Batten down the hatches.....

Orange_Ena

Decluttering hit the century :T
100. uni text books x 3. One of the online book buying websites would only give me 10p for one of them and wasn't interested in the other 2, heartbreaking really when they cost £30 or £40 20 years ago....I suppose they're a bit out of date now anyway
101. mirror

I bought some more cooking bacon, such good value at £1.18. It said it was 1kg but when I weighed it it was just over 1200g and even better, it was already cut into little bits, perfect for omelettes. I've portioned it up into 12 bags so it's a bit 10p per portion! A couple of eggs, the bacon and a bit of cheese and it's a meal for around 55p.

I've been very busy beavering away with house tasks. Unfortunately my toilet needed a professional so that cost £110 but it's fine now. I hadn't heard from the original plumber
so I asked the toilet guy for a quote for changing my shower screen. Then the original plumber got back to me although I'll tell him in a couple of weeks to forget it! I decided not to bother getting my taps changed so I took them back for a refund and bought the screen instead. I'm just going to give the bathroom a good scrub, get the floor bloke to sort the flooring out then get the decorator in. It will do.....I need to conserve money now!

The garden guy started and already it looks great just for clearing the jungle. He'll be finished on Monday and I'll be £500 poorer.

In other exciting house news.........I fitted my own stair carpet! I used the left over carpet from the remnant I got for my bedroom, what a bargain. I've only fitted the carpet to the treads and I've got vinyl wooden looking planks on the risers but it looks amazing. Not perfect but not terrible either. Absolutely worn out though going up and down the stairs, cutting and measuring it all :rotfl: I had to buy a carpet tucker, staple gun, spray adhesive and a metal ruler which cost about £35 but money well spent and I can use them again. The vinyl planks were £21, an edging strip was £5 and I had the carpet so for about £61, my stairs and landing are now complete! I'm so chuffed with myself for giving it a go at least :T:j Definitely feel a bit more capable now so I might even try and fit some of those planks on the bathroom floor :D

I've not heard anything from the jobs which is so disheartening but I'm not giving up. I keep changing my mind about how to make the big move and I've kind of gone back to the plan of moving to my hometown first to guarantee a decent place on my current income (but not overstretching), commuting for a bit and then getting a job but the thought of working in my job for a few more months makes me feel ill. I really need to get one of those jobs to force my hand!

Bit of a jumbled catch up but I'm so tired. I'll try and catch up with diaries tomorrow.

Hope everyone is doing well and saving or making money :T

GoingToDoIt

Wow Ena, fitting your own carpets is seriously impressive!!!!
Sorry that you have not heard back on the job front, although it's not been long there's still a bit of hope.
You're public sector aren't you - if you've not done so already, have a look at STAR competency-based application/interview answers. You can start prepping now (because you will get an interview!) plus it's also good prep for any job applications. I have some answers I re-use which are typed out and I can cut and paste.
Sounds like you're still going great guns on the surveys and money saving!

doingitanyway

Another one here impressed you did the carpet by yourself (insert bowing down emoji)

I like the bacon pieces omelettes idea.

It sounds as if you are going great guns on the house and garden. Well done. You are putting everything in place to achieve your plan. Fingers crossed for new job opportunities opening up for you

Enjoy your Sunday

DIA x

Orange_Ena

GoingToDoIt wrote: »

Wow Ena, fitting your own carpets is seriously impressive!!!!
Sorry that you have not heard back on the job front, although it's not been long there's still a bit of hope.
You're public sector aren't you - if you've not done so already, have a look at STAR competency-based application/interview answers. You can start prepping now (because you will get an interview!) plus it's also good prep for any job applications. I have some answers I re-use which are typed out and I can cut and paste.
Sounds like you're still going great guns on the surveys and money saving!

Ah thanks gonna. I'm really proud of myself for fitting it!

Thank you for that information, I shall take a look. Fingers crossed I will get an interview at some point. I need some interview experience

Orange_Ena

doingitanyway wrote: »

Another one here impressed you did the carpet by yourself (insert bowing down emoji)

I like the bacon pieces omelettes idea.

It sounds as if you are going great guns on the house and garden. Well done. You are putting everything in place to achieve your plan. Fingers crossed for new job opportunities opening up for you

Enjoy your Sunday

DIA x

Haha thank you. I'm still chuffed with it all, everytime I go up stairs I just look!

Yeah I definitely got lucky with the bacon in that pack. It's so easy when it's ready for cooking.

The house is definitely coming on now and I'm really pleased with it. Trying not to kick myself for not making an effort years ago so I could enjoy it for longer! Still, I had no money back then and I hadn't had my LBM so I could have shoved it all on credit

Have a fab week x

Orange_Ena

Another Sunday rolls around. Another Monday at work to come Next Sunday will be nice though as I've got the Monday off :T

Sunday 26th February
* NSD

Monday 27th February
* £4.70 in C0sta for 2 drinks, it was my turn
* £500 to the gardener, he's done a great job taming the jungle :j
* 0nepll surveys

Tuesday 28th February
* £6.80 in T3sco
* £30.01 for fuel
* Youg0v survey
* 0nep0ll surveys
* PA survey

Wednesday 1st March
* £28.73 in L1dl
* £34.65 in M0rrisons
* Opini0n Outp0st surveys
* 0nep0ll surveys
* PA survey

