The Sock Project

socks

As mentioned in Monday’s post, socks are my kryptonite. I also said “But not buying these socks was one of the harder moments of this challenge for me.” My brain said – You might need socks later, and Aldi do not always have them available. It is just $6, what does it matter. You better get these now!

The way things work right now, I tend to have 7-10 pairs of socks that I wear over and over until they get a hole in them, then I either buy more because they are on Special Buys at Aldi, or dig some out of the Long Forgotten Socks drawer.

Rather than buying more socks, I figured it would be a good time to catalogue the socks I have and try wearing one pair each day.So the first task was to pull out all the socks from the Long Forgotten Sock Drawer, wash them, then pair them up again. I discovered I actually had two Long Forgotten Socks Drawers.

When I pulled the socks out of the dryer, The Other Half laughed at me and said how are you going to pair all these up? I did not initially comprehend the magnitude of the problem. After 40 minutes of sock pairing, I had to take a break, and I still had half the basket to go.

51 pairs of thin socks I can wear around the house.

13 pairs of long socks for wearing with boots.

8 pairs of bed socks.

5 pairs of fluffy long socks for house wear in winter.

17 pairs of black sports socks.

45 pairs of socks I can wear for workouts.

Plus 5 extra ones I had washed and forgot about, not pictured
The pair I was wearing at the time I did this – not pictured =

Total = 145 pairs of socks.

Dear Brain, I do not need to buy any more socks right now. So please shut up. ;)

If I wore only one pair per day I would be set for 145 days. The truth is, I do not wear only one pair per day. I wear one workout pair, then I have my shower, then I wear another pair of thin socks for the rest of the day. So in reality I am set for about 50 days.

You can expect the occasional Sock Friday where I montage together some of the cuter pairs, during this project.

No socks were purchased in the making of this post, but many, many, MANY socks were paired.

2018yobn, Aldi, shopping, Snoskred Socks

Things I Did Not Buy – February

20salestyles

Noni B had a $20 sale, luckily none of the dresses I love were included. I already own one of the above tops – the Effie – I did like the Candice and Shelly but KTHXNOBUY. :)

tempted1

We went to the local cheap shop to buy, of all things, Isopropyl Alcohol which we use for cleaning laptops, phones and tablets. As this is a cleaning item it is not on my Can’t Buy list. ;) Last time I’d paid some ridiculous amount for it at Bunnings for what seemed like a tiny bottle of it – here we got double the size for half the price. While there I spotted these colourful hanging things for $12.99 and the pompoms were velvety and so gorgeous, but KTHXNOBUY.

socks

You guys, YOU GUYS. Socks are like my kryptonite. I am a firm believer that you can never have too many socks and this one time I bought a truly magnificent set from Aldi, when I went back the next week to get more they were totally sold out.

Aldi socks are perfection in my opinion especially the workout socks. They have never once let me down yet, not a single blister ever, and they are my main go-to for a workout sock. PLUS you get three pairs so they are $2 a pair which is CRAY CRAY.

This did lead me to do a big clean out of the sock drawer which provided me with an extremely shocking discovery, I will tell you about that on Wednesday. In the process I re-discovered a few old favourites that had vanished. I do have enough socks to last the year. I really do. But not buying these socks was one of the harder moments of this challenge for me.

PS Sorry if I am absent a little bit last week and this week, The Other Half is on holidays and we are catching up on some chores and activities we have been meaning to do. :) There are several emails I have not replied to and I am not leaving a lot of comments. I’ll get to it soon, I promise!

2018yobn, Aldi, Things I Did Not Buy

My Favourite Aldi Products

aioli1

Wasabi Aioli

This is my favourite aioli that you can get from a supermarket. It is in the refrigerated section instead of just on the shelf and it is not too spicy, just perfect to add a little heat to our weekly fish and chips. The Wasabi one is light green and not pictured here as they had sold out – and I am totally not surprised. Made in Australia, too!

cleanser

Foaming Facial Cleanser

I use two items of skincare for my face every single day. One of them is this foaming cleanser from Aldi which I use in the shower while my hair conditions. They sometimes have a tea tree oil version in their special buys which I have used before and liked. Both this version and the tea tree smell great and do what they need to do. Made in Australia.

The other skincare item is moisturizer and I have a few different ones I switch back and forth between, including a cream that I credit with keeping my skin awesome which is actually a slightly up money hand balm for gardeners bought from Scully’s in Berry. It smells amazing.

aldihandwashverde

Luxury Hand Wash

If you like citrus chances are you would love this hand wash. I first bought this scent as a moisturiser when they had it on special buys and it smelled SO incredible, the next time it is in stock I am going to stock up big time. But in the meantime I have this luxury hand wash in the guest bathroom and at least once a day I go in there and treat myself to a big scenty lather up. The scent stays around for a long while and the sage adds a delicious smoky element.

