Apple muncher's number crunching

apple_muncher

Have signed up to kat's May challenge :j. There's always excitement as a new month approaches!

I've done some money shuffling. My smug cheque is in the 'don't touch it' savings, awaiting action. £400 has gone off the mortgage and another £400 into savings. This time, I have managed NOT to double up any payments!

Thinking about my comment on finding where I am wasteful, I've taken a first step: bought more scrummy red pepper hummous and mixed it with a tin of whizzed up chickpeas, lemon juice and some onions and garlic I'd cooked. Have tripled the quantity of my yummy hummous! Result.

Confession: there was a boxful (stacker box size) of old-style Polly Pocket in the charity shop....for £8. Do I need to mention that I bought it! And it is already hidden from little eyes. I did callously also think about the resale value when she grows out of PP. Anyhow, I had to forego the weekly shop and get it home, then went back for the food. I thought of how much mothernerd gets done and decided to walk there again.


Well dd and next door's dd are both at an after school club, giving me an extra hour alone. Sheer bliss!

Exercise? I managed to tweak a thigh muscle when running for the bus! Stretching it out when home and then walking back to the shops helped, so I did one round instead of 2. ZWOW 23. 5 yoga burpee (sumo jump, cobra, downward dog, dive bomber =1); 10 ab split (V-up, straddle and touch ground, knee hug); 50 burpee; 100 air squat (thighs parallel). 12 mins 48 and a good sweat.

I bought 2 bags of aldee onions and have cooked up 1 of them-for the soup (pea, spinach and rocket) and a bit for the hummous mix. The rest will do tonight's curry and also some for the freezer.

Washing upis ongoing, as ever! Got 1 lot done and there's another rackful for when the girls are home.

Got the MOLS stuff done - phew! 1.5 hours. But it'll bring in a bit more money eventually.

The washing got done and some jumper.

All in all, going well! A lovely achieving day. Now to go and get the girls...

apple_muncher

Note to self: must factor in childcare costs into May's budget.

apple_muncher

£1169.59 paid off the mortgage this month :T:j:T

apple_muncher

It's MAY tomorrow :j !

I am NSK Tribute #7:

NSD - 15
Exercise - 16
Power of 10 - 31
Declutter - 62
Sell - 10
Be grateful x5 - 31
Post on NSK - 31
Finish off all those odds and sods of knitting - 12?

Then we have the funds:
Travel - 150 (Bham, London, oyster, fuel)
Food - 220 (tho really want to get sub-200)
Dd - 150 (activities, parties, childcare)
Giving - 188 (fixed)
Other - 70
Total - 770. Ouch. That is way higher than other months...

( travel is increased; childcare is new; that accounts for an extra 100)

I shall work with cash as much as poss and keep a column per fund pot in my notebook, counting down to zero.

I shall plan meals and snacks, and use up stores. Sugarfree will become the norm...

Unnecessary spends shall be stamped out - splat! I shall find the hidden pennies and make them count!

:)Am looking forward to not spending!

apple_muncher

Oh me, oh my! Three daysinto May and I've not been posting here. I've signed up to NSK's May challenge and joined fmess's fitter and trimmer thread. Writing on 3 different ones is tricky! Must try harder...

The jumper is progressing nicely and dd is happy with it so far :j.

Went to a friend's for lunch and she made me scrambled egg with bacon and cheese. Yum!! Whilst there, dh did some work on their pcs dd played with the ponies and sindy dolss, and I got a lovely back massage. There were a few really tight knots to loosen off, which was a tad painful at the time. But good now!

Dd has a cold. She went to school perfectly well yesterday, and came home saying she'd been sneezing, and by bedtime she was producing green snot. Speedy! Balm tissues - the aldee ones - are now on the shopping list! And broken nights are on the agenda.

Did a good workout this morning - 20 minutes of very hard work indeed. ZWOW 1, full of dive bombers, burpees, squats with side leg lifts, side plank with leg lift and pistol squats. Twas a full on sweaty workout which dd enjoyed as she bounced around me on her space hopper, and tried to get/not get hit by flailing limbs. :j

Have also done some washing without causing the machine to 'break'. I must simply avoid the 60 wash from now on! So, 30 it is.

Dinner is ready - will be interesting to see now far it stretches, I'm hoping for 8 portions... It was 1lb mince, onions, peppers, spinach, tin toms, tin beans.

Time to get dd out of the bath.

apple_muncher

A supremely lazy day!

swept, mowed, cooked, washed up, did exam board work, knitted, chilled out, switched off.

Dd is nearly asleep... She perked up this afternoon then slumped back into cold mode with hardly any tea and not even wanting to play. So she's had an early night - bally well should after getting up at 6.30 to see what the tooth fairy had left!

Mentioned to dh about 'wouldn't it be good to pay off the mortgage by the time he's 60'. He likes the idea, but the repayments are beyond us for that time scale. But if we can do £1k per month, then about 6 years should see it gone. We currently pay £700 monthly, plus any I'm able to save from my income. I reckon that between us we could find another £300... Hmmm. Will need to find an appropriate moment to mention it...!

Bagged anothrr NSD as I hardly left the house today. Dh went to church but I kept dd at home - too germy to share bugs with othrrs! And she only put real clothes on at about 4pm!

apple_muncher

Mentioned the extra £300 idea to dh and it got nicely thrown out! However, an additional £100 was deemed a good idea, which will save us a lot anyway. So a good result!

Dd slept well and now has a loose cough.

Off to visit some friends today, who are recently back from 8 weeks in America. There is a fete in the park behind their house too so we'll wander over there. Dd has already checked that I'm taking my purse!

Off to do some car racing with her.

apple_muncher

Another NSD :j.

And paid just over 100 to the mortgage this morning - 'leftovers' from April. Plus a 10.10 rebate from when we switched energy provider. Not forgetting the usual 400 from my extra wages - 4 more 'big' paycheques left.

It's a really good exercise for me to not touch the extra, and to see savings go up and mortgage go down. I really want it below 70k now!

apple_muncher

I get an extra long weekend as I don't work on a Tuesday - lucky me!

Today's list includes:
- school run and 4pm pickup ABOUT TO BE DONE
- 2pm dentist DONE
- ?am meet friend for coffee - time + location tbc DONE - HERE SO CHEAP
- shopping at aldee, sains DONE
- get calpol DONE
- go to PO... DONE
- but do exam board admin first DONE
- unpick soooo much knitting - grrrrr misread instructions 32 rows ago!
- make soup
- make choc cookies for dd DONE
- do a wash - tho lovely drying weather has scarpered for now DONE
- exercise DONE
- hoover stairs and landing
- take rags to recyc
- fill up at mealtimes and no snacking

Up and at 'em!

Time to have a few mins quiet reading then get breakfast ready before waking dd.

Habibiboo

:wave:

Just got back in from meeting and made myself a coffee and had a good long catch up with your thread A*M ... my goodness, lots going on!

Well done on the dormant account result - superb! Has reminded me that I must go into Nationwidthways sometime with some ID as I know I had an account with them in a previous life. Pension sounds like very sensible planning!

Now then, these workout-majigs you're doing ... are you sure you're not just making up these names as you go along? I can't keep up with the physical or the imaginary aspect of them! Split squat jumps sound like something that should only ever happen by accident, not intention! Do you want me to keep an ambulance on speed-dial for you? I think I can nearly do a clap up ... but my version is called clapped out!

I like your gentle negotiating touch with OH re: mortgage OPs, this is exactly the approach I have with Mr. Hbbb and it's working a treat! Keep going with it, you'll soon have him thinking £300 a month was his idea!

:T Signature for this month is looking mighty healthy ... brilliant work on both knitting and decluttering fronts. Will have a look at the NSK challenge for May as I've kept my MFW focus but kind of lost the thread of other contributory bits, so I think I need a little extrinsic motivation at the moment.

Hope work's not too full-on ... at least you're over the hump of the week by the time you've gone back to it this week ... happy times! x