** Wish I was a money fairy **

Housework*Fairy

* dusts off diary *

Here I am back again.

The usual has happened and I've lost control again, not been 'spending like mad' but got a wee bit lazy, stopped monitoring my internet banking (I utterly hate that stupid secure key for HSBC), didn't go to the supermarkets on Saturday morning so ended up going every day which meant putting extra bits in the trolley I didn't mean, and DH has been having as much money as he wanted whenever he wants.

So it needs to stop!

Today I have been to Morrisons for 'stuff for packed lunches, something for Saturday tea and something for Sunday tea'. This ridiculously came in at £30.00 and I barely seem to have bought anything. DS1 eats like a horse and likes to have plenty in his lunchbox to eat throughout the day.

I came home and did a 7 day meal plan, and from the meal plan did an internet shop at Tesco which has come to £44.70 including delivery for Monday evening. I'm giving myself a £300 grocery budget which will include everything, and as I use it I shall write it on a shopping list with the Tesco price next to it, then next week I will go to Farmfoods and Aldi and see if I can buy it any cheaper there. I really do dislike shopping because it takes so much time and I don't like crowds.

I had a letter from Natwest this morning asking me to get in touch with them which I found really worrying but I can only ring the 'credit options' team on Monday to Fridays. It says they want to discuss my borrowing and ensure that I have the borrowing which is best for me and underneath it states information about the Citizens Advice if you're suffering debt etc etc...I just hope they wont suddenly get all arsey and demand I start making more than the minimum payment? I always pay on time, have not missed or been late, and although I went over the limit once, I paid it back (admittedly via another credit card) but that was in September.

I took two binliners of kids clothes and shoes that had been cluttering up the kitchen waiting for me to take it to the recycling shop, and got £5 for those two bags (it would have been £5.40 but he didn't have any change).

February is going to be a lean month for me, so thank God it's a short one. I've been charged £25 for being overdrawn by £11 for one day in December just before I got paid. They wont waive the charges, I have asked. I've got to pay for some gig tickets, DH is 40 so we're having a rare night out and DS2 also has a birthday the same month.

What's made it worse is DH (spends account money) got paid on 23rd December, but isn't getting paid until 31st January so that is 38 days between wages and six weekends which has just killed us.

I'm not even paying DS1's installment for his school trip out of this end of Jan wage, so will need to try and squirrel money away for that so I can pay it on 2nd March when it is due (£135 remaining)

DH is sulking already.

Today's spends
£14.00 - topped up DS1's bus pass.
£30.00 - Morrisons
£44.70 - Tesco
£1.00 - lotto
£2.96 - Cigs for DH
£1.14 - Morrisons (extra groceries, lemonade and naan bread)

Grocery budget: £75.84/£300 (£224.16 remaining)

Housework*Fairy

Have stopped panicking about the Natwest letter now. I found (on this site) that it's a ploy to try and sell me a loan.

£5 from yesterday's clothes recycling squirrelled away in DS1's school-fund trip.

Remembered I hadn't validated DH's Green Flag cover which I bought through Quidco so I did that yesterday, that has tracked at £5 so hopefully will be paid soon. £14.68 tracked on there in total but not sure when it will be paid although I will have to pay my annual fee from that.

Also went to Lightspeed and redeemed £6 of paypal worth of points. I'll definitely start doing those surveys again.

Housework*Fairy

Yesterday was a no spend day :T

It'll teach me not to check my internet banking - discovered yesterday that DH actually got paid on Friday! I wasn't expecting any money from his work until Tuesday as they normally get paid the last working day of the month, so that has helped a lot in that I was able to get petrol and buy my asthma prescription.

I found (on MSE last night) a thread about a place called Zapper, like music magpie, where you can not only sell the usual music and games, but they also buy books. I had a look at how much they would offer for an old Gamecube game and it was £2.20. I have loads of these languishing in the garage so I'm going to get my !!! into gear, get them out of the garage (if we can find them), test them to make sure they work, and get them listed. Same with the Wii, the x-box takes precedence in our house now so there's the console and lots of games lying around un-used. Also got loads of stuff to take to the fabric recycling shop.

DH has been told that he will be getting a £1500 pay rise effective from 1st April (£85 per month after tax). This, along with the tax codes going up in April will mean we are £114 per month better off which will be very welcome. I will try and not fritter this. Hopefully I should be a fully fledged money saving ninja by then :money:

Today's spends
£2.00 - this was a PAD from yesterday to DS1 school trip fund
£2.50 - DS1 didn't go to school today so he doesn't have after school football. I will put this towards DS1's school trip
£1.50 - as above, this is the cost of 1 day school dinner money, so will put this towards the school trip. (£11 of £135 found now)
£1.00 - birthday card for my Godson
£10.00 - to put in Godson's birthday card
£0.46 - 1st class stamp to post aforementioned card
£14.80 - prescription x 2
£57.80 - Petrol (will update later - cant remember how much)
£5.00 - my dinner tickets for the week

mooomin

If you have games in good condition check out Amazon's tradein service. The site you mentioned offered me £7 for a game, I am getting £13 Amazon credit from them

OK, it's not cash, but it would pay for your Kindle books or for presents through the year :money:

We don't pay for prescriptions on the civilised side of the border but could you not get a prepayment certificate if you need regular prescriptions? We used to get one of those for Mr Fresian's regular medication and it worked out cheaper in the long run for an upfront cost.

