Lending money with conditions

[p5oebe]

Dh has been made redundant (bloody brexit) & frantically searching for another job but its really difficult as his work is very specific. I work but low paid & we have a max mortgage that we can only afford with his salary. I also have two pre schoolers at home.

Dm has very kindly offered to tide us over if it comes to that, they are very well off & adore the grandkids & extremely generous with gifts for them etc

The only thing is she has insisted we stop shopping at Waitrose, Boden & our favourite shops basically she is a reverse snob (?) and doesnt miss an opportunity to tell me what a waste Waitrose is. I am very particular about food & what the kids eat. We dont have a freezer or microwave & i find it so much easier to shop fresh somewhere i trust. I spend approx £150 a week for the four of us.
We hardly drink & rarely buy clothes for dh & I but obviously the kids need new clothes regularly. She's basically said i don't want you to waste my money!

If you're that bothered about what food goes into your children I'm surprised you're buying them "childrens" yogurts. Especially low sugar ones which will highly likely have artificial sweeteners in. Just buy natural yogurt and add fruit.

Me too! Cant believe it. I choose to buy at ldll as the food is better quality. I choose my health over packaging. I cook from stratch. Dont batch cook. Cook on the day, fresh food and eat it. Some people batch cook which is fine but i dont. Ldll doesnt do many of those ready meals that waitrose, marks etc do so you have to cook so i dont add salt and the other rubbish ready meals do. We used to eat for £30 per week and eat well.

Wow
Some really bitchy comments on this thread.

Some supermarket clothes are brilliant value and they wash really well- you might surprise yourself.

I'm recently an Aldi convert (we had a change of circs and I had to leave my job.

Nobody likes conditions and strings or being controlled but you mum sounds lovely and like she cares and wants the best for you and that doesn't mean fancy

Aldi-seriously check it out

Good luck with the job hunting.

Was going to say thatformerly.

p5oebe. I know you feel like the suggestions given maybe weren't all that helpful, and there have been some snarky replies...mainly because nobody can quite believe that you'd cling so tightly to a lifestyle that is unaffordable.
There are at least a few of us who understand your position, and are trying to offer you sound advice, which you don't seem to want to listen to because I think you were expecting us to say that your DM is unreasonable for demanding that you spend a bit more wisely.
It's not saying you can't prioritise health and wellbeing of your children, we all want that. When we were a two income household, I was very much like you in many ways. At the moment, we've just returned from two years abroad where I couldn't work, and I'm having trouble finding a position that suits our family. While we are very lucky that my DH's salary supports us, I am also very aware that my pre-abroad spending habits will not sustain us while I'm looking for work. So, I've had to learn to feed my family healthily on a smaller budget. This has meant changing grocery stores, graciously accepting hand me downs from lovely friends (who I also hand stuff down to), or buying cheaper clothes from charity shops or different stores. We have never been in danger of not being able to cover our mortgage, so we aren't in dire straits, but it would be irresponsible for me to keep spending like I did two years ago...my DH is working hard to pay the bills, so my side of that partnership, while I am not working, is to help by keeping the house running smoothly on a budget. It can be done, OP...and it may be a shock, but you are in some financial danger here, and need to re-prioritise to make this work. You are lucky to have someone who is willing to save you all from a potentially very bad situation, lots of people don't have that soft place to land, so you should do that graciously, and adjust your lifestyle accordingly. I haven't had to completely abandon any ethical or moral beliefs to do this, but I have had to let things slide...my dcs won't die any time soon from eating regular veg as opposed to organic. Your dcs need to be fed, clothed and sheltered...and kept from the real hardship of potentially losing their home, and the strain of listening to their parents worrying over where their next meal is coming from. Think long and hard, OP.

YABU

You are arguing about a lifestyle you can no longer afford. If you didn't have the privledge of help from DM would you still be spending 150 pounds on food?

You can get quality food several places, would you buy direct from farms? There are a number in my area that deliver fresh to your door for much cheaper than supermarket prices.

You say the DC are pre-school age, I have a few pre-schoolers, they generally wear whatever i get for them. If you think h clothes are scratchy, bu some decent underwear and lower grade top clothes.

Basically, you need to live within your means. If you don't think you can live on the premise of reducing spending then don't take the money on offer.

Also
Sign up to quidco and receipt hog. Both have apps, easy to use and check quidco before you buy anything
Receipt hog you snap a pic of your receipt and you get points which build up to rewards plus sweepstake entries

OpalFruitsMarathonsandSpira You have made my morning!!

in Waitrose the food is good & i don't have to spend hours checking labels for aspartame and all that rubbish

They have Pot Noodles in Waitrose. And Frazzles. And Marshmallow Fluff. And Fray Bentos pies. Equally, they have kiwis, Merchant Gourmet grains and edamame beans in Tesco. I shop in both places.

