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

grandma247

cw18 wrote: »

I'm now working on a 6 week meal plan starting from tomorrow (which takes me through to 5th April and covers my entire March grocery budget) -- and it looks like I'll have to buy very, very little (apart from veg) for our main meals :blink:

Thats brilliant cheryl It should save you a lot of time too.
I would like to do this but no time yet. I just keep buying woopsies and squirreling them away, today I thought i would take a leaf out of your book and see just what I saved. The full cost would have been £51.01 and the actual price I paid was £19.28.
2 large boxes of chicken legs were £1.05 instead of £4 each and 4 kieves(sp) were .98p. also got sweet potatoes 65p a bag and normal ones 45p a bag plus fruit and other stuff.
Friday we got 10 pkts of cheese at .75p each, people were picking them up and putting them down again which to me was crazy as the normal price was £2.49 each. I am willing to pay up to just over £1 for cheese unless it is a very large block.


Welcome chika you will love this group of people.


Have to go to see a specialist tomorrow about cyst on my eyelid but since I saw the doc. it has started to get smaller:o

slowlyfading

Chika, just realised you're doing teacher training! Is it secondary or primary? I start a secondary PGCE in Sept!

sophiesmum_2

Welcome on board chika - sure Nyk will be along to add you to the list soon:D (interrupted while doing this post so everyone has been on since I started it an age ago )

1274 - I nicked "fitter not fatter" from Nyk -

No piccies yet bails??
Your lunch looks great skint- chick:T

Nothing exciting happened here today, been for swim/jacuzzi etc with friend and DD this evening. Earlier made another batch of tortillas - some for OH some to freeze. Must find a local supplier of the masa harina flour:rolleyes: then started off another crop of mung beans for sprouting, and stuck a loaf on.
That's about all today:rolleyes:

chika

Hi Looby loo and Slowly Fading. I'm doing primary, I'm doing the BA with QTS but I'm in year three of four so a little way to go yet.

Where are you going to do your PGCE SF and in what subject? I guess everyone will have told you its hard work but teaching really is great.

Just while thinking of the challenge - I'll start officially tomorrow. I think going through everything I have spent will be a massive job and I'll only have 20p left to live off for the rest of the year! I'm going to start on 4k as of tomorrow. I'll try and get to grips with excel and make an incominng and outgoing spreadsheet to keep track. I'll also go through my cupboards and fridge and freezer and see what food I have.

Does anyone else have an awful habit of going food shopping for the sake of it? I seem to spend half my cash in various supermarkets which I'm going to tackle this week.

slowlyfading

in Lancaster where I studied - and music! Am really looking forward to it though a bit scared as well, lol

chika

grandma247 wrote: »

Have to go to see a specialist tomorrow about cyst on my eyelid but since I saw the doc. it has started to get smaller:o

Good luck tomorrow, if its started to get smaller it might just dissapear without medical intervention...

chika

You will be fine! well done for getting your PGCE place too

angelatgraceland

nykmedia wrote: »

Welcome Chika! so sacrifices do need to be made, even if it means using 0range Wednesdays with a packet of crisps and a bottle of tap water hidden in a handbag rather than swiping plastic for haute cuisine at The Hilt0n. One thing that I can assure you of is that none of us are really miserable, even when we're miserable and we try not to come across as cold even when we're freezing. :rotfl:

I thought that was normal! Or am I just a wee bit tight?
Just come back from the theatre where I took a bottle of diet coke bought from Approved foods-hidden in my handbag. Yes Chika-we do go out too and reward ourselves but we do it on the cheap!
I also got a free lift there and home with my dd kindly by my neighbour who also got the tickets on my behalf as she wanted to see same show.
I dont feel I take her fro granted as I do favours for her-like getting things from Freecycle for her as she has no internet and no comp.
All helping each other saves a lot of money all around. I got her a nice lawnmower a while back and the lady who I got it from I posted a spare cinema bogof vue ticket to her tonight(a Freecycle friend)
Ive met some great people via Freecycle and we often ask each other favours in the name of being green,recycling and moneysaving/timesaving/fundraising. And Im proud to say that it all started here on MSE so welcome all newbies-you never know where this path will lead you!:j

cw18

nykmedia wrote: »

Use some empty milk cartons with water to fill the gaps until they're needed

Never thought of that !!! Is it safe to do this with the plastic milk cartons, 'cos they're the only ones we get !! (Also what puts me off freezing milk, as I would imagine there's a possibility of them splitting as the milk freezes and expands )

I have loads of freezable tubs I could fill for now though :rolleyes2



ETA: Have sorted my 6 week plan. Apart from fresh veg, fruit, bread, milk, breakfast cereals (possibly) and sandwich fillers (some - I must use up the jars of paste in the cupboard as well!), I reckon I need 3 or 4 bags of frozen veg (peas, sweetcorn, mixed), 2kg of oven chips (just can't get HM ones to work, so have decided this is one thing we're not giving up), spaghetti (unless I find the pack I'm sure is lurking somewhere), sausages, and fish in butter sauce - plus toppings for two lots of pizza (bought a pack of base mix from A!di at the weekend - never tried making my own before).

So it's just possible that if I buy nothing to add to my stockpiles I could spend less than £60 in the next 6 weeks -- which is less than I used to spend in a week even with as much in stock as I have now!! I was feeding 3 of us then -- whereas now it's 2 plus part-time feeding of my GDs -- but it still seems a massive reduction.

DdraigGoch

Office of the President
Presidential Palace
Presidential Square
Fruga
Frugonia
FR2 0NIA

23th February, 2009

Dear Chika

Welcome to our new citizen of Frugonia, Chika. I trust that you will stand up when the Frugonian National Anthem is played at the cinema, whilst hurriedly stuffing the crisps back into your handbag? :rotfl:

Further proofs of citizenship of our great Nation can be achieved and recorded here online and approved by our President, the delightful and everfragrant NYK. I'm afraid that my level in the government is rather lowly, but a clerk's work is never done [well, not by me, anyway! :rotfl:]. So, in conclusion, welcome again, Chika, keep up the good work and be proud of your new nationality.

Yours sincerely,
DG
Clerk to the Presidential Office








BB, thanks for the reminder about the sheets .... See, told you I'd forget:rolleyes: