Missy’s family of 4, paying off debts, saving for a house and just trying to survive!

mumtoomany

Hi, Missy. Please don't put your pennies in the machine at Tesco. They charge around 8%, doesn't sound much, but 8% of your five pounds is 40p. That's a loaf of a bag of pasta. Every little helps. If you use a self service till you can use the change there for free. 
In January i always buy a couple of rolls of reduced Christmas paper in non Christmas patterns. At the moment I've got gold spots and Red and white stripes. Around 50p a roll of ten metres. I then use it all year. I once had a friend who saved all her children's paintings from school and nursery to use as wrapping paper. 
If you're short of margarine for cakes, try using half cooking oil, or even use all oil. Still edible.
Good luck with the scrimping, mumtoomany.

missymoo81

Hey mumtoomany! Thanks so much for posting! Ah I didn’t realise the charged so much! I usually use self service, and the children would love to put all of the coins in so you’re right, that’s a much better idea.
so far today we have done our work and trained. Now home, I’m going to have a half an hour cat nap then go and pick the children up. 

Going to attempt chicken fried rice for dinner.

missymoo81

Feeling more than a little bit stressed at the moment. Have so much to do this evening. Need to decorate the house for Roos birthday tomorrow. I need to go through the presents and wrap them. I need to finish programming for tomorrow. I need to do my online class at 7.45. Then make dinner. Was going to do everything later, but I have an hour and a half now, so I will put some rice on to cook and go through Roos presents whilst that is cooking. I’m really tired today everything feels like a major chore! Doesn’t help I know I’ve got to get up at 0550!

jwil

Hope you get it all sorted and manage to chill for a bit too!

I've frozen sliced courgette raw.  It's always been fine.  I'd freeze BNS too.  I don't ever blanche anything and it's always been fine.

I also try and buy enough 'neutral' christmas paper in the Jan sales to use as wrapping paper throughout the year.

Happy Birthday to Roo tomorrow x

missymoo81

Thanks Jwil.
Ok managed to get everything done then fell asleep on the sofa, after OH pouring me some wine and chilling outside with a blanket. 

Just up and going to do my online work at 0630-0730, then have lovely time with Roo for his birthday before school.
had a small turn up for the bookS. I forgot someone hadn’t paid me for a PT so I chased them up so I have £25 in my bank! Also OH said he owes me £50 from ages ago.... he hasn’t paid it yet but I’m hoping it will materialise. Going to have a look through my accounts and see if I can actually pay everything this month! Which I thought wouldn’t be happening, just need to get my head around the figures, but I was too sleepy last night. The £25 I’m going to save as a contingency for shopping, in the hope I don’t need it all and can put that to the budget next month, but we’ll see. Chicken fried rice went down really well last night, first time I’d made it, and I just used left over chicken and left over ingredients from the Gousto boxes from forever ago! 

Right I’m going to have a little look at the diaries whilst I drink my tea! 

I hope you all have amazing days.

missymoo81

Well I think roo had a lovely day. Our Mexican feast was wonderful, and for fun we sat and worked out how much it cost and it was almost exactly £10, back in the day we’d have gone to a restaurant and spent around £70!!! 😱

I still need to do some number crunching, I’ve still got loads of stuff I need to buy for Xmas presents and hardly any budget for it. I’ve been picking up change from around the house and I did a survey on prolific. So it’s slowly mounting up but I’m about £80 out.

Going to see what I can put on FB selling page and eBay To try and make Xmas present money. Still on task to pay nothing out of my bank account for food for the next 17 days. It’s all going to be cash/change or vouchers! 

Queen_of_the_Hive

missymoo81 said:

Well I think roo had a lovely day. Our Mexican feast was wonderful, and for fun we sat and worked out how much it cost and it was almost exactly £10, back in the day we’d have gone to a restaurant and spent around £70!!! 😱

I still need to do some number crunching, I’ve still got loads of stuff I need to buy for Xmas presents and hardly any budget for it. I’ve been picking up change from around the house and I did a survey on prolific. So it’s slowly mounting up but I’m about £80 out.

Going to see what I can put on FB selling page and eBay To try and make Xmas present money. Still on task to pay nothing out of my bank account for food for the next 17 days. It’s all going to be cash/change or vouchers! 

Missy keep your diary posted on your spending challenge and this really is a difficult one. Good luck!

missymoo81

Thanks Queen of the Hive. I will be updating as I go! 

I think I’m going to make fish pie for dinner.... forgot I had some frozen fish in the freezer, and I think I’ve got enough potatoes, that should do is for 2 days. We’ve been to work this morning, and we’re just about to leave. Going to make fried egg sandwiches when we get home. 

Need to do a little bit of washing and a general clear up after yesterday’s craziness then we’re going to chill. We’re going to play scrabble tonight as we were a bit bored last night. So we’re going to use our brains a little instead! 

Hope you’re all ok, it’s yet another NSD and no money has been taken out of my account apart from direct debits for 6 days now 😁.

missymoo81

Ok so fish pie was ok, sauce wouldn’t thicken though then I added too much flour so it was a bit floury 🙄. And there was only enough for tonight not for tomorrow as well, so I’ll have to rethink for tomorrow and Monday night. Probably thai green curry or sausage stew.

missymoo81

I’ve changed the way I’m eating in the fact I’m being careful to make sure there’s enough to go around. Examples are:

I've stopped having squash so it doesn’t run out as quickly.
I’m using half the amount of milk in my tea and just cooling it with cold water.
Instead of grabbing one of the children’s chocolate bars when I’m hungry which cost around 7p according to Tesco. I’m having 2 Richtea biscuits which costs around 2p. Only tiny savings but this is a daily occurrence. 

I’ve watered down the milk a little bit.
We had egg sandwiches for lunch today and I usually have 2 eggs but I realised I would be fine with one and if I only had one There were enough eggs for us to have egg sandwiches Another day.
I’m constantly thinking of the next meal, seeing If I need to scrimp and save on what I’m doing. 

I only used 2 chicken breasts last night for dinner, we didn’t need any more than that but I would just automatically use more as the packet was open, but this time instead I just wrapped up the extra one and put it in the freezer. 

I can’t think of any more right now but I’m sure there is other odd things I’m doing. 

I got super excited earlier, I found £1.33 in my gym bag! So sad that’s what I get excited about.  All going to the shopping/present fund. And I listed something on FB and someone is coming to pick it up tomorrow for £15. 🤗.