Not Buying It- A Consumer Holiday 2016

[Deleted User]

I have spent a chunk of cash on tickets for my four DGS and son-in-law and I to go to Wembley in September.A few weeks ago one of the boys spotted that their team Liverpool were playing at Wembley but the tickets sold out so quickly and they were quite disappointed.But last night apparently there is another match going on there ,haven't a clue who is playing but if you were and EE customer you could get then for £10,00 instead of £15.00. So I bought 6 tickets and my four grandsons and my son-in-law and I are all going to watch a match on 2nd September as a treat for the boys Probably a not needed spend, but you have to have a treat at some point, and the amount of pleasure it will give those boys to go and see a 'proper' match at Wembley stadium guarantees me unlimited tea and coffee for the rest of the year from my DGS :):) they are so chuffed and I'm the best Gran in the world.I shall go along with them even though footie isn't my thing and being escorted by five young men has its advantages :):).
So blowing £60.00 seems a lot but the amount of pleasure it will bring is incalculable :):)


JackieO xx

Primrose

Jackie - I am sure that when your grandsons are mature men with kids of their own they will still recall and recount the day their Gran took them to Wembley. I've only ever been to the "old" stadium, but I'm sure it will be an outing to remember.

tighteningthebelt

Today the shed and its shelving went from house a to house b, was dismantled and rebuilt by my dad and my son. I am so pleased it survived. The ground needs some work in front of it, possibly decking, to make the levels up, but that can wait for sales or reusing someone else's cast offs.
I've been so lucky that a local branch of a diy store was closing, so have saved a huge amount of money on the things i had to buy, perfect timing! Lots of the spends have been around windows, house a had lots of tiny windows, house b has bigger ones, so not as much transferability as i would have liked.fortunately I can sew, else it would have got into scary money. Just my bedroom ones left to tackle, and with a.bit of fiddling, I might be able to get them from refashioning 2 pairs of matching smaller ones.
My dad has been amazing, today he's been boxing in the ugliest ever selection of pipes in the bathroom. He's using a combination of offcuts and various finds, and creating a thing of beauty for me.
He is my nbi guru, and gets such pleasure from anything make do, mend, find, free, shared, glued, fixed... His best joke is to tell us to 'keep up' when he pulls his miraculously-ancient-but-still-working-fine nokia phone out of his pocket, making a miraculously-ancient-but-still-working-fine joke of his own frugality!
And I have a can of paint to go back, overestimated requirements.
Carpet fitter for lounge tomorrow, sale price plus bargaining, didn't do badly overall, and it's not like you get a carpet frequently, so that feels ok. Bathroom so small I had a choice of cheap remnants, they are really the last jobs before the move, hooray!

nursemaggie

Wow Jackie That sounds a brilliant day out for you DGS's. £60 was a very good price.

I think you are right being content with your lot is the key to a happy life. I think where you live in the country can make a big difference. We actually moved to the North West from West Sussex because of the cheapness of rents.

Since we moved here I joined MSE and came on the threads. I've quickly learned to lots of money saving tips. I have to admit downgrading our groceries was the best. I say downgrading but it's not really.

We went off to Ald! and did a big shop. We have tried everything we use regularly and there is only one thing we still buy the most popular brand of. I don't use it all that often and stock up every time Mr M has it on offer.

The other big thing I did was start shopping in my local food market. Not a farmers market but a nice indoor market of permanent stalls that are open four days a week. I now buy meat in bulk. My biggest saving is I buy 5 kg of chicken breasts about once every 5 or 6 weeks. I bargain for it and mostly manage to get it down in price. The average price I pay is £18 for the 5 kg.

At the beginning of this month I bought 2 lbs mince steak, 12 nice big plump sausages, 4 of each traditional pork, lincolnshire, and DS's favourite chilli, they are all good quality butchers made sausages, and my 5 kg chicken breast. The total price £28.

We now live better for a great deal less. I batch cook a big 4 lts of soup for my lunches. I put at least two tins of pulses in it so it is a proper meal really filling. I sometimes manage to get a big bag of vegetables already chopped and with red kidney beans in it for 25p from one of the veg stalls. I think he makes them up himself from any of his veg that are looking tired. He must have machine to chop to chop everything up.

It pays to look around your local area and shop accordingly. We also have a sizable Asian population locally so all the supermarkets have things like Indian spices, tins of pulses, tinned tomatoes very cheap. I must get to our nearest Asian Supermarket and find out what the prices are like. What puts me off is it is uphill all the way back home. Apart from Crossing the main road no flat bits at all and very steep in places.

Good luck with your move tighteningthebelt.

[Deleted User]

When I was in Staffordshire a few months ago on a spring break we stayed in Leek and they had a fabulous indoor market there. I brought home and froze some wonderful sliced farm ham, it wasn't anything like the slightly sweaty stuff you get in plastic wrap in a supermarket but gorgeous deep pink tasty stuff. wrapped in packs of three slices at a time I had some lovely salads and meals from it.although I live in Kent to find an indoor market as good as that one is hard.I do have a splendid fresh fish market half an hour away in Whitstable though.

My local Dobbie have a pretty good deli and meat counter but nowhere near as good as Leek market was.

I have done my menus for the next 21 days and will do my last food shop hopefully this Saturday as we are away on holiday next month ,so using up as much as I can with what's inthe cupboards and will only need fingers crossed around a £20 top-up shop this weekend

blackcatsx2

Has anyone been watching this on BBC? Extraordinary way that people shop and eat! I reckon some of the lovely folk on here could teach them a thing or two and the presenters could learn lots from here too! I do enjoy watching it though, even though most of the time I'm staring at the screen in disbelief!

Upsidedown_Bear

blackcatsx2 wrote: »

Has anyone been watching this on BBC? Extraordinary way that people shop and eat! I reckon some of the lovely folk on here could teach them a thing or two and the presenters could learn lots from here too! I do enjoy watching it though, even though most of the time I'm staring at the screen in disbelief!

Thread here about it

Eat well for less

blackcatsx2

Thanks for the link - a great read.
After a long day at work today I waivered over getting a takeaway but instead made a lovely risotto with fridge contents and it was lovely with enough left for tomorrow too. I've decided an occasional takeaway can be a treat not just a default when feeling tired or rushed.

Siebrie

We are holidaying at home at the moment and to dds' great delight we are 'camping': we put the party tent up on the terrace, added the two walls and a musquito net, and put our normal matresses and bedding inside. The girls love it!

Happytravelling

I'm not sure if this link has been shared before as the article is a few months old now, but I've only just noticed it.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/mar/01/less-careful-consumption-spending-buying-stuff

Even though the amount of material waste the UK produces is still frightening, its good to see it is at least reducing.