2014 - New Rules to Live By

Pennydropped

Tomorrow I will be painting the second coat on the stairs and getting the trim done as well. The landings will require some tricky manoeuvres. We need to be able to walk on them to get up and down stairs, and I noted that it took quite some time for the paint to completely dry. So... tactical painting. I will paint PART of the landing, leaving room to walk. Once that part is done, I will paint another part of it, and so on. It may take awhile but at least it will eventually get done.


The other thing I need to do is rip off the carpeting on the bottom landing/elevated square at the bottom of the stairs. I have no idea what it looks like underneath that carpeting. A bit scared it's something nasty and horrible and will need repair or replacing. Fingers crossed that it's not. I'm hoping it can just be cleaned up and dried well and painted. That would be ideal. We will see. (eeeek!)

Pennydropped

The carpet at the foot of the stairs has been ripped up and binned. What a manky mess it was!! I'm not sure how many carpet tacks they used to fasten it down but let's just say it was a lot. I've cleaned up the flooring (wood planking just like the stairs), but I will need to pull all the tacks before I paint it. I've managed to get a few out, but it's going to take some brute force to get some of them out. Once I get them out, then I can paint that section (okay most of the section, otherwise we're trapped downstairs! lol).


Once I've finished painting the base of the stairs, then I can put the last couple pieces of the wood vinyl planking down in the hallway/entryway. I've kept it back because I don't want to risk getting paint on it - so much easier to paint when you don't have to stress over dripping it on the floor!!


Then the two jobs I need to focus on are the stair bannister and rail (to finish sanding to upper part on the first floor) and the stairway wall (the top part where I need to balance on the ladder to reach!). The sanding I can do while the dcs are home, provided I do it by hand. Ds1 cannot tolerate the noise from the electric hand sander. So again, I will simply dedicate a slot of time each day to doing a little sanding and hopefully it will soon all be done. It worked well with the rest of the bannister, until I got sidetracked by other pressing concerns.


The stairway wall will unfortunately have to wait until the children are back in school. I am not foolish enough to stand balanced precariously on a ladder on the stairs with two small children in the house. It's a recipe for disaster (and injury!). So that project is shelved until September (which is scarily not that far away!!!).


Long term goals right now:
- finish stairway wall (Sept)
- finish sanding bannister
- stain/varnish bannister railing (Sept)
- stain/varnish wood section just in front of stairs in hallway
- paint and put up trim around room and fireplace in living room (Sept)
- replace skirting boards in living room (Sept)


Financially and realistically (due to children) most of the work needs to be in September. There's still the slight option that I may not need to replace the skirting boards - I may paint them so they look nice and delay this until next summer, depending on finances. They are the soft aspect of the schedule - not an absolutely necessary replace, more of a "would like to" but I can make do with them for now in order to funnel finances towards another task that may be more of a priority.


I have had some issues with my cooker lately, and to be honest, it's seen better days. I'm a bit concerned that it's struggling, and that means I need to save money towards a new one. I'll still use this one as long as possible - but I want to make sure that when it does finally kick over, that I have the money for a replacement ready to go.

Pennydropped

I've found that the sanding, even by hand, seems to set off ds1. The repetitive noise seems to be a sensory trigger for him. Combine that with 5yo ds2 who is intent on trying to help (which really isn't that helpful unfortunately at this point), I've given up trying to sand while the boys are home. Another job pushed back to September.

So I'm back to focusing on decluttering over the next few weeks.

I have a big box of paperwork that needs shredding. I don't have a shredder. You can see this is a problem, right? I used to burn all paperwork I wanted to shred in my chiminea - job done. But again, with the dcs home, that's just not very easy to do. So I dug out my shredding scissors and have been devoting a good portion of time each day to shredding the paperwork by hand. It's actually moving along quite nicely. I've managed to get through maybe a third to a half of my box of shredding already! And I can sit in the living room in the evening, watching a programme, and shred paperwork quietly without all the noise of an electric shredder (see? truly moneysaving as I also am not using the electricity when I'm using the scissors!!).

