Waste Not Want Not... a good old fashioned saying ...

"Waste not want not."  That was a favourite saying for grandmothers to say when their grandchildren left food or threw away something they still thought of as having the potential to be useful. Though at the time the saying was probably greeted with a feeling of dread; I now understand the importance of the message it conveys. 

My grandparents and great-grandparents generations had seen' hard times'; not just a recession but a lack of employment with no social cash benefits to back them up in times of need. More of this later. They also had to manage to feed themselves and their children through the war years of a limited food supply being rationed. To us this is unthinkable, yes they never suffered in the way that people do in some third world countries do. But what they lived through they did not forget and they never took food or resources for granted in the way we tend to do now.

Which is probably why although I hate the word frugal, I also cannot easily waste good food or throw something away because it has been superseded by a new feature or design change being added to it.

This is why my next few postings here will be on the theme of waste not want not. Growing my own fruit and vegetables, baking my own bread these things have brought home to me how easy it is to waste things without considering what has gone into providing them.