Live Below the Line-Day 2
So we survived Day 1 Living Below The Line.
Here is the excitement that is Day 2…
Breakfast
- Toast with butter and homemade jam (taken from the store cupboard, but I have factored in some pennies for it) and mashed banana-maybe half of our 21p loaf? 20p
- Milk for the Smalls-20p
Snacks
- 2x Sunshine Buns-with butter and jam-12p
- Bananas x 2-8p
- Hobnobs x 4-24p
- Apples x 1-12p
- Milk for the Smalls-20p
- Bowl of porridge with raisins-20p
- Popcorn-we caved, and I made some. I am really quite hungry…75g popcorn kernels+25g sugar works out at about 20p
Lunch
- Hubby took the left over portion of yesterday’s tea-42p
- Smalls and I had carrot soup-made a big batch using 5 carrots (10p), 2 onions (10p) a tsp of curry powder (2p?), a stock cube (8p) and 100g lentils (from the storecupboard) (20p), and a glug of oil (5p)-55p-will do lunch tomorrow as well. We probably had about a third today so 17p
- 2 rolls with butter-15p
Dinner
- Carrot and coriander falafels-recipe here from A Girl Called Jack-88p-I wasn’t sure the Smalls would eat these, but they were a HUGE hit! We will do these again-they look set to become a regular feature 🙂
- Pasta-half of our 30p bag-15p
- Tomato sauce-made witha glug of oil (5p) 2 onions (10p), two tins tomatoes (62p) and quarter bag frozen veg (22.5p)=99.5p. Used about a third of this-33p
- Yoghurt with stewed rhubarb-10p
Total: £3.87
I also added to our supplies today, by buying another bag of flour-might make a banana loaf if we are doing ok for bananas, and a tin of tomatoes (which went in the tomato sauce). This brings the total spend so far up to £18.64. I would really like to be able to get a tin of tuna, and some more bananas/other fruit towards the end of the week.
We had had a chat with BigSmall prior to starting the challenge, and explained that we could only have porridge or toast for breakfast this week. He was very good about it, but then completely lost the plot this morning when I said he couldn’t have peanut butter on his toast. It is very hard to explain to a 4 year old why he can’t have peanut butter when he knows there is some in the cupboard. Hubby managed to talk him round somehow, and he ended up happily munching on mashed banana on toast instead, but it was a bit tricky for a moment or two, and made me question whether or not we should be including the Smalls in the challenge. I guess BigSmall is at an awkward in between age-old enough to be able to express his opinions very forcefully and vocally, but not really ready yet for big discussions about world poverty or any kind of empathy for other less fortunate people.
He has also been on an eating mission today, and about an hour after breakfast announced he wanted something to eat. He had a Sunshine bun. And then about an hour or two after that he was hungry again and had a big bowl of porridge! After this I was fairly sure he wouldn’t eat much lunch, but had a bowl of soup and a whole roll. And I have never seen him eat as much as he ate at tea this evening…
As I said, I am starting to get a little concerned that we shouldn’t be including the Smalls in this, and I am determined that they will not go hungry, so have been making a concerted effort to make sure they have enough snacks etc, and chucked some lentils into the soup at lunchtime as I’m not sure they are getting enough protein. I know that for 5 days, it won’t do any long-term harm, but it makes you appreciate what a worry it must be if you are genuinely living below the line and you have kids to feed.
I am starting to appreciate how difficult it must be to live like this EVERY day. I find myself mentally calculating how much things cost all the time, and have been checking on banana numbers with alarming frequency. If the Smalls say they are hungry or want a snack, I start worrying about there being none left at the end of the week. To live like this ALL THE TIME must be very very hard indeed.
