tastes yummy anyway). My only problem is that even the smallest portions are too big for the two of us and chicken doesn’t re-heat well. So every time I ended up throwing the leftovers away. Given my new more-frugal lifestyle, this bugged me and I mentioned the problem to mum and she gave me such a good solution! Each pack contains three fillets, regardless of the size, and as I said I already buy the very smallest ones. She suggested that when I get home I should repackage them in portions we could actually eat. So out of two packs I can now make three meals!

The only problem with all these frugal tips is that every cent I manage to save is going towards new or increased taxes and the extra-high diesel prices that never decreased but have kept going up even this month against all logic. Viva to an incompetent, inefficient and greedy system!

Juggling life my way

2008-11-19T16:47:00.002+01:00

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could live a life doing only things we liked? Too good to be true, huh? Mum would tell me not to dream and get on with whatever it is I need to do, but I have a better way of dealing with my life.

Because this question can be turned into: How can you make things you need to do enjoyable? Zen Habits (link in my blog list) suggests to figure out the most important things in life and let your life revolve around them. In fact, to quote the article, ‘Make a list of your top 4-5 important things. What’s most important to you? What do you value most? What 4-5 things do you most want to do in your life? Simplifying starts with these priorities, as you are trying to make room in your life so you have more time for these things.’ Which makes my first question easy to answer. Look at it this way – if your family is one of the most important things in your life, then it will be easy to take care of it. Looking at it this way, cooking and cleaning and washing clothes become something you do willingly and with love. Same goes for a job/career. Do what you love to do and you won’t have to work a day in your life – because it will be like spending all day on a hobby.

Which leads me to my resolution of the day: I will figure out these most important things. When I find the time, (probably not before the working week is out as it’s pretty hectic!), I will write them out in big clear wording on fancy paper, and stick them to the wall of my desk, so as to see them in front of me whenever I pass my desk at home. That way, I have a constant reminder to base all my thoughts, actions and decisions on these most important things.

Trick-Buster

2008-11-17T09:01:00.008+01:00

Click on the below link for a list of tricks supermarkets try to get you to buy:

15WaysStoresTrickYouIntoSpending

Grumbling through life

2008-11-14T16:57:00.001+01:00

Why do people grumble about marriage when no one’s forced them into it? Why do people complain about kids after choosing to have them? Why do people say they’re broke and then go out to dinner?
Sometimes I feel like retorting and but I bite my tongue instead. So I thought I could at least grumble on this blog, against all the stuff people whine about. Really, don’t all these married couples realize they’ve been blessed with a person that vowed love till death does them part? When some others might be still be painfully waiting for that special someone to come along? Don’t parents realize that so many women would love to have children but might not be able to conceive? Or might not have the money to support a child? Even more stupidly than that, don’t all these ‘broke’ people know that the term means ‘without money’? When I feel I don’t have the money for something, I usually don’t go for it. Duh, I thought that one was obvious!

So much to do!

2008-11-13T08:26:00.001+01:00

Once again I’m feeling bogged down by the zillion things I need to do and can’t seem to find the time for! I know I can’t blame the bus for everything but I do believe having a car would really help get everything done. Only, there’s no way we can afford to buy me a car so it’s useless to complain. Just like once again this morning, I was reminded that when we’re finally blessed with a child, my problems will get worse since there’s no way we can get me a car by then! And again – I know it’s useless to complain.
Up to now I have very few ideas of how to get everything done but here’s what I’ve come up with:
- I’m doing the grocery shopping from the supermarket with my mum when she needs to go herself. That way I stop at Fgura on the way home and then get a lift with all the purchases. This works a treat since on days when hubby is at uni I anyway have to catch the bus home.
- Once again, the famous Maltese bus is what got me to Lidl after work a couple of weeks ago. I told my parents-in-law what date and time I was available and they coincided their own shopping spree with mine. Again, that gave me a lift home.
- Haven’t found a way of getting to Chef Choice without bugging hubby yet. Prob is, neither my mum nor his goes to shop there but they have good prices on meat and frozen stuff, so much so that it’s worth our while going there around once a month. Now if only we could always manage to do this after work instead of on a Saturday, it would be perfect, since I wouldn’t have to waste part of my housecleaning day at a store on its busiest day.
- Instead of buying fresh fruit and veggies and eggs from the Green Grocer in my area, I ask my mother to buy stuff for me as well when she compiles her weekly list of purchases from the fruit & veggies van. Saves me money and even gives me fresher stuff, as I was always complaining about the produce from the shop not being so good. (No sales in Malta on stuff that’s close to its expiry date or going bad, you just get it at the same price and don’t manage to eat it all before it goes bad. Or else if you don’t like that, you stay without.
I also try to estimate how much of anything I’ll use up in a month or so, to avoid having to make these errands many times a month. Saves on time and diesel.
Another thing that made a noticeable difference in my life is meal-planning. In fact, I’m feeling very lost this week since I didn’t have time to plan this week’s menu ahead. Funny how I used to manage before and now it’s such a hassle. I guess I get too used to my ways!
This turned out to be quite a long post! The rest of the things I need to get done are not only a lot but also one-off things, like shopping for the few remaining Christmas presents, making a card for hubby’s birthday, and going shopping for a few staple clothes I need for the Winter. Goodbye for now, I’ll be back with updates. And oh, one other thing I need to do is try on some old pairs of jeans to see if they still fit, otherwise they go on the ‘to give’ pile. I’m working towards a functional yet concise wardrobe that’s got all I need but not too much stuff so that I’ll finally be left only with so much stuff to fill our bedroom storage areas and do away with the old musty furniture in the spare bedroom.

