your top tips for money-saving and a more frugal life..

[amigoingmadhere]

Right - having until now led a relatively good lifestyle, am about to be single with 3 young dcs and very little money (not going to go into background here as it's depressing and will only get me down on this sunny morning).

Rather than sit here terrified, I would like to gather the collective wisdom of MN to see how I can immediately live a more frugal life and preserve any little money we have for a house and the dcs' future.

So, here's what I can think of to start with:

• get a new Boots card (old one is connected to my stbxh's email account)
  
• get Tesco clubcard
  
• get Nectar card
  
• always scour the internet etc. for vouchers / codes etc. (do this anyway but in a more random way)
  
• only ever buy presents in sales
  
• when moving house, try to get as much as possible from charity shops / freecycle etc.
  
• use library more
  
• see if Surestart still exists (a while since I used their services)
  
• start looking for any local free/cheap gym / sports facilities
  

There must be more that I'm not thinking of.. would be grateful for your ideas! - shopping / cooking / kids' activities / house furnishing etc.
I'm starting afresh on a new and wonderful life.. but it's going to be hard.

thanks :)

[Badvoc]

Yeah am going to go back to normal pasta for the boys and just not have any myself...
Picked up some GF oats to make some flapjacks with and omg! I nearly dropped the pack!
£3 for 500g!!
Robbery......

[Badvoc]

....some got the asda smart price oats which were 60p for 1kg!
:)
I'm not loving the soap nuts :( they aren't getting the clothes clean.
Have fine back to co op own brand non bio gel. It's ine of the cheapest and best IMO.
Got some good bargains for Xmas today form amazon, boots and debenhams clearance....

[Badvoc]

I have found that too racing. Very confusing!

[Fluffycloudland77]

TBH I've heard bad things about soap nuts on MSE but I didnt want to say anything.

Oddly though, laundry gloop gets good reviews.

[Badvoc]

Hmmm...glad its just not me...not impressed at all :(

[crackcrackcrak]

Ouch gf must be a pain to budget around. What's laundry gloop?
I have super sensitive skin so I'm sticking with my Ecover refills but Aldo washing liquid is pretty good IMO and I'm fairly sure it's cheaper.
I like the Tesco daisy range for v cheap household cleaning stuff exist they do washing liquid too?

My next mission is to buy a huge roll of fat furry draught excluder and do all the doors with it before I touch the central heating. I'm getting retro sausage dogs for the doors too - that will amuse me for ages

[pookey]

crackcrackcrack - sausage dogs, cool - energy efficient and a cheap pet!

Badvoc you could use some of the budget oats to make the flapjacks, food processing them first makes them stick together better. this is from jamie oliver site 250g Porridge Oats
125g Butter Lurpack is 2 for £2 in tesco
125g Brown Sugar
2-3 Tablespoons Golden Syrup (Depends how gooey you want it)
Put it in a food processor, then put it in a tray and bake until golden brown (about 20 min).

Not sure if this is actually cheaper than buying them though - pos not! You can also try using budget museli to make them.

I like shopping in a few diff supermarkets (time permitting and within reason) remembering prices is helpful; We tried LIDYL today and although we didn't buy them they had parma ham for about half the price as in sainsburys and parmesan was also much cheaper, however I bought the kids yogs without checking, assuming it would be cheaper, and they were approx 1.50 as opposed to £1 if I had got the same quantity in sains or tesco. If you could be bothered you could check the prices of more expensive items on my supermarket before decidinng where to shop? DP insists on right guard and its always on offer somewhere so I stock pile - at the mo its on offer in sainsburys.

Ooh and don't forget to complain/return things you are not happy with at the supermarket or wherever; they might give goodwill gestures (dp loves complaining )

[BoerWarKids]

I'm sure i read on here once that you can use soap nuts to wash your hair?

I've got some in the cupboard, was going to use when my washing detergent runs out.

[Badvoc]

Draft axcluders are ace :)
We have a sausage dog!
I actually think its cheaper to buy flapjacks tbh...the ingredients are expensive.
Made my fils b day cake last night....hope it's ok!

[Fluffycloudland77]

Laundry gloop is a grated bar of soap, borax and something else I cant remember right now...The recipe is on mse.

Apparently it's really good though for laundry.

