Pumpkins, Pies… and Prudence! Autumn Frugal Saving Shenanigans here 🍂🌰All Welcome 🌰🍁

[MaryGreenhill]

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 we are all friends 😊

@Mochi1fudgegood to see you 🤗
@Frugal25that was so nice of your DH to pay your Uber bless him.
Spends today Lidl £17
Asda £12
Have a lovely day everyone 😊
Forgive the double post it looked like my first post hadn't posted 😁

Hello. I am returning (again) after a not great month. Payday was yesterday so it seems a good time to try again.
Today hasn’t got off to the best start as I had to get an uber into central london this morning so not to miss a train. However I had promised myself a slightly unnecessary uber ride later this week so I will just disallow that and take public transport instead. Will sort of balance out!

Im visiting family this weekend and we going to the football later but it should be a fairly cheap one as I’ve already paid for the tickets.

I hope everyone is ok.
I will try and catch up on the thread over the weekend.

I have to be exceptionally frugal this month. I have a hefty CC bill thanks to our naughty and beloved cat who scared the daylights out of us by bleeding from her bottom. Extensive vet tests later revealed cause unknown thankfully, but it was an unexpected headache. And from December 1 we lose 70% of our income for various reasons for a period of time unknown.

We are well stocked with tins and freezer food and cat food so I am trying to not buy any groceries for... 2 weeks is the aim. Although we need bread so I might be using the Too Good To Go app because our local wonderful bakery is on it.

Good to see you @SockHop
Have a lovely weekend 🤗

My little one will be 3 next week. I looked again at the farm park annual pass. For a termtime one, it's £79 each. non term time it's £144. I think it would be good value for term time. DH disagrees and thinks it's not good value and would make me feel like we always have to go. It advertises 22p a day, obviously, we're not going every day and a toddler can't go alone so that's 44p really. It's got a big indoor soft play and an outdoor water play so I think he's a great age for it. I have him 2 weekdays a week. BUT I'm also considering putting him in 9-3 nursery on one of my non working days as it's free and he's not using his full intilalment. BUT I dropped a day of work to spend more time with him. BUT also to collect DD from school more often.

Dialemas.
Financially, I got a good payslip as I had swapped a weekend overtime shift across months so did 3 instead of 2... last month I did 1. I have given away Tomorrows shift, so it will be 1 again this week. I can pick up more relatively easily. They are more significant then overthinking a farm pass!

And softplay is expensive round here

Today was about £11 in Waitrose. I bought some refills for my new mop and a few odd bits. Am failing on the eating from the freezer and cupboards. The Ottolenghi range is on offer so I feel I might be making a return trip.

Hope you had a glorious lunch with you friend today @Frugal25.

Lots of rain here today too @MaryGreenhill. Last night I looked out the window thinking it was hail but it was just very heavy rain. And thunder and lightning. With some wind thrown in.

That’s one thing that puts me off using TGTG @JustStopItNora. I’m not a bread fan but all the bakeries here give bread in their bags. I still have some in the freezer from last December. I hope you get what you want in yours.

Happy birthday for next week little @Alwayslearning25. If soft play is expensive and you think you’ll go £79 doesn’t seem so bad. I use my annual gallery membership far more than I imagined.

Quiet day today. Have done nothing constructive. Feel like reading but am too lazy to get up off the sofa and get a book.

Oh l love the Ottolenghi stuff l didn't realise it was on offer @RumBananaSundae l must make an effort to go to Waitrose thanks for the heads up 🤗
The rain was like snow it was so heavy here honestly !
I hope you had a lovely lunch with your friend too @Frugal25☺️
TGTG bags are nice now and again but it's very samey , at least it seems to be here @Alwayslearning25
The annual fee seems very good to me tbh but it is something that you will feel like you need to attend because you have paid for it l think .
Good luck with your spending this month @JustStopItNora
It's been like this for a lot of us this month tbh 🙄

It's just started raining here after a glorious day of sunshine so much that no one needed a coat.

Ended up paying £47 for lunch. I had a salad (£17!) and some wine.

@JustStopItNora so sorry about your cat but so glad you found nothing wrong.

Oh l completely missed about your cat @JustStopItNora l am so glad they are ok 😊
Sorry to hear about the reduction in your income minus 70% is huge .
I hope that changes very quickly for you 💐
That was an expensive lunch @Frugal25but as long as you enjoyed it that's the main thing. 😊

My daughters blue Peter badge came through. My cousin had been telling me to apply for one for ages as her daughter has one. Unlike in the past, they are not rare trophies, but easy to apply for and they give the child free access to some days out, age 5-15.

Hello y’all

checking in.

half term has been fun…..

managed to spend not much money which is good. £50 Halloween costumes for the dc and DH.

we had a party at home. DH pulled an absolute blinder and managed to feed 20 people (10 adults 10 kids) from basically our freezer and pantry. No idea how. But he did it.

weather was kind to us so we bbqd. Also managed to get rid of a lot of alcohol we had in the house. In total I think we maybe spent £50 on the party.

