Trying to Save

Yesterday was payday. After paying bills I added �45 to savings.

I managed to only spend �10 at the pub last night.

I woke up to see snow this morning. I think there's about 2 inches of it. I hope it doesn't get as heavy as the last time it was here, I'd like to try driving in it this time.

This weekend two friends got in touch with me and hubby. Both of them want to meet up. We're meeting hubby's friend tonight at the pub for a few (soft) drinks. On Friday we're meeting my friend at the pub too. I'm expecting Friday to cost more since we're both going to have a few drinks, not a lot though. I haven't seen her since last year. I explained to my friend that we're going away in a few weeks so will need money for that.

Hubby bought some food for our trip during the week. We now have plenty of Pot Noodles, macaroni, pasta and instant mashed potato to last us a week. When we got to the checkout I explained to the woman that we're really not that unhealthy; we're just stocking up for going away. When we came home, we found some individual portions of cereal in our cupboard - a Variety Pack - so we're going to take them aswell. Next on the list is toiletries although we won't be taking a lot. We'll be buying them on Friday.

I packed everything at work today. I have plenty of snacks to last me for a few weeks so I should manage to avoid spending at work.

Is it just me or is this year going in really quickly? I'm writing about March goals, where did the time go?

Anyway, my goals for March are:

1) read a book

2) don't use credit card

3) pack 100%

4) leftover to savings

February goals worked out okay. I managed to add extra to savings and I packed everything. The only thing I didn't do was start a car fund.

In roughly four weeks from now DH and I are going to visit his auntie and cousins. I've never met her, and it's been 10+ years since hubby seen her. I paid for the train tickets with cash and put the hotel on my credit card (bad I know!) It's working out about �24 a night for the travel lodge we're staying at. We're going to take plenty of food to snack on while we're there, right now all I can come up with is Pot Noodles and cereal bars, and sachets of coffee and teabags.

I know this money should have gone into savings but hubby really wants to go and visit them. Plus, it will get us away from here for almost a week.

I managed to get overtime this week: seven and a half hours worth. This is practically unheard of at this time of year. I don't know if I will get any more within the next couple of weeks, I'm just happy that I got something.

Lunch challenge is going well. I've packed 100% almost every day with the only exception being Sunday when I had to buy myself dinner at work because I impulsively volunteered to stay on for a few hours to help out. I had only packed for my contracted hours so I had no option but to buy dinner.

We're going out on Saturday night with a few friends. It will be our last night out for a while.

I've been thinking that me and hubby will have to combine our finances soon and get a joint bank account. Right now we're both with different banks.

I've also been thinking that I should help hubby pay back his mum. The sooner she's out the way, the better. It also means that it will free up money which can go to savings. Hmm. I spent most of my shift trying to think of ways to come up with extra money to pay her back. I would love it if the debt was gone by May/June.

Yesterday was payday. After paying bills I added �45 to savings, so that was �20 extra. Also, the day before we got paid I transferred the money I had left (�8) I love adding to savings. I'm going to have to write down when I add to savings so I can keep track of it.

I'm going to withdraw money for petrol and a night out we've got planned for next week and put it into envelopes.

I got my car back today. I can feel the difference. I'm hoping I won't see the inside of a garage for a while now.

This is my second birthday living here. When I moved in I honestly thought I'd celebrate one birthday here and that would be it. Well I'm 26 now. Ideally I'd like to have a child before I'm 30, not in this situation though. I was on a bit of a downer last night but I've cheered up.

Lunch challenge going well. I'm hoping to keep it up for the next few weeks.

It's payday tomorrow.

One of my goals for this month is to add extra to savings. I'm determined to do this. When I look at everyone else's savings, mine is pathetic. Well that will change soon. I'm going to find money, which is already there, and add it to savings. There's �20 there, for a start, that I can add since I'm not paying for Love Film until July. I'm sure I can find some more to add.

Took my car to the garage today for its MOT and service. Well there's a lot wrong with it - handbrake cable, brakes and oil, to name a few things. The garage phoned today and told me it will cost �770 to fix. Remember that credit card I cleared less than four weeks ago? Well I'm goiing to have to use that cos I haven't got enough credit left on CC2 to pay for it. The costs are mostly for their labour, apparently it's a big job. I won't get the car back till next week. I wish I had a car fund.

