Anyone want to join for a No spend January

[ivykaty44]

As done in other years, a no spend January

But also perhaps a budget cooking month, to really keep costs down

the idea is we only spend money on transport & food shopping - so those items don't count, but lets try and keep the shopping spends low

I shall be following the likes of cardiff mum and taming twins for budget ideas for food, especially using slow cooker and doubling up recipes.

I shall also be cooking some slow cooker recipes in January and doubling up, that way can cook for the first 2 weeks of January and freeze for the next two weeks

Purchasing birthday present for January on Black Friday next week, that way getting a good deal.

Its a reset on finances which will be especially needed in the household to curb some unnecessary spending and leave me with money in the bank on 31 January. I did this about 4 years ago and had an extra £110 in my account.

doing free things, , freecycle after Christmas, walks, cycling, library trips, free talks etc

Some take it into February

I really haven't added much on here after joining, but we have definitely cut back on our spends and had lots of NSD's. Although, naturally, we have had a few unexpected, expensive spends that were necessary 😪 The way I see it we are in a better position being mindful of our spends, than if we were still spending money the way we were and THEN had the unexpected costs.

We are going to keep it up as long as we can. There are some things we will spend on, although Valentine's Day we have agreed to only spend money on dinner. My SIL has a birthday in Feb and we will just do a gift card, ordered using our rewards points on our credit card.
We have a lot of birthdays in March, including mine, so that will be tough to navigate, but we should be in a much better financial position by then.

I'm sitting on my sofa with a fleecy blanket over my legs with a hot water bottle under the blanket, it's so warm!

I've not added much either since joining but have stuck to essential spending only bar a few bags of sweets for our holiday next month. I've bought food, birthday cards, necessary toiletries, necessary clothing and necessary travel (bus fare). I lost track of my daily spend but I'm going to look back and add up what I've spent this month on food in particular. I've definitely been far more careful and we have walked to and from school except twice. I've not bought anything from Amazon. That's the biggest achievement this month.

Brilliant thank you I'm going to treat myself to some x

Same I had a good week then seemed to hemorrhage money 🙈I have kick started my savings again though which is the important thing.
I've had a cinema/lunch day with my youngest so definitely not saved anything today & have a birthday coming up.
I am determined to just see how I go week by week & try to keep it up all of 2023 too.

I've actually had a good month overall but it felt like I was completely haemorrhaging money at the beginning of the month despite my best intentions.

I'm looking forward to doing well in February as it's a shorter month.

Unexpected spends in January: Vet £200, new hoover £220.

Expected spends: DC birthday, and big day out in London with expensive train fares food and drink, and sports clubs annual fees, dentist x 3

Worryingly even taking all of these out of the equation I am just about breaking even, which gives me not much room to save generally to pay for them when they do come up.

Groceries for the month: £637 ( that has been feeding 4 people, and two pets, including daily packed lunches, plus several house guests - 9 staying over the course of the month. Plus included food and decorations for dc birthday party, plus food for dc cooking course) so I do actually think it's not too bad. Whether I can actually afford it though is another matter...

On the plus side my food organisation has massively improved. My fridge is so clean tidy and organised. I only have in there what we'll be eating the next couple of days. I've ended up doing small targeted top up shops rather than a big shop, which is keeping me in tighter control of everything.

I'm using an app called spending wallet which is free and nice and simple to use. So I'll see how my spending categories vary or improve month to month.

Big spends in February coming up include: flights for mini-break in March, half-term.

Valentine's Day should be ok as we have a voucher for a lovely restaurant which we'll use then.

I've spent £333 on food for the 3 of us this month. Far too many trips to Asda but then I'm on a health kick and have been buying fresh fruit at least 3 times a week. I haven't had the money for big shops like I wanted to do and I need to shop locally for fruit. February we go on holiday for a long weekend but I'm hoping to have a better month. The positives are I've not spent anything on things I've wanted, it's only been needed.

