Budget food

Mmmmm we would love to go out for dinner every week! Eat a nice salad or beef with fries and of course a big piece of chocolate cake as dessert. But also food is expensive, especially if you go out too many times. There are some solutions such as going to a student restaurant where you can get a nice meal for just 15 euros but the quality of the food often isn't very high.

This week, we will give some tips for making your own quality dinners or snacks and some cheap but very good restaurants. Also, we share some budget cooking experiences on Facebook and Twitter so keep your eyes open.

You want to have a nice evening or a lovely high tea with all your girlfriends but you don’t want to spend too much money? There are some things you can do to reduce the costs.

• Arrange with your friends that everyone makes a small snack or a small bite. Everyone has different qualities and in this way, you have a lot of different snacks for a great evening. On the internet, you can find many recipes for small snacks. Some examples are:
• For the evening: wine is expensive, but it doesn’t have to be! On the website of ... you can find cheap wines of high quality! You can find the wines in your local supermarket or just order it on the web.
• You don’t have enough plates or glasses? Let everyone bring their own. This makes the table look very funny and very cosy.
• Download some romantic movies, light some candles and your done! This is an evening for the girls, without the boys!! 

Some inspiration: (click on the name for the recipes on the internet)

                                   Applesauce Cupcakes                    Coconut Pecan Brownies

                 

                                   Potato Chip Cookies                    Banana Strawberry Smoothie

Create your own Boot Camp Workout

Make your own bootcamp! Last year Boot Camps were hot and in many cities you were able to sign up in a program and once or twice a week you could kill yourself in a workout similar to the ones the soldiers get. But...you don’t have to sign up for a group, you can make your own boot camp workout with friends!!!

Boot camp workouts are great to get in shape because you work on your entire body with different exercises. You burn a lot of calories and it is efficient because you don’t need a lot of time, so it is easy to fit in a busy schedule. You won’t get bored if you try to think of different exercises and you can make them as challenging as you want them to be.

This sounds nice but how can I make a boot camp workout? Easy, go online and you will find many different suggestions and tips. Today we give you our favorite exercises and tips:

Tip 1: When you start, try to make a schedule of your workouts and, slowly, increase the intensity. If you make it to hard in the beginning you won’t persevere. Start with only 15 or 30 minutes a day twice a week and you will be able to keep going.

Start with a 10 till 15 minutes warm-up exercise. Go for a jog or a short run and choose 5 till 10 exercises. Try to perform each one after the other for 30-60 seconds.

Exercise tips

1)      Jumping Jacks
If you like to increase the intensity, after the jump put your feet back together and bring the right knee up and snap the foot out in a front kick.

2)      High jogs

3)      Triceps dips
Find a bench on the street or in the park and you can do them while you jog.

4)      Ski jumps

5)      Lunges

6)      Pushups
In the beginning you can do this exercise on your knees instead of your toes to lower the intensity.

Tip 2: Try to find somebody to workout with. It is always more fun to work out together and to challenge eachother. Moreover, if you don’t want to go, your fiend can convince you to go.

At the end of your workout do not forget to do a cooling down exercise! Good luck ladies and most important, have FUN!

Exercising on a budget

Dear ladies. We all like to have our body in shape, but sometimes you also have to pay attention to your budget and a gym membership is very expensive. Today, we will give you some tips on how to stay in shape on a budget, because we have to keep in mind to move over 30 minutes every day!

A budget tip is to go for a swim in the morning before classes or work. Most of the time there is an early bird discount and you will start your day fresh. Exercising gives you a lot of energy especially in the morning.

If you do want to go to a gym, but you don’t have the money for a wellness center, try to look for a budget gym. They are cheaper because they don’t have spa facilities and sometimes don’t offer group lessons. The disadvantage of these gyms is that they are very busy at particular times during the day. If you can avoid those hours it is a good budget option.

Besides low budget tips we also have some tips to work out for free. Tip 1: take the stars instead of the elevator or the escalator. For example, when you have to go to the 6th floor, go up by using the elevator but when you leave take the stars. It is easier going down the stairs than going up and it will burn calories. You will use over 200 muscles and 15 minutes of taking the stairs equals 30 minutes jogging!

Tip 2 is cleaning your apartment. During this activity you will use many muscles and you will burn many calories and afterwards your apartment is nice and clean. For example, 30 minutes of vacuuming burns over 120 calories and ironing almost 80. Cleaning you windows will burn 120 calories.

