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Archive for October, 2015

Excuse my wordiness

October 29th, 2015 at 10:19 am

What to write about?

I went to Aldi this week. I forgot how cheap it is. Spent 31.10. Made a special effort to buy products from their super 6 range. I then made one of their recipes last night using what was on offer (every few weeks they change the recipes according to what's on offer)

Now that I've decided to participate in NaNoWriMo, I find myself thinking about it a lot. I only have a vague idea of what I'll be writing. Oh well I'll give it my best shot.

My biggest concern is actually finding the time to write. I might have to carry pen and paper with me in case I get inspiration when I'm out. Also, when I'm out I'm usually child free. I still have to go to work, run a household, look after kids, give hubby some attention, chat with my friend... I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. On Sunday. I'm sure it will be ok, I'll just need to manage my time effectively.

Been meal planning again this week. Got plenty leftover in the freezer from last week. I'm making toad in the hole today as per hubby's request.

Went with SG on her nursery trip. It was bucketing down. She loved it. Next she's been invited to a birthday party in a few weeks. She's busier than me.

I think it's time I changed some of my passwords. It's been ages since I've taken the time to do that. I've never been the sort of person who changes them every so often, but maybe I should be.

Little tidbits

October 25th, 2015 at 07:30 am

Met my friend for lunch yesterday. Spent 15.00 exactly. We went to a relatively new place, it was really good.

Found out at work that we're not getting a 20GBP gift card at Christmas. I've gotten it every single year since I've been there. I was going to count it as a snowflake as well. Oh well, I'll need to think outside of the box.

Dh and I always go Christmas shopping together, well, all of us go. We can't this year now that eldest is actually aware of everything. The plan is to divide and conquer.

For the past two months I haven't collected my payslip at work. I know what I've been paid anyway. However, it is a bit lackadaisacal of me to not collect it. Yesterday I got them. My rate of pay increased at the start of the month. Obviously, it increased so much I noticed. Nope. I had an inkling it might have increased, only because it happens every October.

I'm getting the impression at work that things are not going well. At all. I wonder if redundancies are in the future? This happened to lots of management years ago. I'm not exaggerating; a ton of them went. I remember coming back from maternity leave and noticing a lot of people were gone.

At work yesterday upper management kept getting my name wrong, or my nickname rather, so I assumed he must have been talking to my former supervisor who always uses my nickname. Before he used my full name. He only got one letter wrong but I think I missed my chance to correct him since when he first did it I was dealing with a customer and I didn't think he was talking to me - since it's not my name. Never mind.

My mum told me last week that she is saving up for her funeral. Told me she doesn't want to leave me with the burden of it. (She's fine, she was just talking to her friend about it)

The clocks went back. It didn't feel as bad as last year though when I was still doing night feeds so it's not been too bad.

Emergency Fund Update

October 25th, 2015 at 07:12 am

316.00 Beginning Balance
+_2.00 Weekly deposit

---------------------

318.00 New Balance

32.00 to go

This & That

October 23rd, 2015 at 09:29 am

I've been keeping track of our spending and it isn't going too bad. Meal planning is definetly helping with our grocery budget, but then I knew that it would.

Bought us all some new hats, scarves and gloves for winter.

Our Christmas savings vouchers are here. I'm getting them on Saturday. I am also meeting a friend for lunch that day. We haven't hung out together in over a year.

I've decided to attempt NaNoWriMo this year. I haven't tried it since 2010 before the kids. It's going to take some time management, I think. I want to try as much as possible to get it done without letting other areas slide, such as meal planning, running a household etc

One of my credit cards has updated, waiting on the other two. The final one isn't until next month though.

Meal Planning

October 19th, 2015 at 03:26 pm

This week's meal plan is looking like this:

- Sausage and bean hotpot with mashed potatoes
- Tuna Pasta Bake
http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/pasta-recipes/kerryann-s-tuna-pasta-bake/#m4u51tzt2cDVWcyf.
- Spaghetti Bolognaise
http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/pasta-recipes/family-spaghetti-bolognese/#0X4E4RSXmBZkSKd7.97
- Macaroni and cheese
- Leftovers

Random Update

October 18th, 2015 at 09:56 am

A few little things to write about...

