Enough Food to Last?
That title was a bit tongue in cheek because, as you can see from the photos, there is more than enough food to last the two of us and the two house guests we are expecting during October, for the month ..... and eating well at that.
As you saw yesterday the freezer is almost full to the top, and the cupboards are also pretty full, although not groaning under the weight of food as they used to be before my Challenge of the first part of this year.
The '365 Days - £365' challenge (see HERE for the blog) really kept me accountable and stopped me buying a lot of unnecessary things. Unfortunately, once I stopped the challenge I found the habit of buying creeping in a little bit once again. So my main aims for 'Stoptober' are to free up cupboard space and nip this excess shopping in the bud.
It shows the space that is now available in the cupboards as I was able to neatly fit in the bargain packs of pasta that I bought last week. Last year they would have had to live on the worktop awaiting a space, or be used before they even saw the inside of a cupboard.
The only food items in a non-foody cupboard are these two jars of coffee, one of which has just been tipped into the coffee canister on the worktop ready for use. I'm so much better than I used to be .... Lovely Hubby used to have to be ready to catch any falling foodstuff each and every time he opened a cupboard door, poor man :-)
So apart from a couple of one pint cartons of milk for emergency use I will be buying nothing now in readiness for my start tomorrow. I do have an Approved Food order that was placed and paid for last week arriving any day. I was tempted by the catering sized bags of Crumble Mix that were well within date so I placed an order using some of my PayPal balance that I accrued selling some clothes last month, but these will be my last foody purchases. Each time I feel the urge to shop I will take a couple of the dogs out for a walk instead ....... leaving my purse firmly at home!!
If you're joining in with Stoptober, and I know a lot of Bloggers are, please leave a short comment and then we can all link to your blog posts by just clicking on your name and finding your Blog. I should have some spare time in the next couple of weeks to read all about your exploits as the work will be starting on the conservatory, and as I can do nothing to help with this apart from supplying teas and coffees to the builders I should have a bit of time to spend on things that I want to do ..... that should be good!
Good luck to everyone that is taking part, and remember it should be fun, not a hardship.
Sue xx
Hi Sue, I haven't stocked up on everything we need foodwise for Stoptober, so I will still be food shopping weekly, but I am trying to keep it minimal and use up what we already have in the cupboards, allotment and freezer.
ReplyDeleteSue, I have a freezer full of mostly meats, so I'm no buying any meat for a while, regardless of the sale price. If I buy anything else, it may need to be thrown out, so I'd waste the pennies I saved. Looks like you are well stocked!
ReplyDeleteHi Sue, my cupboards are like yours BEFORE you consciously downsized so I am using Stoptober to work my way though the supplies and stop feeling quite so overwhelmed by the amount of 'stuff' that I have everywhere. Except for milk and bread I wont need to shop for a week, after that I will need fresh fruit and veg as well. My aim is to empty two freezers by the end of November, and then perhaps get rid of one of them!
ReplyDeleteHi, Sue. I have full cupboards and freezer and plenty of loo paper, washing gel, toothpaste etc after a stock up using money off codes for Tesco and vouchers for Aldi. I should only need to buy fresh fruit and veg, milk and bread this month so I'm definitely joining in the Stoptober challenge as I didn't do quite as well as I'd hoped during September..
ReplyDeleteI'm joining in too. We went to produce market on Sunday , and bought $28 of vegies. So last night we had broccoli cheddar soup. And the night before used some potatoes to go with crock pot pork. ( I'd never made pork chops in the crock pot and they were good). Tonight we may go out as it's my birth day, but usually I don't like to spend the money for takeout. I have some nice arugula to use and lots of squashes too. Payday is this week and I'm going to only take $100 for groceries. I have lots of pasta, and can make bread too. So hopefully this will be a low spend month on food.
ReplyDeleteMy Stoptober Challenge will be to carry on with my Low/No spend and to stop buying excessive amounts of food and use up what we have. I will do a stocktake tomorrow to see whats in the cupboards and freezers but at a glance I kniw we have more than enough To see us through the month with just the fresh stuff to buy.
ReplyDeleteGood luck to everyone taking part. Xx
I heartily approve of not splashing out on unnecessary shopping, and I can see you live on a busy main road, not too far from a town, but can I add a note of caution before the winter arrives properly? We have lived in Wales for 26 years, and much further south than you (so it should be warmer), but I soon learned during our first year here that what I thought was a good stockpile back in Dorset, wouldn't do here. We sometimes have such dreadful weather - usually of the wetter variety, when our river floods, but sometimes it will snow like the bejeebers when we are not expecting it - and it pays to have a very well stocked store cupboard, especially for animal food. It doesn't do to get as near to running out as we did a couple of years back when we were snowed in for the best part of a week. OK - a week is nothing you are thinking, but just in my experience try not to run things on bare minimum - e.g. towards the end of a month perhaps. My husband wasn't too thrilled to go out in heavy snow with a rucksack on his back to get a sack of cat biscuits and some tins . . . we have several cats I might add. As that was the year even the M4 was shut by snow, bad weather can have quite an impact.
ReplyDeleteGood luck with your Stobtober savings.
Hi sue,
ReplyDeleteI am going to take part and 'blog' about stoptober on my diary on moneysaving expert. Here: http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=5065449
Unfortunately I can no longer blog on mortgage free journey due to it being read by people in real life and causing arguments but I needed an outlet so this was the next best thing. I'm still on my journey, still saving and still inspired by your blog. Let stoptober begin :-)
ReplyDeleteStoptober starts tomorrow! No spend month! however, I have saved to have a wood stove installed and have paid for a log delivery - it's a cheat but we'll need the heating soon enough froogs xx
ReplyDeleteNo spending here in October because of the work being done to the boiler. We're stocked up for the month in food, pet food and toiletries. We have two weeks of school holidays but will fill it with picnics, long walks, reading, watching dvds etc. It will be worth it to have the heating and hot water working again - can't manage without it in the north of Scotland!
ReplyDeleteNo spending this coming week here at Sarina`s Frugal Towers as we are trying to live off the freezers until we go on a 2 week Moroccan holiday. Once back from holiday we shall continue to raid the freezers as much as possible. There might be a few basics to stock up on when we come home, but that`s it then, and we hope to continue this way until the end of October. My kitchen is well stocked with most necessaries and we should be able to make ends meet fairly easily for the rest of October. Now we must get cases packed for the holiday, so some washing and ironing to do until we leave on Saturday.
ReplyDeleteI'm ready for Stopover but will still have to buy fresh food but not a lot mainly milk which is ironic as up to 2011 we use to have about 3000litres in the yard everyday when we milked cows.
ReplyDeleteI have worked through September spending as little as i can, cupboards were groaning under the strain and freezer drawers were filled tightly. I will carry on through October and only buy what fresh stuff I have to. I will not be running everything down to the bare minimum, I have been snowed in a few times. At the beginning of November I will do a winter shop of basics and make sure that I can get through whatever the weather throws at us.
ReplyDeleteI wasn't expecting a comment on my diary sue! Thankyou! So motivated, this is just at the right time for me :-)
ReplyDeleteToday's plan - spend nothing, phone utilities and tell them of house move (and hopefully get some refunds) and organise things to do with renting house out.
Good luck everyone x
Wish I was as organised as you but your pantry photos have given me the urge to go and sort mine out. Think it is yearly moth season as have seen a couple lurking in the kitchen and I could not face the thought of them getting in foodstuffs again. Do you have pantry moths over there or is it an Australian thing I wonder?
ReplyDeleteRuth
I have so much to learn. I will be following all your pursuits very carefully this month!
ReplyDelete