The October Awakening!

lizziesnips

count me in. needto get my OH on board too.

cottage_retreatist

lizziesnips wrote: »

count me in. needto get my OH on board too.

welcome to the club with the OH's!!!! :beer:
NSK has done wonders for my OH's grasp of money management - hopefully will do the same for yours too!!!

xx

thriftylass

xJOJOx wrote: »

Unfortunately not much too learn, I take advantage from unused products from works kitchen. Ie Sunday Roast, I take the left over veg which lasts til thursday. Curry night, take home freeze etc They love me as they dont like waste, and I use everything ;-) The £20 will cover milk, fruit etc. Sometimes I even get given milk home when we've not gone through as much as usual x

I do tend to bulk cook when freezer low, Ill make things with similar ingrediants together, shepherds pie, lasagna, bolonise, mince meat pie. So all the fresh ingridents I need, ie onions/peppers etc I use all in one go and dont need to buy more. I do this as my fresh ingredients were always going off before I use.

No ones allowed in kitchen on cooking day, as it is a little crazy with lots going on.

Ah ok, that's explains it One thing I could learn though is to cook more for the freezer. But my downfall is buying fresh fruit, rolls and cold cuts especially for the weekends. But I take that on board and will make a large chilli tonight that I then can also use in lasagne, and on pasta. Now that winter is upon us I will also make more beef stews etc that can go in the freezer and should save money. Thanks

Fmess

NinjaSavingKat wrote: »

Can everyone hit the spam button on post #97 please.... Done

Quick question NSK, I get paid on 25th of each month so have already done October's biggest food shop and buying of animal food. Shall I include this in my Oct totals? I know the challenge is supposed to be 1st to 31st. Or shall I wait until I do a big shop again at the end of Oct and include this?

My SFD has turned into a no SFD so have bought everything I think I need to get us to the weekend so hopefully will have 2/3 SFDs in a row

lilian1977

NinjaSavingKat wrote: »

Pull yourself together woman!!! :p:p

Haha - I have done already. I'm going to treat myself to a £4 visit to the cinema to see his new film instead.

Why do we have to hit the spam button on karmachi's post?

Just planning Christmas food now so I can start getting bits in this month - argh!

EDIT - just found this lovely meal planner online so going to print a few of them. Here's another one with space for all 3 meals.

hollieinbloom

Just made a yummy nut roast. There is enough there for 8 servings so will have to plan when it's going to get eaten and freeze whatever needs to be! I haven't spent anything today and don't intend to either!

We put £168 into savings this month. The random £68 is because we have only just got british gas to get their bums into gear and sort our direct debits out for the new place (3 months later!!) but they are only taking the gas out this month which is £33 and then next month the electric will come out too which is £68 so I've put it away so it's like its come out this month. We are a bit better off this month anyway due to it being a 5 week month and will have 5 tax credit payments. OH is happy to see money saved in his bank so hopefully it spurs on a saving spree!! hehe xx

ClootiesMum

Really, really quick

ClootiesMum

Really quick post from work as internet has been down at home - but look s like sorted now. Will catch up tonight with totals & trackers
Just wanted to let you know Kat before I got the first telling off

lilian1977

hollieinbloom wrote: »

Just made a yummy nut roast. There is enough there for 8 servings so will have to plan when it's going to get eaten and freeze whatever needs to be! I haven't spent anything today and don't intend to either!

Recipe please? xx

fyggy

Good morning OAers!

Great to see so many taking part and checking in already! :money:

This will be my 3rd month of NSK's money saving, life addressing and fabby MSE community challenges, so again, thank you to the focused Kat :T

A few replies first-

Shyspender- Welcome to you and all the "first timers" of these challenges. I like the phrase you saw- "Sober for October". It seems to be the month of addiction/habit quitting as it's the NHS's annual "Stoptober too- is anyone taking part in that? I think there is a thread in the DFW forum for it too. That's very MSEing indeed. A lot of my colleagues have been quitting lately, 4 of them in fact and 2 of them using those eCigs. I digress.

Avogirly- Depending on your APR and level of debts I'd personally use that £200 towards debts.

NSK- Re gyms. Make sure you scope out the cheaper one first and of course if you chose to switch make sure you're not tied into a contract on your current one first and haggle a good deal with the new one! Quite a lot of council gyms are coming into their own lately. The one that's been built in my town is gorgeous and very reasonable. I have been noseying for next year as currently I use the one in my building (paid for through exorbitant service charges) but if we manage to move out next year I'll/we'll need a new one.

---

Onto me!
SFDs. Last month and August I managed 16. I shall aim for 20 and hopefully given this month is slightly less hectic I plan to hit it!

Debts. All in my signature. Paid £220 this month as planned. Totalling £997.67 in debt repayments (CCs, x2 loans, HP):eek: Hopefully I'll put some more towards this using my money making rule- any monies generated must be allocated as 2/3 to debts and 1/3 to fun/joint money. I have frozen my CCs in the freezer so more importantly NO new debt shall accrue.

DFD- Aiming for July 2014 for CCs. Loans run for longer.

Spreadsheet- I keep all receipts piles of them! DH brings me them too. I use an app tho not spreadsheet as I'm an iP.ader. I find it really good as you can create a "family" so DH has it on his device too and can open it and see what the books look like, budget is and put in any spends himself. Granted he doesn't bother, but as I do the finances I like to be transparent about it so he can't blame me or say I didn't tell me plans etc. For anyone who's interested, I use one called Home Budget. I think I paid for it, but it's been worth it for sure.

Food- I start my budgets from the 27th as that's our paydays. So I have a shop to report. This month is proper tight. I planned for £150 after the first shop. But we don't have that much disposable so it has been reduced to £100. The reason I wanted it a bit higher than last months is because it's a 5 week month for us between our paydays. I hate them! Always struggle! So I can report: £40.55/£140. Our shops are done in L1dl with top ups of Milk only (I bake our bread) from Sainies or T.

