How Low Can You Go Challenge: Day 21-25

Yay, we've finally been paid!  Very exciting!!  Had a bad few days on the takeaway though - I should buy a packet of frozen pies or something to keep in the freezer for the times when its too tempting to get junk fod.

Wednesday - stayed home, no spending!

Thursday - we had a scheduled trip to the chiropractor, then used some vouchers to have lunch at Hungry Jacks ($10).  Called into the fish markets while we were down there ($38), and then Aldi on the way home for butter, milk, bread & rolls ($10)

Friday - we had our homeschool excursion to the macadamia farm - the tour was free, but we spent $10 on goodies at the shop (it was only fair lol!)

Saturday - stayed home, veged out all day - but still managed to spend!  Ordered takeaway pizza for tea because I had the lazies. ($23)

Sunday - Billy & I were out in the rain for the ANZAC Day march, and bought takeaway for lunch to take home to warm us up :(  ($25)

Monday - stayed home so no spending

Running total - Food - $321.29, extras - $212.95.


The cupboard is looking very bare atm and we have a very busy week coming up.  I'm planning on doing a full shop tomorrow using next month's grocery money or we'll just end up getting more takeaway. 

How Low Can You Go Challenge: Day 15-20

A very brief summary as I've forgotten most of the details..

Friday - stayed home, no spend

Saturday - Steamfest $20 in entry fees & lunch (could have avoided buying lunch - but it smelt so good lol)

Sunday - We arrived home from Billy's cousin's b'day party about dinner time, and I did not feel like cooking. Could have been avoided but it was me or the money :) $20

Monday - $10 martial arts

Tuesday - $35.50 fruit, vege & eggs, $6 archery

Running total - Food - $215.29, extras (budgeted) - $202.95.

Still no payment from our client so have had to dip into savings... :(

How Low Can You Go Challenge: Day 11-14

It's been an expensive few days! but generally all budgeted for.

Monday - $35.55 Cubs uniform, $35.50 fruit, vege & eggs and $10 martial arts

Tuesday - the Home ice-cream van did its rounds, so we couldn't resist the lure of the bell :) $6.90

Wednesday was an expensive day! We caught the train to Newcastle ($10.40), went to a kid's play, bought a programme & magic wand ($8), ate lunch out ($9) and then caught the train back.

The play was excellent though and it was all budgeted for.

On the way home, we called into KMart and bought Billy a new pair of footy boots and some socks ($33). Then into Foodworks for butter, ham & soft drink ($31.39) - not all budgeted for, but we resisted pretty well!

Thursday wasn't much better! Billy had a science workshop in Newcastle ($70), and while he was there, I had to go shopping for b'day presents. They come out of the gift budget account so I won't count them - they came in on budget though. I bought lunch out of my spending money - I should've been good and taken lunch with me, but I didn't.... The spending challenge did stop me buying a few things that I looked at and would've bought, but didn't need.

Running total - Food - $139.79, extras (budgeted) - $186.95.

I can't really remember what we've been eating each night, but we did make a very nice upside apple cake (adapted from an upside pineapple cake recipe Billy found on taste.com.au). Oh and I pulled some sweet & sour sauce out of the freezer that I made a while ago and made sweet & sour pork one night.

Head on over and give my friends who are also attempting the challenge some encouragement too - Korina and Renelle.

How Low Can You Go Challenge: Day 8, 9 and 10

Spending over the last couple of days:

$4 bread
$10 martial arts
$5 soft drink for Pete

Running total - Food - $57, extras (budgeted) - $20.

For Friday's dinner I made the most delicious bolognaise sauce and Billy & I made fresh pasta to go along with it. Yummy! With the sauce, I used beef stock instead of the red wine, and also added a rasher of bacon and a couple of sliced mushrooms. It was really rich and tomatoey. Even better, the recipe made enough for half of it to go in the freezer for another night.

Saturday night Pete had a mate over to watch the football, so for dinner we made a couple of homemade pizzas (ham & pineapple, and a meatlovers style with ham, bacon, frankfurt, mushroom & tomato, plus a small garlic pizza). For dessert we made golden syrup dumplings and homemade ice-cream. The ice-cream didn't set properly, but it was nice with the dumplings anyway. There were not a lot of leftovers from the meal!!

