Happy New Year

I hope you all had a great Christmas and I wish you a fun filled happy New Year.

This year I am going to change the format of my blog, more ways to become self sufficient and at least one art journalling page a week.

The reason for the self sufficiency is that John retires at the end of the year and we will be living on a pension.  I am really looking forward to this.  My thoughts are that when you work you have a reasonable income but are time poor.  We are not good at spending wisely, as we are time poor and just buy whatever we think we need, we also waste a lot.  When you retire and go on the pension your income is less but the upside is you have a lot of time to become better at spending your smaller income and living within your means. I find this exciting and a challenge.  I started working towards this several years ago and planning on ways to ease into this.  We have  spent up on making sure we have good reliable electrical goods, linen and clothing.  In my mind I knew that there where things we where going to have repaired and we made sure that we had savings to cover them.  In the last month the air conditioner broke down, we had been warned, it happened just before the heat wave, damn it all and we never got it fixed for a week, but now it will be good for at least another 10 years.  Next to go was the vacuum cleaner, we have always tried to get the best quality we could afford and this was a Dyson, worth every cent.  Will get another one of that brand.  And as it always goes in threes, the reticulation system is playing up, hoping it will last out summer then get it renewed.  Got new sheets at David Jones 50% off in the sale, so got good quality  they should also last 10 years, then we will be just getting what we can afford.  So, after all explanations aside, the plan for this year is to learn self sufficiency and planning on how I spend my $ as I also think that the most important thing when you get older is your health.  So my aim is to get good quality food and get it in season.  I will share with you my journey, hope I don't bore you with this, and I am hoping you will share with me your money saving ideas.  I joined Pinterest through Facebook about 4 months ago, what a wealth of ideas I am getting from there.  I am going to try their tips and will also share them with you.  

This morning I headed off to the Kalamunda Fresh Food Markets which is on every Sunday.  I allowed myself $50 and this is the basket I bought home.  I was very proud of myself as I found heaps of exciting new things I hadn't seen there before.  This market is only small but it has very good quality produce.

For my $50 I got a head of celery $2, rangefree eggs $5 (not a big saving but I know they are fresh and this person farms the chooks) banana's, 3 white flesh nectarines and 3 white flesh peaches for $2, whole grain bread $7 loaf ( sounds expensive but it will last me about 10 days)  1 kilo of natural honey ( cutting out all sugar and using honey instead including baking) $14 could of had it for $12 in a plastic container but I can re use the jar with a seal cap lid (more on that in later blog) beautiful fresh baby Cos lettuce $1.50 mix of 6 different young green sprouts (learnt how he grows these will share when I have tried to grow them myself), watermelon and rock melon plants $2 each, oh, in the brown bag 2 vanilla custard horns from the bread lady(not in the budget).

a slice of the yummy bread, see all those poppy and sesame seeds on top.  Maybe, a bit liberal, spread of butter and some of the honey, delicious.  I know you are probably thinking that I shouldn't be eating butter but I refuse to eat margarine and after reading on Pinterest an article from a heart specialist about cholesterol not being the cause for heart disease after all, I am giving up on following advise on so called knowledgeable people, being very cynical here, who may, or may not, have a hidden agenda and are just as likely down the track to change their opinion, like this doctor.  I intend to follow my own instincts and what I grew up with.  Getting off all processed foods, finding whats in season and last but not least growing or making my own.

I hope you will stay with me on this journey

stay healthy and happy

Jacky