NST: September: the Turtles go Wombling

stewby

Hello...

Thanks for speaking to me about budgets.

I have been assessing stuff for a while and it is a mixture of things. Our cheapest local shop used to be morries (technically it still is) but prices have definitely gone up.
Previously, we used to get pork ribs (for example) for as low as 79p. This is non-yellow label. However, they are now upwards from £1.30 which is obviously a big change.
So much so that OH no longer buys them unless they are yellow labelled.


Yellow labels have also changed. Morries seems to now have a love affair with £2.99 and everything seems to be dropped to that price (as in anything in the 3 for £10 deal).
W haven't seen anything for less than £1.00 (excluding my 99p meatballs this week) recently and it is making our budget quite stretched. I never realised how much we relied on yellow labels.
:undecided

We, officially, have £0.00 left of the budget. The plan is that we will try and get by for the next 11 days.
Currently, OH is away with a friend down south so I don't need to feed him until Sunday night. I am hanging out with my parents which means free food.
Sunday is simple as it's just me at home so will make do with soup or something easy.
Then we just have 9 days to worry about... which we will raid our freezer (and probably my parent's freezer too).


Tescimos is more expensive compared to morries. We could buy the same things in both shops and there would probably be about a fiver in difference. Which doesn't sound like much but when you are restricted to £30 a week... it would really cut into the budget.
:sad:

Credit card payment has gone off... we are now under £1000!!!!
Currently the credit card is sitting at £892.58 although interest is still to be added.
:j

Sounds really bad but I might make an extra payment to the credit card later, just enough to bring it back below £900 after the interest is added on. Sounds like the stupidest reason but oh well.


Hope everyone is doing okay.
Hugs.

Bobarella

Stewby - I hear you on the YS shopping. It really makes such a difference.

When things were really tight for us whilst I wasnt able to work when the business was closed I had us down to £200 a month for 2 adults, a 6 year old boy & a cat. I could only do that by religiously going to my local Mr T at 7pm and stocking up on food for pennies. I never bought anything outside of the basics range at Mr S or things on mark down. We didnt buy any alcohol (although I was also pregnant for a bit of this time so we wouldnt have anyway) & that did all OH's lunchboxes, and sons as well.

I think it is very hard to keep to £200 a month unless you are a dedicated stockpiler, of which there seems to be quite a lot of folk on the grocery boards, and that needs extra funds to buy the bargains in the first place when they are there.

It takes time to shop for pennies, so if you are both working hard and cant go off stalking around for bargains (I was not working so would regularly end up doing trips just to see what was there) its harder and therefore more expensive.

Thats my 2p worth.

Long day on the art trail. No one bought anything yet, but the artist is hopeful tommorow will be for the more serious buyers. I did quite a good days trade, but I took the same today as yesterday and was open an extra 3 hours, so not amaze balls, but I've paid the other half of my business energy bill so the wolf is away from the door for a few more days. Off for a hot bath!

Bob

The_Only_Girl

Good morning lovelies! Halfway through my first night of two night shifts and the first time I've checked in since Tuesday night. Thank you all for your congratulations and well wishes. I count myself lucky to have landed the job and to be able to share the good news with like minded people in the turtle world. I haven't been ignoring you these past few days. It's been super crazy and hectic at work (no surprises there) that when I get home I just have enough time to cook a simple dinner, eat with the hungry hippos, catch up on my favourite TV programmes and crash into bed.... And repeat the same process next day. I was supposed to finish at 3pm on Thursday but because we were so short staffed, I volunteered to stay til 5pm (yes I know I have M.U.G. written or sealed on my forehead). Two hours overtime though so not bad.

So what have I missed for 4 days? You have been really busy while I was out of the loop. I reckon I have about 4 pages of catch up reading to do. I might not be able to truly catch up but will definitely try, starting from the most recent.

The_Only_Girl

Bobarella wrote: »

Stewby - I hear you on the YS shopping. It really makes such a difference.

When things were really tight for us whilst I wasnt able to work when the business was closed I had us down to £200 a month for 2 adults, a 6 year old boy & a cat. I could only do that by religiously going to my local Mr T at 7pm and stocking up on food for pennies. I never bought anything outside of the basics range at Mr S or things on mark down. We didnt buy any alcohol (although I was also pregnant for a bit of this time so we wouldnt have anyway) & that did all OH's lunchboxes, and sons as well.

