Frugal Friends Facing Forward with Fortitude

[Happierwithouthim]

Here's a friendly space for new and existing frugal friends.

We have all different types of incomes and lifestyles but with a common goal of making the best of the money we have.

Many of us have experiences of becoming debt free or being in difficulty with money for one reason or another so there's no need for embarrassment, just join in, post as little or as often as you wish.

Some record daily spends, some record only spends that are unplanned, some don't record spends at all, the choice is yours!

It's probably MN sacrilege but I can't get on with yotam recipes at all.

It's obviously meter reading season, waiting for our winter bill too. Not sure if we're in credit or not to be honest, something to add to the admin list.

Spends
£24 food

Avoided spends
40p petrol as walked. Good for the pennies and now we're all hungry for lunch too.

Hackathon - not a Parmesan rind one, no. In fact, it was the grated cheese added that made it palatable. I usually like recipes that include Parmesan rind, and routinely chuck them into risottos, stocks, soups..

Need - I'm the same on energy consumption, tbh. Not that I'd be mad about it, and I do my fair share of wrapping up warm and heating the human, etc, but I'm not going to be cold in my own home, nor am I going to require it of my guests. I economise in lots of other ways, but so far, have managed without forgoing this basic comfort. I realise that for many it's a luxury, and unaffordable, I'm not complacent about it.

DH has agreed that we do a freezer stocktake tomorrow, hurrah! It'll be good to get a full inventory of what we have in there, and time to ask - if that's been there for a year is it the sort of thing we should be buying at all?

I was compiling a list for Sainsburys, but the weather is arctic out there, so we;re staying put and making do with what's in.

I'm also planning some handmade gifts for this year and am currently knitting a pair of socks for a friend's birthday, it's not for a few months but I'm trying to get ahead as I'm quite slow! Fingerless mitts sound great!

Lovely walk with DH today to blow the cobwebs away. Smoked haddock chowder for lunch was lovely. As her parting gift, dd made cinnamon rolls yesterday which were also lovely but v calorific!
Noticing some changes in my mum & spoke to one of her sisters this morning who agrees. I foresee a tough year ahead trying to get them moved to somewhere more manageable. As a result of both parents looking like they may have dementia & me being the only child, I'm considering what support I can give longer term to keep them as independent as possible. I can take the majority (27 years) of my NHS pension in 2 years 10 months, not that I'm counting!! If I can keep going with what I'm doing at my current grade until November that will be my final salary secured and I could look at slightly different options for the remaining 2 years, less responsibility, fewer hours in order to give dparents more support. I would still need to work after taking the pension but by then we'll be mortgage free and have enough saved to cover dd's uni rent so our outgoings will have dropped by £1400 a month so less pressure. Hard thoughts, but necessary.

Managed a nsd today, much needed!

Total frugal fail ystd evening as my heating didn't switch off upstairs like it's meant to, didn't realise until we went up to bed and it was 27 degrees 🤦‍♀️😱

No idea why it didn't switch off but no heating upstairs for a while!

north I'm sorry to hear about your DM's decline. To have one parent with dementia would be tough but to have two must be extremely difficult. And since you're the only child, the entire burden of care/decision making will fall to you. Do they live nearby or far away? The only thing I would say is only to take on as much as you're reasonably capable of. I remember seeing a TV interview with a woman who was determined to care for her DM who had dementia. Unfortunately, it turned out to be much more difficult than she had anticipated (and she got very little support from the state). She ended up having a nervous breakdown. So put yourself first.

A friend is going through something similar with her Dad. Her Mam is his carer but she's finding it tough and needs a second person there to help out. As it happens, their adult son still lives at home (he works full-time but is there every evening and overnight) but if he goes away for a holiday or whatever, the other DC step in and stay over.

I only realized today that I have a community group meeting tonight. So I didn't do my walk - I spent the afternoon cleaning instead. On that note, I should probably give the fridge a quick once over.

@northender there is an elderly parents section where you will get support. £1.55 on milk today. I can live with that😁

NSD today. And I can report that Parsnip cake is very nice. I halved the recipe as I didn't want to use 4 eggs, but it made a reasonable sized cake for the two of us. I also used brown sugar instead of maple syrup due to cost. It would benefit from bit of icing, but is ok without, and is healthier obviously.

So today's menu was egg on toast for breakfast, chicken in creamy mustard sauce with roasties and broccoli for dinner, and leek soup, crusty roll followed by a lump of parsnip cake for tea. We've got three quarters of the cake left, so we'll be eating it for a couple of days.

We thankfully came into winter with a credit balance for the gas and electric. They had been taking nearly £400 pm on the DD. We used less than £150 pm over the summer. The DD is now £200 pm which feels right ...we used £210 each month for the last few months.

North that sounds so difficult. It is hard enough with one slightly demanding parent with responsibility shared with a sibling.

Tonight is a hot pot. Forgotten freezer a fridge bits. NSD...but I did a lot of taxi-ing so the petrol bill will come sooner than I would have liked.

@northender so sorry you have such tough decisions and planning. That sounds so tough indeed.

The weekend away was very nice and we managed to get some gorgeous clear days after the deluge on Thursday. The kids had some of their own money to spend which took the pressure off activities. We did visit an attraction and I got a pretty good discount using an app. Had a couple of meals out which were much cheaper than they are near where I live so that felt more frugal than it could have done. Today was a McD with the kids which came to around £20. Will need to scale back for the next few days.

