The final countdown... and a newbie in the DFSD house!

debtfreesomeday

Hubby's shoes came and he was really pleased with them. His old shoes went in the bin and he's gone off to work in 'shiny new shoes' as he put it, this morning! One pair didn't fit, but thankfully they were the cheapest pair at £15. They're quite heavy and in a large box, so I'm thinking the return postage on them will be considerable. I've advertised them on the notice board at work instead for now, not sure we'll get any takers as hubby has huge feet so they're a big size, but it's worth a try.

I found it easier to stand and move around last night than to sit, so I did get on with a few jobs around the house. More presents were wrapped and put under the tree, the last of the Christmas decs were put up, bar a couple of bits I shall do at the weekend and we tidied all the storage boxes away for now until they need to go back up in the loft in January. We now have a dining room back!

I also managed to finally sort out the paperwork for my maternity leave and hubby's paternity leave, so that shall get sent off today.
In addition to that, we got rid of a bag of paper recycling that was in various forms around the house, so it's looking a little tidier now. Just need to buy some hoover bags this week so I can give the carpets a good hoover - the last one's nearly full so it's not working to max at the mo.

The odd pennies were transferred over to the maternity account this morning as usual, that's looking reasonably healthy with nearly £2k in it. Another £500 will be going in when we next get paid. I have to buy a few bits for the dreaded 'hospital bag' at the weekend though, so if I don't have the money in the main bank account, I shall use some from the maternity account to prevent going overdrawn. It shouldn't be a lot, but I don't want to leave the bank account too low and too near the dreaded £5 a month overdraft fee they've introduced recently. :mad:

DFSD

debtfreesomeday

I've sold the shoes for £10 via the notice board at work, so only a loss of £5.99 which I'm happy enough with, considering it would cost me more than that to return them.

debtfreesomeday

This morning I've ordered one of the two Christmas presents I was yet to buy (I forgot about one!) - something in the M&S sale for 50% off and a free delivery code, costing £6 in total. Just one more to get now which we'll pick up on Saturday. :j

I've written a long list of things I need to buy to get the hospital bag finished too so I'll buy those at the weekend. It's mainly cheap little bits and bobs, but there's lots of them to pick up.

We need to pop to Sainsbury's tonight to pick up a few bits. We're having friend's round for dinner on Friday so need to get some bits for that, as well as some fruit & veg for ourselves. Hubby is buying the meat at a butchers in town as it's much nicer and cheaper. I've also sent him off with some money to buy some hoover bags in the market today on his lunch hour, again, they're usually cheaper there.

DFSD

debtfreesomeday

I've ordered some more baby-related bits this morning that we still needed to buy, although have been savvy and got a couple of bits off ebay that were going for a quarter of the price. £3 in my paypal account from a survey has helped a little towards it. Unfortunately, £20 of it has had to go on the credit card as I don't want to be overdrawn on the bank account, but will pay this off when I get paid in 10 days or so.

debtfreesomeday

We do the lottery at work as a syndicate every week and any winnings get dished out at the end of the year. Well today is that day - we're £31 'better off' or £21 'worse off' if you consider I've paid a pound every week! Oh well, you have to be in it to win it eh?
Instead of taking the cash though, I've just given it straight back to pay for the lottery for the first 31 weeks of next year as I'll be on maternity leave for that period. Saves me finding the money to pay up in advance I guess!

debtfreesomeday

Today I need to get some shopping so I have taken £40 out of the grocery pot to cover that. It won't be that much (I hope!!!) so the change will be going back in the tin tonight. I have a list and intend on sticking to it!

Whilst I'm at the supermarket I'll also top the car up with petrol as it is cheaper there. It'll probably take around £25 - £30 I guess.

The shoes I sold are being picked up today, so I will be £10 better off by this afternoon. That will go towards buying some hospital bag stuff at the weekend.

Last night we made a list of things we need to pay for before Christmas -nothiing huge, just little 'one-off' bits and bobs here and there. Hubby is able to cover most of them too, so that's great.

I also re-organised the baby's room a bit and went through all the clothes we have. We seem to have hundreds and hundreds of vests but very few baby gro's in under 3 months size, so suggested to my Mum last night that if anyone asks what to buy when it's born, a few more baby gro's would be great.

Dinner is in the slow cooker, ready for when we get home tonight. I'm feeling like last night was a great 'getting organised' evening! I like those!

DFSD

debtfreesomeday

We spent £35 on grocery shopping yesterday but £7 of it was on ingredients for tonight's meal as we're cooking for friends and £2.50 was on some waterproof spray for hubby's new shoes. The car also took £35 in petrol, which was a lot more than I anticipated! We're still way under on the petrol budget this month though as we have another £50 left there.

