New Life, My DFW Diary!

Lucy1982_2

Hopefully. And I am going to have one hell of a holiday and shopping trip!!! Once I've saved up for them of course!

Lucy1982_2

Right I am allowing myself to spend £1.89 on some strawberries today and nothing else. I treated myself to a £15 summer dress last night. So feel a little guilty, but as it's the only treat I've allowed myself this month I shouldn't really.

Already managed to get loads done at work. Been here since 8 am:rolleyes: Looking forward to weighing in at SW tonight as I should have had a good weight loss.... well according to my scales anyway :rotfl: We shall see.

Anyway I am going to try and stay positive today and not let the length of time paying all this back get me down. Afterall so long as it's gone by the time I'm 28 and I've learnt how to budget it can't be all bad. Can it?

Anyway keep saving x

Sea78

Good luck tonight hon - hope it's good news

Lucy1982_2

Morning

Well I weighed in last night and had lost 1 1/2 pounds :j which means I am hopefully back on track

But really chuffed with the weight loss, and hopefully I can keep it up this week to. It's my birthday a week tomorrow so and I'm going to try and steer clear of to much cake that weekend, could be hard :rolleyes:

But on a money note, check my account this morning and I must have miss calculated somewhere and was nearly at my max OD :eek: so I've had to transfer the £80 I had put aside into my account :mad: although I do still have £69 in my Amazon account waiting to be transfered on Monday, so it's not all that bad..... MUST BE GOOD NOW!!!!

But all of my bills have now gone out (I'd forgotten about my phone bill :rolleyes: ) So it's just petrol and some spending money now, which I'll try to keep to a minimum. It's just a pain that I live in a rural area, public transport is awful and I really need my car, but nevermind, I suppose anything off my OD is better than nothing. So now feel really bad about buying myself something the other night.... When will I ever learn!!

But I'm going to be positive today, I have money in my purse that will now have to last as long as it can and I already have money set aside for my haircut tomorrow. But I may need help and monitoring to have loads of NSD'd over the weekend and next week. I get paid on Monday so really need to try for NSD's' all week and then plan my budget a bit more realistically... Oh and actually start and keep a spending diary.

Any other tips would be appreciated.

Thanks x

Lucy1982_2

Afternoon!

Ok, I have just been to lunch and I have bought myself a note book and started my spending diary.

I have vowed that I will have just eaten my last punnet of strawberries to be bought at work. Now feeling rather red and english (YUMMY!!)

Already feel better for writing it down. How easily am I pleased! Feeling more positive. Have divided the notebook page into Place/Item and amount, so I can see where I'm spending and on what. Hopefully this will cut out loads of stuff I don't need.

But I had a very healthy lunch I am going to try really hard to get another good weight loss next week as I need a bit of a kick to get me going again.

But I am on the orange squash (sugar free, 54p a bottle) and I'm going to hit the filing this afternoon as I have about 3 weeks worth to do :eek: it's taking over my desk, but storming through my to do list and MSEing as much as I can. I seem to have finally found a work/addiction balance :T

Take care x

InTheRed

Hi Lucy,

Glad to hear you are feeling much more positive today!
Just look back at your diary to see what you have achieved with all the energy and endless enthusiam you have thrown into it!

Spending diary hey? I have been putting off the spending diary, but I know I need to do one
How are you going to deal with bank direct debits - do they get included in a spend diary? Or is it purely cash?

Take care and have a good weekend - DFW of course!
Very excited today as have first mystery shop dinner tonight!

InTheRed

Lucy1982_2

Good luck with Dinner!!

I don't think I'll include Direct debits. As I dont' have a problem paying for them. My real problems comes from sticking within my weekly budget. So I think I will be just cash. I might include petrol as that is sometimes a case of oh well nevermind I need it.

Which in all fairness I do, but I should really stick to the budget and not pick up bottles of coke and then pay on my card :rolleyes:

I'll let you know how I get on. Don't know if I'm see OH tonight, but everything will be as DFW as it can be. I'm going to carry my spending diary with me so everything can go in it.

