Pro - Does anyone else's nest boxes get soaked in rain?

[fairy&cake]

After the thread above i was wondering how much people spend on food and where they shop???

 

We now have a budget of £200 a month for me , ross and our 11 month old.

 

i think i need to get some more seeds to grow moe Veggies!

[Beauty-Box]

We spend about £350 a month on food shopping, but the kids are 12 and 14 so it'd like feeding four adults! They can eat I can tell you!!

[Mel (& Paul)]

Depends on whether you are including alcohol in that budget or not

[Cinnamon]

We are nearer to £500 (& yes, that does include wine,Mel )

[Mel (& Paul)]

[Christian]

£300-£400 per month, with just the two of us

 

We now shop at Waitrose and i know it is seen as expensive! But the quality is fantastic and as I have boycotted Tesco, there isnt anywhere else to shop. We have a very small Somerfield a few miles away and i use that for bits and pieces.

 

 

 

That does include ny diet coke habit

[Popcorn]

up to £200 here, but we do occasionally spend more.

 

I tend to do my shopping weekly these days so I only buy what we really need. Having Stefan it's so easy to keep buying 'special' things for him. It is getting much easier now he's 15 months as I can cook one meal for us all now. (He;s still has his own cupboard though )

 

I love good food, but I really resent spending all our money on the stuff!

[Mrs Frugal]

Ooops! Misread it and thought you meant a week . Please excuse the way off target £50-100 . Never in a million years!! I think we probably spend around £280-300 per month on food/groceries etc.

[lisa33]

£200 - £300 including cider for just the two of us.

 

No wonder no waistline is expanding!!

 

[Guest]

We spend between £300-£350 a month, although this has dropped a bit, now that I'm not buying wine.....

[AmandaR]

I spend £400 - £500 a month on our family of four (2 adults and 2 kids aged 9 & 10). I have sooo tried to cut it down over the past few months but we are big fruit eaters and can easily spend £40 a week on fruit alone.

[Tina C]

We usually spend about £100 a month on a 'big shop' plus the veggie boxes but that includes stuff other than food and alcohol - toilteries, washing-up liquid, cat food. Then we have a £100 in cash to last each week, which is used on a when its gone, its gone basis - some of thats for food but its also for entertainment/magazines/whatever.

 

Just this weekend (after going into Waitrose 'for a few things' and spending £18....I decided that we were going to start writing down what we spend and analyse the receipts so we can we where we can cut back - probably have to be the beer and wine. When we did that before we became a lot more conscious of what we were spending.

 

We shop at River Nene (veg box), Waitrose and Somerfield and occasionally M&S because they are in the town centre (and I walk or bike to the shops) and (reluctantly) we do go to Tesco for 'the basics'. We have a small farmers market but I always forget about it as I rarely go into town on a Saturday.

[Charlottechicken]

I have a budget of £20 per week for food (and drink ). My overall spending budget for each month after bills are paid is £200, that has to cover food, petrol, clothing, entertainment and everything else. Leftover cash after that goes into a savings account to be used for things like insurances, road tax, MOT, TV licence, and all those one off things that crop up.

 

Just this weekend (after going into Waitrose 'for a few things' and spending £18....I decided that we were going to start writing down what we spend and analyse the receipts so we can we where we can cut back - probably have to be the beer and wine. When we did that before we became a lot more conscious of what we were spending.

 

Tina that is a fabulous way of spotting where the money goes, it was the method I used to find out where I could cut back. Amazing where small amounts of money are 'wasted' and they all add up. I often hear colleagues (on higher salary than me) moan that they have no money, then see them feeding cash into the vending machines several times a day

[bronze]

probably slightly above the 300 mark all in (cleaning,food etc etc) for five of us

[craftyhunnypie]

On average we spend about £300 a month & that isn't including any alcohol. I don't drink now at all - since I've been doing slimming world. I don't really miss it either - I enjoy my diet pepsi & homemade fruit smoothies & green tea!

We do often spend over £300 as we spend a lot on meat for my red days and I really, really like local grown organic veg - so I will pay more for that!

I don't believe in skimping & I don't believe in going bananas either. I just think you should have good quality, fresh food & shouldn't mind paying that bit extra for that, rather than yukky ready meals, frozen veg & processed foods.

 

I like Morrisons & Waitrose for shopping!

