Wishing on an ickle star

icklehelen

Been having a little tidy up of the accounts as it's nearly the end of the month. How have we got half way through the year already???

So end of June update:
January CC £104.94/£100 Food £120.06/£150
February CC £60.69/£100 Food £167.79/£150
March CC £96.73/£100 Food £135.08/£150
April CC £85.62/£100 Food £117.93/£150
May CC £51.53/£100 Food £147.96/£150
June CC £80.42/£100 Food £141.04/£150
Overall CC £479.93/£600 Food £829.86/£900

Another month on track with both spending and saving. I set myself some mini targets for overpaying and saving at the beginning of the year - the overpaying ones are on track or just slightly ahead and the savings are much better than I'd expected - one account is already 100% of my target and the other is over 90% there!

Shop accounts are finalised for last financial year so just need to do DH's self assessment. I've also done our tax credits review online. Also sorted house insurance for another year - £20 cheaper than the renewal (same company!) and hoping for £30 cashback.

Hoping a to do list will help with the other things I need to get on with:

• Call HMRC - My self assessment (still not got through!)
• Check Elec & Gas for cheaper tariffs
• Start buying DDs school stuff (the list is huge!)
• Get up to date with questionnaires and other small money making sites
• Plan budget for summer holidays (already got loads plannned in my head!)
• DD's birthday present(s) and find out what she wants to do

I think that's enough to be getting on with!

icklehelen

Busy busy busy here......slightly scuppered in progress by DD catching chicken pox. At least she scabbed over so has been able to go to some of her intro week into FS2 (or 'big school' as she calls it)

Some parts of the house are actually tidy to the point when my SIL came over I wasn't embarrassed by it! The ROOM OF DOOM is still in progress but I can get in and have retrieved the carpet cleaner from it.....that's another job to now add to the list!

I've sorted the quarter end for the shop and got most of the household paperwork filed and tidy too.

The week started badly as DH needed some antibiotics and hayfever meds so spent about £25 on presriptions! However it has got better as the week has gone on.

Been accepted for the new Virgin 0% credit card so need to decide if I should transfer other (about to expire 0%) cards or pay them off and just spend and stooze again..... will wait till the paperwork comes to decide

Also had the tax credits paperwork and for what I think is the first time it's correct! It'll have to change in September when I'm no longer paying for childcare but for the summer I can relax! To think how stressful this was last year as they had got nearly everything wrong and wanted all of their money back.....turned out they owed us money but it was a stressful time!

I've updated my SOA to see how it looks and have some extra pennies which I will be using for the summer holidays to entertain DD before she goes to school. If there is any left from this 'pot' in September I'll OP it but I feel this is right for our OP/Life balance.

Gosh I do go on and on in these posts........I sometimes wonder if anyone is actually reading them?

icklehelen

End of July update:
January CC £104.94/£100 Food £120.06/£150
February CC £60.69/£100 Food £167.79/£150
March CC £96.73/£100 Food £135.08/£150
April CC £85.62/£100 Food £117.93/£150
May CC £51.53/£100 Food £147.96/£150
June CC £80.42/£100 Food £141.04/£150
July CC £77.56/£100 Food £139.72/£150
Overall CC £557.49/£700 Food £969.58/£1050

Another month on target and another £100 OP this morning.

Yesterday was DD's birthday. She wanted a birthday tea so had all the family around .... left overs will keep us fed over the weekend! We're also planning a trip out with her best friend soon.
She got quite a bit of money but said I should have it all .... she's 4 going on 40! I've convinced her to use some on her favourite bath bubbles then I'll bank the rest for her. (I may put some towards an OP but any money I 'borrow' from her is recorded on another spreadsheet to pay her back when she's older)


Time to go and sort the tax credits....I knew it was too good to be true. Latest paperwork is wrong!

icklehelen

Small OP of £10.44 made(rounding last month's interest to £100) and sorted the paperwork for another week.

Still got a few things to do ....like find the time to call HMRC about my self assessment, M&S about my credit card, Scottish Widows about my savings and then find the energy to sort out the tax credits. Sadly this won't be happening today as we're going out for some mummy & daughter time instead!

icklehelen

Happy September!

Not managed to post much over the summer as any time I was not working was spent having lots of family time! Had some lovely days out and made some lovely memories before DD starts school next week!

