Marvellous Money Saving March.

[CremeEggThief]

Hi All,
Thought I'd start a new thread for all regulars and anyone else who is interested in saving money in March .

Er... Compostable...

need Ta muchly.

£6 tesco on cake, bin liners, tonic, pasta sauce & marked down ox tongue.

£5 custom made mirror. Would've been more but the vase dh bought doesn't go.

Dh sold something on eBay, of course now it's not working. Fabby.

Had brinner for dinner, was good as I was starving when got in from work and can throw brinner together in about 10 mins

Lsd 75p on paracetamol and ibruphen as had run out and like to have some in just in case.

£1.20 parking that will claim back

£7 on more meds for my girl cat, we have a diagnosis now! She has something called eosinophilic granuloma complex, I think it basically is an auto immune type condition where her body over reacts to an allergen. I'm relieved its not cancer but sad that this is something she is always going to have and will prob need lifelong steroids. The insurance company should cover the med spends though.

Afternoon all, hope you're all well

Bank: £257.92 (was £257.92)
Purse: £0.00 (was £0.00)
Jar: £19.70 (was £22.25)
Grand Total: £277.62
Reduced by £2.55
Days to payday: 9

Spends:

£2.55 – from the coin jar

Woo – it's practically a non spend day for me today although I have spent about £30 on Amazon on an external phone charger and some Kalms but that'll come out of the budget when it debits the account, and I have a bit of grocery shopping to get tonight as DS2 needs some ingredients for his food tech class.

Also got my phone bill and when my Irish cousin was over here, I sent him 12 text messages and they have charged me 25p per texts! I'm glad I didn't send him more than that. It never occurred to me they wouldn't be included in the inclusive texts.

Budget looks like this: 277.62
Petrol: £141 budget / £109 spent / £32 remaining
Groceries: £300 budget / £224.13 spent / £75.87 remaining
Interest: £12.40
Kids activities & bus fare: £22.40
My bus fares: £14.50
Leaves for everything else....£120.45

comfortable bin bags.... glad to see that you like to disposie of stuff tenderly and respectfully TeWI

I had ANOTHER NSD!! whoooooooo!

And for Me (home alone duringthe week) Its .. yes.....wait for it.... its ....... even more of the frugal veggie curry, brown rice and dhal.. ( and theres still some left for tomorrow!! )

Good job I love curry and dont mind eating the same every night .. !

Don't think I've updated since Sunday...

Monday was NSD. Hooray!

Tuesday - NSD! Double Hooray!

Today - LSD - stopped at shop on my walk home, and bought ham, and (frozen pastry) so I can make a quiche lorraine for lunches.

have walked to work twice this week so far. saving £12. and took some stuff back to the cookshop and got a refund so £30 richer! yay.

I do, I do.

Giving myself points for remembering to put the bins out this week!

I can't eat the same thing all the time. It's irrational but I can't do it. DH is perfectly happy though - this is why he gets to eat all the leftovers for his lunches

What the hell are comfortable bin bags?!!! Are you taking frugaleering to new limits and wearing them te

Chorizo, mushroom and spring green risotto went well, there's enough left for lunch tomorrow. Carrot and coriander soup made and doing the pea and ham. It's easier to do this when DH is away as he would tell me to stop and sit down!!!!

Hi! Sorry, been quite busy at work and in negotiations. NSD yesterday and today. Last night was home late as had a work dinner where I was hosting a table for work. It was very strange having to sell my current place where I have in my head that I'm not going to be around.

I've not quite made up my mind 100% and the new boss has invited me to meet the staff next week. It's all looking quite positive... Even though the thought of paying more tax is mad, plus commuting. Other things have since happened at my work place and my old boss from 12 years back or so, has been in touch and has given me some good advice, and importantly support. All round good.

Have just made the mn 3 minute pudding. Second time I'm doing it. Kids love it!!

It was an autocorrect! compostable liners for our food recycling bins.
they are not very frugal really but foxes got in that bin last night and the bags contain some of the mess at least!

A fairly Spendy day today, around £40 all told but mostly in Pound Shop and on monthly supplies, got paid from some jobs and have some in pipeline so tomorrow could be very busy.

Frugal wins today 4 Pizza Express pizzas for £2.24 in Tesco along with 3 bottles of marked down wine for £8.95, 55p for some fresh tomato and mascarpone sauce, 31p for a tub of hummus.

Did new Facebook page for business and downloaded a website template for portfolio to rejig.

DS is going as a pirate to world book day so we already have costume at least so no money spent there. School trip on Friday so will probably have at least some small spends.

Love breadandwines recipes, still not got round to bread making but hope to soon. Got to do a painting at weekend for my sister so not yet. Will do some baking near Easter as will need to make Folar and Paola de Lo.

