Renovations and Repayments.

May Targets:
Days getting longer and summer only around the corner, May is the month to sell a no longer wanted classic, I think.

Organise trip to Rutland Water with in-laws. Now have a day.
Organise Whitsun holiday. 1. Trip to R.W. 2. Trip to the coast.
Start work on the bathroom More work happening over this week, I think by the end we will have some items fitted.
Total Grocery Spend: £205 / £400.
Surplus Money: £230 / £1,000.
11.30pm bedtime: 8 / 31.
Meditation: 9 / 31.
Schedule / Spreadsheets: 15 / 31. Keep finding ways to utilise spreadsheets at the moment.
De-clutter and Sell: 1 / 5 items. Plan for tomorrow is to work on this for a few hours.
New Recipes: 1 / 4.
Books read for pleasure: / 3.
Learn something new or refine a skill: 1. Continue learning and applying new knowledge to create more sophisticated and streamlined spreadsheets. 2. Learn a new piece of repertoire. Spent some time on this today. 3. Demolishing a bathroom. Think I can safely say this is done. :eek:

Suffolk_lass wrote: »

Good to see you back Alex - your Son's illness explains where you had gone. Watch that selling stuff bug, it can become a bit of a compulsion! Before you know it you will have accumulated enough for the bathroom, then the mortgage, and next thing you'll be on the FIRE trail

:rotfl: I got heavily into selling stuff when I was a DFW. However, it was more buying stuff to sell on rather than selling surplus stuff we don't need. Would like to get back into a bit of antiques / pens / watches dealing.

maman wrote: »

That's great news! It'll give them something to occupy their time instead of relying on you to entertain them as well as the obvious healthy eating.

Hopefully, in time, they can rebuild a relationship with LittleK.:)

Poor little chap (that's LittleK not you!:p). Thinking about it though he's had minimal illness since starting school which is unusual. Hopefully it'll be the same for you when you 'start school'. It's very common to pick up every bug going until you build up an immunity.

No problem with looking to your parents for help in the circumstances. I would imagine it must have been very difficult if LittleK was violently ill with no functioning bathroom. It's just that I don't want you (or them) to get too comfortable with you being there.

I think you've done really well with your grocery budgets lately. It is possible to eat healthily without it being too expensive. I think the way forward is plenty of planning so you don't waste food or buy ready made stuff, have smallish meat portions balanced by plenty of vegetables and keep away from the cake shop!

However you pay it off and I'm sure you will it would be good if you did it so you can move on to the next project rather than because you don't trust yourself with the 0% card.

Hope you have a good weekend now that MrsK's back and things returning to normal.:)

My father called today for advice on using "notes" on iPad as they've slightly modified a recipe and want to share it with me. Find it rather hilarious they call me for tech advice. :rotfl: Quite pleased they seem to have found a new hobby, though. They are much more pleasant to be around when they are kept busy.

They have mentioned my son and I going to them in the half term holiday one day for my son to bake some cakes with them and for me to have a day of peace and quiet. :eek: Not really going to happen in their company. :rotfl: I'm going to speak to my son about baking with his grandparents as a plan for a day in the holiday but am going to give him the final say for if he wants to or not.

My son has had a few illnesses since starting school, nothing major or like last week, though. The school is very small which I think probably helps and he seems to have quite a strong immune system, thank goodness.

Thank you re. grocery budget. I am pleased with it too and we are eating healthily, probably more healthily if truth be known. Planning has become something I'm slowly becoming accustomed to it. I've gone from dreading it to embracing it. I was concerned it would potentially bring some issues of control I used to have but it hasn't. Glad I'm over that and understand things cannot always go exactly as one would wish, nor can one hold much influence over others.

We will definitely pay off the 0% card. I am concerned about the debt but I also realise if I am going to be successful with some of the business plans I have for the future, I need to be able to deal with debt / borrowing in a sensible manner.

May Targets:
Days getting longer and summer only around the corner, May is the month to sell a no longer wanted classic, I think.

Organise trip to Rutland Water with in-laws. Now have a day.
Organise Whitsun holiday. 1. Trip to R.W. 2. Trip to the coast. 3. Son baking with parents.
Start work on the bathroom Work is happening but it seems all too slowly. Going to our neighbour's for a shower everyday is getting old, despite them being nice people and making us breakfast and nightly visits to the loo outside isn't helping me to get a good night's sleep. A bit too much information there. :rotfl: The bathroom situation is bothering me the most but I think that's because I'm here all day and am dealing with the work being done.
Total Grocery Spend: £215 / £400.
Surplus Money: £230 / £1,000.
11.30pm bedtime: 10 / 31.
Meditation: 11 / 31.
Schedule / Spreadsheets: 17 / 31.
De-clutter and Sell: 1 / 5 items.
New Recipes: 1 / 4.
Books read for pleasure: / 3.
Learn something new or refine a skill: 1. Continue learning and applying new knowledge to create more sophisticated and streamlined spreadsheets. 2. Learn a new piece of repertoire. 3. Demolishing a bathroom.

