Dreaming of financial freedom!

Kittenkirst

Hey Charley, sounds like you're doing fab with the groceries & the cooking!

One essential recipe I found was to learn to make a white sauce- it can be used for so many different meals (lasagne, pastas, macaroni cheese, pies etc) and you can add flavours such as herbs to make it different. I'd definitely recommend giving it a go you could use it next time for chicken tarragon & mushroom pie maybe,

I learnt from a Jamie Oliver cookbook and use it all the time- copied here if it helps "Melt the butter in pan over a medium-low heat, then mix in the flour adding and stirring in 1 splash of milk at a time until you have a smooth white sauce. Bring to the boil, then simmer for a couple of minutes before removing from the heat. Finely grate and stir through most of the Parmesan, then season to taste."

(From Jamie Oliver lasagne recipe)

newgirly

Hi ch4rly, just wanted to say best of luck with the new diary and it sounds like you have got off to a great start

We don't have internet or phone with sky but have also found that we can get a good deal on the basic package by cancelling. We have not paid over £10 pm for years now, but I have bought a few now tv boxes (we have 3 kids) as the movies are £9.99 pm for up to 4 devices , so it works out well for us.

Sorry this is more spending than saving I guess but if you are regular cinema goers do you have a Cineworld nearby? we have monthly passes that can also be used with meerkat codes for free tickets on a Tuesday and weds, just a thought! It's probably saved us money in the long run as we tend to go there a lot more

Try the old style boards for grocery budget advice as they are fantastic and you will be amazed at what you can save with planning, also there are some good blogs around on the subject, - cooking on a bootstrap is a favourite of mine.

Anyway best of luck

ch4rly2002

Thanks KittenKirst, I'll be brave and try making the sauce myself and see how I get on. I was nervous before trying to do a roast but it worked out ok so I might surprise myself with this too!

Thanks for the tips Neegirly I've only just found out about NowTV and I think it's a great idea. As we're moving to Virgin we will lose Sky Atlantic which is what we watch DH's favourite show on so I got the NowTV just for that really and we can watch on the main TV through his Xbox. However, as we can register it on 3 more devices he's going to register it on his iPad as he travels a lot with work so he'll be able to watch some decent programmes for a change while he's away. I don't know if the TV in our bedroom is a smart TV but if it is we'll be able to use it there too, although if not I'll be tempted to buy a NowTV smart box so we can pause etc.

I went to M&S earlier I checked my Sparks card for offers and there was a £5 off voucher as it's my birthday coming up soon, I was really pleased with that as I had only gone in for some bread and their 3 for £10 meat offer so it nearly halved my bill. It got me thinking, I wonder what other birthday offers/vouchers/freebies are available out there so I'm going to do a bit of Googling and see if I can find something else worth taking advantage of. Might as well make the most of turning 30!

I was a bit gutted today that I had a voucher for £6 off when you spend £40 at Tesco that expires today. As it !!!!!! at 4pm on a Sunday I thought I'd place an order online but it wouldn't let me use the voucher. Nowhere on the voucher does it say the shopping had to be delivered by the expiry date, it just says to use it by that date and under the online T&Cs it says the discount will be applied at the checkout. I'm going to complain to them tomorrow as I think they should make it clear on the voucher.

I also went to Sainsbury's today looking for a specific birthday present for a friend who's coming up to visit us next week. Unfortunately they didn't have what I was looking for, but when I swiped my nectar card I won 200 bonus points, so that put a smile on my face. I'm saving up my Nectar points to get an iPad as mine is a bit slow with all the apps I have on it. I have £300 so far and if I buy it at Argos I can pay part points and part money so I want to save up as many points as I can before I buy it... but I am impatient so it will be hard! Eyes on the prize though, the main aim is to make some home improvements and pay more off the mortgage so a new iPad isn't a priority. I think I need to print that out and chant it everyday until it sticks! I'm just so bad for impulse buying but I will use all my willpower

DH is asleep next to me (he's not well at the moment) and tea is cooking in the oven as I type. It was another half price bargain from our Sainsbury's local. It was reduced yesterday to half price even though the use by date is today. The guy on the checkout said they always reduce items the day before so they can sell in time. That's really handy to know

Since I've started cooking more myself I have been using wine in my cooking. I always buy loads of bottles when it is on offer but we hardly drink it so I thought if I use it in my cooking it will taste good (the slow cooked beef in red wine was lovely) and it's a good way to use it. I bought some ice cube bags today to pour the leftover wine into as I read that tip somewhere once and I didn't want to throw away half a bottle of wine.

