Its time to grow up and pay off the mortgage

OS_QS

Exactly Southerndave, life wouldn't be very fun if everyone knew their unknowns it's a careful balance of preparing for the certainties and possibilities, so any unknown unknowns don't blindside!

Ventured into the town today and got some lovely food from M&$ plus got a good deal on some kettle bells, so I can work out from home hopefully saving hundreds of pounds on the gym/ trainer. OH will use them too so all good. Going to look up some fitness classes out with the gym to keep the motivation going.

OS_QS

Righto, time to stop finding more interesting things to do and get on with some chores.

I like to start the new year fresh, so try to not 'carry' things into the 1st January. Like the massive pile of ironing, or the clothes folded at the bottom of said basket that need buttons, etc stitched on. So,

- clear iron pile
- clothing repairs
- put away Christmas decorations
- finalise Jan meal plan

Would also like to clear out my wardrobe, but will do that another weekend

OS_QS

Hope everyone had a great new year. Just back from a couple of days away with friends to take in the new year. I'm glad tomorrow's a bank holiday too as I definitely need it to recover. I'm curled up on the sofa in my PJs and I'm sooooo comfy going away is great, but sometimes you can't beat home.

Nipped into the city last week and did a bit of banking, got my annual season pass and had a mooch around the shops. Didn't fancy anything and although getting my train pass now was supposed to feel like money saving, it still cost not much less than £1500 :eek: so it kind of put any shopping spree into perspective :rotfl:

Got a nice fresh annual mortgage statement....we reduced the overall debt by £10,681 :T in 2012 and have a £9.17 daily interest!:eek:

Onwards!!!

OS_QS

Had an awesome lazy day yesterday watching up all my recorded HD programmes before the service expires! Any excuse!!!:rotfl:

Also bought a meal planning app on the ipad (don't worry I had vouchers!) and am away to sort out and organise our eating for January. Strangely looking forward to it! The app has a 'pantry' function which tracks the food you have in the house and also generates a shopping list. I'm hoping it will be £1.99 well spent!!

Anna_Glypta

OS_QS wrote: »

Had an awesome lazy day yesterday watching up all my recorded HD programmes before the service expires! Any excuse!!!:rotfl:

Also bought a meal planning app on the ipad (don't worry I had vouchers!) and am away to sort out and organise our eating for January. Strangely looking forward to it! The app has a 'pantry' function which tracks the food you have in the house and also generates a shopping list. I'm hoping it will be £1.99 well spent!!

That sounds great - will be interested to see how it goes - what's the app called please?

OS_QS

Anna_Glypta wrote: »

That sounds great - will be interested to see how it goes - what's the app called please?

If you search for meal planners in itunes, only 3 relevant apps come up. All pretty similar, but the one I opted for was called 'menu planner'. however I've just spent all afternoon importing my 'recipes' which should speed up doing a monthly meal plan and shopping list.

OS_QS

Spent a few hours putting our fave recipes into the meal planning app and organising the next weeks lunches & dinners. Just to do a stocktake and input it into my virtual pantry I can email daily/weekly meal plans to OH as well as shopping lists! :rotfl:

So glad I have 'spare' time to spend doing this, doubt I'd be so interested if I was back to work. Hopefully this is an investment and will make life easier.

Also on the to-do list is OH applying for FD. It's only taken a year :rotfl:

OS_QS

Got the eon refund just shy of £69. Was wondering if its sensible to overpay this into edf account as the money was accumulated over time as our winter surplus and not an over the top direct debit. Much prefer to be in credit and draw down rather than owe. I know the DD scheme balances out over the year, but I'll see how our usage looks.

Also had a look at our loyalty points/ money:

Nectar (Sains) £9.76
Tesco £28.50
Boots £13.38
TML GC £7.00

will likely keep the tesco points for rewards, and will use boots to restock toiletries which will low me to keep grocery spend solely on food

£48 spent on food already this month, and we're only 4 days in! But it was more staples to compliment the freezer full of stuff we're gonna eat up

OS_QS

It's actually quite depressing to see the mortgage statement at a higher amount than the MFi3T3 starting amount! Stupid daily interest! Normal payment + regular OP should come off soon, but I'm holding back any 'spare' money until January is through, as there's still 26 days to payday!! :eek: also car insurance is due beginning of feb too, so doubt there will actually be anything 'spare'

Spent another £18 on food, again on building up my pantry/ stock cupboard. Healthy eating is expensive! But meals are lovely and I'm definitely feeling the benefit. Will see what the monthly food bill averages out at.

Also invested in a juicer, hopefully this will be worthwhile as we spend a lot of money on fresh veg/ fruit juice. See if I can make them as nice as M&$

Off to look for juice recipes!

OS_QS

Freezer inventory done and rearranged to free up a whole drawer!

Major batch cooking session and have 4 portions of spag Bol, 4 portions of chilli and 2 days each of burritos for lunches :T

Spag Bol and chilli to go in freezer for healthy, quick suppers

Found fillet steak in the freezer so I have a very happy OH tonight, went lovely with sweet potato wedges.