Here are some more money-saving tips for women.
Following on from yesterday's article, here are five more money-saving tips for women.
1. Clothes -- Tip #1
If you don't have much cash, cherish and above all, find the clothes you already have. Recently when super-strapped, I tidied out my main clothes cupboard and exclaimed `Oh wow! I was wondering where that was!' six times. That's six items of clothing I knew I adored and didn't have before I started.
Once you've found the things you love, wash, iron and if necessary, mend them. If you can't mend anything yourself (I must admit I can't) many dry cleaners have tailors or seamstresses who will do so from £5 upwards.
2. Clothes -- Tip #2
Another pearl of wisdom I wish my mother had imparted to me before I discovered credit card debt, is that charity shops can yield more quality than Sloane Street if they are situated in wealthy areas.
Recently, when in a rare clothes buying mood (just before going on holiday) I popped into the Oxfam in the trendy part of London's Westbourne Park Road and within five minutes had found four items which were a. my size, b. fashion items of this past summer season and c. all at less than a third of the price I'd just noted for the same things in the shops.
3. Links on this site
The two best links of special interest for girls already featured on this site are: www.channel4.com/4homes/style/eco_cleaning.html which best tells how to clean ecologically and cheaply using lemon juice, bicarbonate of soda and distilled vinegar in different combinations for different tasks and http://www.mooncup.co.uk/index.html for information on a very cheap alternative to the euphemistically termed `feminine hygiene products'.
4. Nails
Having recommended above that you approach educational institutions to get students to give you cheap manicures, I'm now going to contradict myself to an extent and suggest that you save money by avoiding nail polish of all kinds and for all time.
By all means get your nails shaped by a professional if you don't find it therapeutic to do it yourself (or, like me, consider it a complete waste of time to do it at all). But if you're considering splashing out on a new shade of polish, you may want to know that according to a recent study, children whose mothers were pregnant while employed at nail salons got bad results when tested on attention, language and general knowledge. So listen to Aunty Harriet and save money and your health at the same time.
5. Smells
Editor's note: We have removed this part of the article because some Fools have advised us that this suggestion may be unsafe. Safety is more important than saving money, so we've removed it.