A blissful home - mortgage_girl's MF diary

mortgage_girl

I've being doing some tidying around the house this weekend (while recovering from the flu and a chest infection ) and whilst clearing out the cupboard under the stairs I discovered a stash (massive understatement) of carrier bags. Our local supermarket doesn't recycle them and there are so many that i'd feel guilty for throwing them away so i'm going to use them instead of bin bags - they'll probably keep me going for a year at least! I cannot believe how many seem to accumulated in my cupboard, in fact i'm quite ashamed . On the plus side, my little discovery has shocked me enough to ensure that I don't forget to take a carrier bag or two with me when I go to the shops in the future.

Whilst rummaging through my kitchen cupboards I discovered some lentils which have been lurking for ages so I decided to use them up. I had to pop to the shop for some fresh ingredients but for just under a fiver I managed to make six portions of spinach and lentil soup/stew, with some ingredients left over for later in the week.

Looking at my food budget, I think I can reduce it from £100 to £75, or maybe even less. So i'm going to focus on batch cooking healthy, nutritious meals at the weekend and see how I get on. Any savings I make can be added to my mortgage overpayment pot (i'm trying to keep that extra £1800 I need to make at the forefront of my mind). I did actually have £20 spending money left over from last month so i've added that to the pot :T

Think that's all my news for the weekend. Hope everyone has a great week.

linz

Hi mortgage girl.

I'd like to subscribe to your diary. Our SOA's are very similar and i'm on my own too. Will look to your diary for some new ideas and inspiration

Do you have a slow cooker for batch cooking? If not Argos have one on offer at the mo, for £6.29

http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/4207490/Trail/searchtext%3ESLOW+COOKER.htm

Good luck with your MFW future

babyb06

I like the sound of that slow cooker - want to try one and that isn't too much to spend. Can also get cash back from topcashack - every little helps!

mortgage_girl

Hi linz - just on the way to seek out your diary, i'd be interested to follow yours too. It's always useful to have a look at what other people are doing as there's often many good hints and tips to be found. Thanks for the advice on the slow cooker - I haven't got one as i've got a massive le creuset pot that was given to me by my Nanna and I always tend to use that. My Mum swears by her slow cooker and suggested I get one but i'd be too paranoid to leave it on while i'm at work and as I do most of my batch cooking in my other pot i'm not sure if it would be worth getting one. £6.29 is an absolute bargain but I think i'd just be buying it for the sake of buying it if you see what I mean?

Right, off to go and see if I can find you

mortgage_girl

My monthly mortgage payment has gone through along with my £100 overpayment so i've updated my signature :j Hmmm I think this mortgage overpayment lark could become quite addictive

linz

Nice going Mortgage-girl. And thanks for looking up my diary

I joined Bingoport a while ago but have never built up points on there as I tried to see what I was meant to be doing but the site is so confusing! If you could point me in the right direction for earning points for Amazon vouchers that'd be ace. I'm slowly saving Amazon vouchers from surveys/clicks for a new mp3 player

mortgage_girl

I've managed to make some fabulous savings on some essentials this weekend so i'm feeling quite pleased with myself, in fact, as sad as it is i'm almost doing this :j I had a spend £20 get £3 off voucher for Mr T's so I decided to stock up on cat food for the snugglepuss. When I arrived I discovered that it was already reduced as part of a 3 for 2 offer and I was still able to use my voucher so I ended up getting 9 packs (54 tins) plus 3 boxes of cat biscuits for just over £18 - a saving of around £13! Cereals were also on 3 for 2 so I stocked up on porridge oats and probably have enough to keep me going now until the end of the year, perhaps even longer! :rotfl:

Today I have decluttered the dining room which has been a bit of a dumping ground since I started decorating the hallway in August. Since finishing the hallway, the clutter has been getting on my nerves so I decided to bite the bullet and blitz it, the result being that now I have a dining room again :T I also made up a batch of soup to use up some left over celery and spinach that I had in the fridge, it's the first time i've made it but it was very lush and there's a few portions left over to freeze too.

So overall it's been quite a thrifty weekend and it's only Saturday! Right, off to go and make a well earned cuppa and catch up with some diaries.

mortgage_girl

Hmmmm well it's been a slow start to the day so far as i've been quite happy lounging around in my pj's, drinking tea and browsing mse. But there's quite a few things that i'd like to get done today so i'm hoping that a to-do list will get me motivated.

Things to do:
* [STRIKE]bake bread[/STRIKE]
* [STRIKE]make yoghurt[/STRIKE]
* washing will do later in the week as load is only tiny at the moment
* [STRIKE]ironing[/STRIKE]
* [STRIKE]finish planning and print out[/STRIKE]
* [STRIKE]plant onion seeds (a bit late with this one - oops)[/STRIKE] broke shed padlock in the process but thankfully Dad fixed it
* online surveys
* [STRIKE]bingoport[/STRIKE]
* [STRIKE]visit grandparents[/STRIKE]
* [STRIKE]list something on ebay[/STRIKE]
* [STRIKE]do a workout[/STRIKE]

Right, better get started!

adwat

I think £75 per week for shopping is quite doable, it's what we spend for me and DW and the two boys, we don't batch cook either so it's fresh each day, but we could save more if we did.

Sepa74

Hi Mortgage girl, your post reminded me of one of my slow cooking experiences...

The first time I put my slow cooker on during the day while I was at work, it got to lunch time and I completely panicked, with images of my block of flats burning down and me being responsible for making 7 people homeless!!!

I rushed home during my lunch hour saying I'd thought I'd left something on the stove as an excuse, but everything was fine! Everyone at work thought I was mad! It was so embarrassing

I do have a tendency to be paranoid about fire, not sure why - I burned myself badly as a small child (so small I can't even remember it and have no scars or anything) and I wonder if that's the cause.

I had my slow cooker on overnight, cooking something with cauliflower in it. Now the flat smells of over-boiled cabbage, and I woke up in the middle of the night because of the smell. DISGUSTING!!!!! Don't slow cook cauliflower!