Cupboards- Inventory has taken place. Plenty of dried pasta, rice, noodles and sauces. We've stopped eating jars of sauces though due to their high sugar content and the rest of it. DH prefers to make his own as well. As I don't cook, I shall use the sauce jars up when I cook for myself (not a regular occurrence). We're low on things like Quorn though, but quite often I'm eating my protein in the form of chickpeas or eggs so I can do without. I'll keep an eye out for offers in big T or S though (only buy it when it's on offer!).

Charity- As said before I donate regularly to BHF and last month raised £250 for Help for Heroes doing Tough Mudder. Speaking of charity, sort of, I have an interview to be a volunteer at the Commonwealth Games next year. How exciting! More on this later.

Fuel- Hoping to get away with one fill up each. DHs car has been topped up. Mine is on just under 1/4 tank. I may half fill mine and use the rest for DHs as the bigger trips are all done in his and he works twice as far away than me (only 8miles mind!). So £70.05/£120

Misc- Each week I give DH money for him to spend as he wishes. He 9/10 will spend it on beer and or drinking beer in the pub. Alcohol and pub evenings used to be apart of the grocery and 'joint eats & fun' budgets/accounts. But I totalled up the amount this was costing and was shocked at how much of our cash was being effectively drank. Alongside this DH doesn't have any other hobbies, apart from diving, and I go to pole fitness which is paid for each month from our money. So I switched the money around and give him £30 per week. Alongside this, I give myself £20 per week, but I invariably don't spend it, or if I do it's on household things or say birthday cards, gifts or eB.ay postage etc.
I give myself some too so I have some money for when DH wants us to go out to the local etc as he's very protective of his PM and won't spend it on me! Haha. I find it gives me a bit of flexibility as for example if we're short at the end of the month I can just use my PM for groceries etc. I suppose it's kinda like other people's Misc budget. But this month it looks like so much as it's a 5 week month. I input all my PM spends into our HomeBudget app, but don't for DH as he's so protective of it and gets mad saying I'm judging what he spends it on.

Planned outings/outgoings-
5th- Best girl is back from Guernsey so she has requested a trip to our fave curry house. This shall be paid for out of our own weekly pocket money we get each.
5th- Football game at Anfield. I am a season ticket holder. I'll be going to this one. I park for free and walk 1.5miles to the ground. I usually buy a programme for £3. But take my lunch, snacks and drinks with me. Never buy in the ground. Fuel is budgeted for- it uses a 1/4 ish of a tank and I'll take DHs car which is far more economical than mine (approx 11p p/mile, mine is approx 17p p/mile)
9th- I have an interview for Volunteer for the Commonwealth Games next year. Unfortunately all the interviews are being held in Glasgow. I planned and priced up the cheapest and most stress free way of getting there- train won. Then researched the best website to book through and best times. There was 40 difference between getting the 3pm and 4pm train back! Nearly double the cost. So of course I went with the cheaper one. I'd budgeted this to cost £100 and got the tickets for £85.50 with Quid.co cashback too. I am just going for the day. I can walk to the train stations, no taxis required and I'll take my food with me so no expensive train meals nor snacks etc.
7th- Dental check up. £25. Budgeted in. I could walk to this too, prob take me about half an hour.
16th- We go on our summer holiday next month and it's a group from our dive club staying on a big boat together for 8 days. We don't know most of the people going and need to book a course for whilst we're there. So the club has arranged a curry evening which is a fiver a head & BYOB (if wanted). We'll pay for our meal each out of our pocket money. The other thing we'll need to pay for is our Deep course. This will be £198 altogether. Our tenants rent comes in the following day so I shall be playing debit card roulette to pay for this. It's budgeted.
19th-20th- My fittie friend and I booked months ago, well she did, then asked me if I wanted to come with her and let me pay her monthly for the tickets, to go and watch the UK Bodybuilding & Fitness Federation (UKBFF) championship finals which is taking place in the town she lives in. Looking forward to that! I'm going to stay at hers and we will take all our food and snacks /drinks etc for the days with us. We can walk to the event too as she lives centrally. Just my fuel to get over to hers. Woo
24th- DH has to go back for a filling re-doing. They found it wasn't airtight at his last appt. Its not causing him bother, so I'd be inclined to put it off a month, but as mentioned we're diving in a months time and doing a course to go down to 40m. So loose fillings are a big no no. It's budgeted for and nearly on next months pay packet so could be another for debit card roulette if we are short by then. £75.
Other things to pay for: Our diving gear is over a year old and so needs servicing- £98 approx. I am dropping it in today, but plan on leaving it there until the end of the month so I can use next months pay as this is not budgeted for this month. But it needs doing due to the holiday and tbh our regulators are playing up. We also need some wetsuits for the holiday, so I'm going to look at them today and then I can budget as I've not got a good idea of 1. What thickness we need and 2. Cost. I expect them to be in the region of £250 for the both of us. We only have 7mm and 1/2mm which is like Goldilocks, too thin and too thick. I expect we'll want a 3mm or 5mm at most and not sure whether a shorty or full one will be best. Again I want to make sure I get us the most versatile so we can use them again in future.

Cash generating- This will be done through eB.ay sales and my 2nd job. I need to make extra to balance the books. £50/£100.

Lunches, no problem. Beauty, I thought I'd run out dry shampoo which is an emergency and I usually stockpile it once it's on offer. Thankfully I had tidied it away. :happyhear

I know I always write excessively long posts, but my apologies for this one. It is the 1st and it was morning when I first started typing too! Best get on with my day!!