Tonight was pork chops, mashed potatoes, squash, zucchini and carrots.

Lunches have been toasted sandwiches or leftovers.

Oh and someone asked about Mountain Bread - it's a flatbread that can be used for wraps etc. Quite versatile!

Camera Fund

Yesterday, to my utter dismay, I dropped my camera on the wooden floor.. Fortunately it still works - as in it still takes photos. Unfortunately, the clips that hold the battery flap closed broke off, so the flap needs to be held shut with packing tape. Not ideal... Especially when you need to change batteries while out.. "Hang on while I just tape my camera back together..." :)

I don't want to depress myself too much, so I've only had a cursory search to find out how much I'll be up for. I very much doubt it would be able to be fixed as the clips are part of the main camera case. It looks like I can probably get a similar quality one for about $600 - $700.

One the plus side, I have been wanting a new camera for a while (esp since I tried my mum's with the 20x zoom - and mine still has a 10x zoom). This will just focus my savings intent!

So I'm starting the 'Camera Fund' to save up - and hopefully my old one will keep working with tape until then!!

I have some ebay auctions up atm that are doing quite well (for books), so that'll be the first deposit when they finish.

How Low Can You Go Challenge: Day 5, 6 and 7

We had to go out to the library on Tuesday so while we were out I ducked into Aldi for 5kg flour and 4L milk. Oh, and then I put some sausages & buns in the trolley as well because I was feeling lazy and wanted something quick & easy to cook for tea before I went to yoga. And the apple juice that DH asked for - he's cutting down on diet cola so I was happy to help with that! All up $18 - not too bad - the flour should last the rest of the month and the milk will last a couple of weeks (I put one 2L carton in the freezer).

My box of fruit & vege arrived yesterday - I'd already paid for it online but I'll count it in here. The produce looks quite good quality and will force me to be a bit creative as there's a few things I rarely buy (button squash, zucchini, mushrooms). It was light on our staple of potatoes, but that's not a bad thing - it'll break me out of my comfort zone! $30

Lunch for me was chicken noodle soup using the chicken stock I made the other day and toasted sandwiches for the boys. Dinner was chicken schnitzel made using our home-made breadcrumbs with chips.

Today we went to visit friends for morning tea and made some gingerbread men to take to share. The kids then decorated them while we were there which was fun :) Lunch was the leftover sausages from Tue night, and dinner tonight was beef stirfry using the last of the hoisin sauce and the last of a packet of stirfry frozen veges. I'm slowly but surely using up odds and ends.

The only spending today was $10 for Billy's martial arts.

Running total - Food - $48, extras - $10.

Oh and I figured out how to set the timer on the washing machine so that it starts about 6am and finishes before the off-peak price period ends. Now to figure out if I can turn off the little tune that it plays as well!!

How Low Can You Go Challenge: Day 3 & 4

It's certainly a lot easier to not spend when you're staying at home :)

No spending again for the last 2 days - we've been busy decluttering our spare room, so I've listed a heap of books on ebay. Hopefully I can even make some money today! I've given away a lot of books on Freecycle as well.

We ran out of milk but I've survived with powdered milk in my tea. I've been fairly busy in the kitchen:

• making crackers out of Mountain Bread (cut mountain bread into smaller bits, put on an oven tray, spray with oil and sprinkle with salt - stick in the oven for a few minutes until the desired crispness),
  
  
• starting to make breadcrumbs out of the crusts of bread in the freezer - I put the bread in the oven tonight to dry out while tea was cooking; will stick it in the blender tomorrow,
  
  
• I made my own BBQ sauce to go on the pork ribs we had for tea tonight. I had to substitute a few ingredients, but all in all it was quite yummy!
  
  
• I made chicken stock out of the leftover chicken carcass from lunch the other day.
  

Speaking of food - does anyone have any ideas for what I can do with a can of chickpeas in the cupboard? We're legume novices, so something innocuous looking that we'll eat!

How Low Can You Go Challenge: Day 2

Another no-spend day today.

Pete's parents came out to visit us for lunch and brought along a BBQ chook and some buns, so we had chicken & salad rolls. I also made hot cross buns for afternoon tea which were pretty yummy! (based on this recipe on taste.com.au)

We'd had a large lunch so we didn't feel like much dinner - we made do with leftovers.

