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

andromache_2

Marru, come back, we miss you xxx I think people were just trying to be helpful and offer advice - you don't have to take it! No-one was being mean. I still think this is a lovely friendly thread and it would be great to see you posting if and when you're ready xxx

sophiesmum, I love how as soon as you hear about a new kitchen gadget you buy it straight away hope you enjoy the press!

That was really lovely, grandma, thanks

A quiet day working today - OH has an exam this week and so decided that he had to stay at his uni and revise instead of seeing me for Valentine's oh well, I'm glad he's being so sensible really. I've posted him a nice card and at least it gives me a chance to catch up on work as the next couple of weekends are shaping up to be busy.

I should probably go food shopping but I've only spent 50p so far this week and I so want to hold off for a couple more days so that I can write that in my spending diary as my weekly spend :rotfl:

Frugaldom

Hi fruguys and gals, hope everyone is having a lovely weekend. Sorry to hear that your local pool may be closing, CW, I guess even the councils & Government will need to get their acts together soon and sort out the needs from the wants - they'll need to start saving the money for 2012 expenses because there's not much to be made by way of interest.

HH, noticed you in another thread but you must have missed my post about €gg - I just got notification that HiSave rates are dropping again, am I right in thinking that €gg is now the highest rate available on an instant access? Seems to me that pre-loading their Money card gains you more interest than any of the banks or building societies, especially if they leave the 1% cashback on existing accounts. Thoughts on this, please - Redglass, and anyone else in the st00zing game, d'you think €gg may be trying to attract our 'borrowed' money?

This morning, I have received a card with 'donation' towards my frugaldom project in honour of Valentine's Day. :T Going to tuck this away safely and will probably put it towards the Duck & Hen house projects, I think. :j

Last night, I finished cutting the material to make the kitchen curtains. I also got email via Freecycle about my 'wanted' ad and can go collect polystyrene - it's free insulation for the shed, brooder, hen/duck houses. Lady who is providing it also uses it to insulate her garden pond to stop it freezing over winter and insulates planters, so there's no shortage of uses for this stuff. Now I can't decide if I should collect the polystyrene, in which case I would want to start insulating the shed, or start sewing the curtains, in which case polystyrene would need to wait until Monday. Hmm... I also want to try making some 'hot pockets', as suggested by Grandma247. Where do I start?

Purplevamp, nice to see you back, have a lovely weekend with your dad & s/mum visiting

Andromache, good luck with the ultra low grocery spending

5 days until Ald! store opens in my nearest town! :j

enjoyfinancialchallenges

NYK....how about collecting the polystyrene now and sewing the curtains in the evening......I'm feeling even more guilty that I dont live near enough to help you, they would have been up at the windows by now.

Had a good night but I was very sedated. My sciatica is still quite bad today so I am going to take more tablets and go to bed again...what a life! ...but then I was told to rest it until the pain is less...Shame I dont have a live in man to bring me drinks when I want one....I do have a lovely lovely live out man who comes when we both want to see each other, and I could do with a hug right now but he is away at the moment. Oh dear, Shame.

andromache_2

Masomnia wrote: »

Hi Marru, I just want to echo what everyone else has said, we're all here to achieve our own goals and support each other with that. I don't have any debt except my student debt, and I won't be paying that off any sooner than I need to.

My budget deficit after this week is a horrifying -£188.83, so basically I need to rebudget as something isn't working. If I came in £10 under each week I'd have it balanced by June. Hmm!

Be fine

Sorry I haven't posted much recently, I've been quite busy at uni, and I want to make an effort with this thread.

Meant to say :wave: Masomnia! It's nice to see you posting since we're in such similar positions and are trying to achieve such similar things - I think you're even in your second year as well, right? Are you looking at jobs and things too or just ignoring the whole question for the minute? (That would be quite a good idea, I think!)

Anyhoo, just wanted to say that I found that last year during the revision period I barely spent any money as there was so little socialising going on and I spent most of my time holed up in my room rather than in town spending money, so exam term will probably represent a good opportunity to balance your books. Who knew there were good things about exams eh Though of course you have to budget for a few parties after they're over! I have a current weekly spend of £73.05 against a £48.08 target (yes my spreadsheet is very geeky ) but I reckon it's going to even out - particularly if I have a few more 50p-spend weeks like this one! Thanks for the encouragement on that front, nyk

Skint_Lynne

Hi everyone,

I am safely deposited back in Glasgow and into my wee shop where I will work on a Saturday. The drive home was something else, left Leicester at 3pm, got into mum's place around 8.45. I stayed there until around 11ish and then went home and to bed.