Lucy1982_2

I have just opened an A and L account. (big smiles) I'm going to use it as my spending account and only have my direct debits go out and slowly pay off my overdraft. I'll still be paid into that account and will just transfer some money over each month.

It's really exciting, as I will earn more interest on the other account I should be doing ok soon. Plus it will be nice to see some interest actually being earnt!

diamonds

Lucy1982 wrote: »

Good luck with Dinner!!

but I should really stick to the budget and not pick up bottles of coke and then pay on my card :rolleyes:

.

Lucy my way around this is to keep juice in the car, i would spend average of 2-3quid a day on sugar free fluids a day & that was a good day! - a 4 pack of Macaw Iron Brew 97p at Asda is whats in my boot now & tastes better than the real Diet Irn Bru !, I have no debts to speak of only my monthly bills but money got tigher and I realised my juice fix was was biggest daily expenditure after my 99p sandwich for lunch I dont do hot caffine drinks really, I now spend 97p for 2/3 days juice supply not 6-9 quid in that same timescale, just from that alone in a month I notice buying something for the house monthly is no big deal these days but when I had more cash it was ? Or as an many MSE'er I could have made a sandwich and been better a quid of a month, nope not faffing about for saving a quid a day when juice could yeild 3 quid a day upwards...

Anyone whom seems to have a compulsive shopping thing like I used to
( most do - keep reading ) and that includes one/two item card purchases is a major struggling point in debt/savings management, banks retailers etc all promote this, example : " chip and pin " - psycology your not spending money are you ? , where does money/credit/overdrafts come into it in your subconsience - It doesnt ! thats exactly the way they all want to make you think ( I mean they have shareholders to feed dont they ? ) Card & Pin, Cash & Pin anyone ? or does " chip and pin " sound better now your subconsience is used to seeing/hearing it ? We all seen the new chips on cards - do we need a reminder of it ? NO - the PIN as card users is the inportant bit for us!
Think back to before Chip nPpin....either would have fitted in but they both mention cash ! 1 directly & the other in the way of a " card " we all know on a conciese and subcon level " card " = access to cash, they dont want you thinking of your cash/debt levels - they all make thier cut everytime you
swipe/pin it - 15/20 years from now all cash transactions will have a transaction fee ...mark my words.....higher than what retailers pay per card transaction I might add
Money saving is about not adhereing to all the subconcience not just about counting ( however bad you are people! ) Change the behaviour within as well as happy @ scoring a great bargain/deal !

1) If your in Tesco your there for food shopping - avoid all non food isles unless you've seen a bargain on here ( in all needs hunt it down if its something you really want ( but do you really need it ?, is it cheap enough to bulk buy to save in future and if it is, how much can you comfortably afford ) but avoid the other few tiny small purchases in the non food isles at the same time as you pass through them !!!

2) Dont carry a card leave home with enough cash to cover why you are going out on this trip, with a little extra - for a 2 minute payphone call, car park late overcharges, emergency bus fare - if you dont use it that doesnt mean go to nearest shop and spend it - no dramas no spending - back in the pot at home it goes ! If you see something you need/want ask for it to be put aside until you can return to store & then you can stop impulse and by the time you get back to shop have time to think " do I really need this " ?
If retailer refuses to put aside - are they really worth you custom ? Vote with your feet !


EMPOWERMENT!!!

Lucy1982_2

I have to admit I have been spending cash, but still carry my card around. Hopefully spending diary will work. I think I'm going to pop so D Coke in the boot as everywhere I go at the moment seems to run out of it!!

But will only buy a multi pack if it's on offer. I have a little box at home that I am putting spare cash in. I knew I'm having my hair cut (£7.50, family friend) so that's been building up in the box for the last couple of weeks.

Thing is I can do it, just every now and then I slip a little.