2014 Frugal Living Challenge

mum2one

not sure if is frugal but saved a few pence petrol, - off to cinema at wend, so brought £20 card from morrisons - gave me 2p a litre off petrol, handy as tank was 1/4 full - put £50 in.. xx

23rdspiral

Goldiegirl wrote: »

Thanks for your good wishes 23rdspiral

For the last couple of months we have started to 'live' on our pension, and save our salaries. It's not an exact science, as, like you say, we still have the two cars, and we pay out on the petrol that we need for our journeys to work. But, broadly speaking, we have come in within budget for the last two months, so it is encouraging.

One of my plans for the year is to build up a store cupboard, to take advantage of offers when they happen, and also to help when we do finally stop work. So our outlay may not decrease too much in the short term, but I'll be looking to buy more for a similar outlay.

I'm finding the OS boards to be very helpful - apart from the bread maker, slow cookers are also under discussion, not to mention batch cooking.

Also, brand down shifting is happening. I've always bought Andrex loo rolls...but this time I bought Sainsburys own brand, and the Sainsbury's rolls work just fine!

Incidentally, the £325 I mentioned does cover all loo rolls, cleaning products and most toiletries.

I'm looking forward to 2014, it feels like I'm starting my way on the next stage of my life

:T you're definitely doing well. Store cupboard (now pantry! Thanks to a little DIY) offer shopping is something I do naturally, (im still workin through the slight over-buy of tinned chickpeas from when they were 22p a can in morrisons 2 yrs ago!) and I've come to love my slow cooker. Havnt got on with an inherited bread maker but I should probably try again

Something I do is buy 'woopsied'/ yellow sticker things when able, but 'imagine' I spent full price (thus stopping me buying things on a whim), so the full price is still taken out from the food budget But the money saved is put into savings towards something else we need.

I'll admit you've got me thinking about retirement planning, even though it's a long way off!

23rdspiral

Our dishwasher has died after 10 yrs of service. The last 3 were slightly interesting as ,y husband had to "Fonzie" whack it into action and it'd only do Eco-cycle!
Anyway, weve gone a month without and whilst I think we shouldn't be spending the money (we do have it saved, it wouldn't be debt), and they are very expensive, we are both done with washing up!

Does anyone have any "demotivation" comments?!
Or if not, does anyone know if dishwashers are the sort of things included in the Janurary sales?

Frugalsod

quidsy wrote: »

Thanks for your comments frugalsod.

I actually do use up left overs in fridge & will make a stew etc with veg on the turn I also batch cook but as me & oh eat different ethicity food it adds up as he requires different ingredients etc for his food whereas me & ds eat mostly what I cook but there is certainly room for savings. OH will take over the cooking from January, we will all eat the same & he is getting lessons from me on how to stretch the meal. he comes from a country where fresh food is cheap & abundant so he needs a mind adjustment. He's willing but will take a while.

Mobile, well I hardly use it, take full advantage of the telephone at work (allowed) & the internet so I really don't need the package I have.

The sky can def be cut back, we keep it for the kids channels & I enjoy the shows on fox but I am looking into ways to stream online so if I can, it will go. We do use the internet all the time though so that can't go but I am sure I can cut it back with a different provider. Same with the landline, oh needs it to call family/friends overseas on 1p a minute numbers (skype not an option) so it has to stay but I will cut the cost down if i can.

The plan this weekend is to make a list of end dates for contracts & diary date times to call up & see what deals can be done.

Eating out, we don't tend to eat out at night, most of our eating out is snacks, lunches or some kind of fast food after shopping. This can be stopped, it's not heathy & it is expensive. We can eat when we get home or take our own.

What I found is that by looking closely at what I spend I can make some savings. For example I have swapped all my light bulbs for LED which are around 50% cheaper to run than low energy bulbs. I have done the same for my food. I looked at where the cost of everything went and made changes.

If you have a lot of fast food, why not make it yourself. It might take longer but the savings can be huge. My home made pizza costs around £1 an equivalent tasting one in the supermarket might cost £5 and a ready made and delivered pizza could be £15. I found that by dropping the ready meals and making it your self you can do just as well. All can be achieved without a drop in your standard of living. If you like fresh pasta make it yourself it is very easy and so much cheaper than fresh pasta in the stores. Only this week I have been experimenting with cream of tomato soup which I can make for the equivalent of 58 p a can. Not a great saving but that was based on the price I would have paid in the Tesco Metro for the ingredients, where a can is closer to £1.

