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

Crumpets

Hello

Feeling really pleased today. I just managed to grab my dd2s Christmas present for a really fantastic price on Amazon:T i've been watching the price for ages and it went down from £48+ to £22.19. I also brought it using vouchers from TCB :money::D I'm almost sorted with the kids presents now I just need one more thing for dd1 but I'm stumped. She's nearly 10 and I have no idea what to get her:o

I also had my flu jab at the drs today, a quick phone call the other day and I discovered I was entitled to a free one so saved myself about £10 there. Yay!

Skittles was good last night, I was player of the night and we only spent about £15. The power went off in the pub though so the evening ended a bit earlier than it should have.

Tonight we are off to a friends for some fireworks, just need to take some drinks with us. I haven't got anything in so will get dh to pop into Asda on his way home. He's taken dd1 to a tae kwon do seminar which has cost £15:eek: all these extra curricular activities cost a fortune.

Got a chicken roasting in the oven at the moment so we'll see how many meals we can get out of it. Fajitas and roast dinner are definitiley on the menu and maybe some soup:)

Crumpets x

Crumpets

Well I'm glad that weekend is over, it was rather stressful to say the least, mainly down to dd1s behaviour, but that's another story:o

I had my approved food delivery today, so my cupboards are now full of random things including £1.49 for 9 rolls loo roll:T I then went to tesco this morning to get the rest of things that I can't get from Aldi and managed to spend over £80:eek: We're well stocked up now though so that should show in the coming weeks shopping bills. Ds kept throwing things in the trolley so I suppose I'm lucky it wasn't more...at one point there were 6 tubes of toothpaste in there that I didn't know about:rotfl:

over the weekend dh has been going through the DVDs so we're on track for getting some sold this month:T I also sold a few more things on eBay, about £15 so a bit more for the pot:T

I'm having a bit if an internal argument with myself at the moment as I really want a new coat, but the one I have is fine, I brought it last year and it's not the warmest coat in the world but it will do. It doesn't stop me from lusting after people's nice new coats though. I think I'll get it cleaned and sew on the missing button and maybe get a new scarf to jazz it up a bit:)

It's gone so cold in the evenings now, i'm wearing thick socks and a onesie in bed :cool:. We're still only having the heating on for an hour a day in the mornings but will probably increase that to an hour at bedtime soon. I think dh and I need a new duvet, we brought ours when we got married and it's really thin in parts now. My parents have just brought a wool filled duvet from JL and say it's rally warm. Might have to get one with our Christmas money.

Crumpets x

Crumpets

Evening. I've been finding it a bit of a struggle to update every day lately, not that there's much to report but it does keep the mind focused:)

Yesterday was a bit of a traumatic evening as Ds fell and cut his eye open, cue a trip to the hospital to get him stuck back together:eek: he's all fine today and climbing around like nothing's happened.;)

Today has been a LSD with just £2 spent at playgroup. Both dd's have produced lovely Christmas cards at school that I feel like I have to order. They cost £5.80 for 10 cards:eek: so I'm going to be spending £11.60 on 20 cards:eek: they are lovely though but Bloomin heck, never in a million years would I spend that on normal cards, I don't even send that many.

This afternoon I have been imputing DVDs and CDs into music magpie, it's so demoralising when they only offer you 30p for something you paid £10+ for. Its mainly Mr C's naff CDs and DVDs that are going though, some of them are very questionable (right said Fred cd anyone!:rotfl:)

All eBay parcels have been posted and I have a few more things listed, I still can't believe how much stuff we keep hold of. It really feels never ending. I'm taking a bag of toys to Argos tomorrow for their toy exchange so a few more things gone:T

I'm done with Christmas shopping for the kids now, hurrah! Just the pesky family to go. It's difficult to know what to buy. We do amazon gift lists with my sil which helps, but the in laws and my parents are really difficult to buy for. We have a budget of £20pp for close family, less if we can get away with it:) I love Christmas though and I'm really looking forward to the festive season getting closer:xmastree:

Crumpets x

Crumpets

Forgot to add that I've been reading lots of articles on having a simple Christmas which is making me feel much better about the presents we've got the kids. It's hard to break out of the mentality that the house needs to be bursting at the seams with presents and look like a scene from a magazine. I'm really looking forward to a simple Christmas and to actually sit and play with kids instead of rushing round like a mad woman.

SmlSave

Looking forward to a quieter Xmas here too Crumpets. Well done on getting the kid's presents sorted

Crumpets

Hello, it's been a busy few days again, all pretty low spend though. We have a new M&S food open in a near by town:T so we had a treat of a dine in for £10 meal last night. I didn't drink the wine though, will save it for mulling next week:) I will have to restrict my visits to it though as it's so tempting to put yummy things in the basket.

Today dd2 has been to a lovely party at a wildlife centre, presents and wrapping paper were all from TK Maxx and the present box so pretty pleased with that (it was a joint party for 3 children:eek:) other than that it was a NSD.

Music magpie picked up the DVDs and CDs today so hopefully we'll have a payment into the bank soon:T I have 6 things listed on eBay too, I'm not that hopeful about them selling though.

Tomorrow we are off to my parents for lunch so the only spend should be £5 on tae kwon do, I'm hoping to have at least £10 of my weekly spends left to put in my tin.

I'm starting to feel really festive now :santa2::xmastree: can't wait to get the advent calendar out and welcome Richard, our elf on the shelf back. Going to start wrapping up my presents in the next week or so and it will soon be time for the festive music and movies:D

Crumpets x

lilyp

Ooh I love elf on the shelf! Can't wait to start that next year even though baby will only be 11 months. We already have about 5 Decembers worth of ideas of where to put it

Crumpets

Hi lilyp, this is our 2nd year of doing elf on the shelf and we had great fun last year thinking of things for him to get up to. Got to get thinking about this year so it's different. My eldest dd is bound to remember everything he got up to :rotfl:

Good luck with your impending arrival. X

gallygirl

I'd never heard of him, but get the drift. A few ideas HERE :rotfl:.

lilyp

:rotfl:I saw that earlier in the week. Brilliant! I imagine we will end up doing lots of stuff like this.

I have friends whos elf reappears randomly throughout the year to check in good behaviour. Works like a charm apparently :rotfl: