Frugal Living Challenge 2011 - Part 3.

23rdspiral

Kerry_Woman wrote: »

rising from the ashes - Sending hugs at this sad time.

And also from me, and my other half who is very much a dog man xx

23rdspiral

hi everyone,

we've still not put the heating on a timer, we're coping at night due to new woodburner in dining room ( i think i mentioned that?!)
~ had to put hot water bottles in the bed for first time last night. and slept very well because of it i think.
~ woodburner is keeping dining room nice and warm, living room ok. (began watching 7 Years in Tebit last night, 3 hours later it finished, i was frozen, but also deeply moved and rather emotional. i recomend it, but put the heating on first!)
~ made soup from the Slow Cooker chicken remenants. nom. we had it early to stave off the cold, the rest of dinner will be something with a little leftover beef brisket (again from S/C) and some veg. humm, do you think i can do toad in the hole with beef bits?
~ think i've persuaded OH that we really do need curtains in the living room... it's so cold by our bay window.

~ :j recieved free craft fair tickets ( x2, worth 3.50) from our lovely neighbour, her daughter runs them, they are quite posh and everything there was Very Lovely i took my 'M-I-L to be' and we had a lovely time. we resisted the coffee shop as i'd bought a woopsied cherry maderia cake. she was very kind and bought me my christmas present there and then, a padded heart wreath i loved and will have up on the wall all year round. that saves a whole lotta stress doesnt it. i also got xmas sorted for my parents (phew!), and treated myself to a little something with a tenner that fell out of a cook book the other day (must be last last of birthday money, honest!) and an awesome present for my best mate but i cant say what as she reads on here sometimes! i spent about 35 but am very pleased with it all.

mooomin

I've had a not-so-frugal weekend as I just got paid so have spent £60+ in the various supermarkets near me. Some good points about this though:

• Bought peppers from Aldi yesterday while they were still 69p for three and have chopped and frozen three bags of them
• Bought two large punnets of mushrooms and have chopped and frozen four portions of them with enough left over to go in my pasta sauce tonight
• Used a £5 off voucher in Aldi which helped with stocking up with essentials
• The freezer is now jammed to overflowing, which means I can start filling Freezer #2 with batch cooked goodies this week. I plan to make loads of bolognaise on Tuesday night (going to have a bash at sausage casserole tomorrow)

I still don't have the heating on often, although it's cold here tonight. I'm about to fetch the fluffy slippers and my padded jumper

slowlyfading

F_F - brr, it's too cold here for that now. I'd be freeeeezing if we didn't have the heating on!
rising - I think I've posted this elsewhere, but I'm sorry for your loss xx

Well, another weekend over. They go so fast! We've been at my mum's for the weekend which was lovely. She has a big open fire in the front room which I lit this morning, so it was nice to be sat in front of that this afternoon, before coming back to ours. I spent yesterday, as I had my hair cut, but I've had another NSD today, which is good

Hope everyone is having a good evening

mooomin

slowlyfading wrote: »

F_F - brr, it's too cold here for that now. I'd be freeeeezing if we didn't have the heating on!

It's pretty cool here too, Edinburgh tends to get pretty chilly, but Mr F is in the much-more-frozen-North at the moment and I don't see the point in putting the heating on just for me Whereabouts are you?

slowlyfading

North East England, so it's probably not as cold for us

Blairweech

Rising - Hugs to you xx

Just wanted to say thankyou to everyone for your kind wishes and thoughts re: my late friends. The services for them were all excellent and felt like life celebrations rather than sadness at their passing. Can't remember who posted about the seatbelt cutter tool but that is a very good idea to have in your car - I know the witnesses said on the news that people were trapped and they couldn't get them out before the fire got to them

Anyway, enough maudling (sorry)

I am being very frugal by just staying in and doing coursework all the time! I have started walking to town and catching the college bus, as I was going through 2 tanks of fuel a week. Hopefully this will save me some pennies and if I am particularly careful I might be able to make a trip home and back on one tank - will try this out on Thursday!

Annoyingly, I have made an absolute error in that last year (as I was not using the car during my first term at uni) I let the insurance/MOT lapse on it in October and then renewed them in...December. So now I have car insurance, MOT and Xmas all in one month, BEFORE my next student loan installment comes in. Fortunately I have already saved up for my insurance and MOT this year :money:, just Xmas to deal with now! Should not be too bad, just OH that has a particularly expensive present and maybe my brother (he likes to save up his birthday present so its all owed to him at xmas).

Hope everyone is getting on ok, I will be doing the challenge again next year (maybe will last the whole year this time?!) and planning on using envelope budgeting so I know whats going on...thats the theory anyway

My niece will be 6 months old at Xmas...I was thinking of opening a savings account for her (this is what I had off my Godparents when I was a kid) and then contributing to it every birthday/xmas...good idea? I dont want to get her toys but dont want her Mum to be offended that she won't have anything to open on Xmas day

rubytuesday

Hello again.

Just made cookie to take to the last day of my course tomorrow and I will be doing my presentation on an aspect of mental health.

I popped into my neighbour's earlier and saw a photo on the side that I hadn't noticed before.

It was of a companion of hers who died last year, with a group of friends in the Navy probably nearly seventy years ago.

She was saying that she sometimes wishes she'd gone with him rather than being stuck in those four walls on her own.

She did make me laugh saying how they used to have a kiss and cuddle but didn't bother with the 'other nonsense' as they were past that!

At least her daughter had stayed for the week so that was nice.

dizzy_lizzie

Risingfromtheashes I am so sorry to hear of you losing Ben. My heart goes out to you. Take care

Welcome to the thread prepareathome

Hiya Ruby, missed you huni. Lovely to see you on here again

23rdspiral glad you enjoyed the craft fair. Wish I had one of those cookbooks It's a lovely surprise when something like that happens. Like when you have a £5 note in change and wrap it in with your receipt then find it later.

flying-fresian I hope you're still keeping warm with the heating off.

slowly well done on another NSD :T

Blairweech I've been doing the 'envelope' system recently using those little plastic money bags from the bank and it's really helped. Was only doing the challenge for one week and it's now day 13 so I'd definately recommend having a go.

Went to a carboot today and spent £10 ish. Haven't added that to sig as that was from a different pot and taken into account.
Will have to call at Mr As tomorrow and sort out tea otherwise I'm thinking there may be mutiny afoot
Have finished DDs wristwarmers and managed to start another pair last night and now on the second.
Can't believe how fast Monday comes round!
Hugz to everyone
x
Just seen your new post Ruby. Good Luck with the presentation tomorrow.
Bless your neighbour, she sounds lovely. Pleased her daughter stayed, at least that's something.
x

SandraScarlett

Rising - so sorry to read your sad news, and sending my hugs and sympathy to you. DD still in hospital, and it could be months. DH is so dependant on me now, and also looking after DGD and school runs and activities is really taking its toll on me. I'm just trying to concentrate on buying food and preparing it, and haven't a clue what it's costing, so I'm not really participating in being frugal.

I'd like to wish everyone on here all the best, and perhaps when things are a bit easier, I can come back.

Thank you all so much for your friendship and support.

xx