Putting it all together

2008-11-10T12:19:00.001+01:00

Lately I’ve been thinking how my blog lacks something when compared to blogs I like to follow. And now it hit me – mine seems a little disjointed. Ok, maybe that was a weird way of putting it! Thing is, I just write what I feel like whenever I feel like, without really following any kind of pattern. So from now on, anything I write will be more ‘me’ based. Again, that’s not exactly understandable, is it? I mean that I will be writing down what’s going on in my life, the experiments I carry out (my wardrobe will be one of the guinea pigs for this!), challenges, my way of life in general. With updates to what’s going on. So no more grumbling about ‘no coupon’ stores but rather a retell of what I do to get the best I can anyway. If I mention the rising prices, I must also present my thoughts on how to make up for that money otherwise. Anyway, you get the gist of it. So from now on, it really is ‘my dizzy life blog’.

Christmas without a credit card

2008-10-31T13:23:00.001+01:00

What would you give to have a credit-card-free Christmas? Impossible you say? Of course not! Christmas after we got married turned crazy, because regardless of the fact that we now had bills to pay, the budget for presents remained the same. So out came the credit card, one quick swipe is all it took, and I didn’t feel too bad about it since I knew I’d pay it off when the bill arrived. Only, come January I got a bill for stuff I’d bought in December and which technically, were over our budget for January! The one positive aspect was that I realized what the problem was and that, as they say, is halfway to sorting it out.

And from January 2007 I resolved one thing... that I would lower our budget and try to avoid the credit card. It took some thought, and I did start the shopping in October, but in the end it was well worth it. It gave me time to browse through all the stuff my loved ones would like, and filter down my list slowly to only a few people by Christmas week. So no hassle, no last-minute buying of presents at whatever the price, and a much better following January. I grumbled anyway, since we exceeded our meagre budget just the same, but my husband commented on how much lower the impact of the shopping was this time around.

Which meant that this year, I was already thinking about presents in January and found my first two gifts (for both mothers) in May. By last month I’d decided what we could give my father-in-law without breaking our budget (whilst still giving him something he’d love and appreciate) and browsing aisles this week on a day off, the right present for my sister-in-law popped up at a greatly reduced price! Leaving me only with one question mark, as I’ve already decided what I’ll be giving granny-in-law and there’s something my husband needs which I promised him for Christmas. The big question is... what to give my brother! A gorgeous tie caught my eye this Wednesday but unfortunately, we bought him one last year, so I’ll have to keep thinking and browsing... after all, I’ve almost two months left!

'Throw it away' Time

2008-10-24T14:25:00.001+02:00

What seems like ages and ages ago but is actually only a little over a year ago (up to April 2007 to be exact), I used to be the kind of person to collect all kinds of things, whether I needed them or not. Sometimes, ironically, whether I liked them or not! The reason for this was simple: there was always enough space! Sure, my mother used to grumble, but whenever that happened I said I needed all the things I had, and that is why some things, still kept in boxes after the house move in summer 2002, lay gathering dust in the cabinet beneath the staircase to the washroom till I got married in 2005. That is why, when another piece of furniture got added to our study room to accommodate my brother’s Playstation and tv set, its cabinets became my territory and were stuffed full with old school books I never wanted to see again.

Even when I moved out of mum’s house into a rented place, smaller but still quite spacious, I took all the junk with me, and added some more of mum’s when she decided to move house also and started cleaning out and throwing away unwanted stuff. After all, there was this big washroom upstairs which I didn’t use and the boxes could all go in there.

