January Frugaleers thread brings no judgment just friendly banter & advice for like minded folk

[Happierwithouthim]

A place where all are welcome regardless of income, level of debt or reason for being in debt or debt free.

We're friendly, full of good advice and open to new ideas where to shave off expense and how to live your best life on the income you have.

Over the years we've celebrated debt payoffs, babies, leaving jobs, getting different jobs, bonuses, and we've been there for each other through difficult times.

New posters welcome always & I hope posters who have fallen off thread will rejoin too

Must work out date for 21 days before car insurance renewal in early feb!
€33.03 in SuperValu utilising €5 off €35 spend
Got 3 for €10 fruit, 3 meats for dinner, milk & big bag of carrots that I normally get for free direct from source but paid €3.50 for today
Prepared if can't leave house tomorrow or next day. No bread available in shop at all!

I'm due to renew my car insurance and found confused.com quotes cheaper than other comparison sites and the rewards of a Greggs hot drink each month & options of £20 voucher for a store a great reward. Saves me buying a hot drink each month and pays for a birthday gift if I put the voucher to good use 😁

NSD and yesterday, and I've got a 30% off Ocado shop, so I will spend a happy hour ordering this week's shopping, for about the same price as Aldi and also save petrol.

Stayed home most of yesterday and today decluttering. 2 bags of stuff to drop off at clothes bank plus a couple of bits to put on Vinted tomorrow. Made a big pot of soup and prepped some
lunches for tomorrow with random things we already had in the fridge.

Am really gritting my teeth to avoid buying anything. Love reading and crafting and those books and yarny projects are calling me!!!

I’m feeling panicky at the scale of the task ahead to pay off the debt and get organised. Our home needs so much work doing to it as well. I just don’t know how I’m going to do it.

Gousto payment came out today, but minus £20 as I referred my mum and she got a box for 60% off!

I count Gousto as an essential spend though, it's completely changed my life!

Busy day taking DS to his hospital check up £6 parking, £6 tolls£15 food. But he’s been discharged so that’s good.

make a list Betsy. What debt you have, what interest rates, savings if you have, what jobs, prioritise that then try & get rough costing

we have bugger all snow left. It was a pita for half off Sunday then gone. Stay safe frugaleers

@FurForksSake not judging what so ever but do you really need a window cleaner ? Could you not just put up with dirty windows for a month ?

I'm driving around in a dirty car (outside) as refuse to pay to get it cleaned (don't have the tools to clean for myself). I've Binned off the £10 Xmas tree collection and cut the tree up myself in our garden waste bin. Not buying myself any flowers for home. No one else cares if we have any, only me. No takeaways. No wine at home, drinking spirits which we have lots of and diet coke. So I've only had to buy a bottle of coke that will last several evenings and not a £10 bottle wine that only lasts 1 eve. Only 1 gel nails appt booked this month. I now take them off myself too, much cheaper.

@Nellieinthebarn we've used ocado for years they are great. One of our DC has to have specific brands for a specialist diet so ocado are great on that front. They have good offers on and the own brand stuff is reasonable. They also price match to Tesco on lots of items

4/7 NSDs Had to buy petrol and a loaf of bread £31.71 today. I tried to send off a parcel but the In post box was playing up so after a phone call and two cancellations by the Customer Services Phone line - I gave up and went off to pick up the GCs from school and nursery. Will try again tomorrow.
Now, I'm sat at home in the warm, munching on leftover xmas sweets with a brew watching a bit of Harry Potter!!

@BetsyBanana

swcond the plan of writing a list of debts and interest rates.

if it was me I’d focus on either the lowest balance first or the highest interest rates. Pick one and focus on throwing all extra money at that whilst paying minimum payments on others. Assuming credit cards.

also change to paying minimum payment by standing order. The last minimum payment plus £1. This will chip away at the balance each month.

I’d like to join too.
I’ve already spotted some good hints and tips
Dh and I did our first no spend January a couple of years ago and were so pleased with how well we did, we do it every year.

I’ve found it really helpful to start paying for everything in cash where possible. I take £100 out and the challenge is to see how long I can make it last.
It really focuses your mind on how much you are spending, how much is left etc, especially with food shops as it stops the “pop to the shop to buy some milk and spend £30” problem.

Another NSD day today, yesterday was a £40 petrol spend but nothing else. Fridge is looking a bit empty now but it'll get us to the end of the week.
Loving how busy the thread is!

