Frugal Friends, planning, saving and considerate spending through July and August

[Wolfcubisthefemalenominal]

New Fred frugal friends

Well done Wolf. Hope you enjoyed your ice cream.

Welcome Pep

Nsd. Hooray!

That's good then wolf. Would have made an intolerable situation worse. Well deserved Ice cream imo

Nsd today

Welcome pep

Welcome Pep
Well done wolf another step taken, crap service though, hope you enjoyed the ice cream.
Em lovely idea to have breakfast ready for mil when she arrives. It must be frustrating, when you've travelled all that way, to have to wait overnight for the last, shortest connecting flight.
Dreadful journey back in the rain last night, but we made it! Sea hope you got on okay.
Good day with family yesterday. Went for a pub lunch which pil paid for. The only spends were pasties for the journey!
Today ds is playing cricket, dd is scoring, then babysitting. I'll be doing cricket teas & then going out for a friend's 50th

Thanks all for the welcome. Was a LSD yesterday -£8 for soft play for the dcs and £5 at the local bakery for Friday treats.
Am off for a long drive today to collect relatives who are staying for a few days so will fill up the car with petrol before I go.
Hope you all have a good weekend.

Morning everyone and welcome to pep
Had two NSDs in a row 🎉 Don’t think I’ll manage a third as I need to do my online shop. Going to try and stick to under £50 as I have already spent £25 in Lidl this week. Dh has been following some crazy diet and using up all the chicken breasts and eggs 🙄 I feel like I want to really complain about this but am trying not to. Once I get my meal planning up and running again I won’t be so tolerant.

I’ve been chipping away at tidying our bedroom and trying to chuck as much stuff as possible. I think I definitely have hoarding tendencies as I find it almost impossible to get rid of things that I think I might need at some point. So for example I’ve got about five unidentified electrical leads in my drawer that I will keep in case I suddenly realise what they are for and need them, even though the chances of me remembering that I’ve got them or being able to find them are very, very slim. I need to be much more ruthless as it makes me so much happier when I can put stuff away without having to ram it into drawers.

Lovely dog happier. I would love one but I’ve got three cats that already cost me a fortune and I’m not sure how they would all get on.

Morning all. Busy day for you North! Em great idea to get breakfast on the go for mil

Ds dropped off for contact along with a reasonable quantity of h’s crap. He keeps asking for his hobby stuff, this time I told him I couldn’t get to it without taking some other things first so a big bag of clothes and shoes have gone.
Having a cuppa and a toasted tea cake before I hang the washing out and do some cleaning so I can watch the rugby in peace later

Baby steps wolf. More stuff done and gone.

£10.60 Aldi, £8 Iceland, £3 Poundland but £2 for Scouts, £1.50 Morrisons, £11 footy and awards tickets, £25 pony.
Think that's it for today.
I need some work trousers. Saw some nice Morrisons one bit they don't have a change room so left them as it's not a regular shop for us

For me the hop from Gatwick to here is always the worst part of any holiday. Especially when we’ve travelled back from nz.

It’s like you’re almost there. So close. But still have to keep going.

Every time I’ve done the trip we’ve just carried straight on home. The next time we’ll stay overnight. Added cost but with two kids I can’t be dealing with the stress of landing at Heathrow from Auckland then having to get to Gatwick and get on another plane. Doing the schlep to Gatwick to check jnto a hotel is bad enough.

£7-ish in Tesco. Dishwasher tabs and a couple of bits for the food bank box. DH paid for top up shop in Sainsbo’s, so I put some biscuits in their food bank box too. He also paid for school shoes, £36.

Hey everyone!

I've been so bad with spending over the last few days, mostly essential stuff but still spent on random impulse buys.

I've finished the new school year buys today with a trip to Clark's which was quick easy and expensive but successful- this very rarely happens so win! For us there. I've also spent £58 in m&s on tights, underwear and a pair of sunglasses for me!

Weekly shop budget is £125, and today I've spent £10 in the butchers, £48 in Asda including £15 on dog food, £17 in Iceland and £24 at the market.

