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Original poster

an Ostentatiously Austere October...join here for a frugal month ahead!

999 replies

PeoniesforMissAnnersley · 26/09/2014 10:20

All welcome to join the MN frugaleers for another month of recording our spends, frugal wins and frugal fails!

NSD = No Spend Day (let's have as many as possible!)

LSD = Low Spend Day

OP posts:
ItalianWiking84 · 26/09/2014 18:38

Thank you for the treat missA and hope your soon feeling a lot better again.
Saved 600£ this months which I am really pleased about. Hoping for the double next month if we live very frugally. Hoping a meeting with the bank next week will make us even more determine Grin

ItalianWiking84 · 26/09/2014 18:45

Nsd grin
Going to a kinda local castle which have veterancars, bikes and vans ect tomorrow but have free tickets so we are saving around 40£ in entrance smile frugal win
Will pack picnic to take with us and drinks so we can have lunch in the castle garden
smile
Wish everybody a lovely weekend cake

Itsfab · 26/09/2014 19:09

SpottyTeacakes - there are no personal spends. All my housekeeping goes on food and petrol. All I spend on me is 2 newspapers a week. The kids get pocket money but only £4 a week. I buy bread and freeze it and make some as well. I have stopped buying the variety of fruit I used too and it is mainly bananas, apples and pears at the moment or anything that is a pound a punnet. I also buy tinned and frozen but have stopped buying the frozen at the moment as it isn't the bargain I thought. £3 for a punnet that does one meal for three kids.

SpottyTeacakes · 26/09/2014 19:17

Have you got a market near you? We don't but the one in the nearest town has bargainous fruit. Big bowls of x y and z for a pound each.

CoolCadbury · 26/09/2014 19:23

LSD today - DS piano book

AdoraBell · 26/09/2014 19:46

Itsfab are you buying expensive fruit and veg? One of mine would like to have mango and papaya served on a silver platter on a daily basis but will acceptHmm apples instead.

Also, could you swap the cereal for something like porridge, cheese on toast, beans on toast, granola made from the oats if they won't go for porridge? We have that with yoghurt from a large pot and chopped apple/pair/banana or frozen berries.

My DH is currently eating me out of house and home. He keeps trying to deny the fact that he has a problem with gluten, because he doesn't want to have a problem with gluten, but the last couple of weeks have been painfull so he is making an effort, again. He's asked me to cook "a bit more, like double, please" for him as well as keeping his supply of nuts for the car topped up. It's like having another bloody teenager in the house.

Ohhelpohnoitsa · 26/09/2014 19:54

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Fluffycloudland77 · 26/09/2014 19:55

We have big meals but no snacks. Meal planning worked for us.

We had the same meals when I was little, I never thought to say I didn't like something because I knew there was nothing else. When I was older it was normal for our cats to have several open cans of food because they'd refused the first offering.

Obviously the cats had my mum well and truly under the paw.

NK5BM3 · 26/09/2014 19:57

Checking in! Thank you!

PixieofCatan · 26/09/2014 20:16

needa Thanks :) I know exactly where every penny has gone, I just need to stop spending it Blush

I spent a lot today. I did an ad hoc childcare job for social services for 3 hours this afternoon so got £20-something for that, but went to the gym to sign up and spent £18 on a good pair of goggles, £11 on a couple of combi-locks and paid our registration fees. It'll be expensive but cheaper than going to the local pool twice a week when bus fares are included Hmm

I think tomorrow DP needs to buy a new suit as he starts his placement year on Monday but Sunday should be a NSD :)

Does anybody know what fruit and veg freezes well? We end up throwing some bits out as we buy it for the [pet] rats and they don't go through a whole punnet of fruit or bag of kale and we don't eat a huge amount of it either. We should, but we're not good Blush
I made up lots of little mixed fruit/veg baggies for the freezer a couple of months ago and the whole lot went horrid in the freezer Confused

AliceDoesntLiveHereAnymore · 26/09/2014 20:17

Itsfab A couple thoughts - maybe implement one "cheap night" a week, possibly two, with beans on toast or eggs and chips or something like that? You say "the boys" and "DD" so I was assuming 3 dcs, maybe let them each choose one meal per week, so that's 3 meals, plus the 2 cheap meals, that gives you 2 meals for you to decide. Everyone eats the same main meal, unless you have a "forage" evening - or in our case, a "eat the leftovers" meal where everyone gets to choose from different leftovers. lol But definitely meal plan.

Some of the things we do: Treats are basics, homemade, or on offer only here. I keep a couple containers of UHT milk in the cupboard in unlikely event that we run out of milk. Bread in freezer. A tenner set aside out of the budgeted grocery shop in case of an absolutely necessary trip to the supermarket, otherwise when it's out, it's out.

SpottyTeacakes · 26/09/2014 20:21

We try to do the one cheap meal a week thing. Jackets and beans or beans on toast, pasta and pesto or tuna, pasta and sauce etc. Dp moans about the lack of meat though Hmm

Itsfab · 26/09/2014 20:38

AdoraBell - oh yes, my kids love mangoes. They love all fruit and I am pleased they eat so healthily but omg it is dear at times. They are fine at the moment with the less exotic stuff. Grapes are sometimes £1 a punnet so they get them too but bananas are crazily cheap - of course DD won't eat those.