@moimichme @Haveyoubrushedyourteeth Im pleased I’m not the only one with a difficult man! It’s more frustrating because he’s not really a fussy eater at all and eats almost everything but it seems he only eats everything when it’s exactly what he wants at that time and not if that’s what we have that needs eating.

Another spendy few days. Cat has been stress grooming and has bald patches so have ordered feliway refills. Bloody expensive. I’ve also bought some essential oils and a pack of spelling cards to help dd with her sight words because she is struggling. My older dc used to get these sent home every week from reception onwards to learn but dds school doesn’t seem to do that and she’s in year 2 now and still not recognising them all.

Plus groceries.

New totals:
groceries £546.04

presents for own dc birthdays £210

birthday presents for other people £120

other £209.51

😬 Next month will be better (I hope)

Missed some punctuation there, the essential oils are nothing to do with dd’s reading 😆

So my groceries spend works out at £91 per person for the month and £2.93 per person per day (as long as I don’t buy any more food). That doesn’t seem too bad for all meals and snacks (bar two) for the month? Or would you consider that a lot?

spendier weekend, but I knew it was coming, and it's more-or-less manageable. Visited DS at his university town, and although hotel accommodation and breakfast was covered by Christmas gift from my DParents, the following additional spends:
£142 on a mahoosive Aldi shop for DS, which included a bunch of cleaning stuff, toiletries, huge quantities of loo roll, stuff to freeze, multiple cupboard staples, doubling up on chocolate, oils...Since this is around twice my biggest Aldi shop when at home, I blinked a bit at the checkout, but
£16 on arancini and coffee
£14 on cinnamon buns
£6 on parking.

DH also topped up petrol (£40), paid for pub pizza dinner for 3, and a gastropub dinner for 3. More cinnamon buns (hangs head). Oh, and loads of batteries so DS can get the bloody Hive working and run the heating. (Six lads cannot bring themselves to stump up for batteries and would rather go cold. Unbelievable.) He also rushed out last night, despite my having organised food from the freezer for our return, to buy biscuits, cheese slices, 0% beers.

We ate the house empty before we went away, packed sandwiches for the road, and I have spent £43 at Sainsburys buying a load of veg and pulses, spices, feta, naan breads etc to continue with a more vegetarian food plan for February. Hopefully, this will be cheaper and healthier. We've rather compensated for not drinking by carb-loading. We'll carry on not drinking but try to improve our diet!

Lost a post, but back to say @Orcubed - your spend is amazing. Very impressed, and gives me something to aim for. Will tot up mine tomorrow and report back.

I've failed dismally this month (aside from one week) 😂🙈
I'm going to start afresh for February & write most of this month off. It seemed the more I told myself no spending the more I ended up spending.
Even today 🙈
Well done to everyone who've managed to rein themselves in!

NSD today but I've had a bit of a spendy weekend with family visiting and went out to lunch. Just did a check and it looks like I am finishing this month in the black, so happy as went into the red in October, November and December. Considering the washing machine disaster I am really pleased although if DH hadn't come up with half for the new washing machine I would be in the red again.

I'm hoping I can do well in February but I'm sure something will come up to challenge me.

NSD but Dog has a follow up vet visit tomorrow, I've got no veg left and we went away for the weekend and had to spend out on fuel for the car and food while we were there. Nothing extravagant, but more than home made. The weekend was budgeted for, but that was before the dog had his unexpected vet visits. I will be starting February with an overdraft of about £600, when I was just about set to break even this month and be able to save some in February. But the dog seems brighter, and he had a lovely weekend with Grandma.

Pay day! 🎉
I'm starting the month with a fridge full of our meals for the next few days thanks to a big chicken pie I made yesterday and pasta bake from DC's cooking course. So it feels quite a calm and organised start to the month.

I made a note of all bills that came out last month and dates, so today I'm going to do a weekly spending plan, so I have a realistic budget to stick to for groceries and any extras I'll need.