I think it is very hard to keep to £200 a month unless you are a dedicated stockpiler, of which there seems to be quite a lot of folk on the grocery boards, and that needs extra funds to buy the bargains in the first place when they are there.

It takes time to shop for pennies, so if you are both working hard and cant go off stalking around for bargains (I was not working so would regularly end up doing trips just to see what was there) its harder and therefore more expensive.

Thats my 2p worth.

Long day on the art trail. No one bought anything yet, but the artist is hopeful tommorow will be for the more serious buyers. I did quite a good days trade, but I took the same today as yesterday and was open an extra 3 hours, so not amaze balls, but I've paid the other half of my business energy bill so the wolf is away from the door for a few more days. Off for a hot bath!

Bob

Good luck on your weekend trade Bob!

The_Only_Girl

stewby wrote: »

Hello...

Thanks for speaking to me about budgets.

I have been assessing stuff for a while and it is a mixture of things. Our cheapest local shop used to be morries (technically it still is) but prices have definitely gone up.
Previously, we used to get pork ribs (for example) for as low as 79p. This is non-yellow label. However, they are now upwards from £1.30 which is obviously a big change.
So much so that OH no longer buys them unless they are yellow labelled.


Yellow labels have also changed. Morries seems to now have a love affair with £2.99 and everything seems to be dropped to that price (as in anything in the 3 for £10 deal).
W haven't seen anything for less than £1.00 (excluding my 99p meatballs this week) recently and it is making our budget quite stretched. I never realised how much we relied on yellow labels.
:undecided

We, officially, have £0.00 left of the budget. The plan is that we will try and get by for the next 11 days.
Currently, OH is away with a friend down south so I don't need to feed him until Sunday night. I am hanging out with my parents which means free food.
Sunday is simple as it's just me at home so will make do with soup or something easy.
Then we just have 9 days to worry about... which we will raid our freezer (and probably my parent's freezer too).


Tescimos is more expensive compared to morries. We could buy the same things in both shops and there would probably be about a fiver in difference. Which doesn't sound like much but when you are restricted to £30 a week... it would really cut into the budget.
:sad:

Credit card payment has gone off... we are now under £1000!!!!
Currently the credit card is sitting at £892.58 although interest is still to be added.
:j

Sounds really bad but I might make an extra payment to the credit card later, just enough to bring it back below £900 after the interest is added on. Sounds like the stupidest reason but oh well.


Hope everyone is doing okay.
Hugs.

Stewby I'm with you in the budget. I don't know what happened or how it happened but it looks like I have only £19 left in the groceries/household budget til the end of the month. Not sure how I'm going to manage that especially as we are going to London next weekend (although I have a separate budget for that). I have done a lot of ys shopping this month and have been keeping track of the spending. I think it's due to the low NSD count this month. Low spends however little, if frequent, all add up. Plus there have been several birthdays in the clan this month, a few of our friends ran on the GNR last week, DS2's phone screen got smashed again (2nd time grrrr.) and all of these extra bits were taken from the G/H budget. I might have to think hard whether to start next month's budget after payday next week (it feels like old times when I spent my earnings before I earned them, although technically it's not like that. It just makes me feel uneasy.). For years we used to set out G/H budget to £650 but a few months ago we reduced it to £400/£450 to feed 2 adults and 2 hungry hippos, (I mean 2 teenagers who are hungry all the time. We have managed all these months except this month. And to think that most of my shopping is with YS?!? If I decide to stick to the budget and not touch next month's earning til 1st of October, I have a few Ashda Price Guarantee vouchers, and some nectar points to use, and fridge, freezer and cupboard have decent amount of stuff. Wish us luck,

Congratulations on getting your debt under £1000. What an achievement. Before you know it, it's your DFD and you can shout the debt free scream! Good luck on your next part of the journey.

Abundant sorry to hear you have not been feeling great this month. Please do drop in every now and then so we can cheer you up. Well done on sticking to your budget despite not feeling on top form. It is easy to fall off the wagon, when you are down. You are more resilient than you think you are.

Apple re smart metre, we were contacted by our precious energy provider about the installation of the smart metre however in between arranging the date and receiving their letter, we have switched provider for a better monthly tariff. We are still awaiting the call of the new provider to say if and when we will get the smart metres,

Academia sorry to hear about your oven door, I bet your mum was pretty gutted. I hope it didn't cost an arm and a leg to get it fixed for your mum's sake and yours of course,

Bob and thrifty, happy wedding anniversary to both of you and your OH's. May you have many more happy and prosperous years together.

