Spend Nowt, Buy Nowt, Owe Nowt

brizzlegirl

Impressive savings, well done x

Suffolk_lass

Just a quick reference to turf for your garden - normally the best time to lay it is February (down here, March where you are) before things start to grow, or autumn - late September or early October so it is regularly watered from the sky and gets established over winter. Have you considered seeding the area instead? - there are some excellent mixes of seeds in one packet available and it is much cheaper. If you put turf down now (if you can get it) you may be setting it up to fail with warm weather coming and the overhead of regular watering and no walking on it for a month after laying it.

XSpender

Suffolk_lass said:

Just a quick reference to turf for your garden - normally the best time to lay it is February (down here, March where you are) before things start to grow, or autumn - late September or early October so it is regularly watered from the sky and gets established over winter. Have you considered seeding the area instead? - there are some excellent mixes of seeds in one packet available and it is much cheaper. If you put turf down now (if you can get it) you may be setting it up to fail with warm weather coming and the overhead of regular watering and no walking on it for a month after laying it.

DH did think about grass seeding the area but wanted the instant ‘done’ effect of turf.  The 30m we laid a couple fo weeks ago has gone down well despite the lovely weather we have had due to DH diligent watering and no walking on it.  DH actually ordered the turf first thing this morning and was told by the company they weren’t sure when they would get it to us so we hadn’t prepared the ground and it turned up 2 hours later! The cost was a fair bit higher per metre than our last order but we still have a bit left in the garden makeover budget.

Our new prints arrived and they look great.  DH has put them up and also the old cupboard thing in the utility that will be painted if I can ever buy any furniture paint.  The curtain hooks also arrived but putting the curtains up will have to wait until the garden work is finished tomorrow.

This afternoon DH and I watched the first lesson of DRs Financial Peace Uni and I think DH quite enjoyed (although was aghast at tithing as the first line on the budget example) and has agreed to do the budget tomorrow morning before we watch lesson 2.  I think we will have to have double lessons some days to get through it all before my free trial runs out.

My payslip was on line this afternoon and I received about £100 more than I had guesstimated as I have a much better tax code this year and a small refund of cash expenses.

XSpender

I am so tired I can hardly lift my glass of wine 

DH and I have dug, shovelled, carried, wheelbarrowed and raked a small mountain today in order to lay the last 20 metres of turf.  It looks good but we now have another massive border to fill.  At least the compost bin is now in it’s new permanent home.

We couldn’t do the 2nd DR class this morning due to internet issues as the supplier changed today and there was a 2 hour gap with no service so DH has suggested we have a ‘breakfast meeting’ tomorrow as we are both always up early and he will make a pot of proper coffee and toast and we can watch class 2 and 3 and review the budget before DS surfaces.

We had a tray of eggs and a sack of potatoes delivered today.  DH tried baking some in the slow cooker but it didn’t work so I finished them off in the oven and we will have them for lunch tomorrow.

I am aiming to spend no more than £80/week on food, cleaning, dog food, booze, the odd takeaway etc.  The first week started Monday and we are at £54 already after the egg/spud delivery then buying wine, beer and snacks after the gardening marathon and a few basics on Monday.  There wasn’t a square of chocolate, a jelly baby or a crisp in the house today and we had finished the last of the homemade cake yesterday.  I hadn’t had chance to bake the apple cake I had planned and I NEEDED snacks!  Some real food was bought too and we dropped lucky with some YS items.  One thing about being at home all the time is we do not waste any food.  I made the last of the soft potatoes into homemade fried chips last night which were a real treat.  I don’t think I have ever made them for DS before.

I haven't opened my 16kg sack of GF flour yet and don’t really have enough big containers to store it in so will have to move some contents about.  I have found a supplier of 5KG of GF oats that is much cheaper even than the supermarkets even with P&P on.  I eat oats almost everyday so these will be a good buy but I need some storage solutions before I order them.

I moved last month’s savings into the ISA bringing us to 6.25% of our savings target for the mortgage free period excluding the EF which I am counting separately.  This also doesn’t include our savings from this month’s pay which I will move once DH and I have agreed the budget.