I did not use most of the stuff in the boxes, but I did take all the stuff from my study at mum’s into my new living quarters and opened up those boxes immediately. Mum was sweet enough to let me have some of her furniture so my desk, complete with drawers and shelves, went with me to our rented abode, which my hubby and I knew was only a temporary home (if home you could call it, seeing as I didn’t feel at all at home in the place.) There too, went all my clothes, old and new, to which were added my new hubby’s ones.

But the day finally came when I opened my eyes, knowing I had to move all this stuff once again! With a tiring full-time job and too many deadlines at work to allow me some days off for packing, I faced the last week in our first matrimonial home and saw chaos. I pleaded a couple of days off, knowing I’d need to pack the whole house in those 48 hours, and called for help!

Reinforcements came quickly, with my mum stopping by on both days as soon as she was done from her part-time, and my dearest bestest friend too, came over during her free hours. Between the three of us, you could say we managed it but only because my musketeers had something up their sleeve. Know what it was called? Plain and simple ‘throw away’. Who would have thought of that? Within hours, my bulging drawers had been half-emptied into garbage bags and I had to dance around grabbing things I didn’t want to go in the trash. The result: boy knows, I’d never have got it done otherwise!

Which left me with one more thing to do: unpack everything all over again at our new smaller house, of which this time around we were the proud owners. What made it more daunting was the fact that this was hopefully to be my last move, so it was either unpack or throw away the stuff. Who needs boxes bulging with stuff that will never have a home? So it was finally time to go through with what I’d procrastinated for ages, 5 years to be exact. I vowed that things must have a place, or else they’d need to go. Remember those boxes gathering dust beneath my mum’s old staircase? Well, I courageously opened them up and tried to cram as much as I could into the previously mentioned desk with drawers/shelves. What made it worse was, I had let my books remain packed throughout my stay at the rented maisonette and knew I wanted these now to be handy in my new home. Which meant I had to clear enough shelves for them to have a place to stay. Throw away more stuff, would you? Exactly what I had to do.

But this was still unfortunately not enough. For even then, my drawers were crammed so full it was a wonder I could find anything at all. So once again, a Spring Clean. Out came all the stuff again, out of drawers and onto the floors, off the shelves and onto the desk. I vowed I’d get it all cleaned up and better organized, whatever that might take. And you know what... I managed it! The drawers are still full and sometimes it takes a bit of prodding about to find exactly what I want, but I don’t believe there’s much else I could throw away at this point. Now the trick is to keep it organized, at least till I finally change the desk I hated so much as a kid with something more practical for my needs.

Tips and Tricks - My first five

2008-10-23T14:52:00.001+02:00

So I promised earlier on that I would paste some frugal tips on here. So here go the first five:

1) Make your own greeting cards. Fancy paper from my supplier is slightly expensive but still, my home-made cards turn out cheaper than the ones I could get from Tal-Lira at EUR0.50 each, which are the cheapest lovely cards I could buy. You need: a little bit of time, basic drawing skills, some creativity. Coupled with ideas off the internet, you could give your loved ones cards that show you actually took the time to give them something different. (Although I was pleased when my mother-in-law didn’t even realize I’d made it myself!)

2) Put the lid on the cooking pot, it will cook faster, using less gas. Also, water boils faster when it’s salted.

3) Re-use wrapping paper if it’s still good. Why waste paper? Also, do remember gift receivers usually just dump it in the bin anyway, so why use new ones every time? (I don’t mean you should use wrappers that are torn, full of tape, or creased)

4) Buy snacks from the supermarket and take to work, instead of going to the vending machine whenever you feel like something. It will save you quite a bit of money over time.

5) Do check out the difference in price between generic and brand name products. I used to buy a certain brand of tortellini, and my mother was forever telling me they were very over-priced. When I tried to find ways to cut my food bills, I took a look at other brands’ prices and voila’ – the ones I was buying were 3 times the usual price!

These are just a few tips that came to mind, will post more as I think about them. Funnily enough, lots of ideas have become such routine that I don’t even remember them as individual tips anymore but rather as part of my lifestyle.