Not in a great frame of mind today. Took the dogs for a walk with my mother and she thinks I'm causing my father to be "reflective". I have had a few difficult conversations with them about how they treat my son and I recently which I know has upset my father and prompted him to do what he did yesterday. She got a bit annoyed with me again showing she thinks anything can be solved by throwing money at it.

May Targets:
Days getting longer and summer only around the corner, May is the month to sell a no longer wanted classic, I think.

Organise trip to Rutland Water with in-laws. Planned a few more details today.
Organise Whitsun holiday. 1. Trip to R.W. 2. Trip to the coast. 3. Son baking with parents. 4. At least one quiet day dog walking etc. 5. Swimming (thanks, Red Squirrel ).
Start work on the bathroom Starting to see some progress with this now items have started to be fitted today. Not in a usable state yet but despite being concerned about our budget the suite so far looks fantastic. Also means we are getting a lot closer to the 0% debt going live. :eek: Managed to have a laugh with my father about it today, though. He said if a 0% debt was all he had to worry about at my age he'd have been grinning from ear to ear. I asked him if he thought I'd be able to handle this responsibly and he said he thinks I will.
Total Grocery Spend: £235 / £400.
Surplus Money: £230 / £1,000.
11.30pm bedtime: 10 / 31.
Meditation: 12 / 31.
Schedule / Spreadsheets: 18 / 31.
De-clutter and Sell: 1 / 5 items.
New Recipes: 1 / 4.
Books read for pleasure: / 3.
Learn something new or refine a skill: 1. Continue learning and applying new knowledge to create more sophisticated and streamlined spreadsheets. 2. Learn a new piece of repertoire. 3. Demolishing a bathroom.

Struggling a bit today. I've been volunteering at school and it's been a bit of a hard day. Pupils have been generally bad tempered and I don't think I delivered a particularly good session to one group or handled some behaviour issues in the best possible way. I'll move on from it and know what I need to do next week. Things like this happen sometimes. Going to have an unexpected car bill also which it has only threw at me today; having investigated I've also found another problem which means I'm going to be re-building the diff so might as well do a rear brake overhaul and a few other jobs. Mrs K and I will probably be able to get it all done in one weekend, though we need to get the car we want to sell gone.

We've decided we aren't going to France this summer. I'd rather put the money towards getting the debt paid and we are still going to have a holiday as we're going to go to Spain for a week which will cost our flights and food only. My mother is going to drive us to the airport to save on parking / taxi fees. Definitely going to France next year, though.

Told my parents I won't see them until next week as we are busy with other things. I suppose I was quite blunt about it but I do need to have some boundaries in place.

Red-Squirrel wrote: »

There's research that a shower everyday is unnecessary and bad for your skin. You could skip the odd day and just brush your teeth and have a 'festival wash' with some baby wipes or a soapy flannel.

Or if you have a swimming pool/leisure centre in driving distance what about a swimming or sport trip as a family a couple of times a week and use their showers after?

It'll all be worth it when the new bathroom is done! I'm decorating at the moment and doing it all myself between shifts and the disruption is starting to get to me a bit now, so I feel your pain!

If your father is reflecting, that can only be a good thing. It might not be easy on your mum but maybe it will trigger some uncomfortable feelings and thoughts for her too. Just because changing and becoming a better person isn't easy doesn't mean we shouldn't try to do it. Look at you, it's not been easy for you to get to where you are, but you've grown so much and made such positive changes to the way you think and how you approach people and situations.

Never heard that. IIRC you are a nurse, so I assume would be privy to such research?

We have a leisure centre in driveable distance and go swimming sometimes. Not been for a few weeks so have made it a "something to do" over the holiday. Also gives us something to do this weekend as we were a bit stuck. Thank you.

The decorating between shifts sounds like hard work. Yes, I'm starting to see the project will be worth it now.

I think I have inherited at least some of my father's depressive tendencies. Never realised it at the time and he would always deny it until recently but I think he has some issues with mental health. Recently, his memory has been of concern but this seems to be improving. He is under the care of the medical profession and they have thankfully not found anything untoward (he does have other health concerns but everything is stable at the moment). Father goes through periods of remorse and regret for the past, though he usually returns to his old self which in turn disappoints me. I don't want him to be upset, just to not tell me he wishes he'd behaved in a different way only to behave in the way he regrets to my son. Anyhow, he'll do what he'll do ultimately.

My mother is different. She doesn't regret any actions she has taken in life and believes they / she are / is were / was right.

I seem to have been playing counsellor to others again today. Friend from school who had a bit of drug problem has now fell head over heels in love with a girl he's met a couple of times (story of his life, there) but is concerned she won't be interested when she finds he's divorced / has some financial problems. Mrs. K. put it in perspective when she said "so, he's not concerned she'll run a mile over the fact a few months ago he was high practically everyday but a marriage that didn't work out and a few late payments mean it's doomed from the start ... tell him not to give her his log on to Experian and that at our age I doubt she's still angelic." Harsh but she does amuse me.