2008 - Live on £4000 for a full year.

Marru

Oh Janey,

I am sorry to hear about your mouse trouble but the way you write I have to confess it ended up being extremely entertaining :rotfl: . Have you thought about writing for living?

I agree with Sophiesmum about the freecycle. I see regurlarly slabs offered in my local one.

Marru

Frugaldom

Whilst confessions are in the offing, remember my cooker hob blew up? Well, the dear landlord has never been back in contact about it :rolleyes: and I had resorted to risking using the one surviving ring in the hope that the whole thing didn't blow up - cooking for 3 isn't easy with one ring! Since then, I have won a brand new 2-ring tabletop cooker on eBid for £10, and it's just arrived! :T I paid it at the weekend but, with all the excitement of the day trip to Mr T's, I forgot to add it to my spending diary! I now have a new cooker that can come with me to my next house! :j
Signature now updated. I will get back within budget soon. By end of this month I should be at around £1000/£4000 to represent a quarter of the way through my year - that ain't gonna happen because I'm already past that on the spending stakes, but whatever happens, I will do my very best to keep within the 4k for 2008.

Penny2myName

Just renewed Contents insurance, and have managed to get the new price at £8 cheaper than what renewal with present insurer was going to cost. Plus £60 cash back via Quid. Water is going up by £30 a year, and don't yet know what my new costs will be with new energy suppliers, electric I am estimating at £25pm, and hoping Gas will be around £60pm (want to pay slightly more so covered for winter patch)

Frugaldom

Well done on the cashback, Penny, and good luck with the new power suppliers. :T

With all the changes in the offing, it's reminding me of the impending Council Tax bill... wonder how much it'll increase this year?! At least we don't need to worry about water bills here, as ours is included with Council Tax. Wish I could get my electricity down to £25 pm; I can't even get mine down to that per week :eek:

bails

What a lovely post Nyk, and so true. I'm having a break from preparing for tomorrow's lesson and it was great to think I could come on here to catch up and no doubt be inspired by something.
Janey, the mouse story was quality, despite the hot ending!

I haven't spent anything today but OH has! We now have a carbon monoxide detector! I think there may be other bits too but I daren't look at the receipts slot. In fairness, he did phone me the other day to ask if he could buy it and I said he had to wait til today (SD) - at least he remembered, even though I'd woken up thinking we could have a NSD after all :rolleyes:

On the subject of appreciating things: I've volunteered to teach a class tomorrow rather than just cover it ie I plan the lesson. I thought it would be good for me to help get back into things, and although I'm a little nervous (confidence has gone out of the window), I've just sat here thinking what a great opportunity I have - quite a bit of time and enough energy to really get stuck into the work and fully prepare set texts etc. I don't know when I'll need to use them again but when I do, I'll have all these resources made and collated, making life so much easier. I love the lesson planning side of the job, it's my chance to be creative (I'm a 'work outside the box' kind of teacher), but there's never been enough time before to really excel at it. Now I have that chance; how fantastic! :T

taka

nykmedia wrote: »

With all the changes in the offing, it's reminding me of the impending Council Tax bill... wonder how much it'll increase this year?! At least we don't need to worry about water bills here, as ours is included with Council Tax. Wish I could get my electricity down to £25 pm; I can't even get mine down to that per week :eek:

In Scotland all the councils have agreed to keep the council tax the same as last year (apart for Stirling which is reducing its council tax ) so that part of it is still the same. However Scottish Water I think are increasing the water/sewerage bit of the council tax . Hmmmm actually thats no help at all is it because you still don't know how much it is.

Do they not know people need to know these things... I mean I start paying it again in under a month and I want to have the correct amount in my budget :rotfl:

P.S. My electric is only £15/month and I'm in credit again :rotfl: Mind you only about £25 this time!! My Gas is even less than this

LollopyBear

Good afternoon Frugalites,

I'm feeling quite good today. I only spent £1.60 as I had to get the bus back to the station after school today, yesterday I spent £2.58 on enough ingrediants to bulk cook a big batch of bolognase sauce (think it is enough for 3 2-person meals) including my fab find in Mr Ts of a bag of 12 carrots reduced to 6p!! The day before was a NSD :j I love having a season ticket now! It means my NSDs are increasing a lot.

Another boost I had was that I decided to compare how much I had spent so far this month with day 6 in Jan and Feb:
Jan: £31.07
Feb: £111.45
Mar: £38.95

Bearing in mind that in Jan I had cupboards filled with food I think I'm back in the frugal mindset again and feeling much more positive about this challenge! The only drawback is I'm going out on a big night tomorrow for my birthday drinks/club with friends (my birthday is actually on Sun but I'm having a family thing then) so hopefully I won't spend too much and they will buy me some drinks!

DH is still doing well with not smoking although he still is being extremely grumpy and doing an impersonation of a caveman who can only grunt.

Last night he said to me that he thinks I should do all the shopping as I am good at frugal buying and he does all the cooking (as my bolognase needed him to rescue it badly! My cooking is either fab or goes very very wrong). I love this plan! I don't know whether he will stick to it though.

Bails - Good luck with the teaching tomorrow! I'm sure you'll be great and the nerves will go very quickly. What are you going to teach?

Janey - I loved your mouse/ratlet story! You're a gifted storyteller, they always have me in stitches.

My only wish at the moment is that I can get some sleep! That is a permanent ambition so I can never fully tick that off. I'll try and write a proper wishlist after this one is fulfilled on Sat morning.

System

:eek: :eek::eek::eek::eek::eek: If i see a mouse i must remember to jump up on a chair clutching my skirts like Daphne Broon

I was very unfrugal today - i forgot to defrost bread so ended up BUYING lunch, how horrifying!

I must restock my freezer with luchables, it has nothing in it apart from my lidl free bread stash and a million tubs of that red cabbage i had a long long time ago...

Janey51

Marru,Nyk, bails et al I am so pleased the unexpected disasters in my life appeal to everyone's sense of humour

Had a kind letter :rolleyes: from one of our creditors accepting our latest offer from CCCS to pay off our debts so thats good news.

Mrs Weatherwoman warnings again.
I have been reading that a Big Big Storm is expected to hit our area on Monday next week :eek:
Oh joy :rolleyes:
So, its out with the storm lanterns, place matches in strategic places, turn the freezer to Superfreeze, tie down everything that could fly, lots of chocolate, batteries at the ready, log boxes filled, warn work I might not get there and wait for the light breeze that will probably arrive.

So who still wants to live in the country

Spent 95p on a packet of (low fat) digestive biscuits and £1.99 on some cheddar that was half price.
DH just wanted some biscuits and I have run out of a vital ingredient....energy.

Going to do the charity shops tomorrow :j Its my Mum's birthday as well so I will have to make a birthday cake.

Janey51

taka our council tax has gone up by £20 according to the Council website and I was going to throw a wobbler til I read your post and realised it would be the water increase so thanks for that.