FRUGAL LIVING CHALLENGE 2010, part 1. (Living on £4,000 a year)

Ches

Cheryl I think you should discount the whole amount paid for the coat as apart from the present money it was all money either saved or cash backed from 2009 spends. If you count it as spent in 2010 it will distort the figures as its not money earned this year. Well done.

I have only spent £6 so far from this weeks h/k and that was on my hobby. Dinner tonight was leftover Christmas roast beef so very cheap. I will be shopping tomorrow though but have made a list. If I keep to the list except for anything too much of a bargain not to stock up on, then I should be OK for this week.

sabs10

Hello All,

Another NSD today


Frugal achievements today;

• finished renovating the small chest of drawers for additional shelving in Kitchen. Decided to paint the drawers with paint from Dad - he has loads of half empty tins so will ask him first in future before going to Wickes for paint.
• Used leftover wallpaper from decorating DD1's bedroom as lining paper for all kitchen cupboards - so all cupboards are now clean & organised.
• listed 10 items on ebay - need to raise some funds for brownie camps for DD's.
• Dinner was from the freezer - had a chicken pie filling which was reheated with some curry powderto turn it into chicken curry served with rice & steamed brocolli. Am going to make all meals from freezer, and remains of fridge & storecupboard. Hopefully will not need to buy any groceries this week.

Am quite pleased with today's progress - day 1 out of 7 NSD for this week

Bye for now

sabs10

Fishcake_Random

Lillibet - Sounds like a perfect moment to me, I've been able to have all the windows in our flat open today and the whole place just feels so much fresher.

JayneC - Have you considered freezing all your crusts and left over ends of bread for bread and butter puddings??? Thats where ours normally end up and crusts are extra nummy to put in it.

Thrifty Lass- OH and I always share a bath to make it more frugal as I love a nice hot bath and he likes a luke warm one so we even out pretty well. I always leave the water in the bath afterwards untill its cold so it helps heat up the flat in winter and in summer gives you somewhere cool to duck your feet in for a cool down lol. Also when I finally drain it I leave an inch or two and pop all my plants in for the day to have a drink (depending on wether I've used bath oil etc, but normally its just cheapy shampoo which they dont mind).

BigMummaF - Please can I have a recipe for those cheese straws, OH loves them and I've never found a recipe that quite does it for him. Never through of adding the mustard either.

Update on my frugallings;
Dinner has now been eaten lol nom nom nom.
Socks are finished and wrapped for delivery and elephant mark 2 has four legs made.
Just finishing up the last of the milk (yesterdays date) in some hot chocolate and its beddy byes for me.
x x x x

cw18

Sounds like everyone's had a pretty good day - Skint Lynne, I really like the sound of yours

Just totted up todays spends....

'Regular' bills :
£17 on presents (T-shirts for DS1, 2 or 3 for birthday and 1 or 2 for Christmas)
£3.95 on 'work expenses' to cover a key for my locker at work (they should hold a spare, but I discovered on Thursday - when I couldn't find mine! - that they don't. So I've now got a spare, which I'll test tomorrow, with my house keys as well as the original on my swipe card/name badge)

Groceries :
Mr A : £8.76, including £3 on 9 bottles of pop for DS2 - which will have to last him until mid-March.
Mr T : £17.28, including 8 multi-packs of McC0ys crisps (favourite in our house) which are currently half price - also to last, as I'll only bring out one multi pack a week
Mr M : £2.79, which was all Whoopsie buys (worth £15.65)

Toiletries & Cleaning :
£9.95 on coat cleaner (fully discounted as money from present, 2009 budget, and 2009 'cashback')
£1.50 on washing up bowl (not had one in this house, but had noticed during the cold snap that the water is cooling much quicker due to having a metal sink that's been a lot colder)
50p on a 'dish brush' (much needed for cleaning grater and potato masher)
£5 on toilet rolls (24 rolls, so should last three months or so)

'Others' :
£169 on coat (discounted as per cleaner)
£5 on sweatshirt (15-16 boys from school uniform section in Mr T. Bought one last year, and it's a nice fit plus snug under my normal 'XL' loose fit ones - great for layering up)
£2.25 on a pizza cutter (current one fell to pieces a couple of months ago, and is now hard to use)

Total spend = £242.98 :eek:
Spend from 2010 budget = £64.03 (sounds a lot better )



Off to get my road tax on-line now - don't think I've any D/Debs due out for a few days, so ordering it tonight means I don't ruin a day that could otherwise be a total NSD :rolleyes2

chinagirl

NSD for me today! Went for a walk in the country near my house, as the weather was good. Needed milk, but my DS1 was going out in his car, so asked him to buy for me, and he paid.

BigMummaF

CHEESE STRAWS.
8oz Plain Flour
8oz Marg/Butter
8ox Grated Cheese
Pinch Salt
I added 2 generous teaspoons mustard powder as we like a bit of a kick.

Sift together the flour, salt & mustard powder. Rub in the marg. Mush together as it forms a dough WITHOUT adding water etc. I put mine in a sandwich little bag & chilled it in the fridge of a couple of hours, then rolled it out on the floured baking sheet. Cut into slices & bake in a hot oven approx 30mins.

Sorry I can't be more accurate with the temperature--my oven only ever works on Gas Mk6 & it had been on for about an hour cooking the joint The mix was a tad messy which is why I thought I should have used the block marg as suggested, but it came out OK.

redglass_2

Hmmm, not long since i suggested freezing bananas and it just so happens that i was blending a frozen one tonight when one of the toothy bits underneath the blender goblet (the bits that mesh with the rest of the machine) broke. The blender still works and TBH I don't know if the banana was the cause, but i feel i have to warn you! Probably best to cut the fruit into smaller pieces if you try making a smoothie in this way (I was too lazy to bother and it was quite hard to blend.)

FrankieM

Morning all,
I have a day of house stuff to do today so that hopefully means I won't be spending any money!
I need to do some baking, cleaning and paperwork.

It's still dark at the moment so no idea what the weather will bring but I'm hoping to be too busy to notice till this afternoon...I really must get on top of things. I've left it far too long and its now starting to feel a little out of control. Of course I'm also not sure how I'm going to fit everything in as well as Uni, which starts tomorrow for 3 days a week...Its going to be a very steep learning curve.

Righto, going to read some blogs and do some other browsing until the kinders leave for school.
Have a good day everyone.

slowlyfading

good morning everyone

I'm spending the day in a primary school for a change, so it'll be interesting what we'll be roped in to do! Should result in a NSD though

Have a good day everyone.

mooomin

Frugal plans for today

1. Take lunch to work with me (HM soup, HM flapjack, reduced grapes, reduced crisps)
2. Take full advantage of free coffee at work
3. Charge phone at work
4. Pay Very bill for cheap clothes bought before Christmas
5. Slow-cooked chilli for dinner, hide some from Mr Fresian and freeze it. He sees 3 litres of chilli as a challenge, not a batch-cook :rolleyes:

Aiming for a NSD today, but might head to M&S and see if they still have £1 items in their sale.