Karnevil SOA - tentative first steps

karnevil

I tried pack lunches at the beginning of this year - I am quite rubbish at shopping and although I really tried I would spend out on pack lunch stuff for the week for all three of the children, and it would all have gone by wednesday (the kids would take it for snacks etc - I would snack on it) So I'd end up having to go to the local garage/shop to get bits for them on thursday which cost a small fortune. I dont think I can do pack lunch for £1.70 a day ? If anyone has any shopping lists for this type of thing it would be great - escpecially in september when number 3 child goes to school too !

I agree with the broadband thing....i'm on BT - I'll have a look around - aren;t there some free ones at the mo ?

Thanks for your help - any advice is brilliant....

lynzpower

Hello & welcome
Yes you can do packed lunches for WELL cheap. PUt it this way, me & my OH have packed lunches for work out of our shopping budget and its pence. There is a massive thread on Old Style about cheapie options some of the things that people have are pasta salads/ cous cous salads,cold pizza slices, wraps with chicken and salad,sandwiches, yoghurts, raisins, cooked sausages, sausage rolls, mini pasties , pittas with salad, meat hoummous bits of cheese, beadstidcks, crisps/pretzels/ fairy cakes Soup in a flask etc. Just for examples.

Additionally your food at 320 is :eek: - you dont need to be spending that, honestly. I guess you could easily save 120 a month. As if you add up the school dinners on this you are spending 400 a month on food almost. Plus I guess there are bits & pieces not accounted for. Be strict with this budget.

You can halve the cost of your broadband, tesco and madasafish do broadband for 15 ( plus CC points on tesco too) Your phone looks high too, what have ytou got, some kind of package? find out what it is there may be a similar package elsewhere for cheaper.

Could you also sell some of your kids clothes, toys etc that they have gorwn out of on ebay or car boot sale, that should bring money in. many of us sell on here, and its something definatley worth doing :beer:

All the best & welcome
Lynz
x

Kevicho

lynzpower wrote:

Additionally your food at 320 is :eek: - you dont need to be spending that, honestly. I guess you could easily save 120 a month. As if you add up the school dinners on this you are spending 400 a month on food almost. Plus I guess there are bits & pieces not accounted for. Be strict with this budget.

I was waiting for that i think lynz should be the offical DFW chef

lynzpower

LOL @ kevicho

Maybe I need to be using one of these :bdaycake:

karnevil

thanks guys - I'll have a look through the old style forum now. I guess if I give the kids 'made' food rather than premade packaged food they won't nick it for snacks.... the other thing is there school dinners are so good (and healthy) I'll have something to live up to. Doing my weekly shop tonight so I will try and get a list together - I tried doing it online but its just not the same and I ended up going to the local shop to get everything I missed....

Yes the kids have too many toys - I should spend a day at the weekend sorting out the rubbish and cleaning it up then getting it posted on ebay. There clothes tend to get worn to death so I dont think I can sell any of those.

I'll also try and spend an hour over the weekend findng a cheaper broadband supplier - I'll have to check my telephone stuff - I went from BT to Talk Talk but then they messed up my DD's defaulted me and I was cut off for three weeks before I got back onto BT again !so think I'll stick with BT. I dont have a package with them at the moment - so may I could save by doing that - I'll look into my options.

The food bill includes all the cleaning stuffs too. But I'm going to try and only spend £60 tonight and see how well I get through the week. Going to have to get stricter with the children.... they are so wasteful when it comes to food.

I'll post my receipt here when i get back. then I'll have that in my mind as I do the shop and not get tempted by 'cheap' flowerpots, garden toys,socks (I buy too many socks from supermarkets!) and toys...

Thanks for your comments guys. I feel like I'm back in control of things.

missk_ensington

Packed lunch shopping list-

Bread 50p x2 = £1
Large tuna tins 60p x2 =£1.20
6 eggs 80p
wafer ham -approx £1 a packet
yogurts (Asda 12 fruit corners for £3, plus other offers)
crisps 12 pack £1-1.50

TOTAL: £8.50 /2 children = £4.25/5 days in a week = 85p a day each?

This leaves you some change to buy a bit of chocolate or something to go with it. Apples/oranges/plums these only equate to maybe 25-30p each, and you would obviously make a drink using cordial.

You could also bake little fairy cakes, not only are you a) bonding with your kids b) teaching them to cook c) they have fun, but you save money!!!!

domesticgoddess

we spend heaps on yoghurts and drinking yogs for the kids, I've just ordered a Easyo maker from ideal world and hope that will save money for us. I've also stopped giving choc biscuits for pack lunches for my oldest.

I really need to cut back on our grocery bill, I've already cut out buying cleaning products, washing powder, fabric softner. We don't buy pre-packed food, so I'm going to have to keep receipts to see where ours goes.

Have you thought of having milk delivered? It saves overspending when you have to pop out to buy milk.

Glad all is going well for you. I will be looking to see if you have any tips I can steal

Kevicho

I actually enjoy making my work lunch

I usually make sandwiches and sometimes the occasional pasta/chicken or whatever.

Stick some fruit in my bag in the morning and im done for the day

Much better, and more cost eddective than nasty canteen food at 2.50+ a time

50 quid a month there

karnevil

Hi Guys, Little update - I got all my budget info from the cccs so am getting all the bits together to send back to him to make a start 1st July getting sorted.

Have managed to get all 3 children to have packed lunch for the whole week so far - I bought a few little tubs with lids, and tesco value rice pudding tins (one between the 3 of them) Crisps I also put in little pots, and they had a jam/ham/tuna sandwich each day, with a few grapes or a banana. For their drinks I have bought them reuseable bottles, and we are filling them with squash, or value apple juice which they love. So I think that will work out okay. They love their school dinners though, so I have said they can have 3 days pack lunch, two days school dinners, and we'll see how that goes.

One downer I have had - I have been trying to get a correct bill from my electricty supplier since december 2004 ! when they suddenly gave me a £1k plus bill. Then last week they adjested the whole account and it seemed I owed them over £2500 - OMG ! - today they have issued another new bill which sounds about right so I now owe them £1390 since november 2003 (we have no gas and I had only been paying £35 a month until a few months ago)

They have said they will allow me to repay this over 2 years in with my normal bill, but as my CCCS budget allows for £50 payment for electricity, what do I do ?

My creditor budget is on £178 as it is, so if I take another £58 amonth off that its going to add an extra year onto the plan, plus the actual direct debits for my ongoing useage are going to be higher as I am going to give them monthly readings.

NOW - I am claiming my charges back from the bank at the moment so IF this works out I was thinking I could use the money to get 1) double glazing (to conserve the heat from my coal fires more so I dont rely on electric heaters in the winter. OR/and get Gas central heating installed ? depending how much I can get back from the bank....

Any opinions/ideas which would be the best way to go? I can't cope with the electric bills being over £50 but my house is ruddy freezing in the winter.....

Thanks guys x

Annie_Fanny

How much are you likely to claim in bank charges?

Well done on doing the pack lunches! See you can do it!