Lock in fuel savings and make them last!

Our household has found a super easy way to make the most of cheap fuel prices. We watch the fuel cycles with the ACCC petrol price cycles website (https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/petrol-diesel-lpg/petrol-price-cycles). When it is getting to the lowest point of the cycle, as well as our vehicle, we also fill up five 20 litre fuel containers. If it is inconvenient to do so, we prepay and lock in the fuel price on both of our phones on the 7/11 app. This guarantees that locked price for seven days. We then use that fuel through the next 3-4 weeks (the length of the fuel cycle generally). It's like having our own petrol station at home!

Fuel containers cost around $20-$25 at BCF and the savings per cycle paid for each container. Now it's pure savings of $30 per cycle. Petrol works out around $520 per year less for us, for very little effort! At first, my husband was concerned that the fuel may not last (he is a qualified mechanic), but I showed him some tests BP had done on this matter, finding that six months later, the values were still the same. We notice zero difference in fuel consumption, km/L, or parts wearing out any faster.

Everyone we tell thinks this is an amazing idea, we find it strange that no one else seems to have thought of it!

You can heal your life - and your nails!

A book by Louise Hay helped me to put an end to 45 long years of nail biting! According to her book, 'You Can Heal Your Life', biting your nails may represent 'frustration, eating away at oneself, or spite of a parent.' It wasn't until I made the conscious connection to my unresolved feelings and nail biting that I stopped. What I found really helped me was downloading some free meditations from YouTube. These cost absolutely nothing to help relax and unwind. I also repeated some daily affirmations such as 'I enjoy having beautiful, long and strong nails'. I have also used homeopathic remedies such as Brauer's Nerve Tonic, which in my opinion is the best thing since sliced bread to calm a stressed nervous system!

Cook two simultaneous meals in one crock pot

We are a family of only two adults who cook often with a large crock pot. However we do find ourselves with a heap of left overs after cooking a pot full of food. So, instead of filling the crock pot with enough food for one meal several times over, we now take two oven bags and divide our meat/chicken/fish between both bags. We add different flavourings to each bag then arrange both bags in the slow cooker and cook on low for eight hours. I have just made Chicken Korma in one bag, using drumsticks that were on special with an extra pinch of cinnamon and some chilli, and Mediterranean Chicken with olives in the other bag. The conflicting smells are surprisingly delightful and the final result is two delicious meals both cooked with the same amount of power I would have used for one. Any extras we don't consume straight away I simply freeze and save for a later date.

Better food, less vet trips

We have found that changing our brand of dog food from a 'cheap' supermarket brand to a vet-only brand has effectively saved us $5,000.

We used to feed our pets a good quality but cheap brand of food, costing around $20 per week in two kilo bag lots. We decided to experiment and switched to an ultra premium brand that is only available from veterinary hospitals and some pet shops. At $35 for a two kilo bag, it was quite a shock and we thought this was a mistake! However, we stuck it out for a month as planned and came to the following conclusions:

1. They gained condition, coats were shinier, softer and thicker and whiskers grew longer and stronger.
2. They had more energy but lost their tendency to behave like children at a five year old's birthday party!
3. They 'pooped' less and the odour of their urine and faeces was reduced by at least 75%.

The biggest realisation was that they only ate their way through half a bag every week, meaning we were now saving $10 a month just on food alone. Plus, we no longer had to feed supplements and we saved money on litter and both time and money on litter tray cleaning.

In the long term, we have found that their odour has decreased so much that they only need a shampoo bath every six months, not every two weeks as previously.

We have also had less trips to the vet and some chronic conditions have disappeared or become easier to manage without medication. A saving of close to $5,000 per year for us. We love our local vet and so do our pets, so we still visit regularly - but only for a cuppa and a chat!