March 2024 Grocery Challenge

wishus

I've updated my signature - shopping list done for tomorrow, and it needs to come under £16, which is what I've got left.

Meal plan needs to get us to Thursday as we'll be travelling over Easter weekend. 

Today - Roast chicken, roast tatties, veg.
Mon - Hero Korean pork-fried rice - (Joe Wicks)
Tue - creamy garlic salmon and rice (Pinch of Nom)
Wed - lentil dahl and red onion roti
Thur - haddock, sweet potato wedges and peas

So just need:
broccoli
carrots
spring onions
chilli
low fat cream cheese
pork fillet

Soontobeoap

Dh went to Aldi today for lunch stuff. £6.00 Spent and we have enough for the week now hope that's it. 

PipneyJane

Good morning All

Well, we’re all spent up.  In fact, we’re over by 13p.  DH went to Sainsbugs yesterday afternoon to collect the Sunday paper. Since we had an offer for 2-packs of Blitz paper towels, decreasing their price to £3.66, he picked up two packages, spending £7.32 in the process.  (We have vouchers for the Sunday paper, so I don’t count that in the GC spend.) 

I’m declaring at £145.93/£145.80.

It’s payday on Thursday, so that’s when I’ll start April’s CG.  We’ve got plenty of food in stock and won’t need to purchase any fresh produce before then.

- Pip

Suffolk_lass

PipneyJane said:

Good morning All

Well, we’re all spent up.  In fact, we’re over by 13p.  DH went to Sainsbugs yesterday afternoon to collect the Sunday paper. Since we had an offer for 2-packs of Blitz paper towels, decreasing their price to £3.66, he picked up two packages, spending £7.32 in the process.  (We have vouchers for the Sunday paper, so I don’t count that in the GC spend.) 

I’m declaring at £145.93/£145.80.

It’s payday on Thursday, so that’s when I’ll start April’s CG.  We’ve got plenty of food in stock and won’t need to purchase any fresh produce before then.

- Pip

In all the years, @PipneyJane, I have never before seen you go over. Me too this month.

I notice a few sneaky things. The coleslaw (ob but not cheapest, bought because no added sugar) has gone up from £1 to £1.65 so I will carry on making my own, which DH prefers (no pressure!) and meat is really expensive again. No more meat purchases until the end of April now. I am at £270.37 with milk bill on Friday of £7.50 unless I cancel it. Which reminds me, I need to skip the days when we are away in April. I am just over 25% of my annual budget already. Thank goodness two weeks away will pull things back in April

Finstickle

A few shops for me to declare this week.

Small top ups totalling £19.59
Main shop at £80.59 which included beer for a party
Tesco shop for other party supplies totalling £41.31
Musclefood at £59.63
   
A fair bit left over from all party supplies as we didn't actually drink that much and we have cut our drinking pretty low outside of events now so no more to be bought for a while.
Musclefood deal should give me 58 + meals so happy with that, been a while since I have used them looking forward to it helping and helping me do some meal prep.  ordered for next week as away for Easter.

I'll be ending March on Thursday so planning a few no-spend days now.

Currently at £499/£500

lovemula21

I’ve implemented some changes to my families diet so I have spent more than planned this month. 

Final total for March is:

£616.97/£500 

LotsOfTea

With a few instances of just picking up a few bits and bobs and a large shopping order due to arrive today with extras for the school holidays I'm going to be over budget this month. I really could have done better if I'd kept my eye on the ball but you can't change the past so it's time to move on to April.

Declaring at £277.09/£250 as we've got everything we need until next week now. 

PipneyJane

Suffolk_lass said:

PipneyJane said:

Good morning All

Well, we’re all spent up.  In fact, we’re over by 13p.  DH went to Sainsbugs yesterday afternoon to collect the Sunday paper. Since we had an offer for 2-packs of Blitz paper towels, decreasing their price to £3.66, he picked up two packages, spending £7.32 in the process.  (We have vouchers for the Sunday paper, so I don’t count that in the GC spend.) 

I’m declaring at £145.93/£145.80.

It’s payday on Thursday, so that’s when I’ll start April’s CG.  We’ve got plenty of food in stock and won’t need to purchase any fresh produce before then.

- Pip

In all the years, @PipneyJane, I have never before seen you go over. Me too this month.

I notice a few sneaky things. The coleslaw (ob but not cheapest, bought because no added sugar) has gone up from £1 to £1.65 so I will carry on making my own, which DH prefers (no pressure!) and meat is really expensive again. No more meat purchases until the end of April now. I am at £270.37 with milk bill on Friday of £7.50 unless I cancel it. Which reminds me, I need to skip the days when we are away in April. I am just over 25% of my annual budget already. Thank goodness two weeks away will pull things back in April

It’s lovely of you to say so @Suffolk_lass but, sadly, I only had to go back through my spreadsheet to last September (2023) to find the last time I went over.  In that case, it was by £15.86.  I can’t remember why we went over then - naturally, it’s the one time I didn’t record how the money was spent - but the L!dl+ app saves receipts, so looking at the last receipt for the month (£18.21), I can say that we bought a quite a bit of YS meat.

I do remember that month, having a conversation with DH about whether we should put up the GC Housekeeping to £160.  The decision was “wait and see.  If we go over next month, then probably…”.

- Pip

diminua

Budget blown. I went up to Sheffield to visit my brother at the weekend and between coffee shops, the market, and lunch out I'm at £240.96. 

leftatthetrafficlights

The month isn't finished for me but I don't think I'll need anything else now- I've come in at £190 so under target