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

Frugaldom

Good afternoon to all

I have just finished catching up with all the posts, so here goes:

Purplevamp, welcome to frugaldom, I have now added your name to the list of 'trainees for 2009'

Mumzy, I have answered your PM

Janey, see you tomorrow

Sophiesmum - I know the feeling, I have a walk-in cupboard under the stairs here and it's chocabloc full of stuff. I wonder how that happened and who, on earth, got me into such stockpiling!

Garden update - I still have one full bucket of apples to stew, plenty of potatoes still in the garden, plenty of onions about ready for picking, beetroot coming along OK, plenty of leeks now ready and some cherry tomatoes that look more like red peas than tomatoes because they are so small. Moving house 2nd week in November to one that has garden space but it's gone wild, so it'll be a whole new project about to start, yet again.

I've forgotten everything else already, back soon

PS: I need to make leek & potato soup, can't think of anything else to do with leeks and potatoes.

sophiesmum_2

Here you go whitewing:D

Bottom row -
cans of pepsi for DD for college, kitchen rolls, toilet rolls



next row



flour, teabags, coffee, rice,orange juice, salad dressings etc

next row

porridge, pasta, pulses, seeds, dried fruit , nuts, meat free mince ,broth mixes, etc



next row
tinned goods, kidney beans, tinned tomatoes, curry sauces, - salmon , tuna, fruit etc,



including 72 tins tuna and salmon:rotfl:



next 2 rows
dried goods, splenda, tapioca, pizza base mix, bisquik, peas,couscous, dried onions etc, merringues
home made preserves, chutneys and other jars of condiments, dried mushrooms in big jar.



there are 50 assorted jars of HM jams and chutneys:D



Hidden at top of cupboard smaller shelf for goodies, rice cakes, shortbreads,choc, etc;) and my macadamia nuts



The shelves are 3ft deep and about 3.5ft wide. i also have 3 double cupboards in the kitchen for food stores and a couple of big storage crates for more flour, sugar and uht milk, two freezers and a fridge.

and to carry on the theme these are my boxes of stashed xmas pressies - all money neutral gifts:T just rounding up and sorting out now:D

taka

I think my posts are disappearing too - I'm sure I posted yesterday evening I was struggling to open pages and thank yesterday on here too...

((((Hugs)))) Janey - sounds like a difficult time with your mum. I'm loving your Mums memory of the day section.

Sophiesmum - Thats a mighty impressive cupboard!

I had a loo roll mountain too. At 1 point early last year 1 had ~60 and ummmmm... I live on my own... :rotfl: It took me till about a month a go to use them all up :rolleyes: I was most upset at having to go buy more! I only have 10 + 1 in use now and it feels wrong .

I spent Saturday clearing and cleaning the kitchen. My store cupboard consists of very little food at the mo - it all fits in one of the 9l "really useful company" boxes apart from the billion and 1 cans of chopped tomatoes :eek: Actually I think all the equipment in my kitchen could fit into the larder with the food. Pity my kitchen is the biggest room in my flat and has loads of cupboards! Oh well it gives me hope that my longterm plans to change my kitchen+dining recess into a livingroom with a small kitchen in the dining recess may work with not too much cupboard space. Just need to finish saving for the bathroom renovations first... :rolleyes: In the meantime I have lots of stockpiling room - I wonder if I can bribe my parents into a trip to Costco soon Anyone know what offers are on in the next few weeks?

Welcome purplevamp!

You could do some kind of leek and potato pie Nyk - thats what we had for xmas dinner last year (family is all veggie so we're not very traditional mealwise)

PS its all your fault if I blow my GC budget on bananas... I'm now craving banana on toast with cinamon... nomnomnom

Skint_Lynne

Hi Sophiesmum,

How did you get all these prezzies? I take it that moneyneutral means you actually got them for free. Is this thru competitions and the like?

I am impressed!!!

SL x

sophiesmum_2

money neutral means that any cash I spent on them was made back through stuff like clicks, quidco, topcashback, amazon, vouchers from pigsback etc. I also do what nyk does and get everything discounted in sales etc so I get more for my free money. Got stuff in boxing day sales,boots 75% off sale etc and picked up bargains through the year. Also used boots points for some things.

There is a money neutral thread on the special occasions board started by jamtart:D Xmas so far is free for me:T :T

sophiesmum_2

nykmedia wrote: »

Sophiesmum - I know the feeling, I have a walk-in cupboard under the stairs here and it's chocabloc full of stuff. I wonder how that happened and who, on earth, got me into such stockpiling!

:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

Skint_Lynne

sophiesmum wrote: »

money neutral means that any cash I spent on them was made back through stuff like clicks, quidco, topcashback, amazon, vouchers from pigsback etc. I also do what nyk does and get everything discounted in sales etc so I get more for my free money. Got stuff in boxing day sales,boots 75% off sale etc and picked up bargains through the year. Also used boots points for some things.

There is a money neutral thread on the special occasions board started by jamtart:D Xmas so far is free for me:T :T

WOW:j :j ,

I'm going to have a look at that now, well done you!!!

SL x

jamtart6

Well done SophiesMum!! Skint Lynne just mentioned that you had posted your haul, you should come back and visit our thread when you get chance!! I'm thrilled that you have done so well :T:T

shelovestobuystuff

Well done sophiesmum.I am now embarrassed at the state of my cupboards after seeing how tidy and organised yours are.
Thats a good amount of cash neutral gifts you have already.
I managed a spend neutral xmas last year and am aiming for the same again this year.I have still to get stuff organised and on ebay too.
Last year I made £800 for xmas on ebay and this year already I have used my september quidco cashback,just over £170, to cover the cost of all DD,s xmas pressies.I am expecting about another £100 from quidco before xmas and will have to ebay like mad for the rest.

Frugaldom

Umm... dare I ask what the insides of your freezers look like, sophiesmum?

THANKFULLY, the new house has a small larder in the kitchen and a separate walk-in cupboard at the back door so, despite sizing down housewise, storage shouldn't be a problem, especially as the house is all on the flat with plenty of loft-space. Not sure what it will cost to get a socket installed into the big cupboard but can work off an extension at the start if needs be.

I'll be keeping the frugal garden webpage going to reflect the entire 'construct a garden from the small wilderness' project, so I'll be back to the green forums to glean some new info and checking back on all sophiesmum's photos to copycat her hanging basket methods.

As for the moneyneutral scenario - I am still planning on attempting to make the 2009 'living on 4k' challenge money neutral, assuming I can get the first £1000 up front from my £1000 in £100 days challenge.