We also have just over £40 left in the grocery tin, but have decided to put that towards some expenses at the weekend, together with the £10 I got paid for the shoes yesterday. It is MIL's birthday and we are supposed to be taking her out for a meal and splitting the cost between other relatives. Including our own meal, it will cost us about £60. :eek: Hubby has thrown the extra tenner in to cover the shortfall. It's only a week left until payday and we have fully stocked cupboards now so we won't need a lot of groceries. Any more we do need, we can pay for with our £100 of sainsbury's vouchers/nectar points as it's nearly Christmas, so we shall start using those.

We went through the 'spends left to pay for' list again last night as I am worrying about money a lot again at the moment. We have written a list down and hubby is able to cover pretty much all of it, but we've scrapped one cinema visit we were going to do with friends before Christmas - it will have to wait until afterwards now or not at all. We were also going to go out for a cheap brunch or lunch whilst in town on Saturday and make a day of it, but have done the sensible thing and decided to eat before we go. We'll just have a cuppa somewhere instead which will be much cheaper!

I had a bit of a clear out last night and sorted through all of my clothes and underwear, throwing out lots of things that were worn out. The things that were still good but I wouldn't/couldn't (!) wear again have gone to the charity shop. There are no two empty drawers in our cupboard where I used to have clothes (albeit, none of them really fitted!). I will have to look for some VERY cheap, stretchy tops etc that I can still wear for the next couple of months and then one baby is here as I am down to the bare bones of a wardrobe now, it's embarrassing.


I still need to get quite a few things to finish the hospital bag at the weekend, but these will have to be paid for on the credit card unfortunately. We just don't have the money elsewhere and I can't leave it until another payday. We also need to get another present and some batteries for various things around the house that all seem to have gone at once, but I remembered we still have £15 in maplins vouchers from a glitch long ago, so we may be able to use those to pay for these things.

Also, bad news is I think our laptop has finally died. It wouldn't do a thing last night, I need to sit down and take a look at it properly, but it's not looking good. Also, hubby's ipod touch thing (that he had free with his phone 2 years ago) seems to have decided to stop working this morning, meaning we have no means of accessing the internet at home presently. Why do these things always happen at once??? :mad:

After a discussion with someone yesterday about being happy with our gas and electric supplier as prices were cheap, there was a letter waiting for us when we got home, saying prices had increased by nearly 10%! :eek: I shall have to see if switching willl be any cheaper, but I really don't want to be tied in to an expensive contract that I can't get out of. Same with the home phone & broadband, talk talk's prices have rocketed lately and I really need to find a cheaper option as it's costing us an extra £7 -£10 a month than it was a few months ago! Grrr. :mad:

DFSD

debtfreesomeday

Urgh, I've had enough today. Work is pretty horrific at the moment; there are major job cuts going on, ridiculous changes to terms of employment which are making people miserable and pay cuts. (I'm in the public sector). The morale is at an all time low and everybody is worried sick about money and their jobs.

If nothing else, it's forced me on a bit into trying to make/save some more money. I've been slack at the money-making lately, but I really don't know what other avenues to explore. I suppose I could give music magpie another go, but it hardly seems worth it for the very small amount they offer.

The mystery shopping jobs that came up in this area were minimal and mostly for fast food places which I wasn't keen on doing for £4 or whatever the fee was, plus we struggled with paying for the items/meals up front and then waiting for 2 months to be reimbursed.

Ebay is out, as anything we had surplus of value or 'saleable' has been ebayed already; the same goes for Amazon.

The surveys can be nice little supplements but I've had to stop doing one which pays out in vouchers as I can no longer access the site at work and my laptop at home struggles to load the site (well, it's not loading anything at the moment!).

Matched betting is out as, unfortunately we don't have the funds available as a 'float'. We do have maternity savings but I can't afford to use these as I don't understand the concept enough to risk it, no matter how many times I read the guides!

I'm going to really have to get my thinking cap on over the weekend and see what I can come up with as something needs to be done. If I lose my job now we will be so far up the creek without a paddle, it's terrifying to think about.

I shall have to join some challenges for the new year, particularly grocery related ones as this is an area I can do more in to keep the costs down, especially as I will be at home on maternity leave for a large proportion of the year.

Feeling very blue today.

DFSD

debtfreesomeday

I've taken step one towards next year's money making/saving and joined the 'sealed pot challenge'.
I'm strangely excited about the thought of going home and finding a suitable pot to seal! :rotfl:

dreamdreamer

Hope you don't mind I've just subscribed to your diary - I'm debt-busting with the hope of starting a family in 2012 so this thread has been an inspiration to me! Saw you'd joined the SPC4 thread - I love it there.

I'm also in the public sector, where morale is also at rock-bottom in the current climate. I heard this week there was talk of shutting us down and "consolidating" us into the Essex office - some 100 miles away and not viable as we've just bought a house here. It's all worrying but I suppose we should thank our lucky stars that we HAVE jobs these days.

Look forward to reading more

Dreamer xx