December 2016 Grocery Challenge

Franalamadingdong

Redshank, don't feel too bad. Do you have a joint account? If your hubby picks bits up it wouldn't take much to stick the receipt on the fridge. Is he on board with budgeting?

Stephie, £110 for 10 days sounds ok. You can do it! We have £140.46 for to the end of the month - I'll be shopping tomorrow. I figure the budget is most helpful to have a guide, so even if I go over I am doing better than not trying at all.

Redshank

StephieWillcox wrote: »

Never mind. I will continue these challenges next year and I'm sure things will get better.

That's pretty much what I've decided too

Franalamadingdong wrote: »

Redshank, don't feel too bad. Do you have a joint account? If your hubby picks bits up it wouldn't take much to stick the receipt on the fridge. Is he on board with budgeting? .

Yes he does - I think my mistake this time was trying to keep track of absolutely all our spending rather than just focusing on groceries for my first month. I got overwhelmed and panicked.

Franalamadingdong

I've tracked everything but I'm fabulously obsessive, but I get that it makes it so easy to become overwhelmed, especially if you have hubby spending too.

Just the two of us, I only started last month (hence still enjoying being obsessive) I hacked what we were spending by a third, because it was ridiculous, and we under spent by £50, out of a £200 budget. I've left the £200 as it is for this month, so I guess you could say it's increased by £50, based on last month's spends, but in January I won't cut the budget by £50, but just by £20 instead, given we were spending about £300, to cut to £180 I'm rather pleased, and we'll see how we get on, if we can reduce it further we will. Sorry I'm not particularly helpful. Also worth knowing that we're going to my parents' over Christmas, but I will be bringing sweets, biscuits, a side of salmon, some alcohol other snack things, so it isn't a cost free Christmas.

PennyGrabber

Re Christmas food, I've been buying bits and pieces for the last few weeks - Pringles, peanuts, cheeses, pate, par baked baguettes, pickled onions, etc. partner is buying the meat and I'm doing the veg, so won't really need a massive spend during Christmas week. Maybe £20, for dips and pince mies, and special bits like pigs in blankets.

I've been saving my 50p coins all year, and I have about £60. I'll be using this on Xmas eve to do ys shopping of meat. Bit of a challenge to see what I can get for it! If the deals aren't great, I think I'll look on Boxing Day too, although I'll have the children with me too...

I'm looking forward to starting next year, and seeing how little I can spend!

PG x

Ps - Nsd today

t14cy_t

spends of £4 in morrisons yesterday, the best chorizo sausages x2, bacon steaks x2 and milk! still in budget, phew!! xx

pamsdish

Called in morries last night as per, my sister visiting so she came with me, big mistake, £69-77, however that included sisters purchases,£30 amazon gift vouchers, she gave me a £10 to cover her bits, paid with £25 saved vouchers, £30 off sister at till for Amazon vouchers, so by convoluted accounting my shop was £5, that included a bottle of vodka, so I have run menu through my head and only need cream etc, got another £5 voucher yesterday too, and the amazon cards added 750 points,garage gave me a spend £30 get 3500 points all added up to me just requiring about 200 points for another £5, so think I am happy with those totals.

kkffoo

just_the_two_of_us wrote: »

Hi all
What have you all done about Xmas - added extra onto your normal monthly shop?

Both my hubby and son get their Christmas bonus in food vouchers. I also add longlife items in with the ordinary shop if budget allows in Oct & Nov, or bake / freeze things if I have time. This year I've totted up the bankable amounts from our change pot (£19) for our treat takeaway, so I'm not saving for that out of the regular food budget.
All this should mean we can manage just our regular spend through December (we'll see!)

My neighbour has a wholesale account at a couple of cash and carries, due to buying items for community events, and as a timesaver she buys her own household products in bulk at the same time. As the quantities are quite large she wondered if I wanted to split some packs. I was tempted, but I didn't want to commit the cash and storage space upfront. The savings were reasonable but not outstanding. Also, hubby had a spree on toiletries when he visited the discount pharmacy, so we have enough toothpaste etc. to last us until Easter, and combined with my big monthly !sda shop the budget is sailing a bit high at the moment.

Áldi top up shop £11.99
Áldi veg & bread £7.84
Moreishons- veg & bread £9.44
$avers cleaning / toiletries £7.90 (just the non pharmacy items relevant to this budget)
H!ron voucher top-up £3.88*

4 week budget for four £112.91/ £273.08 (just one week's spend ...eeep!)

StephieWillcox

Franalamadingdong wrote: »

Stephie, £110 for 10 days sounds ok. You can do it! We have £140.46 for to the end of the month - I'll be shopping tomorrow. I figure the budget is most helpful to have a guide, so even if I go over I am doing better than not trying at all.

You're right, I was getting myself all confused that I would need to pay for the turkey etc with that budget, but I don't have to! I'm used to spending ~£150 on my big shops, so only need to trim that down a touch to come in on budget for the month.

