Ending 2013 with 348 payments to go

teabody

Today has been a NSD so far
Jan Grocery spends so far: £151.10

Still managing to put a £1 a day away

Planning to buy more food tomorrow and spent yesterday adding to the grocery spend.

Cooking a four bird roast today....had excess at xmas so using it up!

teabody

Today I have spent £20 on meat. I get 5 types of meat and I am trying to get inspired by Jamie Olivers saving recipe book so we shall see!

A letter arrived from Santander today acknowledging my last overpayment but I have to wait for another letter that tells me my term etc. :T

I don't think I will be overpaying again for a while as I need to rebuild a bit of cash!

Total Jan Grocery spend so far: £190.74

Reduced items I am selling on ebay so fingers crossed!

teabody

Jan Grocery spend so far : £258.56 according to my spreadsheet!
Wont be too far out as I try to fill it in as I go. Sadly I have had to put some on the cc but will allow for that next month. I will try not to go over £300 for the month if I can help it! So despite the cc:eek: I am happy that I have cut back. Goodness knows how I would have got on if I was not tracking my spends!

After my last OP the letter arrived to say my term had gone down to 27 years and 7 months when previously it had been 28 yrs. So that is nice :T That takes my total payments down to 331 to mortgage freedom

teabody

Spent approx £58 in Aldi last night so slightly over planned but happy with it seeing as my original budget was £400. Just shows it can be done! A tiny bit behind with my savings challenges but hope to catch up by the end of the week.

NSD today....not difficult....didn't go anywhere besides little ones swimming lesson.

I have to update the spending spreadsheets and make sure I have not overspent anywhere.

Switch Tariff for Gas and elec and due to receive a gift card for £50 this week for switching(no doubt the 'cheaper' tariff will be more expensive before the years out) so there is money for gifts etc maybe xmas shopping 2014?

I have been very MS this weekend having bought new fruit last night, the bowl was still full so I have diced and frozen it all perhaps for puddings and so on.

teabody

I am excited as I have just seen the first proper cashback from my Santander 123 account plus interest = £38.34 - £2 account fee = £36.34:j I have promptly sent this to my £1000 in 2014 fund!
Having said this my spreadsheets indicate that in total I have overspent by £30 this month!!:mad: but I will still allocate the cash and try to allow for overspend in Feb.

Back on track with my saving pots(mostly)!

Does not look like I will be making an OP anytime soon but will keep trying x

teabody

Received a £50 giftcard today - incentive for fixing my gas and elec!
Great, as its my brother's 30th coming up and it will be a huge help towards getting him something special.

NSD.....really tempted to fetch things I WANT rather than NEED
Grocery will last till tomorrow so should not have to spend till Sat.

teabody

NSD today

Trying not to spend anymore on Groceries this week as I am budgeting at £300 for Feb and have already spent approx £85!

I overspent around £90 in Jan on my total spends:eek:

I think I am going to change my spreadsheet strategy a little as I usually fill in as I go along but by then it's too late....i lose track and it's already spent! So this month I will allocate cash and change the colour and then fill in as I go along. Perhaps add columns for budget amount?Either way MUST TRY HARDER!

teabody

NSD today....have done quite well with that so far in Feb but I dont tend to keep count.

Grocery spend so far:£134.86
£165.14 remaining of budget

No overpayments made but keeping up with my saving pots.

Really trying hard especially with the food budget.....the weather has been great motivation too as it's nice to know you don't have to go out unless you really need to. Also, managing to embrace frozen food stocks thanks to a little inspiration from Jamie Oliver who makes some delicious looking grub on his money saving meals show.

Was horrified at what ebay is now charging to sell stuff so I am not going to bother anymore. Since they added the £0 insertion incentive weekends, the final value fees seem to have slowly risen, meaning most of what i end up selling only sees me with 20p a time!

suse*

I was just thinking how well the weather has stopped me going food shopping. I ran out of milk at one point this week even and started drinking black coffee as I didn't fancy going out.

Normally I might also have resorted to takeaway, if but I wouldn't be so mean to drag someone out in this right now.

Last month I was just under 100 for groceries, right now I'm at 41 and thinking maybe I'll try and get under 75 this time or less even.

A friend recommended to me to have a look on facebook for local seller groups, rather than ebay as I had been so put off by their fee's too. So might be worth seeing if you have something similar in your area depending what you're selling.

teabody

suse* wrote: »

I was just thinking how well the weather has stopped me going food shopping. I ran out of milk at one point this week even and started drinking black coffee as I didn't fancy going out.

Normally I might also have resorted to takeaway, if but I wouldn't be so mean to drag someone out in this right now.

Last month I was just under 100 for groceries, right now I'm at 41 and thinking maybe I'll try and get under 75 this time or less even.

A friend recommended to me to have a look on facebook for local seller groups, rather than ebay as I had been so put off by their fee's too. So might be worth seeing if you have something similar in your area depending what you're selling.

Yes, isn't it amazing that the weather can help restrain us! My sis in law has been selling on local facebook groups too! Think this is a winner with no fees....thankyou for that!