My goals for next month are pretty simple:

[]Any extra to savings

[]Pack 100%

[]Some of bonus to start car fund

I'm expecting a bonus at work. I don't know how much it will be, but I'm going to use it to start my car fund.

I mentioned this a few months ago in one of my entries, but then I never thought about it afterwards. Until last night, that is. As usual it was one of hubby and MIL's arguments that got me thinking. When hubby came back to the room he mentioned getting a loan out. A while later I was searching for places online to rent. I found one nearby, a 3-bedroom house, �500 pcm.

It looks so good. Of course we would be struggling if we didn't get Housing Benefit.

Then I started to think about all of the things we would have to pay for:

- rent (�500, plus one month's deposit I assume?)

- council tax (not too sure of the rates)

- food

- gas

- electricity

- phone

- tv licence

- loan payment?

And that's just what I can think of. I also have my car payments and CC debt.

Hubby pointed out that it will take us ages to save up the money we would need. I know it will. But I don't want to get into more debt just so we can move out. He doesn't mind. I can see his point, his mum is annoying me now.

I know the sensible thing to do:

1) SAVE the money

2) clear debt

3) move out

After reading CJ's entry I took a few moments to reflect on what would I change about my job, my life, myself.

My job:

- I wish I had a better paying job (I earn just over the minimum wage)

-I wish I worked in a place where you weren't just a number

- I wish my hard work was acknowledged; the more I do, the more they expect me to. Others barely do anything yet nothing is said.

Myself:

- I wish I had chosen a career path while at uni. I studied Psychology and now I have nothing to show for it. I didn't get any relevant work experience, in fact I never got any

- I wish I was confident

- I'd like to be laid-back to a certain extent. I worry about everything

- I'd like to be more productive when I'm not at work

Home life:

- I'd like me and hubby to have our own space. Choose our own meals. Heck, choose what time to eat.

- I'd like to look forward to going home when I finish work.

- I'd like to have a place to call my own

Basically I want control of my life.

Today is my second no-spend day in a row

It's our going out anniversary next month. We still like to acknowledge it. I suggested to hubby today that we go to the pub for a meal. It will get us out of the house, and we get to choose what we're having. We spent �40 on last year's meal, this year I'm thinking �20 max. Anything to get out of the house. If we lived in a nice warm country we'd most likely go for a picnic. Unfortunately, we don't.

I've agreed to go to Zumba next week with hubby's mum. She was talking to me about how she wants to lose weight. Apparently a woman at her work raves about it so she's decided to go. She didn't specifically ask me but I picked up on the hints. I told her I'm free after work to go. As it happens, I'm on holiday next week. I'm curious to see what the class will be like. I checked prices and it's �3 a class.

I'm going to check my bank balance tonight, just to see where I'm at. I'll need to withdraw money for the class next week, and money for the meal.

Gave my mum �20, and bought some bread and milk for her.

Bought a cardigan today that I had my eye on last week. It was �9 last week, half price today.

Tomorrow I will be buying wine to take to my mum's when I go over for dinner. Estimated expense: �4

Never spent a penny at work today. Tomorrow will be the same.

Less than three weeks till payday now.

since my last entry. Since then, things have been bad here. Hubby had a huge argument with his mum and basically told me he wants out now. Well I told him I'll need his help saving because our current method of him paying back his mum and not helping me save isn't working. It doesn't help that his mum hasn't acknowledged how much he has actually paid back. But that's not the point. The point is that we both want out. Preferably this year.

Everything was going fine yesterday until I got into the car to get hubby from work. My steering was really heavy as I was reversing out of the parking space,so I think there's something wrong with my power steering. I was telling people at work that I'll need to take it to the garage this week. However, from what people have told me, it might have something to do with the fluid. I really hope it's easy to solve this problem.

Apart from that, things are going well. Before I started work this morning I bought a few things to have on my breaks: snack packs of mini oreos and a snack pack of grapes. I had a coupon for the grapes, 50p off so they only cost 50p

I only got paid 2 days ago and already Im thinking of ways to save money. DH thinks I'm like this all the time anyway but these past few days I've been constantly thinking about my outgoings for the next four weeks. So, what are my reasons? Well my MOT is due next month. I really DO NOT want to put any of it on the CC, I want to pay for it with cash. I just got rid of one credit card, I don't want to add to the remaining one any more (I put my tyre on it) I'm thinking worst case scenario that work will need done since it is an old car. Aargh! If I had money saved for car maintenance I wouldn't have this problem!

