Live on £4000 for a Year, 2009 Challenge, part 2

Blairweech

Hi folks,

Have been reading but forgot to take notes so hugs to those in need, congrats to those with good news etc

SF - Hope your hand gets better asap

Was down the lottie yesterday, got absolutely sunburnt :mad: but did manage to clear a bit more space. Hope to go up there tomorrow morning and start planting - my theory is that I will just plant stuff and hope it grows - am going to plant: broccolli, sweetcorn, runner beans, carrots and maybe leeks and potatoes. I think the hot summer will help. I am really enjoying being down there, its so relaxing.

Am making a menu plan for July - will probably make a monthly plan but shop weekly or fortnightly, that way I can keep the waste in check.
Have had 6 NSD this week :j and only spent £9 on seeds/rawlplugs today so doing alright.

Good job as my current spend is....£3100.82 . This includes the service/MOT but not tax/insurance atm.

Nyk - Can I please up my budget to £5000 please?

I am having some problems with my slowcooker - everything I cook in it turns out really fatty? I am draining the fat off the meat when I brown it off, hardly using any oil....I guess I just need more practise.

Have a good one :beer:

savingfortravel

sf-Hope your hand gets better soon. x
bb-Sorry to hear you've been poorly.

Well wasn't sure I'd have much of a weekend..as I too had been feeling poorly with a virus..but dragged myself into school..its not done to be ill.
Felt rubbish Friday night and we were going to postpone Alfriston.

But since our hamlet were holding their annunal open gardens (so it would have been very busy)and I felt a bit better we decided to go. We even did our walk from Alfriston to the coast (need to explore the Seven Sisters more though) and saw a new wildflower (called Viper's Bugloss!). Supported the YHA by having our dinner there (3 courses for £9.30).
This morning we had a lovely breakfast at the Badger's Tea Room.(BB) On the way home we stopped off at Mr S and spent about £37. Bought lots of fish (which I hope will keep me going until our trip-trying to eat better so I feel fitter for it) and salad. Had a fresh fruit salad at the YHA and I thought why don't I have this more often?
This afternoon I've been catching up on school work and then this afternoon we went for a walk along a footpath at the end of the road. Can't explain how it lifts my spirits. We looked for good blackberry spots (get in before the other locals) and elderberrry flowers (no luck-nyk's recipe looked delicious). Saw a few new wildflowers including a Pyramidal Orchid, Argimony and Imperforate St. Johns-wort. Planning to retrace our route tomorrow evening-taking a picnic and our camera. Then stop off at the local..Lets hope the weather doesn't change.

Watching Trevor MacDonald's tour of Carribean-fabulous. Loved Cuba and would thoroughly recommend it..hope to go back with Mr SFT one day.

Take care all

sft

Skint_Lynne

I hope this works, I have been trying to post all day and it kept rejecting them, so fingers crossed.:rolleyes:

A good productive day was had, I made potato scones for breakfast and tried out cream of chicken and mushroom soup for the first time, it worked out really well, so I'll make it again. I done it with chicken stock I made myself, I would never have dreamed of doing that before I found this thread.

I had 2 loads of washing out and that was all dried off. I love the smell of it when it comes back in from outside drying, there's nothing like it.;)

I was out for dinner this afternoon with the family, I didn't really talk to any of them as the nephew was there and I was busy with him, there was a lot of comments flying about, but they know that I love to keep him entertained, so the rest of them have to take a back seat when he is around.:A The good thing is that was a free meal.:T

I think that there are lots of elderflowers around my way, I will need to have a better look and see, I would never have thought that these could be eaten, I will defo have a go if they are the same thing, I'll find some pictures on the internet to double check in case I poison myself.:rolleyes:

I have a bramble bush at the bottom of my garden so I will defo pick the berries off it this year, the birds usually have them, but I think I'll try and get a big net from somewhere to cover the bush up to deter them. I fancy trying to make jam, so what better way to start than to use the berries from there.

Well, here goes nothing, I hope my post works.

cw18

Had my first fresh raspberries of the year tonight :T I had some tinned ones last week - one of the tins I found 'lurking' - but fresh are just soooooooo much nicer

DD was staying with my parents this weekend, and my Dad brought her back this evening. I'd done some shopping for her, some of which she was going to take home after collecting GDs tomorrow, and the rest on Tuesday.

But my Dad went out and harvested some raspberries off his bushes this afternoon - sent some home with DD, and called here on the way to hers to drop some off for me (and collect her shopping).

In return I've sent him home with a jar of blackberry jam I made with wild berries last year, and a jar of sweet pickle I made using a recipe I found on Weezl's 50p/day thread (made loads as one of our local shops had several punnets of plums going for a really silly clearance price one night). DD then sulked until she got a jar of the jam as well :rolleyes2

And today I bought the bits I need and didn't have (marrow, shallots and pickling vinegar) to make a huge batch of marrow chutney. Think I made my last batch around 5 years ago, but am now on my last jar (having to eke it out as I missed marrow season last year :mad: ) Have promised my Dad some of that as well, and he's chuffed to pieces The recipe we have was his Mum's, and going to visit her in the October half-term always meant we came home with several jars of that (and several of h/m pickled onions as well - yumm-mmeeeee)


Don't know how things are doing elsewhere in the country, but Dad says the raspberries are cropping well, the plums are 'OK' in terms of potential size of crop, but the apples (eaters and cookers) are almost non-existant. And apparently everyone he knows locally with these crops is saying the same thing..... so if that's the case everywhere it sounds like cooking apples prices could shoot up soon, and I love my stewed apples/apple crumbles and custard during the winter I normally end up with a fair few carriers of cookers from my parents - last year I gave away about 15lb, and that was only about a third of what I got from them

I just didn't have the freezer space to store it all They were so 'late' delivering to me I didn't think I was going to get any, and had already had quite a lot via an MSE member (which I'd passed some of to DD) - so in a way what I passed on from my parents crop was really only passing on what I'd had from elsewhere, but at a later date

slowlyfading

Evening everyone.

