Simple Savings Newsletter - January 2017

Happy New Year!

I hope you had a great New Year's Eve and a wonderful 2016.

Here at Simple Savings, 2017 is going to be a year of change and trying new things. We started by playing with our newsletters. Instead of one big long newsletter each month, we are going to try smaller newsletters every few days.

I hope you like the new format. As always, if you have any feedback - good or bad, please write in and tell us. What would you like to see in your Simple Savings emails?

I look forward to hearing from you.

Many grins,
Fiona

Sally and Hanna: How much an hour??

"Dinner's ready!" Pete called. "Cool!" the kids ran excitedly into the kitchen. "What? I thought we were getting pizza tonight?" frowned James. "What do you call this, chopped liver?!" laughed Pete, gesturing at the pizzas on the table. "We thought you meant TAKEAWAY pizza," said Sarah. "It's not the same." "You're right there," agreed Pete. "Pedro's Pizzeria is much better! Delicious homemade pizza in the comfort of your own home - and I get to earn $80 an hour as the chef!"

"Er - how did you work that out? Nobody's paid you any money," James scowled. "Yeah, you haven't earned anything!" agreed Sarah. "Ah, that's where you're wrong!" grinned Pete. "I whipped these pizzas up in an hour using ingredients we already had at home. This saved me buying four takeaway pizzas at $18 each, plus time and petrol going to get them. That's $80 I get to keep in my pocket and three days I didn't have to work to buy dinner. Win!"

James and Sarah looked confused. After a long silence James asked, "THREE DAYS!?! As if, Dad! It doesn't take you 3 days to earn $80... does it?"

Next Newsletter:

In our next newsletter we will show why it takes poor Pete 3 days to pay for takeaway pizza.

Savings Tip: Home Laundromat helps pay the power bill

Our home 'Laundromat' makes paying the power bill much easier. When my now husband and I first moved out of home, we lived in a big block of units that had a communal laundry. It was $1.20 to wash and another $1.20 to dry our clothes. We had an ice cream container to put our $1 and 20c pieces in so we would always have money for washing.

Now we live in a big house with two children, a washing machine and dryer of our own! Because the cost of electricity to run both can get high with a family, I now pay myself $0.50c for a load of washing and if I have to use the dryer on a wet day I pay myself $0.50c to dry the clothes. I put the money into an ice cream container in the laundry to stop the temptation to spend it, and when the power bill comes in the money is put towards it. I do at least one load a day so this works out to $182 a year!

Contributed by: Rebecca Howard

Facebook Story: Self Sufficient in Suburbia

"Don't ever think a small house block is useless for growing your own fruit and vegetables. I live on a 405 square metre block in suburbia. Take away the 250 square metre house and 40 square metre shed then 40 square metre driveway and that leaves very little space to grow anything - or so you'd think. However with a degassed fridge, nine medium size beds, seven large pots and 12 wall mounted herb pots (so far) and six chooks, I grow around 15 to 20% of our daily fresh food needs and collect 4 to 5 eggs a day!"

Awesome stuff Mark! Thank you for sharing. Joining our busy Facebook community is super easy. Either search up 'Simple Savers' on Facebook or click this link and request to join. Once you're in, let the fun begin!

$21 Challenge Books

We only have a small number of $21 Challenge books remaining and we will not be reprinting them. If you want one, follow this link.

See You Soon!

Once again, I hope you will enjoy the new format. You will hear from us again in a few days.