** Debtbusting, Decluttering and Married life by Mrs Orange Fairy :-) **

OrangeFairy

This is my brand new diary!!!!!

I only just started a new diary in January but felt i wanted a new one to use my new name and start my married life

I am 27 and live in North Devon with my Husband and 2 daughters who are 8 and nearly 6.

We got married just 3 weeks ago in Cyprus after being together 9 years. It was a fantastically relaxed wedding with 30 of us there. We then had a big party for 150 people when we got back.

In total we recieved £1090 in gift money plus presents. We needed £740 to pay off the wedding party. So £350 left. With this we have treated ourselves to a new bed and cabinets! It is nice to have bought something with our money. Plus our old black metal bed is about to collapse any time soon. We have bought solid rustic oak cabinets and bed. We have built in wardrobes so this was all we needed to complete our bedroom! I can't wait to pick them up on SUnday!

I have been on MSE a year or so now. I have paid off a lot of money and started budgetting. We were on track with £200 a month on groceries down from £300. I decluttered a lot and improved the house.

Now though i need to get back on track!!!

I want a fine balance between debt busting and buying new furniture. Also I need to declutter badly!

So

Goals

Debt bust as much as possible
Do lots of activities with the kids and make the use of national trust membership
Improve the kids eating habits
Concentrate on their school work more
Declutter - challenge 100 items in 2 weeks
Improve the house
Have a happy married life

I need to remember the little things like using water sparingly, lights off, being economic with food and meal planning. Also to use up toilettries - i have loads of samples and hotel size bottles to use!

We have a freezer full of food at the mo - lots of meat bargains we have picked up and frozen. need to make an inventory of what we have and meal plan.

First task - sort and organise the crap underneath our bed - vital due to the fact the new one will be here at the weekend.

Also a big thing in my life at the moment is my 101 things to do in 1001 days list I am really enjoying the challenges and having goals of things i want to do. i have 33 things done now!

http://www.dayzeroproject.com/user/littlekel

My list. Some things in progress that i need to work on.

My AAT course finishes next month giving me an extra day a week at home which i will use wisely!

Today-
Looking after my bro (9) and sis (5) until 12 - this means my Mum will look after my two on thursday while i work
GO to visit my Stepmum after lunch - havent seen her for a bit
Hubby to pick me up on way back from work to avoid 2 bus fares
Inventory of food
Meal Plan
Write thank notes for wedding
Start sorting under the bed! - record decluttering
Lunch from stores - Mushroom soup

Thanks for reading if you got this far!

OrangeFairy

Also to add my weight loss goal! I am 11 stone 1 at present so ideally could do with losing a couple of stone more! My goal for the moment is 10 stone 7 pounds so i will aim towards that!

I am trying to avoid bread, pasta and potatoes as much as possible really. I will have them on the odd occasion but trying to make breakfast my only high carb meal. Lunch is difficult for me as i dont like salad and struggle to find alternatives to a sandwich. I am sticking with soup of beans with eggs mostly.

Going to make a tuna dish of mushrooms, peppers, onions, sweetcorn and tuna for today i think!

La_escocesa

Hi OF :wave:

Thought I'd pop by

I have a lot of cous cous for lunch - can mix it with most sandwich fillings but not have the bread

Good luck with the clearout!

And big congrats on the wedding again!!!

xx

jwil

Good luck OrangeFairy!

charlyze2

Congratulations on the wedding
and good luck with the debt busting and spring cleaning.

I was just wondering what level AAT you were studing at the mo?
Im also doing AAT and only have a couple of weeks left. YAY.

Charlie

JAMIEDODGER

Congratulations on the wedding! And the new furniture:) good luck on your debtbusting!

OrangeFairy

Thanks to my visitors

La E - lovely to see your friendly 'face'

Charlyze- I am finishing my last year in a few weeks too. We have our Financial exam next friday and then Business tax the end of June! I haven't done my fraud project though!! Will have to get on with that - wedding kind of got in the way!!!

Today is a day at home as i swapped my weds at work for thursday (i work mon, weds,fri) So today is to finish sorting under my bed as i made a good start yesterday. Housework to do and also my meal plan which i didn't do yesterday in the end.

Got out professional photos from our UK wedding party today :j
http://mattfryer.zenfolio.com/p126086746/e1cb29fab love this one!

Dinner from stores - pork (got loads reduced in the freezer) with lots of veg. Use up everything i can that needs to go!

Sort out holiday photos! I have an album of 832 but i reckon i can get that down to about 500 once i get rid of the awful ones!!

I dont plan to leave the house today

Let the decluttering commence .........

charlyze2

Good luck with your exams.
Ive done all mine bar the business tax, which i have a week monday.
Im halfway through my project. i just keep puting it off, there is just so much work to do. It takes ages.

