need a kick up the ass to do my shopping list!!!

[lucysmam]

but i am completely lacking motivation to even attempt to plan a fortnights worth of meals for 3 on £40!!! I know I can do it because often that's all I have to spend per fortnight, I just don't know what to get this time around.

please give me a kick up the bum to get me going!!

[zookeeper]

I'll be watching this thread with interest - I seem to be in the supermarket all the time and spend a fortune

[TrinityRhino]

I am hopeless at sorting this too so all I can do is bumo this for you

oh and dont forget to start sorting xmas

[JackieNo]

This may not be any practical help now (sorry), but once you have planned, and done your list, could you keep it somewhere for future reference, so that in, say 6 weeks time, if you have the same situation, you could go back and look at what you've done in the past?

Oh, and here's a kick up the bum, as requested .

[lucysmam]

I'm budgeting a fiver a week to put aside as of last week Trinity, and am ebaying and collecting Boots points on nappies/toiletries and getting a nectar card. zookeeper, once I actually get motivated I will post my list & meal plan for the fortnight. If I had more to spend believe me I would!

Thanks for the kick Trinity, still no motivation. I'll have a cuppa and try again later maybe

[lucysmam]

JackieNo, I have lots of lists, in various 'safe' places, I can just never remember where those safe places are but yes it would help

[TrinityRhino]

oh and sorry I wasn't really pointing thazt xmas bit at you

should have explained
I am on the 'for the love of god stop.......talking about xmas ' thread

so I thought I'd start signing all my posts that way

just to annoy

[lucysmam]

lol, oh!!

well thanks anyways, it reminded me i need to put todays £5 aside

[stirlingmum]

Does this Help??

Also, bbc food or bbc good food sites are useful.

[FAQ]

ooo - I'll join you in making a shopping list - I've been saying for days (possibly a week or more ) that I must get another online Asda shop done and meal plan properly- but still haven't done it.

Aiming to start afresh in September with planning more carefully - so need to get my order done soon so I can make sure I can have it delivered on Monday next week.

[lucysmam]

lol FAQ, I've only set out to do it this morning but have zero motivation atm!! am going to sit down to it again when i get home from town

[lucysmam]

stirling, yup thats helpful!! means I don't have to tax my likkle brain with thinking about what to serve up, cheers

[JackieNo]

(sorry lucysmam - I knew that wasn't going to be a very helpful suggestion - those 'safe places' are a nightmare aren't they).

[lucysmam]

they could well be hiding somewhere in paperwork mountain JackieNo, I just don't fancy rooting through there much either!

Paper n pen are out at last, got to go to town now though so they will have to wait until i'm back from appointment, hopefully full of enthusiasm for budget shopping!

[lucysmam]

still in need of a kick up the ass, have started looking at desserts instead of serious shopping

[JackieNo]

Go and look in the cupboards, and see what you've got, that you could use up, if you bought some other stuff to go with it.

[lucysmam]

beans, tomatoes, soup, tin of beans & sausages. barley, flour, lentils, dried fruit, all sorts. i just can't be arsed tbh JackieNo, am thinking about making oh struggle to make £40 stretch for a fortnight for a change since I always cook/sort money. there's leftovers in freezer too that would mean less to get. I'll start with a list of what I have and go from there although I could get sidetracked by the dried fruit which was meant for cakes but I've munched loads of . . .scrummy

[lucysmam]

well I finally did my list, have had a very pleasant and peaceful virtual wander around online asda and my list comes to £53 and odd pennies but is subject to stuff being taken off depending what's left in cupboard on Friday and includes £10 for 90 nappies. So I don't think I've done too badly & there's plenty to last us 2 weeks with only the odd top up as we go along

[JackieNo]

Yay - well done.

[lucysmam]

lol JackieNo, what a productive online day I've had

[JackieNo]

Oh me too.

[penguinaballerina]

We have 2 lists, one for non-perishables, frozen foods and household goods etc that we bulk-buy once every 8 weeks. The other is perishalbes that we buy every week. So 7 weeks out of 8, I only need to visit the dairy, meat, chilled and fruit and veg isles, I can ignore the rest of the shop! This means that I can usually get through the checkouts in 20 minutes.
When the time comes to do the 8-weekly bulk shop either I or my DH does the shopping and the other looks after the children.

We have checklists of everything we ever need to buy and we copy things down from those. They are written in the order that you go round the shop so I hope the shop doesn't decide to rearrange everything!

It sounds sad, but it saves loads of time, hassle and money.

[lucysmam]

good thinking penguin, I should start to keep lists like that I think . . . another 'somewhere safe' to find. It would help loads to have space to buy for 8 weeks at a time but unfortunately I only have a very thin and tiny cupboard for tins/cooking ingredients/biccy tin/baby's medicines & ours so they're out of way. 4 weekly may be an option though as when we've done that in the past we've only spent £80 at most including nappies!

[collision]

I have just done a big shop this week at Lidl and spent £48! and that included sweets for the boys, bottle of wine and a bunch of flowers!!

this week we are eating

Aubergine Parmigiana

Chilli chicken and noodles

Sausage, mash and onion gravy

Bacon and chickpea pasta

HM burgers and HM chips

Vegetarian Lasagne

Smoked Salmon Salad

Chicken with tomatoes and creme fraiche

I heart LIDL

[lucysmam]

Aubergine parmigiana, what's that? sounds interesting!

My list will do us two weeks which I don't think is bad and it includes nappies that will do 3 weeks as they were on offer for 3 packs for £10. We used to do lidl all the time when we lived within walking distance but had to move as I was pg or would def shop there