Spent A Little Credit

Remember when I took FREE books to the 2nd hand bookshop for shop credit? Well I went in and spent $20 of my credit. That leaves me a huge $40 still available to spend.

I'm building up my bookshelf with resources for simple living, frugal living and eco living. In the process, I'm removing books that I know I wont read again or are too frivolous to have access to space. In their place I am placing cooking, gardening, crafting, DIY, self sufficiency and other must have books that will cover my new obsession and lifestyle choice.

So what did I buy? Two new books on food preparation. The 1st is an easy to read book on preserving foods "A Year In a Bottle". The other is "Slow Cooker" both by Sally Wise. Both excellent resources to make use of my garden produce and teach me new skills in using my slow cooker to it's full potential.

A Year in a Bottle - Sally Wise

Slow Cooker - Sally Wise

Those living in Darwin and wanting to know where the bookshop is located; the book shop is in the Darwin City Mall (next to the Red Cross Op Shop). There is another 2nd hand bookshop in Nightcliff Shopping Centre called Gordon's Book Exchange - I've heard he also gives good book credit.

All these small steps to improve my life and make in more wholesome is making me very happy. I've also been decluttering and taking 1 bag to the op shop most days. Now if only I could stick to one kind of sleep pattern and be less chaotic...

What about you, any eco-frugal wins lately? Sleep pattern all over the place? Chaotic?

Random Tibbits

Hi Everyone,

I have a few random things I want to show you and chat about.

The Swap-O-Matic Vending Machine...
Have you seen it? I love all things cool and kitchy. Well click this link and take a look! Or this link for a little demonstration video. I love it!! And want one right here in my city! I could see this in the local libraries and cool arty shops.

Super Cheap Haircut.
So my fringe was touching the middle of my nose and I was feeling blah about my hair. But wanting to not spend time or money at the hairdressers I grabbed my small sewing scissors and snipped snipped away in less then 5 minutes. It's a bit crooked, but I like quirky so now I'm quirky.
By the way, if you live in Darwin I noticed the hairdressers in Karama Shopping Centre are looking for models for creative haircuts. So if your feeling groovy give them a call and see if you can get a FREE cut.

Crookedly Quirky and Free.

Bad Book Purchase Turned into a Win.
I purchased a 2nd hand book for $4 thinking it had a photograph The Rambling Expat had taken. It didn't. However it had eight, 55 cent postal stamps that I can use. Value $4.40, that's a 40 cent win. Book off to the op shop, stamps in my wallet. Yeah for small wins.

Not the Right Book.

Happy Discovery of Stamps.

Birthday Goodie Bags.
Dolly prepared her goodie bags for her birthday party. I was inspired by this Blog Post. We used a 50 cent Art op shop book we had lying around gathering dust and lunch bags from last years birthday party. I am trying to instill a love and knowledge of Art to Dolly. So she chose Art Nouveau pictures that looked like Princesses, Princes, Queens and Kings.

Working Hard

10 Bags Completed - Ready To Be Filled With Treats.

Tiny Frog.
As I blog tonight the rain is sprinkling it's much wanted moisture giving us some relief from the humid heat. I can hear frogs singing from every direction and I saw this tiny creature on the fly screen catching insects attracted by my light. I dashed out in the rain to take a photo of him on the window and as I did so, he jumped on my head. As I eased him off gently, I took a quick pic for you. So small and beautiful.

The Rambling Expat in the Background, Inside Out Of The Rain.

Exquisite.

Thanks for reading and if you're lucky enough to get a Swap-O-Matic near you let me know :-)

PS: My Rambling Expat has a Fishing Lure Giveaway if you enjoy fishing.

Book Credit!

Remember the free books I gathered and talked about a few days ago here, (nine of them were in Italian) well when I went in to the second hand book shop in the CBD, I saw the Borneo book I wanted for $25. So I pulled out my bag and asked if I could gain store credit for my books. I was feeling shy and nervous as I have never done this before. I was encouraged with a smiling yes and I crossed my fingers I would get enough credit for the book I want.

Well, let me tell you.....

It was totally worth it! I was given $60 store credit!!!!!! I'm so thrilled as I now have $60 to spend at my leisure on books that I want. I left the Borneo book behind because the manager told me it was now a popular destination so I know that book will be on the shelves again and we are not going for another year.

