Sunflowers MFW Journey

sunflower76

Well bad news on the cat front; another £76 and an operation . He's OK but now has a big hole in his head :eek: as well as being rather cross and fed up.

Funny really that I've 'found' £138 in two days to fix the puddy, as I don't normally have a spare £138 quid at the end of the month - where does it normally go? There must be a big black hole eating my salary somewhere :rotfl:

I've also had to buy extra cat food as he needs a bland diet and I treated him to a whole chicken which I've roasted and will feed him over the next few days. I'm a mug I know but he looks like he needs a good dinner to cheer him up :rolleyes:.

So I didn't manage the no spend day BUT I haven't been to the pub as mother got the date of the baby shower wrong. I've also claimed my expenses for yesterdays trip.

setmefree2

I'm sure he/she is worth every penny

sunflower76

Well, the puddy is a million times better and only has to go back for one quick checkup; I'm hoping that they won't charge me for this but I expect I shall have to pay for another consultation (£20 ish).

Shopping this weekend was horrendous - £99.41 :eek:. Not very MSE eh? I will NOT be doing a full shop next week and if we have to eat plain cous cous (I hate cous cous) then so be it. Appalling.

Today I did a car boot sale which raised £90 between my mum and I; I haven't seen the cash yet as she cashed up and will drop it off later. I'll have to put this towards our holiday I think, along with £32.80 of expenses as I've just paid the £818 to bring the balance down to nil. I think this will be our last abroad holiday for a while so I want to enjoy every minute of it and don't want to worry about coming back to a big bill for it so I'll work extra hard to get that paid off by the end of July (CC Statement due then). It's all inclusive so I shouldn't need more than £100 spending money and once it's gone - it's gone. We don't need new clothes either so we can just pack and go hopefully.

I'd sold a few bits on eBay to get my PayPal up to £30 but I've ordered some photos from the wedding photographer from last weeks wedding so that's eaten into it. It should get raised back up now though as I've just sold some bits for £25 ish and I have a tent, some heaters and a hoover to go on tonight if I get chance or tomorrow if not. As soon as it hits £50 I'll transfer it to my bank to be paid off something.

I've done loads of surveys over the past few weeks which are adding up nicely. I don't usually get 25+ a week but it's gone mad recently and I've been having around 5 a day; struggling to find time for these at the moment.

I need to count the penny jar again at some point as it's getting really heavy. I'm half minded to wait until it's full but then I figure that the interest I'm paying on my loan / mortgage is WAY more than I'm getting from it sitting in a jar so i should pay it in every week if I can.

So, in short, nothing paid off the mortgage, a holiday paid for, an horrendous £100 shopping bill and a mended cat. :rolleyes: Not quote sure how I feel about all that really.

SmlSave

Glad to hear your cat is feelign better

Don't worry bout the shopping bill, I'm sure you'll be extra good for the next few weeks. You don't like couscous? I love it, but only discovered it last year really (OH isn't fussed)

Well done on getting the holiday paid for

sunflower76

Gah, who decided we should have a Fathers Day celebration? I'm being particuarly grumpy about this as I don't really see the point of it and I have three 'Dads' to buy for. My Dad, MrS's Dad and my Step Dad. Cards are c. £3 each and then gifts too? Easily £30 blown on tat that no one wants or needs. :mad:

So this year MrS's dad is getting a cheap card and 4 can of lager and my Dad and Step Dad are getting home made cards and home made cake. Total cost should then be < £10, which is better :T I think all three dads will be ahppy with this rather than some car wash gift set, or a naff mug with 'Worlds Best Dad' on.

I sound like a mare don't I? I'm not an awful person and I love the three of them dearly but, really, do we need this commercialised tat day?

sunflower76

Well another trip to the vets today which wasn't as straight forward as I'd hoped as puddy had to have his abcess cleared again which was yakky, and another £40 almost. At this rate I may as well just hand over my salary to the vets.

My expenses didn't come through last week, which is a pain, but should be in the bank tomorrow or Friday. I've listed a tent and a hoover on ebay so hopefully they'll give me a bit of cash; I've just sold an inner tent which fetched £21.

