Significant Summer Saving, significantly less spending, super (non) splurging. Frugal folk continue being frugal here. All welcome.

[needastrongoneagain]

Making a new thread!

Please check in regular posters and welcome new people.

This is a super friendly thread to contribute to. We are all wanting to be as efficient as possible re spending but all have different budgets and priorities. No judgement here.

NSD (no spend day) for me.

Yes. Same stay. She arrived on the 25 July.

@ememem84 that's a long stay if it's the same one and she does sound hard graft. Enjoy your swim and beach bar dinner.

Today was just Lidl £62. And a lot of washing from holidays...

Well done em. It’s what DH wants not mil

Well done em for powering through! Enjoy your beach breakfast and leave her at home! Xx

How did it go @ememem84 ? I hope your DH had a brilliant day and you did too. When is she leaving?

£16 something on lunch at national trust.
£1 on 3 books in their second hand book shop why can't I stay away from them?! Although found a book I've wanted for ages in there.

Oh. My purchase from vinted turned up and they sent the wrong item. So sending it back and getting £12 refund. Spent £28 on a new (same) item from Amazon. Hate Amazon. This is why I try and shop elsewhere. So doubly cross. Never mind. Item arriving tomorrow which is needed and will make me happy.

£18 on yoga sessions as I forgot to pay when I went. Whoops. All caught up now though.

Hope everyone has an amazing bank holiday Monday.

We had breakfast on the beach. It was glorious.

high tide early morning swim. Then coffee and croissants and fruit. The kids played. We saw dolphins in the bay. And something I’ve never seen before - saw a seagull pluck a mackerel out of the water and fly off with it.

Then home by 11. More coffee. Hang swim stuff out to dry. Dparents came round. Had birthday cake.

chilled out afternoon then took the kids to another beach before dinner. Beach below bar for dinner. Took my old (vintage) body boards down too. The kids had an amazing time in the surf. DH decided he didn’t want to go in the water as he wasn’t feeling 100. So me and the kiddos spent an hour in the surf. Catching the waves. Sometimes not catching them. Sometimes falling off the boards. I forgot how fun bodyboarding was. (Until I put my weight too far forwards then the board nose dived into the sand and I flipped off)

dparents kept mine and dsis’ boards we had when we were about 10. So 30 years. Ish. Still in great condition (except the leashes have snapped off in the attic so need to buy new ones).

dinner was really nice. Taught the kids how to make a “car changing room” (we left our dry clothes in the car much to mils annoyance) and went to dinner a bit disheveled sandy and wet hair (but beach bar so it’s ok).

stayed out until about 9.

kids now up. DH in bed. I’m outside. Just rinsed the swim stuff and rash vests off. On the line ready to go again today.

mil leaves on weds morning.

Morning

3 books for £1 doesn't sound too bad @Frugal25. Have you any recommendations? We are going on holiday in a couple of weeks and I'm hoping to get chance to read. I'm not even sure what I like to read anymore I'm afraid?! I have a metal lunch box, bought from new. It has lasted years so far and will last years more. #enabling.

£20 yesterday on a bulk buy of conditioner. I'm all up to date with bulk buys of toiletries, cleaning products, dog food, tablets etc.

Maybe a drink later at the local sports club for DH, but that will be it. Sensible Spaniel may come with us, he doesn't usually.

@ememem84 my god I hope there is something strong in that cup. I love my mother in law but I couldn't cope for anything like this long with her.
My spending is quite frankly messed up this month. I know I am in positive numbers so that's ok. Payday next week so must try harder.

Hi Everyone, i've been away from the thread for about a month due to summer basically. delighted to see you all still posting away and i've had a quick catch up of the posts.

Very sorry to hear about your dog @needastrongoneagain but you sound like you gave him both a great life and a good end.

@ememem84 fair play to you on hosting the MIL for this length of time and roll on wednesday!

Those of you worried about the Mounjaro increase (Crazy prices) i hope you can find an alternative. I know my sister did ozempic and perhaps that might work for some?

Today is Payday and small child is back to school on thursday so the summer is officially ending here. i now have to do a proper look at my bank acounts and tot up how much this has cost us. Its our first year without summer childcare and definitely more holidays and ive taken parental laeve so i'm thinking it won't be pretty. I'll report back once ive gotten over the wince.

more body boarding with the kids. Perfection.

the cup had coffee in it.

mil is ok. Intense. But ok. It’s just been a long 5 weeks.

and DH has covid. Sigh.

Oh @ememem84 your poor hubby. Esp on his birthday celebrations. So glad the day was gorgeous yesterday though. Sounds like amazing fun and making me want to come and stay (once mil has gone!!)

Welcome back @pistachiosanscream I hope you had an amazing summer... Good luck with the totting up.

@needastrongoneagain I'm quite enjoying the rom comes for summer. Easy pool side /chilling out reads. Nothing too hard to concentrate on. Things like Debbie Johnson. :) although I have just started "I don't know how she does it" and that's quite funny so far.

NSD here. Thank god. Although after your enabling I may just buy the metal lunch boxes lol

Spendy day.