I'm quite looking forward to planning that all out properly as I started this month pretty blind about it all.

One of the biggest successes from last month was the switch from school dinners to packed lunches for the children. They are actually really happy about it as it means they don't need to queue.

School dinners were £3 per day - so £120 at least for the month. That's been a really good saving.

Also I didn't buy a single takeaway coffee. And only 2 drinks in a pub - one for me and a friend.

No clothes or extras were bought.

Oh dear - I've just looked at price per day of my grocery spend in Jan- it's over £20 per day!!

Over £5 per person per day.

That is quite high, I'm sure I can get it lower in Feb.

I'm going forward into February on a good note and I will continue my low spend. Good news for me, I must be the only person on the planet whose electricity bills were lower than they have been paying so EDF are going to put some money into my bank account in the next couple of days.

I was supposed to be going on holiday in April with a friend, but she doesn't feel she's up to it, I did think maybe I could go by myself, but it was only to my holiday home and I spend the whole of summer there anyhow, so I've decided to stay at home and put the money I've saved into my "Get the Fuck out of France for Christmas" fund. I really have no desire to spend another Christmas here in grey gloomy Brittany. I want to take me and my DCs to Oz to visit my brother. Every time I see something I want to buy, I think of this. So far, so good.

Thank you to everyone who posts on this thread, you are really helping keeping me on track, and I appreciate everything.

Last day and I’ve emptied my Amazon basket of £115 worth of stuff I don’t need and just ordered the two items I still want at £35 for both

ive made a note of the other things I’ve not purchased or spent on this month and it’s coming in at around £170

so £285 savings this month

it’s balanced out Decembers spending 👍🏻

Ok, totting up what I've managed to capture this month's groceries spends are:

£323 on regular supermarket, butcher, baker. Not bad, since it included buying ingredients for a couple of posher cakes than usual, and entertaining a bit. Obviously some of that expenditure will take us into February.

However, we did buy a takeaway for four people, which I haven't included; I spent £142 on DS' groceries, which I wouldn't normally do; £44 on food and drinks on the go while away; and DH has also spent on a few top-ups, but I don't know what he's spent since that's come from his account. As do his lunches at work, and the meals he paid for while we were away.

We also feed and treat a rather entitled dog, which doesn't come cheap.

So, I'm going to conclude that we can do better, and I'm making a start by embracing more meat-free and dairy-free days in February.

Well I managed my £10 a day for January, plus cost of haircut which wasn't included, but the £300 did include food, petrol, parking, chemist etc, so am pretty pleased. Doing the same for February now. Thanks to the poster who spotted the Greenchef offer - did that and it worked really well!

Are we all doing February?

Absolutely keen for February!

I’ve managed to save this month, not as much as I hoped but still not bad at all. Determined to do better in February (there were a couple of things that went out at start of Jan that were Dec spends, this won’t happen again). Not looking forward to children being off school for more than a week though, that definitely impacts ££!
Tonight’s last-day-of-month treat dinner: pitta pizza

My daily spend for January for food was £7.73, so thats not too bad at £3.86 per person. BUT, I had loads of leftovers from Christmas and we've more or less eaten the freezer right down, so it will be more of a struggle for February. I have just checked the freezer prior to shopping tomorrow and I have only 4 main meals, some veg and a spare loaf of bread. I am determined to get the overdraft gone though. Its a short month which will help and theres no council tax to pay.

Checking in with similar numbers - only food-wise! - to @bewilderedhedgehog. I managed £9.80 per day (that's both groceries and snacks, coffee or food out/takeaways). For 3 of us + kitten that seems high, especially as DH has also contributed a bit! Definitely an area to pare back further next month.

We have mine and ds' birthday coming up very soon, so I'll check in here more in the second half of February. Hoping for some nice NSDs to balance out the higher costs early next month! But I'll try to carry on being more mindful as much as possible.