Live on £4000 for a Year, 2009 Challenge, part 1

Frugaldom

Hello, just playing catch-up again after a busy (ish) day, so beware, this is a longish post.

Appropriate responses to everyone and nice to see some familiar faces resurfacing and still on the challenge.

Janey is doing fine, she has asked me to say hello to everyone and she'll be back with us soon.

My logs were delivered this morning, so that was £40 right away, plus I have been surfing the sales with an assortment of codes and vouchers. I now have quite a few of my 2009 gifts bought, despite saying I was going to make most of them. B0dy Sh0p has lovely little gift bags at 50p, ideal for filling and using as gifts. I ordered from there yesterday and the box arrived today! :T The one thing that made me laugh was the fact that I always wanted to be able to afford to shop at The B0dy Sh0p, as it was one of those places I always heard about but was only ever fortunate enough to visit a real store a couple of times because there just haven't been any anywhere close to anywhere I have lived. (And I never had that amount to spend on the few occasions that I did manage to venture into a store.) It was like something I'd write in my 'wishing book': "I wish I was 'rich' enough to shop at TBS". :rotfl: It's brilliant to be able to go online and shop there, vouchercode in one hand, cashback in the other! :cool: I only do this about twice a year, so my spending in January gets pretty scary, to say the least. :eek:

I also visited the $up€rdrug sale via cashback with a 10% off voucher code and have now topped up with several more gifts. They have little porcelain soap dishes with pebble soaps marked down to 49p (these may also fit in the fancy bronze gift bags from TBS) and I thought they would be ideal for adding into gift baskets. There were some great deals on hair products, so that's our household hair care taken care of for the entire year and my total order was less than £20 inc delivery. The £3 delivery charge gets added to my 'travel related' column of my budget spreadsheet so I can total everything at the end of the year and compare the overall amount with what it would cost me if I had a car and drove to all these stores.

On the subject of Billy Can, mine is still sitting here but, whilst checking back for the links from last year, I got a pleasant surprise! My last year's grocery budget actually started out at £30 per week for the 3 of us (£1568), then it got billy canned to £120 per month (£1440) and then billy canned again to £100 per month (£1200) so, rather than being £26 over my original grocery budget last year (I spent £1226) I was actually £342 UNDER and still managed to stockpile for 2009 :eek: :T :j This meant that I was able to bank the money I would normally have spent on cigs as they are no longer part of my grocery shop.

I have now worked out the costs for my coal and logs and it's averaging £1.60 per day, so my 'pet' fire eats quite a bit, but not as much as the miniature pony. I'm thinking a log fire makes a better mascot for frugaldom but you're still all welcome to send me a £ towards its keep in exchange for a certificate. :rotfl:

savingfortravel

Nyk-Pet fire now there's a thought. Will be reading up on Billy Can tomorrow. Can you explain the link for the Superdrug sale please Thanks SFT
And what is cashback???????????

sophiesmum_2

Cooked tea for the oldies when I got back from other court and was happily working away when OH slipped into conversation that my approved foods order had been delivered and was sat upstairs waiting.:j The hour following that went really slowly until I could get up here and have a good mooch:rolleyes:

Happy with the stuff I received just need to create a space to put it all my storecupboard is already bursting at the seams and I need to fit 50 sachets of sauces, a box of ryvita bars, 2 boxes yoghurt bars, box snackajacks, 2 boxes ryvita snacks, 2 boxes cakes, 24 bottles diet coke, and 4 tubs choc cake icing somewhere:eek: OH and DD sorted for bits to add to their pack ups for a while though:D and I have already hidden the choc marzipan eggs before OH finds them, as I have easter plans for them;)
Another no spend day today but tomorrow will be a spend day as cable tv DD is due out and I need to buy eggs.(free range not marzipan )

Janey xx
Whitewing xx

Marru

savingfortravel wrote: »

And what is cashback???????????

SFT, have a look HERE

fallen_angel_shelley

Good evening all. not much to report, I took one of things I got in the b00t's sale back yesterday, Iggle Piggle, and picked up 2 more bits:rolleyes: got a nice box of christmas crackers for about £3 as well, just need to find the receipt to up date my sig. while I was out I got a couple of books for uni, £54:eek:, and some coloured printer paper, but I get the money back for them so thats o.k, and if I look after the books I can always sell them later on.


Been a busy bunny since I got home tidying up etc, that way I will have more time over the weekend to catch up on some work, just need to nip to MrT's for a couple of bits tomorrow and give the bathroom the once over.


One of the gift sets I got in the sale is a treat for me;) and I opened it last night and it smells really nice, can't wait to try it out, it's the s@nctuary one in the big gold bag, so i feel a pamper day coming on.