Hope you got all your decluttering done

Charlyze

OrangeFairy

Thanks Charlyze....should really type up my project

My dear hubby sent me to a link of a MSE thread today where everyone noted down what they have given up to save money

Made me quite sad as i feel we dont live lavishly and get a bit down that we cant splash out more to have nice things.......but this post made me realise we havent given up too much. Some people werent buying grapes anymore for example. This isnt something i would have thought of.

I think i should be more grateful for how i live. But also realise there are more cutbacks that can be made!

All decluttering from under the bed sorted :-) Decluttered about 30 items but i have to start on the kids room next!!!

Got the forms to open joint account tomorrow so we can finally pay our wedding cheques in and pay the wedding party money off my credit card.

OH is applying for a tesco credit card this week. It is quite a good deal as we use our tesco points very wisely and you get a lot extra by using their credit card!

Right off to tidy up!

jtr2803

Hey you, just found your new diary!!

Your wedding pics are fab, it looks like you all had a fantastic day . Yay to getting AAT finished, the project was awful. My workmate left his too late and now has to switch to the diploma status which is annoying. If I can help with the project at all then let me know, even if you want to see an example of it laid out and presented etc

I am so glad exams are over for the summer. I sat two week just gone, think one went ok but not sure about the other! Was hoping to pass both as I am then officially a part qualified accountant but ho-hum!

OrangeFairy

Right i am back posting again!!

I have been slack

Holiday and wedding stuff all over!! Now i need to concentrate on saving money and paying things off. Also to declutter

Recent things - good and bad

• New bed and cabinets arrived which we bought with our wedding money - i LOVE them!!!
• Bought DD2 a HSM bike reduced from £100 to £40 in argos! I am really chuffed with it as a main present for her birthday in september. It is on sale at halfords for £80! Means we will save a bit of money for her birthday!
• OH and I have stepped up a gear on the girls reading and homework - making sure they are reading at least 4/5 times a week. Made me a bit happier
• Back to mealplanning which has helped
• Using bread maker again
• Opened an account to finally pay our cheques in from the wedding so we can pay the hotel cost off my card
• MOT - passed except for needing the 2 rear tyres. £250 but still not bad as we knew we needed them. So added to the two tyres bought at the beginning of the month we have spent £400 on the car this month! Though not on unexpected things!
• Bit skint this month really but obviously the car didnt exactly help. Has meant OH has had less money so i have paid for most of food shopping
• Decluttered under the bed and sorted out mountain of paperwork that was in a pile in the lounge
• Completed a few things from my 101 things list
• Our wages have gone up by about £40 a month between us with the tax change
• Had a lovely meal for fathers day with hubby and the girls as a nice little pub with an outdoor play area. The girls played while we had a cup of coffee after - a perfect afternoon out
• Gas and electric d/d has gone down from £89 to £66 :j
• Just sent 18 cartridges to Mr T's so hopefully will get some points

For the beginning of July i want to start totalling up our grocery spend again as i am sure it has creeped up. Also i need to keep a spending diary again as i found that really helped

Properly started eating healthily again this week. Need to up the exercise though. Badminton tomorrow which is a good start. Want to lose about a stone and a half.

E*O*N have sent a fixing our prices offer for 2 years so i will look into that when OH gets home.

Making use of the grabbit board. Got our hands on loads of smirnoff ice on a glitch at Mr S! 36p a bottle! OH cleared the shelf. Also we have stocked up for 3 months in fruit flakes!! DD2 has a pack a day and when not on offer they are 37p a pack which is pricey. Mr T had an offer for £2 a pack of 8 so i spent a tenner on 5 packs. These work out 25p a pack so a lot better......then Mr S had a deal for £1.79 BOGOF for packs of 5 so worked out 18p a pack. We have stocked up. OH said after payday we may buy another load if they are still on offer! 90 packs in our cupboard

I need to start making jelly in the moulds i bought for a cheap 'pudding' for lunch times. I want to search online for cheap meals to print off before the start of next months mealplan.

I need to start ebaying again and start binning stuff that doesnt sell. Also in a big declutter mission - slowly getting there. Sorted out the messy drawer in the kitchen.

Just ordered a groupon code to get a canvas print done (20 x 30 inches) for £20. This will be lovely with a wedding print. A cheap way of doing it as canvas prints are usually so expensive

Start to think about the school hols and the cheaper things to do with the kids. Make use of national trust membership. We want to take the kids to cardiff for a couple of days and go to the science museum there. We can use tesco vouchers for that so a cheap day out.

Open a savings account for the kids each and start putting money away for them. Also need to change my name on a lot of things!

Overall - spend more time with the girls and be a better Mum to them. Lots of sadness around for people i know at the moment and it has made me feel very grateful for what i have. My gorgeous hubby and daughters are the most important things and i really want to enjoy my time with them.

Thats me for now...off to get me girlies off to bed xxxxx

Jody - I will message you on facebook later hun about my project - thank you xxx