Ecoelle's MFW Diary

ecoelle

29.12 from music magpie, i've moved it to the OP pot so a total of £33.05 sitting there, although going to see what hubby's wages are like tomorrow and look at paying off the credit cards before we OP this.
£80.00 Co-op CC 1 by 17th November
£169.00 Co-op CC 2 by 1st November
£134.66 Santander CC by 7th November

Hubby gets paid tomorrow so am going to pay off Co-op CC 2 first, then when i get paid on November 1st i can pay the Santander card off and then the child benefit £81.20 on the 12th November i can pay co-op CC1.

Really wishing we'd not used them now:( hoping that this month we can get back on track and not have to use them at all.

I have to move some money to halifax rewards tomorrow too to make sure we get our 2 x £5 reward. Not done it before so should be good. Free £10:)

Weronika

I use my cc because it gives me points, so I pay for everything with it. I use Debenhams one, as that's my favourite shop and Dh is using Tesco one. It's free money for using them, and we pay them off with DD in full each month.
So maybe instead of dreading them, use them to your advantage?

ecoelle

I try to use the CC to our advantage, i have the 123 from santander, and the co-op membership one which pays me part of my dividend, but i still hate them.

Joined onepoll yesterday and have made £2.85 so far, £2.50 of that was the sign up credit, so only actually made 35p but 35p a day is £127 a year:)

So thinking forward to November, i would really like to have £100 by the end of the month to pay as an extra OP in December, this will be made up from the 'make £x per day in November challenge' so to get £100 i need to make £3.33 per day in November.

ecoelle

Do we think that lots of watchers is a good thing? i have 15 watchers now on the one item i have on ebay, is this a good thing or does it just mean that loads of people have the same item and just want to nose at how much itgoes for? I know the item it is that i'm selling was originally from Boots and you can't buy them anymore. anyway 15 watchers! woo hoo!

It's gone up from £4 this afternoon to £7 and 23 hours to go:)

Weronika

14 is a good number:-) 15 is excellent:-) good luck selling it!

BookWorm

15 watchers sounds good to me hun! :T Not sure I've ever had that many on anything I've sold

ecoelle

Busy cooking up a storm, the Tuscan bean soup is just simmering awaiting the addition of the beans in about 10 mins so i thought i'd check in, ebay still sitting at £7, hoping for a bidding frenzy in the last few hours:)

Going to attempt to make my pasties in a bit, it uses a similar filling to the mince pie so thinking i might just make them both at the same time. Once the soup is done, i will make the pastry, then leave that to chill in the fridge while i do the filling. Guess i could be par boiling the potato slices while the soup is cooking, but that might be a multitask too far:)

Hope everyone is having a lovely autumnal Saturday.

ecoelle

Tuscan Bean and Pasta Soup
Serves 6
Total cost £1.38
Portion cost 23p

1 large onion 12p
4 cloves garlic 12p
1/4 carton of passata 10p
1 400g tin chopped tomatoes 25p
fresh basil 30p (use as much or as little as you like, but it's not the same without it)
1 400g tin of beans (cannelini/kidney/black eyed/ chick peas) 20p
salt 1p
pepper 1p
1 stock cube 5p
120g pasta 20p
2 pints tap water
1tsp veg oil 2p

Gently fry the chopped onion and chopped garlic in a large pan with the vegetable oil

Add the passata, tomatoes and basil and simmer gently for 15 mins

Dissolve the stock cube in 2 pints of boiling water and add to the pan along with the beans, simmer for 5-10 mins *

Add the pasta and simmer gently for 12-15 mins until the pasta is al dente

Season to serve

If making to freeze, do not add the pasta, stop cooking at * and allow to cool before freezing in desired portion size, eg enough for 1/2/3 people. Then once you want it, defrost over night in the fridge, then simmer with the pasta for 12-15 mins, you may need to add a little more water to thin it down a bit.

ecoelle

So, 6 portions of Tuscan Bean soup done and just cooling, also did a vegetable lasagne so that's cooling too, ready for the white sauce on the top, think we'll have that for tea tonight, we'll only eat half of it so the other 2 portions will go in the freezer. Onto defrosting said freezer, it's almost empty hence the big cook off, so think i'll defrost while i'm waiting for the things i've made to cool.

Beckyy

Yum, it sounds lovely!