Building The Burrow!

Goldiegirl

Lots and lots going on, what with budget planning and streamlining things for a potential move.

I love reading about people's plans, it always gives me a few ideas.

You'll be busy PM, but it sounds as if everything is coming together very nicely

Pearla*Merle

Habibiboo wrote: »

:wave:

Wow, masses to think about in all contexts there P*M, thrilled for you that things are not only panning out but also that you can keep your current job and other prospects going at the same time.

Great news on both counts of being able to possibly work from home at times and of being able to use travel time productively with writing and projects :T Also very glad to hear that stationery is coming into its own in this vital planning phase!

BTL adventures interests and scares me in equal measures (flat over the road from us is for sale and I would love to be able to buy it as a pension BTL) so will be very keen to hear all about your thoughts and progress with that. Buying somewhere you have family to help out sounds like a great idea and maximises the potential of getting a friend-of-a-friend or family tenant in, which might be less hassle.

Good luck for Mr P*M for next week but hope you both manage to get a happy, relaxed bank holiday weekend and take some time out together before it all gets frantic!

Big hugs and well wishes to you both! x

Ooh, you snuck a post in between all my ramblings, Hbbb! I didn't see you in there.

Tell me about it, loads to ponder but I'm mostly managing to distract myself with lots of RightMove-Down-South searching at the moment. I daresay once that's done & dusted I'll crack on with other property ideas.

Re: BTLs, it's only because I have absolutely no pension that I'm thinking about this. It seems the 'easier' way to catch up given current level of income (& projected income levels over next several years), plus I have an interest in property anyway and have lots of people around me that have BTLs so plenty of people to ask for advice. I also have some handyman contacts so it could all come together rather well. Ahh, I want to go shopping for BTLs now

I'm really having to hold myself back and not run to the shops to furnish myself with a whole new set of stationary goodness.

I think we're hunkering down to avoid all this water falling from the sky today, so a quiet afternoon of book reading (with the creation of a 'London For Free or Relatively Cheap' spreadsheet sandwiched in there at some point) is looking like the order of the day.

Pearla*Merle

gallygirl wrote: »

Love the decluttering strategy :beer:.

Commiserations on family member, hope all goes as well as it can.

GG x

Thanks GG, I think this week (although gave us a bit of a fright) has at least given everyone a bit of breathing room to adjust and will hopefully soften the blow (if that's at all possible?) for more immediate family members when the time comes.

Decluttering going well.

Pearla*Merle

apple_muncher wrote: »

Golly gosh, PM! So much change ahead! So exciting!

Love the idea of having a slush fund - but surely it shouldn't be to fund stuff like the dentist? Unless of course you're planning on having bling on your teeth...:D

LOL! I think not... though my dad does a pirate's gold tooth that he likes to use as inspiration at Halloween

I'm thinking that instead of having everything budgeted to the hilt that I might have a slush/emergency/random bits fund that covers the odd dentist check up, emergency tights situation, oh-god-I-need-a-coffee moments. Though knowing me I'd probably rather have everything noted down and spreadsheeted up, so we'll see. :rotfl:

Pearla*Merle

in_need_of_direction wrote: »

Lots of opportunities for hair academy cuts in the city.

Ooh, good thinking. I get mine for free/around £5 at the moment though. But probably should sort out an emergency hairdresser when I go down there, I do tend to let things go to seed which does me no favours.

Pearla*Merle

Thank you MWC and Goldie

Goldie, I love reading about other people's plans as well, it always kicks me into action. In fact I love reading or watching anything to do with plotting and planning - I stuck on Monster's University the other day, I love the Get-Up-Early-Put-Awesome-Plans-Into-Action vibe. :rotfl:

Quick update on yesterday - I should learn not to write anything here, my 'oh, maybe I'll buy shoes at the end of the year when my fund has built up' turned into 'omg, I've just found some gorgeous half price shh puppies, I'd better buy them!'. So I'm now -£35 on my clothes fund. Will try and pay this off before buying too much more, but I do seem to have a bit of a list of things that need replaced so we'll see. I did need some decent officey shoes though, and these I should be able to walk quite far in so had to grab them otherwise it would have been a lifetime of regret.

Also picked up a hairbrush (£6.99), desperately needed as my other one is cheap/broken/not that good. Shall call it a treat to myself.

