I'm going to do a diary too :)

gerbiljo

I have done the food shop today. We planned to do a meal for my mums birthday so needed to get lots of extras and some cash, so total spend today is £65 yikes. I'm kicking myself, I dont think i was with it today and made a few blunders in the shop and ended up spending more like i managed to buy pampers instead of supermarket own nappies, so im annoyed but its done now i guess.

We do have some food over tho so I'm hoping perhaps we can have left overs tomorrow, instead of normal meals and save them for another night.

on the growing side, we have loads of strawberries growing so hopefully over the next couple of weeks our fruit bill should reduce, tho we dont buy much i guess they will be snack alternatives to more expensive things.

we have our balustrading quote, this is a bit more than we have but my sis is lendong me the extra as the quote isnt valid for long and we can pay her back next month and it shouldnt really interfere with our over payments so all good. It ended up my extra salary a few weeks ago was deliberate yay! so a bit better off overall than i thought.

looking forward to the chart update!

vl2588

You need the non-disposable nappies

gerbiljo

vl2588 wrote: »

You need the non-disposable nappies

oh i know....i bought them i planned to do it all good, but i just couldn't. I planned to start with them right away as I knew once i started on disposables i wouldn't go back! I think my mistake was I tried to be too ambitious and bought the old terry towelling ones, I even practiced putting them on a toy lion. When the moment came tho everyone bought me disposables as presents even neighbours and because they were newborn ones I used them so they weren't wasted, about a month into it, I grabbed for the terry ones and grabbed a nappy liner, which I expected to be like a big 'night towel' and it was like tracing paper and i couldn't believe it. i put it on none the less and got the water proof pants and they were huge 'does my bum look big in this sleepsuit' I could hear my little girl saying... at that point I took it off and since then they have been used as general purpose towels and I've not so much as thought about it again...

I had so many ideas about what being a mum would be like when I was pregnant, I was so disillusioned, don't even get me started on the breast pump idea!

vl2588

LOL I have another friend who is about to go through all this, I think it's better not to know these things in advance!!

gerbiljo

yeah your right, trying to 'imagine' what it will be like is pointless!

As mentioned previously (as seems fairly common on here) hubby is slightly less committed to all this than me. Plus he worries more than me about money etc. I had set ourselves targets every month and then I was trying to beat them but unless things get easier (not sure why they should, unexpected payrise etc) then I think the next couple of months we will just hold on to any extra (I really don't want to reduce the target) for hubby to stick in his ISA so he doesn't need to worry, we always have a bit in there for car insurance etc etc, so I will have to accept that reaching the target is a good enough goal! the extra was for the extension foundations but will not scrimp further for now! we are infact £1100 ahead of target, I think I just need to deal with the fact that I really cannot shorten the term further as we need to overpay alot to make a difference as we are already trying to do it so quickly.

We worked out some motivational stats last night. We started our tracker mortgage sept/oct 2008 and I went on maternity leave for which I got SMP (until end July 2009), during this time we cut right back and even though we thought we couldn't manage without my wage we paid off £5828. Since I've returned to work full time so Aug to present (10 months) we have paid off £27281, obviously we are chuffed with this figure.

We have ordered the balustrading, they charge 2.6% if u use a credit card rather than a debit card...is this sort of thing normal??

pammyj74

That is an amazing figure that you have paid off, very well done.

My work have to charge 2% on any order over £1k on credit cards but no charge on debit cards. The banks charge us you see.

gerbiljo

pammyj74 wrote: »

That is an amazing figure that you have paid off, very well done.

My work have to charge 2% on any order over £1k on credit cards but no charge on debit cards. The banks charge us you see.

thanks pammy interesting, it was under 1k, i'll keep hold of the debit card then!

gerbiljo

Update on spending...

Food shop was £26 in sainsburys and £6 in asda. So pretty good plus that included some compost. No dog food though so have to get that tomorrow and the chicken and duck food, hopefully will end up with a bit extra this month.

Have to do a course with work in a couple of weeks and will get some extra petrol money so thats a relief, otherwise would of blown the budget.

Our phone bill direct debit has gone up, so not too happy, considering transferring to sky so sky works out as a free extra almost...will look into this as our freeview reception is rubbish, but not keen to change my internet so might just try the phone.

Hubby is doing a 1/2 marathon and his trainers fell apart this week so he was going to get some more, but hes had a rummage and found some proper running shoes that were covered in grout, after a clean theyre good as new so a golden money-saving star for him!

Did the card offer as suggested on the email as others have mentioned on here, bargainacious!

Looking forward to the chart tomorrow, only one more shop to come from this months money so will try and not spend much more!!

gerbiljo

Excited about the chart today, I am just in the green still

Bought some duck and chicken food today oh and dog food. Had a nice day in the garden. done some more cuttings, the strawberries are coming on really good and theres some raspberries now, we have loads of herbs, once they bush up I might have a go on ebay again.

Account seems fairly healthy at the mo but sometimes it just disappears infront of our eyes!

Had a figure review last night and going to try and sneak a bit extra in so we hit £85k for the first of August.

Had a foundation quote and it was a bit more than we hoped so not sure what to do at the mo. Hubby has decided he wants a new car but that must wait until after this is paid or wel never keep up the progress!!

gerbiljo

Rightio!

Got the fathers day card today yay! Our cats ate my husbands mini bonsai tree (was only £3) so may replace that for fathers day, he said not to get anything, but i think he wont mind that, plus my nan has eggs once a week and insists on paying us £2 so that will virtually cover it! Sorted

My hubby has got a £2 frame so were going to put a picture of our daughter in that for my dad and some sweets which I hope we can incorporate into the weekly shop. Sorted

Hubbys family has lost of birthdays this month and we have covered them with some bargain hunting so thats all good, again come out of the monthly food/petrol allowance. Has left us a bit short as I have to travel with work next week but they're going to give me extra petrol money so not going to worry about that.

Spent the last little while evaluating the surveys I get sent. I have deleted chozz,I had no points in my account despite doing lots of questions and then getting declined. YouGov don't send me alerts anymore so I am checking regularly, not sure its worth it but theres a tenner in there so will keep registered for now. I do the odd pigsback thing though am a bit reluctant to keep registering for things as I don't want randoms calling me up! I have looked on Martin's guide to surveys and am going to start trying them out one by one when I have time as i am always rushing about. I just need to get rid of the rubbish ones. Ipsos I have a couple of pound in points so I might see it through to a £5 voucher and see how long that takes!

Stair posts are ordered, tho they were meant to send us a drawing first to confirm and they're all made so fingers crossed. Owe my sis some cash for them which can clear next week. Had a look and aiming to get to 85k for 1st august, watch this space!

Looking into the sky thing still, my sis is trying to get a deal through work as sometimes she can do this.

Finally our local pizza guy is really good and doing world cup fantasy football league (hubby loves FF) and if you score higher than him you get £5 credit for a max of 4 weeks so max £20, hubby is registered (he also does large pizza for £4.99 but if you mention 'facebook' he reduces it by £1) and currently 1 point behind, so watch this space hopefully he can win himself a few weeks worth of pizza!

Not much else to say, will wait for a free listing day on ebay as I have a few flourished cuttings so will give it a shot!