September 2020 Grocery Challenge

ToadyAli

Hi all, I am new and would love to join this thread. I see myself as a fairly budget conscious shopper (meal planning, lists etc) but the budget has gone out of the window this August. We were meant to be going to Tenerife but instead spent some of that money on eating out, and buying more expensive food. This will end on Monday with our last 50% eat out at a posh restaurant. 

So starting from 1st Sept I am budgeting £450 for the month for 2 adults, 2 teenagers and a hungry 10 year old. I am hoping I will be surprised and spend less but thought I would try to be realistic for the first month. Ideally I would like to be around about £350.

Butterfly_Brain

Can you put me down for £200 this month please, that includes pet food and toiletries.
Pay day tomorrow and my freezer doesn't seem to be going down much...blush and I have plenty of staples in the cupboards.
The main reason for that is Farmfoods have some great deals at the moment, we picked up chickens for £1.99 each and I usually stretch them to three meals, casserole veg, mixed veg, and corn on the cob are 59p a bag which is way cheaper than buying fresh, I went to home bargains and got 4 packs of mince for £1.99 each and it is way nicer than most supermarkets. Oh and we went foraging yesterday and got 3 kilos of blackberries, some apples, hawthorns and sloes to make some sloe gin which we also make for Christmas pressies.
I am doing an inventory today and will do my meal plan based on that, hopefully I won't have to buy much. Christmas is fast approaching and I have been buying a couple of pressies a month, only six left to get and I have cards, paper etc from the January sales.
October is our worst month because car insurance is due and zoo membership, but both pay for themselves eventually. We live a five minute drive from Whipsnade zoo and we can go up any time we like and we also get half price tickets for family, and 10% discount on everything but we take a picnic and it is a cheap day out.
Haven't been much this year because it has been closed, but they gave us extra time on our membership. 
I will post my meal plan as soon as I have got it sorted out.

Butterfly_Brain

Woohoo I just found a Waitrose  gift card for £50 when I was sorting out some paperwork, that will come in handy for September

Butterfly_Brain

Aaargh would you believe it, had a phone call from the hospital saying that my op has been rescheduled to 17th September  and I have to go back into shielding for three days which is better than the two weeks when it was originally scheduled, so it looks like I will be preparing a lot of homemade freezer meals because I will be in a sling for at least a month!

Doom_and_Gloom

elsiepac said:

@Doom_and_Gloom did you used to have 2 chins? I had 2 rescues but the older one, the mum died earlier this year at a rough age of about 20.  Her daughter is still going and is about 17.

Yes we did used to have two. Our girl unfortunately passed away last year. My husband and I were both distraught. We rescued them and if we believe what we were told she would have been around 12 when we lost her so not old at all. He is supposed to be around 13 now. I have a strong feeling they were older than what we were told though. Don't think it helped that their original feed was horrific and (I believe strongly) shortened their lives, likely meaning we lost her sooner than she should have 😔. I made sure to slowly switch them onto something much better as soon as we got them. We may have never had chinchilla before them but even we knew that feed was seriously sub par!
Since he lost his mate last year we noticed him get lethargic and getting depressed. As soon as we noticed that we made sure to give him more out time, more interaction, increased the toys in his cage etc and he perked up. They were spoiled as it was but now he's really spoilt as an only chin.

It's odd to know others with a chinchilla as they aren't a usual pet. 
I'm very sorry to hear about the loss of your older girl *hugs*. Even though 20 is a good age for them it's still hard when they go as they burrow into your heart. I'm sure like us with our little boy that you now dote on your girl more than before. Hugs to both you and your chin.

elsiepac

Budgets updated to here

Welcome @Competsoph and @ToadyAli - hope you both enjoy your first month as GCers!  Don't be afraid to ask questions and there's tons of resources in the first few posts of this thread.

@Butterfly_Brain Congrats on the Wa1tr0se card, what a great find! Also shame your op was rescheduled but at least you'll be out of the sling by Christmas and of course it'll force you to meal prep which is never a bad thing lol!!

@Doom_and_Gloom aw that's so sad about your girl,  and not old at all if the ages were correct.  Correct feed is so important for them isn't it - mine were never even given hay before I had them! The vet was shocked they were in such good health when I took them in for their first check up! Unfortunately the girl I still have (the daughter) has always been extremely skittish and would never take food from me or anything even when mum was still around, and now she's alone she's 10x worse.  I don't like to stress her so I don't try and touch her or anything, but even when changing her food etc she acts terrified! I took them in about 5 years ago and they had already lived in a couple of different homes and had never really been socialised or interacted with and whilst I did get the mum to a point where she would come to the cage door when called and would take treats from my hand, that was the furthest I ever got with them.  It's amazing to me when I see people interacting so much with their chins as mine couldn't be more different, although I appreciate it's different circumstances! 

elsiepac

Setting my budget to

£191.32

this month - yes I know it's an odd figure!

PipneyJane

elsiepac said:

Setting my budget to

£191.32

this month - yes I know it's an odd figure!

Sounds like you're rolling over last month's change.

How did you do the highlighter block?  Was that the "quote" feature?

- Pip

elsiepac

PipneyJane said:

elsiepac said:

Setting my budget to

£191.32

this month - yes I know it's an odd figure!

Sounds like you're rolling over last month's change.

How did you do the highlighter block?  Was that the "quote" feature?

- Pip

No, it's the Code block and then I made it Bold.  I really miss the text editing tools!!

PipneyJane

elsiepac said:

PipneyJane said:

elsiepac said:

Setting my budget to

£191.32

this month - yes I know it's an odd figure!

Sounds like you're rolling over last month's change.

How did you do the highlighter block?  Was that the "quote" feature?

- Pip

No, it's the Code block and then I made it Bold.  I really miss the text editing tools!!

So do I.  And the daily digests.  I reckon traffic on the Boards has dropped off considerably because people no longer get the nudge when an old thread is resurrected. 

- Pip