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January 2023 Grocery Challenge
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Every one seems to be doing so well this month.We have had a funny old week. A couple of catastrophes have hit the soon to be household! On Monday a car speeding down our little road, glanced off of a neighbours parked car and crash bang wallop into ours! He carried ongoing and just didn’t stop. An enormous rumbling bang woke us up and we discovered that our car is probably a write off. Only 20,000 miles on the clock but 6 years old so we will have to pay more to get a similar level of car we think!🤬. We have been waiting all week for insurance to come and collect ( it is undriveable and has been pushed onto the pavement!) but apparently the engineers who are studying our photographs are still trying to assess value of damage!) I remember the days when they used to come out!!!!!! So result is that we are without a car at the moment so walking everywhere. Looking on the bright side insurance company have waived our excess and we are getting fitter by the minute.
then yesterday I could ignore my toothache no longer. Temporary root canal work done and a couple of hundred pounds lighter I have to go back in 2 weeks to get it done properly and to shed another few hundred pounds. We can’t find an NHS dentist where we live so it is what it is!!!!!
what I am trying to say is thank goodness for this challenge where I can at least control some of our spending. I am doing really well this month. A year of being a member of this lovely group has helped me to hone my skills and I am learning more everyday. I even think I might get 30 washes out of my 25 wash washing powder!😅😂. Absolutely determined that we won’t have to chip into savings this year! I have saved so much on spending this month compared to January 2022 that I have enough over for unexpected dentist appt so that’s something and the next one is on 1st February so new month. ( I wouldn’t even have thought of Eeking the cost out to the next months pay without looking at my finances as closely as I have been so thanks again for all of your support.
No more spends to declare and feel much better for my little rant. Hope you don’t mind guys.craft stash 2023 =161, 2024 = 119 2025 = £25.96 spent, 128 made and 5 mended,
GC 2022 = £3154.96
2023 = £3334. 84
2024 = £.3221.81
2025 = £2043.99/£3300
Jan 413.77 Feb £361.32, March £192. April £438.06 May £261.66 June £204.54 July £172.64/ £250
Decluttering campaign. 2024= 76 and half/52 bin bags full. ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐🏅💐DH ⭐12 -
Soontobeoap said:Every one seems to be doing so well this month.We have had a funny old week. A couple of catastrophes have hit the soon to be household! On Monday a car speeding down our little road, glanced off of a neighbours parked car and crash bang wallop into ours! He carried ongoing and just didn’t stop. An enormous rumbling bang woke us up and we discovered that our car is probably a write off. Only 20,000 miles on the clock but 6 years old so we will have to pay more to get a similar level of car we think!🤬. We have been waiting all week for insurance to come and collect ( it is undriveable and has been pushed onto the pavement!) but apparently the engineers who are studying our photographs are still trying to assess value of damage!) I remember the days when they used to come out!!!!!! So result is that we are without a car at the moment so walking everywhere. Looking on the bright side insurance company have waived our excess and we are getting fitter by the minute.
then yesterday I could ignore my toothache no longer. Temporary root canal work done and a couple of hundred pounds lighter I have to go back in 2 weeks to get it done properly and to shed another few hundred pounds. We can’t find an NHS dentist where we live so it is what it is!!!!!
what I am trying to say is thank goodness for this challenge where I can at least control some of our spending. I am doing really well this month. A year of being a member of this lovely group has helped me to hone my skills and I am learning more everyday. I even think I might get 30 washes out of my 25 wash washing powder!😅😂. Absolutely determined that we won’t have to chip into savings this year! I have saved so much on spending this month compared to January 2022 that I have enough over for unexpected dentist appt so that’s something and the next one is on 1st February so new month. ( I wouldn’t even have thought of Eeking the cost out to the next months pay without looking at my finances as closely as I have been so thanks again for all of your support.
No more spends to declare and feel much better for my little rant. Hope you don’t mind guys.:money::rotfl::T7 -
Have spent nearly £11 on foods to eat tomorrow at the airport and on the plane going on holiday. Quite a lot but far cheaper than buying breakfast at the airport plus a sandwich or similar on the plane! Would normally come out of the eating out budget but as we've eaten out a few times this month it will be coming from the GC as there is plenty left in it. Will only have a week's shopping to do when we get back.
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Hi all. We about your car @Soontobeoap. When you get the insurance offer, try getting them to increase it. When DD3 wrote here off last year, I miss read the quote they'd sent. I complained saying i thought it bed worth more, pointing out the prices offered on the car sites that buy your car. They immediately increased the offer. In checking i saw that the original quote was more than the sites had offered!
Spend yesterday, £37.50 in the veg shop, 24 tomatoes, 21 apples, 3 lettuce, 3 grapefruit, 6 heads broccoli, 2 punnets grapes, 10 oranges, 4 peppers, 25kg potatoes, 25kg onions, bag of sweets. Also Aldi for 2 jars coffee and 3bottles of milk. Total spends for the year now, £170.32/£2640.
