FRUGAL LIVING CHALLENGE 2010, part 2, April - June.

NualaBuala

Evening all :wave:


Kerry Woman, well done on your progress! I think it’s the small changes (like being aware of what you spend) that help you save in the long run.

SF, good to see you over here. I hope you’re feeling better, haven’t been keeping track of your diary thread recently.

Hope you don’t get the soup and gloop mixed up Jen!:) Maybe the scent in your gloop is getting washed away in the rinse cycle? I get a nice smell on my laundry by putting some essential oil on the cotton bag that holds my soapnuts in the wash. The scent seems to survive the rinse cycle. So I’m wondering if you could put some essential oil on a rag or something and throw it in the drum with the rest of the laundry? Hope you’re taking some time for yourself – no idea how you manage doing 2 jobs! I really admire you for it though.

ChinaTea, hope the builders won’t take too long. It would drive me nuts having them around – all the noise etc. And even worse for you if you have M.E. A few of my friends have suggested that maybe that’s what I have, and not depression. Am back to my Doc tomorrow so will ask him then. Best of luck with your debts. I’m not an expert by any means but if you’re not being charged interest, I’d save in an interest-bearing account and pay them off one by one.

I love all the frugal language Frugaldom! I’m not sure if we have any other Irish posters/readers here? Will have to think up a nice name for our neck of the frugal woods. :-)

Thanks Lynda! I spent a little time in the garden today but nothing too strenuous. 2 naps helped me feel less exhausted. No signs of anything germinating yet – I am like a watchful mother hen clucking over her eggs! Great news that you’re rid of your naughty tenant. Hopefully you’ll have an ideal tenant moved in soon.

Hey Erme aka online sister :-) Your prayers must have done the trick because I’m feeling pretty good this evening – thank you! Really really hope you catch up on your sleep tonight. If I don’t get enough I am fit for nothing. Free milka sounds good if we’re talking about chocolate.

Great news about increasing your hours Cheryl!!!

I have just had a couple of hours of cheesey fun watching the Eurovision semi-final. I love it, it's such fun! Ireland is competing in the 2nd qualifier on Thursday - we've been pretty rubbish lately and I can't help but think of the Father Ted episode where they put carp songs through as we couldn't afford to host it.:rotfl: Not casting any aspersions though as I haven't even heard our song yet. But Moldova may have captured my vote as they had a lot of the right ingredients IMHO including silver spandex.

Candygirl - I meant to wish you a great trip away but I think you've already left! Glad it's all tootling along nicely with Mr Meerkat ... am eagerly awaiting the next installment!

Hope you're all doing well and hugs all around ... if I manage to get this pic to work, you can thank Erme for her instructions!

chika

Hello everyone,

Jen have you tried boiling the ham before adding it to the soup? put in a pan of cold water, bring to the boil and repeat three or four times until it it less salty. i do this when cooking salted cos and it works really well.

Erme I agree about the BB dates on stuff. especially from M&S or Waitrose. I used to eb really fussy about things like that but as long as it hasn't changed colour or doesn't smell bad then I'm having it. The local Marks does really good reductions on fruit and veg and I find that the stuff often lasts up to a week after the BB date.

Its a bit hectic here at the moment. I've spent the past few weeks applying for teaching jobs. I really wanted to move back to my home town but its not happening as I've had no response from any of the four schools I applied to there. However, every school I've applied to in Manchester has called me for an interview - I have two today and two tomorrow so fingers crossed I get one of them! Wish me luck frugallers.

NualaBuala

Best of luck Chika!!!! But I'm sure you don't need it - you must be pretty amazing to get called to all those interviews!

Keiss_21

BigMummaF wrote: »

Advice please!
Neighbour has given us a room sized carpet & I intend to put it over the back garden to help rid the blummin weeds :mad: so:-
1. It's a foam backed carpet. Does it make a difference if it goes pile side up or down? At the moment, Pup thinks he's struck gold by having somewhere so luxurious to lay in the sun, when his mates only get grass :rotfl:
2. How long do we leave it down for?
3. Is this likely to be an almost permanent solution, that should enable us to get ahead of the game & just be able to do the odd bit of weeding as we see them?

Can't sit here tho..too much to do. Hope the sun is shining in your world too x

Hya BMF, foam-backed carpet will work pretty well in keeping down the weeds. Just be prepared for bits of foam-stuff hanging about for ages afterwards!! If the carpet itself has any man-made fibres in it, it won't disintegrate/rot down, but you may want that!! Whereas a wool and canvas carpet can be left on and covered and will eventually rot down. I still have some carpet lying around my garden after over 10 years..great for keeping paths clear of weeds!!