Also spent £11 in primark on socks for me and dd's, and £7 in Poundland on back to school stationery.

Just have to collect two blazers and everything is done ✅ and we are fully prepared. DS is starting college in September but we don't need to order his uniforms until 4th September.

The house could do with a good once over but I'm not ping it today, I need to just stop and do nothing. I usually do a huge overhaul upstairs on a Sunday along with any ironing that needs to be done.

Both dd's are going away on Monday, so I need to sort their cases out and make sure they pack everything they need, dd2 in particular is a nightmare, she will pack 4 swimming costumes and a load of accessories but no coat or underwear

Hi all.
Welcome Pep.

We got home from Devon early evening, but very wet! So had to wash everything as I'm now travelling to Edinburgh to see DD1, and didn't want to come home to smelly moldy clothes.

Devon was beautiful and everyone got on really well, considering there was 9 of us in a caravan.
If I was still with my ex, there would have been at least 2 big rows, over something small!
What a difference it makes being with people, well that will just go with the flow and want to make it enjoyable for all.
I think I was expecting a row, but I guess that is just from past experiences!

Anyway spent way too much money, but it was worth it!

Hope you all have a great weekend.

Glad you’ve had a great time Curvy, enjoy your time with dd

Sausage casserole in the slow cooker and polenta in the IP for tea, the polenta will either be brilliant or a burned disaster. I am following a recipe but I confess to being skeptical

Phew, home from Wales! 7 hours, including an hour’s stop in a service station to feed the kids (picnic again). Over the whole fortnight we had one fish and chip takeaway and a few ice creams but that was it, not even a cafe lunch. Still spent a fortune in supermarkets but we had a great time. I will seriously miss our lovely sea views but it’s good to be home. It’s goubg to gr a takeaway tonight though, Ocado is coming 9-10pm and we are tired and hungry!

So glad your trip was great Curvy.

It’s going to be a big credit card bill this month (holiday spends, uniform, house insurance, my craft spends at recent yarn festival ) but we will pay it off in full as usual. I must really slow down the spending though as I’ve got to protect our savings for the house renovation works. And the fact that I am only on an 18-month contract.

Back to work and back to the diet on Monday. A clean slate and some proper focus is required.

And welcome Peppi (my DD loves that show!)

Long day today. Mil arrived with presents for everyone. She is so so good with ds and took dd off my hands for pretty much the whole day. Which was nice actually. Fed her cuddled her etc. Didn’t change nappies. But meh. Can deal with that.

She also sorted out laundry - out on the line and it was raining so she brought it in.

This afternoon some of her friends came up with their kids. Dh has arranged this. I had either not been told about it or had been and had just forgotten. Giving dh the benefit of the doubt and going with the latter.

They all brought cake. And dh made pots of tea and coffee. And entertained the kids.

I sat and chatted and ate cake.

It was a nice afternoon but if I’m honest I was getting a bit anxious with that many people in the house and just wanted them all to leave.

One of the friends brought curry. And stuck it in our freezer and fridge. So we’ve got 4 dinners now. She got it from the guy who runs the local Sri Lankan restaurant. No idea why. But four boxes of potato chickpea and spinach curry. So winning.

Mil has also snuck a bottle of tattinger in our fridge. So might crack that open later.

Tomorrow she’s coming up early. I jokingly said for her to come up as soon as she’s awake. Then realised that it might be early early as she’ll be jetlagged!! But to be fair if she did rock up at 6 we could both have a lie in....

Swimming with ds tomorrow apparently. First hurdle is who stays home. me

Welcome pep

3 hours in the bank was ridiculous wolf

Glad seacow and everyone else who have recently been away made it back from their holidays safely and had a good time

We’ve been back from holiday for a couple of days now. Spent a lot on food in Disneyland but saved a bit through the loads of snacks we took with us. We walked 15k steps at least each day and were so glad we took the pushchair for DD aged 4. Hotel was good and saved a significant amount by not staying in a Disney hotel.

