2012 Frugal Living Challenge (Part 1)

happy_but_skint

Hi
I have been reading the thread over the past week and would like to join this challenge aswell, I will PM the request aswell.

I am 29 married with 3 children, I gave my job up last month as we couldn't afford childcare for 2 under 2's. We are also moving soon and will have a rent increase of £350ish. Thank you x

slowlyfading

Erme wrote: »

Och and there was me worried about my inner tube on my bike and my sweeper cable (lost)....- Hugs hun. Do you have a rainy day fund or anything for these things?

I did, it's all gone now though :rotfl:

ASG_2

quintwins wrote: »

you can get wee meters that do it for you but thats not very mse :money::rotfl:

Our Library will loan you one of these for a month for free:)

moneybear123

Thank you everyone, for all the great tips today. I will be going around turning off lights, and monitor when not in use.

Blairweech

Hi everyone,

Well, my drama...got back to uni last night to discover my housemate-who-stayed-here-over-xmas had turned our fridge freezer off (we have one between 2, I share mine with another girl) 'to save electric'...so all our frozen food had rotted (did he not smell it and think there may be a problem?!!) and had to be chucked. I'm pretty cross about it tbh, myself and the other girl each put £20 on the electric before we went away, so its not like we weren't 'paying our way' over the holidays. I have tried speaking to him and he is adamant it was an oversight. Give him oversight! :mad: :mad: I reckon we had about £50 of food in there, and then the trauma of the stench when we opened the door _pale_

Apart from that...I have purchased a new car. A Seat Ibiza Pick it up on Friday :T Oh, and I got 71% in my first piece of coursework for the year :cool: - was ecstatic as it was group work and I was in a dreadful group who did NO work.

dizzy_lizzie

LolaLemon wrote: »

Dizzy - I didn't even think of a scarf, even though I have a flower scarf on my 'crochet to-do list!'

Lets decide to do one Lola. There are some lovely ones around at the moment and they're called lariats rather than scarves. Like this one here I would choose different flowers though. The frugal part comes in when we can only use wool that we already have in
Have had a nsd today as well.

Blairweech well done on the results but not so good about the freezer. I can imagine you were fuming. I would have been!
x

Frugaldom

Welcome on board the good ship 'Frugaldom', username Happy but skint now added to the challenger list.

Quintwins, I'd recheck the figures for your computer and electricity as £54 per month is way too much to be attributed to just a single computer. That would work out at over 500w per hour burning 24/7 and even the top desktop computers with extra large monitors don't consume that much power. Maybe I misread your post, will go and re-read it, just in case.

Edit: Back again. I'm Guessing your computer must be some sort of monster, as my oil-filled radiator doesn't even use that amount a month. Wow! Glad there are no serious gamers in this household. :eek:

SandraScarlett

Frivolous wrote: »

Good Afternoon everyone,

I haven't posted much as I'm not very good with words, but I read the posts everyday and they are keeping me soo motivated! :j

I keep a record of all my outgoings and I am trying to stick to my budget, its the food shopping which is stressing me out!:( I'm not a very good cook, it's a bit of a joke in our house, everytime I cook the smoke alarm goes off!!:rotfl:So I tend to shop at I**land and the bill soon adds up!

That is such a great start if you're keeping a record - you're now a book-keeper! And if you're keeping to a budget - you can give the politicians a run for their money! I laughed at your smoke alarm saga! :rotfl: Just a little suggestion, why not try to master one new dish, made from scratch, each week? There are zillions of fantastic frugal recipes that the frugalistas on here will be happy to share.

Here's my cheap Family Favourite. In the recipe, I've suggested using condensed vegetable soup. When you're about to enter Master Chef, you can make your own soup!

Use pork shoulder chops, very economical, say 3 between 4 people. Cut into cubes. Put a third of a can of condensed vegetable soup in the bottom of a casserole dish, then add 4 carrots, sliced diagonally. Cover with another third of the soup, then add the meat, and some sliced mushrooms, sprigs of fresh broccolli, whatever veg you have.

Then cover with the rest of the soup, seal with a foil lid, and bake in the centre of the oven, on a lowish heat, gas mark 3, for 3 hours. Serve with mashed potatoes or dumplings. It's yummylicious! To be thoroughly frugal, use the other shelves in the oven to bake other things. I'm sure other posters have got their own favourite frugal dishes.

letsdothis wrote: »

I may not post much, but I love catching up on all the tips - and makes me feel so good that I am not alone in the fight, and whenever I feel myself waivering I only have to come on here and it boosts my motivation again - thank you all x x x

Hi letsdothis. :wave: You're absolutely right, you're not alone in the financial fight! There are hundreds of "members" and lurkers on here, in fact we're a huge army. We're all ages, some of us have bigger budgets than others, some are single, married, widowed, divorced, some work, some don't, and it doesn't matter a bit. This is a friendly helpful site, and you'll get loads of help here. :beer:

moneybear123 wrote: »

Thank you everyone, for all the great tips today. I will be going around turning off lights, and monitor when not in use.

Every tip on here helps to make a brick! My Mum always used to fill the kettle to overflowing, every night, before she went to bed and all through the day. So when I became a blushing bride, in the 1960s, I did exactly the same. I bloomin' blush to think how much leccy I wasted, before it dawned on me (very recently!) that my Mum picked up this habit, during the War, because, living in the East End, the water pipes were often out of action.

And the War ended nearly 70 years ago!!!!! Nowadays, I fill the kettle with the amount of water needed, and blow a noisy raspberry at the energy providers!!

xx

JayneC

Hello again all,

Blairweech how very annoying, I feel for you, that's a lot of food to lose.

Welcome to all the new people - you'll like it here:)

I have an energy monitor, got it free from EOn and do keep and eye on it but not obsessively. Tell you what though the kettle uses a frightening amount:eek:. It's a good job it's not on for long!!

Submitted my gas and electric reading today and got a 'quick bill' which said I was over £400 in credit, so methinks I'll be asking for some of that back when I get it confirmed in a proper bill....and a reduction in my monthly payment;)

NSD today tho am quite good at those as usually CBA going to the shops:p

Was planning to go shopping yesterday but milk lady came and I owed 4 weeks so £29.12 for milk, that was all my money gone:( DD will give me her board tomorrow so will go shopping Thursday instead and try very hard to put milk money away weekly:A

Took doggie for walk earlier and noticed somebody had put out a headboard with the rubbish so may have to go and retrieve that later (for firewood;)) and also picked up a lovely wooden magazine rack that somebody else had put out with their rubbish - told you I was a compulsive scavenger:D - but not burning that, I will put it to use.

Was talking to one of the girls at work and came to a deal to provide her with a weekly veg box from my Landshare garden in exchange for logs (her OH can get them free!) so really need to pull my finger out growing some decent stuff. May even lead to more orders if I can produce a decent amount.

Wish me luck

JayneC

SS we crossed posts, lol What a coincidence that we were both talking about the kettle!! I know some people make a flask of tea to avoid keep boiling the kettle. I don't do this but I might start!