Right, I'm going to stop there - I've rambled on enough

foxyloxy11

I'm pleased you said about freezing wine. I don't drink it but like you use it for cooking so wondered if I could put it in ice cube bags. thanks for that!

ch4rly2002

Glad I could help FL I've read the wine tip a few times online so I thought I'd give it a go. I'll let you know how it goes when I use some for cooking.
I rang Tesco about the coupons won't be valid for online shopping if the delivery date is past the coupon expiry date, even if you place the order while the coupon is in-date. I asked if they could add that to the back so other people don't make the same mistake. The woman said they wouldn't do that because the full T&Cs are on the website, but she did give me a voucher for £6 as a gesture of goodwill, which I thought was really nice of her. I placed the order and used a £4 off when you spend £40 voucher so I saved £10 in total
It was my 10th wedding anniversary yesterday but DH was working in London so we couldn't really celebrate, however we are going out for a meal with family and friends at the weekend to celebrate my 30th birthday so we will count it as a joint celebration! February's always an expensive time for DH with our anniversary, birthday and valentine's all within a few days of each other so in recent years I've started asking for joint gifts. I told him I wasn't bothered about a gift this year as I'd rather we saved the money for house improvements, but he said that wasn't going to happen with us having some big milestones so when we were on holiday he bought me a beautiful pendant from my favourite Spanish jewellery brand. The payment for that is a distant memory now and came out of the holiday budget so even though I have a lovely gift, it didn't feel like an expensive day yesterday. I asked him what he wanted and he couldn't think of anything so he's taken a rain check for when there is something he really wants (will probably end up being a games console or something in future) so rather than wasting money on something he doesn't want I shall wait for him to choose something that he'll love.
The B-I-L is coming tonight. DH and I have been really ill with chest infection and bad cough so we didn't feel up to hosting on Monday. As DH was away yesterday I'm making his and his brother's favourite for tea and it shouldn't cost too much either. Chicken breasts are from M&S on their 3 for £10 offer with my £5 birthday discount, diced chorizo with pepper and onion cooked in a cheese sauce, served with pasta or mushroom rice, depending on what they fancy at the time. Not the healthiest or the most imaginative - I 'invented' it when I was using up some ingredients once - but they absolutely love it and it is easy to make so win-win!
We updated the finance spreadsheet and I checked the mortgage tab. The interest charged has gone down from around £570 p/m to about £325 p/m, meaning an overpayment of approximately £245 every month just by keeping the payment the same. It's the same story on the BTL mortgage as well, down from around £525 to about £287 meaning an overpayment of approximately £238 by keeping the payment the same. We have some fairly big jobs that we need to do to the house before I can chuck any real OPs at the mortgage so just seeing how much extra is being paid off by the interest rate dropping with the new deals has really cheered me up, especially as they have not been at all straight forward. Worth the hassle! I paid £16.68 off the mortgage to round it down to an even £201,800 which looks better to me and is a Tilly Tidies method (I feel like I'm learning a lot from these blogs!). Every little helps as they say

Kittenkirst

That's fab reductions in your interest! Way to go

Enjoy all your celebrations :beer:

Jessy103

Hi ch4rly2002! Well done with your meals, sounds like you're saving money and eating great food, which is the best way of doing it! Happy anniversary and have a great 30th birthday!! xxx

try_harder

What a great reduction in interest ,well done .Love reading your diary .

themadvix

Those are great reductions in interest Ch4rley - it must feel really good to be making such a dent as a result!

foxyloxy11

woohoo! sounds like celebrations all round.