2025 Frugal Living Challenge

Nelliegrace

We went to Home Bargains. A litre of Greek Style yoghurt was £1.45. We don’t buy anything labelled low fat. It is just yoghurt, milk with no additives. 
A British Standard hot water bottle, ribbed on both sides, was £2.99

DH makes our daily milk kefir. We were sent the original kefir “seeds,” in October 2018, is that a record? I keep some of them in reserve in a tiny jam jar of milk in the freezer. 

Frugaldom

@Prudent you are an inspiration! I've had my original bank account for decades and don't want to ditch it as it's linked to the 5.5% savings plan. I have a couple of old accounts that I thought I'd closed so I'll need to try to access them to see what's what and then start looking for a better rate of interest for savings. Maybe I can find an account with cashback to open that doesn't require mobile facial scanning! That drives me potty.

Gem-gem

Oh blow! My catch-up post has just disappeared.  I'll do be an abridged version. 

* spent three days helping mum declutter and with her pending house move. 

* Friday - went to a quiz with DH. I go for free as I do the scoring. (I do still play with a team). We won - £7 spent - night out for two. Won a bottle of wine each. I use mine as thank you gifts ir in cooking. 

* Had rare day in the house by myself. Spent the day crafting and crocheting and watch a television programme. 

* sent two boxes of books off, nearly £13 made. 

Dizzycap

Cas said:

Evening everyone. We're still eating out the freezer and cupboards. Tomorrow will be soup making day now that there's a bit of space in the freezer.
We've been enjoying some glorious sunshine today so took the opportunity to get a few bulky items like the hall mats washed and hung outside to dry. It looks like it'll be dry for the next few days so will be getting a few more things washed and out.

How lovely! We usually get Winter sun here, but very little this year. More cold & grey skies than anything at the moment.

I'm still using food from the cupboards & freezers which there seems to be plenty left. Today I batch cooked baby face her fresh home made dinners, put in small tubs, and put in the freezer. I also batch cooked peanut butter & apple cookies whilst the oven was on.

My Frugal Living Challenge this year is a 'No Spend Year' outside of absolute essentials with an aim to reducing those essential spends even further with cashbacks, freebies, vouchers, points etc. I've also given myself a discretionary 10% leeway for household bills in my monthly / overall yearly budget.

I decluttered the house, garden & shed last year with the exception of one remaining mega wardrobe which I'm working my way through this year and selling off, donating, and free cycling items that really are not needed.

2 doors clear & cleaned, 1 door with stored items to sell & 2 doors I dare not even think about looking behind at the moment They can wait until next month

findingthisdifficult

MayDogsandCoffee said:

@Prudent I have heard a lot of people going back to the 'old school' Dunlops - the posh expensive wellies don't seem to last 5 mins these days.  I have really big calves so really struggle to get knee length which limits my options, and they need to be comfortable enough for very long walks.  
@Duchess2 I always have some sort of soup on the go.  My colleagues now know that when I say I am making soup for lunch it is not coming out of a tin I don't bake but can batch cook.

I am still doing well budget wise, probably because I can't be bothered to go the the shop, esp when the weather is bad.  Although this week I have a charity quiz to attend and will no doubt buy some raffle tickets.  It will be a good night out, inexpensive and all monies are donated so well worth it.

For some reason last night I had a hankering for egg and chips !!  Can't remember the last time I had that but I really enjoyed it - the simple things..........

Avid lurker, hoping to pick up some tips to make our money go further.  Coming out of my lurk to mention Jileon wellies to you.  I too have large calves (as in literally never find boots to fit) I have a couple of pairs of Jileon wellies and they're fantastic for large calves, wide feet etc.  
They often have deals on, so might be worth checking them out if you're in need of some. 

Thanks everyone for sharing your little wins and tips on making our money go further.  Hopefully my comment is ok, I don't often venture far out of debt free wannabes on here.

Frugaldom

findingthisdifficult said:

Thanks everyone for sharing your little wins and tips on making our money go further.  Hopefully my comment is ok, I don't often venture far out of debt free wannabes on here.

Welcome and thank you for delurking. All comments are welcome from anyone with a passion for debt freedom, it's what frugal living is all about - achieving and maintaining financial freedom.

Frugaldom

I had a good look at my various accounts today and found £7 odds in my topcashback so it got swept into savings. I'm still on no spends, barring direct debits, so the year's food budget is still intact. I'll need to stick up on sugar soon so if anyone spots a bargain price, pop it in here and tag me in, please.

I wanted to make a new 'Phil the Pig' but no longer know anyone who reads newspapers that can be made into Papier mache. I'll let you all know if paper horse feed bags can be used instead. I just need to source some balloons. I'm sure the grandchildren will have fun making banks of their own, too. 

Katiehound

You don't need newspaper to make papier mache, any paper will do so if you have any old bills that would be an easy way to use up paper without shredding ! Just tear into roughly 1" strips and paste in place.  You do need paper that doesn't have glossy surface so generally magazines don't work well. I think you may struggle with the brown paper sacks because they are fairly tough & the paper needs to absorb paste to become pliable- might work if you tear into smallish squares instead of strips.

(I did a final project on a ND craft course on papier mache many years ago making platters/ chargers that were a metre in diameter!)

mandy47

Frugaldom said:

I had a good look at my various accounts today and found £7 odds in my topcashback so it got swept into savings. I'm still on no spends, barring direct debits, so the year's food budget is still intact. I'll need to stick up on sugar soon so if anyone spots a bargain price, pop it in here and tag me in, please.

I wanted to make a new 'Phil the Pig' but no longer know anyone who reads newspapers that can be made into Papier mache. I'll let you all know if paper horse feed bags can be used instead. I just need to source some balloons. I'm sure the grandchildren will have fun making banks of their own, too. 

Our local area has a free weekly newspaper. It's available in a number of supermarkets aswell as other smaller shops. I usually have a hand full. After reading I use it to help start the wood burner.
I've also seen newspapers being requested on Olio. 

annieb64

Waitrose have a free newspaper at weekends if you know anyone who shops there. I always pick one up and hang on to it rather than put it in the recycling. It's useful to have newspaper in the house sometimes.