November Numbercrunchers *blows the budgeteering bugle*

[claretandamberforever]

In here please.

Feel free to post a daily spending diary, to ask for advice or just for a general money moan.

Thanks fluffy. Will definitely get the mirror tomorrow so I can fill up my new fridge freezer on Saturday. I've just written my shopping list in fact.

NSD today.

bitchesof - I get a perverse pleasure in working to a tight budget!

Anyone know how much the mirror is? Im going to have to raid my copper stash. Newsagent is going to love me.

50p

Thanks again fluffy.

I'm doubting myself because the mse newsletter didn't mention it but it was on hotdealsuk.

I will be so embarrassed if I'm wrong.

possibly and monikar a baker I am not! shortbread is about all I can manage but it was so well received it may become my frugal secret weapon!

bitchesof really interesting you mention 'the budget talk' with partner. I'm currently dropping huge hints about total overhaul of finances come January. My DH is on board to some extent but I think he sees frugality as my hobby rather than a lifestyle necessity. Saying that, the gas bill did give him a shock so he is getting on board. I'm leaving the discussion until the new year as Christmas always throws a spanner in. In the meantime would love some tips on how to get family on board, how to start the discussion etc.

Spent today - £3 bus ticket, £1 birthday card, 50p grapes for dd on way home.
3frugalthings: found emergency birthday present in the present drawer (guiltily admit to some re-gifting in there!), have had glass of water rather than boiling the kettle for tea when I wake up for the third week running! (First cup of tea at work so appreciated!), have talked to best friend about birthday meal this Saturday, we're starting off with drinks at their house (provided by them) to save money.

I always take baked things with me as gifts and they always go down really well. The teachers at DC's schools will be getting fudge and rocky road this year. It went down so well last year. I make cranberry and white chocolate fudge from the tesco website. It's so easy.

Several NSDs this week. Had an eruption at the bank when they blocked my card due to "unusual online activity" erm that would be commonly known as Christmas! Meant I had to put the Sainsburys shop on CC as that was the first I knew of problems with my card (and clearly it's not the bank's responsibility to ring me to tell me oh no!)

Will be getting the aldi voucher and going to do the aldi shop tomorrow.
News on the PC isn't great but our friend has fixed it for now and has retrieved music and photos. Will be buying a hard drive straight away and backing everything up regularly. We have lost a lot of stuff though . Both our CVs were on there.
Did has her final ear op check up today. Please keep your fingers crossed that it's healed.
Expecting an LSD today

Northender what a pain about the computer

Helena baked teacher gifts is genius. Definitely doing that!

Turnoff it took a good few 'chats' (and one proper row) before DH properly got on board with the frugal thing. He is getting there now. In terms of getting him on board, best successes have included getting him the budgeting app I use so he can actually see what money we have and stop being in denial, and talking about how superior we are to friends who are blatantly living on credit

I am going to view a house today that is £350pm cheaper rent than current house. If it's ok it will enable us to really start saving for house deposit. Fingers crossed! It is far smaller, but we are looking at it as a 12-24 month compromise to replenish our savings.

A real life example of how the economy is still shrinking the lives of millions of people - with particular focus on the self employed.
www.allthatsleft.co.uk/2013/11/its-the-stupid-economy-stupid/

Everything crossed for DD's ear North and fingers crossed for the cheaper house Possibly

Should be an NSD Today but might not work out as DD has To stay late To a test she missed while off sick. I'll have To hang around with t'other one but I'll take a snack for her.

hotdealsuk lied about the Aldi voucher.

sorry

Inadvertent money saving today - was planning a cafe lunch in between house viewings but forgot wallet so pacified DS with emergency snack bar and bought lunch in waitrose on the way home. Still a treat, but only £9 including treats for gluten intolerant friend visiting today, instead of £15+.

Farmfoods sell quite a lot of branded goods and own brands quite cheaply, also if you sign up on their web site you get printable vouchers think they update every month giving you £2.50 off £25, £5 off £50 or £10 off £100
Farmfoods

£1.69 on bread and milk. £7.80 on posting eBay parcels too, but that was paid for.

Woo just doing a freezer audit (the fun never starts in this house, I tell ya). Will only have to buy 1 main evening meal for the next week and sandwich & breakfast stuff, milk, pop and eggs although frozen veg and Yorkshire Puddings feature very strongly throughout the week. Trying to defrost the fridge freezer.

(even frugalised the hot water that I had been boiling corn-on-the-cob in, by sticking it in the freezer to try and melt the ice on top)

Budget is like this...
Petrol: £113.20 remaining (DH will get some work reimbursement and I will probably need £15)
Grocery: £100.11 remaining (want to try and bring this week's bits in at under £30)
Everything else: £231.11 (admittedly I might have forgotten a few bits and pieces)

Days left to payday: 7

MOT booked in for Monday - really hope it doesn't cost too much or I will be really disheartened. Last year it passed completely without even an advisory but it is now 13 years old.

