5 year plan

kittiej

Afternoon :j

Well it's the last day of the month for me moneywise as it's payday tomorrow :j woo-hoo!

I have kept an eye on the mortgage amount religiously every day and it has stayed the same since the last tiny increase so I am thinking that it rises just once a month. I'll keep a close eye on it to see if that's the case.

Tomorrow I have to take my DS1 to the hospital, the more I have thought about the situation the more I am put out by the school. My son was rushing to get to the canteen first which is part of his make-up as he doesn't like people 'crowding' him (he's being assessed for Asperger's but it's a slow process, almost 4 years now - tut) and he has always been like this since first starting school at the age of 3.

Apparently the running in the school at lunchtime is a regular thing amongst pupils :mad: and they are left unsupervised which is a recipe for disaster if you ask me.

One teacher did hear a child screaming so rushed to find my son crying. So this teacher first attended to my son, then the first aider saw my son and his teacher knew his arm was hurting and not one person sent so much as a note home to say he'd had an accident and to keep an eye on DS1. I'm not very impressed tbh though not much I can do today about it. I'll wait and see what the consultant says about son's arm.

Anyway moving onto other news I was watching that programme that shows people who are considering moving to Australia. I notice that they seem to have lovely pantries in their properties over there. My house had a pantry originally but was ripped out at some point - probably considered 'old-fashioned', I could really do with a pantry so might have one built back in

I have noticed over the past week or so that there are quite a few people complaining that they earn a pittance and then it turns out they earn twice as much as I do! It's all about the planning I would say, I earn less than £900 per month but I know that if I really had to I could pay for my house and all bills, run a car and feed my family on what I earn.

Being happy is what matters

kittiej

Well how are things with you? Excellent I hear the replies

DS had his new plaster on today and has to have it for 3 weeks. He's remarkably pleased about this and is looking forward to his classmates signing his pot :cool:

Only drawback is it has cost me half a day's wages, no matter I will be looking at recovering my losses :money:

Other news, I have been listening to witterings and chunterings and it never ceases to amaze me how much time people spend either fluffing their own egos or recruiting others who will attend to this need. Having never been one to follow any crowd or feeling the need to gain the approval of others I find this sort of thing quite amusing really.

I prefer to do my own thing and abide by my own ideals and as long as my family are safe and secure then this is all that matters.

You can see where my son gets his ASD tendencies from

and finally, tonight Matthew I am going to be Anthea Turner :rotfl:I have been obsessing over pantries lots and lots of lovely pantries. This sounds really funny, and it is to a degree until it turns itself into an all consuming monster which takes over my every waking thought On the plus side my lovely husband has said it shouldn't take too much effort to re-install a pantry :T:T

I need to search the net now so shall speak later

folam

Hi Kittie,

I hope you don't mind i have subscribed to your diary. I was having a read and you have such a lovely positive outlook I thought it would be nice to follow. I have also looked in on the take your lunch to work thread and have taken a few good ideas from there.

Thanks again x

kittiej

Hi folam, I don't mind you subscribing if you don't mind my mutterings of a mad woman :rotfl:

you are also very welcome to say hello :hello: on the LTW thread too if you like.

kittiej

Hi everyone :wave:

Today has been mostly filled by panic caused by my DS and his pot arm but first the financial news

the mortgage has received my payment so currently stands at £12078.16. I also have another small overpayment to make but would ideally like it to be below £12k.

I withdrew my food money and petrol money yesterday and straight away put £65 in my car. The amount was actually £65.01 but the guy let me off with the penny :money: woo-hoo a penny saved for me :rotfl:

I am going food shopping tomorrow, I'll try to pick up a sack of spuds if the spud man is there and I plan on going to Poundstretcher as the tuna was 4 cans for £3 the other day and DS2 loves tuna and sweetcorn.

I then plan on visiting home bargains for toilet roll and curry sauces and then might have a looksy in Aldi as all three are in the same place which is fortunate :T

I've joined the NSD challenge for March and will have 6 days of spending, oh eck :think:_pale_ it's all good and I love a challenge!

I have also had a flash of inspiration re my wages and streeeetching those pennies. I got the inspiration due to the NSD challenge so they need a big 'thank you'. I declared 25 NSDs but will be paid on the 25th so I thought that instead of withdrawing any money on pay day I would wait until April 1st thereby stretching this month's pay by 7 days and the next month by another 7 days etc until I have 1 month's money built up. Don't know if I will achieve this but I can only try

(hmm I wonder who will use this idea as well, it will be interesting to see who is reading )

Nothing ventured - nothing gained :j

Edit - doh! I forgot to tell you about the pot arm panic

I was sat at my desk beavering away as always when I received a phone call from DS1's school. 'Oh what's happened now' I thought . Apparently he'd had an itch under his cast and had tried to scratch it by using a pen - only he used the lid end, and yes you guessed it, the lid came off down his pot :eek:. I told school I would have a look once I got home but if he was uncomfortable to let me know and I would come to collect him.

