The Ultimate Hard and Fast debt clearing mission

Cinny91

Must be so exciting to be in your new home, Ruby! And I'll be keeping my fingers crossed everything goes well on your first day. What's your new place like?!

Have you found anywhere to live yet, Archers? Must be stressful!

Back to work for me tomorrow! Will be getting a pretty signature up and working too, have a little credit card debt from booking excursions on holiday (which I need to complain about, meant to go too Turkey one day and the coach just zoomed on by!) and OH's car insurance. And a more interesting savings pot for next year's holiday!

Hope everyone's had a nice long weekend With plenty of cake!

wendz86

Hope you didn't mind me adding you Cinny. The holiday pics are brilliant, looks like you had an amazing time.

Hope you manage to find somewhere to live soon Archers.

Good luck tomorrow Ruby! Hope you are settling in well to the new place.

My weekend was good, went to family jubillee festival in hyde park saturday and saw friends yesterday. Only a 2 day work week for me this week as i don't work fridays so will soon be the weekend again.

Birdie85

Hi all! :wave:

Glad you had a great time Cinny! Pics are great, are you a foreign holiday convert now?!

Hope work goes OK Archers, what are you doing?

Good luck for your first day too Ruby!

OH's Nana died on Sunday night so our weekend has been a little up and down. She'd been in a home with advanced dementia for the last 7/8 years and TBH everyone is surprised she held on this long but it's still very sad. We then found out on Monday that a school friend of OH had died on Saturday, he was only 28. Quite a lot for OH to take in over 2 days, poor lad He's off to Berlin on Friday for his friend's Stag and I think he needs it!

On a totally unrelated note, has anyone read Fifty Shades of Grey?! Read all 3 in 6 days and although they're total trash and very dirty I loved them! Boys, this is not a recommendation for you guys!

Dinah93

Really sorry about your DH's gran Birdie. It doesn't matter if its expected or not, it still takes the wind out of you when it happens.

Feeling very let down by physics this morning. It appears all the electricities have escaped from my grandads car again overnight, so I need to hook it up to the garage to try to start it. Which means I'll miss Grace's rounds.

Was let out of hospital Saturday, but back in today as an outpatient just to get checked up on. I have a CT next week, until I see a picture of this thing I can't quite believe I actually have it.

Doctor has told us he shouldn't speculate for so far away, but all being well we might get Grace home sometime in the week beginning the 25th. She'll be on oxygen for a few months most likely, so we'll need to get a tank fitted. I'm not sure how that will fit with going to my cousin's wedding, if we could pick up tanks down there, or if we'd need to take a week's worth with us, which would pretty much fill the car.

Saw grandad on Monday and things are very clearly getting worse quite quickly. He has a lot of random movements and has just in the last few days lost the ability to grab onto things. In one way I'm devastated this is happening, in the other I think if it had to happen it's better that its so quick. He's still the same person, he still tells jokes, he just falls asleep a lot, can't sit up, sees things that aren't there etc, that sort of make you forget who he is underneath.

Emotionally I'm not in the best place at the moment, this tumour is sort of the straw that broke the camel's back. I was holding it together with Grace's surgery, and the whole neonatal rollercoaster, then grandad being issued end of life drugs, but somehow all I can now think is that I'm not going to see her grow up, and she'll end up calling someone else mommy. I've always been a bit prone to what I call the dark and twisties, but it's been a long time since they were this bad.

Moneywise I think we're doing okay, I will try to get a full update in the next few days. Things certainly haven't gotten worse this month, although I had put £950 aside to pay off a CC when we found it to get the number, and while it's been sat there we decided to replace Grace's carpet with a wood floor (£300 gone) and then the car needs tax (although we haven't received a letter) so that'll be another £260. I'm just glad we have it rather than it pushing us back onto a credit card, although in fairness we'd never have done Grace's floor if we hadn't had the money.

