The debt free journey of an easily distracted Moog

LittleMoog

Morning Diary
Went to the college salon for my haircut last night, have had a short graduated bob with a side swept fringe! Bit daring for me as it's now too short to tie up, but since I've been trying to get into wearing it down as much as possible (part of my plan to look and dress like someone who paid attention to what they were putting on!:rotfl:) I thought this would help me get into the habit a bit more!

The salon was pretty good, lots of supervision from the instructors, especially as my girl had never done the kind of layers I had before, but it was VERY slow, my appointment was at 615 and I didn't get home until 820! My bum was going numb in the chair after an hour. Was a little bit disappointed in the finish, only blow dried and no product, so didn't really have that "just been to the hairdressers" look, but straightened it when I got in and it looks really nice. It was also only £9, so I think I'll be going back again.

We've got DH's brothers and brother no2's girlfriend coming for dinner and staying over tonight. We were all supposed to be going out for dinner with MIL, as bro no2 and girlfriend are heading off on their travels, but once again she's started drinking instead of doing something that's important to her sons :mad:
Will be a bit hectic tonight, as need to dash round supermarket before picking bro's GF up from station and getting back to ours before he arrives, as he's driving down separately. Then also need to get spare rooms ready for people to sleep in them, currently full of things waiting to go to the tip etc, so not really welcoming! :rotfl:

LittleMoog

Afternoon diary

Had a lovely evening last night with DH's brothers, it's always fun when we all get together. Really going to miss DH bro no 2 while he's off travelling, family events won't be the same
Managed to get round Tescos and sort everything out before people arrived, quite relieved. Luckily we had a good tidy up and clean at the weekend, so not much to be done on that front.

Have been reviewing my snowball, and assuming I get the same bonus in April as I did this year, our current DFD looks like about March 2012, so I need to find some extra money (about 5-6k I think!) from somewhere to meet our target of December 2011. It was always an ambitious target, as out original DFD was October 2012, so almost a year early. Even if we didn't manage to bring it any further forward though, if we cleared it all in March 2012, I'd get my bonus to myself in April, which would be a luxury!

Almost everything is interest free at the moment, so not many savings to be had, and hopefully we'll be clearing things near to the end of 0% periods and be able to transfer other things to them as deals run out.
In terms of extra savings, our bills for the new house are still settling down.

In February when the council tax year resets payments for that should drop about £40-50 as we're paying 6 months over 4 months due to the council being so slow to set up payments for us.

DDs for gas, electric and water have been set up, so will review around February to see if we're building up a surplus, I'm hoping that the water at least will be cut down a bit, we were paying £22 at our flat, and we got a refund when we moved out, but the new water board has set our payments at £30. Since it's just the 2 of us and we haven't changed our laundry/washing habits I'm hoping a surplus will build up and we can reduce the payments. Must stop DH washing up under a running tap though, bad habit!

All our other bills are pretty reasonable, so the only other place to cut back is personal spends, but we've only just increased these so I'm hestitant to cut back. After not really having any spending money at all (ie just using credit! ) for years, I actually do need to learn to only spend what I have. Also we're much further away from family and friends now, so just visiting people adds up to quite a lot of petrol. I might try putting a bit of my spends budget aside each month, maybe £40, and see if I can live without it. That would leave me with £80 for anything not in the normal budget (haircuts, presents, clothes and eating out/socialising)

Will have to think about this some more and see if I can make any other savings

jtr2803

Hey Jules

That is a very organised Xmas shopping list there! Woohoo to new shoes too, I have given up on all my glitzy heels as I just can't walk in them...I think I will end up breaking an ankle!

Sounds like the college salon was good value, shame they didn't totally 'finish' it but in all honesty, a few times now I've not been happy when I've left a more expensive hairdressers and have come home and re-done it myself! I don't think I will ever have the courage to tell them I don't like it

LittleMoog

I also can't walk in my high heels, but we go out so rarely that I just insist on taxis :rotfl:

DH's pay hit the joint account today, so have made all the payments and updated snowball and signature. Not a huge difference this month, but we have soooo many family birthdays and Christmas to deal with in October and December that I'm not too upset. One day I'll actually start saving in advance for things through the year, but for the moment I think it's better to pay as much as possible towards the debts when we can and then pay less on expensive months. It probably works out about the same really, but I know if the money was sat in savings accounts I'd struggle to leave it there.
So, payments made, and an extra £5.38 sent to barclaycard to round the total down to a nice number

Woowoo

Morning

Well done on the payments.

That's exactly how I deal with things, I would rather pay more off the credit card each month than save £10 a month towards car tax for example - I just include the full amount in that months budget when I know it is due.

LittleMoog

Thanks Woo, good to know I'm not the only one who does things that way.

Once we've paid all the CCs off, I plan to set up a monthly standing order to savings to cover cars, house insurance, presents etc, and hopefully we'll get a nice buffer built up against all the regular bills. That way we won't have to dip into our house deposit savings to pay those things, and if we round the monthly payment up a bit we should have enough spare if one of the bills is more expensive than expected, or an extra lump sum to add to the deposit Happy days, roll on 2012....

Kepp

I'm the same - my o/d savings are a real exercise in patience for me!

LittleMoog

Off to the physio this morning, fingers crossed they can do something for my back, it's been awful all week.

Woowoo

Good luck, let us know how you get on x

jtr2803

I have fingers and toes crossed that the Physio helps hun