Housework*Fairy

Yes, a pre-paid prescription would probably be the sensible option. I will look into that next month.

DS2 didn't want to go to athletics last night so that's another £2 into DS1's school trip fund £13/£135.

Tuesday's spends
£2.00 on salad
£0.46 on a first class stamp

Grocery budget: £77.84/£300 (£222.16 remaining)

Housework*Fairy

Today's spends
£1.88 - milk
£0.99 - 4 cans of pepsi max

New grocery budget: £79.72 / £220.28

Found £2 in the cards part of my purse which will go towards DS1 school trip £15/£135. I forgot to submit my invoice to the person I do some private typing work for. I don't get very much work from her and she did pay us £25 per hour :eek: and has now put it down to £20 per hour, which is still very much welcome. I managed to get an hour's worth of work out of her last month so I'll print my invoice and leave it on her desk tomorrow.

Checked my paypal and no survey money yet, and none of my Quidco money has been paid yet. :-( I do have some invites to some more lightspeed surveys though which I will check out this evening.

Housework*Fairy

Thursday & Friday spends

£?.?? - various cards
£99.00 - DS2 birthday present*
£2.89 - 12 cans of pepsi max
£3.00 - DS1 athletics

DS2's birthday isn't as horrific as it sounds because We've got him a google pad due to laptop wars, but we are putting the birthday money he gets from his various relatives towards it but I wont know how much he will get until tomorrow.

PAD's to DS1 school trip
£6.00 - from survey website
£1.00 - I took my lunch into work yesterday
£1.00 - I didn't buy any pepsi even though it killed me (but I did cave in today)
£1.84 - postage savings
£22.84 / £135

Tesco have kindly sent me a £5 off my next internet shop e-voucher which I will be doing online this evening so that can go as tomorrow's PAD.

At some point this evening will transfer the equivalent in PAD money in the handbag into my internet savings account, and I will spend the money in the handbag

** update**

Supermarket shop came to £46.68 including my £5 off voucher. I also got the sandwich stuff in that too whereas I hadn't last week.

Week 1 meal plan

Shepherds Pie
Sausage, chips, salad
Pasta Bolognese
Chicken Stew & dumplings
Hunters chicken & mash
Chicken Korma & rice
Beefburger & chips

Week 2 meal plan
Cornish pasty, chips & beans
Chilli con Carne
Toad in the hole
Fishfinger sandwiches
Fish & chips
Roast dinner
Steak & Kidney pudding, mash, veg

(admittedly it would have been more, but I do have a joint of gammon in the fridge)

EDF have also written to me with a bill saying I am £168 in credit and they will reduce my direct debits by £9 per month

Housework*Fairy

Saturday & Sunday spending

Bit of a spendy weekend due to DS1's birthday
£13.90 (went for a meal which MIL paid for, but I got the first round of drinks)
£17.98 (took DS1 & 3 of his friends to soft play and bought pop whilst there)
£10.38 (invited them back for tea, bought chips, nuggets and cake)
£14.00 - new school shoes for DS1 (GRRR)
£5.00 - set up a lotto account (got £3 from Quidco for this too)
£10.00 - DS2 went to a birthday party so put £10 in the kid's card

PADS
£5.00 - Saturday (thankyou Tesco)
£6.00 - no football (thank you snow; football savings can go to the PAD
Total now: £33.84 which is 25% of the way there :-) :T

Grocery Budget £126.40/£173.60

Eager_Elephant

flying_fresian wrote: »

We don't pay for prescriptions on the civilised side of the border but could you not get a prepayment certificate if you need regular prescriptions? We used to get one of those for Mr Fresian's regular medication and it worked out cheaper in the long run for an upfront cost.

Found the link so you don't have to

http://www.nhsbsa.nhs.uk/1127.aspx

My DH pays monthly by direct debit, if you buy a yearly one they take 10 payments of £10.40 which is brilliant and it automatically carries on instead of you having to remember to buy one each year or save up the money.

Housework*Fairy

Oh my word, I had no idea you could pay by direct debit. That is so incredibly handy. I was stuck back in the olden days when you had to buy them either quarterly or annually - thanks so much x