Back filling the big hole I dug with my credit card

Aesop

PiggyBankShaker wrote: »

God its tedious, I'm almost at the stage where I want to write 'Please buy this crap' and copy and paste it 100 times.

me too! and not all of it is carp! some decent DS old clothes! just hate having to write tiny hole caused by faulty washer dryer. Can be fixed if you are good with needle.

Used but in excellent condition, from a smoke free, pet free home.

gaaaaahhhhh

still not found the card! It is DH's fault. He was moaning about the clutter, I had the card where I could find it easily, and then I moved the clutter and have lost the card! It was a lovely one too...

good luck with everything, remember we are all here supporting you both. x

AllThatStuffIsJustStuff

Three bits of good news to report:

1. The third and final skip has gone off with the last of the concrete this morning

2. I've got a £180 rebate coming from TalkTalk after I realised they had been billing both my account AND our joint account since January.

3. (from last week but haven't posted it on here) I've got a new 0% credit card deal so my debt is fixed till October 2012 which makes it easier to pay off those on PBS's card first (as isn't at 0%).

EBay on the other hand is slower than a slow thing - but I think it just feels that way because of our recent successes. We are starting to scrape the barrel and things going for over a fiver is now a good result rather than the expected when we were listing more popular items. Still - it all adds up. On the face value there is actually £250 of stuff for sale to end before Sunday - just only about £20 has sold so far - so fingers crossed for the weekend. I actually don't mind writing the descriptions. It's all the faff of photos and packaging and going to the post office that gets on my nerves.

Aesop

Well done!

chevalier

well done on getting the new card, all makes it a bit easier. also nice one on the ebay sales, that is a great amount
chev

PiggyBankShaker

Thanks Aesop and Chevalier for your continued encouragement and support.

Had to rind Tax Credits yesterday to inform them of the chnages in our circumstances. The phone conversation itself went fine, but I always come off thephone from them with a sense of impending dread, thinking 'how are they going to mess it up this time?'. Both of us dread an overpayment scenario, where they realise in a few months time and we have to find hundreds of pound to pay them back. It shouldn't happen, but I know from speaking to other people that it does, all to often

Also, the back yard is going WAY over budget. We costed about £600 originally, but it's now nearly double that The extra skips and other bits that we hadn't really considered like drainage channels and pipes and cables... It all adds up. The only saving grace is that we have the money to do it thanks to eBay etc. It hasn't affected our cash flow, but it does mean that there is no money toward our living room project yet

In fairness to the back yard projet has encompassed more than originally intended. We are planning on mopving our washing machine / tumbler in the garage to free up space in the kitchen and hopefully will run the washer off rainwater harvested from the garage roof. I'm really excited about it. Just need the bits to arrive and the weather to stay dry long enough to get everything in place.

AllThatStuffIsJustStuff

The back yard is going quite over budget yes - about £400. I've done some calculations and I've broken the current projected overspend down to this:

1. Previous owners incompetence (51%) - that is the cost of the additional skips for all the #$*!ing concrete.
2. Additional project brought forward for logistical reasons (29%) - This is the cost of the rainwater washing machine project, which we have decided to do now so we can bury all the associated pipes and cables before the new stone floor goes down.
3. Me upgrading the job (11%) - channel drainage.
4. PBS upgrading the job (9%) - manhole cover.

So really only about £80 of it is overspend on this job because of our own changes, which is not bad going.

I think the rainwater/garage project is a great idea and if we can make further water savings elsewhere may give us scope to save money by switching to a meter (though this may not be possible as we are a small house so already have a relatively 'low' bill). But it's not about that anyway, it's about trying to reduce the impact of our lives and our family home.

So yes, the wood burner is moving moreso on to (if you'll pardon the expression) the back burner. I'm a bit down about this because we have at least one winter's worth of fire wood in the garage so i'm keen to get our gas bills down asap. But then our income isn't still meeting it's potential. If the business doesn't get fully running in the next month or so I'll take some part time work to pull in a bit of extra income. I'm sure one way or another we can get the additional income above projected to be able to get it in by the autumn.

As for tax credits I have the best part of £500 nestled away that I am certain they have overpaid us. They are just beyond incompetent. Still no sign of an final statement for last year let alone any indication of what they should be paying us now. I'm sure they are overpaying by at least £80 a month. Madness.

More good news though - we've got a few bits and pieces of owed income coming in next month and we should be able to cut the debts down by at least £1200, maybe more

chevalier

well done on making your june target with still june days left to go.

wow to the amount of concrete in the garden! are you going to filter the water you use for washing? ie uv filter, or mesh to make sure it isn't contaminated?
chev

PiggyBankShaker

Feeling really ill today and consequently a bit depressed. However one thing has happened to really make me feel on top of the world - after 2 years of waiting we have FINALLY bought a woodburning stove for our living room. It's second hand off ebay (which I couldn't have imagined doing two years ago) and at £210 it's cost a third of the price of the equivalent new model. Best of all it is the exact same model we had in the cottage where we stayed when we decided we wanted to get one for our house. It feels like it was meant to be....

Only thing is its a 4 hour drive to collect But I don't care - it'll be super amazing to have in for Christmas. I'll ring around installers and geta few quotes. We need to sell more [STRIKE]crap[/STRIKE] treasure on ebay to pay for that but we'll manage it.

On the back yard - weather is being a pain. It's either too wet or too hot to get much done. Some bits should be arriving by post tomorrow (on a pallet, which increased cost YET AGAIN by £30) but I'm pleased with progress. Sadly due to all our commitments, we won't be doing anything in it until next week now, but again - it gives us time to get some more money in from ebay hopefully.

AllThatStuff has found a really brilliant job to apply for - which he could do standing on his head. And again, it is part time, leaving us ok for childcare, the pay is good. I just need to look after the kids long enough for him to find the time to send off an application.

PiggyBankShaker

chevalier wrote: »

well done on making your june target with still june days left to go.

wow to the amount of concrete in the garden! are you going to filter the water you use for washing? ie uv filter, or mesh to make sure it isn't contaminated?
chev

Hi Chevalier - how are you?

Good questions on teh rain water. We read that you only need UV filtering if you want to use it for drinking water, so a mesh filter to separate out bits of prganis matter etc willl be fine. Also, apparently, any small particles that get through the filter sink to the bottom and - as the outlet tap should be higher than the actual bottom of the tank - this should be fine for running the washer.

Also, I spied some discarded tanks on my travels the other day that had been used for water only - so I might email the person who own the land they were on and ask if they can give me one for free

Aesop

sounding positive PBS, hope the illness is nothing serious.

Keep up the good work Allthatstuff and here's to ebay making you lots more money!

Good luck with the job interview, hope you get it.