Tracking 2015 – December

2 Comments

Here is my final post about tracking our spending for 2015.

Budgeting

January – $5,144.53
February – $1,783.49
March – $4,350.56
April – $2,385.31
May – $5,961.54
June – $2,939.07
July – $3,537.09
August – $3,601.19
September – $9,406.95
October – $7,490.03
November – $15,707.97
December – $4,821.34

December was a more reasonable figure with no huge items like the previous few months.  There was a bit of additional spending with the silly season taking its toll.

On my spreadsheet I have the spending divided into various categories.

The category with the highest spend was the all-encompassing ‘House and Garden’.  This was mainly due to the installation of additional solar panels and a hybrid battery system.  Nevertheless, after putting that cost aside, it is evident that we do spend quite a bit in this category.  However, many of these expenses are one-off things which we will not have to purchase again for many years – if at all.

‘Holidays’ was also quite high as we paid for and took a holiday to Singapore, paid for flights, long-distance train fares and some accommodation for our USA/Canada trip in July 2016 and made several domestic trips for family reasons.

‘Transport’ was our next highest cost and this is our train fares for a fairly long commute.  There is not a lot we can do to change this until we retire.

We spent an average of $93/week on groceries which includes food, cleaning items and toiletries.  I am going to try to reduce this a bit this year.  Growing more of our own food should make a difference.

Entertainment and dining out also made up a substantial chunk of our spending with an average of just over $60/week.  This includes meals, films, theatre and shows.  I plan to reduce the spur of the moment eating out and hopefully reign in the spending in this category.

I have not detailed every category but the other 2 where we averaged greater than $50/week were clothing (combined for GMan and I) and petrol/maintenance for our 2 cars.  I expect that the clothing spend will be somewhat less this year but the car costs will be about the same.

Tracking our spending has been an eye-opening exercise which I will continue in 2016.  I will not be posting monthly tallies but I will do a review at the end of 2016 and compare it to 2015.

Happy New Year

1 Comment

I was searching for a photo that really portrayed my feelings for the end of one year and beginning of the next.  I did not want images of alcohol or fireworks.

I found this which summed it up for me.

New Year 2016

As 2015 is washed away by the incoming tide it is time to write a fresh new date in the sand and move on.

Wishing you a peaceful and fulfilling year.

More Holiday Shopping

Leave a comment

We have been home from our holiday for 3 days now and it is over a week since my last post.

I hope you all had a relaxed and happy Christmas, wherever you were and whatever you did.  We had a delightful day which we shared with our daughters and some festive food but did not over-indulge.

The other shopping I did on my holiday was a little more planned than the random collection from my last post.  I went to my favourite shop in Melbourne, Rivette & Blair, where I replenished my supply of tops.

The are all simple styles and basic colours that will mix and match with existing pieces in my wardrobe.

005

A simple v-neck black and white tee.

The same style in plain red.

001

3/4 sleeve red with scoop neck for cooler days.

002

Both of the red ones are waiting to be ironed.

003

Plain black linen with pleats at neckline.  This is the same style as 2 spotted tops I already had.

004

Finally, a loose navy v-neck top in very fine polyester.  It is super light and cool.

I look forward to sharing the different ways I wear these as I mix and match with shorts, trousers and skirts.

Holiday Shopping

Leave a comment

I rarely purchase impulsively because on the days I am in the office I am simply too busy to be interested in wandering around the city to look for stuff to buy.  Since we live in a semi-rural area I have to make a specific trip for what I need so unplanned buys rarely happen.

Holidays seem to be a different story because I actually have time to stop and look around.

This is a fun post to share my purchases from today.

2015-12-23 01

Peanuts, pomegranate molasses, facewash and moisturiser was my haul for today.

We went to the A1 Lebanese Bakery because my daughter wanted pomegranate molasses for a salad she is making for Christmas lunch.  It seems to be a relatively common ingredient in Middle eastern cuisine and since I was not sure how easy it would be to source at home, I bought a bottle.

The peanuts were from a stall at the Queen Victoria Market and I thought the price was pretty good – $7/kg so I bought a kilogram.  I plan to use these to make my own peanut paste in my new blender.

Finally, the facewash and moisturiser are Sukin, which is the regular brand that I buy.  The small chemist next to the entrance to the market had a special with 20% off all Sukin products so I could not pass up an easy saving.

I am not sure that I would have ever bought pomegranate molasses if I had not been here as would not have known what to do with it but the other things would have been bought at some time.

Do you buy ‘different’ things when you are on holidays and more relaxed?

 

Christmas Cheer

1 Comment

Unlike some other years I have written very little about Christmas this year.

We decided not to put up the tree this year as we will be away for Christmas.

2015-12-21 01

Yesterday we had a small Christmas celebration with my immediate family as we will not see them on Christmas Day.  We went out for a casual lunch, then went to the local playground so that our 2 granddaughters could use up some excess energy.  Finally, we adjourned to my brother’s place were we shared some sweet nibbles and drinks while we opened our gifts.  It was a low-key but perfect day.

