Doing without...

How's the planning for the £7 challenge going? We've decided that it's porridge for breakfast, a lemon curd or peanut butter sandwich for lunch - or maybe poached egg on toast for a couple of the days, and then either lentils or rice for the evening meal. We'll have coffee and water to drink. (As there are two of us doing it together we have a total allowance of £14.)

So far our shopping list consists of:

Yeast £0.82
Curry powder £0.39
Rice £0.40
Porridge oats £1.09
Flour £1.02
Lemon Curd £0.22
Oil £1.00
Lentils £0.88
Stock Cubes £0.65
Coffee (Instant and Fairtrade) £1.89

So that lot comes to £8.36, leaving the two of us £5.64. With this we need to get:

4 pints of milk £1.00
Salt (about) £0.20 - this will be for the bread - it might be cheaper to buy bread depending on what offers are around on Saturday!
Peanut butter £0.52
Garlic £0.30
Onions £1.20
Bananas £1.39
Eggs £0.69
3 tins Kidney beans £0.48

So that lot comes to £5.78

Which is too much and obviously leaves no money to buy the carrots (£0.50), mushrooms (£1.00), cabbage (£0.90) and some other fruit (kiwi fruit (£1.00), apples (£1.00)) that we'd hoped for...

So back to the drawing board with the planning...

Probably get two loaves of bread for less than £1.20 - so that would save about £0.80.
Forget the eggs - saving £0.69.
No peanut butter - saving £0.52.

Total now stands at: £12.13 meaning we could afford mushrooms and carrots...need to visit the shops and see what special offers are available.

What difference can I make?

We are often overwhelmed with a sense of need and feel that our individual contribution is so insignificant and meaningless that we end up doing nothing. How can filling one shoe box with a few items make a difference in the life of a child who is faced with poverty or famine or war?

This short video will show you just how much difference that one shoe box makes.



If you want to be a part of this year's Operation Christmas Child campaign, which runs from 1-18 November, and want to know what to do, or where to drop of your completed box, you'll find everything you need by clicking here.

Get Planning

If you are going to be taking part in the £7 challenge next week then now is the time to start planning your meals and shopping list. With only £7 to spend per person for all your food and drink for the whole week careful preparation is going to be needed if you are not going to run out of food half way through, or find that although you have a whole box of sugar puffs to eat you have no milk left to eat them with.

Also, you don't want to forget those items such as cooking oil, coffee/tea, milk, herbs, salt, sugar, spices...remember the £7 per person is to cover everything that you will use in your cooking and everything that you will eat and drink.

So far the cheapest option for oil I have found is £1 for 250ml of olive oil - but I can't remember if that was from Sainsburys or Morrisons.

In terms of drinks probably going to go with a reasonable own label instant (caffeinated) coffee, and then go without tea, and drink water for the rest of the day.

As I am doing this challenge with my wife we have £14 to spend between us which does allow for a bit more variety - in that we can afford both rice and lentils. We can also afford flour and yeast so will be able to make our own bread. Fresh fruit and veg is a challenge so will probably have to do with one piece of fruit a day. Protein will mainly be coming from kidney beans, which we have found for 16p a tin.

Probably go for an own brand jar of lemon curd, and peanut butter - and go without margarine/butter.

Breakfast is going to be porridge - so have to get up a bit earlier as it takes a bit longer to prepare, and a lot longer to wash up afterwards! I think we've got 1kg of porridge for £1.09 which will do about 25 portions - and by the end of the week we may have got used to eating it made with water instead of milk, and without salt, sugar or syrup.

Where we come from

This morning my eldest daughter (Year 2) did a class assembly based on this half-term's geography project 'Where we come from'. One of the great things about living in this part of London is that there are so many people from so many different parts of the world. I'll no doubt forget some of the countries represented in this class assembly (with 30 children) but I can remember: Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, England, Ireland, Romania, Bulgaria, Poland, Sweden, Kuwait, Sri Lanka, Jamaica, Portugal, Albania, Bangladesh, Somalia.

One of my responsibilities as a school governor is to ensure that the school's equalities policy is implemented and it was great to see all these children recognising that they are unique and that they are special, and taking the time to celebrate each other's culture. Hopefully as this class goes through the school together their multi-cultural friendships will grow and they will leave school free from the stereo-types and prejudices that we fall into when we start seeing groups of people as 'them' and 'us'.

Unfortunately, but understandably, the school's photography policy means that although we could take photos we can't put them on the internet.