A Year of Living Frugabulously

Lula-Hula

Good morning all,

I've been very busy having fabulous FUN so no time for updates.

I met up with lovely friend yesterday & I treated us to large cappuccinos to keep us hydrated while we caught up on all the news & chat. Lovely friend then treated us to an ice skating session which was fantastically fabulous fun ( watch out dancing on ice wannabe winners :rotfl:) & after that I treated us to drinks & a ride on a carousel .

It was a beautiful sunny day & just a perfect start to the fun side of the year; a bit of exercise to burn up some calories & a ride on a brightly painted horse with the castle and river as a gorgeous backdrop while we rested our aching legs . Parking is a always a bit pricey there but all the days spends came out of my pocket money & I now have £50 left in cash, which will go towards next weeks 'Drinks with the Boys' :cool:

Just off out now to have lunch with a friend so will be back later with all real finance updates.

Have a lovely day all
xx

Shoe_Gal

Sounds lovely, glad you're having some fun times

RosaBernicia

Sounds gorgeous

Getting the year off to a good start :T

Rosa xx

Lula-Hula

Back again :hello:

We had a trip round the M25 to visit a friend for lunch & I missed the junction so we did a few miles more than expected ... it took an hour to get there & just 40 minutes to get home again :rotfl:I don't somehow think that my car will get to the end of the month on the fuel that's left in the tank.

Anyway, let's go back to yesterday; home-job earnings enable payments to:

Childcare Fund : £140
Gift Fund : £10
Yule 2012 Fund : £10 (oh yeh, get me all savey uppy from week 1 of the year :cool:)
Entertainment fund : £20

I was in the town where my Secret Bank Account is held so it made sense to pay in the gift cheque there as it would clear immediately & I could then decide what to do with it later.

At some point during the day I collected a £2 coin so I now have £54 ( I think, will need to check sig to be sure ).

I did have a little splurge on a shiny new app - am now the proud owner of a spending log on my phone so can log all my spends easily - & it didn't actually cost me anything as DD still has credit in her i tunes account & was kind enough to let me have the 69p app from her balance :A.

There was a bacon sandwich incident this morning so we ran out of bread & as I needed to take something along to friends for dessert I whizzed down to the shops this morning to do a bit of buying & also a bit of finance juggling. I spent a bit of time thinking about how to best organise myself & think I've come up with a workable plan

First I withdrew the £100 from the Secret Bank Account & then withdrew my weekly allowance from my current account. I've chosen to start off with a weekly budget of £50 & that will be for food spends, any cleaning or household items & other things like paying the window cleaner. I expect to have money left at the end of most weeks, but haven't yet decided exactly what to do with it.

It probably should go into a savings fund of some sort, but it's more likely to go into the Entertainment Fund & I'm ok with that. If I manage to save money by being canny with the groceries etc, then why not use the savings to have some fun .

I contemplated keeping the £100 gift money in cash, but came to the conclusion that it would be far safer in the bank, so I've put it into my dormant basic current account & will use that as my clothes challenge fund & will add to it every month for DDs clothing & shoes. I have a debit/cashcard on the account & can use it for any ebay transactions via paypal.

I hope that keeping this money separate from my cash pocket money & also my current account will enable me to keep track of the spends & get it fixed in my mind that I have to have a budget for things other than rent & bills & more importantly, that I cant use money that's in my current account unless it's actually spare.

So, I had a couple of squids left from pre-christmas cash, withdrew this week's allowance, zipped into the co op to buy the bits I needed spent £7.75 & now have £44.85 left.

When I got home I realised that I previously had my purses organised in the wrong way; I had just my pocket money cash in one of them & my general cash, debit & CC & all loyalty cards etc in the other. When shopping, the temptation/habit to get the loyalty card out & then hand over the CC was overwhelming. On a subconscious level, I must have known that I was going to use the CC to pay & so knew that I could overspend :doh:

What I've now done is put my weekly cash spends allowance in one purse along with my supermarket loyalty cards ( tatco one removed ) but nothing else.

I am now a cash only customer .

In other news, it turns out that the sofa purchase did just miss this month's CC statement so not quite as scary as it could have been. I will have it paid off by the end of this month & then need to spend the next 2 months making up for not having paid into my online Savings Funds

This shouldn't bee too hard as they're the 2 months when I don't have to pay council tax or water rates so have an extra £240 to use.

I'm off to bed now, will catch up with everyones diaries over the next couple of days

G'night
xx

Karmacat

Love the attention and focus to the detail - you've inspired me to really keep track of fresh spends for Christmas - I'll keep it in my sig on here, I think, rather than a piece of paper somewhere I'm going to lose - it'll remind me to update it, as well. Thanks sweetie!

Lula-Hula

Well there I was feeling all buzzy & positive, but it's gone downhill a bit since then.

Woke up bright & early having decided to take DD to outdoor skating this morning & then get all chores & homework done this afternoon. We set off at half ten & I immediately noticed the clutch pedal felt a bit funny & pulled over as thought the carpet was caught under neath it. Carried on a bit & then it just went, engine revving & unable to put car in gear at all :eek:.

Fortunately managed to pull over & was on quiet road about 2 miles from home. Rang RAC ( memebership due to run out this week) & lovely man called me 20 minutes later to suggest things to do & then arrived about 15 minutes later. He tried it out & informed me that clutch worn to within an inch of life & I needed to get to a garage quick.

I had no idea where best to take it but thought prob easier to go to one near work where I got it serviced last year. Roundabouts were not much fun with but we managed to get there in one piece, saw manager ( very hunky;)) & he said he wasnt sure if it could be fixed tomorrow, but if not then Tuesday & he'd call me (;);)) in the morning to let me know.

DD & I will be walking to school I'll then carry on to the station & have to get on a train with all the peasants :eek:.

Have to change at PoshTown & then get on another train back home again. On the plus side, I'll be walking about 3 miles so getting plenty of exercise, the downside is it'll cost me money from my weekly allowance & I cant go do my shop at Sainsbugs.

Absolutely dreading the cost, but on the other hand, sooooooooo relieved that it went today on a nice quiet road near home, rather than when miles from home, like yesterday on the motorway _pale_

Going to go investigate possible costs & do some ironing as stress relief.

Pippilongstocking

Eeek Gads lula poor you!

I hope you get it sorted. Thankfully neither of you were hurt xxxx

Pesky cars.

Xxx

Lula-Hula

Thanks Pippi,

my thoughts exactly, could have been a much worse experience & frankly - it's only money ! my research reveals it could be about £300.
RAC man said 'expensive' & I tend to think that anything over £500 is expensive so currently feeling ok about it.

*runs off to will more money in to the car repairs fund*

Karmacat

Yep, when you think of how dangerous breaking down on the motorway could have been, the money gets into perspective really quickly, doesn't it. Not nice, but still. And I *really* understand the horror of taking the train with the peasants :eek::rotfl: thats why I was so glad we used to drive to London, in spite of the not-green-ness.

Definitely want you to find something local thats pleasant this afternoon tho :kisses3:

ZTD

Can I just stick up for the peasants here?

Despite not living in the south east myself, I would point out these are *working* peasants, and *not* chav peasants with 10 kids called things like Chelsea, Bel Air and Romford...