2014 Frugal Living Challenge

pm2326

cw18 wrote: »

Yesterday I did a full stock take of my freezers, and even shocked myself with how much I have of some items (177 sausages for starters!! at least there's a variety of meat types and flavours amongst them, but as most of them are 2 per serving that's 85 portions worth!!!). I've now meal planned for the rest of this month and most of next (which I plan to finish off later today - other than the 3 meals I'm away with OH and 2 youngest GDs for), but there are a couple this month may need to change as under normal circumstances I'd only be cooking for me and there's now a strong possibility OH will be here as well.

I'm determined to run my freezers down, as I'll then be able to get everything into my standalone while I replace my built in (the freezer isn't as good as it was, but the fridge part is definitely on the way out), and then I'll hopefully be more organised with what goes into it / keeping it stocked up with homemade 'ready meals' that I've labelled (I've got a couple of dozen at the moment that don't give any clues, so I won't know what I'm having for tea until I've defrosted them - that'll be UFO roulette for me on days I'm on my own then )

But I'm still going to have to buy some meat as I go on, otherwise we'll be eating nothing but mince, beef stew and sausages - though I've a fair amount of fish for when it's just me (or me and OH). I've only got enough chicken breasts/thighs left for a couple of meals, ditto lamb, and only one meal worth of pork steaks, but need to use up some stuff before I have space to top up supplies of these...... And whenever I pull mince/stewing steak to make a meal I always end up with several portions that need to go back into the freezer!! I can see it's still going to take a while to run them down as much as I need to :rotfl:

I decided to tidy my freezer up on Sunday as it was untidy and I'm off work next week and planning to go to fish market 15 mile away and stock up (could eat fish everyday)

But turns out it wasn't just untidy....its crammed full still even after tidying it....cant fit any fish in :eek: There's only me and its a 7 shelf monster!

Have decided to eat out of freezer as much as possible from Friday night onwards (out for tea tomorrow) and clear at least one shelf! will go to the market next thursday if I'm successful

cw18

pm2326 wrote: »

But turns out it wasn't just untidy....its crammed full still even after tidying it....cant fit any fish in :eek: There's only me and its a 7 shelf monster!

My free standing upright has 4 shelves plus the half depth basket at the bottom, and my built in has 3 shelves plus the bottom half depth. I suppose I'm just about feeding 2, as I cater for DS1 50% of the time and OH 5 nights out of every 3 weeks.

DawnW

:wave:Hello Merry!

lovefullshelves wrote: »

I also have a cookbook addiction

Me too I did have a sort out a while ago, and DIL took her pick of the ones I decided could go, and the CS got the rest. Still have loads though - scared to count :eek:

macwah97 wrote: »

On two doses of antibiotics for a tooth infection which is into my sinus canal and needs an extraction and probably loads more work.....Eugh so fuzzy headed but logged onto emails tonight and thought I would check out my spam.

I feel a bit selfish but DD's Granny has offered to give her spending money for her school trip and I've said that she should not be spending her money like this but secretly I'm going yeah!!! :j Means we dont have to fork out all of the permitted funds ourselves.

You poor thing! Hope you feel better soon

Speaking as a Granny myself, you are not being selfish at all, as grandmas love to do this

One more day at work before 11days off :j
Each day this week has been a nightmare, and I am hoping, perhaps unrealistically, to escape early tomorrow, or at least early by the usual standards anyway!

Frugal things today - only spend was the train fare to work

Free paper to read on the train

Lunch to work with me - last slices of bread in the pack, made into cheese and cucumber sandwiches, which I enjoy

Lovely walk with the dog this evening in the sunshine

New potatoes and greens from the garden with some grillsteak things lurking in the freezer for supper. Not something I usually buy, but they were ok, and made a nice meal with veg, gravy and HM quince jelly

My quince tree by the way is about to burst into bloom It is a dwarf one that lives in a big pot on the patio, as I only have a small garden, but I love it. It had 5 huge quinces on it last year (the second year we had it) which looked just like big golden apples and made lots of quince jelly The flowers when they open will be quite large single blooms in pale pink. It will look lovely

Anyone have any ideas for using up loads of rather sour loganberries currently lurking in the freezer? I have lots of blackberries as well, and am a bit bored of crumbles..... Ideas welcome please!

hollieinbloom

DawnW wrote: »

Anyone have any ideas for using up loads of rather sour loganberries currently lurking in the freezer? I have lots of blackberries as well, and am a bit bored of crumbles..... Ideas welcome please!

How about a blackberry tray bake? just a regular cake mix and add the blackberries into it. I went to a pick your own farm last year and picked loads of raspberries and made one and it was so moist and yummy!

hollieinbloom

Hi all, havent posted in a while as we've had so many ups and downs in this house, my stress levels have been incredibly high lately! My OH lost his job last month and as we just about made ends meet with his wages, we had no savings to pay the bills. It was absolutely awful!! With what tax credits that came in and left over money from paying the bills for end of feb/beginning of march, we had to live on what we had in the cupboards and my lovely neighbours got us 2 food parcels from the foodbank at their church. THANKFULLY now OH got a new job which he started last week so we are back on track. I had to sell lots of things on Ebay and music magpie (and it was my birthday last month so the £150 i got in Birthday money) so we could pay the bills this time round but we managed it. So since the end of February we've been living very frugally! It's actually been very nice to see us barely spending anything and making some very yummy meals with random items out of the cupboards. DD has been moaning as she's not had as many nice treats but she'll have to get used to it! lol.

