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

Frugaldom

Thriftkitten wrote: »

Maybe I should put an ad in or place it on a profile somewhere,

"Lady looking for friendship leading to posible LTR,
Many good qualities including wholesome cooking,
non shopaholic and the willpower to run the household
on 4k per year"...
Oh why didn't I think of this before!!!
Only downfall is how do you write
"can always make something out of nothing"
and make that sound attractive!!!

Just write, "I'm a huge fan of frugal living, thriftiness may be my your middle name, but I haven't a mean bone in my body."

BigMummaF wrote: »

Not meaning to put a dampener but I heard the tail end of THIS on the local news last night. Sounds like Life is going to be getting more interesting from here on in as I can see other utilities jumping on the bandwagon...

OK, if this gets passed as policy then I'm investing my virtual savings in water butt, tank and plastic barrel manufacturing companies. What a great opportunity to store when it's 'cheap rate' and then use them during 'peak rate'. Could mean an overall saving if you worked the plan carefully! Every cloud, and all that.... frugaltastic positive spin.

All 3 chicks doing really well so far, SM's been round to visit, we've had our coffee and kitchen table discussions and my soft cheese has passed the taste test. The yoghurt, to my relief, can be put back into warm flask for a second setting time, so fingers crossed it thickens up better this time around.

Having been really frugal and only paying extras once I have earned extra 'free' cash. I have managed to stick another £300 away into this year's ISA! :j I'm now only £350 short of filling it and, as long as I don't go over budget, this should be available by the end of March. I'm REALLY pleased about this, especially as HS is now doing similar and should be able to fill his. I just need DS to do the same, so he makes some progress towards saving for his future. He started off pretty well but blew all his savings on a car and hasn't been able to replace them since.

Today's bread has been made, 2 lots of washing now done, all the big stuff our on the line in the hope of it drying before the rain returns. It's windy out, so there's some hope. I also lit the fire this morning, but it's a frugal fire based on paper bricks, just smoldering away in the background and warming the livingroom.

Hope everyone is having a great weekend. I'll get my budget to date posted later.

Puddleglum

Hi Folks,

congratulations to all for weddings, babies (still contained!), chicks (released), datishes and frugal living.

I seem to be coming in under budget again this month, which is great. Today has been a bit expensive though. DD and DS both needed new swiming costumes in order to stay decent and we were unable to find anything suitable in either of our local thrift shops, so we had to buy new from the leisure centre. £17 pounds has now been taken off my £100 clothing allowance for the 3 of us for the year and they had better stay decent for a good while!:p

There was a rebellion yesterday at Puddleglum Mansion as the family decided that as they had not had any meat since Christmas, they wanted a cooked (full English) breakfast and Sunday lunch this week. Never one to stand in the way of a revolution, :cool:I consulted with the butcher this morning and bought bacon and a pork hand. The hand cost £5.13 and he assures me that there should be plenty to stash some away in the freezer incase the peasants start looking nasty again. Anyway, they have promised that they won't ask for anymore meat until at least Easter!

Hope today is good for everyone. Batten down the hatches tomorrow.

crystals2632

not been on for a whilefather ill, pneumonia, but getting there, filled in dla carers for mum, but unsureabout level of care needed as his situation has changed so rapidly. bought bed down stairs and comode. hospital visit today at 3, staff placed him on pureed food which he is not eating so will take soup and soft cake. we are all a bit worried at mo.savings 1006 woooho magic number breach.next target 1100.hopefully he should be better in a few days and i can keep uptodate with all the posts.

ellemm

Hi all, not been posting as not much to report. Living quietly and watching the budget but have been keeping up with all the posts and what everyone is up to.

Quietly pleased with progress so far.

I must say Frugaldom parts of your lifestyle reminds me of when I lived in the wilds of Argyll when my family were young-growing all our own veg, keeping hens, ducks, geese and even peacocks although it was more necessity rather than choice due to very low agricultural wages

The kids all had their chores to do (in rotation to stop any moaning) such as feeding the hens, collecting eggs and bringing in logs for the fires. Now as grown ups they do remember those days fondly although they all live in towns now.

Keep up the good work everyone and have a good weekend.

catznine

:hello:Hello!

Just checking in with my fortnightly report and I have just scraped through which is not quite what I hoped for! Yes I have come in at £49.32 under budget so that's good but I hoped for better and am hanging my head in shame. Hopefully it will work out better over the year though. Some of the money has gone on a Costco stock up and we now have plenty of tinned tuna, lemon juice, mixed spice, rice, tea, coffee, chicken, braising beef, salmon and tuna steaks in store. Also an af order with lots of cous cous, rice, herbs& curry paste so lots to play with.

