The Friendly Frugaleers, figuring out our finances with furry feline photos!

[Cagliostro]

Hello all :)

Morning girlie
I drank a couple of glasses of wine last night while getting my tan done & then stayed up talking to dh until 1.30, need to drink water now I think

No lie in here as the plasterer is arriving at 8. At least that's a sign of how well things are moving on.

Cag if you can afford to then spend the money on yourself, it does you good now and again. My birthday is November so quite close to Christmas. Dh's parents are very generous with presents so I'm starting to come up with a list so that dh knows, when asked, what to suggest. Some will be practical things but others, things that I like but usually wouldn't be able to justify.

Been up since 4 am to get dh up for morning shift, he's defn not a morning person... On the bright side have folded 2 loads of laundry and washed 4 machines...

cag agree. Spend the money on yourself if you can. The £10 grandma sent me came with strict instruction to buy myself something lovely.

Dh Made tikka masala last night. Yum. But now the whole house smells like curry. We finished dinner at 730 and I retired to bed with my wine my sore throats and my snot face. genie the snot is back!

£25 riding today. In the rain.

cag agree with the above. At least spend some of it on yourself. The last time I had bday money I spent 3/4 of it on boring house stuff but 1/4 of it on myself. I actually really enjoyed it. It felt so good to treat myself.

trying We're moving by Halloween

Today we will be cleaning and sorting. I still feel very very sick so I don't want to do a lot

£30 fuel
£67 in lidl but that included waterproofs for the dc £6 each.

Still need toilet cleaner.

Meal plan:

Toad in the hole
Roast chicken
Left over chicken with couscous and coleslaw etc
Lasagne
Shepherds pie
Macaroni cheese
Fish cakes and mash

Morning all I'm still in bed

Managed about 10 hours of sleep last night and feeling much perkier for it!

Plan today is to go into town, my list is;
Trainers for dd for school - budget £20.
Gift for my brother, have already got him one smallish gift, so budget £10.
Gift for friends little boy whose bday is tomos, budget £5.

I have a voucher for Subway so may get lunch there for about £6.

Will see how well I do!

Dd has riding later but my lovely dm has paid and we possibly may go swimming at a new pool that has opened up....

Thanks for the . That really hit the spot there.

I am currently enjoying a cup of coffee that DH made me. I have period pains and am feeling sorry for myself.

Argh someone is being rude on a selling site. I don't want to see to her now. She said she would collect something this weekend so I said 'I've sent you a pm' and in that asked her when this weekend she would like to come. No response so I posted on the OP could she let me know if she still wanted it. She said 'I said I did and I would collect at the weekend. Tomorrow ok?' Grrrr

6 hours sleep(interrupted several time by ds who eventually slept across my chest with his wet nappy in my face) here girlie your ten hours sounds like bliss!

I had yummy breakfast though a pitta filled with mashed avocado, a fried egg & some black pudding le yum
Currently at hairdresser getting my colour done.

Wreck you did well with grocery shop.

Dh ordered a fluorescent strip light from the internet last week and it arrived yesterday, folded in half and making a noise like a rainmaker when tilted. #frugalfail

Oh no genie!

Just cancelled hair salon 'up do' appt for before my friends hen do (£60) in favour of an at home hair dresser £25. Frugal win!

The "at home" part of that plan sounds lovely Wreck. It makes me think of duvets and hot chocolate.

£8 on crudités and dips for nephews party (we all bring something to these things and we always offer. Makes it much easier and cheaper for the host)

Been through YNAB and everything is square to start a new month. Need to be careful but all is ok.

£4.10 on a few bits in Sainsbury's and we're getting a takeaway tonight. Think I'm coming down with the Fruflu now and it's a horrible wet day here so staying in the warm doing cosy things like making soup and cake.

Wow! My numbers this month are really bizzare. I got ill twice this month and so spent much less on meat, and almost nothing on fixing the house or buying clothes. My month's spending is down about £600 as a consequence. Ya Gads. Clearly incapacitating me is the answer to controlling our household spending. I should just destroy my credit card and go veggie right now.

Morning everyone! I needed that coffee girlie...! Cant seem to get going today, we all have a cold so I'm dosed up on paracetamol and trying to do things in little bursts. DH has taken DS to the cinema kids club, DD is having a nap - need to get up now and sort everyone some lunch before they get back, they normally get a lunch out after the cinema but not any more! New weekly shop day is Monday, so using up freezer stuff over the weekend - have made the filling for steak pie, will sort some pastry later to finish it off. Sad parsnips which I will roast and a slightly yellowed broccoli which I will hide in cheese sauce to use up to accompany along with baby spuds - cracking down on waste. Have taken some bacon out for tomorrow and I think tomorrow will end up making a quiche with it or a pasta dish.

Have also planned to bake a cake for after tea and some flapjacks - someone give me a little push off the sofa to get this all done!

Went through the budget and its tight but doable as long as DH gets fully on board, which he has promised. Starting with an envelope system this week so on Sunday will draw out the weeks grocery and spending money and see how we get on - sink or swim! We have some savings but ideally Id like to keep those for backup, however the new budget leaves us tight for spending money so I would imagine its inevitable it'll get slowly used up. Need to start generating some extra income to avoid this, all tips appreciated!

Boobs your cat is very cute! Makes me almost want one lol (but not quite!)

Thanks for all the welcome backs guys, appreciate it :) love this thread!

Wreck I think Id have to think of the £ and grin and bear it lol. Well done on the hair plan, £60 seems v expensive for an up do in the first place :/

Collie good luck with the packing - declutter opportunity?

Anybody got much experience with ebay? Have quite a few little bits to sell but wondering how you work out the postage etc?

Toaster everything is expensive round here

Ooo! I did well in my bank accounts this month too because I got interest in my ISA. I really like that kind of month.

Toaster I've bought and sold a lot on ebay and I find it's great for buying stuff for cheap, but whenever I try to sell something I get totally stung. The only use I've ever found for actually selling stuff is if I really need to get rid of things to make space and don't care about getting the money back that I paid for them.

My best deals on ebay have been things that I got for a totally knock-down price:

Babylock overlocker for £100, 2 years old, that would have been £700 new.

Bechstein piano for £16; it was 94 years old. Looked like it had been pulled out the sea but was hands-down the coolest thing I've ever bought.

Sounds amazing genie, I bet you were delighted with those bargains! It's mostly baby stuff I have to sell which doesnt seem to do well on our local facebook sites - breast pump, gro clock - that kind of thing - might give it a go and see

Toaster I'm trying to sell baby stuff at the moment too. I have it on streetlife and a facebook local site and no one is interested at all. I priced it to sell too. A really big box of nice things for £30 (two baby gyms and whole lot of other stuff) and not a sniff. Odd isn't it?

Is anybody else appalled at the state of the savings market at the moment? I can't get an ISA worth looking at. It used to be that 6% was a very normal amount to get on a savings account.

I keep seeing riskier savings products that don't have the capital underwritten, but that just doesn't seem like a good idea.

£18 in Iceland and £39 in Aldi today. That's all my food for the week including lunches for work. In fact it will last more than a week as the freezer is now fully stocked.
Car is full of petrol and I have my train pass for work sorted too. So only other spends will probably be £10 for a takeaway tonight.
Does that seem like a lot for weekly shop? There's just me and the cat here all week and my OH will be here for most of the weekend.