2017 Frugal Living Challenge

Biiiiiig spend today as I ordered a new built-in fridge/freezer (have seen the need coming for a few years, but the old one has continued to limp along without major issues until a few weeks ago). I've now got 11 days to finish empyting it, an evening to defrost it, a weekend to pull it out (with OH's help) and drag it outside so I'm not falling over it, then the new arrives the following Friday for us to install after work on the Saturday (so from delivery to installing I only have 32 hours at most of falling over that one, and I'm at work on the Saturday so it's actually less than that).

I'm on leave the following week, which means I can do some major batch cooking to fill it - and make life much easier when I get in from work absolutely exhausted and not wanting to cook I picked that date for delivery so that I could utilise my week off (which has been booked for months) to do this. Does mean my grocery budget for March may not go well though, as I'll need to shop for loads of veg. But it'll balance out over the following couple of months when I'll only need to buy very small amounts.

Explained to my boss why I needed to know what day he was allocating me as my day off for the week before my annual leave, and he sorted it immediately. I don't normally find out until a Thurday what I'm having the following week, so I really appreciate him doing that Could have had it delivered this Thursday (day off for this week), but having found a window that worked for me (and for OH with helping me) I've stuck to my planned dates.

It's taken a couple of weeks of careful research to find one that does what I want and fits into my existing cabinet. It actually turns out the people who installed the current one (employed by the house builders) didn't do so properly, and it doesn't have correct venting - so OH need to bring some tools over to put a hole in the plinth (which can't be removed as they put in the units before they tiled the floor) and probably to also put a hole in the base of the cabinet under the appliance (can't see them having bothered doing that if they didn't vent the plinth). We suspect the lack of venting may be at least partially to blame for the problems with my existing appliance, but after 15 years I doubt I'd get anywhere complaining to the builders



Im doing pretty well with my self-imposed rules on buying DVDs - though I have to confess that I have bought a couple before I'd watched enough, and then rapidly watched a few so I was back on balance. But it's been helped by DD having bought me loads for my birthday and the voucher OH gave me to buy some more. The first couple of box sets I 'bought' with the voucher failed to arrive as the suppliers system had let me order at the same time as someone else, meaning my order actually met a zero stock when it came to being processed But I'm currently in receipt of 2 sets (each being one season of a different series) and a film set (6 films with the same main star), and am awaiting delivery of another season (of yet another series), a set with two films (original and follow-up), and 6 individual films. Still leaves me with 98p of the £20 he gave me :T He knew I'd stretch it a long way, but I don't think he expected me to get as many as I have done with it



It's looking like my petrol spends this month will once again be easily covered by mileage payments from work. Of 8 working days so far this month I've spent 6 away from my official office. With one day still owed from the end of Jan that covers almost 1.5 tanks of fuel, and I'm filling the car just over once every 4 weeks so shouldn't need more than that. Already done one fill-up last Monday, so may not need another until the very start of March - just depends on where I get sent and what mileage that means I end up doing in very slow moving traffic. But as it's half-term from tomorrow I should get better mpg for the next week

nice one cw18 :T I have been wanting to post on here, but have had nothing really to contribute! All the years I've been watching this thread and it used to be one of the busiest threads on the boards! Hope everyone is sticking with it.

I think I've lost my way on recording spends! so will need to sit down and reconcile at some point very soon.

I've been really trying to work on emptying some of the food out of my freezer and for the past 4 weeks have spent sub £20 each week. The freezer is still going strong and have another couple of weeks at least! I've found it hard to not continue to cook/bake and add to freezer stocks! Think we are down to our last couple of cinnamon rolls now so planning to have a cupcake baking session with madam this afternoon :money:

We received a refund of £33 from the old energy supplier yesterday which mitigates some of the additional spending for Feb. We went out for a meal to celebrate our anniversary last week which I regretted once we got the bill. How can the price be justified?! I could have done something nicer for £20 for the 3 of us. Well you live and learn don't you???? I think in future I will do a meal at home and just go out for drinks or some other activity. The only exceptions to this will be if we have vouchers

My inlaws are on holiday for 6 weeks and have lent us their national heritage cards so on Sunday we went to Walmer Castle saving £26 on entrance costs :money:

Other than that just plodding, starting to plan my allotment/veg for the coming year, which is very exciting :j

kb_soma wrote: »

Hiya! I'm a bit late to the post, but would like to join please

Hi kb_soma welcome to the thread good luck! Have you done your budget forecast yet?

kb_soma wrote: »

No not quite yet. I'm still reading through all the posts. I've just moved to a bigger house which costs more in rent, so need to save some pennies somewhere. Xx

I have trouble recording all my spends always have done and at almost 3 months in I know over the last month I've fallen by the wayside. Need to set aside an hour (maybe more) to go through all the receipts over the last month yawn!

Good luck. I think at this point I have a few spends which I just haven't allowed a budget for so I'm struggling with recording....

Doing really well on grocery spends though and have spent less than £100 this month. Just goes to show what a food hoarder I am

Phew I just forced myself to sit down, get all receipts in date order and checked what had been added to the ss. Wasn't anywhere near as off as I thought - although the sorting out of receipts was pretty painful!

Have added 2 columns to the ss - 1 is medical/dental. have had to have some emergency work done this week and cost so far is £30 (dentist and meds) and have to go back to have the rest of the work done £35. Not really sure what to give this as a budget amount???

the other is "other" I bought my dd a carpet for her lounge. I had the money in savings but I can see over the year this will be used. I've just committed to £100 pm to support her with accessing private therapy as she has a mental health condition that the only cure (not really a cure but the route to recovery) is a particular psychological therapy and the nhs support is really shocking she has been waiting a year to access it but she still no where near. I wish I could pay for it in it's entirety but sadly my finances do not allow...

I'm going to have to go back to the budgets and add some additional funds to these accounts