DFSD's five year plan... and all it brings along the way

debtfreesomeday

oh no, just tried to double up my tesco vouchers and they need the clubcard to do it - I think ours has been lost for ages! :mad::( I'll have a look around at home, but I think it went missing when hubby lost his wallet last.

debtfreesomeday

Urgh, I woke up at 3am this morning and still haven't managed to get back to sleep since. :mad: I can feel a lazy Sunday coming on...

Lying awake this morning I have been going over loads in my head - finances - maternity leave - Christmas shopping - overdraft - future house extension - finances - you get the picture. Finally had to admit defeat and get up, have done the free scratchcards and now having a browse on here as it usually calms my financial fears a little.

Yesterday I went shopping for the rest of a wedding outfit - I managed to find everthing I needed in the sale, bar a pair of trousers which were full price (annoyingly so). I bought a couple of outfit 'options' which I wanted to try at home, and pleased to say I returned the stuff I didn't need yesterday afternoon, which saw £60+ refunded. I also returned the maternity clothes I ordered last week and a top which had to go back to Debenhams. I found some shoes half price in Monsoon (£17.50), a cardi reduced to £24 from £40 and I begrudgingly paid £45 for the trousers as they were the only ones I found that fitted and were the right colour. I also bought a dress at half price for £17.50, which I was considering wearing to one of the September weddings we have, but I may return it yet as I would need to buy shoes and a cardi to go with it, so would end up being an expensive buy. The trouser outfit I shall be wearing to at least 3 events we have coming up, so although I spent more than I would've liked, it's going to be used for several outings!

Looking at the bank account this morning, we have around £100 left in there this month once all the bills are paid. This needs to cover petrol though which is my main concern as we have a 6 hour round trip to do next weekend. Also needs to cover groceries, but I'm not so worried about that as we can do that cheaply.

I'm going to try and get some sleep again now... wish me luck!

DFSD

Chocforever

When I saw you had posted at 6:21, I thought that was keen for a Sunday morning, even for you . Not so good if you have been awake since 3am and been thinking about money and other responsibilities that seem so much worse at that hour .

The wedding outfit sounds nice and the trousers seem like a good buy if they are the right colour and fit. I find saving £10 pounds on a cheaper but inferior pair isn't such a good idea when I actually wear them and don't feel so confident, particularly if they are for an event where everyone is dressed up.

I was thinking yesterday that I still want to move. Part of the reason for me blitzing the mortgage this year is to see whether I could cope with a £175k mortgage (assuming someone would lend me the money in the first place). I have been so busy with one thing and another that the things I need to do around the flat in advance of a sale haven't progressed at all. In fact, the situation is worse than ever!

I have a day of MSing ahead. Some new shops today, so must go and read the instructions properly. Two are food shops so I can stock up on some fresh food for the week ahead. Much as I like MSing, I think I may have to reduce it to get some jobs done at home.

Enjoy a quiet, relaxing day at home x

debtfreesomeday

Hi Chocs

I hope the MS went well yesterday.

As for moving, although you feel like you're not getting jobs done around the flat, you must be in a better position than you were at the start of the year money-wise with your savings and money-making, so it's not like you've made no progress. Maybe write a list of all the jobs that need doing and tackle one at a time? It's what I try and do - it certainly feels great ticking one off!

DFSD

debtfreesomeday

I didn't have a great night's sleep last night either. Not as bad as the previous night, but not great, so I'm feeling really tired and headachey today. I'm finding our pillows really uncomfortable at the moment (hubby also agreed), so think I may need to buy some new ones this week when I get chance.

The weekend, although not generous with sleep, was lovely. We spent the morning sitting in the garden which was very relaxing and such a lovely change to see the sunshine! I managed to get through all of the washing which had piled up too and wash and change the bed linen in the spare room, even better, line-dry the lot.

Yesterday afternoon we went blackberry picking which was so enjoyable. It's still a bit early in the season but we managed to fill a litre tub which was enough to make a crumble with some stewed down apples from the fruit bowl (which really needed using up anyway). Activities like this are good for the soul - how wonderful it is to pick fruit, do a little baking and then feast on your hard work afterwards. We plan to forage some more when there's more ripe ones about.


The odd pennies from the bank account have been transferred over to the maternity leave account this morning. I'm loving doing this every day (that I remember!). The little amounts soon add up.

Lunch for both of us today was left over chilli from last night. We did a 'stocktake' and listed all the groceries we had in over the weekend too. I found a few more meals for lunches in the freezer which I'd made a while back and forgotten about. It really is worthwhile doing this every now and then - we've now know exactly what we have in and what we need to buy, we've also been able to make a meal plan for the week without needing to buy anything in.

DFSD

debtfreesomeday

Right, tonight's plan:

• Make some pizza dough in the bread machine & make pizzas to freeze for hubby's packed lunches - got some chicken out of the freezer last night to go on them with lots of 'bottom of the fridge veg'.

