The march to financial freedom

Ali-OK

Evening - from our hotel room

Full on this morning taking doglets, packing and finishing off work stuff, but left home feeling caught up as far as I could be.

Good journey down - we seemed to side step the black clouds and just got caught in the end of one shower. Sun was out, warm breeze and tomorrow looks to be isolated showers so fingers crossed for a mainly dry day.

Have wandered around locally and found the shops - got our eye on fish and chips for tomorrow night for dinner.

Still had time for the financials!
- bank account checked before leaving home
- freepostcodelottery (both) checked
- Nectar adpoints - clocked up some more and on 86 points
- Nectar card - still on £68.92
- Inbox Pounds - up at £4.56
- Qmee - nothing new tonight so far

Spends
- fuel fill up at £22
- coffees at motorway services £7.20 :eek:
- meal tonight and drinks £16.28 :eek:
- car parking £3
- 24 hrs wi-fi for both of us £3

I cheekily packed teabags and brought some milk, so tea still on tap avoiding the hotel bar Packed snacks and drinks are saving a fortune and we had home made sandwiches at the services. Taking plenty with us tomorrow too to keep costs down.

Thanks to Moomin, I bought YNAB at £7.49 on Steam very late last night and have started filling that in. Looks really good and will be interesting to see if it takes over from my years of excel budget sheets. Sure I'll be working my way through more tutorials, but seems easy enough so far.

Early night tonight in readiness for a long day out tomorrow. Should have time within the 24 hr wi-fi period to update though

Hope everyone has had a good day.

supersaver1000

Ali. You are so organised even on holiday. I am in so much admiration. My summer goal is to be as organised (along with over awing them at my new job and getting fit)

Have a great break

AlexLK

Get off the "internets" ... you're on holiday!

Ali-OK

Good evening!

We're home - glad of the borrowed sat-nav as it diverted us due to a long delay on one of the motorways - added 10 miles but not much time difference, so was delighted about that and we didn't stop on the way home. I am going to buy one, just need to seek out a really good deal.

I was too tired to post last night after a really long but very good day, plus I'd have had to pay another £3 . No rain either at the event, just a heavy shower on the drive back to the hotel last night. Very lucky. Even hotter this morning, though had clouded over and was spotting with rain when we left at lunchtime. DS saw and got everything he wanted - I didn't track his spends, but he's kept his receipts to add up. Good lad.

We hit the fish and chip shop for dinner last night which was a lovely treat. Cost was £8.50. Didn't spend anything on food or drink today - finished off what we had taken with us and dinner out of the freezer tonight.

Mostly unpacked and sorted and getting ready for tomorrow. DS has another day off due to Teacher Training, so I've got an extra 60 miles of driving to drop/collect him from Mum's and also to collect the doglets after my morning work meeting - that bill will be £100.80 :eek: but is in the budget.

Financials:
- bank account checked tonight - all looking as it should do
- freepostcodelottery (both) - checked
- Nectar adpoints - finishing the week on 86 points
- Nectar Canvass - nothing done there
- Nectar card value - up at £69.40
- Inbox Pounds - up at £5.01
- Qmee - 10p added and £1.10 ready to be transferred

Spends this coming week:
- hospital car parking for DS's appointment on Wednesday morning
- £60 gas boiler service on Thursday morning at 7.30am :eek:

Goals this week:
- Get up to speed on YNAB and complete the monthly/annual data
- Do more surveys with Canvass and IP
- Sort the Euros for the July present that's outstanding

I've just done the Elec and Gas readings, so now to update spreadsheets there.

Hope everyone has had a good weekend.

supersaver1000

Hi Ali. Welcome home. Glad you had a good time away and have come back within budget. There is nothing worse than getting home with a sick feeling of 'now I've got to add up the debt' (and why we aren't going away this year) .

I have got a sat nav but have been using navmi downloaded on my iPhone. I had it previously on my iPhone 3 but the sound wouldn't work until I changed to the iPhone 4. There is a free version nav free I think but the purchased one was something like £2.99. It's not bad, not as good as the Garmin but is ok.

I've had a very relaxing weekend, feel pretty relaxed and ready for the new job. Exciting times.

Ali-OK

Thanks SS . Was quite pleased that I came back with money to spare and used that today to put more fuel in the car - another £20.

I've been using a maps app on my phone, but it's unreliable in the GPS signal picking me up. It's a fairly old phone (nothing trendy like an iPhone) and I do like the Garmin I borrowed.

* * *

New working week and a mad rush this morning but everything done on time. So tired tonight though!

Dogs collected and I've booked a training session with the owner (he's a gun dog trainer so knows springers inside out) for next week to sort once and for all the springer pulling like a steam train. £30 for 1 hr, which is very reasonable and he gave me a free 15 mins taster today - lo and behold, springy was walking to heel beautifully. I just need to keep the technique up and then we'll use the lesson for walking to heel off lead. So much for my old trainer saying he is so wilful he probably would never walk loose-lead and charging me £60 for the privilege. :mad:

Financials then:
- bank account checked
- freepostcodelottery (both) checked
- Nectar Adpoints - off the blocks with 37 points available and done
- Nectar card value - up at £69.83
- Inbox Pounds - up at £5.17
- Qmee - nothing extra today

Completed one product test feedback survey as well.

Loads to do - hedge needs it's trim finishing, grass needs cutting, housework, more washing, work stuff...but I've been watching Murray play (and he's just won :j) and I'd like to watch Djokovich and Tsonga next

Right, going to hot foot off here and clear up dinner things and sort DS's school stuff for tomorrow - then back to tennis

Hope everyone has had a good day.

millionaire_in_training

Glad you had a good time away and all within budget

I haven't managed to see a minute of the tennis unfortunately and I have manged to body swerve the footie thankfully. Hardly watched any television recently and I'm having a wee law and order catch up tonight

supersaver1000

Training sounds good. Hmmm to the old trainer.

And coming home with cash is great. I forgot about the tennis, doh. Will catch up tomorrow. Thanks for reminding me

Ali-OK

Enjoyed the tennis, it's the first I've watched of it too, but hopefully not the last this week

The old dog trainer was 5 years ago, goodness knows what the charge is per hour for them now, hence delighted at the £30 p/hr cost with this chap. Hoping I won't need many sessions - trainer says 1 will be enough if I keep up what he taught me yesterday. A very good incentive on top of not being pulled to the fields!

* * *

It's a new month :eek: How did that happen!

Mortgage capital payment of £806 gone out this morning, bank account already checked. Sig updated and a few stats to record:

Mortgage interest should come in at £12.99 per day this month, down from £13.44 on 31/12/13.
Monthly interest amount down by £15.44 from £410.34 to £394.90
% house owned - now at 50.67%, up from 48.94%
OPs total this year - £760.81 - an extra 1.22 months paid off
Paid off - 3.88% £133,444 is now £128,269

That's enough for this morning

in_need_of_direction

Scary that we are now half way through the year.