2018 Frugal Living Challenge

Frugaldom

Littlesimplelivingcottage - there is a dedicated section of the MSE forums all about slow cooker recipes, you should be able to find it by doing a quick search

FrankieM, glad all went well for DS's 21st birthday bash.

Welcome to the frugal living challenge, stay_at_home_mum, I'll get your name added to the challenger list.

Moll, glad you enjoyed your holiday with your American friend but you have my sympathies trying to stay frugal is that sort of company. £100 per night just on theatre tickets alone? :eek: Hopefully you managed to visit many of the free tourist options to help compensate.

Life continues as usual here except the rain has returned. The blackberries are ripening, blueberries still being picked and we're also getting plums off the garden trees. Yesterday, I made a single pot of jam from plums and mixed berries, so I'll now need to get some sugar to make the year's supply of jams and jellies. I'll be doing mixed fruit (blackcurrant, raspberry combo) and hedgerow jelly from rowans, blackberries and crab apples. Once the apples are ready, I'll be stewing some, swapping some and storing some.

Foraging is free fun for all and means you're getting lenty of your 5-a-day without having to run to the shp every other day. Brilliant! :j

the_cross_rabbit

hi can i join the challenge please? We live i think a fairly frugal life but there is always room for improvement. I'm wanting to pay our mortgage off early and OH has moved job with a pay cut so joining this challenge will hopefully help towards managing our money better.

ma-ri-ella

I tend to read more than I post but wanted to share the mealplan ive had the last few weeks - note I couldn't do this everyweek but it helps with the other weeks to follow my £1 a day challenge.

Breakfast - porridge - free by shopping app redemption . I used water in my porridge. Berrys on top free by foraging . I would have used value porridge if not free on shopping app

lunches - I picked up 2 packets of pitta pockets for 24p each - these each had 6 in them so covered most lunches for 2 weeks - 48p (then minus my discount) = 44p
again with the time of year I used a lot of grown salad leaves etc to fill

dinners - I had soup over the time x4 =9p a time (from a previous glitch) so 36p . various yellow stickers from 10p-15p the rest . Going to put that in at the top end of £1.50 although I know this is less

so
breakfasts - free
lunches -44p
dinners 1.86
drinks - tea . used 4 cartons of reduced milk at 6p each 24p
going to put teabags at 10p a day which I know is overestimating - 1.40
snacks again from foraging was a lot of berries etc


so total cost £3.94 for the 2 weeks?

Worth saying I don't like butter and wraps are things like salad leafs with tomatoes cucumer etc
If it wasn't for all the local free produce I couldn't have done this so extremely - I am eating a lot of berrys etc. The cashback is a bit of a gamble but the money has paid out :P I defo don't go hungry either .

jammydodgersandrhl

Hi, I'm new and would like to join the challenge.

9 months ago my partner left me and since then I've racked up £3000 on a credit card and £350 on an overdraft. Money is now super tight. Im a single parent so literally all of my money goes on bills bar £180 so need to find a way of reducing spend, selling what i no longer want/need and being as frugal as possible with food budgets and gift buying (xmas and birthdays coming up).

I've started by joining grocery challenges to help with the food aspect and am batch cooking to get me started and ready for school start in September (im a teacher so time is always an issue when cooking healthy and cheap foods).

Next is to tackle christmas gifts and birthday gifts that are coming up! So i thought i would share a link i found for a word art ( https://wordart.com/ generator that allows to make a jpeg or png using different shapes (can even add your own images to make them) that I'm going to start using to make homemade gifts for friends and family as well as other random things. Im a crafter so may make fabric hoop art too.

[Deleted User]

I'm still around!!

Haven't posted much recently as August is always a chaotic month with birthdays and mad working hours!! Add to that trying to get the house sorted and it's been a bit mental!!:rotfl:

Well, today is the start of the real sticking to budgets and getting the money together for the house. Our petrol and grocery funds are replenished tomorrow and I have added the remainder of the window money to the fund - just got to wait for the date of installation now!!

