2020 Frugal Living Challenge

Elisheba

I've made my bread rolls and fruit buns so that should do me for lunches and snacks this week.

I was so busy cleaning and baking earlier that I didn't need the heating on, and when I'd finished baking I opened the oven door which warned the house a bit so that was nice.

I tried a 'Navy Shower' (only have the water on at the start and finish). It certainly was quick! I'll have to wait to get my smart energy meter to see if its worth it. I'm not on a water meter so although I'm sure it's better environmentally, it doesn't make any different financially to me how much water I use.

I was also very good and resisted the most gorgeous hats and scarves reduced in Cotton Traders, and some half price beautiful diaries in the local Garden Centre.

Treasurequeen

So far i have had 5 NSD this month, Insurance renewal (contents) is due at the end of the month and I cant believe my renewal price had gone up to £96.00:eek:. I have done a price comparison and got it down to £79.30 which includes legal. Along with using meerkat site I have 2 for 1 movies and meals until 2021.

Holiday is paid for just need to save some money for food and days out. As a few of the days out include national trust sites. I invested in a yearly membership, as I am just under 25 years I can apply for a young persons membership for £36.00 this year. Went though a cashback site and earned £5.00. The membership will save me a fair bit of money. As I am disabled my carer goes free as well.

Van_Girl

Elisheba wrote: »

I

I tried a 'Navy Shower' (only have the water on at the start and finish).

:rotfl: This tickled me, but I like the idea. Our water bill has rocketed since OH moved in, I think luxurious showers are part of the problem. Might have to give this a go.

Missywissy wrote: »

I am trying out using soap instead of shower gel, so it's less plastic but it is also cheaper, I buy 2 pink dove bars for £1 and they smell lovely and last a longer then shower gel.

I'm almost out of Christmas shower gels as I didn't get any this year, so I'll be switching to soap bars. The amount of plastic I must have gone through in mini sized shower gels over the years makes me queasy. I've just invested in 5L bottles of natural shampoo and conditioner. Bigger outlay, but since I use so much less natural shampoo than the old stuff I used to use, it should last me ages.

I've spent the day reviewing my spending and proposed budgets. Set up several Monzo pots for various expenses and planned treats throughout the year, and have set a tight 'fun money' budget. This has left me with £400 per month to put towards paying down my debts. Feel much more in control. Also aiming for a NS week, as we have plenty of stored and frozen foods to keep us going. In fact, we have a ridiculous amount of food in really, I'm a bit of a food hoarder I think...

Muggle1000

Hello, please can I sign up? I have read all the posts so far which have inspired me to sign up officially.

Trying to have a frugal year this year to clear debts from house renovations.

A bit about me. Married to DH with school age kids. I'm currently studying at uni but am working part time. I finish uni this year so my wage will go up from working more hours but I'm planning to wait until my youngest is at high school to go full time. DH works full time and works away quite a bit so I can save money on food shopping on those days.

We have started by opening a separate bank account from our current account and are paying a weekly house keeping amount into this each Friday which I track with an app I've found that helps me sort the balance into budget pots.

My plan is to also save for annual expenses in the new account such as car costs and also save any spare money from the house keeping for treats or towards other known expenses we have coming this year such as caravan costs.

I've been trying to stretch out food shopping money by batch cooking in the slow cooker. So I have a full freezer at the moment. Also DH is away this week so I have set myself a challenge of not buying any food for me so that I use up all the odds and ends in the freezer. I can see some strange omelettes coming my way this week.

I have also been getting the kids to plan out what they are having for tea and then use this to make a shopping list, which I've found works really well, as I hate trying to think what to make on the way home. This is also helping me reduce those small shops that turn into big shops.

We have also cut up our credit cards except for one which is clear with a £500 limit . I am planning to not buy anything until it is saved for when we would have previously swiped the card and thought no more of it. I am also saving £20 a week into our emergency fund. Once I've built it up a bit the other credit card will go.

Not spent any unplanned money so far. Our weakness is takeaways at the weekend so hopefully we will be a bit healthier too. I've made home made pizza this weekend instead of having takeaway. It's one of the kids and DH favourites so they haven't complained. But it does mean I didn't get a night off from cooking which is probably the reason why we were getting them.

Our plan to do dry January has failed as there was so much left over from Xmas and also not eating sweets but I won't buy anymore once they have all gone. So just another three bottles of vodka to get through. Ha.