Once OH gets paid I need to stock up on some bits so I will take £20 and keep it in my purse for when I see certain items on offers. We're low on all cleaning products so that's my first stop! Never known so many things to go wrong lately, hopefully it's at its end now.

Sorry for the moan and being away for so long!! xx

Merrylegs1

Thanks for all the welcomes!
Today has been a no spend day here....even managed to resist a chocolate craving, hurrah!

Looking forward to getting some great tips. Already gathered that batch cooking is the way forward, on my next day off i'm going to look through my (quite large) cook book collection for ideas.

Tomorrow is a work day, so off to bed once i've prepared food for the day.
Merry

lynnejk

DawnW wrote: »

Anyone have any ideas for using up loads of rather sour loganberries currently lurking in the freezer? I have lots of blackberries as well, and am a bit bored of crumbles..... Ideas welcome please!

Pies, tarts or jams/jellies. Maybe make some purees to have with chicken/duck/fish or over ice-cream in the summer. If you cook them when you have time you could re-freeze them in useable portions

hollieinbloom wrote: »

Never known so many things to go wrong lately, hopefully it's at its end now.
Sorry for the moan and being away for so long!! xx

Sooo sorry to hear you've been having a bit of a struggle. Hope you have turned the corner and heading for a calmer patch now (hug)

Merrylegs1 wrote: »

Thanks for all the welcomes!

Merry

Hiya Merry :hello: - good to have you on board


Hope you all have a tremendous Thursday
Lx

[Deleted User]

hollieinbloom wrote: »

Hi all, havent posted in a while as we've had so many ups and downs in this house, my stress levels have been incredibly high lately! My OH lost his job last month and as we just about made ends meet with his wages, we had no savings to pay the bills. It was absolutely awful!! With what tax credits that came in and left over money from paying the bills for end of feb/beginning of march, we had to live on what we had in the cupboards and my lovely neighbours got us 2 food parcels from the foodbank at their church. THANKFULLY now OH got a new job which he started last week so we are back on track. I had to sell lots of things on Ebay and music magpie (and it was my birthday last month so the £150 i got in Birthday money) so we could pay the bills this time round but we managed it. So since the end of February we've been living very frugally! It's actually been very nice to see us barely spending anything and making some very yummy meals with random items out of the cupboards. DD has been moaning as she's not had as many nice treats but she'll have to get used to it! lol.

Once OH gets paid I need to stock up on some bits so I will take £20 and keep it in my purse for when I see certain items on offers. We're low on all cleaning products so that's my first stop! Never known so many things to go wrong lately, hopefully it's at its end now.

Sorry for the moan and being away for so long!! xx

Hi Hollie, I am so glad your OH has found another job. Its sounds like you did incredibly well to cope during such a hard time.

Your post has really inspired me - since we have become a dual income household I have seen my frugal living ethos slowly erode as myself and OH fritter away money on unnecessary things. We are more likely to go out for the day (including lunch in cafe etc) than stay around the house and get the garden done or the house looking spick and span - these are things we used to enjoy and yet we now see them as a chore.

For me frugal living is about the environment, about less waste, about being creative and resourceful as well as saving money and somewhere along the way we have started to lose that.
Today it is time to make some changes towards prioritising frugal living again.

hollieinbloom

[Deleted User] wrote:

Hi Hollie, I am so glad your OH has found another job. Its sounds like you did incredibly well to cope during such a hard time.

Your post has really inspired me - since we have become a dual income household I have seen my frugal living ethos slowly erode as myself and OH fritter away money on unnecessary things. We are more likely to go out for the day (including lunch in cafe etc) than stay around the house and get the garden done or the house looking spick and span - these are things we used to enjoy and yet we now see them as a chore.

For me frugal living is about the environment, about less waste, about being creative and resourceful as well as saving money and somewhere along the way we have started to lose that.
Today it is time to make some changes towards prioritising frugal living again.

Hi Allie! it was difficult to cope but it was a challenge I came to enjoy with trying to find things to sell on Ebay etc and I got to declutter in the mean time

You should definitely try staying in more and enjoying your home, after all, if you work all day and then go out at the weekends, you're not spending time in the place that takes up majorities of your income lol We realised this when we kept going down to Costa coffee every weekend and complaining about being cold walking down there and it being packed or how it cost £6 for 2 coffees. We ended up buying some costa coffee in Morrisons for the coffee machine and some coffee syrups (vanilla is yummy!!) and now we drink it at home So much cheaper and it means we can drink it whilst we are pottering around in the garden or whilst watching something on the TV.

Hopefully now OH is working again, we'll be able to afford some garden furniture as my grandparents have decided to buy my daughter a trampoline for her birthday! so we'll need something to sit out on whilst we watch her jumping around like a loon! hehe.

Happy frugalling everyone. I've put some washing out this morning and as it's super sunny, I hope it's dry enough for me to go and get in now! xx

Nargleblast

We have a Dolce Gusto coffee machine, and a pack of capsules costs £3.77. If it is a drink like cappuccino, where you need a milk capsule and a coffee capsule, the boxes contain 16 capsules altogether which make only 8 coffees. ( Although 47 pence for a posh coffee is a lot better than the big coffee chains' prices - and you don't get it in a cheap and nasty cardboard cup, either!). I have found that if I buy a box of 16 espresso capsules and make it up with twice the quantity of water, then add milk or cream, I get 16 really good tasting coffees for £3.77. I do have to give the finished result about 20 seconds in the microwave, though, as the machine doesn't do it hot enough for my taste.