Amigos actively attempting austere actions August 24>

[Happierwithouthim]

Link to last thread
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/cost_of_living/5007277-familiar-friends-in-frugalityfeb-24?latest=1

All welcome, the vibe is frugal life to make the things that matter possible, which is different for everyone, some of us have overcome debt, separations etc. All are friendly and we're sometimes chatty, sometimes quiet.

Don't lurk, join in

Hi,

Can I join you all? 2024 hasn’t been a great year financially or mentally for me so far - and I would really like to refocus.

We live very rurally so I have zero access to cheap food shops or yellow stickers, this plus huge petrol needs (50 mile round trip to small Coop) adds a lot to my bills!

I have to spend a lot on my disabled daughter, eg I just spent £700 on a specialist mattress to help pain management - and I need to save for a car with a bigger boot for her wheelchair.

I’d like to hold myself to account for August. So - no buying costs today, though £45 of swimming lessons went out. Tomorrow will be no buying, am determined! Will make daal for dinner, everyone loves it.

Welcome @MrsTartanTeacosy .

I'm also a parent toma disabled child and it's expensive isn't it! Does your child get DLA at all? Are you eligible for a motorbility car?

We have a 7 seater which fits DC wheelchair in but we have 4 children so would need a 7 seater anyway!

@Decafflatteplease yes, have a motability car now that I put £4,000 towards to try and get roomy enough for everything but the only dealership for a wheelchair suitable one now that I can actually get to (within a three hour drive) requires a £7500 advance payment. I feel that might be “dead” money but I don’t have much luck at all with secondhand cars and hate the thought of us being broken down and her frightened/unsafe. But £7500 somehow on my own makes me just want to cry…maybe a bank loan. I really don’t want to.

I cancelled £24 worth of monthly subscriptions.

I have sinned...£35 on two pairs of linen blend trousers from Uniclo. In my defense, they are reduced to £14.90 each, and I didnt buy anything else to get the free postage. And I do pretty much live in various types of secret pyjamas, so I will wear them a lot. Once I've taken the hems up a bit anyway.

Frugal activity - I dribbed mayonnaise on a nice shirt, of course it hasn't come out. I have cunningly embroidered a design over the blobs to make it wearable again, I am quite pleased with it. Its just some simple circles with cross stitch in the middle, over lapping, in toning colours of thread. It put a couple on the other side as well, to make it look a bit more on purpose.

Excellent frugaleering there Nellie. Sounds like the price per wear will be worth it for the trousers

£50 more on food
-£9 returned some sliders

DH is buying some work clothes. I'm OK with this. He's been squeezing into clothes that fit him when he was 40lbs+ lighter and it looks like it.

Overall, I doubt we'll save much this month as he probably needs a complete work and not-work wardrobe. However, for various reasons, it's a fairly stressful time, and I've been asking him to size up his clothing for more than 2 years so I'm at peace with spending this money.

As of tomorrow I'm unemployed
Starting my new job on Monday week, was taken out for a long lunch today & sent off an hour early which I used to drop off my flat tyre to tyre shop, recycling at bottle bins, joys of being an adult

Got some lovely gifts & a lovely surprise delivery of a bunch of flowers & I got a nice wedge of cash which will ease the transition from weekly pay, next Thurs is last payment until 29th August!

Aren't they beautiful ?

And randomly £20 in whiparound at work, we're in Ireland rest was €'s!

Good luck in your new job @Happierwithouthim and the flowers are beautiful!

DHs work have stopped doing whiprounds for birthdays and now only do for "big" birthdays and wedding/babies etc. all the staff agreed it was a good decision due to COL.

I'm looking ahead to autumn and ways to be more frugal around the home. I'm thinking of getting thermal curtain lining for the bedroom curtains. We have very high energy costs as our house is Victorian with 12 foot ceilings!

I'm also debating a door curtain for the front door I debate this every year and have never actually done it. I can't understand how you open the door?!

DH and I mainly live in the back of the house once the kids are in bed in winter we joke about closing off the east wing for winter but basically just means the hall door stays shut and we don't use the hall or lounge in the evening.

I've bought those foil panels for behind the radiators not used them before.

Ah enjoy the break happier

you put the curtain on a rail above the door and open the curtain to open the door. Do it - makes such a difference

@Decafflatteplease a door curtain certainly makes a difference, we've got something similar to this. It kind of swings out with the door.

https://www.dunelm.com/product/dormer-door-curtain-rod-1000217208?defaultSkuId=30820421&branchCode=0154

@Happierwithouthim beautiful flowers!

@Decafflatteplease I definitely recommend curtain linings, and door curtains.

It is turning autumnal here already, I plan to forage for as many blackberries as possible and I have a crop on my new-last-year apple trees to deal with…apple butter as gifts for peoples, and for the pantry, I think.

Today we are going fishing, so fresh (free) mackerel for dinner I hope, with roasted fennel and chard both from the garden.

Jumping straight back in so apologies to any news missed
Back from holiday - had a wonderful time. Busy but well worth it. Managed to spend less than £2k. My tips: booked an early morning arrival and evening return flights - maximised the time whilst reducing nights stayed; used airmiles to reduce flight costs; packed ready to eat bits such as cereal, snacks, etc. So less money spent there; spent £1.49 on 100ml reusable travel bottles meaning no checked in baggage costs as hand luggage only; have a debit/credit card that charges no fees and excellent conversion rates; prebooked airport parking using a discount code; plenty of research - good, affordable restaurants; and tourist attraction combos/bundles (saved almost £200 doing this - might not always be possible of course depending on location).
Hope that helps anyone yet to go away or planning a trip. I probably saved around £1k if I added all the savings up.