[flubba]

Have been reading thread with interest because we're skint and I'm a tightarse because I'm also concerned about our impact on the environment and lots of the things we do to save money also help the environment.
So, over the past week I have;
a) turned the hot water tank temp down to 55 degrees (I read that it shouldn't be lower than 130/55 to prevent bacterial growth, such as Legionnaires disease.)
b) snapped my dishwasher tabs in half and it's tackled curry plates very well :)
c) added vinegar to my rinse-aid, topped up the machine (as it was begging me to!) and no different smell or taste on my plates etc this morning. Yay!
d) bought a t-shirt from the £1 rail and made two lots of leggings for my girls which they love
e) made some bread rolls for our bbq today
f) using my own firestarters for the bbq today
g) made DH's birthday present with the kiddies this morning ~ kind of saltdough key ring with their fingerprints on

What else can I get going on? :o

[pookey]

wow flubba you have been busy! Very impressed that you made leggings out of a t shirt! Will check my heating and make sure its high enough, didn't know that thanks.

[crackcrackcrak]

just been looking at borax.....wat was it for again and what was that other cheap cleaning stuff someone metioned?

sorry i can look this up myself it was just better than writing bump

[flubba]

thanks pookey here are the leggings if you want to have a nosey.
I'm going to have to turn the water tank temp up a bit when the weather gets colder I think - shower was a bit on the cool side this morning >>pathetic emoticon

[crackcrackcrak]

Set an alarm on your phone re the boiler?

I tried to turn mine down in the end phoned the plumber who works for my letting agent. It's impossible but he did advise that I must turn the hot taps in full power as this reduces the temp/energy rather than less power which creates scalding/wasted water. Ah well I tried.

My next task is to reduce the price of dd lunch box. She is 3 and has a packed lunch at least 4 times a week (too giddy to risk restaurant food even if I was loaded). I realise this is quite an expense because I buy her things in sealed packets because she is often do awkward I can't risk the waste if she turns things down on the day and they come home again.

Things I buy separately are jelly, yoghurt, cheese, pouches (Ella's kitchen), sometimes chocolate bars but she will accept own brand multi packs so this is ok.
Might attempt jelly in old weaning pots with lids but not sure what else I can do?

[flubba]

Good idea - will give that a go. I have no idea how quickly it takes to heat up, but unless I try, I'll never know!

My DDs' lunchboxes are cheap, cheap, cheap poor things. I buy two loaves of bread at once (usually on offer), and do a whole loaf in one go and freeze (we currently need 9 sets of sandwiches a week), and it's also then cheaper on ham etc as you can use up nearly a whole pack so none goes to waste.

You could surely do lumps of cheese in pots?
We also do pots of breadsticks, raisins, biscuits if they're very lucky and that sort of stuff.

[crackcrackcrak]

Do the sandwiches survive ok if you freeze them?

[flubba]

Yes - if you get them out in the morning they're fine by lunchtime (I put a couple we had left over in the fridge this morning and we had them for lunch today at home - they were fine). So far I've used ham, chicken (ham-like chicken slices) and cheese and philadelphia equivalent (cheapo from Sainsbury's basics). Have been advised against mayo. I don't put salad stuff in them.

[Fluffycloudland77]

I only put our hot water on for 20mins now, the tank is below waist height as opposed to the 5 foot high one we had before.

I worked out our last months use was 23 units or £8ish. It was £25 a month before on the old tariff.

[crackcrackcrak]

Genius! Going to try this straight away as would save me do much time thanks!

[boredandrestless]

For pack up stuff I go to Heron Frozen Foods, I'm not sure if they are a national chain or just regional but their stuff is way cheaper than the supermarkets. You can usually get kids yogs (petit filou, frubes, etc) 2 or 3 packs for £1, big packs of naice ham for half the price of asda, baby bels/cheese strings type things 2 or 3 multi packs for £1. I got 3 multi packs of philadelphia and bread stick dunkers for £1 the other day. If Heron aren't national I'm sure there will be another similar type of store in other places.

I put the yogs in the freezer and take them out for pack ups in a morning so none go to waste and they keep the pack up cool. I also portion up the nice ham as only me eating it so will put half in fridge, and the rest in freezer in little pots for sandwiches, pizzas, pasta, etc.

Another thing I do is put a little portion of something into a small tupperware pot stuff like microwave popcorn, dried apricots, raisins, chunks of sausage, chunks of cheddar, etc - stuff that can be bought cheaply if you buy a big pack.

[flubba]

Good to know, thanks Fluffy.
Right, have set alarm for water heater and have turned it off totally. I'll give it half an hour tonight and if my DCs turn into freezer blocks, I'll give it 35 mins tomorrow and so on until they stop being blue... :o

[Fluffycloudland77]

Main problem Ive got is that the bastard hot water comes on whenever the heating goes on. I'm going to have to turn the stat right down when the heating is on.

[flubba]

Ohh! That's crapology and I think mine may be the same.

[crackcrackcrak]

I predict I have the same problem. Maybe we can crack it together! Got a few weeks before heating needed