 

Emma.x

[chelsea]

we shop at Sainsburys and I have it delivered as our stores are a 40mile round trip.

 

We spend about £320-£400 a month on groceries for the 2 of us and the dog and chickens. The dog food and her treats are expensive and we eat very well and we like quality food. We dont shop anywhere else in the week, and there is no need for us to "pop to the shops for extras", as I buy it all on a Friday and it lasts all week.

 

I think in a way compared to most we do spend a lot on our groceries....although we do not drink, we go out for meals very rarely (special occasions) and we dont have takeaways very often either, and we both work hard - so we deserve it!!

 

Like I said in the other post, I dont know how families do it...it must be hard, and I think its amazing you can manage on £200 of shopping a month....we couldnt do it and there's 2 of us

[Looney]

We spend much less than we used to and try and make sure we eat what we have bought and not leave it to go off / out of date just because we don't fancy it (or can't be bothered to cook it!)

 

I haven't been drinking at all recently and that makes a difference. Even if it was just a bottle of wine and a couple of beers (on a very angelic week ) it soon adds up.

 

In my attempts to actually eat food that is in my cupboards - not just assume I have none and go and buy more - I have rediscovered my absolute love of pilchards and sardines on toast. MMMMmmmmmmmm!

[Snowy]

There's no choice for 300 - 400! Put that in and I'll vote.

[Charlottechicken]

I have rediscovered my absolute love of pilchards and sardines on toast. MMMMmmmmmmmm!

 

Ooh, sardines on toast, mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

 

 

(and so cheap )

[Jules.]

We have a little notebook, in which we write all our income for the month- both salaries, tax credits & family allowance. Then on the other side we have a lump sum for our standing orders & direct debits, £70 for travel, £270 for food, & either £40 or £50 for church, depending on how many Sundays there are in the month. The difference is our disposable income, usually around £300 if we are lucky.Since the Tax Credits are paid weekly om Mondays , the best months when we have 5 Mondays in the month

We try to write in our notebook weekly what we have spent our disposable income on... Hattie loves those nights, we have receipts everwhere that she likes to chase

[superjules]

I've recently been trying to keep it to £50-£60 per week for me, DH, DS age5 and DD age3, (and Jasper the 2yo springer!) including toiletries and cleaning stuff and I make packed lunches for DH and DS. I just need to keep DH away from the supermarket!! It's easier than you think to end up spending £80-100 per week if you don't control it carefully.

 

I grow some food in the garden and cook everything from scratch, including bread, yogurt, cakes, biscuits etc, which helps keep costs down and makes it easy to hide veggies in meals (for DH rather than the children LOL!).

 

That figure doesn't include wine though, I wouldn't like to admit how much we spend on that!

[Jules.]

superjules, I like your forum name!

[superjules]

In my attempts to actually eat food that is in my cupboards - not just assume I have none and go and buy more - I have rediscovered my absolute love of pilchards and sardines on toast. MMMMmmmmmmmm!

 

I've done the same recently. Last week I got 4 tins of sardines in tomato sauce from the cupboard (leftover from the start of the 2nd gulf war when everyone stockpiled food and bottled water - don't ask!) chucked them in a dish, put puff pastry over the top and baked it. Served it with mashed potato and green veg. As I was doing it I was trying not to think what the family would make of it but I was proved wrong as it was clean plates all round. Slim pickings for the dog that night who only got some of DDs pastry as leftovers!! I could still taste them at 10pm though, lol! always have that problem with tinned sardines.

[superjules]

superjules, I like your forum name!

 

Why thank you!!

 

My sis in law thinks me very immodest but hey!

[Rona]

I honestly don't know how much I spend a month now but I suspect too much is on wine and gin!!

 

When I was your age I had to feed 3 of us on @!**^& all and although I think that was about 100 years ago the principles are the same - don't part with a penny unless you are really getting your money's worth.

 

Don't know if you will be working as that does make a difference to how economical you can be. £200 a month will be hard work but if you are creative and develop a slightly mean streak you will do it nae bother and will get a lot of satisfaction out of it. If you have time to use cheaper cuts of meat that need more prep and cooking and seasonal fresh veg either home grown or whatever is in the shops and no ready meals, that will certainly make you healthier.

 

Don't forget to freecycle, if you offer things you don't need, then you can ask for something you do need.

 

Good luck and enjoy the challenge!!