Anyway so do I still have to pay within these next four weeks?

- petrol

- phone bill

- car payment

- car insurance

- dental plan

- Christmas savings

- auto savings transfer

- fix leak in alloy wheel (has to be done before MOT)

The only good thing about not using my car for almost four weeks is that I didn't have to get petrol as soon as I got paid.

I'm expecting my car insurance to go up next month because of the accident.

For the next 26 days I will pack everything I need for work. Before I can do this though I'll need to buy a few things to take to work, mostly things to snack on since that's my downfall. HH has motivated me to do this I enjoyed the feeling before when I did the lunch challenge and realised how much money I'd saved.

I don't have any pub nights planned so that's good - we were out last night anyway, but hubby treated me.

OK, that's my plan. Hope I succeed!

But it is already spent. This morning I cleared CC1!! I also added my first �25 to savings, it felt good. I paid my other credit card and catalogue too.

I'm not done spending. My tyre may finally get fixed today. I had to phone the AA and upgrade my membership, someone is coming out soon. That was �66 I wasn't planning on spending. I phoned the garage, they have my tyre. I think it will need to go on CC2 when I pick it up. So depressing. I had roughly �50 extra and I've used it for AA.

I'm going to focus on not buying anything at work for the next four weeks. That will save me some money.

Every month I pay for my Love Film subscription. This month they offered a 20% saving if you prepaid either 3 months (15% savings), 6 months (20%) or one year (25%). I prepaid for 6 months. This means that I have leftover money since a payment was due out this week before payday. This money is going towards CC1. When I get paid I will pay the rest of CC1. For the next 6 months I will put the money I would normally use for Love Film towards CC2.

In other news, Hubby can now view his bank statements online and he is going to start getting paper statements again. This is great news for us because we can finally see where his money is going. for years he hasn't been getting statements because he had signed up for online banking, then he forgot his sign in details. The bank would only let him change his details when he had ID. Well he now has his provisional (learners permit to you guys).

Hope everyone is having a great day!

Things aren't looking too good here. Hubby is in his (unauthorised) overdraft so I'm going to replace the money tomorrow. He'll still get charged but I'm hoping it won't be as bad as if I hadn't put the money in. Also, I still need to get my tyre fixed, so I'm looking into my options, preferably the cheapest. Although, and I hate to say it, I may have to use my credit card if I haven't got the money in the bank to cover it. I do not want to use it. My MOT is due next month too, so I'm hoping I will have the cash to cover it.

I'm working extra tomorrow. I was surprised when my manager asked me, it's rare to get overtime in January. I'm not complaining though, I need all the money I can get, I have goals to accomplish.

My goals this month are to add to savings and to get my budget card so I can start saving for road tax.

I've changed my goals for this year slightly, made them more specific. "Increase regular savings" is now "Add �800 to savings" and "start car maintenance fund" is now "�200 car maintenance fund". This way I have something to aim for.

One of my goals is to increase my regular savings. This is my plan:

1. save �25 4 weekly

2. DH will save �18 4 weekly

We get paid thirteen times a year. So we should end up saving �559. I will add any extra money that I have. I haven't cancelled my �5 auto savings. I checked my bank account and I can't set up a transfer for every four weeks, so I will just have to transfer the money over on payday.

As for Christmas, I will pay �10 each payday towards vouchers until October (through a woman at my work this time) I'm also going to start a Christmas savings card.

The car maintenance fund will probably start off small.

Happy New Year everyone!!

Originally I had a long list of what I wanted to achieve in 2011. However, after taking a look at my list, I deided to narrow it down to these goals:

1) Clear credit card 1

2) Clear credit card 2

3) Increase regular savings

4) Start car maintenance fund

5) Save for a cash-only Christmas

I think goals 1 and 5 will be the easiest to complete. Goals 2 and 3 will be the most challenging, I think. Once CC1 is gone, the money will be put to CC2.

I want to increase my regular savings to either �25 monthly or every 4 weeks when I get paid. I know �25 isn't a lot but it's better than the �5 auto-savings I currently have set up.

As for the car maintenance fund, well that will start after I have dealt with my current car problems.

