Frugal Friday

Although we have done a few, small, frugal things this has also been a week of big, unexpected emergency spending ! To keep things real I shall tell you what we had to spend big money on and how it taught a couple of our children a valuable lesson !

First of all the frugal stuff:- buying lots of snacks for very little money; making soup and putting it in the freezer rather than letting things go to waste in the fridge; getting a £5 Love2Shop voucher from the Royal Mail survey; swapping a birthday present for a gift card; cooking dried chick peas and freezing then to make felafels later; borrowing a free ebook from the library; getting a free whiteboard from MissShoestring's 'getting rid of ' pile and finding lots of change from clearing out her drawers after she'd moved and swapping hot meals for cold ones !

Now to the spending ! First of all the van we helped MissShoestring move in was hit in Central London and since no collision damage waiver was offered when we picked it up we had to pay for the £700 worth of damage that was done ! Ouch ! We were glad that no-one was in the van at the time, that no-one was hurt and that our emergency fund could cover the whole amount ! Then on Monday we discovered that all the plaster work was damaged in MissShoestring's old room. There was a bathroom leak behind the bath and the water seepage caused the damage. We hadn't been able to see what was happening before, as MissShoestring's stuff covered every wall ! MrShoestring discovered the problem but couldn't reach the pipe , which had a hole in it. On Tuesday the plumber came and used a special tool to reach the pipe and replace it at a cost of £192 ! Ouch! It was at this point that MasterShoestring said "I guess this is why you guys have a big emergency fund !" "Yes!", we replied. "That's right !"

Later in the week MissShoestring called with a few DIY problems of her own in her new flat and MasterShoestring told her all about the emergency fund and what a good idea one is and shouldn't she think of having one now she's got her own place ? We were proud of him and then MissShoestring asked her Dad for budgeting advice so she could could build an emergency fund of her own !

The final Ouch ! was buying Prom clothes and some other new clothes for MasterShoestring as he has grown again and nothing fitted when we tried it on. We did manage to bring the cost down a bit with the use of voucher codes and other discounts but the final total was still just over £160 ! However, this bought: a smart shirt, a smart pair of trousers, 5 pairs of underpants, 3 T shirts, 2 pairs of shorts, a complete tuxedo set including a dress shirt, a pair of sunglasses and a cabin baggage roll along case, so that actually seems good value for money !

Phew ! I hope July will be a bit less 'spendy!'