I got home and could only just see the lid so I had to find something to try to poke it back out from where it had got in. A knitting needle wrapped in sellotape at the tip to make it blunt was the instrument of choice and *eventually* worked the lid out :j I was having visions of having to go back to the hospital tomorrow to get this cast removed so the lid could be released, how embarrassing would that have been

If there's nothing else in life I can rely on I know I can always rely on DS1 being 'the one' to get into trouble :rotfl:

Snagggles

Hi Kittie, I hadn't seen your diary before, but what a lovely, positive thing it is. I have a son who is always 'the one' too. I did laugh at the cast story, but only after I knew the pen lid had been safely retrieved.

I read in your op about your plan for donating money to a local homeless charity. That's such a nice idea. I work for a homeless/housing charity, and with the welfare reforms and the size criteria reductions in housing benefit payments, there will be increasing amounts of pressure on such organisations, who are already struggling due to funding cuts. I feel compelled to thank you, even though I work for a different charity, in a different area.

kittiej

Hi Snaggles :j

I was laughing with relief afterwards :rotfl:You have my sympathies if you also have a son who always ends up in a pickle

Re the homeless charity, you just never know what blows life might inflict, ready and waiting to turn your world upside down. I am trying hard to stop drinking and one of my motivations is instead of buying a bottle of vodka a month I am using that money to buy food to donate this little charity because they are doing a fantastic job. I only wished I lived nearer so I could volunteer as well.

I bet you find your job very rewarding knowing that you are helping those in need, frustrating because of 'rules and regs' but rewarding nevertheless, and not everyone can cope with dealing with homeless people so good on yer

kittiej

Hellooooo!

Good afternoon and here is the financial news. Today the Halifax reports that the mortgage currently stands at £12082.18. At first it was unclear how the increases were applied but now it seems that after making the monthly payment interest is added on the 1st of each month. Glad we sorted that one out

Elsewhere, the 'Housewife in me' will be compiling an inventory of food cupboards tomorrow and transferring all food from one freezer into the other thereby enabling me to defrost the one freezer which is long overdue.

I will be making good use of the bread maker tomorrow and shall make bread and madeira cake - yummy :j

I need to make my money stretch an extra week this month and will have to be as resourceful as I possibly can. My direct debits will still come out on their regular dates but the money for food and petrol will not be touched until April 1st.

Nearly Easter - how do you eat yours? :rotfl:

kittiej

Evening all

A strange thing just happened, I checked the mortgage and it's dropped by 7p, yes a whole seven pence. No idea what that's all about but hey if I've saved 7p then it's a saving right?

I've joined the pay 1% off at a time challenge which equates to £25. I need to get rid of the car debt asap because this is preventing me from overpaying the mortgage and @ £100 pw that's going to be a sizeable sum to throw at this house :T I might make my deadline after all, though this depends on me keeping my job of course because the threat of redundancy continually looms in the background.

I had 6 items selling on ebay and all have sold :T it's funny what will sell on there! anyway I've made £25 so that's my first 1% sorted :j I have loads of things to sort through ready for the next free listings weekend. I'm struggling with whether to sell my pine Welsh dresser or not. Common sense says yes get it out of here because it is a 'clutter magnet' but then again part of me doesn't want to see it go. I must realise it's an object and stop having feelings for it, I think it's the 'woodiness' of it I find so appealing. I'm being weird again, oh well it is ma diary and I can be honest on here

Bath time was fun again with the pot armed kid of mine. I put a large black bin liner over his arm, right up to his shoulder and sellotaped it at the top. This does work but if anyone knows of a better method please feel free to cut me in on it :rotfl:

Will have to go to bedski soon. I was reading somewhere about your job being as satisfactory as you make it. It's all about how you think of your job apparently so tomorrow I am going to be going to work to do the most spectacular tasks and it is going to make me sooo very happy that I shall feel completely enriched by the experience

I must tell colleagues about this - I have a feeling the reply will be something off and the something won't be very complimentary :rotfl:

Have fun out there peeps :T

Snagggles

Woohoo, well done on the Ebay sales. Shamefully, I have had a box of 'things to Ebay' in a cupboard since I moved to Edinburgh in...*mumbles*...


Okay, okay JUNE. Since JUNE. Happy now? :rotfl:


I usually eat my Creme Eggs thus:

Remove wrapper, bring to lips, remember that I don't like Creme Eggs at all, give it to one of the kids.

Ahh, if only it were so easy with all forms of chocolate! I would be a supermodel by now. :cool:

Good luck with your colleagues tomorrow.