Other fruganews: £1800 paid into pension; no premium bonds win again 😓 ; all monthly payday moves done; lots of socialising money to be spent with pils 80th bday and a friend's 40th; used up waitrose referral gift cards (from phone swap back a few months ago) for easy food this weekend as we are shattered!; and dare I say it - first Christmas 🎄 present 🎁 bought !!! Reduced from £40 to £20.

Pleased you had a good time chilli. We to do the early & late flight combos.

Delighted with my bargain on dds schoolbag, hoping this one will see her through the next 5 years

Needed a new tyre €95 but I do have a category that in YNAB so that's sorted

I had an online basket with nice little bits for the children - just things like character water bottles and Hello Kitty pens etc, bit it all adds up and not actually needed right now. I nearly clicked buy, but didn’t. Trying to feel proud of myself but feeling a little glum.

2/3 NSDs - caved in for a takeaway tonight! 😛

@lifelongfrugaleer it will be even more flexible as the DDs grow up (as we still have to stick to relatively reasonable times)
@Happierwithouthim looks great 👍

@MrsTartanTeacosy well done. That's exactly the sort of unnecessary spending that can tip tbe budget. Can you reward yourself by having an avoided spends target/tracker to give you a replacement dopamine hit?
@Rainbow1901 was it tasty? 🥡

Frugajobs: need to nip out later for some food (got several playdates planned); have set budget for the rest of the summer holidays - we'll see how that goes as it's probably a bit short but it's what we have saved so any overspend will need to be taken from somewhere else; car off to the garage tomorrow for final fix and payment.

I'd like to join the thread.

Just milk needed today.

@Chile1978 Yes it was! So worth the guilt!! 😀
I hope you had a good break and how frustrating that the Premium Bonds didn't do their bit! I'm keeping the pressure on them to do a win on my PBs held since I was a kid - all two of them!! 😂
@MissMarplesNiece Hiya!! 🤗

@Happierwithouthim Lovely flowers - lots of luck with the new job. Are you treating yourself with the cash or being frugal?

My SonIL came with some more timber yesterday, so hopefully any spends for the shed be less. Then we can have a good declutter of the greenhouse, his den/pump house for pond/somewhere to hide and the patio. We will have somewhere for it all to live plus NDNs have just got themselves an allotment so duplicates of tools and spare plant pots can go in their direction.
The GCs big toys and bikes are going back to ACs after the holidays and I will sort the toy box too as they are planning on doing a boot sale. The childcare routines will be changing then to pickups etc from schools and nursery so we can get our living room back again with a few less toys around. 😉Will still need stuff but it needs to be more age related like box games,puzzles, arts and crafts type of things. Or there's always the TV!! 👀
DD will be paying us a monthly nominal sum to cover petrol plus wear and tear on the car when doing school/nursery runs - so will be stashing that to create a car fund. It's first MOT is due November so we need to be prepared for those possible kind of related expenses. 🚙
Also have possible overnight stay in hotel plus petrol coming up as have family funeral to attend in a couple of weeks - but that's what savings are for - so a necessary expense if a sad one. We could do it there and back in a day but DH may want to catch up with relatives so need to be flexible for him.
Need to root in the freezer and dig out dinner or it will still be frozen solid when I want to cook it!! 🍴I'm considering Lamb - the weather looks a bit iffy so a roast would be good after all the salads this week!!

Rainbow I'm moving from weekly pay to monthly pay so I'm using it to cover that and to pay for my weeks activities. Night away with my sis tonight so spa treatment and hotel cost tonight, lots of driving so extra fuel, it's great not to be taking it from savings.

Welcome @MissMarplesNiece

Had a big conversation at my leaving party with a former colleague who's in a relationship with a single mother. So horrible to hear of their dad only paying €50 a week for two children and only taking them now and again for access, but lovely to see how committed my colleague is to the two children

€2.45 on a bottle of water today
Yesterday €3.80 on milk & onions

Its much cooler here today, so we're having a bean and bacon casserole with sausages on the side. Like a very British version of cassoulet, with no duck at all, and beer instead of wine in the gravy. So more frugal than a classic French one, hopefully it will taste ok. And as the oven is on I will do a batch of cupcakes for elevensis during the week.

NS day today, but the Aldi monthly big shop will probably be tomorrow, or the day after. But I've stretched it to the 5th or 6th of the month, so not too bad.

Afternoon all - back from my break.

Thank you for the thread Happier I’ve not caught up but hope everyone is as well as they can be.

Holiday was amazing. I came back with about £400 but had some unexpected spending while I was there. Think I will (unfrugally) put it towards next year’s break.

Spending since I’ve been back:

• £6.17 on milk and cottage cheese
• £7.29 on snacks
• £4.14 on white spirit
• £54 in the Swiss bakery
• £55 on a membership.

Not too pleased with the Swiss bakery splash. I’ve wanted to try it for a while and yesterday was their last day open before their summer break so I went wild at the counter. Planning on starting back at the gym tomorrow. So got the snacks out the way.

Got back to arsehole being arsehole. Have done a few legal bits and am waiting to hear back. Should give some thought to the inevitable mortgage application.

I’m going to try and make more of an effort to be frugal. Less impulse buying and using work’s gift card scheme more. Will have to work out how the latter can work logistically. Not sure it will save much but something is better than nothing.