MFWW - Cinny Gets Serious

ruby_eskimo

Many thanks for the congrats. I feel like a big weight has been lifted off my shoulders and now my money is for me! And I love the pioneer woman! Made her ultimate macaroni cheese a few times and a few of her desert recipe's are a fave with OH.

Birdie85

Hello there! I'm so impressed by the numbers in your sig, go you! :T

Your food plans always make me so belly-jealous, will you please come and cook for me?! I eat so badly as it's whatever can be made and eaten with one hand with 5 minutes notice! So... sandwiches mostly. Really need to get more organised but my brain is just mush and I forget how to human more often than not.

Enjoy your maternity leave Ali! Take the time waiting for baby to nap, read and eat cake!

Cinny91

Cinny91 wrote: »

Thought I'd do a little to-do list for today:

[STRIKE]
• Do whatever needs to be done to le beef
• Meal Plan
• Shopping List (for said meal plan!)
• Bake new recipe cookies
• Walk Ryderoodle
• Sort laundry
• Clean: Kitchen
• Living Room
• Bedroom (plus change bedding and other fun stuff)
• Bathroom (yay!)
• Get Gramp's birthday present ready for tomorrow[/STRIKE]

Don't want to brag but... naaaaailed it! OH was home early, which normally throws me out, but I pushed on and ignored his requests to "sit down and watch Lost already" (side note: reached the end of Season 4. I'm now void of any emotion and just slightly dazed about it all if I'm honest.)

Gramp's birthday today, so will be going to see him for dinner. Will pop to the shops on my way home with my shopping list, managed to meal plan for some new and cheap recipes so looking forward to testing those out

Beef joint (only £5!) from yesterday shredded up into 3 generous meal portions, so tonight we're having tacos and I'm already excited. My body is ready!!

Ruby - It's an immense feeling, that's for sure! Didn't feel real to me until the following weekend when I got my wages and only the essential bills went out. Magic!!

Ali - Don't feel bad for not cooking! It took me years to get to a stage where I felt comfortable enough in the kitchen to throw ideas and meal plans together. If it wasn't for the fact I'm home before OH in the evenings, seriously doubt I would have made it Plus when we were really struggling money wise, it was left to me to find ways to be as creative as possible on a budget so tiny the same amount is now what I class as a top up shop. No idea how we made it!

Birdie - Quick meals are the worst Would happily come and cook for you if I could! (You too, Ali!) I'm trying to master quick dinners, but it's mostly just scrambled eggs and some raw veggies which is weird and not fun like crisps and white bread.

Will try and keep up a daily meal post! Tomorrow I'm using some of the beef in little filo parcels with caramelised onion and brie. Be still my beating heart! Heaven in a pastry pillow (but pastry does make everything more heavenly imho)

Need to go through some bill stuff this afternoon, start getting things ready for next month and let OH know what his share is. Along with marking pre-orders into my budget, I really want to try and predict what's in the realms of possible when it comes to saving - and what's just a little bit out of my reach for a decent challenge

Birdie85

I demand daily meal posts and recipes. Inspire me!

It's lovely to see a list all crossed off! :T The only thing I tend to get crossed off my daily to-do list is 'write a list'!

Cinny91

Birdie85 wrote: »

I demand daily meal posts and recipes. Inspire me!

I can try!

Stolen from my instagram! I tried the tortilla recipe last night and they were so simple and OH said they were nicer and less stodgy than the store bought ones. Recipe is here For the filling I soaked the shredded beef in a mixture of chilli, paprika, cumin and coriander. Then fried a mother up with red peppers, more spices and made spicy rice. Served with salad and cheese!

Tonight is moar left over beef. Making filo pastry parcels with brie and caramelised onions. With broccoli, greens and wedges

Shopping went well yesterday, and for the most part I did stick to my list. I spent £17.18 all in and a few things could have been avoided:

£2.60 - 16 cans on Vanilla cola
£1 - Onions, was certain we didn't have any.. turns out we have a few!
£1 - Cadburys fingers

Total: £4.60

Not a shocking amount but still money that might have been better suited to my purse! Did get an APG for £1.02, so that will go on a top up shop.

Snagged 6 peppers reduced to 64p, plan to prep and freeze them for future meals later. Peppers have been a lot cheaper recently, so not as big a saving as it used to be, but it still counts!

Never actually made my apple cake the other day! So after walking Ryder when I get home, that's at the top of my list for this afternoon Will make up some salted caramel too, just for personal reasons.

Can see this diary going the same way as my old one.. 99% food and trying to find cheap recipes!!

But still, it's payday! Lots of things coming out this week, which will mean some beautiful TT's coming up. I've rounded the savings pot up to £150 for the moment, just trying to be over cautious on other bills. Will have everything properly updated by next Friday

Have £3.06 in my purse (plus the APG!) And I'm determined to see it out until October. I got this!

Plan for this weekend:

Stay on the fresh home cooked meals
Not wind up at the shops for extras
Clean my car
Probably get suckered into a 12 hour long Lost marathon
Lots of good walks for Ryder

A pretty chilled weekend! Gutted I'm missing the ultimate threadies meet up, but hope you have a great time Birdie

Cinny91

I can't believe it's the 1st of Halloween! Where this year has gone is beyond me. But as it's a fresh month.. I can smell fresh challenges!! :j (side note, made the cookies with this recipe)

Aiming for 20 NSD's over the month. I don't know if it's a high number or not, but it will certainly put me off nipping to the shops for something that costs £1 and spending £10!

