July 2008 Grocery Challenge

annelouise_2

Morning everyone,

Have repotted 8 lettuces and they are looking decidedly limp but I'll wait it out.They must be the best looked after veggies as mid afternoon I pop out and put the parasol over them so they don't get too much sun - it was 83+ degrees yesterday.

The courgette plants are now almost 3 feet high and my lone tomato plant is 7 inches so a long way yet.....but I'm prepared to wait.

Am on the countdown for OH to join us so we can be a family again only 5 days - hurray.We also have a party of 5 joining us for a week then another party of 5 six days after so we are going to be busy.

I am baking Twinks and freezing half,I have a lovely lemon drizzle cake in and will make meringues and lime cheesecake on Thursday.I also need to wrap some chicken fillets in parma ham cook them off and slice them to pop over my pasta pesto.

Planning is so much fun.

One of the girls who works for me is getting married today so I have emailed everyone who is going to wedding to take lots of photo's and send to me, I also phoned the beauty salon to get the therapist to wish her well.

So have a great day Julie !!!!!

Another NSD for me,I'm busy compiling my shopping list for next week and jigging what I need to cook and freeze when.

annelouise

*BigBird*

Morning everyone.

Yay! It's actually kinda sunny in Devon for a change :j First load of washing out on the rotary thingy-wotsit, second lot in the washer. Down to my last 3 liqui-tab things, do I be very MSE and buy proper powder next time....?

But feeling hopeful about the weather for the open-air concert and picnic we are off to this evening - hopefully won't be huddled under umbrellas or squelching around on muddy grass!

Made breadsticks and cheese & marmite twists last night and they are gorgeous (not sure the cheese & marmite things will actually last until the picnic later!) Friend came over whilst I was baking and she thinks I've gone loopy with making homemade stuff. She's more of a "why make it yourself when you can just buy it in the shops" kind of person. Clearly she needs educating in our GC ways

ioiwe sorry to hear you're feeling rough. Hope it's nothing serious and you're feeling much better soon. (((hugs)))

teedy23

Does anyone else sometimes get the urge to cheat, and just not confess thier spends on the thread? I spent £6.13 in Sainsbury,s last night....going off the rails this week and I cant seem to get a grip on myself.:embarasse

gilly1964

Hi Everyone,

I have set us a budget of £100 for the next 3 weeks. This is for 3 of us, but hoping to get nearer £70. We are then off on holiday to France in our motorhome.

The freezer is rammed, the storecupboard is full so I do NOT need to go shopping, except for bread, milk, fruit and veg.

Yesterday I spent £22.60.
Bread, rolls, milk, yoghurts, fruit and veg and some toiletries for me.

Meal plan for the week and a bit more ahead

Today Chilli, Rice and Garlic Bread
Sunday Chicken Breast, New Potatoes, Veg
Monday HM Fish and Chips
Tuesday Steak Fajitas, salad and corn on the cob
Wednesday Spag Bol, Garlic Bread
Thursday Chicken Curry, Veg Curry, Rice, Bhajis, Pakoras
Friday Off for the weekend, so something quick and easy in the motorhome
Saturday BBQ
Sunday BBQ

I will report in again soon

£77.40 left till 8th August.

All the best
Gilly

angelatgraceland

teedy23 wrote: »

Does anyone else sometimes get the urge to cheat, and just not confess thier spends on the thread? I spent £6.13 in Sainsbury,s last night....going off the rails this week and I cant seem to get a grip on myself.:embarasse

No-well I don't because if I did I'd feel guilty and really I'd only be cheating myself. That would be failure whereas overspending is not failure-just not complete success. Success comes in varying degrees.
Have an "aim" a "target" but don't beat yourself up.
Honesty is always the best policy and can inspire others too rather than get a bad judgement from them. Guess what? I also overspent last week by quite a bit but no, I don't feel bad-I will even it out another week so I'm happy to confess.(Some say its good for the soul)


*Bigbird* If you still need to get blood out of clothes soak them in cold water. Blood is a protein, and like eggs, it "sets" with heat. My son used to get lots of nosebleads so this was a regular little problem for me. If poss I used a bit of bleach afterwards but that depends on the colour of the item.

