How to fall in love with saving money

JoJoC

Hi Cathy,

How has your weekend been?

cathybird

hi JoJoC, well I work Sundays - my weekends is Friday and Saturday. Very productive though - I took a big delivery of firewood, marked down quite a lot due to it being the end of the cold season, which I stored, and I did lots of house stuff. I'm not paying quite so much attention to the nitty-gritty of saving at the mo actually - I have slightly lost track of taking lunch in to work, for instance. Nothing dramatic but I should probably have a think about motivation. Still haven't got round to looking at You Need A Budget, either. Must put that on the list. I think it's mostly because the good weather has arrived and so my thoughts have turned to the allotment and to getting outdoors for some exercise.

And you? ...

JoJoC

Oh, I'm not so bad. Feeling much the same on the motivation front- you probably saw on WTBSE's diary that we've had to dip into savings a bit and although we've brought it back up by a lot, it's so demotivating.

So I feel your pain!

Glad you had a productive weekend- mine was quite busy but not very productive! Basic washing and dishes were done but other than that, everything else has been left to me this week. Today is a lovely day so I've got the bedding in the wash so that I can hang it out.

Our savings target is ultimately to move house and two flats have been listed in our development recently for £20k less than what we bought ours for. We knew that we'd lost value and we're saving to take that into account but this is just really disheartening and just makes our goal seem a million miles away.

I just need a plan!

cathybird

JoJoC wrote: »

Oh, I'm not so bad. Feeling much the same on the motivation front- you probably saw on WTBSE's diary that we've had to dip into savings a bit and although we've brought it back up by a lot, it's so demotivating.

So I feel your pain!

Glad you had a productive weekend- mine was quite busy but not very productive! Basic washing and dishes were done but other than that, everything else has been left to me this week. Today is a lovely day so I've got the bedding in the wash so that I can hang it out.

Our savings target is ultimately to move house and two flats have been listed in our development recently for £20k less than what we bought ours for. We knew that we'd lost value and we're saving to take that into account but this is just really disheartening and just makes our goal seem a million miles away.

I just need a plan!

JoJoC, sounds really disheartening Sorry to hear about the price differential with your flats particularly. Still, with a little time, which is what you need to save anyway, who knows what will happen? The prices might go up. I hope so, for your sake.

Maybe we can think of a new challenge we can both join or invent to get ourselves motivated again? What do you think? ...

Lomcevak

cathybird wrote: »

Maybe we can think of a new challenge we can both join or invent to get ourselves motivated again? What do you think? ...

It's tricky when the motivation starts to dip; my approach is to have everything broken down to smaller chunks. Trying to think £18k in 12 months (in my case) or bust is too hard, but I usually have a mini-goal no more than a month or two away and its easier to focus on that. And then, once you get there, move on to the next one and the end is that bit closer.

cathybird

hi Lomcevak! Yes, I should be setting myself smaller goals - technically I should be saving £1,000 this month, for instance. I think it's the spring weather, though, I just want to be out in the sunshine at the moment, and think about my allotment and exercise, etc. Both of those things are of course good, but not necessarily related to money-saving per se. This is how I slipped away from money-saving last time though - I just lost focus on it. So, I have to be careful, I guess.

atush

Time in the allotment now means less spent on food in several months time. 8 weeks for salad crops.

I did some holiday MSE today. It is 40% chance of thunderstorms and 19 mph winds so have cancelled the fishing/sunset boat charter. $300 saved lol.

cathybird

True, atush - allotments are productive things - and the summer rush of crops isn't far away - teeny tiny gooseberries have already appeared on the gooseberry bushes. Not long to go for those. I looooove gooseberries. Good to hear about your holiday MSE, though the fishing/sunset boat charter does sound fun? ...

My savings plans for this month have just had a massive dent put in them by the £874 I have forked out to the Home Office in the hope of becoming a British citizen. I hope I pass muster as I don't get the cash back if they refuse the application. Meanwhile, I shall just have to try harder to meet my £12,000 target for this year.

cathybird

Actually, just continuing on from what I said last night, I believe becoming a British citizen used to be a lot cheaper. When I first arrived in the UK it was maybe about £400, or less? Then they put the price up massively. But that's how it goes, I didn't want to take that step then.

It is an absolutely beautiful morning. I woke up at 5, weirdly enough, and went out to listen to the dawn chorus in the woods behind my house. I was going to stay in bed, but then I thought, "How many times in my life am I going to get up to hear the dawn chorus, and it's spring." So I got up. The birds sang loudly for about an hour. The bluebells seemed to be glowing with that intense blue light they have even though they were in shadow under the trees, and it was still half-dark, so that was quite spooky, in its own way. It was rather chilly - my breath was frosty. There was a huge fat moon low on the horizon, which I couldn't see once I went into the woods, but it did look very lovely, so I looked at it for a while once I came back out again. Sadly I could still hear traffic in the distance, which spoiled the "getting back to nature" effect a bit, but that's London. I am now back home and contemplating doing something money-saving, like cooking some of the veg I have in the fridge to take to work or eat tonight. Particularly the big bag of rocket - bagged salad being the food item Brits most commonly throw away, and all that.

How is everyone else out there? ... Any plans for the day, savings wins or losses to report, etc?

JoJoC

Sounds like you had a lovely morning Cathy! I'd love to have some kind of nature around me (yes, I'm going to moan about not having a garden again!!) so even though the traffic noise was still in the background, it sounds lovely to be surrounded by nature

The allotment is definitely MSE- as Atush says, you'll be reaping the edible rewards in a few months and working on the allotment is cheaper than being out shopping or spending money on other things!

There's no change to my savings this month, unfortunately. This has been a spendy month all round and it's only going to get worse because another £150 is coming out of the savings this week for husband's exhaust. Uurgh.

Disheartening to the highest degree.

We'll just need to keep plodding along into May and hope we can gain some momentum!

I've not got many plans today- I'm making a kiwi fruit loaf with lemon frosting today and I want to spend some time painting booked eggs with the little man at some point this week (maybe today). If it's nice, we might go for a walk too.

Do you have any plans Cathy? Working?