I waved to everyone on the way up that I could think of, sophiesmum , cheryl, mumsy when I was at the manchester/liverpool area of the motorway and then to nyk and janie when I was around the borders/dumfries area. The traffic around birmingham is so congested, I was there for a good while. I came up the m6/m74 way cause the m1 would have been dodgy, I think there's snow around those parts.

Thanks for correcting my spelling of the Shih-tzu cheryl, I was just up when I wrote that post, I knew I had spelt it wrong, it just shows that the forum police are up and about early in the morning.:rotfl:

I'll need to get cracking on Monday, phoning places etc for my new job so that I start to get appointments quickly. It's great that they do not have an office in this area, so as long as I do my work, I can pop in and out of here. You need to make calls etc and have office time, so my office can be anywhere I want it to be.

Catch up later. xx

andan

Hi guys, not posted on here for a while but am just updating to say i am plodding along with the challenge. I bought lots of food and stocked up last month, so so far this month have bought very little food. My OH is away so gas and elec has been off a lot more and should get cheaper in that respect.

My car had its MOT this month, luckily no repairs were needed, but that has pushed up my total a bit, but this is why my amount is £4500 instead of £4000, to allow for car costs.

Mainly i have just been cutting down and trying to up money making through mystery shops and extra clients. Glad to see everyone is ticking along.

cw18

SL - glad to hear you got home safely And thanks for the wave as you passed

As for spellings, mine's generally not brilliant..... I'm forever having to look thinks up, including Dalmatian (keeping wanting to spell it Dalmation) despite having written it many times since getting one :rolleyes2

sophiesmum_2

Good afternoon frunchkins:D
Been a busy day so far, went for a swim first thing, then off to town with friend for our weekly trot about the market etc.Spent £2.20 on a butternut squash,punnet raspberries, and a large head of broccoli:D ,£1.40 on doz free range eggs, also spent £1 on two cute little tin easter buckets, and 78p on some easter bunny lollies - will both be used for making up easter gifts. Apart from that didn't need anything else.

General frugal aims for today;

• storecupboard lunch and tea
• reduce, reuse,recycle one item- reusable bag for shopping, dropped off lots of bottles at recycle centre
• do something nice for me -
• do something nice for someone else- took friend to town
• fitter not fatter - swimming

Todays frugal meals;

• scrambled egg with spring onions
• tuna, celery and red pepper salad with mayonnaise and crumbled blue cheese left from yesterday
• HM broccoli and stilton soup,raspberries and cream

Fruit and veg portions;
1 fruit, 0 pulses,5 veggies,:D

Expenditure or additional income

spent £3.60 veggies and eggs
£1.78 easter gifts


Remaining target cash for first 6 months food spends - £246.34 left from budget of £400 for first six months.

[Deleted User]

Hello all... Happy Valentines Day to you all! :happyhear

After my waffly post before I have sat down and worked thru some figures and its looks like after including DH's income (after tax etc) and including £20 a week Child Benefit & I included £12 a week possible Tax Credits (thats what the estimate was when I put our figures into calculator on HMRC site), it looks like we'll have £63 left over every month!

I know you cant plan so far ahead but if things stay similar to what they are now, I think we'll be able to cope, either with me going back to work in the office 2 days a week OR getting a possible evening cleaning job. If I could earn £150-£200 a month we'd be okay. If the mortgage stays the same but we will cross that bridge when we come to it. So for now I'm going to save as much as my SMP as I can and keep it as a cushion, would you put it in my Cash ISA or esavings account?

Thanks for listening to me everyone, hope everyones doing okay.

xx

mama67

sophiesmum wrote: »

Managed to get the tortilla press ordered for OH and bulk pack of masa flour for making the tortillas - have told OH he is having it for valentines - but it won't arrive till next week sometime. Budget now £33 lighter after postage costs but have decided to take it out of the extra money I have made so far (£152.43 )so it won't impact on my £4000:D ,

Need to add another tally to my spreadsheet and daily post.;)

Total extra income- £152.43 / Spent from this - £33./ Balance - £119.43


cw - my gym often has bring a friend weekends - next time there is one I will let you know you could come have a swim, sauna, jacuzzi even use gym if you want - all for free

Sm where di you get one from as Dh has said he will get me one for my birthday which is at the end of the month.