Anyway I'm looking forward to this journey with you all and arriving at the end of the year being closer to being debt free, have some savings and being healthier.

miss_empty_piggy

Welcome Muggle1000 good to have you on board. xx

Herbyme

Elisheba wrote: »

I have just worked out it is cheaper to use teabags than looseleaf tea. Phew. Looseleaf is such a faff!
My working are as follows:
The cheapest teabags from Lidl and Tesco are the same price at 0.72 of a penny a bag. A bag weights 2 gms (I just weighed several to check :rotfl:).
The cheapest looseleaf I could see on My Supermarket was £1.28 for 250gms. At 2gms of tea a cup, this is 125 cups, and dividing that by the cost that's 1.01p a cup. You could allow that the bag itself weights a little extra and thus less than 2gms would be needed for looseleaf, but you are just as likely to put too much in. So with the added lack of faff for teabags, they seem to win.
(In terms of reuse, I don't think whether it is teabags or looseleaf makes much difference, so that's not a factor that needs considering)

I was told that tea bags are actually glued together so they do contain some plastic, not sure if that's true (glue=plastic?). I agree it's a faff, I use tea filters (a bit like the one you used to get servied coffee in years ago, like a little plant pot shaped thing with sides made of mesh) so at least there's not that awful job of getting loose tea out of a pot. This way works well if you only make tea in mugs like me. I've had the filters for years so they have made up for their footprint in materials. And as someone said, you can adjust the strength of your tea that way.

I drink about 6 pints of tea a day btw, I've had loads of practice :rotfl:

Herbyme

sinkorswim2018 wrote: »

Missywissy, yes soap is SO much cheaper. I'm still using some body shop bars I picked up on a charity shop last summer...goes on forever. Much better for the environment (ie less plastic, even a wrapped bar is better as it must last at least 6 times as long as liquid soap).

I'd like to use bars of soap but I find they make the sink need cleaning sooner than handwash. Also they get all messy (the soft bits) even if you use a soap dish, is there a way round that?

One tip I heard, maybe well known, is that bath stuff is often identical to shower gel and much cheaper per 100ml. I know, doesn't help with the plastic. My local handmade naturals shop lets you take back your bottle for a refill, lovely stuff too, no chemicals at all

FrankieM

HoneyIShrunktheDebt wrote: »

I'm in a different situation - I have been lurking on these boards for a while. Recently I have moved from UK to a country where living costs are very high due to hubby's job.
He did get a substantial pay rise, but I'm struggling to find work due to work permits etc - I don't live in Europe. All goods are imported and there are no discount grocery stores. Very little fresh local (cheap) produce is available. I'm looking for motivation to live as frugally as possible in the circumstances as our spending started to get out of control and we have got into a lot of debt very quickly. We are trying to reign spending in before it gets out of hand. I'm looking forward to reading ideas and then adapting them to the reality of where I am living!

We moved to Australia to live for 3 months about 10 years ago and I found it really hard trying to figure out budgets etc.

I grew up in Australia but had never run a house over there and found everything very expensive.

I seemed to finally get the hang of it as we were coming back to the UK!

Can I suggest that you speak to 'the locals'?

Find out what meals they eat, how they cook....really just what they do?

I spent about half my time there trying live and do things like I did in the UK, when I should've become a 'local'

In Australia, any kind of ready meal or sauce was really expensive, also certain types of veg that I use regularly over here were more expensive over there.

And, where in the UK we use a slow cooker in the winter so we have something hot to come home to, I found they used theirs in the summer so the house wasn't hot from having the cooker on...

I hope that helps..

FrankieM

I was babysitting this weekend, so groceries and fuel were bought on Friday on the way home from work and no batch cooking this weekend.

I spent a little on keeping children entertained, we had gone to parks to run around but it was a bit on the chilly side!

Everything in budget and I'm trying to not spend anything other than what's already planned and in the diary.

I had my car insurance renewal come through...£150 more than last year!

I thought it was supposed to get cheaper as I got older and so did the car.

I'm going to have to do a search and see if I can get it cheaper.

BelleBaluu

Morning all
Enjoying reading through everyone’s posts! This thread and a couple of other challenges I’m also following are really helping to keep my motivated.
I’m also doing the Grocery Challenge and have decided to put any savings I manage to make into my mortgage as an OP.
Off to get ready for work, and look out the leftover soup I made for tea last night to take for lunch today.
What other challenges are you taking part in?
Happy frugaling everyone