I had some money on paypal the other day from selling a few things, when I realised that Iceland takes paypal. Score!! This week's shop is from Iceland, paid for by paypal and therefore does not come out of my budget.

That money will now be used to pay for ahead on another debt that I am trying to clear quickly. Once that is cleared, I will be focusing on another one. I am working on paying off a debt that is still being charged interest - so the sooner I get it cleared, the better. The rest are not getting interest charged, so they will follow shortly, while I continue to make regular payments.

I have the nasty feeling that I'm going to have to pay a council bill that my stbx was responsible for. It has both our names on it, but when we separated, I took the outstanding gas and electric bill, and he took the rent arrearages from a benefits changeover, as they were about the same amount. I've taken care of the gas and electric bill now, but I've recently found out that he hasn't ben paying the council bill. As it has my name on it, they could still come after me for it - even though they haven't said anything to me at all. So once I pay off this debt that is accruing interest, I will have to contact the council and sort out this other debt. Yes, it annoys me to have to take care of it when stbx should have done so ages ago, but it still has my name on it and needs to be paid. It's not the council's fault that he's been irresponsible (not mine either, I know) and I don't want it to affect my credit. So that will be next in line.

Off to update my savings.

Pennydropped

Quick note that I tried a new courgette bread recipe and it smells divine! I had a few courgettes to use. Yum yum yum!!!

Pennydropped

I fell £7 short of my £100 goal. So will try again, but am going to wait until the first of the month in September, as that's 30 days anyway. But still, better than nothing! I still come out ahead. And while ££ is short right now, I am pretending that money is not there and forcing myself to "be skint" as my current account IS skint.

I popped over to the corner shop to pick up milk this morning with the boys. It's a bit more expensive (£1.50 vs £1 at the supermarket), but if I go into the supermarket and walk all the way through it, I'm not only using petrol to get there, but the temptation to spend what little cash I have then kicks in. So I went to the corner shop, picked up milk, and left the shop. Hoorah. Budget preserved.

Pumpkin bread is baking, and lunch is going to be sausages (from freezer), eggs (few spare still). Still trying to decide what to do for supper, but am leaning towards beans and toast.

Tomorrow is shop day. I'm going to do a shop online however, and have it delivered tomorrow evening. That means we will use up more of the things still in the house during the day. I have some frozen lamb meatballs that I'm thawing to brown tomorrow and put in the slow cooker with some tinned chopped tomatoes and some veg and seasoning, so hopefully that will turn out okay and I can make some rice to go with it.

Other than that, I'm currently putting together a binder with all my autumn/winter/Christmas magazines. I've pulled out the pages I really liked, and I am using a binder I already had, along with some plastic page protectors that I had stashed away. So this year for ideas, I will be browsing Pinterest and/or my binder. If I like something that I want a hard copy of, I can still print it out and pop it in the binder. But I am NOT spending money on any new Christmas magazines this year!!

Pennydropped

My binder is almost finished. Just have a few recipes I'm choosing between and then it will be done. :j I'm hoping this will save me the £20 approximately that I usually spend on Christmas magazines each year. I know £20 isn't a huge amount, but that £20 could then be added to my grocery shop in December to cover any extra baking and Christmas day meal expenses. I don't generally go overboard on the roast meal, but I do like to have some nice baked goods in the lead up to Christmas, especially when people stop over. And I can do some baking for gifts as well.

The trauma of the day is that I am out of coffee. :eek: How I managed that, I will never know. I've obviously dropped the ball somewhere though. So tea it is until next week's shop, as I have decided that I am not going to go to the shop just to top up my coffee supply. I can live with it. I have tea. (but oh am I going to miss it all week!!)