• Sit down with statements and make a firm budget to stick to from next payday - we usually end up going overdrawn to poor planning and we can't afford to do this during maternity leave or we'll be back where we started. I'm sure we can save more money now than we are doing presently and the more in the 'maternity leave' pot now, the better.

• Make a list of all the 'one off' expenses we need to cover over the next few months - ie. wedding gifts etc. and how we're going to cover them. Hubby has been saving monthly for a few of these events but it won't be enough to cover the costs completely.

• Sort packed lunches for tomorrow.

Dinner tonight is jacket spuds, so not much effort required there!

I'm trying to regain my thirst for the debt busting and, now, saving. I am aware I need to get that motivation back that I had in the first few months of tackling these debts - in a weird way it was exciting to chip bits off the huge sums that we owed. I'm determined we won't be overdrawn or using the credit card in the next few months.

On a plus note, the penultimate sofa repayment is coming out this week, so I've adjusted the signature accordingly. Only one more payment to go and we'll be throwing an extra £103 per month into the maternity savings (and it'll be one more debt cleared!).

DFSD

Chocforever

Hi DFSD

I was pleased to see the sofa balance down to £103; a bit sad that it was the first thing I noticed being a numbers geek!

Yes, I am in a better place financially than earlier this year. It's just the DIY and cosmetic bits and pieces that need doing around the place before it goes up for sale. I think I need to be realistic; it is not going to be a showhouse when I leave and the new owners may prefer to decorate to their own taste. However, I do have low standards when it comes to home maintenance and some things do need sorting. You are right, I need to make a list and then get on with it. I am away for a week and a half this month, so I will get on the case when I return.

Hope you sleep well tonight x

debtfreesomeday

I didn't manage to get the budgeting done last night as I got sidetracked doing too many other bits and pieces. I did make pizzas though, so there's now 6 in the freezer ready for hubby to take for his lunches. My lunch today is free again - I'm having a batch-cooked veggie chilli from the freezer that I forgot about and found during our weekend 'stock-take'! There's two more where that came from too.

I also meal-planned for next week (this week's is done ), and wrote a list of the few groceries I need to pick up this week. I immediately wrote a list which included 'usuals' - eg. mushrooms peppers etc. but then looked at our meal plans and realised we didn't need these. It's quite a difficult habit to break. I have now listed exactly what we need, rather than what we usually buy.

I'm pleased to report that I had a much better night's sleep last night, thankfully, so am feeling a bit more human today. Finally.

This morning I found an offer for a car seat we were intending to buy as it fits our pram. It's £25 off at the moment, my parents have kindly offered to pay for it, but I'm wondering whether to wait as it's still early, or to go ahead now and buy it. It's often on offer for around this price, so am wondering whether it will be worth waiting for any better offers in the future... hmmm, what to do.

Also had a result on a email complaint I made recently. I bought hubby some of his favourite treats from a 'posh' food outlet for his birthday. When we opened them at the weekend, it had gone off and was well within date, so I complained. I received a lovely apologetic email today in return, with the promise of sending us a selection of products as compensation. :T It's always so lovely (and such a nice change) to receive good, polite customer service.

DFSD

debtfreesomeday

We managed to 'double up' our tesco vouchers on the way home tonight, so got £40 to spend in the baby section online. I have just ordered a baby monitor, reduced to £39.99 - but Tesco being the company they are, insisted on me rounding the total up by 1p to £40 to use all the vouchers, so, we ordered the cheapest useful thing we could find - a baby blanket reduced to £2.45. We'll collect instore to save the £5 delivery cost.

We also stopped by Lidl on the way home and picked up some groceries, spending £20, which wasn't bad.

Free scratchies done - 10p there.

Off to start dinner now, have a good evening all.

DFSD

debtfreesomeday

Nothing else came out of the bank account overnight, so no 'odd' pennies to transfer into the maternity leave fund this morning - I'm strangely disappointed!

It's 2 weeks until payday today. Just need to get through the next few weekends of not spending any money (apart from petrol) and we'll be fine. Hubby has a bit put aside to cover any drinks we buy at the wedding we're going to on Saturday so nothing will need to come out of the account for that. We both have outifts sorted, hubby's suit is dry-cleaned and we have a gift that we bought many months ago for the happy couple who are close friends of ours.

Tomorrow we need to pick up the 'free' baby monitor and blanket we've bought with the clubcard vouchers. I so love getting something (useful) for practically nothing!

Last night I wrapped birthday presents and wrote cards for two aunts who have birthdays coming up. Both cards and gifts were bought many months ago and have been sitting in my present box ever since. I do love this method of buying gifts throughout the year, it saves so much time, effort and money in the long run. I shall take the gifts with me when I go home at the weekend to save on postage.

Next month, I'm hoping we have £50 'spare' so I'm able to go and buy 5 Christmas gifts - just vouchers which will go towards bigger gifts - but it will certainly help to spread the gift buying load. We should have the £50 available if we are careful these next two weeks.

DFSD