Each great experience like this encourages me to step forward away from my comfort zone and ask, because an ask is rarely declined. And in this occurrence it surpassed my expectations. Another win on my eco frugal life.

Have you ever gained store credit for your books, clothes or anything else?

(By the way, I did go and pick up The Rambling Expat in the darkness of the night. I am happy that I pushed myself, it's nice for The Rambling Expat to have family greeting him instead of waiting in a long queue for a taxi and wasting money. For those who pop over to his blog from time to time he has a fishing lure GIVEAWAY if you enjoy fishing.)

Promoting Ms Dig

Just a quick Post to Promote our friend Ms Dig, because she's nice, goes to interesting places in my part of Australia and writes about her interesting finds. She's an archeologist.

A last week I talked about Arnhemland, this link has a few of her photos. My partner the fishing freak The Rambling Expat sometimes takes unicycling lessons from her. In exchange he teaches a little French. But I think there's more biking then French talking going on.

Buttons and Books

I was posting give-away Guppie Fish and Brazilian Spinach Cuttings on Freecycle. As we needed a few more variety of coloured buttons for Dolly's crafting and new year gift projects, I also posted a request for buttons.

A lady came by to pick up Guppies and Spinach and dropped off these lovely buttons for us.

Beautiful Lolly and Jewel Like Buttons.

They're a great collection of just what we were looking for. Dolly spent a good hour playing, sorting and admiring them. It was a win win all round. I love days like these. Someone also gave us a bottle of champers in exchange for Guppies, I tried to say no but she refused to take it back, so I'll just have to enjoy it :-)

Freecycle is a wonderful way to obtain stuff in a cashless manner that cares for the environment. I've had 8 people come by my home in the past 24 hours to collect guppies and spinach and it's interesting to note they were all women. Is it women who count the pennies and take the opportunities for fabulous frugalness more then men? Or are fish and gardening a gendered domain full of women?

As for my rule of: Whatever new stuff comes into our home the equivalent size - plus some, must leave our home... I followed through by selling a book (bigger then the whole lot of buttons) on Fishpond and posting it. I'm doing well so far with my rule. Lets hope it's not another one of my crazy rules I break off.

Sold a Book - made back the money I had spent to purchase it.

Did you find anything you wanted recently for free and with a good environmental outcome?

Bartering Domestic Help.

Hello Hard Workers,

Every once in a while we take in Helpx travellers to give us a hand in exchange for a place to sleep and a evening meal. We don't do it all the time only when we are in the mood or someone is in desperate need as our flat is cramped.

We live in a small touristy city. The gateway to Asia, so there is a lot of coming and going. A dorm bed in a noisy backpackers is $26.50 a night which is very pricey for people trying to travel on a super tight budget. Knowing this we joined Helpx and have travellers of all ages stay with us for 3 to 7 days. They don't have to fork out $$$ for their accommodation and we don't have to fork out $$$ for domestic help - plus we get to meet some extremely interesting people!

However we are also careful; we check references, we never leave anyone in our home when we go out, we don't give out keys, we don't have valuables and our daughter always sleeps in our room (her bed is next to ours), so she is NEVER EVER alone with strangers. Our profile also states clearly what we want and don't want.

In the past 2 years we have had about 100 Helpx and Couchsurfers stay with us. We have barely had problems. A few broken dishes and a couple of sponging slackers but they are in the 3% minority. We have the luxury to pick and choose our guest/helper carefully as we receive numerous requests each week.

We try to never exploit people,we ask for a maximum of 3 hours help in the late afternoon and they have the day free to visit our city. We try to make their stay as comfortable as possible. We see it as an exchange and aim the exchange to be equal benefit to both us and the guest.

Earlier this week we had lovely young man from Hong Kong. A uni graduate who has spent 6 months in Melbourne working and is now ready to do some tourism before heading home again to his family, girlfriend and his chosen career path.

Our "guest" on the fold out couch/bed.

We loved having this particular Helpx. He was calm, respectful and a great helper! He watered the garden, helped with dinner preparation and played with Dolly. And while I went to bed unusually super early with Dolly, he washed the dishes, cleaned the kitchen floor and hang out the laundry without being asked. In the morning I woke up to everything looking sparkly clean and it was a great start to another crazy hectic day.

The Rambling Expat and I both work full time and Dolly is super energetic, so this gives us time to give our daughter quality attention after busy work days.

Would you take in a travelling helper too?

Stephanie @ Frugal Down Under.