5 ways to save, not limiting yourself in anything
Katia Birger
We all gradually accepted with the euro and the dollar, from which a couple of months ago, we looked at his forehead, and at the same time got used to the idea that still have to save. There are many options for how to cut costs, and we suggest starting with one of the most expensive items - entertainment. Just remember how much you left last time at the bar and how much the recent movie trip cost. We tell how to organize leisure in such a way as to continue to see friends often and not to deny yourself anything - from food to a beautiful manicure - but to spend on this significantly less money.
Great friendly dinners instead of a restaurant
Let's admit, in recent years, for most of us, going to a restaurant imperceptibly turned into a routine and acquired a purely functional character. Simply put, we go there, often on the run and after work - this is how beautiful dinners by candlelight (not necessarily for two) disappear from our lives and at the same time the ability to cook at home. Believe me, it is no less fascinating to grind chicken with spices under the sparkling jokes of friends, and then also mentally eat it at a large cozy table. To optimize the process, you can pre-assign those responsible for the different stages of dinner: the purchase of food, cooking, washing dishes and so on. In any company there are people who do not mind setting a table or really love and know how to cook. Naturally, you should not buy oysters and crab meat, and the planning of the menu should be approached judiciously. For example, in the economy of Mecca "Auchan" you can out of habit pick up a whole cart of everything, and then find out that some eggplants now stand like a plane. Well, the main rule - the dinner budget is divided into all its participants.
Anna Bichevskaya co-founder of "Stay Hungry" and "Friendly Cities"
When choosing - a restaurant or a party at home - the last three years, I choose home gatherings. This happens for several reasons: we rent an apartment with a large kitchen in the center of the city, my husband Dima created a super cozy place from this kitchen from which I don’t want to leave, plus I love cooking and I love being able to be hostess. It was this love to be the mistress, to collect a cool company, to have dinner and gab all night prompted me three years ago to start thinking about the project "Stay Hungry". Indirectly, this is also influenced by the fact that in Moscow I do not have super-favorite places that suit me one hundred percent: the quality of food, cuisine, prices, atmosphere — so I create all this myself. It is also important - if you are in a pair - that both you and your partner love home gatherings. The main problem in organizing any home gatherings is to take on all the organizational issues, usually people do not like to bother. It does not frighten me, so everything grows together, whether it is sitting at home, going out of town for a weekend, or going to Kaliningrad by car.
If you know how to cook, then you can make a bunch of cool dishes, without spending a lot of money, since the added cost is your skill and time. And if you get pleasure from this process, then everything goes. I take the food, all the guests bring in alcohol, we have our own DJs in the company, there are lovers of washing dishes. So if people are cool, then you are good with them everywhere. In fact, any cafe is a kind of collective “organizer” who takes care of the organization of the quality of your leisure time.
Cinema on the couch instead of multiplex
The average price for an evening show in the Moscow cinema is around 300 rubles, add to this popcorn, a drink and cheerfully say goodbye to at least a thousand rubles (on the basis that you go to the cinema as a couple). All the same is easy to repeat at home, getting a projector and cooking popcorn in the microwave, and friends will help to raise the degree of fun. If you do not have a personal projector, you can always borrow it from your friends, in the office or in extreme cases at the box office. Rent will cost 1500 rubles per day - you will agree that it is more than beneficial for a company of friends. Well, where to find movies for free or for symbolic money, sure, you yourself know very well.
Nikola the ProphetsTNT editor
We gave the projector to my ex-wife - quite a lot of people were throwing off, because the thing is not cheap and definitely not the one that is worth saving. Then they argued for a long time about whether a screen or a sheet was needed, and finally decided not to limit the space and simply projected onto the wall with old Soviet faded wallpaper. It was such a little psychedelic effect of an old picture with cracks and specks. Cinema and TV shows were simply divine - a ray of light through which motes fly, as in childhood, when you watch filmstrips. But it was even cooler to play the console - no coolest monitor can compare with this, a very special, indescribable immersion, an absolutely magical sensation.
We hardly began to go to the cinema much less, there were two cinemas in the area at once, but the series looked just avidly - the first season of the Game of Thrones, for example, looked at the weekend without stopping. A projector is a real thing, and not using it when it is possible begins to seem strange. Football, video games, movies, TV shows, porn - all this turns into a real "session", in the sense of Dovlatov.
