Do I Still Do the Things

I've been asked a couple of times if I still do any of the things I used to post about on my various Challenge blogs and on here ... well the answer is a resounding YES  :-)

As you can see from the top photo I religiously check after I have shopped at Asda to make full use of their Asda Price Guarantee thingy.  They don't advertise this anymore either in store or on the receipts, but it is still very much in operation.  Nine times out of ten I get a voucher after I check my receipt online.  

We still get our Tesco Clubcard vouchers, and make good use of them to buy things that we can't grow or produce ourselves.  Although we have now cancelled our Tesco credit card and use just one credit card to keep things simpler (of course paying it off in full every month).

We went out to buy Alan some new jeans the other day as he has lost weight and was having real trouble keeping his jeans up, at the checkout we were given this voucher along with our receipt ...

... when we got home our latest quarterly Marks and Spencer's vouchers were laying on the doormat. 

So if I put one with the other and I will be able to get £35 worth of food for just £15.  Yes ... a little happy dance was danced :-)

Oh and although I have stopped buying this magazine on subscription, I just couldn't resist this offer when I was in Tesco the other night after the Trelawnyd Flower Show,  I must have had growing things still on my mind.

But I just couldn't say no to almost £24 worth of free seeds and a free dvd (which isn't brilliant but I did get a good recipe from it for Cucumber Pickle).

Inside the magazine was this, now the question is  ... can I resist the thought of another £36 worth of seeds and three copies of the magazine for just £5 ?  You just have to be very careful to cancel the subscription before they take the next payment out, something they are relying on you not to do.

So as this all shows I am still a sucker for coupons, vouchers and freebies ... but as hobbies go this isn't so bad  :-)

Sue xx

Saving and Splurging

I got these through the post the week before last, usually they would have been put into my purse and stayed in there briefly, tempting me to go to Tesco to stock up on things we perhaps didn't really need.  Not this time.  At the moment we are busy stockpiling, coupons, vouchers and Nectar points ready for next year ... because we've decided on our Challenge!!

We're doing 'A Year Without ....', a few of you might have noticed a new blog appear on my list of blogs, there's nothing to read over there yet, but I wanted to secure the name before someone else snaffled it.  We are planning a real push into paying off the mortgage and have decided a whole year of minimal spending will be the best way to do this and will also allow us to have a trial of living on a limited income, which of course we will be doing for good once Lovely Hubby gives up the day job.

It will hopefully, also be a way for us to see what our strengths and successes are, as well as seeing what else we need to do to get ourselves as self sufficient as possible for the years ahead.

I'm hoping to run the blog alongside this one and along the lines of last years additional blog which was '365 Days - £365'.  This link takes you right back to the start of that challenge and it's been where I started reading from over the last few days, trying to garner a bit of inspiration for next year.

One thing I most definitely will not be doing next year is spending .....

... £9.99 on a jar of pickles.

I couldn't resist these when I was out with Mum last week, and at first I thought I had really spent over the odds, but out shopping over the weekend I spied a less than half sized jar for £4  so not too bad really.  My main reason for buying them, apart from the fact that we love giant 'chip shop style' pickles, is that I will be able to use the jar over and over again in the future and pickle some our own larger onions.  

So not so much a splurge as an investment in our future ...

... well that's my excuse anyway and I'm sticking to it  ;-)

Sue xx

Gone to Pot

 

Since ending my other Blog '365 Days - £365' recently my spending has gone to pot.

 

Yes, I'm still using my coupons, vouchers and points but not having to be accountable to myself and the blog has meant that I have on occasion bought more than I should, more than I want to and more importantly more than I need to.

 

I need to reign it in big style ..... so in the interests of running down the large chest freezer and breaking this spending habit I have decided to have a No Spend/Low Spend September.  I will only be buying the absolute necessities of everything food wise and absolutely NO books, clothes or other bits and pieces.  As we still have a bit of August left I could go out and buy in what I think we will run out of .... but I won't !!  I have enough, more than enough in the cupboards and freezers to cobble together anything that gets used up. 

 

Bread - no problem, I have flour and yeast.  Biscuits - no problem, I have flour and oats and butter.  Fresh fruit - no problem, I have frozen berries and rhubarb in the freezer an apples on the tree.  You get the picture.  I also have quite a lot of frozen vegetables, so before any fresh veg is bought they will be used up.  The only thing I will have to buy regularly is some milk for Lovely Hubby's coffee, but that's only a couple of pints a week, I don't need to stress about that.

 

I have to do something for my own sanity.  I have gotten out of control so quickly it was worrying, well worrying to me anyway.  From spending £3 here and £4.50 there to suddenly spending £30 to £40 pounds every week it was a shocker.  

 

Coming up soon is our mortgage overpayment, we are allowed to pay a 10% overpayment each year without any penalty and to be able to add the money that would have been spent on food for September to the amount we have saved to do this would be fantastic.

 

 

This photo shows why Suky IS on a diet!!

 

 

 While the weather was hot and we couldn't walk her much, playing with Charley has been getting her nicely breathless a couple of times a day.

 

 

... and she loves it!!

 

I hope you won't get fed up (and I apologise to my brother) but I have a feeling that this Blog will be all about food and saving money next month, I should be able to squeeze in a few doggy photos though, the baby is growing very quickly  :-)

 

Sue xx



Dorset Cereals

 

Look what arrived by courier today :-)

 

 

In their own lovely packaging .....

