MoneyQueen’s MFW Journey and Daily Diary

MoneyQueen

Thanks Floxxie and SMF2..

DH is out with his workmates for drinks today and I am doing a bit of cleaning in the house and sorting the laundry.

Things have come to a stand still and I have run out of ideas to earn/ save more. Probably should get back to MBing.

I am setting a personal challenge for us for yearly £1200 grocery and energy challenge starting from April 2010. This would only include home cooked food. I would keep a seperate budget for eating out or take aways as treats.

My energy direct debit is set to £35 per month. so that should leave £780 for home cooking. And if we are in credit on the energy front thats a bonus.

Not sure if this will be possible or not but I have a well stocked (rather overflowing) stock cupboard so it would be nice to see what I can come up with.

As a rough guide, this is how I think £1200 will be divided

Yearly Monthly Weekly Daily
Energy £420.00 £35.00 £8.08 £1.15
Fruit £208.00 £17.33 £4.00 £0.57
Juice £100.60 £8.38 £1.93 £0.27
Milk £101.40 £8.45 £1.95 £0.28
Snacks/Drinks/Cereal £48.00 £4.00 £0.92 £0.13
Cooked Food £322.00 £26.83 £6.19 £0.88
Total £1,200.00 £100.00 £23.08 £3.28

As always, the above is only valid if we can do it healthily, if not then would have to add some more money to this.

MQ

MoneyQueen

Not sure what happened there.. all the formatting of the figures has been removed.. Oh well ...

MoneyQueen

I have created an account on http://www.spendingdiary.com/ to keep track of all our spending. I was doing it with spreadsheets earlier but now because it would be online, I can do it both at work and at home. Also DH can add his spends himself :cool:

This would help us to keep track of all the miscellaneous spends :j

MQ

Floxxie

Let me know how you get on the online 'diary'; I have bookmarked the site but haven't used it yet.

Fx

MoneyQueen

Floxxie wrote: »

Let me know how you get on the online 'diary'; I have bookmarked the site but haven't used it yet.

Fx

Surely would. It does seem to be a good idea...

MQ

Queen-Bee_2

Hi - I'll be interested to see how you get on with the diary. I started one of these mid last year, but it seemed quite fiddly to fill in, and only appeared to keep note of one month's dairy - ie I couldn't access the one I'd done say two months ago. So now, I have one of those little red cash books and write everything in that instead, making sure I reflect all my spends by keeping receipts for absolutely everything!!

I'll also be interested in your budget. My energy costs in gas alone are frightening... £180 for January for instance!!! Plus I struggle on £20 a week for food - then again, I don't eat out these days, ever (apart from the odd treat at cafe nero) so I'm in awe of your 88p a day!

Best wishes and great news btw about the redundancies passing you and your OH by,
QB

MoneyQueen

Thanks Queen-Bee

Which spending diary did you use? I will use this one for couple of months and will see how it goes... Will let you know

We also had a large bill for Jan. Though nowhere as much as yours. We generally build up some credit in summer which gets consumed in the winter. Our house is very nicely insulated. so I guess that helps and anyway I don't like a very warm house.

Our DD for gas and electricity is set to £35 thats why £420 for the year for energy. Hopefully next winter won't be as cold as this one.

MQ

MoneyQueen

On the financial front, today has been a good day. I had a NSD as we didn't go out all day. Had some friends for dinner last night and were very tired today. Spent the day on the couch

MQ

david_hellier

Money Queen,

Try Little Book of Debt Control. It's a little notebook marked out as a spending diary about the same price as a notebook.

Floxxie

Ok David Hellier, you have a personal interest in what you are recommending as you are the author.

Now why would MQ want to buy something when she can get a free online diary? And incidentally why would she want a book on debt control - have you seen her savings?