Things you bought in lockdown and wish you hadn't bothered

[bridgetreilly]

Mine is an Instant Pot. I mean, it's okay, I guess, but I find it a big faff to use and things quite often come out with a weird texture. Would not recommend.

What else do you regret buying?

Oh god the school uniforms and shoes. All new for both of them and barely worn.

Less than a term's wear for either of them due to various isolation episodes and 'come in your PE kit' days and they are bound to have grown out of it all by the time they actually go back.

The bloody Y6 special colour jumper is especially galling. I already resented paying for that for 1 years wear and now I resent it even more.

As part of my lockdown house clean operation I decided to finally tackle the limescale on my taps as we live in a had water area and some of it is really hard chunks despite my best efforts. I bought this limescale pouch thingy you fill with vinegar and it straps over your tap and apparently wears away the limescale.

Didn’t work, even after leaving it on all night.

A few weeks later I heard you can scrape/chip limescale away on taps with a 2p coin. Thought it sounded far fetched but gave it a a whirl. Worked perfectly, the chunks got filed off leaving taps looking brand new. Never needed the silly pouch thingy.

@Sparklesocks I'm picturing like a tap condom

Dance stuff here too - show costume, tickets to see her dance in the show that was cancelled, personalised show jacket that I think she wore once before chucking to the back of the wardrobe

Over the knee leather boots. Online on the 6ft size 6 model they looked beautifully elegant.
On 5ft size 14 me they do not. I look like a pirate. A short dumpy pirate

I bought a paint by numbers.. still in the envelope it arrived in.

A mosaic sticker book as something different to do.. still not one sticker done.

Fabrics to make us all face masks. We're still wearing disposables on the few occasions we go out.

A towbar for the car. No holidays requiring a towbar were taken.

A dynamic hula hoop... it fastens tight round your waist and you fling a weight round...

To be fair I don’t know if it’s any good or I’d use it as my big mistake was getting really drunk inventing a drinking game while watching suits with DD (don’t worry, she’s 20, lol) and seeing an advert on Facebook, thinking it was genius and ordering it at 4am.

It never arrived - I got a really fugly gold coloured ring for a giant finger instead. It’s too big to even fit on my thumb and I do not have slender fingers.

Emergency high altitude mountaineering emergency oxygen canisters and hazmat suits

[quote 14down]@Sparklesocks I'm picturing like a tap condom [/quote]
Not far off

I bought a load of Diamond Art kits and a huge crafting table, and I have never even touched them since!!

Another one for school fecking uniform. £250+ for both DC, thinking 'ooh it'll make them feel better to have new stuff they can grow into.'

Furniture. We have never, never got this house straight because we had to jettison so much useful furniture when we moved in (weird layout). So I decided we'd have a proper clear out of everything, and buy a load of furniture that fits. Except we can't get rid of the stuff that was supposed to go to the tip/charity, so everything is just everywhere, and surrounded by lovely new furniture that is criminally not in place yet because we HAVE NOWHERE TO PUT IT and the house is even more of a mess because it now has two lots of furniture in it. It's like fecking parkour just getting through the living room or into bed.

I want an ebike!

@sadeyedladyofthelowlandsea facebook market place is brilliant for getting rid of stuff. I bought some bits and got rid of loads

Dds provisional license, got knows when she'll be able to start lessons

Renewing my passport for my long planned holiday of a lifetime that has now been postponed twice. Hopefully thinking about October for that now.

I already had an instant pot, I mostly use it to cook perfect sticky rice. Everyone laughed at my first lockdown purchase of a sodastream but I use it every day.

An outrageously expensive swimsuit for the cancelled 3 times winter sun holiday I didn't go on that is now too tight anyway.
I've got double guilt when I see it in the drawer.

Another vote for air fryer here.

It’s massive, takes up loads of space, I’ve used it twice and I both occasions been distinctly underwhelmed by what it produced.

A prom dress for DD. If we'd just waited til March it could have been avoided but everyone told me you have to buy early and I panicked.

Now it sits in the wardrobe like an unworn wedding dress.

I’m about to hold a little ‘one year celebration’ for the 28 skeins of wool that arrived just after L1 started and are STILL sitting in their packaging.

I eventually purchased the correct crochet hook size last week.

Baby steps eh...? 🤣

To those with an Instant Pot - along with the helpful FB community mentioned upthread, there are quite a few videos on YouTube too. There’s a pair of sisters who do some useful ones.

I get mine out once a week, and cook soup and then one or two other things and put it away again.

Lots of alcohol wipes to sanitise things. Turns out I haven’t needed many and now have all these bulky containers lying around.

School uniform, Scouts uniform, Explorer Scouts uniform.

All the uniforms.

Perhaps we all need to send the unworn school shoes to Downing Street, so that Saint Boris can see how much waste he caused when he told us "schools are safe" and "alas, schools are closed" on the SAME DAY.

I've really liked 2 of my lockdown buys!
Small rice cooker is amazing and like a previous poster - a sodastream. I use it daily and it got me off my pepsi addiction.

The new clothes however have been a total waste of money.

A wax heater and wax kit as I couldn't get to the beautician....don't do it people!