For our third tip you need a friend  for company and nice weather. You can do many different activities outside which are good for your body and shape. Go for a run through the park and if you don’t like running go for a walk, because walking takes 100 calories per 30 minutes. Or go to the beach, because walking through the sand is much harder. If you have roller blades, you can use them. It is fun, fast and it burns a lot of calories, but keep your safety in mind. Use the right equipment and protection.

The next video will show you a funny way of walking and exercising together.



Do not try this at home, but use it to get inspired!

Later on this week we will give some tips for the woman who like to exercise outside. You can create your own bootcamp!

Budget Tips for facial, hair and nail care

Every woman wants to look healthy en beautiful. Unfortunately, beauty products are often very expensive and sometimes they don’t even work! Moreover, some of the cheapest products work even better and provide us with the result we want. In this blog, we give tips for facial, hair and nail care.

Facial care
Sometimes (and certainly with this cold weather), our faces need a health boost. The cold weather gives us a dry skin and we get a pale face. Face masks are perfect for refreshing your face but why pay for a face mask when you can use basic ingredients to make your own simple, hydrating masks and scrubs? Beauty products don't have to cost an arm and a leg. You can make your own cream or scrub for a fraction of the price. Whether you have an oily skin, a dry skin, a sensitive skin or acne-prone skin, you can make a mask with the best ingredients yourself. About.com.Beauty presents you 20 recipes for 6 different skin types. Take a look at their website for your personal face mask.

For your other facial care such as day and night creams and make up removers, try the home-products of the drugstores. For our dutch readers, Etos and Kruidvat products are also very good for you face and way more cheaper than the A brands.

Hair care
A hairdresser is expensive. Most of the time we just dye our hare in the same color we had for years because otherwise the bill is too high. The solution of today is: the hair-dressing academy! In almost every city, you can find some salons that work with hair-dresser students. All the hairdressers are being supervised so they can’t mess up your hair really bad and you just pay a fraction of the price you normally pay at a profession salon. You can always give it a try!

Nail care
Especially in the winter, you need to give your nails special attention. Nails are weak and with all the thick clothes, our nails need to look beautiful. The best and cheapest make-up brand at this moment is Essence.

The Essence make up is great. The price is very low but the quality is good. Moreover, they know what women want and they offer lots of handy tools for make up and nail art. For the nails, they have a lot of colors and they sell quick-dry drops that work really well. Also, they now have a new nail product that gives your nails the look of professional gel nails.

Another tip is to buy some cheap fake nails and put them on. You can color these nails in any color you like, the color will stay on much longer and your nails won’t break. Perfect!!

Valentine Budget Tips

Today we give you some tips to surprise your valentine. How to surprise your Valentine on a low budget? We give you our top 5.

1. Make a lovely breakfast for your love
A simple gesture is to make a lovely breakfast. Make sure that you do not wake up your love while preparing the breakfast! For our Dutch readers you can find some tips at Vier je Weekend met een Lekker Ontbijtje!.

2. Be creative
You can make a valentines card with your own poem or think of a nice present which you can create. For example, buy an empty photo frame and make a collage of your favorite pictures together.

3. Cook your own dinner for two
Instead of going to a restaurant, save your money and try to make your own exclusive dinner for two. You can just make your lover’s favorite dish.
Keep in mind that a large dinner can cost a lot of time. Try to cook as much as possible in advance so you don’t have to stay in the kitchen all evening. Also, don’t try to make it too difficult. If you cannot cook, you can choose for a simple but nice gourmet or fondue.

4. Favorite spot
Bring you boyfriend to one of your favorite spots, for example, the place where you first kissed or where you first met. Also you can go to the beach or go for a walk in the forest.

5. A special tip for the men
For the men among us who don’t know what to do, download the Kleine Valentijnsgids with practical tips, advices and romantic ideas.

Happy Valentine’s Day!!!!!

Seize the day

Last week our blog was about shopping tips. This time I would like to give you ladies budget tips to enjoy yourself during your holiday. I will give you inspiration for a day off ,when you for example would like to plan a nice day with friends on a  limited budget.

My first tip is to go and have a look at the Dutch website of Vakantieveilingen. On this website you will find many suggestions to do in different categories; for an evening out with friends, beauty treatments, tips for a whole day and restaurant tips. Before you plan your day, you can have a look at the website to get ideas and discounts. This website is designed to bid on different activities. The bidding starts at € 1,- and you can bid as high as your budget allows you to. You can bit on all kinds of activities. For example I got two first class tickets to the musical “We will rock you” for half the price!

When you have a low budget, try to make use of the weather. During the cold days in the winter, you could do something active to warm up. For example, you can arrange to go ice-skating and this year you are lucky because you can do it outside for free! However, make sure that the ice is thick enough! Outside the city you can go for a long trip. Ask your friends to bring something nice to eat and bring hot chocolate, a nice treat after the cold.