My hand is a little better I went to Boots and asked the Pharmacist there (mum and dad have been away this weekend) what she thinks I should do for the best, and its currently bandaged using the fast burn healing kit from Boots so hopefully that'll make it heal quicker. I went into work today but left early as I couldn't use the ovens, or wash anything up or chop anything, so it was a bit frustrating more than anything.

I've updated my signiture to show the recent spending this weekend, but I think I'm right on track to come under budget at the end of the year. Not that I want to jinx it this early on, but I'm quietly confident I've had 16 nsds in June, and hope to get maybe one more in before July, and then July will be the same aim I think

Me and the bf go to Greece in 11 days :j :j I am SO excited, and I'm going to do a bit of shopping before we go, so I actually think July will be a biiiig spend month, but never mind - it'll be totally worth it the thought that I'll have a week away, just me and him and in a gorgeous place is just so nice right now. The weather here has been dreadful.

Hope everyone is okay this evening

sf xx

sophiesmum_2

I ate my first ripe raspberry this morning but the rest are green still :rolleyes: I have got about 20 small apples so far on my baby apple tree so that is doing okay up to now.Lots of gooseberries and blackcurrants ready though:D

sf - hope the hand heals soon xx

lyndasharp

There is one apple growing on the tree in our garden, and one gooseberry on the bush.... but blackcurrant has done really well, and blueberry is looking good too. Given that it's their first year I'm pretty impressed. Slugs or snails have now eaten almost all of our bean plants though, grr. I tried putting broken eggshells round the base, but that clearly hasn't helped. Any pet safe suggestions for slug killing? There are lots of cats round here so don't want to put down anything toxic. We tried nematodes at work in our veg garden, and they had no effect at all.

Got a nice surprise of £35 of Mr T gift cards on Saturday. It's their cashback for home insurance :-) Think I know where the next grocery shop will be...

I suspect that even after buying car parts, I'm still under budget for 6 months. However I've got a slight cheat as I was only paying rent for a shared house for the first month of the year, so have been able to carry a bit over. Even so, I'm doing OK for normal monthly spends, even including the wedding stuff! Mostly because my mortgage payments have gone down so much with the interest rate cuts, and I'm paying about £100 less than I'd originally budgeted for. I'd been generous with household bills as well so again I'm getting some savings there on what I expected to spend. The spare money is going in the wedding savings pot!

H2B has an interview for a promotion at work today and was very stressed this morning about cat hairs... I told him not to have breakfast in the living room with the suit on, but he ignored me, then got into a sulk about having hairs on his trousers. He refused all my suggestions of selloptape cleaning and had to go and change. Men!

Frugaldom

Good [STRIKE]morning[/STRIKE] afternoon

BB, your new room and new lifestyle sounds all cosy and romantic. Well done on achieving so much, even if you don't always see the progress as quickly yourself. :T

Thrifty, I haven't included targets in the challenger list this year as so many people are on different budgets, so don't worry about being over - it's how and why you got to be over that is the focus of the challenge more than anything. Are you using your actual budgetted figures or are you just cja;;enging yourself to stay within set parameters for spending?

CW, I have about a dozen tiny apples on each of two of my new trees. I wasn't expecting any this year but there could be enough for a crumble or two :j Wish I could say same of raspberry bushes. You should try a little veg growing, find out how much you can manage without it affecting your back and that way you'll know if launching headlong into a life or rural frugaldom is the one for you.

Blairweech, if your budget stretches to an increase without incurring debts or reducing or missing debt repayments, then set your targets accordingly and good luck for the second half. My 4k has been set at that for a few years and should have been increased accordingly. However, I'm a bit too obsessive about it and I have a longterm plan to stick with, so 4k is my personal preference. I'll let you know at year end if it is still possible, as there isn't an awful lot left to give up to help reduce spends.

Lynda, pet hairs can be a real pain, nothing worse than seeing someone well dressed and then they turn round and are covered in them. Good luck educating the OH2B not to go anywhere hairy before work. What about one of those sticky rollers? Friend in the cops swore by them, as cat hairs weren't really acceptable as part of her uniform. If he refuses to use sticky tape or rollers, you'll just need to make sure you get to the room first and use it on the furniture and cat. :rotfl:

Apologies for late post today, I keep losing my Internet connection. :mad: I started this at 7.45am and keep editing bits into the offline version! Hope I have caught up now.

patchwork_cat

Lynda - slugs have you tried beer traps? Also vaseline works, but it needs a thick wide layer and reapplying. Did this last year with our grow bags - you could make collars for the plants out of old plastic and smear vaseline over that- egg shells and gravel never worked for us either. Also go out at dusk and pick them off, I can't pour salt on them that is cruel.

Savvy_sewing

There is an apple tree in the garden (no idea what variety), that is dropping its fruit, which is about 2-3cm in size. Is this something thats normal? I havent had a fruit tree in any of my gardens before?
With the help of my BF, we put in another cleared patch of garden, with lettuces and onions, however with this hot weather I think we have killed the lettuces!!
I was out there watering them at tea time, only to have a thunderstorm within minutes of finishing.!!