Thursday 2nd March
* £4.75 for cat food, I bought some yesterday but my little cat turned his nose up. I'll try him with it again but if he still won't eat it I'll donate it to the cat rescue
* 0nep0ll surveys
* Opini0n Outp0st surveys and £2.50 redeemed and transferred to my overpayments account
* PA survey

Friday 3rd March
* £3.65 in the c0-op
* £8.03 received from TCB
* 5p roadkill found
* 0nep0ll surveys
* Youg0v survey
* Opini0n Outp0st surveys and amother £2.50 redeemed and transferred to my overpayments account :T:j
* 3 PA surveys

Saturday 4th March
* NSD

Today
* NSD
* 0nep0ll surveys

I did a big food shop last week, in L1dl and M0rrisons and have meal planned up to the 20th March. I'll still need a bit of topping up though. I'm not sure I'm doing the meal planning the right way round though. Instead of planning meals then shopping for it, I just buy stuff then fit it in my meal plan :rotfl: Seems to be working so I shall stick with it I printed a very basic 3 x 7 table at work and on one row I've got the days of week, the next is the meal plan and the bottom row is for a reminder for getting things out of the freezer. Love being organised I'm away for the weekend of the 24th so I shall try and eek out what I have and maybe throw a few more "on toast" nights in to my meal plan :j

I've had a really quite lazy weekend which has been much needed. I've just done a bit of washing and cleaning but otherwise I've just chilled. I took my parents dog for a walk yesterday and it was so nice. I don't do a lot at the weekends socially, I'm usually at home on my own pottering, and I do virtually no exercise, but it was lovely yesterday and I felt so much better for getting outside. I guess it's what "normal" people do at weekends :rotfl: Sometimes I drive to the shops at the weekend and see people coming home from town, or walking their dogs and I realise that I do nothing. I'm constantly pottering at home, cleaning, decluttering, there's always something to do, something to catch up on, and there never seems to be time to just to relax at the weekend. I feel like I'm always working towards something, to get debt free, or to get my house decluttered, and decorated, to improve anything and everything that I wonder, and worry, that I'm never going to make that final transition into the life I want. The life where I go to work, to a job I like and then spend the weekends relaxing, reading a book, socialising, or whatever. Not spending every waking minute tidying up, cleaning or doing surveys! I definitely need to socialise more so it stops all this overthinking when I'm on my own :rotfl::p

Orange_Ena

February stats

PA - £18.07....................total YTD £32.27
Youg0v - 575pts/£5.75..................total YTD £14.50
SB - 0......................total YTD 0
Pinec0ne - 0................total YTD £3
P0pulusLive - £4..................total YTD £11
VO - £5.50...................total YTD £9.50
TCB - £1.61................total YTD £1.74
i-S@y - 0..................total YTD 265pts
Inb0x£s - 46p..................total YTD 84p
Other income - 0...................total YTD £32.84
Roadkill - 5p..................total YTD 5p
0nep0ll - £8.40...................total YTD £6.40
Opini0n Outp0st - 0.......................total YTD £4

February total - £43.84 :T
Year to date - £124.54 :T:T


Other totals:

• Nati0nwide sweeps - 0..................total YTD 0
• FD sweeps - 0.................total YTD 0
• Pennysaver challenge - £58.47...............total YTD £87.67
• NSD's - 10...............total YTD 22
• Books read - 0....................total YTD 0
• DVD's watched - 0....................total YTD 0


I'm not setting any targets for March, other than try to have 12 NSD's

doingitanyway

You are doing great as always but I know what you mean about socialising. Working full time there just is so little free time. When you work out the answer let me know...wishing you a positive week. DIA x

BettyBones

Gosh! You're doing brilliantly with the penny saver challenge. Well done! :T. I think I only have about half that amount in my Xmas saver so far. We need to talk about your weekends though. Step away from that hoover!! :rotfl: Have you thought about maybe volunteering on a weekend? Or looking for some free events to pop along to? Perhaps you could go out in the morning and save the decluttering and cleaning for the afternoon or evening? I challenge you to ignore the cleaning this weekend. Throw down that dishcloth and get out there and socialise. Go on... do it, do it, do it!

Orange_Ena

doingitanyway wrote: »

You are doing great as always but I know what you mean about socialising. Working full time there just is so little free time. When you work out the answer let me know...wishing you a positive week. DIA x

Thanks DIA. I've thought about the socialising thing and I'm not sure I'm correct with how I put it. I don't socialise much with my local friends anymore, drifted apart really, and I have other pockets of friends scattered about. I'm so focused on sorting my life out, earning extra and house things etc, that I don't really have time but actually, I don't really want to socialise much at the moment. And I think, I want to WANT to socialise more but not right now. I think I've "mentally moved home" so in my mind I see no point in reconnecting with my local friends when I won't be here much longer. The drifting apart just happened, mostly my fault I'm sure. But when I had counselling, I spoke quite a bit about them and the counsellor asked if they made me feel insignificant and that's exactly how I felt. None of them are horrible people, but I guess not being a mum and not part of mothers groups made me feel a bit excluded. One time I arranged a lunch and they then invited other people from their groups which did annoy me a bit. I wanted to see them and have lunch with the old group, like it used to be. But then these other people just talked about other people I didn't know and it's so hard to join in. I sound like a spoilt brat, I know :D But I definitely see getting out more as part of my new life x