I'm starting to get a bit obsessed with this selling lark, a car boot sale and loads of ebaying - I think I'll sell the pets, it'll be a lot cheaper!

ShelleyC_2

sunflower76 wrote: »

I love the three of them dearly but, really, do we need this commercialised tat day?

My Dad always moans that it a commercial card company scam but if I don't get him a card I get in trouble with my Mum :rotfl:

Your pressies sound like something they'd really enjoy which is better than expensive gifts that get stuck in a cupboard :T

setmefree2

sunflower76 wrote: »

Well another trip to the vets today which wasn't as straight forward as I'd hoped as puddy had to have his abcess cleared again which was yakky, and another £40 almost. At this rate I may as well just hand over my salary to the vets.

My expenses didn't come through last week, which is a pain, but should be in the bank tomorrow or Friday. I've listed a tent and a hoover on ebay so hopefully they'll give me a bit of cash; I've just sold an inner tent which fetched £21.

I'm starting to get a bit obsessed with this selling lark, a car boot sale and loads of ebaying - I think I'll sell the pets, it'll be a lot cheaper!

Sunflower my sister's cat got run over recently - had an op - cost £450 :eek: and the poor thing still died:rolleyes:

freebiequennie

Your diary is very inspring we have been married 3yrs and I am 29 and husband is 35 and we have had a mortgage for 2yrs we started on a tracker which tracked below the base rate very lucky to get this and intially rates went up and we thought what have we done but then when they came down we have been very very lucky unfortunately deal came to an end, may 09 so we have gone over onto variable rate which in a way is good as we have no limit on overpayments but must get a new deal soon - we had to take a 35yr mortgage as they said we could afford to pay more than the monthly amount on our salaries well proved them wrong and have paid double every month so have paid 14yrs worth mortgage in 2yrs as first few yrs really make a difference.

so looking for new mortgage deal over 20yrs and need to get out ltv ratio down to 75% before we set a new deal as more deals available to us at this rate.

we are very lucky and first time home is a 4 bed house and cost us £200,000 we had a mortage of £165,000 and its down to around £128,000 at the moment. The bank was valuing our home at £180 but now valuing at £170 so chucking every penny we have at it at the mo.


with regards to your comment abour fathers day cards we got ours in asda for £1 each.

sunflower76

It seems an age since I've posted here although it's only been 5 days!
Shopping this week was £67.22 :eek: which is high again. We were out for Dinner with my work on Friday (£45!) then we had a BBQ for us and friends no Saturday so it was an expensive weekend really. The rest of this week should be a no spend though so it's not too bad I suppose.

I'm a bit sick of spending so much money, it doesn't seem necessary but I can't put my finger on where all my money goes really and I don't want to start a spending diary as I just don't have time for writing every last thing down.

I think shopping has gone up as I've persuaded MrS not to buy lunch at work so every night I have to prepare something for him and me instead of buying lunches. This would cost up to £30 a week (£3 each per day x 5) and I reckon shopping has only gone up £10 so around a £20 saving.

I car share every day so only use £50 per month petrol now (unless I have work trips which I get back at 40p per mile).

So where does my cash go? Not sure if we're having a blip or if everything has come at once and generally day to day stuff has gone up Maybe I need to stop punishing myself for not acheiving a reduction each month. I guess it isn't do-able all the time is it?

We recently bought a standby saver which is basically a giant extension which turns off all eight of the appliances plugged in it when a certain one is turned to standby, instead of them all being left on standby. It's pretty good but I wish I'd thought to check how much electricity was being used before I set it up so that I can make a comparison. I did wait until it was on offer

On the positive side I've managed to get loads of things growing in the allotment so can see that the saving is on it's way there. We'll be eating beans forever and a day I reckon.

Counted up my penny jar again last night and anther £25 to bank. :T And three more items on eBay ready to finish tomorrow / Wednesday. They are reasonably high valie items and there are lots of watchers and questions so I'm keeping my fingers crossed for good sale prices.