Streaming films from services like Netflix or Lovefilm might actually be better than the Sky movie package. There are plenty of ways of making savings without anyone really caring.

StressedSteph

Ok, I'm going to have a go at this challenge.

We live on 6 acres, so already have the veg plot, we rear our own meat (except beef) , I make my own bread and I have started a small craft business, so friends will be getting homemade gifts from me from now on.

I have got a spreadsheet for my household budget, but I am crummy at sticking to it. Ruining it with impulse interent purchases. Only small ones but we all know that lots of small ones add up to one BIG one.

Hoping this challenge will help me stay on track with like minded people xxx

COOLTRIKERCHICK

Flipping heck... went shopping yesterday afternoon, in various shops, and you would swear it was the end of the world and everyone was prepping for months .. shopping trollies were over flowing, with, well what the adverts and supermarkets say you should be eating over Christmas... and I bet a lot of those people will be saying how they buy too much food over Christmas.. lol... I must have had the smallest amount of stuff going through the checkouts..


Its a bit hard for me to do an overall budget, as we have pigs, our spend on food for them varies, depending on how many we got at one time, and the growth rate etc.. etc, plus this will end up in the freezer for us to munch on...


Soooo I will be working out our food/grocery spends etc.. and trying to slash it even more..


I did buy a joint of beef in a$da at £4per kg, and I am in two minds to buy some more and and cut them up into beef pieces for casseroles,curries etc and freeze, as the cheapest beef pieces I can see are around £9 - £10 per kg... the only thing when I looked at some of the joints there was a lot of water in some of the bags...

StressedSteph

COOLTRIKERCHICK wrote: »

Flipping heck... went shopping yesterday afternoon, in various shops, and you would swear it was the end of the world and everyone was prepping for months .. shopping trollies were over flowing, with, well what the adverts and supermarkets say you should be eating over Christmas... and I bet a lot of those people will be saying how they buy too much food over Christmas.. lol... I must have had the smallest amount of stuff going through the checkouts..


Its a bit hard for me to do an overall budget, as we have pigs, our spend on food for them varies, depending on how many we got at one time, and the growth rate etc.. etc, plus this will end up in the freezer for us to munch on...


Soooo I will be working out our food/grocery spends etc.. and trying to slash it even more..


I did buy a joint of beef in a$da at £4, and I am in two minds to buy some more and and cut them up into beef pieces for casseroles,curries etc and freeze, as the cheapest beef pieces I can see are around £9 - £10 per kg... the only thing when I looked at some of the joints there was a lot of water in some of the bags...

Hi, we have animals too feed as well. Pigs, sheep, turkeys (dead now ..oops) and a mass of poultry.


We struggle with the costs of animal feed all year round, but then we always have two chest freezes full of good quality meat, so my shopping bills are abit easier to cut down, with not having the expense of buying meat.


Not sure if it's very money saving in the long run though, what with the cost of animal feed these last few years.


xx

COOLTRIKERCHICK

Totally Agree stressedsteph.. we have 11 pigs at mo... 3 adults and 8 porkers, which as you can imagine are eating like there isno tomorrow... our piglets/porkers were attacked by dogs a few months ago, so did knock them back a bit, so that's why we didn't send them to slaughter before Christmas.. we were buying the reduced/waste fruit and veg very cheaply BUT they put the price up, and it was not financially economical to feed them that ( along with top up of hard feed) so now its all hard feed... But They were doing really well on it, so in the spring we are really going to try and get some of our land in full production to try and feed us and some to treat the animals etc...

COOLTRIKERCHICK

being frugal doesn't necessary mean buying the cheapest of everything... I don't, and will not buy any value meat... I would rather spend a bit more, or have a smaller piece of quality meat, and look for cheap veg, to balance the cost out, as if you got a good bit of meat, you are going to have a good tasty meal..


We have chickens and turkeys, but haven't really got into dispatching them to eat... as we normally got a freezer full of pork, lamb, and yellow sticked or offer meat from the butchers and supermarkets

retromother

We always buy less before Christmas. Generally eat leftovers. Then we pop into the grocers on boxing day and snap up all the post Christmas sales food.

My frugal year starts next week. Nervous and excited, but mainly looking forward to not having post spending guilt all the time!