Credit Crunchies - Some of Our Secret Ingrediants

Very quickly I am going to take a few moments to tell you about the articles that can be found inside this site. The overall theme of this site is dealing with and living with the credit crunch however this is made up of a number of skills and abilities topics and ideas.

Garden Shed The garden shed is traditionally where all DIY projects start. In Credit Crunchies this is where the "make and do" articles can be found. Everything from insulating your home to knitting your own clothes.

In short the Garden Shed section deals with beating the crunch by mending, reusing and making do. Practical things you can do that have a low cost to benefit ratio. So if you could save money by teaching yourself how to do a few simple things those simple things are found here.

Laughter Sometimes real life is hard to cope with and so the laughter section is where you will find jokes, comics, jibes and anything else that will raise a chuckle. It is here for some light relief and a chance to have a giggle at the times we are in.

Mother Hubbard's Cupboard A huge source of savings are to be found in the Kitchen. Cooking better, using generic food stuffs and basic versions of things. Cooking your own rather than pre-packaged and making nice things from inexpensive ingredients. The kitchen is, without doubt, the largest single cost in our daily lives.

This is the News is where our writers can report the news and comment on it. This might be news that has already been reported else where or news that they choose to break.

General Crunchy is a section for those other hints, tips and interesting talks that don't seem to fit elsewhere. This is where new sections are born (sometimes) and where the general etcetera of Credit Crunchies can be found.

Micro Crunch is that tiny blog over on the right hand side (assuming you browser rendered the page as it should). Here tiny snippits, links and other things can be found. Good for a tiny snack of Credit Crunchy goodness.

Getting ready to tell the whole story

So far we at Credit Crunchies have focused on the news and the money but that is only part of the story. Living frugally, making do and doing better with what you have also have a part as well as spending with wisdom.

We don't have to live like poor church mice to survive this credit crunch and, as Kate has been showing us there are ways of doing a lot with very little. By adding a little skill and know how to the mi we can be more effective with our money and as a result better off even in hard times.

Over the weeks leading up to Christmas we will be seeing a number of not-at-all Christmas related topics from a number of guest writers. We will look at some of the DIY skills that you can look forward to trying out in the new year.

While we are on this subject save your wrapping paper and wrapping paper off cuts this year. After Christmas I will be showing you some of the things that can be done to keep kids happy, stimulated and above all sitting down for a few hours at a time (depending on your little one's, of course... your mileage may vary product may not be as pictured etc etc).

Technology permitting I will be using video or failing that photographs of my own children's work. You may need news paper, scissors, some scrap books, card (empty cereal packets are good) or heavy paper or some glue. All of the above would probably serve you well but some inventiveness might do the trick anyway.

Later in the spring I hope we can look at growing things in the garden too.