Scottish Friendly's No Spend Weekend Challenge

Money just seems to disappear when you have kids, right? That is one reason I said yes to getting involved with Scottish Friendly's no spend weekend challenge and I think I did well. Come and read all the ways we had fun as a family without spending money.

My lovely friend Cass at Frugal Family often talks about no spend days and to be honest I had never heard of the concept before. So simple but yet completely alien to me and I kept meaning to give it a go but it never happened. So this weekend challenge was a good chance to put it into action and see if a spender like me could go cold turkey! I wasn't expecting miracles if I'm honest.

Friday After School - Pressing Fresh Juice!
Once a month all the families who live together in our community come together for an event to engage the children and we eat together.

This month we were focusing on harvest and how good God is in all He provides in our life. We all went down to the walled garden in the grounds of our home and gathered some fruit and veg and then set about cleaning, preparing and pressing the fruit to make fresh juice to have with our dinner. We ended up with apple, apple and rhubarb and apple and beetroot juice.

We had a great staff dinner of pasta or jacket potato with bolognaise, cheese and salad and of course the fresh juice and we finished off with melon chunks from melons grown in our green houses.  JJ and my husband headed off to church for his youth club and the girls and I had a game of monopoly before bed.

Scottish Friendly's Money Saving Diary Challenge

It was with good timing that Scottish friendly got in touch with me and asked me to join in with their Money Saving Diary Challenge. Whilst I am so much better at being thrifty nowadays I know that there is still some money being wasted and I could do a better job.

So with this in mind, I kept a record of my spending habits for a week, so see where I could cut back or where I was already saving some money.  Here is how I got on -

Monday 
We have just returned from our holiday and Hubby is still on a days leave so we decide to have lunch out amongst the washing and catching up on work.  The plan is to eat at the local college restaurant where you can get a really lovely 3 course meal for £9.99 and then use your Taste card too to get 2 for 1! It normally means we end up spending around £16 for us both for 3 courses and a soft drink.

However when I called the College restaurant they were closed and we headed off to a local fabulous burger joint and ended up spending £25.48 for our meal and thus I totally failed on this first opportunity to save money. I have a Taste card and local TownCity Card so I really should have used one of those and for a 2 for 1 meal - oh well, next time! Overspent by £9.48

On the way home we do go into Lidl though as I want to get the kids some yogurts and again I am reminded just how good their pricing is. I spend £19.79 and this is comparison to buying the same goods at Sainsburys is a saving of around £7, so I really must shop there more often. Saved £7