No-Spend November - sign up for a frugal month ahead!

[PeoniesforMissAnnersley]

Everyone welcome, if you've been lurking then de-lurk and come and join in!

NSD - No spend day
LSD - low spend day

We are a friendly and supportive bunch, recording our spends, frugal wins and frugal fails daily/when we can. Lots of good tips on discount vouchers, household cleaning and maintenance, cheap meals and more!

Signing in - I'm a long-time lurker on these threads and it's really time I got a grip. I've spent far too much this autumn (really bad - TV and DVD player both died, and had to buy school uniform for DD starting reception which meant £42 just for shoes plus I've just ordered a couple of cases of wine ). I haven't even begun to think about Christmas, partly because I don't know who's going to be here.

Have some savings, but not enough: we really want to do major work to the house in a few years and the less we have to borrow to do it, the better, so I'm trying to focus on saving more and spending (a lot) less. My downfall is online shopping: I think "we need X" at 7 p.m. on a Sunday, and I can instantly buy X, whereas in years gone by we might have managed quite happily without it for a few months till I got to a shop.

Spent the evening bulk cooking. Huge batch of tomato/veg sauce and enough lamb for 2 small cottage pies (was tempted to combine into one but hey my wallet AND my waistline could use smaller portions!)

Was going to do a bolognese too but haven't got enough Tupperware in the right size and no heatproof freezer bags.

Fuzz pig I just leave to cool n freeze in normal value freezer bags I just tie up the first one then pop in another and tie that too never had a problem.

Just sent off my weekly Tesco food order for Tuesday. £49.95 so just under my £50 limit. It doesn't look like I got a lot but it includes nappies for 2 DC, wipes, toilet roll and kitchen towels plus a stock up on baking ingredients. I think our meals next week will be interesting and I'll be using up some stuff from the store cupboard. Other than a couple of bags of frozen Waitrose herbs, I'm not going to top up that shop. We'll just have to make do.

Really east I have tesco value freezer bags so I'll do that. TBH the big vat of sauce has cooled now anyway so can do that.

Hello all,

Getting some good ideas here. Forgot it is my son's birthday party very soon. Hired a space, some entertainment. All in all it is going to be 300 pounds. Totally forgot. That's our saving gone this month unfortunately. Never mind. Will still be careful and try to save even more next month. All xmas gifts have been purchased and we have vouchers from various supermarkets from the last year so food is covered.

6 bags of sauce in the freezer, thanks for the tip

cool yes its my great grandma who is 98 years old and still going strong (ish) nothing wrong with her mind.
Visited her with my grand mother and my daughter. So wonderful that she has the opportunity to also be a great great grandma and the little one loves making her laugh...
She has 5 great grandchildren and 6 great great grandchildrens...

Please count me in. Both dp and I have changed our jobs and are clearong debts we had fallen behind on over the last year. We need to cut back on spending dramatically so we can be more comfortable in 2015.

We visited a friend this morning, took dd to her swimming lesson and then I had work to catch up on before school starts again tomorrow, so it was a busy and enjoyable nsd. A good start - I need to keep it up!

No worries fuzz pig I bag mine when I am short on space as takes up less room than boxes. Although can be a fun game of guess the bag if have other concoctions in the freezer unlabelled :)

Have so many birthdays in November so have been buying for those today online. Luckily the shop I bought at had discount so saved quite a bit. Spent 55£ in total.
Then toys r us had 25% Sunday on all toys so got a brio walker and some other bits for in total 75£. That covers some presseies for DD for Christmas and 2 birthday pressiea for friends children.

Reminds me to check what's in the freezer

Welcome new folk.

All my spends are budgeted for today, some small Xmas pressies.

Just £2.20 in a bottle of ale for beef in ale for slow cooker and a fiver in a card for a friends ds that I must confess I forgot about

Hello all newbies to the thread

So today spent £25 on a new rucksack for dd, a bit impulse buy but she hasn't got one that is big enough and it is nice quality so am hoping will last her a few years.

Other than that £1 on 4 pints of milk.

My dad gave me some bday money which was nice - will get myself some new clothes as it is getting embarrassing with the clothes I currently have, most of them falling to bits, faded or stretched beyond recognition

Singme £300 on a bday party blimey that is dear. How old is he going to be? Are you in London? I am in the south west and to hire a church hall and entertainer would cost about £60! Sorry that is probably not making you feel much better

yay was my first NSD in a very long time. Off to bed now before I am tempted to order anything online! Back to work tomorrow so shouldn't need to spend anything.

Oops, yesterday I posted in October by mistake.

Yesterday £216 in Tesco, but that included £30 on wine and £25 ons birthday present for DH's friend. To be fair, I hadn't shopped for 2 weeks other than some bread. £5 church collection.

Today £14.10 for a taxi home from MIL's party. Had tried to book a taxi there, but none available so I drove, taxi home and will get taxi to car tomorrow morning. DH and his brothers paid for lunch.

NSD.

Hope you feel better very soon MissA and the Dr/hospital get this resolved quickly.

Our savings have taken a hit this year. DH is currently owed large amounts but still nothing coming through. Haven't done anything about Christmas yet. We don't buy gifts for adults either.

DH has booked a trip to UK, on the credit card, he hasn't seen his parents for 3 years, and DDs haven't seen them for 4. Could be 5 actually I don't remember our last trip. I could happily stay home all summer but he and the DDs struggle with the heat, so this trip kills two birds with one stone I suppose.

LSD just the toilet seat.

I'm really pissed off. Just got my bill from southern electric and it says they're refunding the £366 that we're in credit and reducing our dd by £50 a month. Bearing in mind we are all electric and that's our summer bill ie no heating on it's absolutely ridiculous. Just hope I can stop the refund because I will spend it otherwise. Bloody idiots. Something else I'll have to sort out

Also, does anyone (fluffy?) know why I got a £12 govt refund on my electricity acct?

It's the Eco refund, the govt reduced the green levy & said everyone would get on average £50 off their bills. Sse lowered my bills but because my usage is low I saved £4 or so.

The £12 is for everyone, I've just had it from flow but some suppliers like british gas haven't done it.

Basically, they took that reduction & threw us £12. Woo-hoo.

Adora, I hope he gets paid soon. I know the feeling of waiting for the money to come through.

Thanks fluffy. I'm not going to stop the refund I'm going to use it to pay off some of my credit card but I will definitely be putting the dd back up.

Need to pop to town today as need petrol, a piece of coloured paper and calpol (own brand).

Going to have a NSD today I think.

Then later, it's YNAB today - I have some chilli nuts as a snack bribe while we sort it out.

Have SO many birthdays etc this month. If anyone has tips for frugal but nice presents I'd be all ears - one for a 39 y/o who is single without kids, one for a 30 y/o with no children but two puppies, my DF, and an elderly male relative.

Sorted one present by asking my DMiL to knit a jumper for one relative, she is happy to do it so I'm just paying for the wool and pattern.

I. Am. Drenched. Change of clothes for me and dd!

+£10 after selling something
£30 petrol
£3.30 tesco
35p on paper
£7.98 lightbulbs.

No word from the radiologist or new consultant yet, have been by phone all morning I have no numbers to even call, but if I don't hear from them by 4 I'm going to call the consultant I saw on Friday to see if he can give me an update.