Grocery Challenge - February 2012

LondonDreamer

Small spend today, £3.83 for juice, bananas and crisps for DH's lunch.

Also picked up a whoopsied bunch of flowers which I don't normally buy, so felt like a splurge. Big bunch of pink roses and lillies, the latter hadn't even opened yet. Looking beautiful on my mantel for the grand price of 50p, original price was £12! :money:

mumwithamission

Fab bargain LD - why wouldn't you treat yourself to that? Well done.

LisaJane

nsd here but £7.21 yesterday on some bits. needed more but bumped into a friend in the supermarket who i hadn't seen in ages so ended up chatting to him for ages and was then running late for my spin class, so i didn't get everything i needed...so back tomorrow to get some muesli/orange juice maybe.

XSpender

College tonight so DH had made jacket pots, beans, cheese and quorn/meat sausages for tea. Always have jackets on a tuesday but asked for sausages too as I was starving.

I got my first 2 assignments back from college tonight with really good marks/feedback and I am chuffed to bits. Also had some feedback from the boss today which was very positive. I know it's not GC related but DH is stuck on his PS3 and only listening with half an ear and I needed to tell somebody:D

I have finally come to the conclusion that the only way I am going to cut my spending on food is to take the debit card out of my purse and use a cash only system. I meal plan and shop with a list but always put extra in the trolley. If I take the money out weekly I can't splurge in the first 2 weeks then struggle in the last 2 like I usually do.

The cold that I had in October that turned into a chest infection and has never gone away has reared it's ugly head again today and I am losing my voice. Will dose myself up before bed.

Night all

sorting_myself_out

Hiya Everyone,
Just a quick update of my spending....went to Mr A for a big shop on Friday spent a whopping £63.41, and then today at Mr M's £7.48 so total spent £70.89 which is a huge chunk of my budget, but i'm hoping i have enough to last me and have a couple of small top up shops!! Fingers Crossed! Thinking i may be better to do a weekly shop and have £30 per week rather than spending too much on the 1st shop?? Does anyone find this works for them!! xx

medsdemon

Good evening everyone. Hope we all had a good day. Just popping on to update my spends. Did a shop in A$da last night after work as cupboards were a little bare. Did it with no list:eek: but mostly knew what I needed and didn't really get any extras. Spent £52.30 and used cash I had already taken out for my weekly shopping. Now my stockcupboard is filled up somewhat and I feel better again. No cheap dishwasher tablets so OH nipped in to MrS later in the evening and bought some andmoney also got a few whoopsies ( yoghurt drinks, Expensive juice drink rolls etc) so £3.09 spent there plus 69p in A*di for blueberries.

We had sausage and mash last night for dinner and tonight jacket potatoes with tuna mayo and salad followed by creme eggs:o.
Plan is Mushroom Risotto for dinner tomorrow as got whoopsied oyster mushrooms yesterday.

NSD for me today ( OH bought yukky booster exercise drinks and winegums today but that can come from his personal money and not the GC)

No plans for spending tomorrow, thursday or friday.:D...we shall see.

hamish222

Lamb Tagine for dinner tonight and was good and watched serving size. Nice big portion in the freezer for DH on one of the days I am lateshift.
Spend today in Mr M's - Got a packet of the half price steaks in Mr M's and popped them in freezer for valentines day dinner. Got some prawns in freezer so will make a prawn cocktail starter and might even treat him and make a cake. Also got some YS pork burgers for freezer and fruit for rest of week at work.
Will go to M&S tomorrow and get some salad to have with dinner over next few days and then shop planned on Thurs to Al*i to use my £5 off voucher. Will maybe try their chicken breasts as running low. Was going to do an online butcher order but didn't get round to it.

cw18

Small (£2.63) grocery spend in A!di today - picked up some biscuits and chocolate (neither really needed!) plus bananas and blueberries. Signature updated with that and another 'from stock' item I opened yesterday evening.

Also picked up a tube of svper glue (managed to break the handle on one of my pan lids a couple of weeks ago, but I'm hoping I can fix it with this as it wasn't a cheap pan when it was bought years ago )..... and a couple of bits to tuck away for my Dad for Christmas :eek: They had quite a bit from older special offers reduced, which is where I picked these up from

Also nipped into the library and got out 4 recipe books - 1 for using up leftovers (Thrifty C00kbook), the T@keaway one I've seen mentioned on MSE quite a bit recently, one on doing vegetarian means in the slowcooker (I don't often use my machine, but am happy with meat free meals now and again - and it turns out my fella is too, so it's got to be worth trying something out), and the L0w-Cholesterol C00kbook for Dummies (mine's marginally high, but my fella has to be very careful what he eats - and I don't currently understand all the yes and no's of the recommended diet, so I'm hoping this might teach me something). The last on the list was actually they type of thing I'd gone in looking for, and only being a fairly small library that was the only one they had..... but I think Dummy describes me pretty well for this topic anyway :rotfl:

Herbyme

Elsiepac, I feel for you. While you are waiting, have you looked at other counselling options? Here is a free one in Bristol,not sure how local it would be to you, but they do offer phone as well as face to face:
http://www.bristolmind.org.uk/our-services/counselling
I am not necessarily recommending them cos obv I don't know them but I do know MIND is a really well run organisation in terms of local branches near me and it's free. It's likely to be less solution-focused than the CBT you're being offered, more about listening to you and exploring with you how you feel in a safe environment. Though all good counsellors will listen to what you want from counselling and adapt to that, or point you at someone else who will. I would encourage you, at least on a good-ish day, to try to explore something like this, it can really help, even if it's just to have a neutral and non-judgemental listening ear.
hth xxx

£35 in Mr M's today, my 'weekly' shop. I know what you mean, sortingmyselfout, I think I've got everything when I do a huge shop early in the month then it turns out I've still got loads to buy. Am really well stocked up on some things tho, like loo rolls, cat food and laundry liquid, and have started bulk buying milk in the hope of getting more NSDs. Too much of the Feb budget spent already - 30% in fact, and only 7 days in which is less than 25%. Thanks for the thought SMO!

PennyGrabber

sorting_myself_out wrote: »

Thinking i may be better to do a weekly shop and have £30 per week rather than spending too much on the 1st shop?? Does anyone find this works for them!! xx

I used to do a big monthly shop, then top ups, but always spent more that way. Since changing to weekly shops with one top up, I am spending less. HTH

cw18 wrote: »

Small (£2.63) grocery spend in A!di today - picked up some biscuits and chocolate (neither really needed!)

Also nipped into the library and got out 4 recipe books -

Biscuits and chocolate are always needed!! :rotfl:

I have been taking out recipe books from the library recently, which curbs my need to buy more cookery books. I write down any recipes I think I'll want to try and put them in my 'to try' file. Currently, this file is way bigger than my 'like' file!! (Prob over two years' worth of recipes in there!!)

I too have an overflowing freezer, and, for the amount my children eat, I'm pretty much cooking for one! I am making a concerted effort to eat from there, and this week I can notice the difference - things now don't fall out when I open the door!

Don't know what we're eating tomorrow yet, as I'm feeling rubbish. Got some tuna left, so that'll go into sandwiches for lunch. Need something easy for dinner, unless the children are at their dad's, which may be the case... In which case, I'll make some bof soup.

Night all,

PG x