2021 Frugal Living Challenge

cw18

Bluegreen143 said:

I’ve been a bit preoccupied the last couple of days as I’ve got an unsolicited potential job offer from an old manager - I’ve been a stay at home mum for 3 years and had no intention of looking for work for another two years so it’s a huge surprise.

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However if I did it for a year (it’s a 1y fixed contract) I would be really well placed to job hunt next year and or it may get extended.

Sounds like an excellent way to try returning to work.   In my experience it takes a few weeks / couple of months to tweak routines so that they work for you (and I was only returning from short bouts of maternity leave - 13 weeks the first time, and 15 the second).  So you've got time to tweak and see what works for you, and then you know what you're ideally looking for moving onwards.    And in the meantime you can squirrel away some of the extra income, which you could even use to take another break from work if you decide you prefer to be at home.

KatyLovesCats

Good morning Frugalers. Very cold today, I just can't get warm. Spent my first money on food for the year today, still have £64.47 left out of my £140 monthly budget and I can't see me spending anywhere near that now for the rest of the month. I'm going to try and save £50 of that and just use the remaining £14.47 for top ups if I need to. I have also managed to reduce my water DD from £51 to £30pm and EDF from £80 to £50pm so very happy with that.

wishus

With just one shop done so far in January, I made it to day 8 before releasing the moths from the purse, and a whopping great BEHEMOTH flew out - yes, the car blimmin failed its MOT. It's handy that it didn't utterly break on us on a date before though. So, a list of things to fix, a known cost, and that's all deducted in the spreadsheet. Plus, I have made a deduction in the gifts column for my 2 nephews who celebrate their birthdays a week apart and even though they are in the same town, with all the shops shut and Lockdown happening I thought I would send them some chocolate pizzas. The pizzas come to half the budget, so I will send the rest as evouchers.

slm6002

Wishus - sorry to hear about your MOT.  I had mine yesterday and although it passed there are several very urgent things that will need doing, so more money from my budget.  Can i ask where the chocolate pizzas were from - sounds like a great gift

MazzieD

thriftylynny said:

Thanks MazzieD , I think it could be due to lack of memory left on my phone , i'll try deleting stuff see if that works first ! Don't think the olio app will warrant me updating to a new phone however !!!

Funnily enough my phone died when I tried to install the NHS Covid 19 Test and Trace app!!.  It was very old and needed replacing anyway but had definitely run out of memory.

@Bluegreen143 Congratulations, definitely go for it.  You are really lucky to be offered a job, I know people who have lost theirs and are really struggling to get anything else.  

I resemble the Michelin Man, I have got so many layers on to try and keep warm rather than put the heating on during the day.  Want to get out in the garden and have a tidy up but it's just too cold.  Looking forward to putting my Grow Rack together at some point. 

Just re-organised my freezer to see if I have any space, been eating out of it for the last few days but still seems really full.  Very low on fresh food,  but resisting the urge to raid a supermarket until next week at the earliest.

skint_chick

Craft wise cross stitch is super easy to do and there are lots of free patterns on the DMC website. I would also recommend regular hand embroidery - you can just use any old cotton fabric you have at home to start with and pop it in an embroidery hoop (eBay sell them cheaply or Hobbycraft/The Range if you can click and collect etc - there are also plenty of patterns free online and you can print them out and trace them onto the fabric lightly with a pencil by holding it against a window if you need more light - or you can buy friction pens on eBay that you rub the line gently and it erases. Most of the time you'll bring the stitching right up to the lines anyway so you can't see them afterwards. There are plenty of stitch tutorials on you tube as well. 

Finally ordered groceries and spent £41.68, getting ingredients to go with what we have. Hopefully that will take us to the end of the month. and then we will get a takeaway to celebrate. Also spent £10 on electricity and £20 on gas, planning to spend the weekend cleaning and decluttering and listing a few things on eBay as I got the selling for £1 email today and have some higher value tech bits to sell.

willow_loulou

@Bluegreen143 you’re very wise to take an offered job i it fits in, I work with unemployed people and getting a new job even after retraining is getting exceedingly difficult. I’d suggest doing linkedin and keep it updated. Once you’re past lower level jobs all industries are becoming picky and look at things like online presence quality. 

One thing I would recommend is doing a social media marketing course or updating things like safeguarding skills or understanding mental health courses. Lots of local authorities adult ed are running online ones free. Whilst they may not directly affect your job role, understanding them seems to be a Big plus point right now. Good luck. 

Bluegreen143

@willow_loulou thanks for much for your thoughts. I’m going to take it and give it a good shot. The role is in internal/employee comms and it’s what I did prior to leaving work (for the same company too) except it’s the grade above my old role. I wouldn’t have taken it if it was full time as I don’t NEED to work financially but as they are willing to let me do it on a work from home, part time position finishing at 3 to pick up my kids - I’d be foolish not to take it. As for social media I must admit I’ve deleted all my social media accounts (well except on here) and am happily living social media free! But perhaps should resurrect LinkedIn. I had harboured hopes that I could remain a housewife indefinitely and so not need to work, either that or I was going to retrain to work in childcare. So I totally hadn’t considered going back into a corporate job but I am looking forward to a new challenge and if it doesn’t work out well and I find I’d still rather work with kids I can still look at retraining after this year.

willow_loulou

Good for you @Bluegreen143 I wish you much luck. 

Talking of learning, has anyone used any language home courses? 

skint_chick

willow_loulou said:

Good for you @Bluegreen143 I wish you much luck. 

Talking of learning, has anyone used any language home courses? 

Which language are you thinking of? Open University have beginners courses free online and there's also plenty of YouTube options - I'm improving my German with a couple of them and watching films and TV shows as well. And there's GCSE French, German, Mandarin and Spanish on the BBC bitesize website. If your library does ebooks and audiobooks you can get beginners guides there too.