The loooooong road to being MF!!

linz

Do you do a weekly shop in Aldi? Don't forget the £5 off a £40 spend vouchers in the Daily Mirror. They're normally the last Thursday of the month. You can get a lot in Aldi with an extra fiver

chocoholic_chick

Ooh I didn't know about that, thanks! I don't normally buy newspapers but it'll be worth it for the £5 off. Is there somewhere online that tells you when they'll be in the paper do you know?

linz

Its normally on the grabbit board on here or on their facebook group, normally last Thursday of the month.

chocoholic_chick

Afternoon all! No more mortgage overpayments until pay day now as we have no money left! But had a productive day yesterday. Took a tin of paint back that we bought to paint the bathroom but realised we had some already so that was £13.59. We did end up buying a couple of bedside lamps and a bathroom mirror so ended up spending more but they were all reduced so it was £43.85 for those, £30.26 if you take off the refunded paint. Just need to re-grout the bathroom and get a new bath panel but I think in total it's going to have cost around £90 to do the bathroom which is alot less than getting a new bathroom suite!

Then went to M&S for food shopping as I won a £50 giftcard. You really can't get much for your money in there :eek: But it saved us from having to spend "real" money on food and hopefully we won't need anything else until pay day, we have plenty of food in the freezer so really shouldn't.

Means that our food/toiletries shop this month is £205.00 ( including 2 trips to the farm shop for meat which is always more expensive but far better quality ) as oppose to £274.40 last month so quite pleased with that :j

I've posted on the 2013 MFW thread as well. Signed up for that challenge with a target of £2000 last year but never got anywhere so have adjusted my target down to £1100. Still feel like this is achievable but also know I will have to make a real effort to reach that target so hopefully it'll give me some motivation.

Right best go get sorted and get dinner on!

chocoholic_chick

Afternoon all!

Hubby was paid today so did my money shuffle ( whilst singing party rock, always gets stuck in my head when I think of shuffling :rotfl:) Have put aside £100 to OP the mortgage which is what I've budgeted for this month. Hopefully we might have some money left over from our food budget which can go towards it as the month goes on. Just don't have much spare cash at the moment as we're doing the house up a bit. Once I've done that £100 payment and my normal payment comes out at the beginning of the month I'll ring the mortgage company and find out the mortgage balance, not expecting it to have gone down by a huge amount to that in my signature but still curious!

Got the email about homebase having 15% off this weekend and they've an offer on dulux paint buy 1 get 1 half price. Plus I filled out their online survey and got a code for £5 off a £50 spend so might pop over tomorrow and get some more bits and pieces while they've got those offers on. May as well make the most of it!

chocoholic_chick

Sent that £100 overpayment :j Not a huge amount I know but every little helps! Got a weekend of DIY and decorating planned so having a few glasses of wine tonight to chill before a busy weekend!

Have also done a £100 payment towards one of our loans so that will be finished next month :j

chocoholic_chick

Well my weekend of DIY didn't happen BUT I have given the house a thorough clean and tidy ( Though I have just shut the door on the spare bedroom with the humongous mountain of ironing, that can wait for another day ).

Quite pleased with all the paint I got yesterday, instead of being £122.92 it cost me £75.26 :T Should be enough there to do the 3 bedrooms, gloss the doors and re-grout the bathroom. Seems alot of people in there were making the most of the 15% off and various offers, I wasn't the only one with a trolley full of paint!

Needed to go food shopping yesterday but couldn't be bothered so just used the last £7 on the M&S card to get a couple of pieces ( literally! ) to last the weekend so will go tomorrow instead. Going to see what I've got in the freezer and try to plan meals round it, sure I've got enough meat in for meals for the week, just need to get the bits and pieces to go with it. Got 4 weekly shops to do until hubbys next pay day, if I can average them to be £40 a shop plus £40 for odd bits over the month that would leave £80 to put towards the mortgage so going to try to meal plan and more importantly stick to it!

chocoholic_chick

Have signed up to the grocery challenge for October and aiming for £220 for the month. Done my first main shop today which came to £38.57 :T so along with the top up shop I did on Friday that brings total spends so far this month to £53.51. A bit ahead of where I would want to be so soon into the month but I've meal planned for the week and shouldn't need to buy anything at all until next weekend. Determined to have some spare cash left from our grocery budget for mortgage overpayments!

chocoholic_chick

Well doing the grocery challenge is certainly opening my eyes to how much we spend :eek: £125.91 spent already!! Really going to try to reign it in now and budget a bit better. I should have 2 more weekly shops to go for which I'll try to stick to £40 each for and £10 for any top ups I need in between should mean I come in on budget. Have enough meat in for meals for this week and next so should just be fruit and veg I need to pick up this weekend which in theory means a cheaper shop, though fruit and veg isn't exactly cheap!

We are waaay under on our petrol budget though , I budget £200 per month for that which runs from DH's pay days and so far have spent £30 :money: I shouldn't need any more for another week either, maybe longer. So I recon we'll maybe spend another £80 this month which will hopefully mean £90 left to go towards the mortgage at the end of the month :T Not going to be able to do that every month sadly.

chocoholic_chick

So since my last update I have managed to reign in the spends on groceries but a few nights out and work trips have meant I've had to take some money out of the food and petrol budget to cover these. Food spends now stand at £175.42 so have just under £45 left and 1 more shop to do until my next months challenge starts, I'm sure I can manage on that Managed to eeeek out my petrol to today as well so topped up £20 which should see me through until pay day now and will mean my petrol spends this month will have been a rather impressive £50 :j Just wish DH's car was the same!

I have £60 put aside as a potential mortgage overpayment, taken out of the excess I knew we'd have from our food and petrol budget, but I'm reluctant to pay it over until I know we'll be ok so I think after this weekend's out the way, if I still don't need it for anything, then I'll pay it over on Monday

Also rang the mortgage company today to get our current mortgage balance which is £94,979.03 :T Always like when you get down into the next thousand