Well I didn't manage to complete my goals for this month. Or my goals for this year actually. I'm going to have another think about my 2011 goals.

So Christmas is over now. We went to my mum's. Dinner with in-laws today.

Tyre still isn't fixed. We can't get it off the car. Also I just paid my road tax today. How ironic.

I finished my Christmas shopping yesterday. I spent �98 on the last of it. It was all paid for with cash so I have met my goal of a cash-only Christmas. I budgeted �150 for it so the leftover money will probably go towards a new tyre.

We're having a lazy day today. I'm going to start wrapping some presents soon.

We've been invited to the pub tonight, although I'm not too sure if we're going, it all depends on the weather. If we do end up going we'll only have a few drinks each since we're working in the morning.

I am so stressed!! When i was driving to work this morning my steering felt a bit funny. However the roads have been icy so I just put it down to that and the snow. When I finished work i took my mum home. Well on the way home my tyres were making a noise. I could see in the wing mirror that my tyre at the back was flat and it looked as though it was coming off! It's usually a short drive home so I thought it would be ok. I got caught in a queue of traffic and there was an accident. When I got to my mum's I had a good look at the tyre and it is coming off. My mum thought someone had slashed it because of how bad it is. Hubby's mum seen the car when I went round, she said I nevaer should have drove it. I'm not sure how it happened but I think - this is my theory anyway - that while my car was sitting in the car park for two weeks during all of this bad weather, I've gotten a flat tyre. Then driving the car and having alloy wheels has made it worse. I'm going to have to get a new tyre. My spare has a leak in the alloy, which I was planning on getting fixed soon so I can't put that on the car (mechanic said something a while ago about how i can't put any weight on the tyre until the leak is fixed) So I'm going to have to order a new tyre and get the leak in my spare fixed. And I'm working tomorrow. I don't know how I'm going to do this.

Ok I'm going to calmly think about what I'm going to do. My next post should make more sense.

I found out what happened today. The company has told hubby's mum that they didn't receive the payments - either all or some of it, I'm not too sure. So, although we gave her the money, they didn't receive it. The reason for this? She has been overdrawn, gotten bank charges and the payments haven't been made. She apologised to us since it is her fault. So how am I going to finish my xmas shopping? Well when I get paid instead of giving MIL "rent" (�160) I've only to give her �10 and use the rest of the money for xmas shopping. Ideally I want to spend less than �150 so I am writing a list of what I need to get. It's not a long list either.

I was reimbursed a few days ago through my health plan for contact lenses I bought a few months ago (�22) so I added that to savings.

I started using an application "Budget Brain" I have two budgets stored on it. One is my current one, the other is what I want to do.

In my first budget I am paying �248.04 towards debt, and only �5 to savings.

Budget 2 I am paying �275.12 towards debt; �48.75 savings and I added �20 for going out. I increased payments to CCs and savings in this budget. I am hoping to follow this budget next year. The only problem with this budget is that it leaves me with a �3 underspend each month. However if it means that I get to clear debt and save then it is worth it. After all, I will have budgeted for everything that i need anyway, right?

My Christmas high street vouchers, that is. You put money aside every month specifically for xmas and you have nothing to show for it. It's 17 days till xmas. I'd like them now. I have a list of what I still have to get yet I haven't got the money to buy it. This better not happen next year.

I'm really not in the mood this year. I haven't got my vouchers, it's freezing (it was -17 this morning) and my xmas night out is on Saturday. I really am not in the mood to go.

I hope I can increase savings next year. VAT is increasing to 20% so my phone bill and Love Film subscription will inreaase.

I don't know what's wrong with me. I'm looking at my 2010 goals and I didn't complete them all (I ADDED to the catalogue when I was meant to clear it, I'm crazy!)My savings have GOT to increase next year.

Just when I think we've got a plan...

Hubby found out last night that MIL hasn't been putting the money towards what he's been asking her to. Also she doesn't know her credit card balances. Since it's his debt hubby is going to start taking over the credit card payments. At least this way he will know how much he has paid.

We're still going to apply for a loan next year. I hate having this hanging over us.

Sometimes I feel as though she wants us here forever. The other day she found out her payday is the same as ours. She wasn't happy, she'd rather the money went in on different days. Well she won't be getting our money forever.

This isn't going to ruin my goals. I'm still going to save for the things I said. I'll still clear my debt.