The only thing that I had not done was send cards/letter/emails.  This afternoon I sat done and wrote a generic letter, added a couple of relevant photographs and sent it off to various corners of Australia and overseas with a couple of clicks.  I still have a small number of cards to post and I will do that tomorrow and hopefully they will still arrive in time for Christmas.

I am not sure how many blog posts will happen over the next week so I will take this opportunity to wish you all a very merry Christmas and a safe and peaceful New Year.

 

Tomato Trial

1 Comment

I apologise for the break in posts but my computer access has been somewhat curtailed due to some repairs to the main computer.  It is all resolved, thanks to the local computer shop, and we are back in business.

Today I want to share my latest success in preserving our bumper harvest of cherry tomatoes.

After removing the stalks and rinsing the tomatoes, I blitzed them in the blender.

My dehydrator has solid sheets for making fruit leathers so I poured the resulting puree onto the sheets.

001

Here is the same tray after drying for about 8 hours.

002

I removed the dried tomato and broke it up.

003

It was quite leathery and pliable so still had some moisture.  I returned the pieces to the dehydrator and dried them some more.

004

Finally, I ground the dried pieces in the blender and this is the result.

002

From a couple of kilos of cherry tomatoes I have 1 jar of powdered tomato concentrate.  This can be blended with water to make tomato paste which I can use on pizzas or added directly to casseroles or soups.  I am sure there will be a hundred and one uses for it and the great part is that I have a single jar which stores easily in the door of the refrigerator.

What I Wear – First 2 Weeks

Leave a comment

It is almost 2 weeks since I began my latest project of keeping track of what I wear.  The purpose of this exercise is to identify what (if any) clothes just hang in my wardrobe without being worn.  I don’t think there are any that fall into this category but I want to prove that to myself.

Since I began recording what I wear each day (via Instagram), I have worn 4 different dresses, 2 skirts, 4 tops and 5 pairs of shorts/trousers.

The weather has been quite changeable so the jeans and 3/4 sleeve top from last Friday were set aside when the weather became quite hot during the week but today has been cool and wet so I was back in the jeans and top.  In fact, tonight I have even dragged out my polar fleece jacket which has not been worn for several months.  Conversely, the shorts and top from last Sunday were worn again yesterday when it was 34C.

I have one more week at work before 2 weeks of holidays so it may well be the New Year before I repeat any of the outfits I have worn to work so far.

This is one of the dresses I have yet to wear this month.

https://organisedcastle.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/2013-02-11-02.jpg
My next challenge will be working out what I need to pack for 6 days in Melbourne over Christmas.  I will leave my final decision until the day before we travel so I have a better idea of what the weather is likel to be while we are there.

I am working from the rather slow laptop as we have some issues with the desktop computer so posts may be somewhat intermittent until we get that sorted out.

Breakfast

2 Comments

I am working from home today and I had time to try out my new blender for the first time.  I decided to make a green smoothie for breakfast.

Here are the ingredients all prepared and ready.

2015-12-11 01

There is kale, celery and an orange from the garden, pineapple which I had already chopped so it is probably a bit smaller than necessary, 2 cubes of frozen passionfruit pulp.  This was from our vine a few months ago.  The small bottle contains powdered ginger.  The root ginger came from my sister’s garden and I dehydrated and ground it.  I added a teaspoonful to my smoothie.

2015-12-11 02

Loaded into the blender and ready to go.  I added about 300ml of water.

2015-12-11 03

The end result.  I had a large glass of this for breakfast and have enough for tomorrow as well.

This was an easy and successful introduction to my new, high-speed blender and I am looking forward to using it to create many more healthy options to add to our diet.

It’s Here!

Leave a comment

After much debate and research, I finally ordered a high-speed blender on Sunday.

3 days later it is here.

2015-12-09 01

Out of the box and set up.

2015-12-09 02

Bright, shiny and red………of course.

There are instructions to read and recipes to try, but that will have to wait for another day.  I am at home on Friday some perhaps I will be able to try it out then and share some more details then.

Weekend Washing

1 Comment

You all know the never-ending cycle of housework – washing, ironing, cooking and cleaning.  That seems to be the routine every weekend as I ready myself for the week ahead.

This weekend was all about washing, and not just clothes, although I did that as well.

I washed my car which is a fairly rare occurrence.  It positively sparkled in the sunshine by the time I had finished.

Solar panels

Then GMan and I washed 3 sides of the exterior of the house.  The long side which faces the street and the 2 ends are done and we will tackle the long, back wall next weekend.  The part that we have done is relatively easy as there is verandah on those 3 sides so access is not difficult.  The last side is a different story as the house is high-set at the back.  We will assemble the scaffolding to reach this part.  It takes a lot more time as you constantly need to move and re-position the scaffolding along with climbing up and down but it will be worth it.

Finally, I washed and cleaned all of the kitchen windows.  There will be more to do once the back wall is cleaned but it is definitely a job worth doing.