Welcome back @SockHop im also hoping for a frugal couple of weeks.

@Alwayslearning25 i think get it for a year as a trial. I’m debating our gym and pool membership. We really don’t use it much but do get discounted camp and swimming lessons for it. Thinking I might just sign up myself as we get free guest passes that DH could use. We moved small child to midweek classes which means we just don’t go as often as we used to get some alone time there when lessons were on

today was €331 on small child’s school party. She had a ball so money well spent and I’m slamming shut the purse strings for her now.

unfortunately found out today we have a leak in our hot press. It’s not a bad one and is isolated but a plumber will have to paid. Hoping they come in Tuesday or Wednesday to fix it. Hoping it’s just a fix.

@Alwayslearning25 per visit I think it's worth it even for once per month and you might use it more than that. When DD was in nursery we had NT membership as we are within five minutes drive of a property. We used to visit the play area and have a walk on my NWD, just for a couple of hours.

@JustStopItNora good luck with the cutting back and pleased your cat is okay.

@MaryGreenhill hope the rain calms down!

@ememem84 sounds a great party.

Shopping today but got some bargains. Boots..Got two lipsticks and two eyeshadows for £17 with 3 for 2 and also a £10 voucher.
M&S £21 pair of jeans which I used a £25 voucher against.
Lidl £22.92 pizza ingredients
Amazon £5.99

Weather has been kind here, cool but dry so made homemade pizzas in the Ninja Outdoor Oven. Very good for a first try and quite a social thing to do as DC did their own toppings, can see that saving us money on takeaways.

Haven't posted for a while, have had a full on time supporting my parents. Their house move still hasn't happened and dad becomes progressively more confused so it is really tough. We are in a much better position financially as DD is working in Germany for 6 months so we are not paying her rent! I am 12 months and 2 weeks from taking my NHS 1995 pension in full which is very exciting. I'm hoping to reduce from 4 days a week to 3 but will see what work say.
Going to Germany to visit DD and from there to Berlin where ds will meet us to celebrate dds 21st 🤩

Party sounds great em

i would get the farm pass. Especially if it’s got indoor and outdoor stuff for over winter

north ❤️ elderly relatives are hard. Yeah for dd in Germany but 21! Wow

I would definitely get the pass @Alwayslearning25 because as long as you take your own drinks and food it's an easy day out, especially on rainy days.

I have to do a deliveroo for some things today which is annoying as everything is so so expensive on there. But I need washing pods, shampoo and conditioner, tampons etc.

Morning! I’d also get the pass, we had similar when mine were tots and knowing we could go somewhere fun for no cost on the day really helped me get out and about.

I’ve just been adding Christmas presents and stocking bits to my Amazon basket, it added up very quickly! So I’ve left it to sit for now.

I’ve ordered a jacket for dh for Christmas and some thermal leggings for me from regatta, should be £60 total once I’ve sent back the extras. I use Klarna so I can buy more sizes and styles and return them. I got a 15% key worker discount so that was good!

Ocado are coming today, £82.76. It was going to be cheaper but I added some balsam tissues and some apothecary handwash that was on offer.

im going to aim to keep my food shopping under £500 for November and my amazon shopping under £200. See how that goes!

Slinking back into the thread after quite a bit of time away.

Change in finances has meant I need to rejoin. On the plus side, I’m quite time rich at the moment (I may regret saying that and it won’t be long term) so have the time to stop paying for stuff out of convenience.

Defo take your own food and drink to the farm. So many options for pic nics.

£43.40 garage for petrol, £5 snacks

£7.97 co-op
£2.85 Starbucks (free drink on the app)
£6.80 Starbucks (takeaway drink for DD!)

LSD at least.

Eyeing up the beauty advent calendars for DD - Boots have the MacMillan calendar on half price 🤔

Nsd today. I think I'll get the pass next weekend as I have plans for this week.

My frugal Christmas tip is reuse Lego advent calendar. DD (7 years old) got a new one (Lego friends) last year. She asked to do her original city one she first got when she was 2 or 3 years old. DS can do the Lego friends one.

I peeled all the potatoes and carrots today, we had half for dinner and half are in the freezer for Christmas. My Christmas food deliver is getting smaller and smaller as I’m chipping away at it.

I’ve got hydrotherapy tomorrow in another town and might do the retail park there for some stocking bits as I think it’ll be cheaper than Amazon prices and I’ll be there anyway.

We went on half term holiday to the new forest last week, spent about £105 on beaulie and Hurst castle entrance and ferry. And about £90 at supermarkets for takeaway lunches. pub lunch £53, £43.indian takeaway and coffees £15 out for a family of 4. We had w days in beaulie and could go back within a year for free.

That seem like very reasonable half term spending!