Trying to take the stress out of the debt - little steps

Triggles

slm - I suppose they have heard every excuse in the book from people they call, so they aren't willing to be put off. It's rather annoying though. We actually ARE trying to sort out the finances, so you'd think the fact that we're communicating with them in writing at least would signal to them that we are not ignoring it, just trying to sort through it carefully. Ah, well, what can you do, right?

I think DD was quite lucky getting this flat - it's a council flat, and she was on the list, and bid on it. She wasn't first on it, but they wanted it rented out immediately and the top bidder couldn't move in until January, whereas DD could move in immediatey, so she got it. She's over there right now, organising and cleaning. She only has beds and dresser for furniture, so she is planning on going to the local charity shops as we have a couple locally that have very low prices on good furniture and they deliver. So she can pick out a couple things and stay within her budget. We're encouraging her to come onto this site and start familiarising herself with OS stuff and budget things, so she develops good spending habits.

I am going this afternoon to get my hair washed and cut. :j I have long hair and haven't had it done in aaaaages! I am looking forward to it, just the pampering of the hair wash will be lovely. DH encouraged me to do this, as he said I need the break (as he'll be home with the kids while I'm gone) and deserve the pampering. Once my hair is cut, DH will do the colour. He's quite good at it, and I can't stand paying salon prices for colouring.

Ooooh. Santander is getting on my nerves. They add £12 for being over the credit limit (due to their fees!) and then £12 for "late payment" as we are not paying the full amount due to DMP. So they're adding £24 every month to our debt. :mad: And Halifax is sending us letters asking if we'd like a loan - we've gotten THREE in the last month from them.

Verbatim

Hi,

Your dd could also try freecycle for all sorts being given away free.

SuzyWuzy_2

Hope you enjoyed your pampering session getting your hair done. Its nice to escape for a few hours isn't it. Had mine cut shorter yesterday for
a change, with having the baby I felt i needed to perk myself up a little and go a little shorter.

Good news about DD - How exciting for her! ( and for you to have some more space ) Hope the move goes well for her and she settles in soon!

Triggles

DD is almost moved into her flat, by Thursday hopefully. Her appliances and utilities will be sorted over the next couple days, and then that's it. We're quite excited - more room for us and of course, her own place for her! :j

Slight aggravation that we are still in such a financial pickle, partly because of being parents and helping our kids, and then they're financially okay now and we're struggling. But I guess that comes with being parents. We've told them both that financially they are on their own now, as we simply don't have the money to spare, so they are expected to be responsible with their money. Again, I'm going to encourage DD to come onto this site and learn a few thiings from it. (not reading this though! LOL)

I'm hoping this will also mean some of our expenses will go down quite a bit - groceries and utilities mainly. We're also going to do some DIY (as inexpensively as possible) and paint 2 bedrooms and have them all ready for the boys, then put carpet remnants in there, so they have a new carpet, even if it's not expensive fitted carpet. We're also going to do that for our living room, as the carpet from the previous owners is still there and it is truly disgusting. We've been wanting to replace it forever. I'd rather have a nice remnant than a horrible threadbare fitted carpet. We initially didn't want to spend the money, but we've allocated £500 of our savings/emergency fund to doing some upkeep and cleaning up of the house, which desperately needs to be done. It won't be on credit, as we have put aside the cash, so I don't feel quite so bad about it.

Next month will start the upped payments for the creditors. I am going to sit down and figure out how much it will be before the end of the month. I also need to do my tax return online, and do an Usborne order. I need to put one order in to stay active in Usborne before 31 December, and since it's working as an Usborne seller (self employed) that allowed me to get my maternity allowance, I don't want to rock the boat in that direction. I will probably put in an order for books and items that I can use over the next year for the kids and grandkids for birthday and Christmas presents. Since I get a discount, it will be worth the money.

We cut out some paper snowflakes today and are going to hang them around the living room and entryway tomorrow. DS2 was quite excited. Nice inexpensive project and seasonal decoration.

DH is still ill with a chest infection, so he's a bit out of commission right now. He can take over with the kids for short periods (hence my haircut Saturday), but is too exhausted to do much more than that. He is slowly making progress though. GP signed him off for another week at work, as he just isn't up to fulltime physical work yet, and she put him on a different antibiotic that will hopefully work a bit better. Fingers crossed!

House is a bit messy today, but with both DH & I under the weather, what can you do? It's one of those "take care of the priority stuff" days and we'll catch up on the other stuff tomorrow - or at least I will, not sure how DH will be feeling.

Triggles

We got our shipped items from storage and went through them. Wow! So much old stuff we'd forgotten about. And some sentimental things we didn't want to lose - such as my christening gown from when I was a baby that DD wore for her christening as well. Some pictures, a few hand crocheted blankets that my (now deceased) grandmother made, some dolls that my father bought for me when I was a child from other countries, some gorgeous wooden platters that my mother gave to me years ago. It's just a relief to have these things here now, so no more storage payments.

Sending out some of the ecards today for Christmas cards. And plan on sending the remainder tomorrow. Then I can get the local cards done. A few things wrapped for Christmas, will hopefully get the rest done tonight. I do hate that DH & I are feeling under the weather at this time (not that there ever IS a convenient time to be ill!), but it just makes me feel rushed for Christmas stuff to get done.

Triggles

What a long day! We had to go over to DD's flat and sit there (with no furniture - but thankfully some toys for DS2) and wait from 8 until noon for the appliances to be delivered and connected. Then when they arrived, the delivery person forgot to pack cables to connect the cooker, so he had to come back this afternoon, so we had to run a few errands then be back at the flat later in the afternoon, with very little warning (they were going to call just before they were headed back to flat to connect the cooker). Then DD came home early from work as DGS was not feeling well and the nursery called her to come pick him up. 90 minutes early. I just don't get it. They said he's been feeling ill from late morning until then, but didn't call her to come pick him up until late afternoon, about 90 minutes before she was to get off work anyway. Why not either call when he's first ill, or simply wait those last 90 minutes, since he's been there all day anyway?? Oh, well. Nothing I can do about it, obviously. Thankfully, I don't deal with them. I would never take DS there as they drive me absolutely crazy. They charge DD weirdly to make more money out of her around the free hours she gets, and their communication is absolutely awful. They tell her DGS is doing great, then all of a sudden say to her "oh he's been having such-and-such problem for weeks now...." well, why didn't they SAY so then?!?! :mad: They said something was wrong with him because he liked to make dinosoar roaring sounds. Don't lots of 3-4 year old boys do that?!?! And it's not at inappropriate times, just when he's playing dinosaur. Weird.

DH and I have been allowing ourselves to get sucked into her moving stress and have just realised we're doing more of the stressing than DD is. So now it's "step back and let DD deal" time. We have enough to deal with.