Frugal Living Challenge 2011 - part 1

Fishcake_Random

Afternoon all,
Thought I'd catch up with the days news before doing my stint at the charity shop this afternoon. I've only been doing it a few weeks but I love it. I really feel like I am making good use of my time and helping local people. Plus its a great chance to meet lots and lots of new people as its such a busy shop. I just need to be carefull not to buy things while I am there. If I see something I like then I wait till the next morning to buy it, and if I can't remember it then I most probably didnt need it.
I'm currently in the process of decluttering the flat, I'm trying to use up things as much as possible as I have a have been trying to donate/rehome/chuck 5 items at least once a week. So far I've shipped out nearly 30 things that have been clogging up my cuboards and drawers, so I'm pretty proud. For every new thing that comes into the flat (apart from food and the obvious things) 2 items have to go out or the new thing has to replace an old thing. This way I'm not getting myself to clogged up.
Hopw we are all doing ok, Hugs to all who need them.
x x x

cw18

Laushappy wrote: »

i.m.Hart Yes you can freeze grated cheese, it doesnt matter if its frozen in bags or container, i personally would portion it off into freezer bags, but you could do either.

Mine goes into freezer bags of around 100g. That will last me 2-3 days depending on whether I'm using it in butties or on top of pasta or enchilladas. Pizza tends to use (at least) a bag at a time......

Aril

Hello frugallers:j
Firstly PatentGirl-sorry to hear your news. It's always horrible but I do hope you find something else quickly.Thinking of you...stick with us I'm sure you'll find plenty of support on here and it will have happened to many of us.

I've done a quick review of January and don't think I did too badly. Spent £225 on groceries but that's for 3 of us [12yo eats adult sized meals], Psychocat and all our cleaning materials. I also managed 13 NSDs [that's excluding what OH spends and anything that comes out of the account as a d/d etc] and found 6 x 1p on the pavement. Bought a few bits from the jumble and the temporary cheapie clothing shop that's opened in the town for a month but didn't buy any books...still erm managed to get my monthly fix though by using the library and book swapping:D No food wasted and our first batch of wine made. New skills learnt for felting and using a soldering iron.

This month so far I found 21p yesterday [roadkill] and we used up our leftover roast potatoes from Sunday [we had cooked up all the tatties to stop them going to waste as they were reduced when bought] last night by reheating them along with some oven chips for our egg and chip supper. They were lovely:D
And no I'm still working my way through all my excuses for not getting back on my bike:D Am most definitely a frugal work in progress!
Aril

Laushappy

23rdSpiral I am with on this one, amazon are cheaper for some things but some items (esp toys) can be completely over priced.
I find the same with stuff being sold on ebay, sometimes (even the second hand stuff!) can work out more expensive than buying it from the shops! Its easy to think that just because its from ebay or amazon its cheap, but this is not always the case.

salski

Hello all -
I tried the Pork chop recipe (dipped in egg then in stuffing mix then grilled) and hubby adored them. I thought they were OK but the meat was frozen chops and not fresh and I think I was a bit of a snob and had turned my nose up on them before even trying them. They were fatty, but actually tasted OK.
I have just chopped up, onion, 2 sprouting spuds, a carrot, mushrooms and celery, a pint of gravy ad the remaining 2 chops and shoved em in the over for casseroling....we shall see what they come out like.
Hubby took me out for tea last night to local carvery. £3.69 for all you can eat veg and (not all you can eat) meat. Cost £11 with 2 drinks Was yummy as I was too exhausted to cook. Not very frugal, but cheaper than other restaurants!

SandraScarlett

salski wrote: »

Hello all -
I tried the Pork chop recipe (dipped in egg then in stuffing mix then grilled) and hubby adored them. I thought they were OK but the meat was frozen chops and not fresh and I think I was a bit of a snob and had turned my nose up on them before even trying them. They were fatty, but actually tasted OK.
I have just chopped up, onion, 2 sprouting spuds, a carrot, mushrooms and celery, a pint of gravy ad the remaining 2 chops and shoved em in the over for casseroling....we shall see what they come out like.
Hubby took me out for tea last night to local carvery. £3.69 for all you can eat veg and (not all you can eat) meat. Cost £11 with 2 drinks Was yummy as I was too exhausted to cook. Not very frugal, but cheaper than other restaurants!

Just seen you've only got 9 days to go till your baby is due! :j You must be so excited. May your labour be swift, may your DH be ultra supportive, may your baby be gorgeous, and may your nights be peaceful!

xx

salski

SandraScarlett wrote: »

Just seen you've only got 9 days to go till your baby is due! :j You must be so excited. May your labour be swift, may your DH be ultra supportive, may your baby be gorgeous, and may your nights be peaceful!

xx

Thats lovely and thank you for taking the time out to write it Thank you so much x

23rdspiral

I"m suposed to be having a housework day but i keep getting distracted. if can get the bare minimum done that'll be ok. i havent been out, it feels too cold and miserable, but that also means i havent spent anything: 1/11 NSD. I'm reducing febs NSDs as its a short month and as i didnt make my Jan goal, and as that was a guess anyway. is that cheating? i dont know.

thanks Laushappy, i'll try other places for the watch - it sounds like an indulgance but it's being paid for by someone else!

Aril - sounds like you've had a posative month.:T

Fishcake - those are great tips about if you actually remember something the next day then maybe it's ok to buy it, and also 1 out 1 in to help with clutter. cheers!

Erme - i avoided my local (only one in my town) post office for years as they were rude and shortchanged me. i had to use them a few months ago and they were ok, changing to posatively lovely after i'd been in a few times will odd random packages (which had worried me over how theyd treat me). maybe some one braver than me had complained? i dont know, but i'm glad they are nice now.

Optimisticpair

Add me please CW and can I say thanks to you for running the thread.

Sorry to be so late. Just didn't have time to clock in, parents in law both in and out of hospital at different times. Both are doing better now.

Last year went well, today we paid off the bank loan that we had to get out for central heating. We feel like we are making progress now. I went over the 5k budget by £71.27 but we have some essential supplies in hand.

This years plan is to stay on budget so we can crack on with more of the renovation. I'm looking forward to having wardrobes again for the first time in three years but the dining room needs lime plastering first.

Outside still looks like a building site. I grew some veg where I could. I ran out of potatoes and onions at the end of January though.

Hanging on to get discounted water butts was well worth it, we got two for £14 so we saved quite a few quid there. Spare water is used to flush the toilet but collecting enough in plastic dustbins was difficult. We got a refund from the Water Company, but with spare water on tap now we should be able to bring the water meter bill down more.

Our first attempt at making wine was more of a success than we expected so we gave bottles of the ones we liked best away as Christmas presents. Think that's all the news from us.

redglass_2

Welcome, Optimisticpair!

Well, I've come in under budget for January but it's a misleading result because some things just haven't come up for payment yet, whereas the ones that have tend to be... over budget. The really scary one is groceries :eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek:. This is the result of impulse buying (often on whoopsies, but that's no excuse since I'm not disciplined enough about using what's already in the fridge). Got to get a grip here - the cupboards are bursting and I just keep adding to it! Oh dear, and I was ambitious and set myself a very low amount - how embarrassing...

Still, I've come a long way from my twenties when I would treat myself to anything I fancied and thought the night wasn't complete without endless rounds of drinks and preferably a restaurant meal too. And there's no denying the power of the spreadsheet of wonder - there it all is, down in black and white! Guilty as charged! :rotfl:

(((Patentgirl))) I hope things sort themselves out for you. It's a horrible thing to face but as others have said, you'll get lots of support from this thread.