 

... which carries the message that suits our lifestyle so well.

 

Lots of lovely cereals ...

 

... porridges ...

 

... mueslis ....

 

 

... and granolas.

 

 

Enough cereals to keep us happy and very well fed for a long, long time.

 

I have to say a BIG thank you to Dorset Cereals for sending me this lovely package full of their goodies and an even BIGGER thank you to each and every one of you who voted for me in the Little Blog of the Month Awards last month.

 

I'm so happy with my huge cereal stash, it'll help out with the '365 Days - £365 Challenge' magnificently, and thanks to that Challenge there is room in the cupboards to store this little lot.

 

Thank you again.

 

Sue xx

My Challenges, Your Challenges

 

 

There are so many of us challenging ourselves to do so many different things this year.  It can be an amazing whirl around Blog land to gather inspiration.  Most of us are doing the Challenges to help us save money and also to focus on aspects of our lives that we want to improve on.

 

My sidebar is full of fellow Bloggers and Blogging Buddies and their challenges, and I love, love, love to visit them regularly to seek inspiration and as so many of them are similar to things that I do myself they also help keep me on the straight and narrow.   

 

Just to pluck three Blogs out of the air I can think of SFT's  Life After Mortgage and her amazing on-going Sealed Pot Challenge, it's being involved in this that has given me the inspiration for this and last years main Challenges, then there is Elaine over at Mortgage Free in Three with her mission to pay off her mortgage in just three years (we are now rather excitingly into the third and final year) and the similarly titled and equally inspiring Stacey over at Mortgage Free Journey.  These and lots of others including the royalty of frugal blogs Froogs (Frugal Queen), Ilona (MeanQueen) and another favourite of mine Laura at No More Spending, with her brilliant monthly round ups and 'food porn' pictures give me and so many others ideas and useful tips.

 

What's your favourite Blog read of the moment?

 

(And please don't cop out and say it's mine, I'm not after praise, just knowing you're here reading and commenting is praise enough ... you really are keeping me on the straight and narrow.)  

 

 Is there a Blog you have just discovered or that has just recently started.  If you love your own the most or would just like a few more folk to visit it to make their own minds up about it please don't be bashful ... let us have a link to it, (or by simply leaving a comment we have the ability to find you through simply clicking on your name). 

 

Lets keep the inspiration flowing around Blogland and save money in the process.

 

Sue xx

The New Blog

 

The new Blog is really keeping me on track, making me stop for a moment and re-think everything to do with food. 

 

 

When you have little or no money to actually spend on food you don't waste a single thing. 

 

Earlier when rolling out slightly thinner the pastry in the pack above,  which has been languishing in the freezer for I don't know how long, I did my usual thing of putting all the tiny trimmings, and there really weren't many, straight into the bowl to take out to the chickens later.   I quickly pulled myself up short. 

 

 Luckily the bowl was clean so I fished them back out squidged them together in my fingers and rolled the little ball of dough out flat, taking a large pinch of grated cheese I pulled the pastry up around it and then re-rolled so the cheese was trapped in the middle, then cutting out with one of my smallest biscuit cutters I managed to make five of the cutest little savoury biscuits you ever did see.

 

A quick brush over with a trace of milk and a sprinkle of Paprika and sesame seeds and I had a perfect little snack for later .... unfortunately the chickens missed out on their favourite little treat!!

 

I've put a link in the right hand sidebar to get you (and me) over there quicker.

 

Sue xx

365 Days - 365 Pounds



We've been having a few Internet problems, due we think mainly to the really bad weather, all seems sorted now but Lovely Hubby needs the main computer for most of the next couple of days to do our end of quarter accounts, not his favourite job in the world but a very necessary one if you have your own business.

Leaving him to it upstairs in the office, means that I have commandeered the old laptop and am sat in the rather chilly conservatory struggling with it, I will go and get a cardi in a minute to warm me up before my fingers go blue!!  This dinosaur of a computer means blogging in any normal way is limited and time consuming, for a start certain letters are, and always have been, swapped with each other for example if you want a '@' you have to hit a capital 2, there is NO pound sign hence the word pound in the title of this post when the idea of it is to introduce my brand new Blog to you all .... which rather frustratingly (at the moment) has a pound sign in the title!! 

There are actually no posts on it yet, there should have been once for each of the last two days but having no internet connection has meant that they will be forever missing, but the two main pages have been set up and I thought while I am absent you could have a little read and find out all about my brand new Challenge for 2014.

I don't know if I can actually do it, whilst I was dreaming it up I went from absolute certainty that I could to horror that I would even try.  But if nothing else I am a trier and it will cost me nothing to give it a go, so in the optimistic frame of mind that I usually have and that is present at the moment I will give it my best shot. 

Use this  link -  http://365days365pounds.blogspot.co.uk/  to nip over and have a read if you are interested, and I would be very interested in your opinions on the idea.  There are at the moment just the two pages that explain the concept and plans behind the Challenge 'My Aim for This Year' and Rules and Extras', this should give you a good idea of my plans.

  A bit more work will be done to the new Blog when I can get at it, a blog list of some of the Blogs that have inspired me for instance and any other links you may think should be there.  My mind is blank at the moment and full of frustration at this bl**dy dinosaur of a laptop (yay .... the ** were in the right place) so for now I am signing off and going out to clean out the henhouse .... at least I know where the chicken shit is!!

Sue xx