£153 Waitrose - stuff to do lunches for a couple of weeks. Kids lunch boxes for sports camp, my lunches, dinners etc. plus olive oil £16?! New chopping boards. £30 (two plastic £5 ones and a wooden one).

boots £ 37. Paracetamol, mouthwash toothbrushes more sunscreen headache stuff (the stuff you rub on your head) cotton buds, vitamins etc.

surf shop £25. New leash for one of the body boards. They only had one left so that will do for the board ds likes. I’ll get another one at some point.

We had a family day out £30 tickets, £5 extra train ride, £1.50 for remote control boats, and we brought picnic, and had ice-cream at home after,so overall quite frugal. DD chose a 40p rubber from the gift shop. I said it was probably the cheapest thing in there and she said and also the best. It's her first year having a.pencil case as school so she's packed it.

Also £18 a few bits from Lidl for picnic, including our free bakery item.

A quiet few days since coming back from holidays:

School blazer £32.99 last one (two years old) is noticeably short!
Coop £1.61 and £4.88
Clinton's £4.68

Had a nice BBQ earlier with the Lidl shop from Saturday. Just realised I have no menu plan or food for the week, still feeling very much in holiday mode! I have the 10% voucher for Lidl so will make use of that.

We are back to work tomorrow but DD not back to school until 4th Sep! I'm ready for autumn now or I will be once I get back to work tomorrow...

Thanks @Frugal25 it was definitely worth it!

so it was an expensive summer. However we make good money and are privileged to be able to have a lovely time. We had 3 weeks on holidays around the country and thanks to family only had to pay for 2 nights accommodation which was a very nice hotel room to celebrate our 10 year anniversary. However even with free accommodation it’s still not cheap being on holidays.

we want to be able to relax, have treats and nice meals. Coupled with being stuck with expensive small shops to buy groceries in it means even self catering is €€€€. We can afford this but crucially we did not budget for it this year.

I am going to setup a couple of new revolut vaults which I will fu d from the joint account. I need a summer spending pot, Foreign holiday pot and back to school pot which also includes all the activities which were on pause over the summer but are now back all at once.ive always felt we should have more leftover in our joint account each month but if it’s there I will spend it!

this is going to be a tight spending month personally as I’m down €763 due to parental leave though DH will pay half that. Today I spent €4 on tea in work and €36 on serum and moisturiser from the Inkey list

@em sounds like a wonderful day even if poor DH was unwell. Glad MIL is off soon, 5 weeks is a LOT!

@need I’ve just read ‘the 6 murders of Daphne St Clair’ for my book club and really loved it. Wickedly clever. Book club all rated it highly too.

Spendy but lovely day. Went out for breakfast and lunch with DW but breakfast was only £13 as we had a voucher and I’m cheap (kids breakfast) thanks mounjaro.

@pistachio I wondered where you were, glad you’ve had a good summer

Boo on the Covid em. GWS DH
summer has been ££££ here too. Same position as you pistachio. But will add to my annual spends pot for next year for it.

£39 Lidl yesterday
£19 compost
£40 vintage shop 2 jeans and a bike top
more spends I’ve not kept track of
payday Friday so will do better

Farm foods £1.00 per 2 litres of milk.You need to buy 2 each time.£2.00 for 4 litres. A very fair price.We get through 2 litres a day.Supermarkets are now charging £1.65 for 4 pints.

Em sounds like a brilliant day for dh’s birthday, grit your teeth until Wed and wave mil cheerfully goodbye
Pity about dh getting extra gift of Covid

Summer has been spendy, I’m going to do a YNAB fresh start for September. My pots are low for everything

Saw someone out walking this evening with a jacket on, I’m not ready for that yet!

How do revoult pots work? I have a revoult account and it confuses me. How if I use my debit card does it know which pot to take it from? That probably sounds very silly and there's a perfectly reasonable explanation 😆

I've been grabbing my blanket in the evenings on the sofa. Winter is coming as I keep telling OH! (Who thinks I'm potty.)

£12 on metal lunch boxes off vinted. #enabled.
And coz I was spending.... £8 on new measuring spoons from eBay.

Went to DM for the afternoon with DD and she provided tea and snacks which was lovely.

£9 for yoga session later.

Very spendy day today!! My phone gave up the ghost over the weekend and despite resetting to factory settings is now stuck in a loop of turning itself on and off and trying to reset - but it's already done the reset and wants to do it again!! So a new phone has gone on a credit card - but I will move it to 0% once it has all gone through. Could have done without that but I can't even remember how old the phone is - I got it when I was working so has be at least 6 or 7 years old - DH got his at the same time so that could be the next expense!! 😱We looked at two year contracts to buy the same phone but it will end up costing twice as much - so it's a no brainer. But 😡

NSD for the past 2 days thankfully 🤗
Need to get some milk and bread tomorrow, otherwise we have been eating out of the fridge/freezer .
Hope everyone is ok and had a lovely bank holiday weekend 😊

First day back at work today. Stopped at Lidl on the way home £23. Must do a proper shop for tomorrow - likely an Asda click and collect.