Its days are numbered ...

DawnW

Work not too bad, but it does seem to have been a long week :eek:
Got paid :j AND it ended up in the correct account :T:T
Just the direct debits to monitor now.

Not much in the way of OPs next month, as I started the FD regular saver in June, but with only £100, and so will be making up last month's payment to the maximum, which is apparently allowed :T. So that will be £500 altogether this month. I also have another, ongoing regular saver, with Barclays, into which I pay £250 each month - so £750 into regular savers for July :eek: Will therefore need to be extra careful.

So, small OPs only. I have liberated £30 from paypal, mainly due to ebay refunds, but also including a couple of pinecone survey payments, so that will be one. Possibly the only one? We will see!

OH not back from London yet, watering to do in the garden (plus picking another huge pile of mangetout :eek:) and the dog to take out. So better get on.

DawnW

Its Friday :j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j

OH made a strange and quite unpleasantly fatty ham and bean stew :eek:

However the homegrown new potatoes with it were very nice

I will be taking charge of the cooking tomorrow!

Filled the car up with petrol, and it is quite noticeable how the prices have dropped recently, thank goodness.

Eggs for breakfast tomorrow as the bowl is overflowing :eek:

Looking forward to the weekend

DawnW

Ooh it is creeping towards Monday again

Still, a nice weekend, despite truly dreadful weather :eek:
Closed S*tander account

Bought some bits at an online auction (not ebay, an ordinary auction, where you can watch and bid online. Didn't spend much - £10 on a set of storage jars which came with loads of other things, including 70s vintage Denby pottery , and £10 on a pair of (allegedly) Laura Ashley curtains. I hadn't see these, but hoped they might fit one of my windows. They are MASSIVE, metres and metres of material! I am taking them to pieces for the fabric, as there is so much of it. I don't know if it is Laura Ashley - the curtains are very skilfully hand made, but it is very nice fabric, and lined as well. So, I am unpicking all the fabric and lining, and will wash and iron it, and when I get a minute, have it made into 2 or 3 pairs of curtains for in here. There would probably be enough material to make 7 or 8 pairs :eek: so hopefully someone else will want some of it as well. I wish I could make them myself, but my sewing skills aren't up to that. But I can pay a local person to do it, and they will still be cheap because the fabric cost so little

Washed half of the linings in the machine on a delicates programme, and they are fine. I have now put just one piece of the actual fabric in, to see if that machine washes ok. Each curtain is made up of 3 long pieces (ie the full width of the fabric), so even if it is not ok, there is still plenty. I think it will be alright though.

Shopped at A!di this morning, and topped up at Waitrose. I spent a scary amount on a leg of lamb for dinner at Waitrose, as I was craving something different to leftovers, veggie things, variations on sausage, ham or bacon, and chicken

Still, there will be plenty of leftovers for later in the week :rotfl:

And all the veg we are having with it are home grown

Right, back to dismantline those curtains - only 1 lining (actually made of 4 lengths joined together :eek:) to go. Piles of material and bits of thread everywhere!

Ist July - I am hoping this will be the month when I will become mortgage neutral , ie I have the same amount of savings or more) than I owe on the house. If not this month, then next

ammonite

Good luck with the curtains. I need to make cushions but can't find suitable material

Mortgage neutral sounds fab. I am 93% off being mortgage neutral! We have 7% of it in savings!

DawnW

Curtains all unpicked now, and I have a huge pile of material to wash and iron. One lot of linings on the airer, others in the machine now. My experiment with gently machine washing one piece of the curtain fabric was successful, so I will do the others over the next day or two (there will be several loads). Then to iron and put away till I get round to finding someone to make them up. And hoover up all the bits of unpicked thread of course :eek:

Just had fresh picked strawberries and loganberries from the garden on our breakfast cereal

Cold lamb and salad tonight, so no real cooking.

Direct debits seem to have gone out of new FD account. I must ring C&G as I can't remember the numbers necessary to set up online OPs from a new bank account :eek: That will never do!

Must also transfer £1k to the Halifax to get the £5 reward. I fear it will soon be transferred back out again, as things are going to be a bit tight this month .