The last week has been quiet around here as we have had the dreadful sickness bug that is doing the rounds, it leaves you very drained and off your food (very moneysaving!). Offset somewhat by our pooch getting a lacerated paw! ouch! There is one very sad and cuddly dog here! Why oh why must people (kids?) spread broken beer bottles around our local parks? :mad:Thank goodness for pet insurance but we still have to find the £100 excess. She is definately worth it though!

A week before the illness I managed to make some marmalade (12 jars) and some blackberry jelly (8 jars) using up the hg berries from the freezer and cheap sugar from costco and very nice it is too. I now have some kiwi fruit to use up, has anyone made kiwi jam or jelly sucessfully?

I have now found your blog frugaldom and being ill and having a bit of time on my hands, am catching up with all that has been going on, loving the chickwatch! congrats! also sophiesmum's blog. Very inspiring both of you! I realise that I have not even begun to scratch the surface of true frugaldom, although I have in the past made yogurt, you get better, thicker results if you use a thick (greek style) starter. If I ever had too thin yogurt I would turn it into ice cream (adding some cocktail type cherries works well in this).

I am lucky enough to have a food dehydrator and made some lovely cinnamon sugared apple rings which are much nicer than sweeties but were meant to be for pies:o this is one of the best pieces of kitchen equipment I have as you can avoid food waste without adding yet more to the freezer! It made some lovely orange slices for the christmas tree, threaded on some thin red ribbon I had in the sewing box (much cheaper than the ridiculous amount of money Liberties wanted!)

Today we went to our MU coffee morning (raising money for the make a mothers day appeal) I spent £8 from charity budget but after buying a cuppa and cake and entering the raffle, came away with several nice things.

body shop reed difuser for £1.50
lovely metallic make up bag with unused/new no 7 eye shadow inside for 40p
pair of pink stripy fingerless gloves (new) for £1
retro knitting needle case for 20p
unwrapped set of 3 audio casettes(agatha christie poirot) for 50p
Set of 6 morney flower soaps for 60p (The wrapping is not in such good condition so might keep these for our own use)

That has certainly topped up the present box. The present budget is much reduced these days and this has really helped. I have made about 20 cards from what I had around the house so should save some money that way as well. I re-use any nice wrapping paper and have a few rolls of ikea brown paper tucked away which could be decorated and used.

Dinner tonight is from the freezer, a soya mince chilli with some rice. Pudding (if we are up to it) will be some more of the af tinned fruit from last year. Really hope to have enough energy soon to venture out in the garden to see what needs doing out there. We should have some brussels ready to use by now!

Anyway have waffled on for long enough! Off for a cuppa using another of the free green tea bags that came in the post last week! The mint one was brilliant for a poorly tum!

Catz x

ChinaTea

Frugaldom wrote: »

Silly question but why does it say 'Happy 7th Birthday' on the MSE website header? I'm sure I've been reading this site since at least 2002.

China Tea, the ground here is beginning to feel like permafrost as it's been frozen for so long. Hoping to get my fruit trees planted soon but looking more and more likely that they'll be going into big pots at this rate. Sorry to hear about the trouble with your carpet, sounds disastrous! Glad you've settled your mind on the Degree, simplifying life is always for the best in the long run, especially if you have health worries.

Only just got round to catching up, keep falling asleep every time I'm not actually doing something

The garden has gone from being frozen to being in danger of floating away. We've had 3 days of almost constant rain on already heavy clay soil. I think my fruit trees will have to go in containers, I have some large ones that should do the job and should be easier to protect from any frost.

Had 18 NSDs this month, well pleased and have come in well under budget. Enough left in current account to cover next months DDs and a bit left over. This is totally unheard of and I have spent on the garden with seeds, fruit bushes and trees and a couple of books. Grocery spend this month including a £16 approved foods order is a grand total of £25.62 :T. Freezer is full to bursting from batch cooking and baking. Store cupboard is pretty well stocked as well so looking good for March.

Has anyone tried bottling fruit? Bought a book of wartime recipes that has instructions and I seem to remember it being shown on Wartime Kitchen a while ago. I used to salt runner beans way back in the 70s before we had a freezer, an elderly neighbour showed me how but never bothered once we got a freezer. Thought I might do this again and bottle surplus fruit from the garden and save some freezer space.

Going to see my parents tomorrow and taking DGS as they haven't seen him for a while, he's their only GGS and a lot of hints have been dropped about it. DS got the 5p a litre off voucher from MrT and was going to throw it in the bin. I rescued it and have used it for the petrol for tomorrow, put £20 in and got 90p off every bit helps.

Hope everyone has a good weekend and hopefully spring is just around the corner.

