March 2012 Grocery Challenge

Barbeduk

Hi all, tigerfeet, bet your kitchen floor is lovely and clean!

My last shop of this month's challenge came in at £5.09 and I have to admit to putting something back so I stayed in budget! Not that I'm taking this seriously or anything!:rotfl::rotfl: Why is it you suddenly realise there is no cheese in the house?

Have made some flapjack to put in packed lunches. Forced ds to try it, 'mmm it's lovely' was the response! It's taken 6 years!!

Really pleased we've stayed just under, but have kept every receipt and tried to keep to a weekly target as well as the monthly one. Also I've got to the stage where I know the price of everything I normally buy and where I can get it cheapest. I have to admit though, the biggest saving has been cutting the wine to one shared bottle a week. Thanks to the demotivator on the main site for that!:T

Will try and catch up with thread, hope everyone is looking forward to the new month!:D

Suffolk_lass

Mrs_Addicted_to_Spending wrote: »

Can I just ask - what does the abbrev "YS" mean?

Mrs Addicted to Spending YS is Yellow Sticker ie reduced items in the SM otherwise known as Whoopsies

tigerfeet2006 wrote: »

Well I found out what happens if you put too much of the Costco Kingsland Washing Powder in the machine today It bubbles up and seeps out of the washing machine door oops!!

tigerfeet2006 - Nightmare! :eek: - I have to confess I did laugh but only because of the way you matter of factly posted...:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:.
Actually I consciously use between half and two thirds of the recommended amount of washing glug - the only exception is when I do the hot wash of white towels when I also add the laundry bleach too. It makes no difference that I can see and I don't get that heavy waft of laundry detergent smell any more (I'd rather smell my perfume!). So I guess that is saving me at least two in five washes and I buy it on special at £5 instead of £7 for 35 instead of 25 washes - so that is 14p instead of 20p per load:j:j

I was away for a meeting yesterday that involved losing half of Sunday to travel but it was lovely and warm and I was able to sit and read my book for an hour in the park, sat on a bench in front of a lake. Not often I've managed that in March. Loving the spring. :T:T

SL

sistercas

temporarily lost track of my budget , nipped into the greengrocers and cant find the receipt at the moment , but it was around £6 ( strawberries, bananas, parsnips, grapes, eggs)

will need to do some more shopping later in the week

cleggie

LC- thats a lovely recipe, will have to put it my 'to try' list! Can it be frozen? I am thinking about cutting it into individual portions and freezing them?

Lovethenight

Hey peeps,
Lovely warm evening here, hope you're all enjoying the weather!

Have been working hard lately and even did 5 hours in the office on Saturday morning. Horrible but hoping the overtime will be worth it when I get paid!!

Just caught up-this thread moves so fast!

Florenceem-so sorry to hear your news and sending big hugs your way. Go easy on yourself sweetie for the next few weeks. Hope the cold improves too.

Well, I am well and truly over budget for March, but new strategy of weekly shops seems to be going ok for April's Challenge so far.
Am going to pop over to the April thread to report but will keep reading what you're all up to on the March one and best of luck to those still hanging on to their budgets until the end of the month - I'm rooting for you! :-)
LTN

Cool_Nanna

I am declaring for this month, it's not payday until Friday but I don't need anything before then. I have a whopping £39 left over, I will put £10 in my xmas grocery fund but and the rest will go towards my petrol costs.

For April I will go for £300.

meg72

Popped into Asda lunchtime as wanted some tomatoes,carrots and icing sugar had a freaky fit at the prices, £1 for carrots ,£1.29 for tomatoes and
£1.39 icing sugar also fancied some frozen summer berrys £ 2decided to go to Aldi instead.It would have been £5.68 in Asda and only came to £3.36 in Aldi so saved £2.32 on the 4 items.

Its a half hour bus ride to get to Aldi,but theres also a market and loads of charity shops so I made an afternoon of it, got a tray of chinese pork
chops and a tray of tikki chicken for £3 on the market and a huge cauliflower for 50p.

As it was about good reduction time in Asda when I got back I thought I would have a look and was delighted to find loads reduced to a third, spent 5.00, saving 10.00.

So last spend of the month. Asda £5.Aldi £3.36 and market£3.50. Total
£11.86, am declaring at £51, £49 in to my holiday fund and all my meat and veg in for April.

freakyogre

£26.88 spent in Tesco today on....lots! That's a big shop for me!

This has taken me over my total, so I have put the extra on to my April total as quite a bit of what i've bought won't be used until then.

PennyGrabber

FrugalLina wrote: »

I am worn out and it is only Monday. One of my team is off due to a bereavement, so I have been extra busy.

Was intending to pop into the big Asd@ after a meeting tomorrow, but I won't be able to due to having to rush back to the office instead. No matter, I popped into Tossco this evening and spent the princely sum of £3.86 and think that may be enough for me until April. That included some cheapo Ibuprofen as all my joints are hurting like mad and I haven't got time to go to the dr for the hard stuff.

Is it Friday yet?

Only three more get-ups!! Not that I'm counting down to the Easter holidays or anything!!

meg72 wrote: »

Morning all, heres hoping for another sunny day,spent most of yesterday
in the garden, its lovely to see everything coming up,the Rhubarb was tempting but only a few sticks ready,so just picked one and dipped it in sugar it was lovely.Noticed loads of new Raspberry canes coming up,
Picked enough lettuce and wild garlic leaves to make a salad for tea.

I have really found that it pays off for me to not stock up the beginning of the month but to use up for a week or two and then use the money to stock up on offers at the end, if I can find anything that I need.

Freezer seems to be as full now as the begining of the month, trouble is
I take out say 250grms mince and put back three portions of whatever Ive made.

Me too! You think you're winning the battle of the freezers, but end up putting in more than you take out. What is up with that?!?! :rotfl:

NSD today - didn't even take my purse out of my handbag. Planning for a nsd tomorrow as well, although I may be tempted when I leave work at half nine, near a tesc0... [STRIKE]Will try to resist[/STRIKE]. WILL resist!!

Hope everyone is doing well towards the end of what has felt like a really long month.

Night all,
PG x

FrugalLina

elsiepac wrote: »

Hi all,

Just thought I'd post the dish I made last night. It was loosely based on a recipe I found online, and the rest I invented. I was really pleased with the result.

Oooh, thank you, this sounds LOVELY - I will make it when I do a big oven cook-fest!