DawnW

Bleurrgh, wet Mondays :mad:

I have wet bits of curtain lining festooned all around the lounge :eek:

Pile of curtain fabric is going up to spare bedroom till we get a day when I can dry it outside.

Cold lamb and salad for supper. Good news is that there is some for sandwiches tomorrow, and enough for a pilaff later in the week. So, 4 meals for 2 of us makes the joint I bought yesterday look a lot less expensive - and the dog has enjoyed gnawing at the bone as well She is only very little, and it is a big bone so I am not worried about her breaking bits of bone off or swallowing it, more nibbling it round the edges really .

Must freeze some more mangetout in a minute
Iron some curtain linings and put more on the airer
Wash up the bits that don't go in the dishwasher
Cart curtain fabric upstairs and dump it on one of the spare beds
Sort out internet banking
Seriously think about meal planning, as I have ham slices, smoked mackerel and about 100 eggs (well, a bit of an exaggeration, but not much :eek:). I have already frozen the rest of the lamb. I think the ham needs to go in there as well!
So, frittata tomorrow and smoked mackerel on Weds. That is as far as I can think at the moment

Right, better get on!!

Tilly_MFW_in_6_YRS

Hi Dawn, smoked mackerel makes a lovely quiche filling - yes really. Then you can serve it with a shredded carrot and mange tout salad :)

Best wishes Tilly x

DawnW

Thanks Tilly

We had ham baguettes with salad though - frittata tomorrow, then smoked mackerel

After that, it will be Friday again :T

Work is a nightmare - 'do it by yesterday' deadlines, ongoing staff issue that I am personally having to deal with, wrestling with a computer system that is not fit for purpose, a restructuring situation where the CEO is either silent or somewhere else, nobody knows what is going to happen, and empire building opportunities galore at the top. Needless to say, loads of people are leaving. So would I if I were 10 years younger! Another of my (lovely, not the one causing all the problems) staff is leaving, and I am looking at covering her job as well. I would like to be made redundant, but cannot see this happening due to the huge exodus at the moment.

Anyway, onward and upward!

Still haven't done spreadsheets for June, as I am still dealing with fallout from changing banks - not all the direct debits have moved as they should, so lots of time consuming phone calls are in order :mad:

Still, at least the mortgage dd got paid

DawnW

Hello :j
I have had a couple of glasses of wine - can't you tell

Work and weather bleurrgh, but once I got home, the sun miraculously appeared

Picked mangetout (loads :eek:) a few berries, some broad beans and carrots, and OH dug some new potatoes

Frittata with chorizo and peppers, saute potatoes and broad beans for dinner, which was very nice, and used some of our egg mountain

Speaking of eggs, the chickens' laying has slowed down, probably due to the weather, but the poorly one seems to be improving, almost back to normal now

Most of the direct debits are 'working' from the new FD account now. Still a few issues, but I will sort them out. I still find their internet banking not the easiest - and yes, I am grandma, but spent some years in a university computer science department - but managed to transfer money to my Halifax account to qualify for next month's reward

Setting up OPs is my (and their) next challenge

Only small ones though as I am committed to 550 per month in regular savers - but they pay a higher interest rate than that of the mortgage.

Spent a few minutes today investigating OU teaching, which I would love to get back into, and other part time teaching at local unis, which made me feel better. I would dearly love to be made redundant from my current role and do something else. This is possible due to restructuring, funding cuts etc, but not at the moment. Once the mortgage is paid off, I may just leave and do something else, I don't really care what. We will see. I am one of those who was due to retire at 63, and now has to wait till 65 . I don't think so!! I don't mean retiring not as in not working at all, just not working at least 1.5 jobs!!

OH has made 2 fabulous garden chairs, using some cast iron end bits (technical term??), which he bought for a fiver at a car boot, and reclaimed teak from a table that he pulled out of the skip at the auction house he frequents (of course he asked first, and as they have to pay to have their skips emptied, were quite happy to oblige a regular customer). They are really gorgeous, so I am trying to persuade him not to sell them, as I love them, and they cost basically £10 including fixing bolts and teak oil

Right, better get on! Thursday tomorrow, which is nearly Friday

pawlala

DawnW wrote: »

sun

I understood most of your post, but not this bit?