As to which way up....if you have cats about...then don't have the foam-side up....they rip it to threads!!! I must admit our cats and dog loved the carpets going down..and the boys did too - they were much younger then!! :rotfl:

Good luck with it all...we are still fighting the weeds in our garden...very little got done last year when I was ill...so this year it is an uphill struggle...and worse now we have plants we want to keep that are being swamped by tons of weeds....aaaargh :mad:

[QUOTE=pagangirl;33086689Sorry for rant - just so cheesed off with everything - sick note from doc said severe irritable bowel syndrome, came out with anti-depressants - huh ??? Took 1 tablet, totally spaced out for 19 hours - scary stuff - definitely won't be taking any more - don't even have depression to start with - now even more confused than before [/QUOTE]Hya pagangirl, rant away...you can feel much better afterwards !! I suffered from IBS years ago, which was triggered by a bout of gastroenteritis, but kept going by stress...so I can sort of understand your GP's thinking.

Saying that, I did have the famed P**z*c when I had depression post DS2's birth...I also got counselling at the same time...the anti-depressant doesn't get you out of the depression hole, it just stops you digging deeper. It was the counselling that did the work....and it did take two years!!

I had another bout last year, after numerous months of physical illnesses...and I refused to have further medication (some of my meds made me ill!! :mad:). Thankfully I was able to see a wonderful Cognitive Behaviour Therapist (CBT). who I saw for over 8 months...expensive (not prepared to wait for over 4 months on the NHS!!). I don't see her now, but I know if I need to talk, she is only a phone-call away.

Go back to the doc and see if you can get different meds and/or some counselling help - the waiting list may be less than here!! It is worth having a look. If you can't afford couonselluing, can you find a meditation group...this really helps with stress, which could ease lots of your problems.

PS My IBS was sorted by sticking to the F-Plan diet for 6 months (lost loads of weight too )...and being back living in the UK...so needed to treat both fronts...food and stress.

Hope this helps.

top_drawer wrote: »

..... laundry gloop - I put 8 drops of lemon essential oil in the mix but I am not smelling any scent at all from the washed items. I'm a little disappointed as I was really hoping for really smellie clothes as I have never been able to afford the smellie washing powders/liquid.... maybe I could add some softener? I have been using white vinagar in the washer when I wash the guinea pigs stuff and that really helps to get rid of the smell of urine. Really wish we had a chinese supermarket around here as I need to buy a huge amount of it to be able to use it as much as I would like too - 99p for 500 ml just isn't enough. Jen

What is this gloop you talk of, have I missed something???

As to finding cheap vinegar, I get 5 litres for £1.99 at my local greengrocers...it is spiced, but that doesn't seem to matter !

Right, off to sow some seeds...it's not too hot out there, thank goodness!!

Wow, just seen how much I have wittered...sorry about that!

cw18

cw18 wrote: »

So (subject to rubber stamping by store management and head office HR) I'm going to be adding another 5 hours to my contract, taking me up to 29 hours/week - which is pretty close to the 30 I've calculated I really need as a minimum to stay afloat after September.

And the really good news is that the very first thing I was told on arrival in the bakery today was that it's been rubber stamped :T

So starting next week I'm on 29 hours a week on a permanent basis, though the contracts haven't yet been printed off for signing.......

The lady who wanted to drop her Monday shift was in today (we have a 1 hour overlap on Mon, Wed, Thur & Fri), and she seemed as pleased as me that it's been given the thumbs up





But the not so good news (looking at my spreadsheet) is that I'm struggling with my grocery budget this year

Last year I ended up with it set to £1.55 per person per day, and came in just 79p over budget on the entire year which I thought was pretty good going - especially as we didn't seem to have missed out on anything major to get there.

I've set it to £1.70 per person per day for this year, but decided that what I'd spent on anything I'd stockpiled prior to year end would be syphoned off (as I used the items) for possible stocking up at the end of this year (or used as a 'lump sum' I could save for a rainy day having run down my grocery mountains) - and it's not working out!!

So far I've used £68 of stock-piled goodies, but am £45.31 overspent on 'new' purchases and still need a few things (like milk for DS) before month end

Thought that maybe I was buying less Whoopsies on average, but that's not the case. In 2009 I spent £429.65 on Whoopsies (worth £1573.09), and my groceries as a whole came in at 53.73% of shelf ticket prices. So by the end of May this averages out to approx a £179.02 Whoopsie spend on goods worth £655.45. So far this year I've spent £219.24 on Whoopsies worth £887.54, and my groceries as a whole have cost 42.67% of the shelf ticket prices.

So I guess I'm feeling the impact of all the price increases that have been creeping up on us :mad:

I really don't want to increase my grocery budget, so am just keeping my fingers crossed that once DS moves out in September I can balance it out (I have bought some stuff already that won't get used until then, as it's stuff he doesn't like but I do...... and I bulk bought when on offer)

Erme

hugs everyone. I passed my first part of my ECDL ...so am pretty pleased but still zombie mode and last of the busy days today .