Bit of a bonus that I had been planning on giving away a couple of bookcases but the person who took them has given me some cash for them so that went straight to the house fund

I've been really good with food.....I have decided that meal planning wise, I'm going to plan three evening meals per week - the way that we eat is erratic but if I do that, we will definitely use it all up and have no waste.
I made a veggie casserole and a veg soup from the remnants of the veg in the fridge on Monday - I did some homemade dumplings (and you don't need suet....who knew!! ) and we had that yesterday, I put the soup in the fridge for Saturday lunch and I will make some bread to go with it.

I have some foraged blackberries to make into a crumble tonight and I have a job lot of basil which needs using up. So, we are having pesto polenta with cannellini beans in a creamy cherry tomato sauce and cannellini beans with a lemon and basil cream sauce. I will serve it with cooked beetroot and some type of greens (not sure what yet - will have to check supplies!) plus leaves and an orange and pink grapefruit salad.

I have been given an inordinate amount of chutney by my sister so I am going to have to think of things to use that with as I need the fridge space - she's made fruit ones that need to be refrigerated which is a bit of an issue space wise!

hugglemonster

Frugaldom, I've just read your thread on saving for a house, when I saw the photos of your garden at the end I had tears in my eyes! Absolutely fantastic and such an inspiration, I have been trying unsuccessfully on many occasions to be frugal especially where food is concerned (we spend more in a month than some in a year) and today I managed to get some free apples whilst out for a walk with the kids, the blackberries aren't quite ready yet.

Whilst we already have a mortgage, we're lucky enough to live in a good house and my mission is to pay off the debt and start on the mortgage.

Thank you for being so inspiring, ooh I also mended the hem of my shorts - thank goodness my Mum taught me how to sew.

H x

FrankieM

Morning

Thanks everyone for the google docs information, I'll take a look over the weekend.

And thank you frugaldom for your kind offer. I'm in the Midlands so I think I may be too far away, but I'll get google maps out on the weekend and see. I'm planning on booking something somewhere, one way or the other!

Its raining here and quite dark in the mornings. I'm having to put lights on!

No spending needed today so my purse is staying at home. My food is organised for lunch and tea and I think I'm popping in to my DD's tonight at some point to pick up some post (and have grandchildren cuddles).


Another day at work for me

Shrewbie

Hi everyone, I've been lurking on this thread for the past few days, I also read your posts Frugaldom on your house buying journey and wanted to say well done also for having the courage to stick to your guns, very inspiring stuff!!

littlesimplelivingcottage

Frugaldom wrote: »

Littlesimplelivingcottage - there is a dedicated section of the MSE forums all about slow cooker recipes, you should be able to find it by doing a quick search

FrankieM, glad all went well for DS's 21st birthday bash.

Welcome to the frugal living challenge, stay_at_home_mum, I'll get your name added to the challenger list.

Moll, glad you enjoyed your holiday with your American friend but you have my sympathies trying to stay frugal is that sort of company. £100 per night just on theatre tickets alone? :eek: Hopefully you managed to visit many of the free tourist options to help compensate.

Life continues as usual here except the rain has returned. The blackberries are ripening, blueberries still being picked and we're also getting plums off the garden trees. Yesterday, I made a single pot of jam from plums and mixed berries, so I'll now need to get some sugar to make the year's supply of jams and jellies. I'll be doing mixed fruit (blackcurrant, raspberry combo) and hedgerow jelly from rowans, blackberries and crab apples. Once the apples are ready, I'll be stewing some, swapping some and storing some.

Foraging is free fun for all and means you're getting lenty of your 5-a-day without having to run to the shp every other day. Brilliant! :j

Thank you, I've had a hunt and I must be a wee bit daft but I cannot find it

FrankieM

I had a little look too littlesimplelivingcottage and I couldn't find it either. I thought it was a 'sticky' but it may have been moved.


Payday and weigh in today


6lbs of weight gone, which was my target The 'weight loss budget' is 10lbs this month to stay on track. 10 months to go.


I've moved money around but the rest has to wait until the 1st so I'll be able to calculate where I am debt wise then.


My Trips, Treats & Travel account has taken quite a hit this month with extra spends for my DS' birthday celebrations etc so I want to concentrate on filling that up (otherwise known as the EEk & RACK fund)


It also means that my budget for going away for my birthday long weekend at the end of the month is alot lower than I originally thought so I really need to hunt for a bargain.