Frugality (Part 2) - Limitations of our country

2008-10-23T12:52:00.000+02:00

Further to my ranting of last time, I could add many more examples of how un-frugal is my home country Malta. In fact, just by checking out any one site with frugal tips online, you’d be amazed by the number of offers going on abroad that us Maltese can’t avail ourselves of. Just take a look at this:

Tawra Kellam, owner of www.LivingOnADime.com gives the following tips on www.menus4mums.com:

- Milk goes on clearance a few days before expiry (comment: really? I though milk was only produced days before it did expire! At least that’s what the local kind is like)
- Meat goes on sale a few days before the sell-by date (comment: again, I’ve paid normal prices for meat due to expire because it was the only kind available. Sometimes I’ve actually passed on buying some kinds of meat when the date was close, and had to stay without)
- Apparently even fruit goes on sale, if you buy it in the morning (comment: I invariably have to make multiple trips to the green-grocer’s in a week because it’s not long before the fruit I get turns bad! On sale? I wish!)

Have a look at some other sites and you’ll be adviced to:

- Buy wrapping paper and greeting cards when these go on sale (comment: Never seen them on sale in Malta, although the ones from Tal-Lira are inexpensive enough at 4 greeting cards for EUR2.00 and usually really nice ones)
- Buy instore brands (comment: I went to this supermarket that had its’ own bottled water at a relatively cheaper price than other brands (EUR1.75). Lo and behold, I got the store’s magazine at home advertising offers and found that the water, when not on offer, would cost over EUR4.00, almost double the price of other, better-known, local brands!)
- Buy in bulk or when you get hold of coupons (comment: buying a pack of 3 instead of one tin of something might save you, say, EUR0.05, so is that worth it? Also, what is a coupon? I’m almost sure the cashiers in the local stores don’t know!)

Enough ranting for now, after all, this is where I live and I’ve got to make the best of it. So instead, I’ve started reading through enough sites to finally came up with a small list of things that I can actually try. So keep tuned to this blog for tips and tricks… coming soon!

Always dumber

2008-10-13T12:09:00.001+02:00

No, I don't mean myself or my readers, I'm talking about some people's pathetically hilarious reactions to the increases in water and electricity tariffs as well as higher rents on W&E meters. I am also actually talking about useless polls that crop up on the local sites as well - 'Have the proposed power tariffs affected your use of electricity and water?' is the current poll on The Times of Malta online.

Now isn't that a cheeky one! As if water and electricity is some want that we can go without, like eating out or buying console games. Reduce on what? Should we now be limited to cold showers and never using the oven for cooking if we were unlucky enough to buy one that works on electricity instead of gas (by the way, I just got to know even the price of gas used in cookers and heaters is going up). What else can we reduce on? Oh I know, let's wear our clothes more times before putting them in the washing machine to avoid 'wasting' electricity.

And what about the water? Maybe all the family should shower together now, think of how much less water that would involve! Wash all the floors at one go, using the same bucketful of water. Any other ideas?

This same newspaper also ran an article quoting people's reactions to the increased rates, rates as yet undecided but definately sky-high and back-dated to 1st October of this year. Funnily enough some people agreed it was fine to have higher rates, to help us save on these scarce commodities... why don't these people refer to my suggestions above then? Or rather, how can they explain the more than 100% increase on water and electricity meter rents, which are not pro-rata to the number of units utilised?

Frugality (Part 1) - An anti-frugal country

2008-09-22T10:39:00.000+02:00

There seemed to be something written on the back of my bus ticket so I turned it over and there, a coupon stared right at me. This was news! Coupons, or rather vouchers as we call them, are rare to find. Ok, so we do get the ‘Voucher Magazine’ at home, full of useless vouchers unless you were planning to spend hundreds of euro already at the particular furniture showroom or worse still, the shop selling appliances that already has a bad reputation! So I read through the wording on the ticket, only to justify my disbelief… it was EUR3.00 off the EUR17.00 ticket to a water chutes park, now that the rain had started and the open-air park was soon to close down for the winter. Now that anyone wanting to visit the place had done so anyway, at the full price and when they wouldn’t be trembling from the cold.

What is it with this country? I read just this morning that out of the 400,000 people living on our small islands, 60,000 are considered poor. And yet a pay-raise is something few people seem to get, whilst the prices of food and fuel, as well as interest rates on loans keep rising at an alarming rate! Suffice to say, my home loan monthly repayment went up by 15.44% in 2 and a half years. The electricity bill went up 95%. And lo and behold, I read yesterday I’d be charged the 95% fuel surcharge even on my water bill… does that mean they’re turning diesel into water now?

