Living on next to nought - is that the key?

117pauline

I have been dipping in and out of your diary and enjoying every step of the way, so I would be sad to see it end. Also, even if only one person gets a new idea, then you have helped - and I know there are so many who have benefited from your musings.

Recently I completed a Pain Management course, based on mindfulness, which has focussed my mind on those things that enrich life and be grateful for them. Today, I am grateful for your diary.

So here's to an Awesome August for us all.

Greying_Pilgrim

Oh my goodness, whoa! hang on, hang on. Oh, I wasn't fishing for such lovely compliments, I wasn't, I wasn't.

I am just confused as to where I can fit in.

It genuinely worries me when I have posted *bah humbug* the ****** plumber/electrician/carpenter/builder/uncle Thos. Cobble It, ain't turned up, and the next post is from a newbie that has had a lightbulb moment with £XXX debt and are frightened to answer the phone/door. We're worlds apart.

What I do LOVE about me diary (location irrelevant for a moment) is that it makes me accountable, makes me think. Lovely people interact with me and make me think/teach me things/make me laugh/cry/blush and everything in between. And it is helping DP and I to live within our means - even though those means are...... modest It has always been important to me to live within my means. But sometimes life throws things at you and you get into debt - and it seems to be easier and easier these days.

Several folk post on the MFW board, living now as they will in retirement (in terms of available funds). DP and I won't be any richer in retirement, so we are genuinely living now how we must come 65/66/68/73/85/97.......... [oops, goal-posts moved again, sorry 'bout that... ] We need to be living in a much more sustainable abode as we approach/get to retirement age. Greying Towers is not such an abode. But we are currently stuck, given the 'situation' we find ourselves in - and which I would prefer not to outline on a public forum.

So my dilemma is, I am chronicling our........ *small* ? *modest* ? *solvent* ? life. Is DFD the right place to do it?

Perhaps I should be on MFW? With a *living now as we need to do when we retire* diary?

I don't know.

I love this board, and the folk on it, but I don't want to upset anyone, who expect to read diaries that outline folks missions to get out of debt. Although you have all been very kind and have seen that living, as we do, does keep costs down, which may help other people. And if it does, no-one would be more chuffed than me to think that something I had done, had helped another

maddiemay wrote: »

(I am just beginning to get the taste for beans and lentils:rotfl:)

AH HA! Now we're at the crux of things! More lentil recipes Miss maddiemay? You ask, I try to deliver

Greying

Goldiegirl

Hello!

I often look in on your diary, and have always enjoyed reading.

I'm one of those MFW diary people who hasn't got a mortgage, but I'm preparing for retirement.

I had wanted to do a diary for ages, but the problem was, there didn't seem anywhere suitable to do it.

I suppose the obvious place was the pensions board, but that's a more serious place, and the kind of figures that are bandied around on that board are way out of my league.

Then I noticed some diary holders on the MFW board, in a similar situation to me, so plucked up the courage to start my diary.

Everybody has been so welcoming and kind, and I'm so glad I started the diary. It's been a real help for planning and staying focused.

Everybody on MFW and DFW is working towards their own personal goals, and that lifestyle is appropriate to achieve other life goals, too.

If a person wants to live the MFW/DFW lifestyle as a personal choice, then I think it's perfectly appropriate to post on those boards.

I've never been made to feel out of place on MFW, and even if they started a diary area for non mortgage holders, I don't think I'd go, because I'm happy where I am!

In short, as long as you are happy to post, I think people are happy to have you in the DFW community. It's your home on the board, and people know you here.

So please carry on!

Although you'd be more than welcome on MFW if you wanted a change of scenery!

beanielou

I think we are all aware that everyone has different situations and realities.
I sometimes get cross when I think of the £££'s some people waste but that is just me.
I would miss your diary greatly.

Tilly_MFW_in_6_YRS

Hi Greying, stop, breath

I wander and roam around MFW and DFW, as well as OS, and frankly I don't see that it matters where your diary is, so long as you're comfortable and feel at home.

All of us have different financial situations and challenges. The ultimate similarity is stretching the £ for whatever reason. Either to get out of debt or to stay out of debt. A mortgage is still a debt.

You have inspired tons of people and that's a significant gift, if I may use that word, to give.

It's hard feeding families/whether that's 1, 2, 3 etc) and you are definitely helping people to think.