We’ve been looking at our finances and looking at what our holiday budget will be for next year. Hoping maybe to do the Canary Islands at Easter and maybe a Eurocamp in France in August. We want to make the most of us both only working 41 weeks a year as unlikely to be this way long term. Frugaleering needs to go back on the menu to fund this!

£83 Clark’s on school shoes but had £10 gv
£20 on book voucher for my mum’s bday
£13.99 in H&M but returned something for £3.99

I had lost the name labels for DD2s school clothes. But they seem to have doubled in price now to order more so I am determined to find them

Decorating and decluttering is the plan for this week off. May need to get trainers and wellies for school for both DC

Happier, that is a great looking dog.
Sea and love glad you had great holidays too.
Thanks wolf, it will be nice to do some more grown up things and I will have to entertain myself at times as dd has some shifts.

Em it does sound like she's making a lovely effort especially as she kist be very tired after that journey. I bet she loves seeing her grandchildren!

Bloody spendy day today. Had an impromptu lunch party with some family. It was very short notice so ended up buying a lot of olives, hummus, nice quiches etc from Sainsbury's. Also bottle of gin which was a gift and a few bits in the 25% off, nothing exciting - pants for me and leggings for dd1. Together with normal top-up stuff like milk and fruit it came to over £100. I have spent an obscene amount on food this week. Illbe on EWFL at this rate!
We are going to audit our cupboards and freezer before meal planning for next week.

snuggly yes. She is - to both!! She is adoring meeting Dd and this is only the second time she’s met ds. Dd is her fave only granddaughter. Ds is her fave grandson over here. 😂

What was lovely is that he recognises her from FaceTime and when he went for his nap and dh dropped her at her friends this morning (so she could unpack etc) he said bye to her. When he woke up he shouted “nanny where are you?!” So lovely.

I’m in the bath now #racy watching moana.

Of all the “new” Disney movies this one is my fave. I think probably because it looks the same as the ones from my childhood. Flat if you know what I mean. And the soundtrack is ace. And it’s so pretty.

Evening - sorry I keep going awol. Nothing to do with my beautiful fabrics arriving at all. I may have very frugally rehomed a couple of flat sheets from my mum to use as infill. North thanks for pointing me in the direction of Hannah's Room.

Sea & Curvy glad to hear you had fab holidays.
Em what a turn around for your mil. Last time was so much more fraught. Welcome to the alright MIL club
Pep lovely to have a new face here.
Wolf we have fortunately moved out of MS2, although Regs are still in the basement. I had missed out on the news - but explains the emails about not wearing our passes out of the office and the H&S policy reminder. It is all so volatile & febrile at the moment.
snuggly I am in need of an EWFL intervention at them moment. My saving grace is that my Mum keeps inviting me and DD for tea while the boys are away. The food bill hasn't gone up - I am just buying half the amount.

My dad bless him is doing an emergency dash to France to stock up his wine stash. He is doubling up so I don't go without. My parents are bonkers but so lovely.

I'm pretty much in the same position as you sea. Except we haven't had our holiday yet
seem to have loads to pay out recently.

Forgot that my car insurance ran out today, dh reminded me this afternoon, luckily he sorted it all for me and we paid £268 for the year, which dh paid in full from our current account(the one I wasn't touching) never mind, so I'm now a bit short for our holiday spends, will just have to cut back a bit. I'm also due a mot at the end of this month and road tax is renewed on September 1st, but that's only £30 so not bad.

In town this morning I picked up 4 super noodle pots, a pack of cereal bars and 6 bags of wotsits so that's lunch sorted for the week ahead I'm keeping away from Lidl!

Ended up spending £51on my Tesco delivery and £21 on a takeaway. Unintentional frugal win as I had originally tried to order it from Just Eat and it was going to be £26 but something happened and the order was refused so ordered it direct and saved £5.

Unescorted that is so sweet of your dad.

born he is :)

Em I hate having people in the house. Sounds like mil is being better behaved though.

We've been to the theatre to see Oklahoma! Was good. £10 tickets front row booked ages ago