Learning to Live on Less!

White_Iris

Payday for DH today and the start of our new budget. From this month onwards we both have £150 spending money each. It's also the start of saving for car tax, insurance, MOT/repairs and breakdown cover in separate pots instead of all together. Car expenses are an area where we regularly fall down and hopefully the new system should stop that happening - I guess we'll see in October, when the car insurance is due, if it's all working as planned. I will have to find some money to pay for this years breakdown cover as that's due next week and we certainly won't have enough in the pot to cover it. At the moment it's going to have to come from the emergency savings and maybe a bit from this months eBay profits.

This month I really need to get to grips with the grocery budget. I allocate £200 every four weeks and really try to stick to £50 a week but it rarely happens. This months cycle started yesterday and I went to the store rather than shop online, to save the delivery charge. I had a list, although I didn't stick to it completely - mainly because I forgot to add a few things that I remembered in-store (and there might have been one or two impulse purchases ) but I was shocked to see the bill came to £75 instead of the £50 I was aiming for. Quite a few things will roll over to next week - I won't need toilet roll, cereal or squash for example. I also bought a large piece of gammon for a roast on Sunday which will also provide a few meals next week as well. I'm not sure whether things are just an awful lot more expensive than I think and I need to up my grocery budget or I just need to shop smarter. I'll add a bit to my signature and keep track of the groceries this month and re-assess in June.

lucielle

Food is sooo expensive. I've managed to keep pots going this year and its made such a difference.

L

White_Iris

I was starting to get a bit anxious as to why our first payment for the new loan didn't come out on the first as we had expected - double, then triple checked the direct debits were correct then finally noticed the first payment wasn't due until June:j. What shall we do with a surprise £400? Well, I know what we should do with it...we agreed all windfalls would go in the new house savings pot but I'd quite like to buy some things for the garden and we also need a new alloy wheel for DHs car as one of them was noted on the MOT as being quite buckled (but still roadworthy). So I think what we'll do is put £100 towards the house, £100 in the emergency savings and use £200 for garden/car things. :beer:

White_Iris

Not really a money-related post but I think I'll feel better for writing things down. I'm feeling a bit (a lot!) anxious at the moment as I had a bit of a dressing down from the neighbours yesterday. I won't go in to too many details in case they read this (:eek:) but it boiled down to them complaining about me not speaking to them first before doing something (something in my garden, I may add :mad:). I apologised in order to keep the peace but it has really upset me and now I feel like I can't go out in the garden and finish the project in case they're out as well. I'm cross with myself for not having the guts to stand up to them but I'm quite a shy person when it comes to personal things (work related stuff is fine) and I hate conflict. I'm now thinking of moving again just to get some peace of mind , which is absolutely ridiculous as we wouldn't get a house that meets our needs as well as this one and another move would cost money and be a huge PITA but my home doesn't feel like a sanctuary any more.

Moan over, I'm sure after a few days I'll feel differently.

debtfreewannabe321

omg what idiots! I would never think to complain to a neighbour about what they do in their own garden! Gosh they're lucky it wasn't someone like me I'd have told them exactly where to go, grr!

I hope you're ok and they haven't put you off doing whatever it is you were doing!

Oh and well done on the extra £400 you divided that well, i'd have blown it probably ! xx

White_Iris

debtfreewannabe321 wrote: »

omg what idiots! I would never think to complain to a neighbour about what they do in their own garden! Gosh they're lucky it wasn't someone like me I'd have told them exactly where to go, grr!

I hope you're ok and they haven't put you off doing whatever it is you were doing!

Oh and well done on the extra £400 you divided that well, i'd have blown it probably ! xx

Thank you! If it had been the other way round it wouldn't have bothered me in the slightest. At worst I might have grumbled a bit to DH in private but as long as it was on their side of the fence I would never dream about complaining. Decided to keep going with it, since we've already had the "discussion" about it with them, it can't get any worse!

White_Iris

Totally blown the grocery budget again this week - £80 online shop for delivery tomorrow and about £20 on extras over the weekend. In theory that leaves £25 until 27th May!

debtfreewannabe321

White_Iris wrote: »

Totally blown the grocery budget again this week - £80 online shop for delivery tomorrow and about £20 on extras over the weekend. In theory that leaves £25 until 27th May!

You know when I started this dfw lark (2011) I had a budget for food that I could quite easily stick to (200-250) but these days I've realised I couldn't possibly do it without feeding kids pizza from Iceland each night. My new budget is 400-500 and already this month we're up to 270 (freezers and cupboards are stocked though) and I've relented and loosened up a bit way I see it is we never go out really and I like organic where possible so this is like our treat each month eating well (bl00dy joke really everyone should be able to eat well on a small budget! ) but anyway what I'm trying to ssy is don't beat your self up over it food is do expensive these days! Xx

White_Iris

debtfreewannabe321 wrote: »

You know when I started this dfw lark (2011) I had a budget for food that I could quite easily stick to (200-250) but these days I've realised I couldn't possibly do it without feeding kids pizza from Iceland each night. My new budget is 400-500 and already this month we're up to 270 (freezers and cupboards are stocked though) and I've relented and loosened up a bit way I see it is we never go out really and I like organic where possible so this is like our treat each month eating well (bl00dy joke really everyone should be able to eat well on a small budget! ) but anyway what I'm trying to ssy is don't beat your self up over it food is do expensive these days! Xx

You're right, I'm basing my budget on our pre-children days and not taking in to account the fact that prices have shot up. Unfortunately we don't have any more money in the budget to spend on food, so I'll have to just shop smarter and start really shopping around for bargains instead of just relying on Mr T. I have done a stock check and menu plan and I think we're ok for main meals for the next two weeks, I'll just have to top up fresh stuff.

White_Iris

White_Iris wrote: »

Not really a money-related post but I think I'll feel better for writing things down. I'm feeling a bit (a lot!) anxious at the moment as I had a bit of a dressing down from the neighbours yesterday. I won't go in to too many details in case they read this (:eek:) but it boiled down to them complaining about me not speaking to them first before doing something (something in my garden, I may add :mad:). I apologised in order to keep the peace but it has really upset me and now I feel like I can't go out in the garden and finish the project in case they're out as well. I'm cross with myself for not having the guts to stand up to them but I'm quite a shy person when it comes to personal things (work related stuff is fine) and I hate conflict. I'm now thinking of moving again just to get some peace of mind , which is absolutely ridiculous as we wouldn't get a house that meets our needs as well as this one and another move would cost money and be a huge PITA but my home doesn't feel like a sanctuary any more.

Moan over, I'm sure after a few days I'll feel differently.

To top this, we got back home from an afternoon out on Monday to find music thumping through our house :eek: Next door were outside with friends and had turned their music up loud enough so they could hear it outside. This was the last straw for me and I was seriously considering taking the first available property the estate agents had and moving asap. Fortunately the music was turned off at about 7.30, and to be fair they rarely do play music, but the whole weekend has really bothered me. I don't want to waste money by moving if we don't need to but at the moment I'm not happy in my home. I've decided to compromise with myself (:o) and stick it out here until the summer and re-assess then (all the while keeping an eye on Rightmove).