I think this might be one of the best smelling hand wash products you can buy in Australia, maybe Aesop has something to compare but the Aesop one is seriously Up Money at $40 for 500ml. I’ll take the $5 version thanks! Made in Australia.

foamsoap

Foaming Hand Wash

My favourite is the passionfruit and guava but they are all good and I have one container of each flavour available in the house at all times. Both the pumps and refills are Made in Australia.

aldifoamsoap

For those of us who do a lot of hand washing, at $2.49 for 500mls these are excellent value and they smell amazing. A little goes a long way with this product, in fact more so than I realised and I was buying one refill each fortnight alternating the flavours until the other half pointed out I had quite a supply of them building up in the cupboard.

aldidishwashing

Dishwashing Detergent

More great smelling stuff from Aldi. The lemongrass and kaffir lime is great but the pomegranate and mango one is deeply intoxicating. I love using it. Someone has worked hard on all these flavours and it shows. Made in Australia.

aldicheddar

Vintage English Cheese

I went for six months without raw cheese in 2017. The one cheese I wanted and craved the entire time was this one. It is super strong and bitey which is how I like my cheese. It was the only one I bought the minute I decided to allow some raw cheese back into my life. Not made in Australia.

cheesekransky

Cheese Kransky

I do not normally like this kind of product but The Other Half loves a kransky or cabana. I actually do like this one and I will eat it without any qualms, just not too often because it is slightly higher in sodium than most foods we eat now. It is a rare treat for both of us.

brioche1

Brioche Awesomeness

I do not eat hot dogs but I love these buns and this is a rare bread treat I will allow myself, perhaps once a month. I like to poach a couple of eggs and place them inside the hot dog bun, and add tomato relish from The Treat Factory.

pizzabase

Pizza Bases

We buy two of these a fortnight, and we get four pizza meals out of each packet of two. They smell amazing, too. Just keep them in the fridge in the warmer months because there can sometimes be a little moisture inside the packet and we’ve had them grow mould before. Made in Australia.

Overall I am very happy with Aldi as a place to shop, especially considering how much effort they have put into sourcing products from our own country, whereas the other two big names tend to be looking to drop the prices down down by importing products from other countries.

Aldi

The Aldi Cat Bed

snugglebed1

Grumpy is appreciating this Aldi cat bed very much lately, especially since it got very cold here.

catbed2

We were lucky to find this on special for $9.99. I bought one. I put it in the bedroom the first night and Grumpy discovered it and settled in. The next morning I carried it out into the lounge and put it in front of the gas heater and she spent the entire day there.

catbed1
A couple of days later we had to go back into town and I sent The Other Half to buy a second one if they had it. He returned with two more!

Aldi, kitties

Aldi Buys

Many of you know I am a huge Aldi fan. I thought I would share with you some of my recent favourite purchases – some of which were special buys so if there are any left at your local store, they might be found for a discounted price.

seasalt

First up, some regular items found on the shelves – the flavoured rice cakes. I love the Sea Salt and Balsamic Vinegar flavour, they do have another one which I think might be sour cream and chives. They are cheap and my go-to replacement for potato chips. Australian made, too!

reeddif

The reed diffusers smell fantastic – they are not too overpowering which I sometimes find with the more “expensive” brands.

candles

They also have candles in the same flavours from the same brand. And now, some special buys.

pots

These pots are brilliant. Super light, beautiful to cook in, and we bought two of the smaller ones so I can make us separate casseroles now and still fit them both in the oven. I like mushrooms in my casseroles. The Other Half believes mushrooms are evil.

rainboots

The rainboots I got are black and shiny and just gorgeous. My two older pairs are five years old and best saved for the truly grotty chook jobs now. Plus one of those pairs got stabbed by a cactus and I am always worried that water is going to leak through, if and when it does I will not have to go hunting the Shoalhaven for a new pair – for some reason gumboots are either very difficult to find here, or HUGELY up money. Like $30 for a pair!

socks

And now a sad story of a fail on my part. I bought one set of these socks because I wanted to wash them, try them out and see if I liked them before buying more pairs. When I discovered that I loved them, I went back and they were all gone. I am not surprised because they were a great price and very comfortable.

sugars

I do not use very much sugar anymore, just in my coffee. I prefer the darker kinds of sugar as they have better flavour. I got three different flavours – rapadura, moscovado and panela. I already had coconut sugar, so I did not get that one.

lipbalms

I cannot resist a lip balm. I bought one blueberry flavoured one and found it to be fantastic, so on our next visit I got the pineapple one, and the visit after that I got the remaining two flavours – honey peach and mint.

balms

These were $2.49 each and worth every cent. They will last me a long while.

Aldi