October 2018 Grocery Challenge

chirpychick

Would it be ok to get on board now? I have £40 ish to last us 8 days which in theory should be ok, but i know will take some tight control. (so sorry if this is more than others have).
Also We heard the blow yesterday that my husband might be getting made redundant for the second time within a year and this time we will get absolutely no money. We are debt free other than the mortgage now but have no savings at all, so having gone through our finances i realise that really housekeeping is the only area we can cut back and we should be trying to get a min of 1 months salary in the savings asap. (Obviously he is job hunting). SO im hoping to become part of the grocery challenge permanently.

I have quite a lot of store cupboard things in so im hoping to make it with just buying some fruit, bread and milk.

elsiepac

chirpychick wrote: »

Would it be ok to get on board now? I have £40 ish to last us 8 days which in theory should be ok,

Welcome! I've added you to the list in the 3rd post :j

pamsdish

£19 to add, £4.98 home bargains, coffee and toothpaste, 2 b,cards for while I am away, £3 in Wilkos, 2 lge mitchum deodorants on offer, good buy for anyone else prefer mitchum too, £9.61 in tesco 4 bakers, can of pineapple for a neighbour, some reduced mushrooms and 30 chicken thighs so freezer restocked for dogs chickens.

chirpychick

I needed fruit for my 5YO so when i took him to gymnastics i parked in sainsburys and then brought my fruit from sainsburys, also crisps (not essential but i got cheap ones) and then LO picked up a yellow sticker muffin which i said yes to - I love it when he spots yellow sticker stuff lol. Overall my shopping came to £8 exactly, I redeemed my parking ticket getting £2 off and then remembered I had nectar points so I redeemed £5 of those and had to pay £1 We do also need bread but I never buy full price bread so I will try and get a wonder to Morries in a bit.
£39 left

Edit: whoops i meant it cost £3 - the £1 in sainsburys + £2 parking silly me.

£37 left

YorksLass

chirpychick wrote: »

Would it be ok to get on board now? Also We heard the blow yesterday that my husband might be getting made redundant for the second time within a year and this time we will get absolutely no money. I have quite a lot of store cupboard things in so im hoping to make it with just buying some fruit, bread and milk.

chirpychick wrote: »

remembered I had nectar points

Welcome chirpychick and please stick with us on a permanent basis! I hope your DH finds a job soon and good luck with using up some of your stores to help on the budget front.

Small shop today at the local Co-op for 4 pts milk and an iceberg lettuce (both essentials), a tub of beef spread (for use next week as long-dated) and a large RTC jar of sweet pickle for stores. Total spend: £4.73. Nine days to go and £39.91 left in my purse.

Those Nectar points come in handy sometimes when there's more week left than money.

JingsMyBucket

pamsdish wrote: »

£19 to add, £4.98 home bargains, coffee and toothpaste, 2 b,cards for while I am away, £3 in Wilkos, 2 lge mitchum deodorants on offer, good buy for anyone else prefer mitchum too, £9.61 in tesco 4 bakers, can of pineapple for a neighbour, some reduced mushrooms and 30 chicken thighs so freezer restocked for dogs chickens.

@pamsdish, how much did those 30 chicken thighs cost you? I'm just wondering. You're also in Scotland, right? I'm curious because of our possible move over there early next year.

Doom_and_Gloom

Since last post we have spent £24.19.

750g red onions, 500g broccoli, 450g brambly apples, 7 yellow peppers, one orange pepper, 3 large mangoes, 275g easy peelers, 300g mushrooms, a papaya, 2 packs rice cakes, rocks blackcurrant squash, rocks lemon squash, 1L unsweetened almond milk, diet lemonade, 2 GF beer, coffee beans, espresso macchiato, latte macchiato, 2 pain au chocolate, 2 cheese twists and cola.
A lot of the above was reduced.

Made some of the vegan mince into a vegetable chilli.
OH had stir fry for dinner.

£147.52/£200
£52.48 left.

elsiepac wrote: »

Where did you find this brand of mince stuff? I've not heard of it...

From Mr S. https://www.plantbasednews.org/post/sainsburys-launch-affordable-vegan-meat-uk

luckofthe_irish

Small spend for me last night in Lidl to pick up rice cakes as I had run out - £1.18! That leaves me with £28.45 for the big shop tomorrow to last me until the 25th - fingers crossed I can do it!

I was thinking of trying to do a beef stew in the slow cooker this week - will that type of beef be very expensive? I have never done beef in the slow cooker for some reason, I have put nearly everything else in there haha! I was thinking beef with loads of root veg & potatoes if I can get the beef cheap and then maybe a veggie soup or curry for lunches! Plus I still have some of those mystery unlabelled meals in the freezer that need to be used.

Thanks for all your tips on the freezer labels - I knew you would all come through. I have found some masking tape and I have a sharpie so the freezer is looking even better already.

Total: £96.55/£125

PipneyJane

chirpychick wrote: »

Would it be ok to get on board now? I have £40 ish to last us 8 days which in theory should be ok, but i know will take some tight control. (so sorry if this is more than others have).
Also We heard the blow yesterday that my husband might be getting made redundant for the second time within a year and this time we will get absolutely no money. We are debt free other than the mortgage now but have no savings at all, so having gone through our finances i realise that really housekeeping is the only area we can cut back and we should be trying to get a min of 1 months salary in the savings asap. (Obviously he is job hunting). SO im hoping to become part of the grocery challenge permanently.

I have quite a lot of store cupboard things in so im hoping to make it with just buying some fruit, bread and milk.

Welcome to the gang, Chirpychick. Both myself and my DH have been through redundancy in the last couple of years, so you have my heartfelt sympathy. I will keep my fingers crossed for your DH in his job search.

Two of the things I did to charge up my money-saving batteries, were to read the entire original Sneaky Ways to Save the Pennies thread and the Lots More Sneaky Ways To Save The Pennies thread.

As I write, I have no additional spends to declare at the moment, but there will be some this evening. I'm home sick - working from home, as I'm a contractor - so my DH has been tasked with a short shopping trip to Costco on his way home from work. We desperately need sugar, in order to make the Cottage Smallholder's Hot Crab Apple Chilli Cheese. I made the associated crab apple jelly on the weekend, having foraged nearly 2kg of crab apples on my way home from work and am now desperate to finish off the process. Up until today, I've been too sick with cold to even contemplate rubbing the crab apples through a sieve. (Nor did I consider it wise to handle/process food, since my nose started running on Sunday and I've not stopped sneezing until today.)

- Pip

XSpender

2 spends from DH are going to make it tough to come in at under £400 which is my max, original budget £350. I am now on £392.17.

I am becoming concerned that my DS is piling on the weight. He is fed by my DPIL after school who cannot cook and are feeding him huge portions of unhealthy food or takeaways more than once a week, give him sweets after school everyday (even though I have asked them not to) and a big pudding. From next month I will give him his dinner so I can have more control over his food. I am not sure what impact this will have on my food bill but as I will eat with DS and then feed DH who comes in a lot later it is going to be a change to our routine.