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

trex170104

Hiya all
I totally agree with the homemade xmas pressies idea. I think it is lovely to be given something that someone has clearly put a lot of effort and thought into. I also like makign jewellery for people and for a number of important occasions this year I ahve made survival kits books for people, e.g. survival kit for a new dad for DH before DS was born, 2 engagement survival kits for two best friends, and my lil sis is 18 next year so am in the process of making one for her.
Also last week in home bargains [absolutely my fave shop don't know if any of you use them] I got hallmark leather envelopes [49p instead of £5.99] in baby blue that I am going to fill with 12 photos of DS this year charting the first year of his life and give them to various family members as xmas pressies. Will get the photos printed free via a number of websites that offer free pictures to new customers.
Mum has also found that the co-op has fab offers late at night so once a week is going to go and have a look for both of us and another night we're going to go to either morrisons or waitrose to scour the shelves for other cheap buys.
Finally this is the last week of DH old job so come Monday 13th he will be the proud owner of a lovely company car so we can finally get ours sold:T

Brighton_belle

Marru, I'm please you are at least in control of your own insurance -it's too importance to trust someone else with. Well done for sorting it:T .
As for xmas, fortunately my family doesn't go over board anyway, but this year I will be making the few I need (either HM cakes/biscuit nicely wrapped, or mosaic things), except for the few children in my life who will get a book each, so no massive layout. (I've also picked up bits over the year from charity shops for them). With friends, I have already come to a mutual agreement that we buy for each other's birthdays only which is a huge relief from the stress of finding something affordable they haven't already got). OH and I probably won't bother, or just something under a tenner. Present buying is hell for him and he's not interested in anything for himself.
Today we had been having a big declutter. OH has unearthed from his stuff two out of date cheques totalling £100 which I have enquired about and the companies concerned will honour them and reissue:j . He also has asked me to put 6 chess books on amazon and 2 of thm are currently on offer for £75 - £100:j :j . So those might bring in some good money but not necessarily soon. He's only touching the tip of the iceburg in the 'combining 2 households' but today progress was definitely made:j .

Frugaldom

I've done a little bit of spending today, will update signature accordingly. Whilst visiting the post office, I popped into Co-op and they had a trolley load of wholemeal loaves marked down to 30p each, so I managed to bag 5 of them for the freezer plus some other odds and ends in my £10 shop. However, it did tally up to £10.50, so I went a little bit over but it'll save me baking this afternoon and let me get on with more decluttering.

I've had a sneaking suspicion that our local bank (HBOS) had been earmarked for closure since they cut their opening times down to just 3 days per week in June. Today, post office has a sign up saying HBOS customers can now withdraw cash from PO counter, so it's looking even more likely that we'll eventually lose our bank! Not sure how that will affect local business here but it will certainly annoy me if I have nowhere to pay in cheques and need to start posting them AGAIN! (The bank 'down south' wouldn't accept my pay cheques nor would they allow me to open a new account because I didn't have a permanent address or a passport! :mad: )

Anyway, casting aside the soap box for a change, I'll get back to accounting for my spends. I bought a lovely little milk churn shaped metal bank filled with dairy fudge and I also won an unwatched video copy of Riverdancefor £2.05 inc P&P in charity auctions (my gran doesn't like DVDs, she always asks for videos of stuff she likes), so that's 2 more gifts to add to the Christmas 'pressie store'.

Total spend for the day - £16.54

lingojingo

Just logged onto my internet bank to find £10.31 from Quidco has gone in. It all helps my pressie budget (I have 7 nieces and nephews to buy for).
Well done Marru on getting your car sorted, and big hugs to all the others who have had such difficulties with their exes (((((((((())))))))))

sophiesmum_2

Went to costco this afternoon for my oldies but picked a couple of things up for my stockpile too using contingency money.
Princes OJ was on offer 12 1 litre cartons for £5.04 inc vat so bought 2 lots and kleenex velvet kitchen rolls were half price - just over £6 for 10 two packs - bargain, and will keep me going for ages.
I only ever buy toilet rolls and kitchen rolls when they are on bulk offer at costco and have also been holding out waiting for the OJ as that is on offer regularly too.
Will change my sig later.:D

cw18

lingojingo wrote: »

Just logged onto my internet bank to find £10.31 from Quidco has gone in.

Thanks for the nudge to check mine -- just short of £47 has arrived in my bank today, which included the £45 cashback on my car insurance I can now officially say I paid the same as my renewal, but dropped the excess from £250 to zero :T

thriftylass

I thought I get away without spending money on the first day of my challenge. Made the mistake of taking my wallet to work and had a chocolate graving (I guess better than smoking) and bought a wee chocolate bar. But I also got a small notepad to write down everything I spend whereever I go (total for the day 1.70, so not too bad).

Marru

Hi all!
You are all FABULOUS!! :smileyhea It was so lovely to log on and see all your messages. It really made me feel so much better!!!! I was so tired and upset this morning that left college after first lesson and came home and had a sleep. Now I just have to wait DVLA to process the form that I sent today and fingers crossed in six weeks time I actually own my car.

After DD goes to bed I will put some nice music on and do my cross stitch (my friend is getting married on Christmas and I ambitiously started a cross stitch of her dog to give her as present) and just quiet down. Tomorrow is my placement day and I was told that I can nurse some puppies :T so I will be a happy bunny tomorrow.

Have a great evening everybody!

Marru

oh, oh ... I will get a foster guinea pig soon... (that I think might stay here...)

cw18

Looks like I've just made another saving on dog food for the next few months :T

I bought a 15kg sack of dried food for the Yorkie from Pets At Home earlier this year, which I knew should last her about 4 months. But it's now going a bit quicker, as the only way to get the Dalmatian to eat the one I've been trying to get him onto (less additives than hers) is if I mix some of hers into it (about a 3:1 ratio of his to hers seems to work).

Had a look on the PAH website, and the one I had isn't on there -- which I thought could cause us a problem. So I did a Google to see if I could find it anywhere, and the only thing that popped up specifically for that brand was a BOGOF voucher on eBay..... and it's for using against the 15kg sacks at PAH before the end of this month.

So I phoned my local PAH and asked, and they do still stock it (just not on the web for some reason ). So I've paid just under £4 for a voucher that will get me a 'free' sack of food that cost £15 (I think) last time I got it -- so it means a saving of over a tenner, and enough of that food in for another 4 months between the two dogs at the rate I've been using it over the last few weeks :j

I currently have enough of the one I'm weaning the Dalmatian onto for a couple of months, and will keep checking the shelves when I'm in Quality Save/Home Bargains, as it's £1.99/2.25kg there and £2.99 in the only other place I've seen it (which QS/HB have on the shelf as the RRP).

Anyway, the upshot is that I'd budgeted £393/year for dog food, so four months would be £131 -- but the next four months could come in at just £58.75 including the cost of the voucher :T

System

hello frunchies,

hmmm well i have not updated the spending part of the sig in a loooong time, as i have had to buy quite a lot of clothes for uni - there are a lot of work placements but I don't have very many smart work clothes. I will have to tot them up and add them to my extras budget as I cant work them into my £1600 budget, boooo!

I have done my best through, got the stuff from ebay, primark, tkmax, & got a top from boden with a good discount & money off voucher

I have already added a few, so i will deduct them but add in the £10 piggie voucher as cash spent, so that my make £1000 target will exist completely as a lovely pile of cash. :money:

ooh ooh i also found thermal vests in a discount store for £5, so i got one to test plus will get another if i like it