October 2017 Grocery Challenge

CRANKY40

Sorry to see your news about your MIL Chocoholic.

XSpender

So sorry for your loss chocoholic chic.

DS is unwell, DH is unwell and I have had a super stressful day at work so 2 frozen pizzas bought along with strawberries for DS breakfast and some basic sandwich bags.

£9.50 spent taking me to £362.81 and over my £350 target

thriftwizard

Much sympathy for your loss, Chocoholic_chick. What a horrid shock.

I totally get where you are coming from budget-wise; we ended up with extra guests over the weekend, coming to see Mum, although I managed to keep to budget there. But lost the plot completely this afternoon, as we still had two guests (OH's family) & I got called down to the hospital (25 miles each way) to confer with the social worker about Mum's ongoing care, as it looks as if she will recover enough to get sent home. Needless to say, in the event the SW wasn't able to come this afternoon, so I have to go back again tomorrow (which I would have done anyway, but they weren't to know that) and by the time I got out, the traffic was awful as it's half-term and we're forecast a couple of days without rain, so every caravan in the Home Counties has headed down this way. So I didn't get back in time to cook supper for our guests, who were leaving this evening with a long drive to look forward to, and had to buy fish & chips all round... another £35 down! We'll have what we were going to have tomorrow, and I will freeze the extra, but I'm more or less throwing in the towel for the rest of this month, I'm afraid; life is just too uncertain just now & I'm too stressed to worry about it, as I'm doing this from choice rather than necessity. Sorry, everyone!

debtfreeforlife

Thriftwizard, that makes total sense to me - the most important thing is to take care of you and yours. Sending good wishes to you and your family, and to you and your family as well chocoholic_chick. I'm so sorry for your loss.

I'm declaring a total spend up to £195.97 so it is getting very tight over here. However that spend includes the Riverford box I just ordered as well as 2kg of oats and 1kg of chickpeas bought at the local plastic-free bulk buy. So will have fresh fruit and veg in the house from Thursday (and enough to see me through to tomorrow), plus I have plenty of milk in the house as well. So no reason why I shouldn't be able to do it. But I've also discovered that I get nervous and assume I don't have enough in the house if I haven't gone shopping in a few days. I need to train myself out of that habit!

lynnejk

Evening all

Sorry to read your news chocoholic chick. Commiserations to you and your family.

Completely with you Thriftwizard - family always must come first. Hope this trying time passes quickly for you and we 'see' you again soon.

Mr T delivery today = £29.52, so still some funds left in the budget :j

Hope you all have a great Wednesday
Lx

elsiepac

Declaring at £220 / £220

I have bought extras but I have covered them with money saved on alcohol this month - I've been really trying to reduce it, and have saved 30% of the money I usually spend on alcohol a month!
so I'm really pleased with myself.

In other news, with other money saved elsewhere, I have joined Slimming World. Next month I will be budgeting based on this. I have definitely upped my veg intake, and I ate a lot of veg before! But I've been buying fruit and a few other things I wouldn't usually. However, I've also obviously cut down on a lot of other things, so my budget shouldn't be affected, BUT I may need to factor in a second shopping trip per week to top up on fresh veg; I'm not really sure yet. I'll still aim for a weekly budget though.

As always I'll still follow this thread till it closes, but see you in November if I don't post again.
My new budget starts Thursday 26 Oct.

I'm starting to buy small things for Christmas now too, I'm determined to be organised this year!

CRANKY40

Week four and £219.90 out of £280 spent so far (but that is with £40 in the pet food budget not yet spent).

thriftwizard it's the savings that you make on ordinary months that provide back up for times when everything goes "***s up" so to speak so although you may not have to do this challenge it's still good for giving you breathing space for months like the one you're having now. I hope your mum is ok .

armchairexpert

I've done that thing again where I was nicely on target and then went to Costco for next month's supplies and now my budget is very confusing again.

Assuming that I will not touch any of that stuff until November, and therefore disallowing it, I am currently at $836/1050, I have one more weekly shop to do but I won't need to hit the butcher's and the store cupboard is largely full so it's mostly fruit and veg and dairy.

Picked up a bunch of ys meat yesterday, all of it discounted by 50% or more, so I got a 2.5kg lamb leg roast, 750g lamb chops, 600g chicken thighs and two generous t-bone steaks for $31.

Flat_Eric

Sorry - I know slightly off topic - but just interested in thoughts. Quick visit to $ainsbxrys this morning and used the self service checkout. As has happened before, instead of getting my nectar till spit coupon, I didn't get anything - it wasn't out of paper completely but my coupon jammed/was just a jumbled mess of screwed up unreadable text.


Now in the grand scheme of things, it could just have been a boring old coupon I seem to get frequently offering extra points if I sign up for pet insurance or the like but if I had been shopping when they do their nectar points bonus weekends, the coupon could actually have been quite valuable (as with these promotions, you need to have the voucher to claim the points).


Anyhow the staff member said the coupons don't reprint (it didn't when it was refilled) and also said that its rare for you to get said coupons. I must admit I don't get them everything time I shop - has anyone else noticed this? I like it when the machine goes crazy and spits out 4 + coupons but this seems to be a rare occurrence.

purpleybat

hello all,
I've been away, busy, too stressed over the last week or so and only now have caught up with posts.
hugs to everyone that needs them, and then hugs for everyone just to celebrate it being Thursday
I think my last visit was about the 15th, if this is right having a quick glance at my book i've spent about £70! my sister decided a surprise visit tho and I always try to cook what she wants to eat.
have totted up and I think I worked out I have about £23 of a £170 budget, I don't think i'll need all that (will need to buy breads) but still too early for me to call time on October