House going up on the market today so have to really reign in the spending to try to buy a bigger house

elsiepac

just_the_two_of_us wrote: »

What have you all done about Xmas - added extra onto your normal monthly shop?

just the two of us I'm quite lucky in that my grocery budget won't really get affected by Christmas unless I buy some treats, which I may. I live alone (prob next year boyfriend will have moved in so all change!) and me and my sister both go to mum and dads on Christmas Eve where we have wine and nibbly bits for tea.
For this mum usually buys a few packs of the supermarket party type food, and because I'm vegan I also buy a couple of packs so I know I have something too which I know is ok for me! (eg, this year the M&S veggie oriental selection is good for vegans, plus the thai sweetcorn fritters and the japanese mushroom onigiri...BUT the pack of veggie spring rolls is not!!).
So I just need about a tenner for Christmas Eve.
I take a few bottles of wine with me as does my sister, as only her and me drink white wine - my dad has beer and mum doesn't drink since she had cancer so we don't expect her to buy wine for us!! So about £20 on wine if I take 5 bottles and get it from Ald1 (that covers the three days usually).

Then Christmas Day mum provides breakfast - we usually have a bagel each - theirs with smoked salmon and cream cheese, and mine with marmite and spread lol. Plus we have champagne which my sister provides for that morning.
Christmas dinner we go out - it's too much for mum to stand up and cook and prep for so long, and the one year me and my sister tried to do it she just couldn't give up control so ended up aching and suffering a bit for it, so since then we've gone out to save the hassle. Mum and dad pay for the food part for us all (as mum said they would have paid for the dinner anyway), and we just pay for our wine/drinks.
So usually about £30.

Then Christmas Day evening there might be nibbles left over, they have cheese and biscuits and chutney and grapes or sandwiches - I usually end up buying artisan vegan cheeses and eating them for the sake of it which isn't good for my weight!!
So this year I am going to take ingredients for a festive salad - it may not sound good to you guys but mym mum and sister will def like it and at least it's something a bit healthier - it's a base of kale with a sweet apple/vinegar dressing (it wilts down the kale, honestly!), with fresh apple, pomegranate seeds, dried cranberries and topped with pecan parm which is made of toasted pecans, nutritional yeast and salt.
I'll make sure I have some nice vegan chocolate as well though, also bread and houmous.
But realistically £15 should more than cover me.

Boxing Day is toast fruit or cereal for breakfast, then we go to my nan's for a big family get together (large family on my mums side as she is one of 6 so I have lots of uncles, aunties and cousins and their kids!). I take my remaining wine but we are told not to bring food as nanny and grandad are always left with tons. So I will nibble on crisps there (they don't really understand veganism and I'm not going to start trying to force my grandparents in their 80s to cater for me!!), buttry and be organised and make sure I have stuff at home for tea of Boxing Day to make soup with or even something ready made as I'll be hungry then!

OK just realised that comes to about £75 but in reality it'll be a bit less I think. Also only Boxing Day evening food to come from Grocery so doesn't impact this budget too much. Ooh I'm getting excited now!!

I've got 8 days left of my December budget now but am doing a shop tonight. I have a £6 off £30 Tesco voucher so will be trying to spend £24 and stocking up a bit! HOWEVER I have a list and a food plan - not a meal plan, just a list of recipes to make and the fresh bits I will need to do so.


Date.......Shop......Amount.....Remaining
25 Nov.....BF........£53.11.....£106.89 (Health Food Stock Up Shop)
26 Nov.....Steve.....£01.00.....£105.89 (for crisps)
26 Nov.....Mark......£01.50.....£104.39 (for bakery)
26 Nov.....T3sc0.....£21.18.....£83.21 (proper groceries shop)
5 Dec......T3sc0.....£22.95.....£60.26 (stock up grocery shop - baking things, tins, salt, stock cubes etc)
7 Dec......T3sc0.....£01.94.....£58.30 (croutons for me for a salad at lunch - last minute using up iceberg which I never normally have! plus rice for my boss... hopefully I'll get that 84p back!)
8 Dec......Co-0p.....£06.45.....£51.85 (kale, spinach, lemons, coriander, tomatoes, limes and peppers - was £8.13 but I used £1.68 on my membership card)
9 Dec......A1d1......£02.17.....£49.68 (onions, peppers, brown sugar)
9 Dec......T3sc0.....£02.19.....£47.49 (salsa, houmous, broccoli)
12 Dec.....T3sc0.....£02.69.....£44.80 (salad leaves and cherry tomatoes from little t3sc0 hence pricey!)
14 Dec.....Chippy....£01.65.....£43.15 (Spring roll at lunch time - got free chips as they forgot to charge as I was getting for a few people in work and they were busy so gave me them free! Saved £2.05!)
14 Dec.....C0-0p.....£01.00.....£42.15 (Ritter Sport Marzipan)

Franalamadingdong

I went to Lidlilly and did a huge shop, including loads of stuff for Christmas. My parents buy the turkey etc so I get salmon, pickles, chocolates, snacks etc. I got stocking bits for DS and some more PJs and socks (unfortunately couldn't get paw patrol PJs in his size: he's tall for his age, and most kids his size wouldn't be that into paw patrol) but those come out of clothing budget. So it is £57.12 for us today! I said it was a biggy! What's funny is that I had a call from mum asking to pick up some stuff for her and I managed to scab an invite for tea. So full fridge and cupboards and we didn't eat any of it! Haha! Confident that this will be our last big shop this month and I did great at putting back things I liked but didn't need (lovely blanket, an electricity set, washi tape, etc). Plenty left in the budget and I have the £64.11 total budget leftover from last month that is free to cover any overspending in any category.

I was also given a box of Benedict's bittermint collection from one of the groups at work and a pay rise, backdated to July! I then fell over and managed to hurt both legs despite landing on my bum! Haha! Swings and roundabouts!

December Grocery budget: £116.66/200