Joining in with Essex Hebridean
Source: womenzmag.com via ashley on Pinterest
Economy does not lie in sparing money, but in spending it wisely.
As this is my first Frugal Friday and I only decided yesterday to join in I thought that I would revisit a blog post that I did earlier in the summer.
One thing that I do enjoy is visiting coffee shops. I love the atmosphere of a coffee shop and I like to people watch. What I don’t like is the cost. There is a particlur cafe that I like to frequent in my home town which is out in the open and on the prom. Great place to people watch. During the summer of 2011 my partner lost his job and was out of work for a few months. This meant that we had to cut back on some luxuries. The first thing to stop was our weekly visit to PDs Diner for coffee and cake on a Saturday afternoon. Then I had a revelation. There were benches within yards of the diner. Still with the same views, still the same bikers, tourists, donkeys, lifeguards and artists to watch. So why not take a flask and some home made cake out with us and sit on the bench pretending we were at the cafe.
This progressed to making biscuits and fancy coffee syrups and even a forage into my long lost boxes from my batchelorette home. Check out my Cafe Chez Moi blog post for the recipes and more information. I didn’t work out costings for the coffee, syrup and biscuits that I made back then but it is certainly something that I will look at doing now. I may revisit this post after I have done the costings. I do know that I usually buy a bag of fairtrade coffee from Morrisons at a cost of £1.95 which gives me about 10 cafetieres of coffee at about 4 cups per serving. The last time I bought coffee was in Costa and it cost £5.96 I think for two medium cafe lattes. Granted it was in a service station but even so that is nearly three bags worth of coffee.
I can honestly say that I get great pleasure out of taking a little picnic along to the prom these days. When I was in London in the summer I treated myself to tea and cake in the garden at the V&A. They had such lovely paper cups that I washed them out and brought them home. They are still going strong and I love to take them out for our coffee from the flask.
We feel rather decadent sitting there among the tourists with our picnic. Not only have we saved a fortune but we know that we are eating healthily too. Oh, and I also try to put the equivalent savings into the piggy bank when we do this just to remind me how much I would have spent. Great incentive for the next time I feel like blowing my budget.
So, how much do you spend on coffee and tea in the cafe? How much could you save per year if you made your own? Is there a way that you can still get that cafe buzz without spending the cafe prices?
I love this – you’ve jumped straight to what I think is the key to the whole thing too – there can be a certain “poor me” mentality around the art of frugality – a tendancy to say “I can’t afford…” “We can’t have…” and that sort of thing. Indeed, there are frugal blogs out there that make you feel that you must be entirely in the wrong for spending your own hard-earned on anything that isn’t classified as a strict necessity! There is none of this in your post though – just a sheer joy on a little luxury, and if anything, the joy has increased due to the frugalisation!
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Thank you. I do think that the whole point of working hard to earn a lot of money is so that people can have what they like within their budgets. However, as I have chosen to step back from the world of careers I know that life has to change. I don’t want to feel impoverished, I want to experience life, enjoy life and do it all within a smaller budget. You are certainly inspiring me to be more conscious.
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Your coffee routine sounds lovely – and I think it’s a brilliant idea to put the equivalent amount away in your savings! Spending wisely is more about making choices… something always has to give, and you can choose where you put your money each time, by deciding your own priorities.
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Hi Cassandra. Thanks. The coffee routine works well for me. Changing mindset is easy with practice. The udea behind putting the equivalent aside came some years ago when I was going on a trip to Mexico. I really wanted to see whales in the wild and so each time I thought of buying something, chocolate, a book, a magazine I checked with myself “do I want this more than seeing whales” if the answer was no then the money went in a jar. As a result I not only got to see whales in the Pacific and hear them sing I met one of my dearest friends in life. So yes ur’s about choices not going without. Thank you for for understanding me.
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Love the coffee on a bench idea – its about the conscious decision to do something different. Unfortunately most of my coffee buying is in service stations, I’ve tried taking coffee with me, but after an hour or two in a flask it generally tastes disgusting. I do have a lovely travel mug though, ceramic which looks so much better than the flask style, and must use it more.
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Yes, I think coffee is better if you drink ir fairly soon afterwards. I love those ceramic mugs too. I keep looking at one in The V&A when I am there. Do they keep the coffee hot enough?
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