I can't believe that its six months since I last posted on this blog. I hadn't planned to be so neglectful but various events conspired against me and consequently time has marched on and its now November!
I'm sure that due to my silence you decided months ago that we had given up on supporting local and gone back to supermarket shopping ...................
So what's happened since April?
We've continued to buy from the village shop all the regular items that were on our list before.
We were able to buy unsalted butter from Landsdowne Dairy in Bude until the Farmers Market finished for the season and we had no need to go to Bude. Luckily we found it in the Cheese Pantry in Hatherleigh, so we're sorted for the winter. However crème fraiche has proved to be more difficult and we've had to buy it in a supermarket.
All our fruit and veg has come from green grocers, farm shops or markets and a small amount from our garden.
Back in the spring we did have to buy a bag of frozen cauliflower from Waitrose as none of the green grocers or Waitrose for that matter had any fresh ones (due to the weather we later found out) and Chris needed it for the curry he was cooking that night.
We were buying dishwasher tablets from the village shop until the dishwasher stopped dispensing them properly so have resorted to buying liquid capsules from Waitrose along with Persil washing capsules due to my sensitive skin. The only other occasion we have had to resort to Waitrose was on our way back from Gatwick after our holiday at 7pm when we needed a few bits such as milk and something for supper.
Apart from this it has become second nature to do our shopping in independent local shops and we're definitely saving money too. We have found that £200 is lasting us five weeks.
It's strange to think that in six weeks time we will have come to the end of this challenge!!
