The lovely Kirsty from the Unspoken conversations is here today to share some of her DIY tips. Do check out her blog where she unpacks some of the deeper unspoken issues and writes in such a beautiful way.
Enjoy...
Thank you to Lisa who has invited me
over to her cute little blog today to share some of my money saving tips. My
name is Kirsty and I'm a serial TIGHT ASS when it comes to renovating and
saving money on purchases for bigger and better things like travel and catching
up with loved ones.
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| This is me doing some DIY on the weekend! My partner thought that it was appropriate to add a paint stripe down my face! |
The number one TIP IS....*drum roll*.
DIY.
Three
little letters that will SAVE you SOOOO much. DIY. Do it yourself. I know that
this can be disheartening. Omg – I don’t have time to do things myself. Surely
it’s much easier to get someone else in to do it? I really can’t be bothered.
BUT TRUST ME! It’s sooo worth it. Sure, paying someone else to complete a task
for you is probably much more efficient BUT IT’S NOT COST EFFECTIVE and you
don’t get the satisfaction of creating an imagine in your mind and seeing it
come to life PLUS everyone loves the adrenaline that you get from scoring
yourself a BARGAIN!
My
partner and I have been renovating since October 2011. We started 2012 with
three big goals in mind. To complete our outside area (with fans, lights,
paving and all things fancy included), to turn our shed that was previously
used by the last owners as a music studio in to a granny flat with an ensuite,
and to paint inside.
Now
that I think about it, we were being fairly optimistic time and money wise.
But
guess what? It’s COMING to life! We’re doing it.
How?
By just plodding along, being savvy with our money and doing things ourself.
We
have learnt to save money by:
- Visiting salvage yards for second hand
goodies. It’s true,
someone’s trash is someone else’s treasure. We have scored a bathroom window
and a shower screen for $200! BARGAIN! Check out my blog post on salvage yards
on my blog by clicking here.
- Recycling material. We have turned rocks into garden beds,
bricks into garden edging, dirt piles into landscape design pieces, old timber
into frames for the ensuite, and plants that we’d pulled up out the back into a
new garden out the front.
- Buying second hand items for sites like Gumtree. Mick and I scored two wine barrels from a
winery for $200. They are awesome and are a real feature of our outside area.
We are now searching gumtree for bar stools to place around the wine barrels
for entertaining.
- Doing the work ourselves. Nothing beats scraping back old paint and
applying the new coats and seeing the HUGE difference that it makes. Nothing
beats the feeling of accomplishment when you rip up the old vine that has
wrapped itself around existing structures and planting new flowers and fruit
trees. And nothing beats looking out of your window on a Monday morning know
where your time and money has gone over the weekend.
Lisa’s
blog has definitely inspired me to keep an eye out for garage sales as well for
any furniture and bits and pieces that we might need.
We
all know that money is precious. If you are smart with your purchases and don’t
mind spending some time looking through websites and visiting salvage yards and
putting in the extra mile to do the work yourself, than you will make your
dollar stretch the extra mile and will truly appreciate the beauty in the
things that you create.
For
other money saving tips, check out my blog over at Unspoken Conversations.
Look
after yourself and those around you,
Kirsty
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