April 2012 Grocery Challenge

Suffolk_lass

:T Piquant - I just noticed from your sig how much you have paid down of your debt - £45k+ in 3 and a half years is phenomenal. Well done you! :T

ms_night_ryder

i spent £7.50 yesterday, but only half of it is gc, it was on a whole salmon half price in mr s, half of it will be going to a family meal over easter so the other half of the money will sneakily go in gifts.

dont really need anything at the moment so still have a huge amount of monthly budget left, i did bulk buy 14 original source shower gels for £5 in the mr s glitch, which will go in with my yearly budget so thats why my monthly is lower at 50 rather than 56.

hope to grab some deals over the weekend with it being easter, hoping for great whoopsies, like at christmas, im pretty new to whoopsies, so dont know if its as good.

cleggie

sabrina_the_mid-20s_rich wrote: »

Hello everyone. I was on the debt free board because my OH just lost his job, and from my SOA people suggested we could save a lot on groceries. So, here I am!

How much should we be aiming to spend? There are two of us and we have a dog.

Since payday yesterday we've spent 55p (last of the big spenders!)

Hi Sabrina, and welcome to the GC

Do you know how much you currently spend every week/month?
I would start off by working out how much you spend at the moment, and then seeing how much of that is 'wasted' on stuff thats not necessary?
I am sure that other people will be along soon with helpful suggestions!

sabrina_the_mid-20s_rich

cleggie wrote: »

Hi Sabrina, and welcome to the GC

Do you know how much you currently spend every week/month?
I would start off by working out how much you spend at the moment, and then seeing how much of that is 'wasted' on stuff thats not necessary?
I am sure that other people will be along soon with helpful suggestions!

Thanks cleggie! I think we spend about £300 a month, which includes toiletries, cleaning products, dog food and alcohol. Maybe if I could get it down to £250 in April?

cleggie

You're welcome Sabrina,

I would suggest that the best thing you could do would be to read the first 2 posts on this thread. It kind of explains where to start, and gives some great tips and advice. I found it really helpful.

Also, do a cupboard/fridge/freezer inventory and write a list of EVERYTHING you already have in the house, and see what meals you can come up with from the stuff you already have.

jumblejack

Another money saving (meat free!) tea lined up. :money:

Just made a veggie bake, ready for the oven. Gonna serve with home made garlic mushrooms n warm crusty bread.


I've just cooked my (wide selection of whoopsied...) veggies in the thermal cooker (reserved stock for another meal of course!). Drained and added to a home made cheese sauce. Topped with breadcrumbs that were from whoopsied bread that went stale, cc cheese and sesame seeds for texture then seasoned.


The garlic mushrooms will be made from a 10p tub of family pack mushrooms that were whoopsied (obviously!)

Gotta love evening reductions.

Will definitely use tinyshoes recipe tomorrow as STILL have loads of broccoli to use up!!!!


Have a great day all!

jumblejack

If I could cut down our milk consumption as a family, I could drop my budget a little lower. I spend £1.70 a day on milk. £1 on 4pt fresh whole milk and 70p on sweetened soya.
This is pretty much a sixth of my weekly grocery budget.

If I can encourage the family to drink more water......?

WelshWoofer

carolinerunner wrote: »

rfta, hugs. I really feel for you. A suggestion: The Cinnamon Trust is a charity that asks people to walk dogs for those no longer able to do it but who don't want to have to give up their dog - eg the housebound - might there be an idea there re getting doggie contact and doing a good turn at the same time?

I used to volunteer for the Cinnamon Trust. I have my own dog but wanted to help out someone else too. They are great and you don't have to take every offer just the ones that fit in with what time you have. At one point there were 3 of us volunteers walking an aging Great Dane called Scooby on different days of the week for a lady in her 70s who had been fighting cancer (her son had died and left her with the dog). I also used to take one dog to the vet every month for an injection for skin allergies - took about 30 mins every 4 weeks or so - not a massive commitment.
I don't have as much time now and my own dog to think of so I've given it up but its well worth a try for dog lovers that can't have a dog for whatever reason.

On the GC front, I made the fatal mistake of going to Mr T's instead of Aldi and spent £35 on what didn't seem like an awful lot. I'm on SW again so most of the trolley seemed full of fresh stuff but still it seemed expensive to me.

tessie_bear

hi...been to home bargains this morning and got a couple of nice bits for the kids for easter...a cadbury easter egg hunt and ferrero rocher eggs...i am not planning on any more spending this weekend as we have enough in

i have made a goulash for tea tonight which we will have with rice and broccoli....might do a bit of baking later
take care tess

Barbeduk

Wow, 5 pages already! Really lovely that so may new people are coming on board, I've found this the most helpful of all the challenges I do.

Came in just under again for March so setting £260 for April for 2 adults and 2 kids. This is for food, cleaning stuff and toiletries and seems to allow for 1 bottle of wine a week!

So far I've spent £25.11 at !id! But did manage to get 20 cartons of the juice ds has in his packed lunch on half price weekend offer. Also includes 20 eggs :eek: I seem to be baking about 3 times a week now! And because I had the kids with me, Pringles and mini eggs (honest, you wouldn't find me eating it )

Also spent £25.76 at a!di and £2.96 at mr m. So I'm already up to £53.83/£260.

Thanks for the lovely thread Zippy, I'll keep my totals in my sig so don't worry about putting me on front page.

Have a lovely weekend everyone.:D