Shelley x


Edit- DS got home from college and said, mum college is going on a trip to the American embassy can I have £35:eek: please, so quick call to his dad and he is going to pay it:j, normaly I would have paid it but the ex has got of to lightly over the years and it's time he started helping more.

In_Search_Of_Me

Evening all...havent updated fgs but will later or tom...feelng shattered after a very difficult week in work...def all work and no play Budget is ok but had a meal out this lunch time to celebrate a colleagues 60th and managed 9.20 then got my mooncup (who posted that they will answer ? as I have a couple to pm if thats ok!!) which was 21 but will be cheaper than "products"...so not a cheap day in challenge terms but have a quiet w/e planned and babysitting on Monday...
sorry to hear about car Marru...alas cant report on not working (although am grateful for a secure job) as never have but am sure it takes time to adjust but that when you do you will, I am told, wonder how you ever had time for work!!

In_Search_Of_Me

oo crossed posts - sounds yummy shelly!!

cha97michelle

Evening folks

Thankfully it is the weekend, as DS1 has been driving me round the bend today, and DS2 has suddenly learnt to bottom shuffle across the floor, so i am glad it is bedtime for them, and that i might get chance to fix the light and also babyproof the house a bit again. DS1 is good really and doesn't touch that much so we took the baby gate off the kitchen and plug socket covers off, but i think DS2 might have more of an exploratory side to him. His current favourites are the TV cabinet as it has a drawer that he uses to pull himself closer, then it is great fun attacking the Wii and accessories, and then my drawer under the cooker with cake tins in.:rolleyes: Hopefully once he has looked once, he'll get bored, but i somehow doubt it.

I've spent nothing again today, and DH walked in from work with a free DVD player that came with some printer cartridges they ordered. So he claimed it so we can put it in our bedroom, perhaps saving on heating costs. What a fab freebie.

Foodwise, i have made a minestrone soup at lunchtime with some garlic bread for the boys and i used up 2 pitta breads that were out of date. They had cheese sarnies for tea, and we are going to have a simple tea of tuna on soy sauce (from AF - 50p a sachet) with some noodles, prawn crackers and the remainder of the garlic bread.

I've got some sausages out for tomorrow, which i think might end up as a bit of a casserole with some of the other random leftovers from the fridge so they get used up before we go away on monday. I'm stuck between not wanting to spend lots, but knowing we are going to costco over the weekend to buy our share of the food for self catering next week, so i want to get some meat for the freezer too before prices go up again, so i am trying to use up things like frozen berries (great in our morning porridge) a bag of broccoli stalks, things that take up lots of room basically, so we make the most of the trip to go there.

2ndtimerounder i hope your health problem is not too serious and you can get sorted. Please keep posting as you have an interesting perspective on the challenge.

I'm glad to hear Janey is ok too.

Michelle, x

Marru

Hello,

I did promise to come back with proper post but I am too tired. My excuse is that I called today to 8 recruitement agencies and one directory distribution firm. 3 out of eight recruiters sounded more positive and with two of them I will have appointments for next week. I think if I get some temping work I would be ok. That would give me time to do college work and keep sorting out the books. Someone asked what will I do with the income from them and the answer is - fund this challenge.

Just managed to put very tired DD to bed. She was clinging on to me and crying that she will miss me. Bless. She will be missing me exactly for 5 hours and then she will wake up to go to the toilet and then come to sleep into my bed for the rest of the night. At least her table lamp is not on unneccessesarily for most of the night as she accepted my new solar light as her night light.

Today requires comfort food so it will be mix and match from fridge and cupboards for supper, this is what I fancy: bolognese sauce, fried egg, instant noodles and baked beans I'd be quite happy with just the last three but happen to have some of the first in fridge. By the way I put some small cubes of ghergins (sp?) in my bolognese sauce and it made it really nice. Next time I will try to put some pickled beetroot as well.

Have a nice evening everyone!

Marru

angelatgraceland

sophiesmum wrote: »

woo Hoo!!! BB we have our first comission:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

I spent the day today with the new manager at her court sorting her office out, decluttering , shredding, moving furniture and generally making it a more efficient working environment for her to take over.......and all the time I was getting paid for doing stuff I enjoy
Personally I have a bit of a basket fetish - you can never have too many baskets,and hampers, and leather storage boxes, and wooden storage boxes, and box files, and lovely preserving jars, and plastic crates, and lock and locks........think you get the drift.........hve to have somewhere to keep my stationery fetish items

janey, whitewing hope you are both okay missing your posts

I think this storage stuff is an "extension" of the stationary fetish. Did your first storage box come from WH Smith at a guess?
DH has brought back diaries and calandars given to him at work this year-if they dont get used they will be useful as spending diaries next year even though the "days" will be wrong.
I also keep anaddress book for all of thos annoying things I join on the internet where I forget the site-the username and the password!
Comes in useful very ofte especially for the ones I don't visit much. Very useful being in alphabetical order!