Time to do some more tasks. I bid you a good weekend. Night night,

apple_muncher

We have 10 more days of September left... And the 'challenge' for those days is to share some meal plans and recipes.

Last night we had our steak celebration meal: steak in a creamy garlic, mushroom and onion sauce, carrots, broccoli, and dh had chips. Yummy!

dolly84

Stewby - if I was in your shoes and had no money left in the food budget I wouldn't make that extra payment to the card. I would get some basic food items to use with what I already had in.

Today is going to be spent doing jobs outside. The fence and gates need painting, the caravan needs cleaning inside and the french doors need a good clean, inside and out. We need to call at Tesco to get some fish using my voucher from The Orchard, so it will be free fish essentially. DH will probably top up with diesel whilst we are there to get him to work next week.

Me and DH will go for a run later on but other than that it will be a quiet day.

Tea today is chicken wrapped in bacon stuffed with garlic and herb cream cheese, potatoes and veg.

Have a good day.

Fmess

Morning all,


stewby - I don't know how you manage £120 for 2 people, I spend £80 for one and find that tricky enough. Well done you.


the only girl - well done on doing the extra two hours


Today I am annoyed and feeling a bit down. There is a possibility of me getting a pay rise at the end of this month but I won't know until I get my pay packet, so I have done next months budgets twice - once with the payrise and once without. However, even with the payrise, I will only overpay my debts by £100 and will have no money saved for the car tax and only enough to cover the MOT, if no work needs doing. I feel like I'll never get rid of this debt atm (sorry feeling really sorry for myself).


I am also annoyed, mainly at myself, because last month I did lots of extra work and paid about £1200 off my credit card (which had £1000+ at 0% and had <£1000 being charged interest). So I assumed that the balance that was being charged interest, would be wiped out. However, because I also made a purchase last month (new TV, as ex took the old one back), the purchases balance is now at around £300. I didn't realise that I should not have paid off the TV money until after the next statement arrived, so now I'll be charged interest on the £300 because I can't afford to clear it as I paid the money in last month. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr


I keep toying with posting a soa as my budget is so tight at the moment, however I know the area that I could save the most money, my dogs, and I can't part with them, so then there doesn't seem any point.

498louise

abundant1972 - sorry to hear you are not feeling too great at the moment, take care.

Fmess - I understand why your feeling annoyed about the credit card, I would be so frustrated by that too but well done on managing to pay off so much money on it last month. Fingers crossed on the pay rise.

Still no other NSD to report here although it should be one today. I have just worked out that I can only spend on 2 of the days for the rest of the month to reach my 15 days target. I think I have enough shopping in till Saturday so I'll do my grocery shopping then. I'll need to pop £10 in a card for my Nephew's birthday on the 28th but I shouldn't need to spend any money other than that. Almost spent my budget for the month.

My son came home from school on Friday with one of those spree books in his bag for us to buy for £20. I usually buy one as it's a fundraiser for the school and I always look in them and see the good deals. However, the reality is that the most I ever use is one or two vouchers as I either forget to use them or just don't go to those places. I think I only saved £10 by using a voucher this year, they run out on Oct 1st so I won't use anymore so I have actually lost £10 on the book. So this year I have decided to put it back in my son's bag to return to the school and save myself the £20. I am quite proud at myself for that one, I used Martin's Money Mantra - If you're skint (YES): Do I need it? NO, Can I afford it? NO! That makes the decision much more clear and easy to make. It's amazing how many of these little extra chances to spend come up and how much money that could add up.

He also got his Christmas card artwork in his bag that you can pay to be made into xmas cards. I will buy a pack of those as they are nice for him to send to grandparents etc. I only buy one pack of 12 standard cards though as they are £6 a pack (you can also buy luxury cards and gift tags). The money is not due until Oct 2nd so I'll wait until then so it can come out of next months budget.

Enjoy what's left of the weekend

498louise

Oh meant to also tell you about meals. I have a spaghetti squash that I need to use (never had one before) so using a recipe 'Italian Style Baked Spaghetti Squash' for lunch today - will post recipe if it's any good. Enchiladas and salad for tea. Also plan to make carrot cake today for pudding tonight and for this week's packed lunches as well as some veg soup for lunches during the week. Better get to it!