I've made yoghurt because of you :)

Very best wishes Tilly x x

little_sweetie

Hi GP, I echo all the comments above and would miss your posts dreadfully if you stopped. You have certainly helped me to stay cheerful over months of potentially depressing events not least of which is my DD's impending financial catastrophe. I don't see why it matters where you keep your diary as long as it helps you and the fact that others gain tips and inspiration goes without saying. OK I'll shut up now

BTW the bubble wand was kinda teardrop shaped and made humungus bubbles! Yesterday the tiddlers entertained me. The 7 year old declared he was too hungry to continue assembling his Stegassaurus and found me the appropriate pan to warm his beans in and showed me how to light the hob :rotfl: By 3pm I was cream crackered and glad to go home for a lie down in a darkened room :eek: The tiddlers didn't want me to go....awwww

I looked at your u toob linkie and it's wonderful. Thank you so much for that.
Nite nite dear friend in the box and chums x

Busymumofthreeplusdog

Greying_Pilgrim wrote: »

Good Evening :hello:

I am seriously thinking of bringing this diary to a conclusion.

Greying

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo'!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:eek::(:eek::(

I simply won't allow it! Enough of this talk dear Greying and continue with business as usual or else!

( I'll figure out the else later....)

Busy......

supersaver1000

Ah, same thread different board? Could the mods move it?

We love your thread. :eek::)

mothernerd

I would like to endorse what everyone else has said - we would all miss you terribly if you stopped. You are providing an invaluable resource for the rest of us, a wonderful role model and an inspiration to us all.

We all have our own stories. I have never had a mortgage - was always in low-paid, insecure temporary employment. I bought my first house at the age of 23 (started my building society account when I was made redundant at 19) using a combination of my own savings, a small amount my mother had saved and a bank loan (the bank 'preferred' to lend to my father, although we were both customers) which I paid off over 2 years.

The house was a shell - it had been boarded up for 11 years, there was no bathroom and the kitchen sink (which I managed with for the first 6 years) had been used to mix cement in (that's a fun cleaning job). In the 32 years since then I think I have probably re-built it twice - re-wired, windows replaced, new roof. Seven years ago I bought this house, again without a mortgage.

So I have 2 houses (DS2 'rents' the little one - but has health problems so rent is a bit hit and miss) both in need of attention but also credit card debts (getting 3 sons through university), failing health and tiny earnings from self-employment - and it's a long way off retirement.

Currently struggling to do house repairs with no money and having had 15 weeks physiotherapy after 3 weeks complete rest, I now have to have a scan because there is something else wrong (having worked all the muscles we can). Can barely hobble into town (used to walk 3 hours a day), am managing about 10 minutes up a ladder (as long as I remember which foot goes first going up - other way round going down) and everything below knee height seems to be a no go area.

I have avoided posting for the past few weeks as I didn't want to moan - there are so many people on here who have so much more to contend with. If I can sell this house (need to buy something that suits me and my mother, now that I only have DS3 at home) I will be able to pay off what I owe and have a little left over (my needs are fairly modest). Just getting to that point that's difficult :rotfl:.

However I always read your diary and it has helped me a great deal, especially since mid- March. If I start to panic about juggling too many things at least I know where to come for food ideas and a nature fix.

mrsinvisible

Dear Greying Pilgrim, please stay where you are, moving around will make me dizzy, and if you stop altogether we will all get lost! You taught me how to make dahl, told me what polenta was, and got DGS to eat 'scrabble tiles'.
The lovely 'family' your diary has generated feel like friends, this is one of the threads without 'trolls' upsetting us, and as others have said far more eloquently than me, you are inspirational to so many.
Now that that is settled, thank goodness for August, a whole new month to play with/mess up/enjoy.
Mothernerd, hope the scan shows up an easily treatable and curable issue, you are coping with an awful lot. keep positive xxx
Yes, GP, we may need the old 'sal. vol.' honestly, talk about fine feathers, of the tail variety, naturally.
It is the hen night on Monday, going to the races, no less. Not to gamble, just an excuse to dress up daft and act the idiots in public, l think.
Defrosted the freezer yesterday, used it as an opportunity to inventorize the contents and make a vague meal plan, and a resolution to buy no more YS meat until this lot is used up, and (what the dickens is in these tubs, baggies, containers) to label and date things lurking there.