April 2018 Grocery Challenge

PipneyJane

I’m declaring for April at £116.41/£120, leaving £3.59 in the purse to roll forward into May. We didn’t have another spend, but £5.40-odd must have gone into the “random shrapnel” coin collections (1p, 2p, and 5p go into jars; £2 coins into a special money box, aka The Running Away Fund. The 5p jar took 15 years to fill up, the varmints are so small.)

cw18 wrote: »

Slower than I'd hoped, but happy to have completed it - even with all 5 blisters I brought home :eek:

I was hopeful for 6:15, and looking safe for 6:30. At the 6 mile marker I was actually ahead of the game for a 6hr run, but then the heat hit me and I ended up walking most of the rest Completed in 6hrs 48mins and 50secs, with over £1300 raised for When You Wish Upon A Star which I'm absolutely stunned about

The slower runners amongst us were greeted by several empty water stations, which must have made things even worse for many. Fortunately I always carry a water bladder on my back, so had set off with 3 litres of my own. I did pick up bottles at a couple of the early stations, but when I reached some in the latter part that had very little left it felt good to be able to (safely) decline and leave them for people behind me

Came home Monday, with Tuesday booked off work for recovery. My manager (bless her) had allocated me Wednesday as my weekly day off to give me an extra recovery day. I ended up wearing personal walking boots (a larger size than my work ones) with the thinnest socks I own on Thur, Fri and Sat to stop the two worst blister points feeling too much pressure!! Feet are looking much better today, and I've managed a 2.75 mile walk this afternoon in old running shoes and thicker socks with no pain (and no dressings on anything). Hoping to get out for my first run since the event on Tuesday (day off), which will be my 3.7 mile #FinishForMatt run.

Cheryl, I’m glad you did OK. Congratulations on a race well run and on avoiding dehydration. Insufficient water for the slower runners is just NOT good enough.

It’s amazingly easy how severe dehydration happens; you don’t have to be a marathon runner to experience it. I had an episode on Friday, or at least, I think it was dehydration that I was suffering from. Thursday night, my boss took our entire team out to dinner; something I ate disagreed with me - probably the cream in my pudding - and by the time I got home, I had stomach cramps. (My IBS has always been triggered by fatty food, but I seem to suffer double the cramps when it is triggered by cream.). Anyway, I had peppermint tea - my usual first line medicine - went to bed and thought nothing more of it.

At work on Friday, since I was still feeling a little delicate, I had another peppermint tea first thing instead of my coffee, and got dragged into a briefing for 1.5 hours. I never got to have my usual second drink at around 10am. The briefing preceded a site tour and security means we can’t take liquids on site (we operate on the same rules as airports). I was already thirsty when we left the office. No worries, I thought, our first stop “inside” is an office suite, so I’ll raid the water fountain; there is 20-odd people in that office; they’re bound to have one.

Err... No. Well, at least, not anywhere I could see, and I looked. Out onto the “factory floor”, which is mainly automated and.... Nothing. Nada. Zilch. No water points anywhere that I could see.

By the time I got back to the office, 3 hours later, I was aching all over and my tongue was as dry as a board. Oh, and I had stomach cramps again. I drank a pint of chilled water and got very cold and shivery. My head was pounding. Could barely think straight. Didn’t have lunch, just couldn’t face food. Went home an hour early and crawled into bed, in an attempt to warm up/sleep off the worst of it. Drank another pint of water when I got home (this time, not chilled), and another two over the course of the evening.

The long and the short of it is that I didn’t feel right until today. I had stomach cramps on and off all Saturday. I really don’t know if the symptoms I felt were down to something I ate on Thursday night or to the dehydration I suffered on Friday. Both, probably.

- Pip (Never again.)

cw18

((hugs)) for Pip

When I get dehydrated I get migraine type headaches which are evil, so I've learned to do anything I can to stop that happening. I also get them if I don't have a 'proper' tea in the morning (fortunately Earl Grey also does the trick, and I have plenty of that in stock yet!), and the couple of days I tried to start out on a fruit or herb tea this month I was barely fit to drive home after work :eek:

selloptape

Well done all! Cautiously optimistic about coming in under budget again... I'm sure I've searched everywhere for stray receipts so hopefully won't find a load that I've missed like last month...

