Millie's debt diary

mildredalien

The OH got some good news today about a payrise in work, it'll be a good £400 or so a month extra which should make things more comfortable for him! My finances are very much separate to his though so it'll only benefit me if I can convince him to buy me presents :rotfl:

I'm trying to encourage him in the MSE ways by getting him to do a new budget so he can save up for the car that he wants, he's always moaning about being skint even though he already earns more than I do and isn't paying off debts any more!

Saw a bunch of posts earlier about slow cooker food which is motivating me to start planning meals, trying out new recipes and being better about cooking in bulk. I'm sure OH has a slow cooker hiding away somewhere....

Pippilongstocking

Hello!

Goodluck with it all - slow cookers and meal planning works brilliantly, I can't say I'm a fan of meal planning myself but I do it, to save money.

When chums come and stay with us we often say 'bring treats' or give them a sort of idea what we're planning on eating and seeing what they do/don't want to contribute to that. OR, I often just say - I'll get everything in if you want to contribute then a tesco/supermarket of your choice voucher would be lovley, I'll leave it to you.

I know when we stay with folk we try and contribute - either by means of treats/wine or a voucher or something. I'd rather know what they'd like and feel like I'm contributing than maybe not get them the right thing.

If that made any kind of sense.

The only other thing I'd say, and you probably do it - but can you take a homemade lunch? All those £2's for lunch add up which could all go to debt.

I hope that's OK, its certainly not a critism - just how folk have helped me in the past.

For the first month on mse when I started I kept all my receipts for food shopping - what an eye opener that was. Where I thought I spent about £400 - with food/coffees/lunches/takeaays it was nearer £600 (I kid you not) - I nearly died of a heart attack. A person on here introduced me to an online spending diary which is really handy when you're starting out. Now we spend about £200, have a really well stocked storecupboard, try and meal plan and use diaries too. The Os board on here has a fantastic recipe resource too.

www.spendingdiary.com

free and simple to use

There is a lunch challenge on here and a storecupboard/grocery challenge - I've not been on them for a while but it did help to make me think about what I'm spending.

Goodluck! And, happy new diary! I was well over £30k in debt when I started on mse - now I'm half that and I have a tiny budget - its really working for us.

mildredalien

Hi Pippi, thanks for the comments and advice! I do appreciate them and don't worry, I like constructive criticism Being stubborn I may not listen to it but I can at least accept it!

I agree about the lunches, I need to plan more in advance about what to take each day, it would certainly help cut down on costs. All my groceries and household items are going to come from my £200/month grocery budget including work lunches, and the more I can save on that the more I can put towards my debts! I am just rubbish at a) planning in advance and b) getting inspiration for work meals though!

Thanks for the link as well, that spending diary looks really useful. I'll try and keep track of my spending on food for a couple of weeks and see how much I can save if I bulk buy/make rather than buying lunch each day.

I'm pretty sure my friends will contribute when they come and stay, at least to food if nothing else. But normally that weekend I'd probably be lounging around the house, lurking on the MSE forums and watching TV... I'm pretty sure they won't want to stay again if I make them do that!! I'll have to look around for free/cheap things that we can do, but I know I'll spend more on food and drink than I normally would in a weekend.

And congratulations on reducing your debt by half, that's amazing!!

Pippilongstocking

Lunches, hmm I know what you mean. For my mr pippi I make little portions of mini leftovers when I cook a big meal and freeze them, he takes them to work when he's in his office, or when he works from home he rummages and heats one up.

Me, I'm more fickle and less organised. I can't do a packed lunch in the morning, I'm like a zombie so I do one when I make the tea or when clearing up. I've also a stash of instant/tinned grub (cup soups/tin fish/soup/cheese and ryvita/rice cakes, etc at work and I use to take in fruit once a week to do me a while. Kept it all in desk/work fridge and had plenty to choose from. But I was lucky we had easy access to it all.

Getting inspiration was easier for mr pip than me to be honest. Always the way eh?
Goodluck and well done if your 200 includes buying lunch!

Re the chums, living in gods country I'm sure you'll find plenty to do. We all indulge a bit with chums, lifes for living. Have fun with them! I tend to meal plan a bit when chums come to let it be more relaxed and if I'm canny and work from freezer stashes etc a gorgeous meal can often be foraged for not as much as it should be

Glad you found the diary handy, it really helped me we were lucky and found MSE at a time when we could take lodgers etc, threw all that extra income to debts. Lovely lot here, never have done it without them.



Have a lovely weekend

mildredalien

The OH makes the same thing every day for his work food and seems to enjoy it, for some reason eating the same thing every day makes me cringe!! Now it's winter though I can probably survive on soup for a good few weeks, we're planning a trip to Costco next week so maybe we can stock up The main reason for wanting to plan lunches in advance is so I can get into the habit of NSDs, I'm finding them impossible at the moment! There's always something....

Today I have crammed myself into my best Spanx and a pretty dress and am off to my Aunt's wedding Should be fun although I have no idea what it's all going to cost - how much drinks etc are.... hoping to keep it to a minimum!

mildredalien

Had a great time yesterday catching up with family, my Aunt and her new hubbie are so cute together! And as a bonus, there was lots of free wine and food so it didn't turn out as expensive as I'd feared

Petrol - £20 (still got half a tank)
Drinks - £11
Hangover food (:() - £5

Just been checking through my budget and trying to work out the snowballing plan. Next month my payments will be:

Barclaycard 1 - £50
Barclaycard 2 - £100
Tesco credit card - £45
Dad loan - £150
HSBC loan - £55.79

The snowball calculator tells me to focus on paying of Barclaycard 1 first. The plan is to pay as much as possible extra towards this at the end of each month, out of my regular bank account (it'll be out of my overdraft, but the credit cards are higher interest so I figure it's better use of the money).

So my aim is to have at least the snowball calculator amount of £153.76 extra paid towards this card in November and December. More if possible!!

mildredalien

Just made a start on buying Xmas pressies - I think it's the earliest ever!! I signed up to Quidco, think it will be handy for buying presents even if I'm not planning any big purchases myself for a while. Found a couple of DVDs for little sis with a 10% off deal, free delivery and 4% cashback, not a bad start I've started an Evernote for keeping track of present buying, this year I am DETERMINED not to spend over my planned budget, no matter how much I want to treat my family.

So that's one person bought for, just 6 more and 3 birthdays to go...

snozberry

mildredalien wrote: »

Just made a start on buying Xmas pressies - I think it's the earliest ever!! I signed up to Quidco, think it will be handy for buying presents even if I'm not planning any big purchases myself for a while. Found a couple of DVDs for little sis with a 10% off deal, free delivery and 4% cashback, not a bad start I've started an Evernote for keeping track of present buying, this year I am DETERMINED not to spend over my planned budget, no matter how much I want to treat my family.

So that's one person bought for, just 6 more and 3 birthdays to go...

Topcashback is much better. You have a fee to pay wilth Quidco and they won't, speaking from personal experience, rectify mistakes that they make.

mildredalien

Thanks for the tip, I'll register and take a look around!

mildredalien

Gah, so I've already run into the downside of cashback sites, it is VERY tempting to buy things that I don't necessarily NEED because I'll be taking advantage of an offer or getting cashback.... must... find... willpower!

That being said I do need to get a pair of winter boots for work, hopefully I'll be able to find a good deal somewhere!