@northender. Massive ❤️ to you. We've gone through this twice in the last year and now my own DF, while not struggling with dementia but more with his 92 year old body failing needs to go into a home. Being an only must be incredibly challenging and pressuring. No words of wisdom I am afraid.

Glad you had a nice weekend away @tuttifritti

Spends today are food only
£148 Ocado but included a really good bottle of whiskey for a present, which will come out of the presents budget. First big Jan shop.
£20 veg box.

@BigSkies2022. Agreed. Also appreciate that we are fortunate enough to have the choice to have the heating on. Another Parmesan rind fan here!

I don't like ottolenghi either. There, I've said it!!

Nothing else out one of my dogs is cheap @Wolfcub 🤣🤣

That’s really tricky north I’m sorry 💐

Well done on the decluttering em we got a skip in October half term, mainly as we’d done the Caglets’ bedrooms, but I threw away sooo much stuff. Very expensive but utterly worth it!

Jealous of the Paris trips 😁

I love sea bass, definitely my favourite fish. Often have it on top of a risotto with roasted veg 😋

Spends
Saturday
£91.98 Tesco 😵‍💫 lots of store cupboard stuff and H chose a lot of stuff too
Sunday
£18 2nd hand game

I am really not in the mood for Monday 😑

Clotted cream update:

I’m avoiding carbs at the mo, so sadly the scone route isn’t an option.

added a spoonful to scrambled egg for extra creaminess , topped with some of my remaining lumpfish roe (caviar!)

mashed with anchovies for a Gentelmans Relish type spread.

added to parsnip/chestnut soup.

North that is a tough row to hoe, indeed, with your parents. I'm sorry about their struggles. My parents' bodies are failing, but their mental capacity still allows them to live independent, if very much diminished, lives. But they need increasing amounts of support and help and my mother is not happily adapting at all. Good luck with your planning.

Need - well, I have enjoyed many Ottolenghi recipes (although I don't fret too much if some of the more esoteric ingredients, or pfaffy processes, get omitted) but this particular one was a dog!

Clotted cream in the soup is a winner!

Popped into Sainsburys for my list of missing bits - They had no lemons! I remembered I had value on my Nectar points, so it don't actually cost me anything.

Scones are never the answer to leftover clotted cream, as they immediately require the purchase of more clotted cream in order to apply with a trowel. lol.

thanks for the soup suggestions, I shall try a few out. I might also make a veggie scotch broth (diced veg, pearl barley, black pepper and whatnot), my dad used to make it for me and it reminds me of him and for some reason I’d quite forgotten about it.

so sorry to hear about your DPs north. That sounds very tough, especially as an only child. I hope your DH will be able to support you through it all as it’s a lot to shoulder the responsibility of decisions etc alone, never mind the practicalities.

I am also planning some home made gifts this year and will start soon! I need to make something truly special for DS’s wonderful LTA at school, who will have supported him for 7 years by the time he leaves in July 😭😭😭. I don’t know what but it needs to be good!

not too spendy a weekend as we went to the panto locally (already paid for) and took snacks. DH had a beer for £4. I did spend another £20 on a top up shop of chicken, lemons and other bits that were missing from my online order. Still no cauliflower though, it seems like a precious and rare commodity round here! Yesterday I made a tray of really lovely choc chip cookies, and a tray of woefully overcooked ones (took my eye off the ball) so I’m a bit sad about them. Lesson learned!

Oh, and £364 for DD’s dance classes to Easter. Ouch.

Its absolutely bitter here, NSD, but we've got the wood-burner alight already, we don't normally light it until the evening. We got the logs back in the early autumn before the price increased for the Winter, but they will have to last until the weather warms up. Its brighter though so the solar panels were charging the grid this morning so I will get a few (very few) quid off the electricity balance.

Menu for today, avocado on toast for breakfast, tomato soup and cheese toasties for lunch, and I'm planning a mushroom stroganoff with rice for dinner.

We had another go at the parsnip cake for elevensis, its even nicer today. I have realised that if I cut the cake we get 8 slices, and if DH does the cutting its 6. In the interests of frugality I will now make sure I am the cake cutter!

Bitter here too! Brrrrr! Tube strikes have been called off at least.

@needastrongoneagain sympathies 💐 please do try and take care of yourself - preferably before you're at breaking point.

@Sandytoxic glad the soup was a winner

@SingToTheSky it's been a miserable Monday feeling

NSD

Ins
+25 selling

Acc1 -990

Oh, and I meant to say thanks to Unescorted for the starter advice and offer. I did what you said (although I only had around 100g to start with) and it still looks sad. Having looked at the original website I was using and all the ‘what goes wrong’ info I think my kitchen may be too warm for it and it has overfermented - it also seems to dry out a bit too much as it’s only loosely covered with a tea towel. it’s pretty warm in there due to the UFH (while fairly cold in the rest of the house) but it’s definitely not too clean! I might try starting again but in a cooler room, and failing that I might take you up on your kind offer to send some. I am sure it’s easy once it’s second nature but it’s tricky when you don’t know what you’re doing!

North ❤️

£608 for the bloody car. Though it’s lovely and clean now. I told them they didn’t have to wash it unless they needed to punish someone but they did.
£259 more tomorrow on it

£14 Lidl, £42 milk, +£7 primark. £17 Amazon

For those that don’t get the car wash reference we drive up and down farm tracks 6 days a week and have various animal. My car is a work horse