Vol work was good yesterday though made lots of mistakes (S couldn't read my handwriting and a lot of my notes for S got lost on K's desk including one for an urgent uplift :eek:) but will work out. Volunteer coordinator is lovely and I think he could see how tired I was cos he kept dropping hints about going home. Kitchen = gorgeous , smoking area not bad. Left my £1 a day book on vol coordinator's desk though so will pick up later when I go to pick up my ironing board (Minky ironing board going for £3...yeah that'll do me nicely) :t. Told chief exec how much I spend on food per week and she was surprised till I said "Yeah but I smoke, can't afford to spend a lot on food when I smoke. No point in moaning about it ". She liked that cos they give out food parcels and stuff. They also recycle carpets ...forgot that and they have won lots of awards .

Anyhow getting a little worried about incapacity benefit changes but then I rationalise and say 'it's not till October and that's like 20 weeks away or almost 6 months - why worry - just keep preparing/working on back to work stuff.'. I don't mind where I work. So long as it's enough to pay the bills and I can do it. I'm hoping ideally to get Mr S cos I can get there in the snow. Or somewhere nearby.

WELL DONE NUALA ON THE SMILEYS.

Anyhow shower time so have to go...

Blessings...

E

BigMummaF

Frugaldom wrote: »

....the kingdom of frugality in Scotland is Frugaldom and in Wales it's Frugonia. Not sure if anyone has named the English or Irish equivalents. :rotfl:....

Perhaps the Reds could be Frugalham & the Green Frugalin?

cw18 wrote: »

....But the not so good news (looking at my spreadsheet) is that I'm struggling with my grocery budget this year
....guess I'm feeling the impact of all the price increases that have been creeping up on us :mad:....

Tell me about it :cool: My shopping has gone up almost two quid on just 6 items, & they are shop's own stuff too :undecided It will be interesting to see the government's take on "essential items" in their imaginary shopping baskets, when it comes to calculating inflation!

ChinaTea

Builder’s still here and confined to 1 room for today. Have new walls, door frames and ceilings in so looking good there, no doors as yet so still have open plan bathroom. The bathroom floor is coming up as I speak and I have fingers crossed building inspector turns up in time to give the go ahead for it to go back down today. The long weekend is fast approaching but the builder keeps telling me it will be done and finished before then, still looks like a building site to me though.

Upside is that I have caught up with a good few things that have been hanging around for ages. My sewing machine had been stuck in the back of a cupboard for a couple years but it’s certainly earned it’s keep this week. Now I’ve got back into sewing going to try and find some cheap/free patterns for clothes/furnishings. I have set a budget of £150 to for decorating, floors, curtains etc. Not much but doable with some creative thinking. I was going to replace the blinds at the front windows, the old ones are 12+ years old and despite cleaning still have the yellow tinge from my smoking days. I had bought new nets for all the 7 windows a while ago, the receipt in the bag said 07/09/2005 so yesterday altered them to fit the 3 windows at the front and will get the rest done today hopefully so a big saving there.


NualaBuala – Good Luck at the Dr’s getting a diagnosis for ME is much better than it was a few years ago. Just a thought but thyroid symptoms are similar to ME so might be worth asking about that as well.

Still not sure about debts. Had a nasty call from a DCA yesterday for a review of the token payment I was making. The little S**T told me that I did not have the right to have pets and I should get rid of them along with BB, car and TV. Usually I take this sort of thing as par for the course but to be told that I should get rid of beloved cats really hurt, I would willingly live in a tent with nothing as long as I have them.

I don’t have what I would class as luxuries, I haven’t had a holiday since 1993 the last time I went out socially was March 2009. I can’t get anywhere without the car and do only use it for shopping and visiting parents every few weeks. I only have a small portable TV and BB is my link to the outside world but he seemed to think I didn’t need any of this. In the end I said politely that I wasn’t trying to get out of paying my debts and I fully acepted responsibility for them and any future contact should be by post only. Do these people sleep at night?

Sorry to ramble and hope everyone is OK. Congrats CW on the job.

Kiwisaver_2

Well I'm checking out now for May, have massively overspent this month, but my mind has been elsewhere and I should catch up over the next month. Just one more sleep and a day at the office tomorrow and then I fly away. :T

Fridge is all but empty and everything cleared and packed away, we managed to consume all the perishables bar two onions that I threw away. I made a big fat omelette for dinner tonight and used everything that was left in the fridge, except a small chunk if cheese I bunged in the freezer. So I am rather pleased with myself for micro-managing the meal plan so accurately.

Anyway, I'll catch up with you all in a month and hope you remember to turn on the sunshine for me.

slowlyfading

Well, it's my last day on placement tomorrow.... :eek: