Frugal Living Challenge 2011 - part 1

midwinter

HowlinWolf wrote: »

I have written an e-mail of complaint concern to Mr A as they had put the wrong bottles of Persil in the offer at the store I went to so I ended up with 54 wash bottles instead of 85 wash bottles. I bought them as I though the 85 earlier in the thread must have been a type but I have since checked online and it should indeed be 85 washes which would be a £10 discount off rrp.

It's good that the offer was as you thought, and hopefully Mr A's customer services will bend over backwards to say sorry...... and the odd voucher or two in compensation + larger size bottle, wouldnt go amiss!

Best of luck, hope it turns out ok.

never_too_old

itsallinthemind

i baked your lemon cake today, that too was lovely, lighter than the other as you said.2/3 gone already and i only made it this afternoon.
( we have had a few vistors who all devoured it) would love the pudding recipe when you get a spare moment.
my kitchen is definately being used now since i started this challenge, currently have ham in slow cooker and bread dough rising.:j:j:j:j

NualaBuala

I am seriously craving lemon cake now! :EasterBun And I even have whoopsied organic lemons I got yesterday reduced from €2.10 to 45c for 3. But then I'm aiming to only eat 1500 calories a day which is probably equivalent to one slice of cake!

Erme - thanks for the linkie, I've got that open now and will check it out. With the multiquote system, you're allowed 3 posts - pity because I usually want to reply to more but end up forgetting. And if you click more than 3, then the 4th one overwrites the 1st one and so on.

chika

23rdspiral wrote: »

??? has anyone ever bought glasses off the internet???

i've had my eyes checked and i do indeed need new glasses. i've been round the ususal suspects like specsavers but can't see anything i like let alone anything i'd want to spend lots of money on! i've read Martin's articles on buying online and wondered if anyone here's done it? :cool:
i saw a lovely pair of designer specs in an independent shop, 110quid (more than i've ever paid but they were Perfect); the lady had me reaching for my prescription then told me the lenses and anti-reflection coating were extra!!!! needless to say i left! i've found them online at select specs for 85.00 all in... But that's still more than specsavers cheapies, but i really like them! argh!!!!!!

I've never bought them from the net - i'm quite fussy and need to really try them on before hand if that makes sense. However, if you have an Asda optician near you they do a fantastic deal where it's £65 for complete glasses including the thinnest lenses. More info here. I had a look last time I was there and they had some nice frames. I'm really short sighted and an equivalent pair in vision express were £583 when I priced them up last week. http://www.asda-contactlenses.co.uk/opticians/glasses.html This is the site.

mooomin

wornoutmumoftwo wrote: »

Total spends this year - 624.28

Going to post properly in a minute once I've caught up, but had to stop reading to say, I absolutely LOVE your smiley guy

seriouslyfrugal

Aril wrote: »

Evening frugallers:j
If you want to go out and feel you're likely to spend perhaps one strategy would be to just take your library card with you- you can read the magazines and papers in there and then bring home lots of books to refresh you. With me it's often the need to have something new to enjoy but with this method there's no cost. The other thing I do is to visit the supermarket and pick up the free inhouse mags or some recipe cards. If you're absolutely desperate just take enough cash with you for a takeaway coffee:D
After doing that I feel like I've spent money even though none has left my purse- just diarise when the books are due back so you don't incur late payment fees
Aril
PS NSD today

I use the library a lot so I think your onto somthing here ! :rotfl:

HowlinWolf wrote: »

I have written an e-mail of complaint concern to Mr A as they had put the wrong bottles of Persil in the offer at the store I went to so I ended up with 54 wash bottles instead of 85 wash bottles. I bought them as I though the 85 earlier in the thread must have been a typo but I have since checked online and it should indeed be 85 washes which would be a £10 discount off rrp.

it was me that orginally posted that offer even I checked that i had the right size bottle as it appeared that both 54 wash & 85 wash bottles were on the same offer ( last weekend ) @ the store when i went in earlier in the week they had disapeared ( i think that they had a certain amount of stock once gone then it reverted back to the oginal price but they should have updated the website good luck with your email - always worth a try :T keep us updated !!

wornoutmumoftwo

flying_fresian wrote: »

Going to post properly in a minute once I've caught up, but had to stop reading to say, I absolutely LOVE your smiley guy

The smileys are here There are just hundreds of them, all free. I got the link from another thread.

mooomin

Evening all

Another frugal day here. I'm away from home with work at the moment, so have been enjoying someone else's hot water and heating - luxury!! All my food spends are reclaimable which is good, the only other spend today was some music downloads but only a few tracks, so less than £4 and this will be taken from my Entertainment budget as they were entertaining me on the train

I like the idea of signing up for my local library. I love reading and have far too many books in the house - four 'Billy' bookcases and one six foot bookcase all jammed full of books It's only ten minutes for me to walk to the library too so I really will have to look into their opening hours.