Aldi and Asda, ouch. Life is such a struggle sometimes

Yabu really, sorry about your situation though. I'm currently in almost exactly the same position but without the wealthy parents. At the end of the day the most important thing is that the mortgage is paid and everyone's fed. Let your standards slip for the moment and buy elsewhere. Sainsburys does lovely kids clothes and the 25% sales are good. Aldi's food is absolutely fine and try your local greengrocer for fruit and veg if you prefer. It's actually been a good kick up the arse for me to see how much money we wasted before as a family so budgeting has been really helpful. Good luck with the dh's job hunting, hopefully he'll get one soon.

But it's clearly not economic the way you cook fresh though, I cook fresh and still only spend £60 per week on a family of 5. You sound like a snob, sorry op but you do.

My kids look just as nice in clothes from cheaper ends of the spectrum. Afraid you need to suck it up, put your big girl pants on and accept you're not rich anymore. End of

OK OP, assuming you are genuine:

Most people, when their circumstances allow, have some luxuries; it might be fancy phones, sky subscriptions, eating out a lot, holidays, fancy cars. Or it might be a preference for expensive food and Boden clothes.

You feel like people are sneering at you because of your choice of luxuries but actually I don't think they are. They're just frustrated because you don't see that shopping at Waitrose is a luxury not an essential and that you CAN'T afford it. When the household income decreases below a level where the luxuries are affordable then the luxuries, whatever they are, have to go. Your luxury is boden and waitrose. If it was a fancy sky package and a merc folk would be telling you to downgrade that too.

It might be nice for your kids to wear boden, nicer for you to eat waitrose food, nicer for everything to be fresh not frozen but it's not essential.

Buy a freezer so you can batch cook healthy meals; curries, chillis, stews, soups (things in sauces basically) freeze very well, and you can heat them up on a hob or in the oven so no terrifying microwave required. I'm sure you prefer to eat only organic, free range etc but you CAN'T AFFORD IT. Your children's nutrition and wellbeing will not be significantly compromised (likely not compromised at all) by you buying chicken from Aldi rather than Waitrose.

Clothes; you haven't said how old the kids are I don't think, but they don't need that much. If they're little then supermarket clothes are absolutely fine or you can often get very good deals if you wait til the late stages of the Debenhams sale (70% off) and the quality is good. If they're older then they won't be growing that fast and won't actually need any significant amount of new clothes so don't buy them!

I am sorry your husband has lost his job, i hope he finds another one soon

I have a friend that sounds a bit like you, her husband lost his job and she couldnt understand that her standard of living would go down

He felt very under pressure and i think it caused some arguements

Most of my friends and i were of the opinion that we would really have to make cutbacks if we were in that situation

Wow, thanks for the laugh OP.

To give you an example my kids like peanut butter. I buy meridian brand which dm scoffs at - she buys some cheapo stuff with palm oil in it sad ok, she's out of date but who would willing give their kids palm oil

I have only read the first page, for which I offer my apologies, but am here to say, p5oebe, that the massive jar of Sunpat currently sitting on my kitchen counter has no palm oil in it at all, just a bit of peanut oil.

(I do, as it happens, also have a little jar of meridien, but I find it a bit claggy and grainy and so am using it up in cooking.)

I buy the huge tubs of peanut butter from Whole Earth as we all love it. Tescos sell them. It uses sustainable palm oil which is fine in fact desirable!

Ive give you at least 2 posts with practical suggestions

Also: but who would willing give their kids palm oil

The issue with Palm oil is the way it is produced in some countries, and the environmental impact of its production

There is no issue to health from having it, unless you are overdoing it massively

OP, I think you need to throw us a bone and tell us if any of this has sunk in.

Exactly, sparechange, I try to always, always avoid palm oil because I rather like orang-utans, not because it will hurt DC's heath.

Instead of £150pw at Waitrose:
-Shop at the co-op: still ethical but will save you a fortune
-Cook mainly vegetarian, to save even more money

Instead of Boden:
-If you don't want to sacrifice ethical concerns (neither do I), then buy second hand
-most children can cope without any new clothes for a few months, so you might be back on a high income by the time you next need to clothes-shop

I'm very frugal with my money. I'd be very happy to give money to family or friends who were struggling, but would be uncomfortable with them spending money on luxuries which I avoid (e.g. Waitrose and expensive new clothes) if I were funding their lifestyle.

I'd recommend sticking with the more frugal lifestyle for a few months after DH gets another job, so that you can build up savings and not have to rely on your parents again... then you can buy Boden to your heart's content!

Yeah I was going to suggest sunpat. I dont like palm oil either. I've never set foot in a Waitrose so can't comment.

OP can you not just rise to the challenge instead of seeing it as the end of the world? You can shop the way you want if you put some work in and dont have to use Waitrose. When things settle and new jobs happen you will have got your bargain shopper eyes.

I can't comment on the clothes, there are other clothes out there, I don't buy Your brand or primark. It's not either or.

As far as palm oil goes I also avoid it- you can buy morrisons own peanut butter 100% peanuts no palm oil. It's more than the cheapest but cheaper than meridian. Or if you have a food processor you can bulk buy peanuts and make your own too. Same for almond butter. Cheap if you get them from Asian supermarkets.