Suffolk_lass

I have just decanted my 25kilo sack of strong white bread flour into old-fashioned sweet jars that DH bought over ten years ago to store or use for a school project (and distributed 2k each (in bags, not the jars) to several women in the Village who are making bread). I found some in the garage never yet used and also had one empty from the larder. Mine comfortably hold 2.8k of flour. They are about £4 each now from Amazing. I also have two like these but mine are glass and hold tea-bags and sugar in a single layer in a cupboard - I can recommend them for a storage cupboard. The advantage is that they stack

XSpender

Suffolk_lass said:

I have just decanted my 25kilo sack of strong white bread flour into old-fashioned sweet jars that DH bought over ten years ago to store or use for a school project (and distributed 2k each (in bags, not the jars) to several women in the Village who are making bread). I found some in the garage never yet used and also had one empty from the larder. Mine comfortably hold 2.8k of flour. They are about £4 each now from Amazing. I also have two like these but mine are glass and hold tea-bags and sugar in a single layer in a cupboard - I can recommend them for a storage cupboard. The advantage is that they stack

Thank you SL, I knew you’d have the answer to that question.   These are perfect and have been added to my Amazonian order for today along with a gift for DS birthday.  I wonder if they would be safe to use on a wooden bookcase in my integral garage or if they would need to be in a kitchen cupboard.  I have one of those corner cupboards with a lazy Susan turning shelf that they could go on.

brizzlegirl

Hi
if you have some flood space then we use brewing buckets for storing large quantities of flour? 

Enjoy the baking! 

X

brizzlegirl

Sorry typo! That’d be floor of course!!!

XSpender

Another good idea for flour storage brizzlegirl, thank you.

Today has been a good day.  We watched FPU lesson 2 & 3 this morning and did the budget.  DH has also downloaded YNAB and debt planner apps. I didn’t think I would feel quite as emotional (in a positive way) with DH getting involved.  Fingers crossed it continues. 

DH reminded me that one of the concert tickets we have requested a refund for was DS christmas present so we have used this to buy him a replacement present for his birthday.  The rest of the money will go in the savings pot when it arrives.  We are at 31.25% of our Furlough savings target not including this refund and have also now paid 50% of our December holiday balance.

Things may be about to change though as it is likely DH will go back to work in a week according to his boss he called today.  He will be pleased to go back but we will need to tweak the budget to cover fuel etc.

We have had torrential rain this afternoon so DS has done some school work, I have done a basket of ironing (all we had 👍) and helped DH rehang the dining room curtains, hang a picture, put a load of stuff in the loft and a few other little niggly jobs.

I finally got hold of some icing sugar at the local Nisa when I went in for dog food.  I was getting worried about how I would decorate DS cake as neither the co-op or Asda had any in stock!  We are slightly over our £80 food budget for this week but this did include 30 eggs and a big bag of spuds.

Suffolk_lass

XSpender said:

Suffolk_lass said:

I have just decanted my 25kilo sack of strong white bread flour into old-fashioned sweet jars that DH bought over ten years ago to store or use for a school project (and distributed 2k each (in bags, not the jars) to several women in the Village who are making bread). I found some in the garage never yet used and also had one empty from the larder. Mine comfortably hold 2.8k of flour. They are about £4 each now from Amazing. I also have two like these but mine are glass and hold tea-bags and sugar in a single layer in a cupboard - I can recommend them for a storage cupboard. The advantage is that they stack

Thank you SL, I knew you’d have the answer to that question.   These are perfect and have been added to my Amazonian order for today along with a gift for DS birthday.  I wonder if they would be safe to use on a wooden bookcase in my integral garage or if they would need to be in a kitchen cupboard.  I have one of those corner cupboards with a lazy Susan turning shelf that they could go on.

Ours used to be out on a worktop - I guess it is dependent on how deep the shelves are. I've always had problems with weight in pull out drawers and shelves. We started our previous kitchen with two pull out larder cupboards 500mm wide and had to move all the tins as they were too heavy for the wall fixings. The shelves were OK except they were pulling away (with my glass storage jars and tins on them. We have used planks of scaffold boards on bricks as shelving previously (to keep bags of sand and cement off the ground - I can vouch that that works (but not indefinitely)).