Marching into a miserly march with the mumsnet frugaleers

[Fluffycloudland77]

Newbies, helpful tips & lurkers always welcome.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/credit_crunch/1600030-Small-money-saving-habits-petty-even

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/credit_crunch/1543785-your-top-tips-for-money-saving-and-a-more-frugal-life

Hi everyone! Checking in for March. Not started too well as an adjustment to DH's tax codes means he's lost almost half his salary this month.

Still no job although he has 13 applications in at the moment and two more going in today. His contract finishes at the end of the month.

I'm alternating between stressed and terrified.

Hoping for an NSD today.

Spendy weekend as needed dress for ds christening plus something over it for respectability at church. Bought 8 hens as we were down to two laying. One laid in car on way home so hope that's a good sign!
Purchased bedclothes from catalogue shopping last night 4 sets for €54 so great deal, one set will be spare and a duplicate so might try sell that on Facebook.
This week also have things to buy for christening but once that's over there's only 6 weeks until I'm back on payroll & can recover financially!!

80p on a bag of potatos.

I can't spend much more, I've got £10 note for petrol & that is it for the week.

Marking place. Wondered why noone had posted on the feb thread

How much are hens? DP wanted a pet and at least hens are useful

Hello, just sneaking in to get some ideas and try to make myself accountable - MUST get debts down after period of v low income and moving house. Brit but working o'seas.

Current debts are:
$21,848.04 (the .04 is obv necessary. Full disclosure...)
£3934.89 (ditto)

My plan is to continue to bring the £ down first, as we have some pension paid in the UK that we are trying to use to do that every month, and then once it's gone, we can hopefully transfer the funds over here to try and reduce the debt this side of the pond. My main concern is that the debt here will grow in the interim!!

So, I'm hoping that by posting here sometimes, and checking in with a debt to date post every month, that I will be able to get it all back to where it needs to be... And you guys have some great ideas!

£4 on a dayrider tram ticket and £5 on lunch today. All totally worth it though as we managed to secure two decent orders from some new stockists! I have just started a small business with a friend and it's kind of beginning to take off, so excited!

£2 on diet coke and crisps. £1.98 on biscuits for the team.

Had £66 back on my card from returning jeans and a pair of shoes.

£60 on petrol, £5.58 on magazine and sausage roll. My target this month is no coffee shop coffees. Will tackle magazine problem next month.

Bought some pancake mix which I wouldn't normally buy but I've claimed cashback on 3 sites taking the cost to minus 20p. I also got 6 Kingsmill pancakes for free ready for tomorrow. Spent about £11 on fruit, milk and eggs.

Doing lots of playdates at people's houses or in the park this week. So glad Spring is here. It's so much easier cheaper to entertain dc in good weather.

Night have you considered baby led weaning? I did it with my dc and it cuts out all the pureeing so it's less faff and cheaper too.

Nsd

€8.50 each here in Ireland for Rhode Island reds.
There's not much minding with hens.

£4 in £ shop, £6 in town on bits and put last £20 of allocated petrol money in, we have done a lot of mileage this month. Plus £25 on clothes for DD residential trip but they will last through summer and autumn

Went out to get pizzas as both DDs have the boyfriends over ( who said double date?) and managed to spend £50. Bloody hell. Not all on pizzas and it was all needed, but still more than I had in mind.

DH is spending money to save money iyswim. Tried a virtual office but had buy a coffee every time he needs the loo, plus now that he can't grab a quick sandwich he's spending a tenner every time he eats, about 4 days during the working day. So he's buying a microwave for the shiny new office he's rented. He bought a kettle last week. Now he just needs to get paid. .

Ran out of time to do more than a few days of mealplanning. Spent 25 quid in LIDL but will need to top up with things they don't stock (goats milk, quorn "ham", hard goats cheese) and nice pizzas. The Asda 2 for 4 quid are lush.

Really hard when DP's freelance work means we can't do family things at the weekend - but if he doesn't say yes he doesn't work (or get paid!).

adora I have the same problem. No space for a home office and DS is around most of the time which wouldn't work. So I work out of cafes, friends' kitchens, our stairs, the car (!) if all else fails. Even at the cheapest place it ends up costing about 3 quid to be there for 3 hours - thank you wetherspoons and your bottomless coffee. But cheaper than renting an office I guess.

Oh also I saved money by pinching lunch for today and tomorrow left over from the partners meeting at work

It's a pain ins't it Freelance? My DH can't work from home full-time, even though we have a spare room he's using as an office here, he has To be in the City for most of his day.

His new office includes a parking space but he can't Get the gass guzzler, which we haven't been able To sell yet, into it. So I'm back To using that now while he uses the much moré economícal one. And petróleo has just hit it a new high, if it goes up much moré they'll have To change the pumps. I still think it's slightly cheaper than UK though, so can't complain about that one.,

Who has a new business with a friend just taking off? Can't see it now but Well done and good luck.

NSD today but that's because my dad has treated me. He also bought DS slippers so that's great. Back home tomorrow but I have got drinks and snacks ready so no teas at 1.95.

I think I need to join. My costs seem to be creeping up all the time. Money seems to have been flowing through my fingers since pay day and I want to save for some work on the house so have to get in control.

This month I need to downgrade my talk package on my phone line as Vigin sold me an upgrade which is not worth me having and is costing me an extra £7 a month to maintain. That's £84 a year down the drain.

My freezer and cupboards are full of all sorts of things and I don't even know what so this week I plan to meal plan entirely based on them and only buy bread, milk and fruit. I'll also have to buy some gluten free stuff as my dad is coming to stay for a few days. I do my weekly shop tomorrow and hoping I can do entire week for food on £25 plus what's in the cupboards. We shop in Aldi and it really does help. Don't thikn Aldi do gluten free though.

DS needs new shoes and DD looks like she will soon though hoping they'll hold out until next month. That's at least another £50-60 over the next 2 months.

Did well today with a no spend day though I already know tomorrow won't be - weekly shop and getting DD's violin repaired plus agreed to meet a friend for coffee before I thought about money. She's got mental health problems and I hate cancelling on her as she gets upset so easily

NSD. Oh and the pizza dough did good. We had 2/6 we made. Could have eaten 3. But that's good that we didn't. So that's pretty good going. We can get 3 meals out of roughly 40p of flour and yeast and some cooking in oven.

£4.40 on Pilates.

Well despite our horrendous car bill our debts have reduced by £1000 since the end of December. Despite all our frugality, it's the first time I've noticed a significant improvement so I'm over the moon! It's probably got a lot to do with the extra hours I've been doing at work but whatever it takes.
Big grocery shop today, £47 at aldi (using the voucher of course), £35 at Booths but apart from fresh food top ups that should do us for a couple of weeks. £30 on petrol.
Dd needs a new cub jumper and I just missed out on one on eBay while distracted by ds but will keep looking out for one. Should be a low spend week here.

Well despite our horrendous car bill our debts have reduced by £1000 since the end of December. Despite all our frugality, it's the first time I've noticed a significant improvement so I'm over the moon! It's probably got a lot to do with the extra hours I've been doing at work but whatever it takes.
Big grocery shop today, £47 at aldi (using the voucher of course), £35 at Booths but apart from fresh food top ups that should do us for a couple of weeks. £30 on petrol.
Dd needs a new cub jumper and I just missed out on one on eBay while distracted by ds but will keep looking out for one. Should be a low spend week here.