Homemade liqueurs instead of cocktails at the bar
Even when the dollar was worth 35 rubles, a long evening at the bar could easily turn into a financial catastrophe. In the current economic situation, only one glass of decent white wine is already a loss for the budget. What to say about the shots or cunning tinctures, which are usually so tasty that it is almost impossible to stop and not drink them all at once. Few people know (well, or know, but lazy) that these very tinctures are easy and fun to do on their own. And for the subsequent tasting, again, you can call friends and have fun for the glory. There is no need to go far for recipes too: here are the instructions for making moonshine, cider, liqueur and so on. It is clear that really save will help except that a complete rejection of alcohol, but why do we need such extremes?
Catherine Krongauzfounder of the babiesitter school "Kidsout"
I would not call this a wild economy. Bourbon tincture on cherries is not too cheap to produce. But much cheaper than in a bar. The fact is that all my life I perceived alcohol as a means to an end, and not to enjoy the process. Not yet tried this tincture. And I realized that thirty years were wasted. But, for example, it is poured in some places for 250 rubles per 50 grams, but it is so tasty and light that you can drink a pint and even a liter. But the idea of paying for it is 2500-5000 rubles per hour, my stomach reduces. But I didn’t want to live anymore. Therefore, I began to do it myself, and in large volumes.
Party with the exchange of clothing instead of shopping
Remember how school changed clothes with the best girlfriend? It’s time to put aside prejudices and revive this practice, but at a new level. Arrange swap party - a party during which girlfriends and girlfriends of girlfriends exchange clothes, footwear, accessories and even cosmetics. From the side, swaps are very similar to useful hen parties: guests come not only with clothes that they want to get rid of, but they usually take a bottle of wine or cookies with them. The pledge of a successful swap is in the number of guests, because the more varied the tastes of the size ruler of your friends, the higher the likelihood that each guest will find in someone else’s wardrobe something to his liking. Well, frankly, to gather a large female company and measure other people's clothes - just a lot of fun.
Alice Taigajournalist
In my life there was a moment when I moved once every four months from one small room to another, and the suitcase was one: therefore everything that fit in it went on, and what did not fit was sent to friends and in the trash. It was a great therapy from hoarding and foolish attachment to objects. We all have a tendency to cherish more than necessary, and at some point I realized that I was suffocating from unnecessary things, in a fit of purchased accessories, sales booty and other great things that made my eyes so dark that they no longer seem to be different. The swaps have come up with poor students and loafers to change, save and have fun in the days of diabolical capitalism and insane margins. If you constantly keep in your head how much even the most expensive and beautiful things actually cost, you begin to treat them much more easily.
The rules of a good swap are girlfriends with excellent taste of different sizes, a lot of light alcohol, shameful music (if you have long wanted to listen to All Saints and TLC, this is the place on the swap) and no boys not to undress in front of them and not be shy. The golden rule is to bring only good and beloved, and not anyhow, and no money exchange. The result is a large themed party, where clothes are just an excuse. I can’t remember how many cool things I gave out to my girlfriends and received over the past year, how long-awaited lip balm and pajamas dreams formed on my shelf and how my heart actually warms when a loved one loves your clothes that you have long idle and takes place. All that did not fit us, we just carry to the church across the road and there they always happily take it all. A new idea - a book swap, because the books are like a dinner in a restaurant and you need to somehow live with it.
Cosmetic hen parties instead of a beauty salon
How to update your wardrobe for free or at least get rid of unnecessary things, we found out. Another impressive item of expenditure is self care. Not each of us is given exactly to make up the nails or to braid the perfect “basket”, but this problem can be solved again by collective efforts. Collect close friends and arrange for each other workshops under the code name "who is in that much" - on nail art, styling, hair coloring and so on. In the end, throw off and buy one set of equipment for all long-term coverage. A special lamp, nail files, a base, a set of lacquers and a top will pay off in one collective manicure session at home. Long live female solidarity!
Sveta Muller the founder of the Picls
Since childhood, I love to do manicure myself, it saves time. In addition, if there is no permanent manicurist, it is very difficult to guess with a specialist, and I am not ready to spend five thousand on a manicure in good salons. I have a LED-lamp for drying the gel at home and the skill to evenly paint the nails, so I do everything myself perfectly, but if I plan to cover with ordinary varnish, I take a moment to work at the computer without fuss, while the varnish dries.
Photo: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 via Shutterstock