I paid off the last of the council debt this morning. One less debt to worry about now.

I got completely out of the habit of transferring money to my mum's savings (from her account). She came over to visit a while ago and told me there had been fradulent activity on her account. She said that someone had been taking money out of her account and putting money in. I was confused. She had the paperwork with her. I had a look, it was her annual savings statement. I had to explain that this was her online savings account and I was the one that had been doing that, like I'd told her ages before. I added some more money to her savings. It's been a month so I was behind. I'll transfer more next week because she's got plenty spare. When I told her it was her savings, she wanted to use it for Christmas shoppping. We explained that it's for emergencies only. Christmas shopping isn't an emergency. Also, she saves up for Christmas too.

I think I might have a survey reward coming my way soon. I had to fill in a food diary for J for a minimum of four days, but I'm not sure if I met the requirement.

I've went back to meal planning properly. I feel more organised already.

Emergency Fund Update

October 18th, 2015 at 08:17 am

304.00 Beginning Balance
+10.00 Four-weekly deposit
+_2.00 Weekly deposit

------------------------

316.00 New Balance

Payday

October 16th, 2015 at 08:34 am

There is really not much to report.

I paid extra to Littlewoods, and paid something to my BNPL item which is due by April. I also paid 11.10 to the council for the overpayment.

I looked through three months worth of bank statements earlier. As of today I have paid 122.10 towards what we owe the council, so I only have to pay another 24.70 then it's done with.

I told dh that we will be using cash only for this four week pay period. It's been a while since we've done this.

I increased three budget categories: food shopping, baby/toddler and miscellaneous. These are all variable expenses so they will all be cash only this pay. It's looking like this:

Food: 180.00
Baby/toddler: 70
Misc: 70

So 320 total. I overbudgeted for both baby and misc but I will probably end up buying one of dh's presents and there wasn't a line in the budget for it, so I suppose that's cheating.

None of my credit cards have updated. So they haven't been paid yet.

Up and Down

October 15th, 2015 at 08:38 am

I'm not talking about my bank balance; I'm talking about attitude these days, or more specifically, my moods. I used to have no problem with my moods - except for during a day or two of the month (sorry male readers!). Recently, this is not the case.

I've been back at work about six months. Yesterday I was doing a job that months ago I decided was a good job that I enjoyed doing. My reasons for this were that it is out of the way of everyone and I can talk to my co-workers.

Yesterday these were exactly the reasons that put me in a mood. Out of the way of everyone? Because nobody likes the job so they don't want to be there. That's why you are usually alone when you do it. Chat to my co-workers? Not when they start conversations that as soon as I hear know straight away that I won't want to get involved in. Lets just say it would have led to a debate about wider issues that I don't discuss at work.

Yesterday was also the day that I bumped into someone who just wanted to argue with me. Seriously. Haven't seen someone in a decade? Start an argument with them. That's one way to make friends and alienate people.

See what I mean?

Of course, the problem with all of this is that I am stuck in a rut. (The other problem might also be that I'm talking to the wrong people?)

When my mood goes, so does my ability to track spending. And make payments. The last week or so I lost track of spending and missed a payment to the council who I still owe for their overpayment last year. I'm not even sure how much is still left to pay because I've been on such a downer I haven't had the energy to work it out. I'll be doing it today or tomorrow. I only realised I'd missed it because I was looking through paperwork, which wasn't organised... I will be making a payment today.

One of my former close friends got in touch recently. I say former close friend because we're not close friends anymore. More of an acquaintance, really, however at this point I think the term acquaintance is being generous. If you only know what someone is up to based on their facebook profile then you're really not friends. Anyway she got in touch literally the night before she wanted to visit. Also, she got in touch through facebook. She has my phone number. I've got no problem with people getting in touch that way if that's there only option, it's annoying if they've had your phone number for years and don't use it. Anyway, the visit never happened because I told her I wasn't free.

Ok that was a bit of a rant...