Seemed to manage to spend the rest of the day eating chocolate cake and avoiding rain. Oh, also went to Costko and bought some Oatso Simples pots (on offer ). Haven't been good at eating breakfast as I need to leave a bit too early for work, but these should do the trick.

Righty, off to read my book, and maybe look at these lists again a bit later.

Pearla*Merle

Didn't do anything yesterday but read and start up my Free Londinium list. Glad I rested though, because at almost 1am last night Mr M and I decided that today we'd head off on a day trip to one of his old haunts today (took three trains to get there, but at least the tickets were almost half price with our railcard).

Had a good wander round in the beautiful sunshine, checking out various churches and Ye Olde Worlde buildings. Might have wandered into a Cath K shop... and tried on a dress... and then bought it. £65. But wait! Mr M had a student discount = 10% off. Oh and look! I have over £60 on a gift card that's been kicking around in my purse for almost a year. Woohoo! FREE DRESS! Quite happy with that. :rotfl:

In other spendy news... ... I'd been thinking that I'd bring forward buying a new phone. Mine was fairly broken & old enough that it barely worked but I'd been persevering as I was only really using it for calls & texts (since nothing else worked ) but now we're moving to a big new city and with me travelling a fair bit I'd feel a lot more comfortable with something that didn't freeze/take ten minutes to load things up etc. And it would be rather nice to have a camera and music again.

Mr M spotted a decent deal (I'd been looking at £19 a month & £100ish upfront, which would be only a few quid more than I was paying now since they well & truly jacked up the price on my sim-only deal last month), but this one is £28 (I could weep, I thought I'd never go there again) and £100 upfront but for a phone with double the space & way more data/minutes yadda yadda. Also, cashback on £co just rocketed, so I'm actually only paying £30 for it upfront, ahahahaha. I think I win? Ultimately it works out that I'd only be paying a negligible amount more over the two years and I'd have a better phone that would be worth a lot more after the two years (at which point I'll do something clever about selling it and upgrading or something along those lines. So that's that. Will be so nice to have a phone that works again, and to have a camera, I've rather missed mine.

Might have just bought a very nice cover for it (£17), but it should last its lifetime and what the hey, lets call that a proper treat to myself for the new job. Packed lunches are still go this week, so that helps even things out a bit.


:www: MFW Wonderment: at least I got a super good deal on the phone since it had to be done, bought something decent with giftcard & didn't just fritter it, Mr M donated 25p to the kittybank :j and I've popped another £1 in there as it kept threatening to fall out of my purse.

:coffee: Simple Pleasures: lovely day out, we walked by a heron on the river that dived in and caught a fish right in front of us! Stunning Tudor buildings, squirrels clambering amongst beautiful churchyard trees, flamboyant irises.

:heartsmil Burrow Building: excellent jaunt out, so nice to have chilled days out together out & about, we haven't done much over the past while so it's nice to feel normal again. Mr M's pleased I've joined the modern world with a phone that works so that'll deal a death blow to the annoyance/exasperation my current phone was causing him. :rotfl:

Habibiboo

:wave:

Oooh I'm sending you a big excited hug ... I can just feel the much more relaxed vibe coming off your thread now and so happy you have treats and epic planning sessions to look forward to (I do some work for a client in London and rely on a few sites in relation to that, I'll find the links for you as they have info on plenty of free things to see and do to add to the spreadsheet)!

Well done on the CK dress, excellent MSE type treat! X

apple_muncher

Awesome mse-ness on the dress!

Your phone sounds like mine - except mine only did calls if it was on speaker . Dh was most frustrated with it, but I was cheerily pottering along with it. So he found me an exact replacement (palm pre, so not many around) and after months of frustration, he got it unlocked and fully functioning. I now can make private calls without the world hearing both sides of the conversation (tho haven't made one yet - am well out of the habit), and the keyboard keys ALL work the first time you press them, and the 'send' button also works first time. I hadn't realised how much it was limping along! I'm only on payg. I'll use a tesc0 double credit thingy for a month, then work down my credit before topping up again. I'm certainly not a heavy user. Dh can't understand my attitude!!

Your day out sounds wonderful. Wishing you many more like that!

greent

Fab going on the dress! And yeay for new phones!