Hello MoneySavers!

MoneySavingMummy Steph is getting married in September! That's right, just 15 weeks today, I'll be walking down the aisle in the most expensive dress I've ever worn, eating expensive food, drinking expensive drink and......breastfeeding, among other things. So far though, everything is arranged and partially paid for. The only thing missing is......the guests. Yes, I am yet to invite anyone to the wedding. OOPS. It isn't all my fault though, since February, me and MSD have been shopping around for a reasonable stationer, and everyone we have approached wants in excess of £100 for our stationary. Thats daytime and evening invites, and place cards. The table plan comes in with our package, so its only the rest we need to arrange. It became apparent that it would be substantially cheaper to make our own, and since MSM Elizabeth is good at her crafts, and incidentally mother of the bride, they are guaranteed to look amazing too.

We sourced our resources locally from a craft shop on an industrial estate just a few miles from home, Craftsite. I browsed online first to see if what they offer is what I wanted, and found some lovely toppers and shiny things that would go nicely with my colour theme. Here is what I bought.

100 cards with a deckle edge, C6 size, including envelopes (I got more than I need to allow for mistakes, last minute additions etc)

2 packs of 'Wedding Invitation' stickers

3 packs of 'Evening Invitation' stickers

3 packs of 5 sheets of pink pearlescent/glitter paper

50 wedding cake card toppers, decorated with synthetic pearls

2 packs of shiny white ribbons

2 packs of pearlescent white/pink butterflies

2 packs of 'glue dots'

15m of silver cord

Because we sourced it from where we did, we have undercut many other websites and suppliers, both stationary/craft wholesalers and printing companies! We have estimated that we can make around 50 invitations from this, and although we may need a few more little bits and pieces (cord, cake card toppers, glue dots), our current cost to ourselves is just £45.30! Thats LESS THAN HALF what the big companies wanted to charge us, for what were (mostly) very basic printed cards! We have designed wording for the insides of the cards, we just need to print them, but we have plenty of paper and ink in the printer. We estimate that all we will need now is a maximum £5-10 of other bits just to finish them off incase we have under-estimated ourselves. I'll follow this blog with a picture just as soon as the first invitation is made! MSM Elizabeth may just even write us an illustrated How-To Guide so you can make your own!

How are you with your crafts? Want to become a MSM blogger? Drop us a line at moneysavingmummy@gmail.com!

Yesterday, I ran out of bread for the millionth time (where does it all go so fast??) so I figured I needed a trip to the supermarket. On checking the fridge, I realised I actually had very little food in for lunches this week. Normally when this happens, I am drawn into the 'naughty lunch' crew at work, which usually involves KFC, McDonalds, or one of our local greasy spoons. Being almost 30 weeks pregnant on top of this means that I am starving constantly, and it usually results in me spending around £8 per day on food. Working 5 days a week, supposing I go 'naughty' for 3 of these, it can add up to almost £100 a month in food! AGH!

So I made the decision to go and buy lunchy things. I took £15 with me, and told myself that I wanted to spend less than £10. This is what I ended up buying:

2 x 2l Morrisons Own Diet Lemonade (on offer at 2 for £1)

3 x Morrisons Fruit Coolers (3 for £3)

1 x 4pk Buns (29p in 'oops' section)

1 x Morrisons Basics white bread loaf (47p)

3 x Mug shots (34p each on offer)

100g Pease pudding (24p)

200g Garlic Sausage (72p)

My food shopping mantra is ''Why buy brands when own brand is normally the same stuff in a different bag?''. If I had bought the branded alternatives I normally may have (which I priced up as I shopped), it would have bumped my shopping bill up by £3.50! 

All in all I spent £6.74, which will do for sandwiches for at least 3 days, and I can have mug shots with bread and butter on the other two days. Given that some of the bits will be consumed at home, I work that out as about £1.20ish per day for meals!

So, MoneySavingMummy recommends setting aside 5 minutes each morning to make a couple of sandwiches in a bag. Why not grab a bag of apples, a 6 pack of yoghurts and a 6 pack of crisps and make a meal of it? I could have spent a lot more and still saved on my weekly 'naughty lunch' spend.

Try it yourself for a week. How much did you save? Drop us a line at moneysavingmummy@gmail.com and let us know!

As an extra challenge, why not put the money you don't spend on eating out into a jar for a month, and at the end of the month, count up how much you saved!