A new royal start

QueenJess

Bit of a fail today as I bought way more than usual at the big shop. Infrequent shops are clearly a problem for me! I've decided instead of treating it as a fortnightly shop, I will treat that as my monthly shop, so just Riverford fruit/veg deliveries and top up shopping until the end of the month.

The plus side is that DD came with me (usually no one is interested and I go on my own) and she chose her own bread. Usually she gets very hungry but doesn't really do toast or sandwiches etc, so I am hoping this will convince her. She already had two slices of toast when we got back!

Planning on clearing out some of the loft today before it gets too hot. Just me and DD today, so we ate leftovers for lunch (I had salad, feta cheese and some of the baguette we bought and DD had leftover baked beans and cheese), served with pineapple juice (which is our current addiction). Dinner will be beef burgers with coleslaw (my hm beetroot relish that should now be ready) and corn on the cob. Dessert is jam biscuits for the kids and apple and blackberry crumble with cream for the adults.

QueenJess

Not much to report here. Plenty of little top up shops, but no big shops done. Am thinking of doing a top up shop at the weekend at the usual big shop to just get the few things we can only get there and hopefully will delay a big shop. £470 already spent this month! I am hoping to get my spend down to £150 a week as at least a more reasonable starting figure with £5 a week extra to be saved for Xmas. Will see how it goes this month, but the real test is September as when the kids are off the consumption of food is odd.

We also decided to not save any money this month and have "invested" it in a few days away at the end of the summer holidays. I still need a break from work (are driving me a bit bananas at the moment) and I have spare holiday from work to use.

I also spent at the weekend to replace a few things that were little irritants in everyday life. I splashed out on a new linen double fitted sheet for our bed (the old cotton one was very old and was starting to get impossible to stretch across the bed and was so annoying) and I absolutely love it! Am hoping that is a good investment. All really dull things like that and about £110 spent. Just pushes the household budget back into a negative, but it'll quickly recover. This is the last month of the high budget for the kids birthday party/birthday and Xmas gift pot. Not sure if you remember but I started a budget originally just before I needed to purchase all those things and so was always a year behind and in a deficit. So I upped the amount to get back to the right amount I should have in there so I am now ahead and in the right place.

The way my budget works is that everything is budgeted and the leftover between what we put into the joint account and the budget goes to holiday. At the moment it should mean the holiday pot is growing (which it needs to as it is slightly in deficit and we don't have enough going in there each month). Maybe one day I could actually reduce the amount we put into the joint account, but I'm not there yet. This was the year of fixing the budget, so maybe when I set up the budget for next year. Will see how it all goes.

Better go as I have sole charge of the kids…

beanielou

Well done.

QueenJess

In the end I decided I didn't need enough for a top up at WR, so I opted to last until September now without it. Just top up local shops between now and then (which is basically Lidl and M&S as the only local options). Hoping to come under budget this month.

Out of interest (and since I budget on spreadsheets), I added up all my budget categories for the year based on what I actually spent to the end of July and divided by 7. Interestingly our actual spend was £25 less than the amount we put into the joint account, so clearly I've been pretty accurate overall, even if per category I haven't. However, I think it'll change a bit given we had some big expenses in the first bit of the year that won't be repeated - 2 separate very expensive ventilation fixes, 2 kids parties and birthdays, our expensive holiday to France and buying DS's wardrobe and shelves. I am hoping to get the amount down so we can reduce the amount going into the joint next year.

Some categories were under… I've spent £131 a week on food (even my current budget is £155 a week, although £5 of that is saved for Xmas).

I've been trawling the cupboards and freezer to use up things that have been hanging around for too long and so dinner will be a slow cooked beef stew with the last of the homegrown potatoes (useful to use some of the very small ones), loads of the carrots (including some that are going slightly bendy) and the last of the green beans. My fridge now has a very small pack of potatoes, 1 onion, a bag of spinach and a handful of carrots in it. I also made an apricot and almond loaf cake that's now cooling on the side.