And still, the discounts you find in supermarkets are fake discounts. I walked down the aisle of one of the leading supermarkets, presumably a cheaper option to other shops because it buys the food in big bulks and at cheaper costs. Well, not really as I found out since I started comparing prices. Anyway, I was looking for canned sliced mushrooms, to keep for when I couldn’t get the fresh stuff. A pack of 3 cans stared at me with ‘Offer’ written right across the front of the packaging. It turned out the cans were selling for around EUR0.10 each cheaper than my usual brand (which is cheaper still than the brand in question), and I picked up the cans. Since the cans were bigger than the ones I usually bought, and even bigger than the usual cans of the same brand, I thought this was a real bargain. Until getting home and stacking the stuff in the cupboards, I saw the net weight written on the can, which turned out to be less than the net weight on the smaller cans of both brands. Brand name one point, Gisele zero. But I only make a mistake once! By the way, the offer was on a local product, hence my mention of it in this article.

I just mentioned mistakes and that I am usually on the look out not to make the same ones. I used to figure every one did that, and that cheating companies would ultimately go bankrupt through boycott. Dream on! Because people don’t check prices, they just grab and go. And in such a culture, how can you combat rising costs, if everyone just wills them on?

My lovely hometown

2008-09-20T16:28:00.001+02:00

Ok, so I switched on my computer and opened up my browser, which is set to load Google as my homepage. And on impulse, I wrote 'Il-Fanal Restaurant', just to see if they have a website and maybe some coupons since it's one of my husband's fave restaurants and we do go there anyway, whether there are offers on or not. As expected, no website for yet another Maltese well-known business, what is it with the Maltese? You wouldn't catch a renowned foreign business not having at least a basic website! But anyway, that's beside the point of this topic.

I looked through the websites that got listed on Google regarding my search, and one particular link seemed interesting enough to make me curious. It was someone's online journal, and the entry was titled 'Goodbye Marsascala' and hey, that's my hometown! More like home village, actually! Anyway, this link came up because the people writing this journal apparently lived in an apartment over Il-Fanal for some months whilst they holidayed in Malta so the word came up in the Google search.

I skimmed through the writing on the page, I am never a patient-enouugh person to read all through anything! But I looked at all the pictures, examining them closely since my village happens to also be the setting for my first novel, though I'm trying my best to keep to fictitious place names so as not to actually 'set it' in Malta, partly for publishers' sake (long story).

And what hit me was how wonderful it all looks, captured by the camera in such a natural way. No weird angles or too-close closeups, just for art's sake. It was a real documentary in pics, showing different aspects and ways of life in the village. As someone actually commented on the site, it's a pity there were no pics of the cliffs, which by the way are just opposite my house! (Am I lucky or what?!)

I guess what I mean to say is, we take things so for granted. I am myself, one of the few people that truly looks around her, trying to register each scene and each mood, but the photos anyway managed to show me stuff I'd never bothered to really look at or think about. The photographer was fascinated by the small sub-post office in the village, the fish and fruit vans that set up by the church, even what we call 'the Pitch', the club and training area for the local water polo team, which I usually tend to associate more with the open air restaurant that takes over the place in the night time, a well-known spot in the hot summers.

So what is it that made this place tick for the Aussie commenting about it? My guess is that it's nothing like his usual surroundings and that's what makes a place more fascinating. When will we start to appreciate that the grass might actually be greener on our side?

PS - the pic is the view from the top of the cliffs

Starting off

2008-09-17T21:41:00.000+02:00

So I've been thinking of setting up a blog for a while but never really got around to it, mostly because I thought I'd have to put together a website myself, and I definately don't know how to code a website!

I don't have much to write today but thought it would be appropriate to start off this blog on the day I set it up (yeah, you'll get loads more funny ideas from me)

I chose the title 'My Dizzy Life' primarily because blogs should be about a particular person, in this case myself, and anything I do, think or say is part of my life, is it not? And I also plan on sometimes writing what's up with my life anyway, so I think that's an apt title. Also the 'Dizzy' part, I guess it's my way of describing life. Isn't it always dizzying in some way or another?

I finally clicked to register on this site because I found a link to my friend Rene's blog from Hi5 and was so impressed with how he can voice whatever he is brooding about on here and it's like you're saying it all out loud for everyone to hear, only I find writing and thinking much easier than talking so it's even better than!

It's time I should be going now but I'll be thinking about what to post next, probably the book I just finished reading. Anyway, I'm off. At a loss for words today, funnily enough, maybe it's because lately I've realized how some things are private and not all thoughts get written down for everyone to see, just like it's so frustrating that I write good poetry and then don't want it published for the same reason! Anyway, I'm really off now, my neck is killing me and my eyes are pleading for sleep. So I'll be leaving you now, till next time.