Off to look for the May thread now x

RedFraggle

Declaring for April at £294.85
I did order the cat food.

I think not adding up made me super cautious, may have to rethink tactics as it worked.
See you on May!

pamsdish

Considering ordering dog food too RedFraggle, looking to come in well under, seem to have a good month then a bad. Will count up my sacks of food now if I can will leave it for a while.
Got 2 and a bit sacks so okay for 2 months.

MadamMim2013

Finally done with April,
Declaring £286.42
Whoop..
Have made a large food purchase today, Shall be putting it on May as I got paid today :T
Thanks all, see you in the next thred..:rotfl:

pamsdish

Finishing off for April, went Lidl and got my £1.50 overcharge, picked up a few salad bits and some Greek Yoghurt, £3.35-£1.50=£1.85, popped into Morries as I had parked in their car park, few y.s. salad bits and some grapes, 2 bottles of pepsi with ginger I like, and 2 small pork shanks, topped it off with a bottle of brandy as I was under budget, so £30.50 +£1.85=£32.35

Finishing off April at £165 , £35 under budget

thriftwizard

Fantastic! Well done, cw18! OH also found the second half much harder than the second.

cw18 wrote: »

Slower than I'd hoped, but happy to have completed it - even with all 5 blisters I brought home :eek:

I was hopeful for 6:15, and looking safe for 6:30. At the 6 mile marker I was actually ahead of the game for a 6hr run, but then the heat hit me and I ended up walking most of the rest Completed in 6hrs 48mins and 50secs, with over £1300 raised for When You Wish Upon A Star which I'm absolutely stunned about

The slower runners amongst us were greeted by several empty water stations, which must have made things even worse for many. Fortunately I always carry a water bladder on my back, so had set off with 3 litres of my own. I did pick up bottles at a couple of the early stations, but when I reached some in the latter part that had very little left it felt good to be able to (safely) decline and leave them for people behind me

Came home Monday, with Tuesday booked off work for recovery. My manager (bless her) had allocated me Wednesday as my weekly day off to give me an extra recovery day. I ended up wearing personal walking boots (a larger size than my work ones) with the thinnest socks I own on Thur, Fri and Sat to stop the two worst blister points feeling too much pressure!! Feet are looking much better today, and I've managed a 2.75 mile walk this afternoon in old running shoes and thicker socks with no pain (and no dressings on anything). Hoping to get out for my first run since the event on Tuesday (day off), which will be my 3.7 mile #FinishForMatt run.

cw18

Managed to stay out of the shops today, so
declaring April as £137.78 / £100
and year to date as £434.50 / £1200

Monthly spend was a serious overspend, but I'm actually quite pleased that I kept it that low. Having spent £95 at a food festival on 1st April I've been on damage limitation for the whole month, which has been an interesting exercise. I've actually only used about £7 of my food festival purchases this month, so if I were to only charge that to the April budget I'd be seriously under budget

I'm now fully aware that my real downfall in the shops is sweet treats for evening muchies, and that's because I have so little of that kind of thing in my personal food mountain. And OH and I like a dessert on a Saturday night, but it's getting tricky finding something cheap due to dislikes / preferences. I'd happily have sponge and custard or a milk pudding every weekend, but OH won't eat any milk pudding including custard. And I really should be limiting my dairy intake due to lactose intolerance, but struggle to find much out there that's dairy free! (I use soya milk if I make custard etc. for myself in the week.)

Doom_and_Gloom

Over budget by £16.06 as we took our eye off the ball.
Bought a few things we didn't really need. When it was hot we bought ice cream for example. Nice as a treat but the OH went though his fast, two different days he got through a whole pot of B&J in a sitting. Even on offer that isn't cheap.

£171.06/£155.
£16.06 over.

Tablet won't let me change colour again.