So a very frugal day. Unfortunately I've used up the last of the plain flour now so will have to buy some in the near future - I do have enough bread mixture made up for another 3 loaves though, so will put it off as long as I can. We're also running short on milk.

How did everyone else go?

How Low Can You Go Challenge: Day 1

Today was a good day for spending - we didn't go anywhere :)

I made some vege soup for lunch with a can of tomatoes, some stock & celery from the freezer, a couple of carrots and some herbs & spices. It proved quite adequate with a freshly baked baguette - I started back making bread a couple of weeks ago from the Artisan Bread in 5 minutes a day book. I don't try to make all the bread we eat, but its nice every few days when I have the time to make a loaf fresh for lunch.

Dinner was crumbed fish from the freezer with home-made chips.

Thanks for everyone's good luck wishes!

Grocery Challenge Wk 4 and 5 of 6

The Challenge: To only spend $25 / week on groceries for the next 6 weeks.

The Result (Wk 4):

I wasn't supposed to spend any money this week at all, since I doubled-up last week. I couldn't resist the siren call of the ice-cream truck though :( (Or more to the point, the nagging of the child who heard the ice-cream truck!)
Spent $6 - tub of ice-cream, $4.70 - eggs

The Result (Wk 5):

Well, the peasants are revolting... I've decided to cut the challenge short. The immediate aim - to get us over a shortfall in the bank account - has been met, and I'm getting the vibe that I need to spend again!! At the end of this week I'll go back to "normal" spending. I might need to do another smaller challenge in a month or so - it depends if clients start paying their bills!

Spent $29.95 at Aldi - Eggs, cereal, cheese, salad veges, potatoes, bread.

Total Spent:

Groceries: $133.80 / 5 weeks = $26.76 average / week. Pretty good!

I have $100 in the "butcher" envelope ready to stock up on meat.

It's been a valuable exercise, it achieved it's aim, but now it's time to start restocking on staples - and add a few luxuries back in for the poor family members :)

Grocery Challenge Wk 3 of 6

The Challenge: To only spend $25 / week on groceries for the next 6 weeks.

The Result (Wk 3):

Shopping weekly makes it really hard to be cost-effective, so I grabbed next week's money as well. So no spending at all next week!

Spent $50.85 - chicken pieces, milk, bread, flour, butter, cream, cheese, eggs, potatoes, apples, tomatoes, lettuce, & donuts (donuts?! How did that sneak into essentials??! lol)

Balance:

Groceries: $7.70+$50-$50.85=$6.85
"Stash": $100
Meat money: $40

Grocery Challenge Wk 2 of 6

The Challenge: To only spend $25 / week on groceries for the next 6 weeks.

The Result (Wk 2):

Spent $14.60 on cheese, bread & a bottle of pepsi for the invalid on Sunday.
Spent $8.95 on noodles, bread & butter on Thursday.

Balance:

Groceries: $6.25+$25=$31.25-$14.60-$8.95=$7.70 (into change jar)
"Stash": $100
Meat money: $20

Grocery Challenge Wk 1 of 6

The Challenge: To only spend $25 / week on groceries for the next 6 weeks.

The Result (Wk 1):

I was doing quite well in the start of the week - spent $18.75 on fruit, eggs & bread at the fruit shop on Tuesday.

Things fell off on Thursday though. Pete had to go into day surgery for a (relatively) minor procedure - we dropped him at 2pm and were told to pick him up at 5:30 on our way home from circus class. We got back - and he was still sitting there waiting to go in! He finally went in about five minutes later, and we were told to come back in another 2 hours!!! I had packed a few snacks in case we had to wait for 30mins or so, but 2 hours!!

It wasn't practical to go home, so we headed off to the nearest food court to get some tea. By the time Pete got out of recovery, it was after 8pm and he'd had nothing to eat since 8am but the small sandwich post-op. Needless to say, he was starving, so more take-away on the way home.. So for the night, we didn't get much change out of $40. Oh, and I was feeling stressed so I bought Billy an activity book to do that he didn't need, and didn't even use. It all came out of some "emergency money" I'd stashed away, but still..

The rest of the week went better.

