Live on £4000 for a year - part 4 (Oct - Dec 2008)

thriftylass

A warm welcome to the newbies twinkle_star and cataddict, I only joined a month ago myself. Amazing budget already twinkle_star. I was the same, I read through various threads and this one is one of the friendliest (astonishing the stuff/attitude you encounter in others).

BTW my favourite word on this thread is frugalmite = the wee one of a frunshkin , not sure who came up with it though.

Was planning on a NSD again today, but the car is broken so we'll have to take the train to Glasgow this afternoon . Luckily BF will cover the repair bill for the car since it's his

lingojingo

lyndasharp wrote: »

My solar clock arrived today from Carboncreditz - small but cute. A good extra Christmas present for someone!

Mine too, it will be a great present for my best friend's gadget mad OH!

Skint_Lynne

Morning all,

Welcome aboard cat addict. It's great to have you here. Well I have been in Morrisons this morning before I opened the shop, spent £8, but £4 of that was on special offer sweets for a Christmas gift.

Janey, I'm afraid that the turkey price was not a typo:eek: , so I will fetch the smelling salts:p . I think the costco membership was around £15 for the year, but you get 2 cards with that. I gave one to my brother. That is for a trade one, but you can get a card if you work for certain organisations eg, the police or a credit union. My mum got hers free thru the credit union.

Bails, It can be hard doing this when you have a family like mine. They just have a good laugh at me, but I hope that someday, they will take me 'seriously'. They sometimes do take things on board, eg, I read on here about using 10p shower gel to fill up your soap dispensers, my mum does this now and has told all her friends. My big downfall is eating out, I love it, but am cutting this down big time. DH is a problem as well, he is anti-frugal and I am not telling him that I am taking part in this challenge. He knows I look at the website but does not know about me being a member of this thread. He is never here anyway, so he will not notice. It's my choice anyway. I want to change my ways as I would like to be comfortable in my retirement, so am aiming to have all debts and my mortgage paid off and have savings by age 50. I am 37 (nearly 38) now.

I have always been interested in being frugal but have never done anything about it before now. I am enjoying it, keeping the diary of my spending has been the biggest turning point, so I will continue to do that. My dad has shown signs of being frugal, he thinks too much money gets wasted around our family. Maybe I take after him, who knows.

I would like to thank everyone in advance for their continued support.

SL x

thriftylass

Skint_Lynne wrote: »

Bails, It can be hard doing this when you have a family like mine. They just have a good laugh at me, but I hope that someday, they will take me 'seriously'. They sometimes do take things on board, eg, I read on here about using 10p shower gel to fill up your soap dispensers, my mum does this now and has told all her friends. My big downfall is eating out, I love it, but am cutting this down big time. DH is a problem as well, he is anti-frugal and I am not telling him that I am taking part in this challenge. He knows I look at the website but does not know about me being a member of this thread. He is never here anyway, so he will not notice. It's my choice anyway. I want to change my ways as I would like to be comfortable in my retirement, so am aiming to have all debts and my mortgage paid off and have savings by age 50. I am 37 (nearly 38) now.

I have always been interested in being frugal but have never done anything about it before now. I am enjoying it, keeping the diary of my spending has been the biggest turning point, so I will continue to do that.

Sounds like I could have written that

P.S. thought I never play bingo again but was just bored and did a few scratch cards - won 45 quid :j:j:j . But I'll be sensible now and stop....

redglass_2

Last night I had my first ever frugal dream! I dreamt I was saving rainwater in a bucket and using it to wash myself with - the 'bathroom' was behind a hedge in my front garden. :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

There are also signs of an epidemic of frugalism sweeping this part of the country. I recently noticed an ad on Freecycle asking if anyone had a free copy of Poundwoman's book to give away. Way to go.....:rotfl:

My local Costco would be the Bristol one. I looked on the site but I don't think I'm entitled to join. I didn't see anything about getting a card for being in the police, though, which gives me hope - can you also get one for working in education?

thriftylass

I have a question. Can you add money to your credit card to increase the amount available beyond the credit limit or what happens if that happens by accident?

Cheers

P.S. Great news BF just got the car fixed free of charge (the just replaced the exhaust and it was broken again, I guess that's why) which means we can save the train fare today

taka

redglass wrote: »

My local Costco would be the Bristol one. I looked on the site but I don't think I'm entitled to join. I didn't see anything about getting a card for being in the police, though, which gives me hope - can you also get one for working in education?

I think you can - I'm sure the last time I went (my parents have a card... and a car ) I noticed I would qualify to get one. I work in education (at a Uni). I seem to remember working in public service type jobs + banking and "professional" things like that counted. I can't remember what ID they would need to prove I qualify though. Lots of people at my work have them.

cw18

thriftylass wrote: »

I have a question. Can you add money to your credit card to increase the amount available beyond the credit limit?

Yes. If you have a credit limit of £2k, but want to charge something costing £2.5k to it, then you need to be showing a balance of £500 credit before using it. The credit limit is the maximum you can OWE them, not the maximum you can use it for in one transaction.

twinkle_star_2

Hello everyone. Thank you for the lovely welcomes. Just looked at spending diary.com (thank you) it's brilliant. Shall have to make use of it.
Today I'm going to see Leonard Cohen (eeeeeeeeeeeeeee!:j) with my OH. But I'm determined not to spend a fortune like a normally would on going out. The tickets plus £20 for a taxi home were a gift to my OH from his parents, we're having dinner and drinks before we go out and getting the bus there. So it should come to a total of £3.20 fo both of us.Yay!

Marru

Good [STRIKE]morning[/STRIKE] afternoon all!

I have sobered up and without any ill effects. Here couple of comments that I forgot last night:

Sophiesmum: EEEK about the accident re you DD, I hope she will be ok soon. _pale_
Shaz: what a wonderful place! Makes me want to pack my bags and hop into my car in the search of view like that.
Welcome twinkle_star and Cat Addict :hello:

I am sure I have forgotten a lot more so just saying HELLO to everybody else.

DD allowed me to have a lie in and what a bliss that was. We have had cheese toasties and white muffins with raspberry jam for breakfast (all whoopsied).

I have yet again a mile long list for the weekend so I better get started with it. No NSD today as need to go to buy food for people and guinea pigs today. I don't seem to be able to think beyond one week at the moment but hopefully I will get myself organised soon and can start thinking monthly and doing all my shopping monthly as well. But I need other freezer and can't seem to be able to get hold of one. Will keep trying.

I have done a study plan and it looks like this :eek:. No socialising for me. Also I have a feeling that after I have finally managed to sort out my spreadsheets my cashflow won't allow me any extra spends either. We shall see.

Catch up again later, have a great day everybody. Here there might be a chance of getting washing dry outside :j.

Marru