Getting back into the serious frugal groove

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Before I start this post, Brisbane Susan has mentioned that she cannot see any comments (is that right Susan?), although she can leave them. I'm not sure why this would be, as all the correct settings are turned on from my end. It may be something to do with your browser compatibility - perhaps Internet Explorer or Firefox have issues recognising the code - or maybe you have an older version of a browser that needs updating. Those are the only two options I can think of right now.

Anyone else having issues?

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So, I sat down and worked out the year's normal and additional expenses last week and I was not happy with what I saw. I won't go into detail in the post - I'll save it for next time - but suffice to say we have A LOT of things that need fixing and repairing this year.

I realise that DH and I are going to have to get a bit frugal to meet these expenses. I no longer do any freelance work for extra cash, as it is too much for me to cope with on top of this place, a full time job and my hobbies (hobbies are now a priority for me, as I had let them fall by the wayside and suffered for it). I still maintain a lot of frugal actions and tasks that I've always done but one big thing that has been greatly reduced is yellow sticker shopping. Travelling to the office every day used to provide me with ample opportunities to nip in to local food shops for a quick snuffle as I went past. Now I work from home, I am restricted to when I go out - usually the middle of the day - and there isn't necessarily much on offer at those times.

So, I've realised I need to go back to doing it. Somehow. The idea of an additional trip out in the evenings doesn't fill me with joy, as there is the expense of the petrol, but then again if I end up with the amount of food I used to I would save much more than the petrol costs.

To give you some idea, yesterday afternoon I dropped into two Tesco's on the way back from visiting my parents. The time was about 7:30-8pm, and this is what I got.

The salmon was cut up into six then cooked, three frozen and three put in the fridge. The salad produce and fancy shredded mushrooms will see me through lunches for the next seven days - I just need to add some protein to it, say, salmon 😋. The whole mushrooms are going to go into a soup, perhaps with a dash of the smoked bacon, while the sliced mushrooms will be sprinkled into various dinners over the week. The unsmoked bacon will be teamed with our hen's eggs for breakfast while the veggie mash will go with sausages one night for dinner. The two mangoes are destined for fruit smoothies. Finally, the teacakes will be eaten by Martin as an after work snack while the scones will be in Martin's lunches and as puddings after dinner.

The sum total of this lot was £9.45. It would have been £37.54 full price so I paid 25%. I already have enough meat and other bits to use for dinners so apart from a few little bits like tea bags, milk, bananas, apples and gluten-free bread, that one shop has topped the fridge and freezer up so I don't need to do a weekly shop.

Result!