HELP !! i appear to be near to tears over lunchbox contents

[MrsMorgan]

I do have pmt, so that may have some bearing it, but fgs, I seem to be spending a fortune.

3 dc, two and primary school, and one at secondary school. All have been on free school meals for the past few years (single parent).
I now have a job and so i'm not entitled to them anymore, and can't afford to pay for the school lunches, so we all will now need a packed lunch every day.

I am sat now trying to do an online shop and it seems to be costing my rather alot. What am I doing wrong ? What do you all spend on packed lunches ??

Yay... DS had the first packed lunch and said he was very happy and he felt full. Success.

bumping this for next week as dd1 had her first week of school last week and this thread helped me plan. school dinners are grim here, lots of nasty prepackaged/repeated shite at over £9 a week.

I got a jigsaw shaped sandwich cutter from lakeland over the holidays and she has
cheese marmite/peanut butter sandwich
fruit, either blueberries from aldi, grapes or whole Apple
banana bread made in a silicon cup cake case OR plain popcorn made in microwave
bottle tap water
frozen yoghurt tube.
I split the luncheon into sections using the other cupcake cases so it looks pretty, has conned dd into eating the lot!

I also cut some cheese with a butterfly cookie cutter, went down so well dd ended up in row with her friends because she wouldn't share.

raisin nut flapjacks in oven now ready for next week and some cocktail sausages.

at luncheon, get me, fucking autocomplete on my phone!

Right.... am on a mission this weekend to make flapjacks. Thanks to the ladies that posted the recipes, will let you know how I get on.

I decided to save money by making DH, DD and DS packed lunches instead of spending £30.00 a week on school dinners/pasties etc for DH, I saved 11p, packed lunches that my lot will actually eat are expensive.

Wow... really. So what have you given them?

Bread from bakers £3.50
Ham from Butchers £2.50
Can of Tuna £1.19
cheese £2.50
10x smoothies £5.00
16x yoghurts £6.00
2 bags apples £2.00
Cucumber 70p
Cherry tomatoes 50p
Crisps £2.00
Mini-mini rolls tub £2.00
Butter £2.00
Haven't included mayo as we had it in.
DH has ham or tuna roll or sandwich with cucumber, apple, crisps, yoghurt, couple of mini rolls.

DD has same sandwich as DH, apple for healthy snack, smoothie, yoghurt, cheese cubes and 2x mini roll for break.

DS has cheese sandwich, smoothie, yoghurt, cucumber and tomatoes and 2x mini rolls.

I know we would use some of the bread and butter anyway, but nowhere near as much. There will be a packet of crisps, a yoghurt and some mini rolls left but DH will prob eat them at the weekend so they won't roll over to next week.
The smoothies and yoghurts were on offer too so would normally cost more. I know I could get cheaper bread and meat but it would be nowhere near the same quality and probably wouldn't get eaten.

Wow, that's a lot.

Have done this week we had

Bread £1 a loaf
peanut butter £1 (obviously only part of a jar)
cheese slices (with marmite)75p
home made raisin flapjack 50p ish for whole week
Blueberries £1
Grapes £1
satsumas £1 a bag
cocktail sausages £2
toy story frubes 9 for £1
home made popcorn pence
few carrots 39p

under a tenner (most from aldi)