Trying to be good today-made the jelly for the weekend trifle. Just made a victoria sanwich with my one egg and cooking oil. Used brown sugar as Im out of white-it looks ok!
Treated myslef to new baking tins this week cos I felt they had been earned.
Garlic chicken in oven Which I bought last week and a tray of sausages-I will make toad in the hole im thinking. Making the most of the oven. Oh and breadmaker on-on a dough programme as I prefer o finish it off in the oven. I must buy some more sugar and maybe eggs later or the cooking will come to a halt.

Herewegoagain

Been busy so far,
done all care needed,
done washing,
breakfast,
hovering,etc
lunch on
sent birthday wishes to Lou Happy Birthday again Lou:j
Made phone calls
thinking about ironing:eek: :eek: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

Love and hugs to all who need them and those who think they don't, cos we all do sometimes:D

miserly_mum

I really need to start using up what i've already got in the freezer and cupboards too.

I'm gonna have a good old dig around this afternoon and see what I can discover. Maybe even meal plan for the next few days if i'm feeling really energetic.

Good luck with the challenge Gilly

Flylady_Flower

mummygems wrote: »

I noticed this earlier and added it to my trolley but at the end when I tried to use a money off code as well it said I could only have either the money off code OR the Kerrygold butter? For some reason the butter has its own online code. (I obviously took the Kerrygold off as I wanted to use my money off code and also because Country thingy butter is on offer 2 for £1.60 I think).

Utterly Butterly original and omega 3 on for 2 for £1.50 in Mr T's at the mo... (Repeating myself a bit as mentioned it earlier as did AngelNikki, but it's so easy to miss things on here)

OrkneyStar

teedy23 wrote: »

Does anyone else sometimes get the urge to cheat, and just not confess thier spends on the thread? I spent £6.13 in Sainsbury,s last night....going off the rails this week and I cant seem to get a grip on myself.:embarasse

When I used to do personal challenges I would set a budget but would often increase or decrease it throughout the month depending on how things were going. Surprisingly it went down as often as up! Now I am doing GC for real I find that I HAVE to record everything and hence over by £20 last month (although I stupidly set a really tight budget of £165 for 2 adults, 1 baby, 1 cat- food, toiletries, pet food etc and did a £60 stock up for a few months!), over by £11 this month, a higher starting budget but with the opening of new Tesco I have stocked up on all the value stuff I heard people talk about (and used lots of vouchers too), and also a 5 week month! Hoping to stick to budget or under next few months, although with the price of food rising so much who knows ? Basically its all small steps and noone gets it right every month, we are all here to help each other save money and share the goods and bads!
Just been out, went in to the COOP and bought no food only the Radio Times which is a treat that DH pays for if he wants it!
Also got a mini muffin tin that I saw last week and forgot to get- will make some big and some small Kiwi muffins mmmmmmmmmm off to do that now

earthmother

Morning everyone

Thought I ought to update my totals - was offline most of last week, and I really missed MSE - must be addicted (as if I didn't know, lol)


I have 8 days left to go, and have so far spent £294.93 from a £310 budget.

That leaves me about £15, and whilst we are almost fully stocked for main meals, there's very little milk or fruit and veg in the house at the moment, so with the kids now off school, we will almost definitely go over, but hopefully not by too much.

I'm annoyed though - I should have been well under budget, but eldest son, in the excitement of the last day of term, left the freezer door wide open after getting his yogurt tube for his lunchbox - argh! It wasn't discovered until about 5 that evening (the freezer is in the utility, and for once I'd not been in there all day), so 10 days worth of meal plan dinners (more when you count the frozen veg), and a couple of days of picnics, gone just like that. I managed to salvage enough for two days meals, but then two black bags of stuff had to go in the bin - most of it had been bought reduced, and I've had to replace meals at full price, hence the over-run


Roll on August, lol