Did anyone see this article? Made me laugh!

Right, better catch up on some other threads then get on with some cardmaking - I have brought some images with me to colour and then I'll make some cards next week. Have a good night all!

Erme

saorsie wrote: »

Quite a high spendy day for me today but actually turned into money neutral. Bought OH's birthday present on line this evening (reduced in sale and via Qu*dco naturally :cool:
However just so happened to have sold some gold earlier in the day for the exact amount that the gift cost me :T His birthday's not until March but feels quite comforting to have got it sorted so early.

Am also sat knitting dishcloths for both mothers for mothers day - I appreciate that it doesn't sound madly exciting however they are very chic and I am going to have a bash at making my own soap so thought I would enclose a chunk of that in with them also.

Desperately needed a coffee whilst shopping earlier but reluctant to fork out cold hard cash (see what you've done to me after only a few days!) so hunted out the old st*rb*cks reward card which had £2 on it - one tall filter coffee for the princely sum of a quid later I was fortified enough to walk home - uphill ~ all the way :cool:

-s-

You know you can get it for 75p if you take your own mug in (i usually take a plastic one) and hope you got all your free extras and your free refill....it's a really good deal if you know what ya doing

Well....upto page 81 so that's almost 10 pages of frugal read and replied to tonight...good night tonight but not enough Boston (human nature in it's fourfold state - huge book - downloaded it for free) read alas cos woe is me - been playing games on facebook :eek:

Bedtime now....DON'T MENTION THE MENU PLAN and AM OUT OF ENGINE OIL (instant coffee) so must go to Mr A tomorrow for 4 jars @ 50p ea... praise God I still have some posh stuff else this could well be 911...lol

I'm not joining you on the no caffeine challenge just yet though you never know

e

Erme

chika wrote: »

I've never bought them from the net - i'm quite fussy and need to really try them on before hand if that makes sense. However, if you have an Asda optician near you they do a fantastic deal where it's £65 for complete glasses including the thinnest lenses. More info here. I had a look last time I was there and they had some nice frames. I'm really short sighted and an equivalent pair in vision express were £583 when I priced them up last week. http://www.asda-contactlenses.co.uk/opticians/glasses.html This is the site.

I got glasses a while back and as recommended by some person off the forums I got them from glasses direct. Great service and like really cheap as well. the glasses came promptly like they said and they were a simple prescription. They had a plastic case. I thought maybe they were a little flimsy but maybe that was just me but really nice glasses and I don't think I paid much more than £20 for prescription lenses

flying_fresian wrote: »

Evening all

Another frugal day here. I'm away from home with work at the moment, so have been enjoying someone else's hot water and heating - luxury!! All my food spends are reclaimable which is good, the only other spend today was some music downloads but only a few tracks, so less than £4 and this will be taken from my Entertainment budget as they were entertaining me on the train

I like the idea of signing up for my local library. I love reading and have far too many books in the house - four 'Billy' bookcases and one six foot bookcase all jammed full of books It's only ten minutes for me to walk to the library too so I really will have to look into their opening hours.

Did anyone see this article? Made me laugh!

Right, better catch up on some other threads then get on with some cardmaking - I have brought some images with me to colour and then I'll make some cards next week. Have a good night all!

You know when I was busking pre frugalism with my tin whistle the under 30's would regularly scowl at me and stuff. Even the students would just look down their noses at me...

I give to charity even though I'm frugal and in debt. It's not much - just £5-10 a month. I used to tithe (10% bar things I don't have control over) but then read you can't really do that if you're in debt cos it makes out you have more than you do. It's better to pay a little or nothing and clear debt THEN tithe. So my tithe monies now go straight on my loan - but if everyone did that then the country would be a lot better.

E