If you have followed my twelve month shopping challenge, you will be aware that I looked at our budget in order to calculate what I have saved so far in the first seven months. While I was delighted with the money I had saved, I was utterly shocked to see how much we had spent, as a family of five, on eating out and takeaway food in 2024!!!!

The eating out bill didn’t bother me too much, as we like to get together, as a family, to enjoy a meal and each other’s company (and we like to have a day off cooking dinner and cleaning up!). But the take out spend worried me!

Firstly, because most of the take-out food is not particularly healthy, and secondly, because we were not at all mindful in our spending. The money was often not being spent for family time. I’m far from being a scrooge! I’m a firm believer in enjoying life. We can’t take it with us! We are only here for a relatively short time! But I do believe in being mindful and considerate of how we spend. If it’s being enjoyed and/or you have it to spend, then go for it!

We have agreed as a family to be more mindful of what we spend on take away and eating out. We are going to take it month by month, as a week is a long time for a child or teenager! For January, we have one birthday, and the birthday girl will decide where we eat out, but we have agreed that this will be our only spend on eating out as a family for January. Lets see how we go!