Coffee and chocolate

miggy

NSD.

We had 'everyone' to dinner (7 of us) and DD and her b/f may be coming on hols with us... DS2 is desperate to go abroad but it would cost a lot and be lots of travelling... mind you so is Cornwall, which is my favourite option.

I'm trawling the net looking for nice but affordable places.

Erme

Skye in a tent

E

miggy

Skye is very beautiful but the only time I actually graced its fair shores, it poured what felt like half the Atlantic ocean on me which took several hours and prevented me doing much else.

miggy

Another mortgage overpayment made! My third ever! I had £10 which would normally go to my piano lesson but as I'm not having one this week, I found a good home for it - adding it to £50 which was the remainder of the money I saved a year ago before DH and I started our current budgetting scheme. I've just been on the mortgage calculator which tells me this has saved £40 over the term of the mortgage, which in addition to the unused lesson money makes £50 saved.

I also did some grocery shopping and saved £4.08 there. I gave in and got the cappuccino sachets which I've been without for a week but as they are down in price by a third at Asd*, that's where I got them - complete with free exercise from walking round various supermarkets trying to find the darn things at any price.

So a total saving today of £54.08. :j

I've also FINALLY chopped up the parsnips that have been sitting in the fridge for ages and made a slow-cooker's worth of curried parsnip soup, some of which DD will have when she gets in from work, some will come to my work with me and the rest is up for grabs. Dinner tonight was the remains of yesterday's roast cooked in gravy, with the remains of the roasties and the remains of the caramelised onions, and some peas... and some cake that was in the cupboard... so nothing spent on dinner today apart from £1 on sausages for DS2 who hates gravy.

Tonight at work my activity to keep me off the telly in the wee small hours will be to make up a box mix for 'pizza swirls' from AF. Theses are really nice if anyone ever considers buying them, should they come up again. The trouble is that the dough has to rise so I don't tend to get round to them and they were just sitting there getting older. This way I can have one for a silly-hours snack and the children can finish them tomorrow (and they will).

Not at all MS-wise, we have found the holiday we want this year. Now we have to afford it. There's enough money in the savings account but between this and replacing a window (necessary and booked for Feb) the poor account will go on a bit of a diet.

I need to pull my socks up and get more frugal again. I did check the change-from-food-money jar today. It's been going since summer and gets raided from time to time to pay the milkman or buy fish and chips, but to my delight there was just over £27 in there. As I'll be out of the way of temptation much of this week, I've added £10 of my half of the food money and am going to try to think up some meals using stuff we already have.

I have one item on Ebay but no bidders yet. I'm resisting the temptation to buy clothes but I can tell it will strike eventually. It would be good if I got back to a size 12 first of course - but some of my work tops are starting to look scruffy so eventually I'll need to replace a few.

Just a thought - we could put the change-from-food-money-jar money (you still with me?) towards holiday food... five of us are going and for some reason it always costs more on holidays. That's an incentive to save odd pennies anyway. By July they should have grown a bit.

Okay, I have work in an hour and a half... time to have a scout round the rest of the saved threads and keep inspired.

miggy

Half way through my run of nights and I have managed to pick up a sleepover shift at the weekend on top of some hours I was already doing. The shift hours will pay about £54.20 before tax, and the sleep is about £25 -all of which comes in useful.

Another bonus is that some of the time will be alongside my NVQ assessor and I think she's almost as keen as I am to get it finished! She's said she can do some observations to help fill some of the remaining gaps, then there are some written questions. For some reason she mentioned these only need brief answers... wonder how long it took her to get through the 2,200 words I wrote last week?

And when I finally have the NVQ (delayed a couple of years due to personal circumstances & shortage of staff), there will be an increment in it for me.

I've also got my payslip. £175.23 in extra hours and Bank Holiday pay. :j So that's going on my signature total.

I also spent on shopping but managed some savings in there including Seville oranges reduced to 22p a bag! Also parsnips marked down so there will be more of the delicious curried parsnip soup. I resisted blue cheese on the grounds it wasn't much reduced and I don't need the calories. Savings = £8.08! What's more we actually have room in the freezer for once.

DS1 owes me £7.40 for a prescription and I owe DD about £8 for ingredients as she made dinner which was delicious.

So £183.31 to add to the signature bringing my savings for Mr B's challenge to ... err... (adds on fingers) £319.90! Wow - at last I'm feeling I'm getting somewhere though of course it doesn't put me on target to get the £2K by April.

miggy

I forgot to update about the holiday - long story short, we are booking a different cottage in the same area which is £182 cheaper than I thought the price of the one I found was, and actually about £400 less than it turned out to be (problems with refreshing the page on the original website meant I didn't get the right tariff - though we've let them know there is a problem with the page now as even though I knew it was slow it didn't stop me getting the wrong reading! - and then there were various additionals on the original one which pushed the price up too much).

Sooo pleased we have this to look forward to, and sooo thankful we don't have to spend so bloomon' much! :T

Okay, work beckons, back anon.

Lemon_Tree

oh a holibob, you lucky thing. not sure if we'll get one this year but i shouldn't complain as we 'will' be getting a new house, can't have everything can i? lol

Erme

Och sorry I've been mia....been sick Miggy (had you guessed?) but hey ho...

Need prayers re everything..Have CV appt this pm with employment support worker....

Thank for everyone's prayers re sick whoopsies. Almost bought a bike (new) for £225 the other day :eek:

E

miggy

LT... yes, I'm really looking forward to it even though it's not till summer. Also very happy that DH found somewhere a lot cheaper than the place I found - and very nearly as nice by the look of it! I think you'll have a lot to enjoy with your new house even if it means you don't get to go away this time around.

Erme - oh no! I sort of disappear for a bit when I'm working and I hadn't realised you weren't so good. I hope you're feeling better now? And as for £225 on the bike :eek: :D! But you need a decent bike to get around and I am sure it will pay you back in terms of being able to get out, keep fit and not have to catch buses etc.

I am briefly emerging from work for a couple of days but I'm tired so I'll try to sleep soon.

On an MS note - added 74 points to my clubcard from one abandoned receipt, plus a penny from another! How can someone spend all that money and not use the points? Well, if they don't want them, I do.

Erme

Nope I already have a bike that can be fixed....

I had whoopsies on a tallboy (£25 from charity shop) and e-cig stuff...that's the poor OD sick again..

Och I forgot about that important phenomena called work

E