Also wanting to get our savings pot up to £500 by the end of the month This has been totally wiped by the water bill, but on the silver lining scale at least we had it there. OH had so many unexpected meetings last month that all our surplus income went there so we wouldn't have had the money if I'd still been making debt payments.

My 4th weekly payday this week (I normally get £20-30 more) and OH's payday so I'll have plenty to update on Friday or over the weekend.

Wish I had more to update moneywise! It's the main reason I've not been posting as all I can really talk about day-to-day is what I'm cooking for tea and 9/10 a funny story about Ryder, money doesn't seem to flow around our lives like it does so excitingly in other threads

However, it's my Mums birthday tomorrow. Have things in to make her and my Dad dinner, and instead of a cake (mostly because my cake stand broke and I'd have no where to put one!) So instead I'll be making these

Aiming for today to be the first NSD.

Birdie85

Those cookies look ace! And the peppermint patties look scrummy!

I can't believe we're in October. This is NOT GOOD! Where's the year gone?! Winter is on the way...

We need to get a meet sorted. You have to meet my baby whilst he's still a baby! He's in a massive rush to be a toddler. Don't know where he gets it from as I'm so gosh darn lazy!

Cinny91

Misty mint cremes from yesterday!

Afternoon everyone!

Getting excited for payday, just want to get some money flowing again and start pumping the savings account up Feels like I'll really be able to stick my teeth into getting savings built up and make some headway here.

Tried to make a basic-doing-this-to-be-budget-friendly chilli a little more interesting last night, instead of standard rice/wedges. Opted for fry bread which was beautiful. Although I did put so many veggies in the chilli to level out the badness, OH didn't think I'd put meat in

Today will not be a NSD. We need sugar and golden syrup for sweets. Starting to test out sweet recipes for Christmas gift ideas, need to make sure they're actually worth giving first :A First on the list is peppermint twist sweeties! Although, if they go well, they'll also be the last on the list. I just need something which isn't too costly that I can make and throw in a £1 storage jar. Perfect thing with this is that I can also use any left over sweet-age crushed up to make peppermint bark Recipe here.

Two freebies in the post to add the to gift box - kitschy apple peeler and make up bag. Applied for some more freebies this morning. Will admit, I don't tend to use freebies as "real" presents (birthdays, christmas etc) but I like having little bits so if someone's feeling down, or requires a bit of a fuss, you can normally whip something up.

As for today. I talked myself down from a very high level, resisted the urge to buy this. Along with another $75 worth of things. I really need to learn to just not look at the internet on my coffee breaks. It will save future heartache.

ETA:

Birdie85 wrote: »

I can't believe we're in October. This is NOT GOOD! Where's the year gone?! Winter is on the way...

Winter is coming, yo!

100% yes to the meet Totally can't wait to meet little Birdie and all his radness!

Cinny91

Happy Friday!

Payday payday payday! I did not want to wake up this morning, but I pushed through as it transpires I'm an adult with a thing called responsibilities. Got myself downstairs to find one very sleepy pooch, who didn't want to get off his bed let alone out for a walk. So I just left him into the garden this morning, will take him out after walk to make up for it.

On the brightside, I forced a very strong coffee into my system and jumped in the shower to wake myself up. I'm feeling this false sense of energy and just general motivation. And it's nice. Admittedly pretend, but nice.

On to money!

• Savings pot swooped up to £100
• £32.95 on Christmas presents (repaid from wages)
• OH won £25 on this months PB :j
• Aiming for the 2nd NSD

Yesterday was very much a nnsd, got my sugar and syrup. Plus a new herb box for OH. We got a lovely one at the start of summer, but OH decided it was better outside.. now he refuses to bring in back in "because spiders" ... where's the rolling eye smilie when you need her?!

Making the peppermint sweets this afternoon, as re-runs of return to amish wound up on my tv yesterday and I couldn't say "no, not now" to them and their silly faces.

Busyish weekend ahead. We need to go get OH a new suit tomorrow, his looks well and truly tired and has done for the last few months. And I don't think it's going to be a quick trip to get that sorted. I have this niggling feeling we're busy on Sunday with something important but can't for the life of me remember what

OH will get paid this evening/tomorrow morning. So another update when that happens

No real tea tonight! Going to work on a meal plan for next week with what we have in and make a little list if needs be, then I'll swing by the supermarket tomorrow for that as we're in need of a sugar thermometer anyways. Trying to plan and cram my spending into set days

Hope everyone has a nice weekend!

littlemiss_pretty

Hi Cinny91 to say i am hooked on your posts will be an understatement. I was born and bought up in Donny town before moving to London at 18, hence the interest in your posts

Just got married in August 2014 and splashed all my savings on my wedding but it was worth every penny. Have started saving again, not saving for anything particular but just want to put away atleast 10% of my wages away or more each month.

I will defo subscribe to your thread. Any recipes for a simple and easy cake? As I am married now and more responsible ahem ahem i want to try and so some baking.

Have a good weekend x