July Frugal thread, Just chatting and saving.

[Fluffycloudland77]

Everyone welcome.

Have just read back through the last couple of days. audit at your monthly fuel dd. I would do the led switch as soon as you can. It will pay for itself in no time. We have 15 lights in the kitchen and the usage rocketed as soon as we switched on. I got to the stage where I was completely paranoid about having them on.

The spin dryer (I've got the same one as fluffy I think) is quite addictive, watching all the extra liquid being whizzed out. It means that for most of the year we can line dry clothes. I'm not using it through the summer as stuff dries pretty quickly anyway.

Welcome to all newbies, this thread is full of support and encouragement.

Welcome back to the UK adora.

I've sold 3 games on eBay for£15 in total. We had a bbq party at the weekend and have a few bits unused (wine etc) so I plan to take them back to Sainsburys and get the money back. We have 3 weeks now until we go on holiday so our plan is to meal plan to within an inch of our lives, using up as much stuff from cupboards and freezer and only buying what extras we need.

The worst news for us over the past few days is that my car needs a new clutch but we've decided to scrap it and replace (having spent £££££ on it over the last couple of years. Am trying to be thankful for having been frugal, have no contingency savings to pay for the replacement car but thinking how much worse things would be if we hadn't been frugal

Morning everyone dd has been shipped off to school much to her disgust did frugal end of year gifts for her teacher and TA (a nice mug, chocolate and dd made them some cupcakes last night - hopefully they will like them!)

Frugal fail was not realising that school was open today so forking out for an extra day of holiday club that I could of avoided!! Oh well.

Paid the cm today but thats budgeted and hopefully no other spends.

Fuzz not sure re Personal Trainer, will probably depend to a certain extent on which area of the country you are in! If near London you could charge silly money I would have thought otherwise I am guessing £40 an hour ish - thats a guess though!!

Morning

I'm aiming for a super low spend this week... I'm setting myself a challenge not to spend more than £10 on food shopping until this time next week. I went through our kitchen last night to make an inventory and we have so much stuff. Hopefully I can easily plan a week's meals from that lot!

Just need to get some yoghurt that I forgot, probably some bread towards end of week, and need to get some Calpol in case we need it after DD's first injections tomorrow. I'm so nervous for her!

Finally home after my beautiful, relaxing hol in Kos. DH has even turned back into a human being again but just a work driven robot .

Yes, how sad have I been posting while sunbathing but just shows how much I love this thread! It also helps to confirm there may be room for a few treats in life if I'm sensible in other areas.

Ah well back to reality....

Thanks girlie we are in West Sussex so not as expensive as London but still near enough for things to be a bit pricey (especially since we are near Gatwick). I had £35ph in my head for no reason whatsoever, so what you say makes sense! I was thinking maybe £20-25 for DH to start with. But it does depend on what kind of help the person wants, if he has to prepare stuff between sessions etc.

That'd still be far more than his hourly wage anyway. He did apply for a few gyms when he first qualified but didn't get anywhere possibly due to his age (hopefully not but you never know... He is late 40s so a lot older than the others applying!) and probably because he'd only recently recovered from a major back injury. He also found out the pay for fitness instructors was a lot worse than he'd been told - lots of zero hour contracts, having to pay upfront to run classes etc

Collie that's great!

Yay Collie! Fab news :) yes it's annoying it gets taxed isn't it. We had the same with DH's end of year. I just hold onto the fact that it's better than nowt :)

Thats great news Collie even with tax that will still be a lovely sum

Maybe your dh could offer a first free consultation or something and then between £30-£40 a session Fuzz?

I am having a house work and sort out filing day but keep getting distracted by mn

Not sure where the sun has gone wanted to wash the sofa cushions today but not going to be hanging anything out at this rate!

That's great Collie

You could always look on here to work out how much of the bonus will be taxed if you really want to be prepared - just add it on to his normal monthly gross wage: m.thesalarycalculator.co.uk

That's what I usually do at bonus time so I don't get carried away assuming I'll be bringing home the full amount!

Still a nice amount Collie will you spend or save?!

Am wondering if it would be a frugal save if I used less washing powder and put it straight in the drum?

Similar to the suggestion about only using half a DW tablet?

Argh I've got two weeks off in August. DH's boss is going on holiday for a week at the end of August (which I haven't got off and was planning on doing overtime) and his boss wants him to have that week off. Dh's annoyed with me because I've said no he needs to take a week off when I've got time off too

I don't use anywhere near the amount of washing powder they recommend and my clothes are clean

Umm I just kind of put it in a couple of heaped tablespoons maybe? I might use a bit more for bedding/towels

You definitely don't need as much washing powder as it says on the box. I always use less (partly because I use cloth nappies and you don't need as much for them anyway). I read something about it - think it was here: www.athriftymrs.com/2014/01/youre-using-too-much-washing-powder.html

I want to switch to using washing powder instead of liquid as I'm sure it works out cheaper but DH doesn't like the smell of the non-bio powder I got for DD's clothes and nappies I've compensated a little by switching to supermarket own brand liquid though (unless branded is on super cheap offer).