Frugal things today:
Sorting Christmas wrapping paper to reuse next year. For the last couple of years I've bought rolls of glick wrapping which is more expensive but easy to salvage & reuse. All sorted & packed away now.
Tea was an odd leftovers creation, leftover turkey from the freezer, random veggies sliced thin, a variety of cheese including Boursin and cubed potatoes, topped with more cheese & baked in the oven. Delish!

Hemlocked you won't regret the Dualit toaster. We bought a 4 slice one 20 years ago & it's still working well & looking good

Spendy day today.
DH went to Costco - we get a lot of store cupboard stuff - and we all love their cheddar.

336.26 groceries and around 20 on pizza which is a rare takeaway treat for us (we don't eat out a lot and mainly cook from scratch at home). Hopefully we have enough to last us 6 weeks or more...
Tomorrow I have some extra cleaning products to pick up and will try to make a meal plan before I do so that we don't have to shop over the weekend and end up picking up a whole host of junk food.... for no reason other than "it's the weekend"!
I am going to keep a running total for myself here. Will just be a total outside of regular expenses. I think seeing the numbers racking up rather than individual amounts will help to cement how much we really are spending...

so we are at 441.88 😱

Posted too soon! Updated figures:

7.1 £10.51 on groceries then another £6.15 on impulse groceries and then £14.90 on dinner out because we were running late. £31.56 total, which doesn't count as a LSD in the YuleHouse.

@Captainladder I like your idea of a running total. Ours is £51.65.

£7.50 Lidl, £6.60 Post Office, £22 Amazon - new headphones for me as office Thursday and need noise, keysafe for the outside (keep locking myself out and having to get keys from DH at work) and shower gel which will last 6 months - so spendier than expected. £15 back in on a refund and first of the book selling parcels collected, once that's paid will be even so not bad 😊.
Absolutely freezing here, dreading the winter energy bills and due to be -9 tomorrow ❄️❄️❄️
Still mostly managing to eat from the freezer too so trying our best

Yesterday was NSD. Fingers crossed I can stay away from the online shopping today. Another snowday day today here.

also did out tax return and we are getting a large amount back about €2k as there’s a tac credit we should have been claiming that we hadn’t been. This is for 4 years. On the one hand it’s great to have this but on the other it’s a pain that we lost so many years of claiming it. We can only claim for 4 years retrospectively.

my financial goals for the year:
be better at using my credit card.
buy only what I need - I’ve set myself a no/low buy challenge for clothes and toiletries. Only buying if I need it or run out. Exception being gift cards.
savings before spends.
Make a chunky payment into my pension this year.

Morning all. Cold again here today and snow threatened. I have a GP appointment today, so might combine steps with that and get them over with.

£90 on annual boiler service. DH changed to Hive thermostat controls in November. I hate tech change and muttered to myself, but the previous ones (we have separate heating channels for upstairs and down) were useless and these are so responsive and you can manage remotely from an app on your phone. Our house is old, has single paned glazing in wooden sash windows and I've stuffed every chimney and insulated every roof, and lined curtains, but it needs heating.

Will buy a chicken to roast today. Going to stuff it with an old-fashioned breadcrumb mix and serve with a fennel, artichoke and lemon lentil side. DH starts his 12 week fitness program properly today - goal to lose 6kg and improve glute and hamstring strength and flexibility. He reasons the course will pay for itself by bringing 2 of his suits back into service. This is absolutely true.

Our daily food budget for the remaining month is £12 per day. I have beef and a big piece of pork belly in the freezer still, so I reckon we can do it without feeling too deprived, but will see what DH's food plan includes.

No milk delivery again today because of the snowy conditions outside. We still have a pint in the fridge and I can easily slip and slide to the shop but trying to have another no spend day - if I'd known I'd have bought some with the bread yesterday! So it could end up being a LSD.
I have to collect GCs again today so may pick some milk up then. I still have a parcel to send. 🙄

£76 at garden centre on food, and litter for catface. We almost had a riot on our hands because I dared to try and feed her whiskers yesterday.

£3.25 flat white at Waitrose (DH is wfh and was on a call in the lounge so needed to get out today).

currently at Waitrose. Need to buy snackies for the kiddos for school and lunchbox supplies because I neglected to book their hot lunches in time for school returning. Oops.

Happierwothoithim yes you are so right about not having any surprise purchases! My XH’s idea of budgeting was writing down everything he’d spent with no thought to how it matched income!

Yesterday was an LSD for me. Hospital
parking and petrol. Well, the petrol wasn’t low spend but it was essential. Hopefully NSD today unless the dishwasher man comes, and I’m hoping he does!