Balance:

Groceries: $25-$18.75 = $6.25
"Stash": $150-$50 = $100

Freezer inventory & grocery challenge

Apologies for the flurry of posts this afternoon!

I decided what better thing to do on a 40 deg day but a freezer inventory and re-org! I had to work fast though to avoid everything thawing..

This is what I have in my freezer & the number of portions (after I tossed the unrecognisable or badly freezer-bitten stuff):

Meat

• steak - 14
  
• mince - 10
  
• chicken - 4
• chicken wings - 1
  
• sausages - 10
  
• pork chops - 2
  
• fish - 3
• bacon
• bacon pieces (use for pizzas & flavouring)
• salami (handful - use for flavouring)
• ham
  
• devon
  

Frozen Veges

• celery
• mushrooms
• capsicum
• broccoli
• cauliflower
• peas
• carrots
• chillis
• mashed pumpkin (use for scones / bread)
  

Frozen Fruit

• bagfull of bananas (to make bread or muffins)
• 2 apples (cook for crumble etc)
• tinned pineapple - 3
• tinned fruit salad - 1
• coconut cream - 1
  

Prepared Meals / Sides / Other stuff

• cooked snags - 1
• cooked snag & onion casserole - 1
• pizza dough - 1
• couscous - 1
• tomato soup - 2
• chicken stock - 5
• shortcrust pastry - 3 or 4 sheets
  

There are at least 6 weeks worth of meals there (along with stuff from the pantry), so how's about a challenge?

I'm going to keep shopping to a minimum for the next 6 weeks. I'll try to keep it to fresh fruit & veges, and staples like eggs, milk, cheese, bread etc. Hmm, can I sneak ice-cream into staples??!

So the money I save doesn't just disappear I'll put some figures on it.

Normal grocery shopping budget is $95/week. If I allow $25/week for purchases, that should be $70/week I save - or $420 over the time.

• I have a higher than normal water bill due in a couple of weeks, so $70 will go to that.
• I'll put aside $20/week to go to restock on meat at the end of the 6 weeks - $120.
• That will leave $230 to go into savings.
  

I'll report in each week - Anyone want to join in?

No more spending!

I've been catching up on our finances the last couple of days, transferring money from savings to pay for our holiday and realising what a dent it's made in the account! One of the worst things about taking a holiday when you're self-employed is that not only does it cost you money but you don't get paid while you're away :( Double-whammy :(

We used the credit card a lot while we were away just so we didn't have to carry large amounts of cash - we didn't go much over budget - I was roughly estimating $100 / day and it cost us around $120 / day. However it's been too easy to just keep on using the card since we got back, and I'm sure we've bought things we could've done without, just because we "put it on the card".

Add to that the uncertainty of Pete's work atm - they've offered voluntary redundancies with a chance of forced redundancies after that - and it's time to take the head out of the sand, buckle down, use lots of cliches and stop spending! I'll be trying to spend only on essentials until the end of January (hopefully longer).

I'll be using twitter to log how I'm going - I'm not really sure how you "follow" me using twitter, but you can see it on the right on my blog.

End of $21 no-supermarket challenge

4 weeks ago I set myself a new challenge - to stay out of the supermarket for the next 4 weeks.

"So my challenge is to not go to the supermarket for 4 weeks. I'll be using what I have at home, and if I need anything else I can only buy it from local shops. So I can buy from the fruit & vege shop, butcher, and the small independent servo."

Well I did it. And I learnt one big thing - they don't call them "convenience stores" for nothing! That was probably the biggest hassle - having to go to different places to pick things up. I hadn't realised how much I relied on being able to go to one spot to buy things.

So where have I been shopping? Lots of places:

* local butcher - as well as great quality meat, he also sells eggs from a local egg farm and bread
* the local service station - I was able to buy bread & potatoes there
* the Organic shop - for the very first time I did some shopping at our local organic shop - I bought some fruit & veges, and shampoo
* a bulk goods place - I stocked up on cases of tin fruit, tin pineapple, sugar and a big bag of flour (that didn't come out of the $20 I had!)
* roadside stall - I found a wonderful stall outside someone's home on the way back from swimming selling bags of homegrown tomatoes. They are so nice!
* community garden - I "rediscovered" a community garden in Maitland selling eggs and produce from the garden. We got 1 dozen wonderful eggs (you could see the chooks that they came from!) and a pumpkin. I had stopped there previously many years ago, but it's on a busy highway and it was too hard while Billy was a toddler to be juggling produce and holding on to him. It's a viable option now though.
* local corner store - snacks for our trip away.

