Time to get organised and get on with it!

jwil

peaceandfreedom wrote: »

Woo-hoo congrats on passing your course - BIG achievement. :T

If you take a look at any module while logged into your OU account, you should see fees that apply to YOU - i.e. the fee should be the transitional fee if it's allowed. Try again while not logged in and see if the fee changes.

As you are doing an Open degree, I would have thought that any course counts towards it, in which case a ten-pointer would be fine. Plan it well, though, you don't want to be studying in the immediate months after having your baby - you want to be able concentrate your energies on loving your gorgeous child.



How long will you get off altogether, Jwil? Gosh, it's getting close now, how very very exciting. :j

Thanks for that peaceandfreedom - when I looked it did say transitional funds, so I'll have a look without being logged in and see if it's different.

I think I had an email the other day saying I needed to sign up to a course by Jan to keep the funding, so will have to check and see if I have to start the course at a specific time. I'm planning on doing a course out of interest - one that's related to my previous degree. It shouldn't be too taxing as it will be a refresher rather than all new stuff. I've done that particularly as I don't want to do anything new next year (I've always been interested in doing the course anyway).

I think it will be about 6 months off altogether - that's when my increased pay will run out and I'll go on to SMP. I'm hoping to be able to stretch til early Sept, but we'll have to see.

It is getting close now, a bit scary but I think I'm also starting to get used to the idea

peaceandfreedom wrote: »

DDFW, well done on the sales. :T I'm jealous of the decluttering and the ebay selling. Embarrassed really that I haven't got around to selling much myself.



I know what you mean, I am trying to keep the going-out to a minimum but it's so hard - we have quite a busy social life. Also Christmas is tough anyway, with teenagers to buy presents for - as they get older, the stuff they want gets smaller but MUCH more expensive. :eek:

Off now to add up my sealed pot contents - hope there's at least £300 in there. Fingers crossed.

I just don't have a life Much cheaper I find

LAM2011 wrote: »

Hi everyone

Well done JWIL on the exam pass. Wow I dont know how you did it but its done now.

I seemed to have lost track this month with spends / sales etc. No further ebay sales as my house is now a complete and utter tip. If a burglar came he would think someone had been in before him! It looks at though a plumbers van has been tipped upside down in it :eek: Hopefully by this weekend though our log burning stove will be providing heating and hot water to the house! I have been promised the front room will be liveable for xmas.

I have managed my christmas presents off amazon vouchers and only a small thing to get for my brother now - we only buy token gifts for each other and its only my son I spend more on and then this year I am copping out by giving him booze and some money. He is so hard to buy for as he never wants anything.

The actual day is no biggie for us - just a normal roast dinner and then off to OH family in evening for big picnic type scenariou on lounge floor with all the rest of the huge family.

I cant see myself getting properly motivated now into raising extra cash until Jan. I dont really have anything left to sell apart from a few horsey bits that still need proper cleaning, oiling and making look presentable.

Well done on getting your shopping through amazon vouchers!

Our house looks like it's been burgled too. I seem to be taking piles of stuff to the post office, but the house doesn't seem to look any better! I hoping that will happen one day!

The wood burning stove sounds lovely. I really want one, but we don't have a chimney at all.

jwil

peaceandfreedom wrote: »

OK, so it's £302.55. :j:j:j

Not bad given the really cr*ppy year we've had money-wise (and lots of other-ways wise!). But next year, I'm going all-out. I'm going to save £1000 in my sealed pot.

Still that's over 300 quid towards Christmas, won't go far enough but it will certainly help. :T

Wow, that's a great amount, well done :T :T I might try and do a sealed pot for next year. It's a great idea. £1000 is a fantastic target though!

LAM2011 wrote: »

Hi Peaceandfreedom and thankyou. I am trying really hard now and as I just posted on the POAMAYC thread - without this forum and you members I would still probably be living off credit. Its been hard and I will admit I have fallen off the wagon a few times but we are all in the same boat I am sure!

The best thing for me about christmas is the time off work. We still have to see to the horses dogs and chickens so its a fairly normal day really. We often see to other peoples horses at the yard as well.

We are lucky in that my OH is a builder so apart from the £500 :eek::eek::eek: he spent on the log burning stove everything else he has done himself in the evenings / weekends - hence the constant mess. He does have a building fund for the alterations and so it has come out of that. We will also have the option to flip a switch to use traditional gas or to just use the heat off the stove. I dunno - very technical

have you counted your pot yet ? I have started another pot

I'd be lost without you guys as well. Mine's all my debt, and whilst DH knows, he hates it, so I don't really talk about it with him. I'm not really getting anywhere with it though

peaceandfreedom wrote: »

I don't put anything lower than 5p in mine but I do put larger amounts in. Truly, larger amounts should go towards debt but I don't have a coherent plan for debt and I really ought to.

I've spent too many years basically making half-hearted efforts to reduce debt. It's not easy, OH has been out of work for over a year and I get no help at all from him - he continues to p*ss lots of spare cash down the bogs of the local pub. :mad:

But I've realised I've got to stop being a victim and just DO something instead of always thinking 'woe is me'. I'm inclined to sit back and hope for a miracle, but a miracle is not going to come. It's up to me. So December 2012 is the start of formulating a new plan and putting it into action.

I may even start my own diary so I can waffle on without cluttering up Jwil's thread.

Go for it! You are very welcome to waffle here, but if you do start a diary, pop a link on here so we can all pile over en masse

jwil

Well I've done a bit of listing on ebay so that's a few new bits on there. I think I wont have anything listed that end after next Sunday to avoid the Christmas post. I'll then pop some stuff on to be on there over the Christmas break.