I have started building up my winter stock up. I've bumped up my supply of tinned tuna and toilet roll. I want to stock up on soup, but I want to make sure it's on sale, so I'll keep an eye on that. UHT milk has a long life, but not forever, so while I keep a container or two regularly, I will pick up about 12 in early October to last the bulk of the winter for backup/emergency supplies. It seems like a lot, but we do use a lot of milk and I'd rather have the extra on hand. It'll get used, that's for sure.

satchmo1

B&M had large tins of lentil and potato soup for 39p, also regular size tins of a good brand's carrot, tomato and chicken soup that was very nice also 39p


Watch out for A!di or Lid! special offer on UHT milk when it's around 55p


Boo to coffee situation

Pennydropped

Yes, I cannot believe I allowed myself to run out of coffee! That'll teach me not to do a regular inventory.

I usually do buy my UHT milk at Aldi, but didn't realise they go on special offer at all. Thanks for that - I'll keep an eye out for it!

Thanks for the information about B&M as well. I will check it out.

Pennydropped

I'm still working on decluttering. I've cleaned off two shelves - one in the living room and one in the dining room. I cannot believe how much "junk" accumulates. I didn't realise what little bits and bobs managed to find their way into boxes that were supposed to be specifically for one thing or another.

The house is slowly starting to look less cluttered and more like I would like it. Such a relief!

Another week and I can get back to the DIY in earnest as the dcs will be back in school.

Smaller DIY/decluttering goals:
- clean above the cabinets in the kitchen. I would ideally like it to be completely empty, although realistically I will need to put things like a cleaner or two up there out of reach of the dcs
- get more cleaned out of the shed in the back garden
- put trim around the living room where the wall meets the ceiling.
- finish painting stairs (edges) and put carpet treads on
- stain/varnish bannister

One to two day projects:
- paint bedrooms (as soon as I choose the paint!)
- paint kitchen walls

Would like to get done, but most likely not until after Christmas:
- strip wallpaper in dining room
- paint dining room walls
- put up new curtain rod in dining room
- replace flooring in dining room to have the vinyl wood planking

I am doing as much decluttering and cleaning as I can do this week, so once the dcs are back in school I can crack on with the DIY. One thing I'd REALLY like to get done is redo the door frames on all the downstairs rooms - they are such a mess of awkward framing from years of changes. But that will definitely be something I'll have to hire someone to come in and do, so that won't likely be happening for quite some time!

Pennydropped

I've applied for and been told I qualify for the Warm Home discount for 2014. That's a relief. With the expense of heating going higher and higher, it's a welcome help this winter. I will still obviously be very careful about how frequently I use it - want to keep the expenses down.

I am hoping to keep the heating off as long as possible. I don't remember when I turned it on last year, and with predictions this year from some that it will be a very cold winter, I'm not sure if I will last a long time. Hopefully until mid October at least, but we'll see.

The heater goes on timer when it is turned on here. Three hour-long periods throughout each 24 hours. Once in the early morning just before/as we get up, once in the early evening just before the dcs have their showers/baths, once in the middle of the night to take the chill off. I have found this to work pretty well.

During the school day, the dcs are in school, so it's just me here. I keep warm by being busy - DIY, cleaning, exercise, and so on. The dcs are encouraged to wear layers - long sleeved shirts, jumpers, slipper socks - to keep warm when they're home in the morning or evening.

I then increase the time as it gets colder from one hour to 90 minutes or possibly 2 hours later on in the winter. Thankfully, the gas company has replaced the timer on my heater just a few weeks ago, so now it actually keeps accurate time. Last year, it kept running ahead (how a digital does that, I will never know!) so that within a week or so, the heating timings were all off and I had to keep resetting the silly thing every few weeks. What a bother! Now it should (hopefully) be fine. :j

Once the dcs are back in school, I plan on digging out the winter clothing and washing it and getting it ready to go again. It does seem like the winter clothing is coming out quite early this year, but I can hardly tell the dcs to put on a jumper if they're packed away, can I?