Lunch will be cheese sandwiches with grapes for the kids and salad for the grown ups.

QueenJess

I'm starting to feel like one of those people on the project pan type groups online that realise it takes an age to use up make-up/bathroom products, but instead my problem is food. I keep panicking and thinking I have nothing to eat, but still seem to be providing meals without doing any shopping. It takes way longer to use things up than I think. I need to retrain my brain..

Last night I realised I have had a big jar of rice in the cupboard for ages, but for some reason I never use rice. Anyway, I made up a recipe using what I could find and made a vegetable risotto using diced carrots and onions, frozen broccoli, peas and sweetcorn. Shockingly everyone liked it, including DD who is so picky at the moment it's amazing she manages to find anything to eat right now. So that's obviously going on the regular menu (and just as well as it barely made a dent in the rice jar 🤣). I may amend the made up recipe to add cooked chicken for the boys that prefer meat.

Doing lots of top up shops just for the things I need, when I need them seems to be working for me at the moment. Otherwise I think "ooh - I need bread, so I may as well do a massive food shop" and then I stock up on everything and we always have too much in reserve. Definitely some reserve is good and a reasonable pantry, but I definitely have more than we actually need and I know when that point is as I lose control of what is actually in the cupboards/freezer!

It's all a work in progress, but if it keeps having a positive impact on the food shopping bill, then it's a very relaxed way for me to do food shopping. It's looking like I'm going to be very much under budget this month and will end up with about £630 spent versus £775 budget (£155 a week). Let's see what happens next month when the kids are back at school. If I end up with too much in the food budget line I'll start cutting it back and reallocate to the fun holiday line instead.

Better run as loads to do. Kids are at swimming so quick and easy beans, eggs and soldiers for dinner tonight.

themadvix

Love a beans, eggs and toast dinner 😋 Could quite happily eat it every day!

I seem to have fallen into a similar trap lately (and/or we’ve just been eating less/differently?) - September is definitely going to be a use-it-up month for some things, with a smaller food budget.

QueenJess

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82115856#Comment_82115856

You do make a good point - I eat way less when it's hot, so maybe I'll find things disappear quicker over the winter. However, I don't think DD or DH ever eat less 😂

daisy_1571

Couple of sausages and rasher or two of bacon, all cut up into small, is nice with a fried rice. Cheap 'special fried rice' 🤣. I usually have it with some home made sweet and sour sauce, Mr d might have some curry sauce.

Mummy, not had it for ages, might have to see what we have in 😋

Also, you might get away with making it into rice pudding do you think? I've started making home made pudding and portioning some for the freezer. Defrosts and reheats well

QueenJess

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82116140#Comment_82116140

I did originally buy it for rice pudding I think, but then never made it. I really should try making some for the kids.

QueenJess

A very quick check in as I am spending some of the morning sorting out the pile of stuff the kids have left outside their rooms "to get rid of" and think it magically disappears…

Did the massive food shop last week and it was big because I ran things down before holiday and had absolutely nothing left of fruit/veg. £200 spent already and now I'm playing the game of seeing how long I can go before another bigger shop! I still have stuff to use up in the cupboards/freezer and am slowly getting it down. The joint account is looking in pretty good shape bar the holiday category, but that's because I didn't save in advance (the same issue as with the kids xmas/birthday stuff) and so I'm always behind. Anything spare is now going to holiday to clear the deficit and build up a pot before I need to spend it. Amazingly though, everything else has been fixed!

Mortgage has been rounded down for this month and now stands at £107,200.

DS and DH are out for lunch today, so will probably just make DD and I something simple and use up the random stuff in the fridge. So looks like beans on toast or pizza and salad! Dinner will be fish, potatoes, salsa, green beans and carrots.

Better go and sort through stuff this morning as it's going to be a long work week next week 😬