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 .

€8 to ds2 for school sports trip. Left overs for dinner!

Thanks for free ebook link fluffy

Thanks for the recipe, Laska. Sounds delicious.

Yesterday NSD. Today, already spent £30.39 on a proper clothes rail for the kids costumes. It was on special offer for £19.99, but their minimum order is £20 before vat. I found something for 40p to rake me over the limit , then VAT and delivery. Expensive, but this is a commercial rail so should be able to take the weight of 28 costumes for the current show.

Need to send £2 to school for storyteller and pay for school photos.

Soops, forgot £5 for an organiser to hang on the costume rail to keep their shoes in one place, and maybe dome of their accessories

Ooh thank you for the recipe, I love a good curry. Might make it tonight to eat tomorrow.

£2 on drinks yesterday. And £36 for cleaner today.

I'm finding that even though I try and not spend money, and think that I have money saved up, somehow it disappears. I know you guys literally take out money into pots, is that a faff or actually something that works?! I put everything on credit card but pay them off every month, so I keep a mental tally sort of thing in my head and I really am pretty good at not spending. So I don't buy magazines, or even treats most of the time.

Today bill came for afterschool club, so another £153 or so. I still have to pay pre school which is another £80. So easily another £200+ out the window....! Getting frustrated.

NSD yesterday except for £20 regular bill to cleaner. I bought a coat online on Sat and it came yesterday, far too big (all over, it's sort of cut big if you see what I mean!) so it's going back to store in town today on my way to Alex tech lesson. I'm actually relieved as it was expensive.

I have planned to go for a run today with a girl from work at 6pm, it's time I took control of my weight again, I have gained over a stone since my surgery in November (I needed to gain about 7-8 pounds as I had lost a lot of weight but I now weight more than I did before surgery and clothes are feeling very uncomfortable, I had to come home and change as a skirt suit I used to wear easily all day was cutting off circulation

Oh and I had to advance work £139.80 for dinners for 20 pupils whom I had taken on a day trip, now I have to wait for my Line Manager to approve the form and it to be processed before I get the money back, so annoying

NK My pots are notional iyswim? I write down our disposable income figure at the start of the month, then divide that up. I sometimes have to swap about a touch, but it does generally keep a handle on things. I know what you mean about it flying out of the window though, we get a few days where I am forever paying out for things, writing cheques etc and I feel a bit anxious afterwards.

Today will be £20 for the cleaner (easily the best £20 I spend all week), then around £60 for the pony being shod. Also need an energiser for electric fencing and an egg counting kits, available on line. So again, a spendy day.

Also, DS went on an Explorer hike last night, which ended up at a chippy. So, even though he had had a full meal 2 hours before, he had fish, chips and scraps, costing me about £6. Then got home and had 4 Weetabix. Beware the teenage male years. The school trousers I bought only 3 months ago are already flapping round his ankles.

Chicken curry for tea tonight. Yum.

Dh has car trouble & is flat broke so I may have to use the savings I'd planned to pay off credit card to bail him out. At least it's not more debt.

His interview went well but there's a lot in for it & it'll be a few weeks before he'll hear.

Yesterday

9/3
£5.85 bus fares
£4 drink/cookie for DCs (softie DH!)

(Didn't get to Amazon in the end)

I now weigh more than I did before

Anyone who wants to lose weight - and save money at the same time - should head over to the 5:2 diet thread. It's every bit as supportive and helpful as this thread is.

Sadly, the truth is that losing weight is 80% diet and only 20% or so exercise. Even so, there is a wonderful exercise thread associated with the 5:2 threads. It has helped me from not being able to do a single press up 15 months ago to now doing 4 x 20 press ups with an 8kg weight on my back!

needa that made me smile, I have 2 brothers and remember my mum despairing at how much they could eat!! They could literally eat a full dinner and then half an hour later be mooching about for cheese on toast

So have just picked up the bike for dd, it looks massive compared to her old one! Hoping it will be o.kay cost £45, was a real squeeze getting it in the car so not sure how am going to fit in everything for our holiday at Easter

Had a look at bike racks, they are about £50 but feel a bit apprehensive about fitting it and getting the actual bike onto it - for things like this men are quite useful plus the bike has duel suspension so not even sure it would go on a bike rack as not a typical frame oh well will have a think.

Just had a lovely brunch of squished avocado and fried egg on toast, was very nice. Am liking this lady of leisure malarky going to go for a swim in a bit

NK5BM3 do you have a direct debit set up to put some money automatically into a savings account each month?

I do this as I know if the money stays in my account I will spend it!!

Things like childcare come under the same umbrella of unavoidable costs associated with having children

Eeek need that's scary the amount he ate....! Better start saving lol

Just sorted phone, contract ended this month and as I don't need a new phone I got a sim only for the same amount of minutes /data £8 instead of the £20 I was paying

Just had hair done, full colour, highlights, cut and blow dry £55. I look at least 8 years younger now the grey has gone! If only the roots didn't regro.....

Might pop to tescos soon and see if I can use the vouchers they keep sending me... £6 off a £40 shop amongst others more specific.

Hi everyone
Yes I do have a direct debit that takes money into savings but frankly, I do transfer them around too! The only account I try not to touch are my children's.

And again, posting on here helps as obviously things like buying things on discount and shopping at Aldi helps. Shopping once a week also helps. It is such a nightmare though, I supposedly earn a good income and yet I can't seem to have a good amount of savings.

We used to have lots of money in the isas and all that, but dh's redundancy threw us into a mess and although I never got into debt, and we did cut down on costs, guess we never really went down to extreme frugality.

Can do better.

Argh, have just realised that DD needs to take a donation of cat food to brownies tonight. Can only get to coop :( going to be expensive isn't it!

A donation of cat food??

The co-op shouldn't be too bad, tins are normally cheapest or bags of biscuits - although the cheap ones have very little meat in them!!

I am feeling all saintly as I cycled to the swimming pool, swam 20 lengths cycled home and I am going to walk to pick dd up from school

No other spends today, chicken casserole for tea tonight that I made yesterday, unfortunately dd won't eat it so she is getting sausages and a mini roast dinner. I always said I wouldn't be one of those mums who cooks two different dinners

Yep it's for the Animal Care badge or something? They have somebody from CPL coming in, so I'm sure DD will be desperate for a cat when she gets home.

Between uniform and other little bits that seem to be needed every other week, I'm not sure Brownies is so cheap after all! TBH I'm quite glad she joined too late to get a place on the next PGL trip.

Instead of buying a big pack you might be able to get just 1 pouch/tin.

Spent £1.16 on sweets. Clearly it's that kind of week

I don't have physical pots, but I have a spreadsheet and at the end of the day I use the receipts to see how much I have spent so far (autosum is awesome) and how much I have left in that pot.

Thanks for advice though I'll hopefully grab a bargain :)

And today's biggest achievement... I've caught up with the thread! :o

nk we have a good household income but I honestly couldn't tell you the last time we put money into savings. We 'could do better' but I want the dc to have swimming lessons, I prefer contact lenses to glasses etc. I think most of us could cut back a little more if we had to but you should be enjoying life too. As for 'pots' I'm about to try the good budget app recommended on another thread, I'll let you know how it goes.

£2 playgroup.

Nsd 3 in a row!!

Dinner is homemade bean burgers in buns with salad chips and coleslaw. Going to attempt my own caramelised onions!

Bank: £117.95 (was £121.44)
Purse: £0.00 (was £0.00)
Jar: £17.45 (was £19.75)
Grand Total: £135.40
Reduced by £5.79
Days to payday: 3

Spends:

£3.49 – Kindle books
£2.30 – bus fare