Frugaldom

HI guys, just updating regarding February spending and am under budget overall! :j Entire month's spend (won't be spending anything this weekend) amounts to £259.35 from household budget. Over past 2 months, total spend has been £600.66, so I'm really pleased with progress. Groceries have been not too bad, considering I've squeezed an Appr0ved F00d and Barga!n F00ds order into it. Total grocery spend to date for 2010 stands at £156.67 including some big bags of porridge oats that I asked SM to pick me up from Mr A. (Much cheaper than we can get here). Monthly grocery average = £78.34 but am aiming for average £75, so I'm a bit over in that department owing to stocking up on stuff like toilet rolls and kitchen rolls.

In my 'EEK' challenge, I've managed to 'earn' £225.97 extra and have spent £164.10. This 'Everything Else Kitty' gets used to pay things like hen & duck food, stuff for the garden, National Trust membership and a tax free savings bond. I have £61.87 balance left in the kitty. March is usually quite a good month for cashback etc, so I'm hoping to get well ahead of the game in making my 'everything else' cash neutral in 2010 whilst also getting my household running costs below £4,000. I can but try, then I'm in with a chance of filling my ISA.

Ellemm, we rented a small holding for a short time when my kids were little and I always had rented land & livestock. I never expected my kids to stay with the rural living but amazingly, after finishing college and making the most of townlife, DD returned to a nearby rural community and DS is still here, enjoying country living too much to even consider moving.

Catznine, hope you're feeling better soon and I'm glad you enjoyed the 24 hour chickwatch 'festival'. :rotfl: Send an ear scratch to limping doggy and well done with your bargains.

Crystals, I hope your dad's health improves very soon.

Puddleglum, I hope your restless natives have calmed and the rebellion quashed. :rotfl:

I'm off out to help HS plant the fruit trees now - I think he's been out there long enough to have got the hard work part of digging the holes completed. :rotfl:

China Tea - just saw your post, our bottling and canning experts should be along shortly, there are a couple on here with canners, so I'm sure there'll be recommendations or cautions relating to what's best to do. I think they're doing peas and carrots etc just now.

rictus123

Big slip up today, bet and lost £150 on the football. So way over budget. Add on another £50 though as thats what il probs spend tonight. Away out to get drunk. Might aswel try and enjoy myself now and again seeing as for the past 2 and a half years iv got myself into £4k of debt, now about £1500. Got a rust bucket of a van which has more dents and scratches than any other vehicle iv ever seen and is also louder than all the scooped up cars i see going about town... Mot out next month which itl no way pass, i dont even think im going to bother, why spend so much money on something i really hate. Only bought it because of the cheap insurance - £700 for the year, yet its cost me at least that in repairs. What a wreck it is its embarrasing. Only think iv got to show for my money at 18 is that bucket + the fact i paid for every single thing to get me through my test. If this is all there is to life then whats the point,im only 18 !!!!!!. Working to keep a van on the road..whats the point. Away out into town soon to hopefully take my mind off of things. Not much of a life.

kittiej

BigMumma - you made me laugh re the hat.

Rictus- how can you bet so much on a bag of air? A pound a week on the lottery with the peeps at work is about my limit lol.

Try to keep your money in your pocket next time

angela110660

rictus123 wrote: »

Big slip up today, bet and lost £150 on the football. So way over budget. Add on another £50 though as thats what il probs spend tonight. Away out to get drunk. Might aswel try and enjoy myself now and again seeing as for the past 2 and a half years iv got myself into £4k of debt, now about £1500. Got a rust bucket of a van which has more dents and scratches than any other vehicle iv ever seen and is also louder than all the scooped up cars i see going about town... Mot out next month which itl no way pass, i dont even think im going to bother, why spend so much money on something i really hate. Only bought it because of the cheap insurance - £700 for the year, yet its cost me at least that in repairs. What a wreck it is its embarrasing. Only think iv got to show for my money at 18 is that bucket + the fact i paid for every single thing to get me through my test. If this is all there is to life then whats the point,im only 18 !!!!!!. Working to keep a van on the road..whats the point. Away out into town soon to hopefully take my mind off of things. Not much of a life.

Don't worry about -as you say- being 18 with only your van to show for all your debt. You are so young and you have reduced your debt already. Pat yourself on the back and keep going. Get rid of the van - could you use the train or bus or get a bike? My son who is 21 shares my car with me but is about to buy a bike for fitness and saving money. He travelled in Oz and NZ last year - very frugally using hostels and bought a tent for some of his travelling to save money. He worked as he had visas for NZ and Oz and since he came home he is working part time again and has saved over £1K already. BUt apart from all that he has nothing to speak of - not even a van !! But hey - what experiences he has had already and the future ahead of him too. Owning "things" is not everything - life is what you make it. Don't go and spend that £50 on drink tonight - it will all be flushed away by tomorrow morning.