PigginSkint's DFW Diary

PigginSkint

Hi Dawn (my pet stalker! :rotfl:)

The show is great - I am biased of course! The reviews have been mostly good, I am glad to say, and from what I gather the audiences have been loving it! There was a standing ovation at Press Night (which I went to as I had a free ticket) which apparently is unheard of - the critics being the hardest people to please!

Had a sneaky power nap at work this afternoon - I was on my own and just decided to give in to the eye closing for 5 minutes - and as a result feel much better now. Avon order is done so I am going to have a bath and go to bed now.

Tara a bit! (as they say round here!)

PigginSkint

Hi All

It's the first of the month and so it is the day when I update my debt totals on my spreadsheet and in my sig. The big news for me this month is that my total non-mortgage debt has now dropped below £30K! Woohoo! It is such a good feeling that is now £20K something, rather than £40K something, which is what it was originally! Feeling very proud of myself today! :j:j:j:j:j

Will post more later - better do some work first!!

Bye All!

dawnybabes

:beer:Thats brilliant news, well done you :beer:

PigginSkint

Thanks Dawn!

penguin83

Well done Piggin on being sub 30k - I managed it this month too and its a great feeling x x x x

PigginSkint

Hi Penguin

Well done to you too! It is a good feeling isn't it?!

penguin83

It is definitely a good motivator - I am trying to work out if I can be below 25k by the end of the year but we will see! x x

PigginSkint

Hi All

I have been extremely busy at work this week, so have not had much time to update on what I have been up to. Work is not likely to let up much for the next few weeks - I shall be ready for my holiday when it comes around. Only 5 weeks left at work - woohoo!!

I have been home alone today so I have taking advantage of a rare opportunity to go and have a mooch round the shops - charity shops, TK Maxx, Matalan etc. I have treated myself to a few new clothes and managed to get myself quite a few nice things and they only cost £25 altogether - not bad eh? It was a rare treat so I think it can be excused!

I have also just treated myself to the Proms Guide - with OH working in London and we will be camping down there in August, it is too good an opportunity to miss to go to a Prom or 2! I am going to retire to the sofa now to read it!

Bye all!!

PigginSkint

penguin83 wrote: »

It is definitely a good motivator - I am trying to work out if I can be below 25k by the end of the year but we will see! x x

It is always good to have a target - even if we don't quite reach it, we will end up closer to it than otherwise!

PigginSkint

Hi All

I’m suffering the aftermath of a migraine at the moment – well, the aftermath of having to take a migraine tablet, more like! The tablets do work (I can see now and my head doesn’t hurt as much) but they make me feel like a zombie – all I want to do right now is sleep!

I have managed to do some work today – when I could actually focus – but I don’t feel confident about signing it off as done at the moment. I think I had better wait until tomorrow to check what I have done and make sure it is right.

As well as getting my total non-mortgage debt figure down to below £30K this month (woohoo!) my LTSB loan is now under £5K – hooray! :j

I have just phoned LTSB to ask whether it is possible to make overpayments to pay it off quicker – and it is! That is excellent news and it is certainly something I plan to do – once my holiday is out of the way!

Talking about my holiday, I think perhaps I ought to mention what my plans are moneywise. I have now booked my car hire and paid my deposit for my camp site pitch. I have put this on my Egg card along with a few other holiday-related expenses (A-Z for the area we are travelling to, new sleeping bag liner, etc etc). I am also trying to put some money aside into my LTSB ISA to pay off at least some of the cost as soon as possible (not a very good interest rate but it is just easy to transfer money over to that account by internet banking) – at the moment there is £100 in there, which I know isn’t a lot but at least it is something! So anyway, the plan is as follows:

· Pay off current balance on Egg card by 1st August (currently about £140).
· If I have any money left over at the end of this month (hope so!) transfer some more into ISA/Holiday Fund.
· No monthly delivery from Sainsburys in August – just buy what we need as we go along (this should save some money).
· Apart from daily payments to Egg card, keep PADs (Payment a Day – see challenge thread) small. There will be no PADs while we are away anyway, so this should help the cashflow situation!
· Do as much as possible between now and when we go away (10th August) to maximise income and minimise outgoings (surveys, Amazon Marketplace sales, no Christmas present shopping, etc etc etc).
· Set up all minimum payments before I go away (including those where I won’t have received the statement yet), so I don’t run the risk of forgetting any while I am still in holiday mood.
· Only pay minimum payments, or just above (e.g. rounding up to nearest £1 rather than nearest £10) for the time being, except of course for Egg, until Egg is paid off.
· While on holiday, put all expenses except for food onto Egg card (don’t want to run the risk of exceeding my overdraft limit!).
· When we return from holiday (which will be just before payday), pay as much as possible off Egg card.
· Then, pay off Egg card as soon as possible – preferably no later than the end of September.

In other news, my Avon delivery should have arrived this morning – it hadn’t arrived by the time I left for work but I am hoping it arrived before DS left for school. If not, that means it will have gone to someone else’s house and I will have to go and fetch it – and hope they are in!

The Avon:Holiday balance should work quite well – the next order after the one I am about to start, is due in just as we go on holiday. This means I will just need to do it a couple of days earlier than I would normally do. The delivery will arrive while we are away but after we come back I will have about a week before the next one to do my deliveries and get all the books out to everyone (except work people as I won’t be back at work until the day the order goes in). This is perfectly do-able especially as I won’t have to take books to work – this means I will get round my customers more quickly.

This favourable balance (the fact that I won’t miss any orders and I don’t have to put 2 books out together – never good for sales) means I should be able to make a decent amount of money from Avon over the summer, which will definitely help to pay for the holiday!!

We had a bit of a crisis in our house on Sunday afternoon – the kettle broke! I changed the fuse but that didn’t work – I think the element had gone. I had to manage with my camping kettle which I fetched out of the shed. Anyway, yesterday I went and bought a cheapie one from Argos - £4.79. I had £2.50 of nectar points so it actually only cost me £2.29! Bargain! :money:

Anyway, I am going to attempt to do a bit more work before it is time to leave – hope it is not raining as much when I leave as it is now otherwise I shall get very wet!

Bye all!!