Got a job interview next Wednesday for my old, old, old job which is where my heart is so I'm nervous but excited about that. I'm nervous because it needs financial vetting and I'm bricking it about our debts - I mean, they are manageable, I have no bad debt, never missed payments, no CCJ's, no defaults and to be honest even all our joint debt will be a lot less than some people's outstanding mortgages. I'm making steps to pay it off...But I will be devvoed if my financial crapness scuppers my chances of getting my dream job back

Even managed to squeeze a coat for DS1 out of the budget from TK Maxx and it was only £39.99 (he's 17 so in adult sizes) and my mum bought DS2 a coat as his (early) Xmas present

Will have a read through the thread now.

Evening all. I had a flick through the mirror this morning so didn't buy it as I couldn't see any voucher. Selfishly I'm quite relieved as I don't actually need £40 of shopping but I would have got it anyway.

Today I popped into sainbury's and used the last £8 that I had on a gift card. I got pretty much all value stuff like rice, pasta, beans so im really stocked up with that kind of stuff. I also went to body shop as I need makeup. I've been using really cheap stuff and I hate it
. I spent £29.60 but I got foundation, powder, concealer, a membership card, hand cream and a shea gift selection for my secret Santa person. So totally off budget but I feel I got a lot for my money.

Northender have you thought about Dropbox as a free alternative to buying a hard disk. We upload our most important stuff like CVs there or we just email them as attachments to a webmail account.

Possibly this is the fudge recipe I use:
m.tesco.com/mt/realfood.tesco.com/recipes/white-chocolate-and-cranberry-fudge.html

It's easy as long as you know you must stand and stir it for five minutes without doing anything else. If the phone rings or the doorbell goes tough! I get cellophane and wrap the fudge then add a handwritten tag and some ribbon and it looks great. One batch does two teachers, maybe three.

Good luck for the interview claret I'm sure your credit rating is good, even if you have debts you're managing them well.

possibly that is such a good tip about budgeting app! I've already had a little browse at the free ones. Any recommendations? Fingers crossed about the house, seeing it as a short term change for long term benefits is a great idea.

picnmix just last week I put a £60 shop through sainsburys online because I had a £15 voucher then cancelled it at the last minute. I would never usually spend that much and even though I had things to 'put away for Christmas' I know they would have been consumed before the end of November!

Spent today - 72p on lunch as I left mine at home, grr!
3frugalthings: as soon as I realised I'd forgotten my lunch challenged myself to source lunch for less than £1 rather than going to Gregg's! Ended up with tin of soup and packet of crumpets with margarine begged from the staff canteen! Crumpets left over for snacks too! Wrapped Christmas presents for daughter and niece last night so I feel their presents are 'done' - no temptation to buy anything else. Have convinced my mum to visit at the weekend so she can babysit for night out meaning no expensive babysitter!

Good luck claret, hope the credit rating stuff doesn't get in your way. As a complete aside claret, we were out on Sunday watching the football on tv . There was a guy there whose final accumulator score to win £480 was Cov to win 3-2. He was not a happy boy!
Better news on the PC, it is back up and running (for now) and our docs are saved after all . However we can well do without the expense of a hard drive pre Christmas so thanks for that Helena we will email the most important stuff now, look into Dropbox and put all photos onto snapfish. We would probably have just gone for the most obvious (and most expensive) option through panic.
Busy weekend coming up as it's dd's birthday. I'm taking her and 2 friends to the circus and then going to the Lakes on Sunday to meet up with sil and her dh. It will all be spendier than I'd like but worthwhile spends iyswim?
Have a good weekend everyone

Turnoff we used a free app for 6 months this year, purely to establish what we were spending our money on. You could record all spending and categorise it. Will try to remember the name of it as it was good.

Double checked my Christmas list last night and I will order my final present today from Argos - £15 but I have a £10 voucher because we bought DS' birthday presents early to get the voucher.

Then I just need coffee creams (harder to buy than cocaine it seems) and three chocolate oranges and I'm done.

Really pleased that we've stuck to our list and come in under budget due to VERY careful shopping. I have done cash back to come too plus DS' January birthday is sorted .

On the downside DH is still looking for a permanent job so we've now decided he will apply for all permanent jobs, not just ones within commuting distance of here. Obviously we could be looking at another move . First non-local application is in Basingstoke. Never been there in my life! Anyone know it?

Morning!

Inadvertently expensive Aldi shop yesterday - £75 and then another £20 in Sainsburys. Need to go through receipt and see why it was so £££. I bought a tenner or so worth of Xmas stuff but even so... Didn't even need to buy meat!

Re budgeting apps we use YNAB, which has big initial purchase fee but works best for us as I am self employed and have variable income.

Have just had a series of huge bills in, need to sit down and go through them this afternoon and panic blindly.

Possibly I never leave the till without scanning my reciept, any prices over say £2 I look at the item description. I once paid £20 for a glass dish that wasn't even on the conveyor belt. It must have been a computer blip but I was jet lagged and just handed over the cash didn't realise until about a week later, too late to do anything about it.

This morning I spent £3 on ofal for the dog's breakfast and splurged a fiver on a Friday breakfast between school run and Pilates. Still need to get a few bits as DDs have friends sleeping over, pizzas and burgers on the menu. We have enough junk snacks. Still got half a freezer of food for next week.

Helena fingers crossed DH ges a job without needing to move.