We are the Marvelous Frugaleers - Mindfully Managing our Money in May.. Come join us!

[Laska42]

So here is a new thread for all the Magical May Frugaleers!

All are welcome to come and join our friendly supportive group if you'd like to take control of your finances in May and beyond..

We are working together to support each other, live within our means, pay off those debts and save for the life we want!

Good luck everyone for another month

Also if of interest 'mighty deals' had odeon tickets for sale yesterday @ £5 each

11% cashback on topcashback too do £4.50 really.

I really ought to go food shopping. Hate food shopping.

Happy 1st of May everyone

Today should be a lsd got some friends turning up later with their new baby but bought food and gift for the baby ystd. Need to get off mn and make a cake or something though

Hope your DH's mum is ok need , and sorry to hear about your family member babs , on Wednesday a lovely colleague's husband dropped dead from a heart attack while out cycling, he was mid fifties, it came as a total shock, I can't even begin to image what state she must be in .

Bank holiday here too, so should be a NSD, plenty of work prep to keep me busy though.

In soft play today with dd, which is free and remembered to bring lunch and drinks.
Bought my moms mother day gift, 60£
And transferred 1800£ to budget so now have 1300£ on normal account for this month, should be fine... Will update later on the rest. Happy bh day

I'd like to join please.

April has been a hard month for me lots of birthdays and I had to pay a big wedge to council tax as I'd stupidly been paying the wrong amount.

Ive been googleing all morning trying to find cheapest gas and electric suppliers im currently on meteters and have been wondering if direct debit is cheaper.

Welcome Tired

Are you using moneysavingexperts energy club?. It's whole of market, some of the other comparison sites aren't.

I got a cheap quote then I switched but went through topcashback using a company called simply switch so I'll get an extra £37 cashback to go towards it.

Register for both topcashback and quidco so you get the highest cashback rate.

DD is usually cheaper.

While your on a mission with the bills read this thread

Hi again all, what with my internet problems I didnt read the last few days of April and now realised I missed several of you having difficult /sad times. .. so just to say my best wishes for all of you

Babs audit need and anyone else having tough times i've missed , apologies for not being supportive at the time.

and La chatte oh, your poor friend , how terrible for someone to go so suddenly like that.. it makes you realise that we should all getthe most out of life when we can..

I am off today having finally persuaded my boss to let me work compressed hours , so I now do my whole two weeks hours in 9 days instead of 10, However my first ' free day off' i am spending sorting out house and finance stuff out!! Imeantto goout cycling and get inthe garden , but its cold an d windy heer and i seem to have only just managed to make it downstairs!
( however have been doing some much-needed 'body maintanance'!!).. n keep off the internet shopping--

should be a NSD though as long as I can keep off the internet shopping ..

Thanks guys. I think if I submitted my life at the moment to a soap script writer they would reject it for being so far fetched!

Hope may is better for everyone.

Right, I'm on an EDF mission after reading the other thread! I've dug out all my bills over the past ten years to see what's what (we've lived in 3 different houses, with different contracts, all with EDF). We currently pay €114/month (€1255 for the year), which is more than we have ever paid. I though we needed to be more careful about leaving lights on and stuff, but looking at the details, we aren't actually using up that much electricity. Turns out the takes have really gone up over the years, as has the price per unit, so that's why our bills are so high - not much we can do about that sadly.
One thing that I did notice, is that a two years ago we had some trouble with some old wiring, which DH sorted out, but it turns out when he redid it, he didn't put the water heater back on to the timer thingy, so basically our water heater has been running all the time for the past couple of years, instead of only working during the cheap rate , making a difference of about €300/year. We are going to call an electrician to come out and sort it asap on Monday (have a few other bits and pieces we need doing too, so it might end up being expensive in the short term, but needs to be done for the long term).

laska you need to make sure you don't let it all pile up for your one day a fortnight, when I had a day off per week I would have a flurry of cleaning on Thursday night just so I could enjoy Fridays!

Back from my interview, it went really well, but I guess it depends on who else walks through the door. If I get it I'd have some big decisions to make.

£40 asda delivery coming later. Also £20 after school club, the kids are having a short trial there even though I'm at home as they'll be going twice a week in the future.

Have fingers crossed for you Pass its a better job you said? What doing?

You are right about my 'day off' though ..having cleaned the house I am now cooking!! ( but creative, am making various fillings for quesadillas (and my own tortillas to wrap them in ) so having floury fun!

