£2-a day:The Final Days!

29th Jan

Budget: £2

A whole day at work again today, so nothing spent, but that's fine seeing as I went so overboard on Friday night!!

30th Jan
Budget: £4
Literally nothing new to report, more work and more staying in feeling tired and sluggish. There's a deep freeze coming this weekend, so maybe that's why...


31st Jan (LAST DAY!!!)
Budget: £6
Tom and I are NEARLY DONE! So to celebrate, with a joint budget of £12, we drove into Berkhamsted, tempted ourselves with the bargains to be had in Oxfam, and then went into one of the nearby cafes and had a slap-up lunch of sausage sandwiches and posh crisps and coffee!!




So... WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED??

• It is entirely possible to do this!!
• We are so much more aware of what we're spending on things: I write this 4 days later, and in that time we've flippantly gone and spent £70 - my entire January budget - in ONE VISIT to Tescos. Ridiculous.
• We've learned to trust own-brand goods, such as cereal, crisps, etc.
• We've learned that our family and friends can be very charitable and giving!!
• I have got so much more done craft-wise and had time to create things on a budget, much more make-do-and-mend.
• We went swimming and actually used our gym memberships more times last month than we did in September-December last year.
• It forced us to be more creative with food.
• We ate faaaar more healthily and we were never hungry once over the whole month.
• We saved £150 alone on meals out - wowsa!!!
• We did a lot more walking and free things to fill our spare time
• We read... a lot!

The downsides though...

• You can't drink (unless someone buys you drinks or you are donated wine)
• You can't go out on a night out with your friends unless they're willing to foot your bill.
• Occasionally, JUST OCCASIONALLY, being at home because you had no money to go anywhere got very, very boring. It definitely made us irritable sometimes, but then again we went on a lot more walks and did free things and probably tried things we didn't know we would like before.

I seriously recommend anyone to try this. We haven't saved buckets of cash this month, it being so soon after the damage that Christmas brings financially, but we plan to do it again in April, July and October, so that over the year we give ourselves chances to catch up and put money away.
As a result of this month, we both go into supermarkets now with a different head on, eating out really is a treat again, and we can always look at our savings account to make us feel better too!


Good luck on your own £2-a-day adventures! 
BBxxxxx