DS1 eats porridge but I have been buying the three boxes of cereal for £3 and getting 2 of "shreddies" and one of rice crispies. I really miss crunchy nut cornflakes Sad.

DS1 and DD have school dinners but don't always choose a filling meal and given that DS2 has a packed lunch and DS1 and DD always eat the cooked meal I figured it was right to do it.

DD moaned a while ago it was too warm for jacket spud Angry.

I love to cook. I spend hours looking through my many cook books and choosing what to make. That was all fine but now we have unplanned school fees and an unexpected £xxx,xxx bill so it is all a bit stressful.

NK5BM3 · 26/09/2014 20:38

Never thought about doing a cheap meal per week. We could do that. Having said that our meals are quite basic most of the week because dh can't really cook and I'm really busy now. So I tend to cook on the weekend and then serve it up that whole week. With that though, I keep telling dh to freeze lasagne etc but he doesn't and so we end up eating it 3 days in a row. Ugh.

So tonight we had pasta tuna with Mayo, cheese and corn. Worked great and I guess it's cheap!

I'm rambling.... Sorry. Blush

SpottyTeacakes · 26/09/2014 20:44

Itsfab I'm like your dc and love strawberries, raspberries etc but am not keen on apples etc. I tend not to eat any fruit as I'd rather the dc had it than me Blush

trainersandaches · 26/09/2014 20:51

Checking in! Had payday and went for a gin and tonic and it felt like THE MOST LUXURIOUS thing in the world after my month of frugality!

Itsfab · 26/09/2014 21:00

Yep, even feel guilty about the odd grape I haveHmm.

Passthecake30 · 26/09/2014 23:47

Ladies. ...v hard not to put the kids first etc but I am really trying to eat as well myself as I encourage them
...sister has been ill for a good while and finally diagnosed with rickets. ...dunno why, she does have a poor diet (no kids thou) and apparently it can be hereditary. So I've gone into healthy eating and supplement overdrive which is going to be spendy!

northender · 26/09/2014 23:50

Marking my place

frazzled74 · 27/09/2014 01:05

I have to feed family of 2 adults, 2 children and a toddler for £60 per week, this month , including packed lunches! It is possible but will be hard, so am looking to this thread for motivation !

AdoraBell · 27/09/2014 02:33

NSD, didn't get the yoghurt and nuts.

DH has done it again, the blithering idiot. He had Bircher muesli, home made, for breakfast, potatoe asparagus and eggs cooked by me, so absolutely no wheat or contact there with, for elevensies and we just ate out. I changed his order from chicken in bread crumbs to grilled chicken and he's bloated. He had chicken for lunch. Chicken in a crispy batter coatingHmm The man is a danger to himself. I'm going to have to stop him going out alone.

And Cake is right, we need to look after our health as much as DCs because they rely on us. They need healthy parents. Which reminds me, I need to buy seeds next time I'm in the health food shop.

Cake I hope your sister can get some treatment now she has a diagnosis.

Frazzled welcome, you will get plenty of motivation here.

Passthecake30 · 27/09/2014 07:55

Thanks Adora

Swimming lesson £18.50 planned today, that might be all the spends.

But.....kids both got Star of the Week yesterday, amazing, as no collusion with the teachers (so at 1 in 900 odds!) so I might treat them as am v proud, especially as ds was crying at the thought of school just 2 weeks agp and dd has only just started.

eastmidswarwicknightnanny · 27/09/2014 07:58

There is a Facebook group called feed your family for £20/week it is stuff alot of us do already but may offer some new recipe ideas n remotivate :)

Itsfab look at your portion sizes we all serve n eat too much. For fruit make 3 children share for variety for example chop into 3 bowls 1 Apple, 1pear n a banana or a few grapes. Chop strawberries into quarters if u buy them looks like they have more :)

Plan ahead for next year now seeds hanging baskets etc all reduced in garden centre buy some strawberries n tomato seeds they grow really well in hanging baskets. If you have space a big pot will do carrots n they are easy to grow.

Itsfab · 27/09/2014 08:30

This week I have been taking a pear, apple and banana and sharing it out between three. I maybe do give them large portions but I don't know. They eat all the fruit, fruit is good, the kids are slim and always hungry Confused.

DS2 grew some carrots but we are no gardeners and didn't know what to do so they are sat in the tub tormenting us. They are small baby ones. Might try and harvest them later.

Currently have tomato bread proving and choc chip muffins cooling.

Karenthetoadslayer · 27/09/2014 08:49

I am full of good intentions for October, inspired by all of you.

My stumbling stone may be giving up my lovely hairdresser and finding a cheaper option. On the other hand I have not had a haircut for a while and my hair is ok when I wear it up, so I may get away with having less frequent haircuts. I am lucky that I don't have grey streaks yet although I should have . Apparently, our hair, the DCs and mine, grows faster than other people's? This is what my hairdresser says.