I've decided to try to tackle some of my dark and twisty feelings when I can, a lot of the time I can't imagine moving let alone putting my energy into anything in particular. However as you all know only too well goals tend to do great things for me and give me something to focus on. I want to try to loose my baby weight before my cousin's wedding in September - I'm not enjoying opening my cupboards each morning and thinking 'what here does up?' rather than choosing based on what I like. I'm only about 10lbs heavier than I was when I fell pregnant, so not a huge goal. I had just gotten serious about loosing weight a month or so before I fell pregnant with Grace, so I'm sort of picking up where I left off. It also obviously is better for my blood pressure if I eat healthily and loose weight - it has been recently suggested I need to loose about 2 stone if I want to attempt another pregnancy, despite having a bmi of 23. Not thinking about if we will or not at the moment, but no one has given me any argument to suggest I wouldn't be better a little lighter. I need to do it sensibly though as a crash diet could make the bp unstable. So I'm proposing to try to loose a stone before my cousin's wedding - and am therefore ressurecting the Ultimate threadie diet challenge for anyone who wishes to join me (and no pressure ladies and cavies but I would love the support of knowing at least one threadie is with me otherwise I tend to give up). Weigh in this coming Monday (11th) and for the following 10 Mondays post your new weight. If you're not happy posting your actual numbers you can just post 10lbs to start with, and then by week 3 you may be "8.2lbs (1lb lost since last week)" for example... but we all know admitting the problem is the first step to fixing it x

Dinah93

Have just run our numbers past the goblins and apparently we cleared another £2177.41 off the debt in May. Considering only 1 week was spent at home I'm pleased enough with that. We do still have about £500 in an instant access savings pot, but given our remaining two credit cards are 0%, and the car loan can only be overpaid if we pay it off in one lump sum, I'd rather actually have a little float in case of emergencies, and I can pay lumps off the debt as we're able to.

If we have another good month in June and manage to pay off another £2726.70 we'd be halfway to clearing the debt. I only managed to get 13 things on ebay over the weekend, as we were sorting out the garage ready for NIM to do a car boot this coming Sunday. So I hope to get a few more bits listed this week. I'd like to make £150+ from the ebay bits, and I'd be pleased if NIM can get £50 at the car boot (and doesn't bring anything back with him even more importantly)

shrimpy_80

Hi everyone, Dinah, I'm so sorry to read what you are going through at the moment, I don't think I have the right words to make you feel better but it is very very early days for you so please try not to focus on the worst, I know it must be hard but hopefully it helps a little to know there are so many of us on here and elsewhere who are sending you all our good wishes x Also the debt is looking great, it will be gone in no time at this rate.

I have some good news to share, I got engaged on Monday It's a secret at the moment as OH wanted to ask my Dad first, he wasn't planning to propose until our going-out-anniversary next week but I was teasing him about taking me ring shopping (completely oblivious) and he cracked! So it's official, I have a ring, but I can't tell anyone yet and its driving me crazy so I hope you don't mind me sharing on here

Dinah93

Big congratulations Shrimpy - you must be thrilled. Did he make a good ring choice?

Cinny91

So sorry to hear about your OH's Nan, Birdie. Hope you're both okay. And I don't even know where to begin with all your terrible news, Dinah. Don't even know how you're managing to function right now, just one of those things would completely stop me in my tracks.

Amazing news on your engagement Shrimpy! Big congrats. Must be so hard keeping it a secret. Does this mean we'll be getting a whole new DOTD?!

And I guess you could say we're converted, Birdie. Mainly because I don't think OH would be happy with an at home holiday anymore. So if for the sake of his happiness I have to go abroad next year well *le sigh* I'll just have to do it! :A We're down to two places where we want to go next year actually, it's just picking which one! We were thinking going for a late deal, but looking at what's on offer around now this year - I don't think after how pretty Rhodes was I want to take the chance So not only am I sunshine holiday-er now but I'm snobby about it!

Hoping Ruby's first day is going well! OH has an interview in 20 minutes, so I'm sympathetically nervous. So hope he gets it.

Poolie

Not more dress pron! I can't take it. Back to the man cave at double speed.

Birdie85

Huge congratulations Shrimpy! :j What's the ring like? When will it be official? :D:D

Great news about Grace hopefully coming home soon! I take it she's recovering well after her operation?

Hugs for feeling so dark and twisty right now. It's no surprise, you've been doing so well to deal with so much in such a short space of time and I can't believe how you haven't fallen apart with it all.

I'll join you in the diet challenge. Not sure how well I'll do but I'll try!

Hope your OH's interview goes well Cinny! It's such a shame that you feel obliged to go on more holidays for your OH's sake now... you're a good girlfriend for putting up with that hardship!

Have I mentioned that we're off to Florida in November?! Not booked it yet but we're super excited! :j