Tomorrow is payday, thankfully. Next pay will be a bit less because I went away an hour early yesterday. From tomorrow's pay I will be buying dh's first Christmas present. Payday weekend is always good because more money gets thrown at the emergency fund.

This entry is all over the place. If you made it this far reward yourself with some chocolate or ice cream. You deserve it.

Emergency Fund Update

October 11th, 2015 at 10:17 am

302.00 Beginning Balance
+_2.00 Weekly deposit

--------------------

304.00 New Balance

46.00 to go to reach my goal. I'd love it if I could get this done in one swift deposit but I will have to wait for my automatic deposits.

Christmas 2015: Forming a Plan

October 8th, 2015 at 10:29 am

So I know it's still a while away yet but I want to attempt to plan for Christmas.

We've finished saving up for our hgh street vouchers like we've done every year for the past five years I think. I only managed to get 10GBP saved on a supermarket savings card, so that plan was an epic fail.

Christmas stuff has started appearing in shops. I will probably write a list of non-perishable items I want and start picking them up.

Christmas dinner will be at home.

I still have to decide what to get the kids. SG is now at the age that she wants every toy from every advert she sees.

DH wants a couple of games. I can't remember exactly which ones, but I can check with him.

I haven't asked my mum what she would like yet but I am sure it will be pretty similar to what she usually wants: pyjamas, chocolates and wine.

We will be doing homemade cards for close friends and family. I think SG will enjoy it although I will have to buy more in soon.

2014 vs 2015

October 4th, 2015 at 09:42 am

Sometimes you just need to reflect. If you don't look back on things you forget what you've accomplished. I know most people reflect on their lives at the beginning or end of the year; I like to do it then too but it also helps to look back when you're feeling like you haven't achieved much.

It's not an exact year-on-year comparison to the day but in November last year I had 5172.29 worth of credit card debt. Today I have 4452.31. That's 719.98 paid off since then.

I don't have a year-on-year comparison for the catalogue because it was on the backburner and getting none of my attention. From my records I can see that it was sitting at 4441.68 in June (including bnpl) now it is 3766.23. That's 675.45 paid off since then.

My emergency fund last year was practically non-existent. Now I've finally reached the 300 mark.

If I hadn't started this blog way back then this probably wouldn't be the case. They say one small thing can change everything so, to me, this blog is the little thing that turned into a big thing. But I didn't even notice. I know I'm still on my journey to becoming debt free but thank you for your support guys!





Emergency Fund Update

October 4th, 2015 at 09:22 am

300.00 Beginning Balance
+_2.00 Weekly deposit

--------------------

302.00 New Balance

Emergency Fund Update

October 1st, 2015 at 08:03 am

292.78 Beginning Balance
+_1.11 Tesco coupon
+_3.75 Survey rewards
+_2.00 Weekly deposit
+_0.36 To even out amount

-----------------------------

300.00 New Balance

Update

October 1st, 2015 at 07:57 am

It's been a few weeks since my last update. I'll try and remember everything I wanted to write about.

We've just been plodding along here.

I've been making more of an effort to track spending, especially miscellaneous spending. So far this pay, almost two weeks in, miscellaneous spending has included a bake sale at SG's nursery to raise money for charity, a sponsored walk to raise money for her nursery, a magazine for me and a few impulse purchases at the checkout.

I seem to be blowing my way through the food budget. I have been doing my best to meal plan again recently and use things up. Maybe it's time to increase the budget. I'll admit though I have noticed that I have been spending more on food in an effort to gain weight and return to my former self.

I started Christmas shopping. I used 24GBP worth of catalogue rewards to get the kids something, so it was essentially free.

Speaking of the catalogue, the minimum payment is now at double digits. I can't remember the last time it was this low. I will enjoy it while it lasts since my horrendous BNPL item will be added on in December, and that will add 44.xx to my minimum payment.

I don't know my snowflakes total for the month. However, I did finally get all of the money transfered to debt and savings for the month. I am stil getting bored of doing surveys, although I did do one yesterday which shoudl reap rewards soon.

I've saved the best news till last: I finally hit 300 in the emergency fund!