Five Frugal Things We’ve Done 23/08/19

I think the last couple of weeks have been pretty good for saving cash, and some of our friends have been showing us how it’s done – we got to see how one couple used their Tastecard to get us into the cinema for nowt, and another family told us how they booked train tickets to York for 10p for the adults and 5p for the kids in Northern Rail’s sale!

Yep, we’re in good company, aren’t we? Anyway, here’s how we’ve been trying to keep up with our thrifty mates.

Opening my Monzo account

I said last time that I was finally catching up with all the different, exciting banking apps there are available, and Monzo was one that I was particularly happy about.

I opened it with a referral link and got £5 added to my account! It’s great when you can use a referral to get a bonus like that – you can find more useful referral codes in this post.

Get your own Monzo account and a free £5 added to it here.

10p off a litre of fuel and more…

The “big shop” we did in Tesco earlier this fortnight paid off in a very helpful way – giving us a coupon for 10p off a litre of fuel because we’d spent over £60 in the supermarket.

Apart from that, we got 63p back in Curve Cash because I’ve chosen Tesco as one of my cashback retailer options in my Curve account, and there’s more – I still get my Tesco Clubcard points AND Tesco Bank Clubcard points because my Curve card is linked to my Clubcard credit card.

Woop!

Second hand carpet cleaner + day out

Last time I also mentioned the orange cleaner I’d made to combat the cat wee situation.

We still wanted to change the carpet though, as it’s only a small square by the front door that leads up the stairs, so it won’t be too expensive. However, we wanted to get ourselves a heavy-duty carpet cleaner to be armed and ready for the next time the cats decide to unleash their evil bladders on our floor.

Of course we got it on eBay, and as it was located in the outskirts of Manchester, we managed to make a day of collecting it and spent a few hours looking around the Lowry.

Selling old books

Ste’s been the good one, getting his eBay game on yet again.

He’s been working on selling some books that didn’t attract any buyers when he listed them some months ago; I don’t know what he’s done this time around, but it’s been working.

Slow cooker dinners = winning

We actually had this conversation one morning, about whether to have a takeaway for dinner or throw something into the slow cooker… guess which one won?

I do love a takeaway as much as the next person, but we can’t do it regularly (not least because I can’t eat everything I want to these days). Using a slow cooker is a great option for a lazy meal because you can start it early in the day when you’ve got more energy, and come back to it later when you’re conked out with little to do.

The truth is, I might just end up falling out of the habit again soon, but over the last two weeks we’ve been getting lots more use out of ours than usual, and I’m hoping to keep it going as long as possible.

Over to you…

Any frugal wins to report? Here’s hoping!

Last fortnight

I’m linking up with Cass, Emma and Becky in this week’s ‘Five Frugal things I’ve done this week’ linky.