So first things first ....end of August update:

January CC £104.94/£100 Food £120.06/£150
February CC £60.69/£100 Food £167.79/£150
March CC £96.73/£100 Food £135.08/£150
April CC £85.62/£100 Food £117.93/£150
May CC £51.53/£100 Food £147.96/£150
June CC £80.42/£100 Food £141.04/£150
July CC £77.56/£100 Food £139.72/£150
Aug CC £90.04/£100 Food £147.16/£150
Overall CC £647.53/£800 Food £1116.74/£1200

Spending was quite tight by the end of the holiday but nothing over budget so I'm happy. The cost of DD's uniform keeps growing but all I have left to get are wellies (I hope)

All accounts updated and made a small OP this morning of £9.56 rounding the mortgage down to a nice round number (still a bigger number than I would like though!) :rotfl:

I've also booked my pamper session given to me for my birthday by my MIL. Treating myself while DD is at school next week. Hair and nails and all for free!

I'd better get on with some shop bits and pieces for DH as we're prepping for the Christmas delivery due on Tuesday!!

icklehelen

Yikes I haven't been on for over a month. September has certainly kept me busy!

So my monthly update:
January CC £104.94/£100 Food £120.06/£150
February CC £60.69/£100 Food £167.79/£150
March CC £96.73/£100 Food £135.08/£150
April CC £85.62/£100 Food £117.93/£150
May CC £51.53/£100 Food £147.96/£150
June CC £80.42/£100 Food £141.04/£150
July CC £77.56/£100 Food £139.72/£150
Aug CC £90.04/£100 Food £147.16/£150
Sept CC £96.16/£100 Food £147.61/£150
Overall CC £743.69/£900 Food £1264.35/£1350

Another month of cutting it fine

Small OP made again at the beginning of October to bring the mortgage to a round number.

Hoping to keep the rest of the year's spending as low as possible as I'll need to use some of the CC spends on Christmas shopping!

Better go and update my signature

ickle

Luckyinlife

Your doing really well the food spend is crazy cheap amazing

whats the mortgage standing at currently ?

spendinglikemad

well done so far ..... I really like your tactic of making OPs even the small ones count and I think I will start to do the same
I also love how small your groceries bill is!!
SLM

icklehelen

:wave: Hello Luckyinlife and SLM! Thank you for dropping in, I was starting to feel like I was talking to myself!!

Mortgage currently stands at £58100.00 with £5500 in savings with a slightly better interest rate. The ickle overpayments do make me smile as they make it a nice round number.

We are on a very tight budget so the food spends need to be as low as possible. I am a little [STRIKE]obsessive[/STRIKE] determined to keep to it and thanks to planning, batch cooking, bulk buying and @ldi I seem to be sticking to it. I would like to use Approved Foods which I know many people use on these boards and as I pass it to get to @ldi it is on my to do list!
I also think being on here helps as there are so many great ideas floating around and seeing people hammering down their mortgages gives me such a boost even though we're on the slow and steady route!

Better go and pick up DD from her dance class and get her ready for her first school disco!!!!

ickle

icklehelen

So yet again I've fallen off the wagon!

Updates for October and November rolled into one are:
January CC £104.94/£100 Food £120.06/£150
February CC £60.69/£100 Food £167.79/£150
March CC £96.73/£100 Food £135.08/£150
April CC £85.62/£100 Food £117.93/£150
May CC £51.53/£100 Food £147.96/£150
June CC £80.42/£100 Food £141.04/£150
July CC £77.56/£100 Food £139.72/£150
Aug CC £90.04/£100 Food £147.16/£150
Sept CC £96.16/£100 Food £147.61/£150
Oct CC £94.92/£100 Food £155.10/£150
Nov CC £43.82/£100 Food £160.91/£150
Overall CC £882.43/£1100 Food £1580.36/£1650

So as you can see a couple of small overspends on food but as our lives have been in total chaos for the past few weeks I cannot complain!

After a VERY stressful, tiring, few weeks of work (both my full time job and our business) I am now on leave until 5th January :j
I am on standby at our shop if DH needs me as Christmas is our busiest. At the moment I'm just helping with little things from home and going to the post office to send online orders out.....one is winging its way to NY state later today!

Looking forward to Christmas and some family time. I am proud of some of the bargains I have found and that I have stuck to my present budget.
Our meat hamper has been ordered from the butcher ready for pick up on 23rd - plenty of excellent quality meat and cheaper than anywhere else! My parents and uncle will be joining us on Christmas Day so they normally pay for the food and bring the wine as we are hosting/cooking etc

We have got ourselves an early present (or two) in the form of kittens...... We lost one of our old cats last year and felt that these two had come along just at the right time. DD loves them, DH is equally smitten and I will be too once they've stopped using my leg as a ladder to get on my knee!

Just updated my MFiT-T3 a little late and registered for MFiT-T4. Still won't be MF in that time but it helps to motivate and keep me on track!

Time to update my signature and see how close to my 2015 goals I am......