Lunch £3 meal deal (I managed to leave my sandwiches at home for the second day in a row), £10 for material for DD2's dancing costume, plus I gave £5 to my friend's mum who us altering the things/making a cape for her. I also asked her advice on taking up a costume for DD1, and she told me to pin it and she sewed it on the machine for me.

I also helped to make one of the hats tonight (we need to make 3 the same) and it seems I'm quite good at it. This means I can trade by making the hats and get people to do some of the sewing for me in return.

Have said that I will sew the other two together tomorrow while we sit at dancing.

DD2 managed to lose one of her shoes at the friend's house! We had to borrow a pair to come home. Hopefully it turns up tomorrow.

I managed to leave my sandwiches at home for the second day in a row

AuditAngel, one of the unexpected benefits resulting from Intermittent Fasting (the 5:2 'diet') is that your body gradually adjusts to doing without meals.

I used to be an impatient bugger before IF. If meals weren't on time, I could get quite ratty.

Now, however, I can be almost zen-like when it comes to food. Yesterday I had 4 teaching sessions back to back - from 10.30 in the morning 'til 8.00 in the evening. It was far easier for me not to eat all day than to faff around with meals. I very rarely have breakfast these days, anyway - so it was just a question of staying in the zone.

This is a bit of a long-winded way of saying that, once you've been doing 5:2 for a bit, you can save that £3 on a bought lunch!

Meant to say thanks, sporting!

The sooner you start making your own bread, the sooner you'll start saving money!

200g s/raising flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
125g water

Mix into a dough, shape into a round, cut a cross in the top and bake for 15-20 minutes.

Cost - 6p for the ingredients.

You're never without bread if you have a bag of s/raising flour in the cupboard!

Yesterday was technically a NSD but I owe my mum 8 quid for the window cleaner. She had a bit of a rubbish day as DD was sick all over her! Made River Cottage carrot hummus for our sandwiches for the rest of the week. Should be another NSD today but I have lost my voice so might get some Strepsils or something.

I need to get motivated about the bread thing don't I. Think I'll have a crack at it on Saturday as today is going to be stupidly busy again. Have you got a good recipe for hot cross buns bread? My mum used to do her own and they were much nicer than the shop bought ones.

Today should be mostly NSD or LSD except for a small Internet spend on clothes possibly. Other than that trying to not spend anything by not going near shops!

Going to walk into town to save money today on bus fare, plus it will get me motivated to get fit. I have tried the 5:2 but didn't stick to it due to stressful work situation so I might re-read the book and try to get back onto it and finding time to exercise, should be a lot easier now it's summer.

Well not summer yet! But it's getting better and I am starting to feel more optimistic...

bread no way on earth could I go without food for that long??! I start gutting flakey/wobbly and if I am hungry too long I get a shocker of a headache.

Off out with a friend today, train, cinema, lunch....will be spendy and I don't care

Will get on the straight and narrow soon!

Just posting the last 3 days!

2/3
£140 DH quarterly bus pass
£3.65 bus
£1.65 Bus home
£11.50 Guinness book of records (DD birthday present)
£3 dinner at work
£9.57 Macdonalds for DH and DCs
£2.69 Boots for DSD

3/3
£2.74 Me coop
£6.19 DH coop

4/3
£55 CM
£3.84 Breakfast
£3.50 Bus
£3.50 Primark dress for WBD - DD loves it so should get plenty of use after, although I had to put safety pins in the front so it won't last long without getting holey!
50p sweets! Pez were on sale...
£9.57 DH picked up some gluten free stuff and snacks for our train ride.

Off on our trip this afternoon so will be a spendy couple of days.

Thank you for link Fluffy, but I don't think we would be candidates for grant. It's sorted anyway, we would have saved for a couple of months but my parents urged us to sort it and they would pay. As they stay with us quite often, this will benefit them so I accepted. Am so looking forward to a lovely bath instead of shower!

Should be Nsd going to my mums as the doors and downstairs windows are being done today. It's so nice to wake up in the morning and have no condensation on the windows let alone puddles!

What kind of windows did you have before?.

They were double glazed but only about 1cm between the panes and wooden frames. Also our windows are really big we have to get curtains 90" width. Hoping this will stop it being so cold in the winter/hot in the summer.

I just need to stop eating out....

Spendy few days

2/3
£3 on breakfast before interview
£3 on lemsip before interview
£15 on celebration takeaway after interview
£40 fuel

3/3
£5.50 on breakfast and lunch at work
£18 on meal out with friends

4/3
£10 McDonalds for me and DP after hospital appt
£2.50 on more decongestant sweets

Am meeting a friend today for breakfast so more spendy but rest of day should be LS. I'm not doing to well at this but at least I can see where it's all going and make changes.