On a summers day you can meet up with some friends in the park. Bring one or more large blankets to sit on and ask all your friends to bring something to drink and to eat (American style). You can start in the afternoon with drinks and if somebody has a barbeque set, you can end the day together with a dinner/barbeque till sundown.

During the spring or autumn you can go to the beach for a long walk and a drink at one of the beach houses. The advantage during those seasons is that it is not too busy and if you go to a less popular part of the beach, most of the time you don’t have to pay for parking.

For my next tip, you can think of visiting a city where you have never been before. This can give you an option to spend the day getting to know a different place. Moreover you can try a different restaurant. For reviews of different restaurants in every town, go to Iens. There is a button on the website which gives you the opportunity to profit from discounts in selected restaurants. To get an overview of the different hotspots in a city, go to the website of the local tourist agency (VVV). You can find list in different categories; museums, buildings which are worth seeing, different events in the city and many more. A few of our suggestions:

• Amsterdam
• Maastricht
• Den Bosch
• Leiden
• Antwerp
• Brussels

If you go to the website of Neweuropetours you find a list of cities where you can arrange a “free” walking tour through the city by local expert guides. At the end of the tour you can give the guide a tip suitable for your budget.

Tip: Beware that if you go to a city for a whole day, your parking costs can be pretty high if you use
one of the parking garages. You can use the P+R parking spaces around the city to avoid this. From
this parking spot you can use public transport to go to the city center. Or you can choose to go by public transport. Go to the website of NS for your discount options.

Budget shopping

We all recognize the following problem: we would like to score a new outfit but we also have to pay the rent at the end of the month. I am going to give you some tips about how you can do both. The solution: budget shopping!! Of course we all know the shops where you can buy low budget clothing, for example H&M and Primark. But the consequence of shopping there is that you will see your outfit at almost every street corner.

To create a more unique look you need to put in a bit more effort. Online you can find unique bargains. Many brands have online outlets where you can buy last season’s collection.  Another fashion paradise online is markplaats.nl. Here you can find the shirt you fell in love with in the store for a fraction of the original price. You can find clothing that is never been worn, the price tags are still attached! Last year, I found an amazing long summer dress in the store that I fell in love with but my size was sold out. Later on, I found the same dress on marktplaats.nl. The girl who owned it sold the dress to me for 50% of the original price. Talking about killing two birds with one stone!!

Another great tip to find beautiful labels for a great price is a sample sale. When a brand wants to get rid of their old collection they organize a sample sale. Sometimes you will even find sample sales from current collections. Sample sales are usually organized in big locations. So count on some use of elbows and long queues, but you can find great pieces for a fraction from the original price. On the Internet you can find information about the upcoming sample sales. 

In the Netherlands, there are great markets where you can find nice vintage and second hand clothing. In Amsterdam for example, you have Waterlooplein. But women who don’t like second hand clothing can visit one of the many outlet malls in the Netherlands. A few examples are Batavia stad in Lelystad (bataviastad.nl) and Rosada in Rosendaal (rosada.nl).  These outlet malls consist of different brands that all have an own store. The malls look like little villages, you can shop here all day and find great brands with nice discounts. The villages also have great lunchrooms and parking is really good arranged. The only disadvantage is that the stores tend to have really old collections. You have to be lucky and visit when they just got restocked. If you are there at the right moment, you can shop till you drop.

When you want a bargain, look outside the normal shopping street in your own town. Labels become affordable if you look in the right place. Even on a small budget you can score a great outfit and as well have a fun day with your girlfriends. In a few weeks I will post a column about more creative ways to extend your wardrobe.

Hello ladies!

We all know the feeling of not knowing what to do on a lazy Saturday. Welcome to BudgeTimes! BudgeTimes is a blog especially made for women who want to have the greatest experiences in their spare time. Of course, all these great moments cost a lot of money but this is where BudgeTimes helps you out! On this blog, you can find various interesting activities with low-budget tips. For example, we will give some tips about budget shopping, health & beauty, budget dining and cooking and ways to make sports more fun AND cheaper. We will give you the best tips for budget moments so that you can fully enjoy every minute of your spare time!

Who are we?
This blog is created by three students from the University of Tilburg:

Danielle        Kim           Chantal

We were wondering how we can give women tips and ideas for great experiences on a low budget. In this way, every woman can enjoy their spare time and still pay the rent at the end of the month.

Enjoy our posts and of course like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter!