Two Pennies Left

unhappy_shopper

Happy New Year FS
Looking forward to your paintings :-)

Fortune_Smiles

Well, we are back from our ridiculously extravagant, calorific, alcoholic, worth-every-penny New Year's celebration. We had a fabulous time but are now happy to be home curled up in front of the log burner, a few pounds heavier and many pounds lighter. Thank you everybody for your good wishes and I hope you all had a happy time seeing in the New Year.

Reflections on 2013:

• we overpaid £672.85 to the mortgage. This doesn't seem much in hindsight but is £672.85 more than we have ever overpaid before :T
• we have a little in savings but not much progress was made in increasing these largely due to:
• achieving more in the house than we planned including the alarm system which was our biggest cost, and
• splashing out on the lilies. We had a fantastic social life in 2013 and a luxury holiday.

All in all I'm satisfied with what we have achieved.

Looking forward to 2014:

• our visit to the North over Christmas has made us realise that if we want to be more involved in the children and future grandchildren's lives we will have to move closer to them. So, our efforts over the coming year will be directed towards putting us in a position to do this if we want to in the future
• if Mr F gets offered the new job this will help as it will mean more money coming in and is home based so not dependent on our staying in the South
• we'll need to focus our efforts on increasing the savings as we'll need cash to fund the move
• maintenance and improvements will need to continue in the house so that it's saleable when the time comes but we may prioritise differently if we're not planning to stay
• I'll be looking at finding ways of maintaining our social life but at a lower cost
• our health and fitness needs some attention now the festivities have done their damage :eek:

So may the MS carry us all onto new and happy horizons.

Fortune x

Fortune_Smiles

Calfuray wrote: »

Merry Christmas Fortune! Hope the card got to you eventually (though I posted it really late )

Cal x

Hi Cal and a very, Happy New Year to you. The card arrived just before Christmas - thank you, that was very sweet of you.

Hope your 2014 has started well.

Fortune x

Fortune_Smiles

Getmeoutofdebt wrote: »

HI Fortune!! Thought I would pop in and wish you a happy new year after noticing you popping in quite a bit on my diary! Thanks for the support and hope you have a wonderful year ahead!
All the best! GMOOD xx :beer:

Happy New Year GMOOD. Thanks for popping by. Looking forward to hearing about your adventures in 2014.

Fortune x

Fortune_Smiles

unhappy_shopper wrote: »

Happy New Year FS
Looking forward to your paintings :-)

And to you too US. I've already got 2 paintings in the plan for 2014.

Fortune x

Calfuray

Fortune_Smiles wrote: »

Hi Cal and a very, Happy New Year to you. The card arrived just before Christmas - thank you, that was very sweet of you.

Hope your 2014 has started well.

Fortune x

Happy New Year back at ya Fortune Thank you, and yay - I'm glad it got there in the end.

Another one looking forward to your paintings.

Best wishes for 2014

Cal x

Fortune_Smiles

Have now faced the full horror of the post Christmas bank account and weight situation. So MS has begun:

• 2p fed to Mr Marmite
• £50 transferred to the savings
• talked through the key aims for 2014 with Mr F
• joined B00t$ Di£t$. Although it's now called Nutrach£ck. I've been successful using this tool before and it's relatively cheap. £12.74 for the first 2 months and £7.99 each month thereafter. If I stick to plan, I'll only need 3 months. I've planned the meals for tomorrow and I'm within the calorie and fat recommendation but will have to find some exercise to do.

A good start although I am horrified at how much weight I've put on in such a short time. Best get to it.

Hope Day 1 has been a good one.

Fortune x

beanielou

So glad you have a lovely time
Agree on the scarey weight gain in a very short time :eek:

Fortune_Smiles

Mr F has been called out with the 4x4 Response Team today. Yalding has flooded again They needed a vehicle that could wade through deep water to rescue someone stranded in the church. I feel so sorry for the people who live there. We came back through the village on our way home from the North and the waterline was half way up the ground floor windows of the houses. We could see the electricity was still off because the traffic and street lights weren't working. People's sodden belongings were piled up by the side of the street. They must have had a miserable Christmas and are likely to flood several times again in January if the forecast holds true. We did look at a lovely house in Yalding when we first moved here but, knowing that the area was prone to flooding, decided against it. Thank goodness! The houses are adapted to cope with flooding but not to this extent.

My first 'normal' day of the year has started well:

• 21p liberated from Mr F's change dish this morning for the Marmit£ jar
• had to buy Mr F a new electric toothbrush as his existing one died of old age over Christmas. I shopped around and bought from J0hn L£wis in the end. B00t$ were the same price for the same brush but were saying this was with 50% off in the sale. Elsewhere the non-sale price was similar so I think they are being a bit naughty. Bought a new diary insert for my Fil0fax at the same time - Mr F said I should use my 'phone but I just can't get used to a virtual diary
• have food planned for the day and will come in under my recommended calories
• managed to do an hour's tidying in the garden as it's such a beautiful day... plus it counts as my 200 calories of exercise today :A
• Waitr0$£ have just delivered. There were 12 substitutions today :eek: All organic veg for non-organic so I suspect the weather is causing problems. I can live with non-organic for a week so not a problem. It also meant a cheaper shop - £17.20 under budget which I'll transfer to the savings
• D£hlia$ Meatballs in Goulash Sauce with Tagliatelle from the meal plan for supper tonight. Should be enough for another meal later in the week.

So not a bad day at all. Just need to get Mr F home safe and sound - I suspect much mud will accompany him!

Hope everyone stays safe in the next round of storms.

Fortune x

LauraJo

Fortune_Smiles wrote: »

Have now faced the full horror of the post Christmas bank account and weight situation. So MS has begun:

• joined B00t$ Di£t$. Although it's now called Nutrach£ck. I've been successful using this tool before and it's relatively cheap. £12.74 for the first 2 months and £7.99 each month thereafter. If I stick to plan, I'll only need 3 months. I've planned the meals for tomorrow and I'm within the calorie and fat recommendation but will have to find some exercise to do.

A good start although I am horrified at how much weight I've put on in such a short time. Best get to it.


Fortune x

Just dont look at the scales - much cheaper and keeps you ignorantly happy :rotfl: