The Crumpet family's journey to Mortgage Freedom:-)

Crumpets

Morning,

It's been a productive couple of days since I last posted, a mixture of frugal and spendy though

frugal things include

• painting the downstairs loo using paint I already had - it looks so much better too :T
• made mince pie twists using left over puff pastry and mince meat
• Suspended contact lens subscription
• doing dry January :A

Spendy things

• Booked theatre tickets for us all as a birthday treat for both dd's
• Booked tickets to Kidzania as a birthday treat (it's the last chance all 3 will get to go before dd1 is too old)
• DD2 has requested horse riding lessons for her birthday :eek: This could be a very expensive hobby! I'm going to stop her swimming lessons now as she can swim and this will cover 2/3 of the cost of riding lesson! I've asked relatives to chip in with this too so we will see where this leads :cool:

Okay so there are way more spendy things than frugal but this time of year is always expensive with both dds birthdays this month :rotfl:

I have tried to get DH interested in the Frugalwoods UFM but he wasn't up for it. I'm reading along with the emails so I'll just choose the bits I want to do and hopefully make some savings.

We've also enjoyed watching the new Marie Kondo programme so we're also trying to to find time to do more sorting and discarding. I have a few things to put on fleabay so hopefully I can find time to do that today.

Crumpets

Wohoo, I just checked our mortgage balance and we are now under £80k :j:beer::j it doesn't seem that long ago that I was excited to be under £100k. It just goes to show that a little can go along way if you just keep chipping away at it :T

the_cross_rabbit

Well done Crumpets on getting the below £80,000 mark, feels good doesn't it? I'm looking forward to the below £75,000 mark although its still quite a way off. I did the frugalwoods challenge last year and to be honest I just used the bits that was relevant to me. Good luck with the rest of the challenge.
CRx

themadvix

Well done on being below £80,000!

Hazelnutty

Well done crumpets!

Crumpets

First day back at school/home ed today, I suppose it's nice to have some structure to the day. Inspired by the Madvix, we had a day out at the beach yesterday to finish off the holidays, it was cold and drizzly but that didn't stop us from having a lovely day out. The dog loved running on the sand too I'm just waiting for the new term invoices for activities to come in now :eek:

I'm hoping to get to the zero waste shop this week and I have a list of things to buy. I wish there was one closer.

I have just bought something totally not frugal but I'm hoping it gets me super cool mum points:cool:...I've booked tickets for dd1 and I to attend the Brit awards I really hope her favourite band will be there as we missed out on getting tickets for them last year. I figured we can always sell the tickets on if they're not and she doesn't want to go. It is her birthday soon so this is a BIG birthday treat! experiences - not things

Not much else to report, I'm just plodding along, doing my best and trying to make savings where I can. I've started running again and I've started learning a new language so that is keeping me busy for free :T:cool:

the_cross_rabbit

I can super cool mum points coming your way with that present.
I wish we had a zero waste shop near to us, I think the nearest one is about an hours drive away. Very jealous of your day out at the coast yesterday.
CRx

themadvix

Glad you had a good day at the beach.

CR have you checked? There's a decently up-to-date map of zero-waste shops here. And Morrisons are trialling zero-waste aisles (with hoppers) in Yorkshire, so who knows, it may be sooner than you think!

What language are you learning Crumpets?

Crumpets

Our nearest ZW shop is about 40 minutes away so not local, I usually go once a month when I have to take dd1 in to the city for a lesson. I wish there was one in my nearest town, I'm half tempted to open one myself! :rotfl:

I'm having a go at Korean MV! It's somewhere that dd1 has a keen interest in and she's been learning so I thought I'd give it a try myself. I have to say I'm really enjoying it. I'm using an app called lingodeer which is free. Ds is learning with me so it's a family effort :T

the_cross_rabbit

wow to learning a new language, Korean was not what I was expecting you to write. What does MV stand for?
CRx