Cloudy's 'bring me some sunshine' diary!

Kepp

That makes sense.

I struggle with the same - I was always setting targets too high - think I'm finally getting it about right - it's taken a long time though!

Cloudy456

I managed three NSDs in a row - haven't spent a penny since Tuesday!

Kepp

Well done! :T

Cloudy456

Thanks Beccie! I'm setting myself a target of having another hat trick of NSDs tomorrow, weds and thursday. Went to a friend's for dinner tonight which was nice but soooo cold walking home! No plans now until Friday night, so hopefully a cheap rest of the week. Not much else to report, did a few more surveys and am up to £22 on Onepoll but still no mystery shops. 10 days until payday!!

Cloudy456

Managed a NSD today and did another pound or so of surveys on Onepoll, but that's about all to report. Lunch is made for tomorrow....9 days until payday!

Cloudy456

I've been very slack, no update in almost a month! But its been a good month and I managed not to go too far off track over Christmas and New Year. I'm slowly managing to recover things after paying for the ski trip, so at the end of this month (well pay cycle on 25th) I will update my signature again!

The big news is that I am moving in with my BF next month, which means that I will be saving around £200 in rent each month - woohoo! Very excited about it and the financial benefit is an additional bonus - even after I contribute about £275 to him we will both be much better off. I am trying to work out my best strategy - at the moment I think it will be to throw all the extra cash at my Barclaycard which is the real thorn in my side at the moment. Its at a balance of £2,408 and I'm paying about £40 a month interest. All my other debts are on 0% deals so don't cost me anything, but I really really want to get that particular balance gone asap. So my new year goal is to get that paid off asap, hopefully by around May. I am fired up with new year enthusiasm at the moment so hopefully I can put it to good use!

Anyway, I am busy doing surveys (Onepoll account is back up to £31.50 so not far to go before another £40 payout) and I'm trying to get the mystery shopping going again as that tailed off at the end of last year. I did my first one yesterday and they seem to have paid me £15 instead of the £5 that I had thought the fee was, which is very nice!

So at the moment I have 18 days to go until I get paid. It is already feeling like a very long month as I got paid so early before Christmas, but I don't have much planned over the next couple of weeks that I can see costing a lot out of the ordinary. I have about £280 left in my monthly spending budget although it looks like I am going to have to pay for my ski lessons out of that which is £180-eeek! So that would leave me £100 spending money plus anything else I manage to make in the next couple of months. Hmmm...

Anyway this next week is looking positive (I am trying to take it week by week rather than always looking ahead to the end of the month). I'm going to friend's houses on both Friday and Saturday night and already have some wine that I can take. And plenty of food in, so hopefully all set up for a cheap few days. But I always say that and it never goes to plan, so we'll see!

Cloudy456

Got paid yesterday woohoo! Which means I'm fired up with enthusiasm for a good month :-)

I have a detailed budget worked out which should see me go back under the 10k mark which means I will be back to updating my signature on here having recovered from booking a holiday, so I can't wait for that to happen. But that depends a lot on what my final nPower bill is when we move out of the flat on 15th Feb- I have a horrible feeling we will have a rather large debit balance due to the time of year, but fingers crossed not!

I'm due £40 from Onepoll in a few days, plus the mystery shopping has picked up nicely with 1-2 jobs every week, so I'm hoping to make a good amount extra this month on top of my salary. Had a NSD today which is the first in a while, and hoping for another tomorrow. Not a lot else to report really just very busy sorting things for my house move, very exciting! At least packing boxes is stopping me going out and spending anything...!

Cloudy456

Week one of this pay cycle is done and dusted and I managed to keep my day to day spending (by which I mean everything aside from my direct debits for rent and bills and credit card payments) to £45.94 which I'm very pleased with. I budgeted £250 for the 3 and a half weeks of this month when I'm at home (separate budget for the week while I'm on holiday) so at this rate I will have some left over, somewhere close to £100 if my daily spend rate stays the same for the rest of the month.... but I definitely think that working on a week to week basis works better for me as the end of the month always seems so far off at the start of the month, making it hard to budget or have a good perspective.

So I am off on holiday on Saturday (yay!) and have set myself a target of spending less than £35 this week (i.e. have my running total under £80). That should be do-able as I don't have any plans in the evenings that will cost anything, and on Friday night I will be going to bed very early due to early flight on Saturday. So just some food to buy, which means I shouldn't go near £30, but I'm saying that to allow for un-budgeted expenses which generally arise!

So anyway in other news I made £20 today selling an old bookcase that was in the way, plus I have a mystery shop tomorrow which will get my lunch plus £4 profit on top. I am also returning a top for £5.99 which I don't need so am being ruthless. But then I have to go and spend £150 on Euros which is my holiday spending money budget (fully catered accommodation hence the quite low amount). So excited about the holiday! Its amazing how much more things mean to me these days now that I have a proper perception of what things cost me in real terms instead of whacking it all on credit.

So glad this month has started well, and my motivation levels are still high so hoping it stays that way when I have the inevitable post-holiday blues towards the end of the month!

Cloudy456

PS - I've bitten the bullet and updated my signature - I was chickening out of doing this after I booked my holiday at the end of last year, but I have made myself type it in. I made an informed decision to spend the money and limit my progress, so there is no reason to shy away from that and avoid looking at the figures, no more of that these days! So my progress for the 11 months since LBM isn't looking great - I previously was up to 12.8% paid off, then fell back to 7.8% paid off after booking the holiday, so to be back up to 9.5% now isn't so bad, I am keeping to my promise not to get thrown off course and to get back to where I was and beyond asap. I should be back up to 12% paid off by the end of this month hopefully, at which point I will no longer just be getting back to where I was but actually getting further and further along.

Cloudy456

Updated my signature - over 2k paid off now! I've massively increased my payment rate over the last couple of months since I moved in with my BF, and am pleased to say that I paid off over £400 this last month alone! I would love to go under 9k by next payday but that seems unlikely as it is a long month (almost 5 weeks between paydays) and I am off work for 10 days which means I am more likely to spend on doing stuff. Plus it is BF's birthday which means a present and meal out, so being realistic I would be satisfied to top £300. My other challenge for this month will be making our food budget last better - no excuses as we are away at our parents for a total of over a week! Not much other news really, I don't update on here that much any more as I feel I am on the straight and narrow (well mainly!) and I don't have so much to say. I am making regular payments by direct debit, living pretty much within my means on the remainder, and am pretty comfortably cruising along now making some steady progress. I am conscious though not to become too complacent and slip back into bad habits. So I am going to start up my spending diary again from payday tomorrow to try and keep a handle on things over the coming month. Then hopefully my total should have an 8 on the front in no time!