I learnt a lot by doing it - I tried new places and found some gems. It was probably more expensive to do it though - I tried to pick things up en-route to other places, but there was more running around and the prices in small local shops are more expensive. I was supporting local business though.

I'm certainly not ready to boycott the supermarkets forever, but I will be changing the way I'm shopping. Doing this in conjunction with reading "Animal Vegetable Miracle" has really opened my eyes.

My next challenge is to try and ferret out as many local producers as I can - but I'll save that for next month. I have Billy's b'day party to get through first!!

Bits and pieces

You know you've gotten carried away with the seed catalogues when they arrive and *that's* when you think "uh oh, where am I going to plant them all??!"

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I started clearing the back vege patch this afternoon in preparation for planting my seed potatoes that arrived a couple of days ago. The cheeky magpies were having a wonderful time sitting right next to me grabbing the bugs I uncovered - I threw quite a few big fat cutworms (or similar) to them which they were most grateful for!

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This is what you find when you miss harvesting all of your potatoes a couple of seasons ago!! I think there's about 1.5kg there. I love "free" food!

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In other exciting news, I met Crazy Mumma today! It was only briefly but I think we both felt like we already knew each other. She very kindly gave me a yacon tuber and rhizome - the yacon tastes so sweet raw, and met with approval here - it was declared "my favourite vegetable ever - can you grow some of those please Mummy?!". It reminded me of a nashi pear or of an old style 'china pear' that we used to get from my uncle's family farm. We ate half raw and cooked the rest up as part of a mixed fruit crumble. In the crumble it kept it's crunch which was unusual but nice!

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Updating my 'no supermarkets for 4 weeks' challenge, all I've bought this week was meat (from the local butcher), bread (from the local baker & our local independent servo, made by a local bakery).

I may need to buy some fruit this week but will see how we go.

$21 & 'no supermarket' challenge explanation

A couple of people asked for more information on the challenges so here's a more detailed explanation.

The $21 challenge was created by someone on the Simple Savings site (see banner on the right). You use this in an 'oh no I have no money until next payday and need to feed the family for the week' situation! The idea is to use up what you have in your pantry / freezer and stretch it as far as possible. The tin of chickpeas you bought when you were on a health kick, the meat that's worked it's way to the back of the freezer etc - time to haul them out and see what you can make.

The first step is to inventory what you have - go through your cupboard, freezer, fridge, fruit bowl etc and make a list of everything that can be used to make a meal. Then get creative and make a menu plan - remember Google is your friend :) Look for substitutions for things you think you need - if you think outside the square you can really stretch your food.

Then work out the things you absolutely *have* to buy and try to keep it to as little as possible (in the case of the original challenge the limit was $21). That's it - stick to not buying anything else for the week and you'll succeed.

It's not something you can do all the time - generally the meals lack a bit on the nutrition front - and certainly in my house, the peasants revolt after a while :)

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The 'no supermarket' challenge has a different purpose. You won't be able to do it unless you have a bit of a stockpile. The idea isn't necessarily to save money (although that can be a handy side-effect) but to challenge yourself to be more self-reliant, and to avoid paying money to the big corporations. Ideally I'd like to get to the stage where I could go an extended period without buying food, but until the garden is producing and my stockpile is bigger, it's baby steps.

So my challenge is to not go to the supermarket for 4 weeks. I'll be using what I have at home, and if I need anything else I can only buy it from local shops. So I can buy from the fruit & vege shop, butcher, and the small independent servo. Oh and I only have $20-odd to do so lol

That's my rules - feel free to adapt it to your circumstances. I shop fortnightly, so I'm just doubling the normal time I usually go - if you go to the supermarket every couple of days, try to extend to a week. If you shop weekly, try to extend to 2 weeks etc.

Let me know if anyone decides to take part - I'd love to hear how you go.

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BTW, there is a truckie's strike happening from Monday next week. Opinions vary as to what the effect will be, but it mightn't hurt to be a bit prepared.