Hugs, mumtoomany.xxxFrugal Living Challenge 2025.7 -
No more spends here yet but love just reading along. Gives me the bug every day!Follow here for the daily life of an ADHD mum with 2 children and a new mortgage to pay
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6570879/life-in-our-forever-family-home-and-the-mortgage-that-came-with-it#latest9 -
Chelleybee said:3rd grocery shop of the month at Tesco. Could have gone to Aldi or Lidl but both are 10 miles away so not worth the fuel unless I'm passing.Spent £79 so £255 spent from the £375 budget. A budget I plucked from thin air so with full cupboards and only one more weekend shop maybe we could go lower for February.Couldn't find stewing meat but it was more economical to buy a roasting brisket, chopped it up and froze half.Wanted to try Kombucha which was on offer so that was handy.Now the challenge is to stick to the menu plan and avoid shops!Today - stew and dumplings in slow cookerMonday - crockpot cashew chicken ( recipe found on Facebook and not tried yet)Tues - leftover lemon chicken for one of us and spicy pasta bake for the other.Wed- baked haloumi cheese in Greek style wraps and saladThurs - chicken in garlic and herb shake and bake seasoning mix, savoury rice and vegFri- steak at the pubSat - crock pot gnocchi ( another recipe found on FB.)
Need to boil some eggs for egg mayo sandwiches for our packed lunches and making a banana cake with brown bananas.
Good luck everyone
Everyone, when you’re feeling down about your spending, please remember that it takes time and baby steps to get to where you want to be. Big hugs to those who need it.
- Pip"Be the type of woman that when you get out of bed in the morning, the devil says 'Oh crap. She's up.'
It ain’t what you do, it’s the way that you do it - that’s what gets results!
2025 Fashion on the Ration Challenge 66 coupons - 25.5 spent.
4 - Thermal Socks from L!dl
4 - 1 pair "combinations" (Merino wool thermal top & leggings)
6 - Ukraine Forever Tartan Ruana wrap
8 - 4 x 100g/450m skeins 3-ply dark green Wool Local yarn
1.5 - sports bra
2 - 100g/220m DK Toft yarn7 -
managed to find some tins of pilchards in tomato sauce yesterday 90p Had that today with chips It was lovely and reminded me of my mums cooking 520/60021k savings no debt7
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MissRikkiC said:No more spends here yet but love just reading along. Gives me the bug every day!
And a lot of us are off to a very strong start this year, It’s fantastic to see! And even those who are struggling seem to be at least making improvements, so well done everyone
I withdraw our food budget cash again tomorrow, I am actually looking forward to planning another weekDebt Free Journey started 21.05.20178 -
I popped into Sainsbury's yesterday to get a basil plant as I need some fresh basil for the weekend and somehow managed to spend £18.13. I did get the basil but also some big bags of spices from the world foods section and some frozen veggie burgers, sausages etc which there were good offers on including a "not beef Wellington" which must have been a Christmas product as it was reduced from about £4 to 98p. I mean, I am supposed to be running my freezer down so I wasn't really doing myself any favours there as by the time I'd put everything away it was back to full again.
Still, even with the unplanned extras I'm doing well this month and am at £117.32/£200.8 -
Ginmonster said:I popped into Sainsbury's yesterday to get a basil plant as I need some fresh basil for the weekend and somehow managed to spend £18.13. I did get the basil but also some big bags of spices from the world foods section and some frozen veggie burgers, sausages etc which there were good offers on including a "not beef Wellington" which must have been a Christmas product as it was reduced from about £4 to 98p. I mean, I am supposed to be running my freezer down so I wasn't really doing myself any favours there as by the time I'd put everything away it was back to full again.
Still, even with the unplanned extras I'm doing well this month and am at £117.32/£200.
So, I've started doing nearly all my shopping online. I put items in the 'basket' when I need them - so that's my list. Then:- and this is the fun bit for me (I can see you thinking 'get a life' or 'how sad') I go through the list with... Do I need it, What can I substitute. Is there a cheaper option. How much would I waste?
My current costing has been for Custard. I usually make it with Bird... powder and milk. Here's the problem, DH can drink cows milk but I'm intolerant to it so I make his with semi milk and mine with oat milk. Somehow or other the remainder of the semi milk never gets used to that goes to Sage & Onion (pigs) However, I have worked out it's cheaper to buy tinned custard - no waste and for some reason I seem to be able to tolerate it as well. Yes, thinking about it I would agree with 'get a life'
I always go for the £1 delivery slots, The supermarkets are 8miles away so I probably save on that as well
£106.53/200 so far for Jan9
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