I'm shattered now and my mouth is hurting so going to go off and have a break now and an early night. I didn't sleep well last night so hoping for better tonight.

Have a good evening everyone

jwil

Oh well, payday today! I've got MOT and car insurance this month, so not looking forward to that.

I'm going to try and raise the extra £300 again this month, so I'll try and keep track a bit better though.

I did sell another couple of books yesterday so pleased with that.

peaceandfreedom

jwil wrote: »

Oh well, payday today! I've got MOT and car insurance this month, so not looking forward to that.

I'm going to try and raise the extra £300 again this month, so I'll try and keep track a bit better though.

I did sell another couple of books yesterday so pleased with that.

Have a good day, Jwil.

jwil

Well I've had a few sales yesterday to start me off for this month :T

I'm now £17/£300

Hope everyone has a good weekend

jwil

Hey everyone, hope you all had a good weekend.

I got a load more listing done this weekend for me and DH. I will leave listing anything new now until I can make sure the auctions end after Christmas to avoid the postal frenzy.

I did have a few more sales as well - £12 for a book on amazon and £21 so far paid up from ebay sales.

That gives me a new total of £50/£300

The joyous news is that my MOT is being done on Thursday and my car insurance is due next week. Also over the weekend, my engine light on the car has come on again *sigh*. It was a tad scary actually, we were driving along the motorway and suddenly the car juddered and lost all power for a couple of seconds :eek: The engine light and oil light and alarm came on. I'm so glad DH was with me as he knows cars. He had a quick look to check nothing had fallen off and the oil was ok, and then the car was driving fine again, albeit with the engine light on (the oil light went out again).

Hopefully it's just a loose connection somewhere as it's driving ok again. I've spoken to the garage and they will look at it all together on Thursday. I'll be avoiding the motorway until then though - it was very early yesterday so it was quiet, but I normally drive it at rush hour and I wouldn't like that happening to me again.

Fingers crossed it's not a huge bill.

Chocforever

Well done with getting so many listings done this weekend.

The car sounds scary. I once drove someone else'e car with the power intermittently cutting out. I was driving back from London on a Friday night. It was not a good experience. I hope they can sort out your car (cheaply) for you on Thursday.

My monthly total so far is -£1. I sold a book on Amazon and made a loss due to postage. I could not believe how heavy this softback book was (over 1kg!) so it cost way more than I expected to post it. Ah well, I haven't anything left listed on Amazon so I think I'll leave it now.

I'm persevering with SB. I think I am getting quite efficient at hitting the targets. I just do one survey a day (it may mean getting DSQ from a first at first, but at least this seems to happen very early on in the survey) and top it up with tasks. Some of the tasks are very easy, some are infuriating because the model answers aren't very reliable so it is difficult to get past the training mode. But I have found some that no one else seems very keen on so I can do them to reach target if they are available.

I have one MS booked for this week (won't get paid for it until January) and nothing new on Ebay so I'm not sure where I think my monthly challenge money is coming from! Need to have a think.

peaceandfreedom

Well done on the ebay sales everyone.

I have done a financial reconciliation today and had to buy myself a disgustingly sweet pastry to ease the stress of it.

Need to raise at least a couple of hundred quid in December AND January just to stay afloat. Have found some stuff that should sell pretty well on ebay. Have also gone out today and got refunds on some stuff (one faulty thing and a some small bits and bobs I should never have bought) so I am already £50 towards my target. :j

Have imposed strict budget rules on grocery buying for December - it's ridiculous how often and how much OH spends on extras every week, including bottles of wine. :mad: Now have a cash-only system and I want each receipt put into the pot so I can reconcile and keep account of it all. If he isn't earning any money, it's really not fair to spend money on booze all the time.

Now, I promised myself I won't keep moaning about OH but sometimes, I just can't restrain myself.

Planning for Christmas shopping is going quite well. My boy, bless him, has declared he needs nothing for Christmas so not to worry about buying him stuff. The girls want expensive stuff, 'twas ever thus. I have imposed limits though, and I can't even afford those.

Sometimes, I think I can't breathe through the stress of it all, I wonder if all this money strife will ever end, will OH ever get a job, will he ever DO anything, get ANY kind of get-up-and-go. Who knows?

Hmm, this post has turned out to be more negative than I intended but sometimes I feel I am carrying the world on my back, need to shake it off.

jwil

Chocforever wrote: »

Well done with getting so many listings done this weekend.

The car sounds scary. I once drove someone else'e car with the power intermittently cutting out. I was driving back from London on a Friday night. It was not a good experience. I hope they can sort out your car (cheaply) for you on Thursday.

My monthly total so far is -£1. I sold a book on Amazon and made a loss due to postage. I could not believe how heavy this softback book was (over 1kg!) so it cost way more than I expected to post it. Ah well, I haven't anything left listed on Amazon so I think I'll leave it now.

I'm persevering with SB. I think I am getting quite efficient at hitting the targets. I just do one survey a day (it may mean getting DSQ from a first at first, but at least this seems to happen very early on in the survey) and top it up with tasks. Some of the tasks are very easy, some are infuriating because the model answers aren't very reliable so it is difficult to get past the training mode. But I have found some that no one else seems very keen on so I can do them to reach target if they are available.

I have one MS booked for this week (won't get paid for it until January) and nothing new on Ebay so I'm not sure where I think my monthly challenge money is coming from! Need to have a think.

The light's gone out again on the car, so that's good. It's driving ok again. I'm still going to get it checked out though as I'd rather not have a problem develop.

That's frustrating about the book postage - I've done that before too.

I might have to have a peek again at Swagbucks, see if I can figure it out at all.