Ooo-er Missus!!

re: internet shopping .. I had a 20% voucher for Monsoon but luckily the thing i might have been tempted by is out of stock , but has not been quite a NSD as have bought a kindle book. ( if anyone interested The vanishing Act of Esme lLennox is down to 99p today on Amazon )

Same sort of job, local gov but 15min drive (and free parking) instead of 1h15 commute (at £19 incl parking each day). Oh to not have to get the train again....

I have been doing house work today as well, got some friends turning up in a min so that was the motivation to get cleaning!! Flat looks lovely now but not holding my breath that it will stay like it for long At least it means I won't have to do much over the wend.

Lsd, 58p on sweets for dd.

Also have made a batch of chocolate brownies, they look yummy - am pleased as my first attempt!!

When do you find out Pass? I really hope you get it.

£43 on food for us. I don't think the butchers is as cheap as lidl but it's better quality.

The butchers was £16 for a small chicken, a massive ham hock,12 big sausages, 500g mince and four slices of thick cut back bacon. Does that sound pricey to you?. I've just realised I forgot the burgers. Bollocks. Their 50p each but really nice.

£5 cat food

Non food.
40p cream cleaner
38p paracetamol
75p hand cream.
£1.99 for a huge bottle of rinse aid
£1.60 for tissues and hair remover cream.

Trying not to spend unnecessarily, or on impulse.
Switched utilities and got very good deals, so happy about that.
Will look at fixing mortgage soon too.

NSD to start the month! I had to spend £6.40 on a taxi home from work yesterday though but that's the only money I've spent this week.

I forgot.

£4 on 2 pairs of thermal leggings for winter from Tesco. 30p cash-back. Woo hoo.
£8.20 Doublebase gel.

Probably going to buy white paint tomorrow, b&q have it on offer from Saturday and Dh will have to go past anyway.

Thanks for the good wishes re MIL. I suspect we are on a rocky road. As does DH, but we can hope.

Sounds decent to me fluffster. I spent £28 at our farm shop on Monday. I got 3 chickens. 4 x 500g (approx) mince. 2lbs thick bacon. 2 lots of liver. 2lb sausages, if that helps. I wanted a pork joint, which are huge and usually £6, but they didn't have any.

£22 on some stirrup leathers for DD.

DH has taken an extra £10, but that's to get his hair cut.

pass The difference in time and cost of commute makes the job very tempting in my view!

Pass that sounds like a way better situation to be in for work, fingers crossed!

I have spent the day elbow deep in "paprasse" (paperwork). I had started to sort things out during the February holidays, but eventually gave up as there was just so much crap to sort through (we have been living in our current house for almost six years, and hadn't been filing anything , just putting all the papers in boxes "to sort").

I had bought some filing boxes for older documents which we probably won't need ever again, but are supposed to keep for 10 or 15 years or something. We already owned a decent filing cabinet, with plenty of hanging files in to store more recent/important documents in, just all empty! So no excuses really.

I went through all our insurance papers as it thought we were paying a hell of a lot once you add it all up - €1700 per year. Having checked everything, there's not much I can reduce. I could stop our life insurance, but I don't think I want to tempt fate . We have two cars which are insured with maximum coverage, once of which we almost never use, I'm sure there is money to be saved there.

I also realised our water bill was twice what I thought : €450/year, although that does include waste water removal (not sure what the term is in English), so maybe it's not that excessive.

I have also found old bank statements that make me want to cry, looking at how stupidly I wasted money. I even found a €20 voucher for the local supermarket, no strings attached, which was valid until December 2012; I may as well have burt a €20 note, gah.

£5.04 in Tesco and £2.80 posting an eBay parcel.

Best of luck, Pass.

Happy frugal bank holiday weekend, all .

lachatte I'm sure we have similar stories. ...I used to cook a chicken, we'd eat the breast, bin the rest. ...

I'd buy fancy chopped tomatoes, organic/finest everything. ...dp used a new razor blade every 2 shaves....I could be rich right now!

I hear re. The job next week, I would be slightly less pay (no London weighting) but would help the work/life balance no end! I'd feel rotten handing in my notice of my current job so soon though.

Nsd! That sound about right fluffy. Quite good prices!

Happy bank holiday. Will need to get dad's passport photo sorted.

Dd's!! And of course the weekly shop. And some clothes for dh.

Hi All...
Babs & Audit sorry April hasn't been good.
Pass I have my fingers crossed for you.
Adora just use a random postcode off the internet. Save a phone call if you haven't already made it

We have moved office and I am not happy. The toilet smells like a swamp and we aren't allowed a kettle or a toaster. I am going to have to rethink my lunches.

At least it is a bank holiday....