A New Year Newbies Diary

Squirrelly

Hello lovely peeps of MSE land...remember me! So sorry I have neglected my diary for so long but rest assured I have not been neglecting my debt free plan.

Part of the reason I have been on here so little in the last month is that I was offered overtime and thanks to some pretty hefty family support, I have been able to grab it with both hands and I think it's going to make a massive difference to the figures. I won't see the true effect of this until next month as it will be in Aprils wages but a plan of what is being put into which bill is already written out.

So I will do a quick figures update (I don't want to update my signature until June) These are my figures for the first quarter

March/April - Mortgage: 108,868 CC debt: 4,398 + 1128 Catalogue: 98 Overdraft: 2,850 Loan: 7,632 Savings: £133 52 week challenge: 115/1378 crazy clothes challenge: 11/100

Other progress which is not in those figures Hubby's course fees only have one more payment (Does happy dance) and youngest's nursery funding has kicked in so this month my bill was £153 instead of £230. We are still finding food planning really effective and A!di a the best way to go.

Biggest change though must be how much more in control I feel, I am finding that my mood is on much more of an even keel. Although I spend a lot of time on financial planning/checking, I am spending so much less time worrying and fretting. We have managed not to go over the overdraft for the last month, no payments have bounced and everything is going down...happy days :j

Take care everyone, I will try not to leave it so long before I make another entry

Box_of_Fluffies

That's fantastic news Squirrelly. I'm so pleased your debt busting plans are coming to fruition. It's such a great feeling when you finally pay off a debt and can free up extra cash.

Happy days indeed.

Squirrelly

Right first day of the bank holiday weekend and I am sitting up in bed with a cup of coffee writing this on the laptop....very peaceful.

Kids have had a couple of nights at my Mum's giving me and the hubby a couple of days to ourselves, which has been great although I am itching to get the kids back now.

We went out for a pub meal after work on Wednesday which is one of the things we really miss since being parents, we were very MSE as we bought from the two 4 one menu, so two Cajun chicken and rump steak meals and a couple of soft drinks came to a total of £19! We really should be doing this kind of thing more often I have no problem wasting £20 and this precious time to be grown ups is so much better use of it.

The meal and time together also gave us more opportunity to talk than we have had in ages. We discussed the money plan as I have been mostly doing it on my own as Hubby has understandably had to focus on the final months of his degree. I still don't feel I have got it quite right as yes we are making huge progress on clearing the debt BUT we are not spending money on things we actually need to, for example I desperately need new bras, but despite the fact I am uncomfortable I haven't bought any. I think I will truly have money under control when we are paying off debts AND have the things we need.

There is no easy solution to this but Hubby will be much more active in helping sort it out from next month as he finishes the degree at the end of May and I am sure together we can work it out.

The other thing we discussed was our house. As I have mentioned before it needs a lot of work but we thought it was our forever home. Since having a long chat about it we came to the conclusion even after all the work it may not be and so we are considering that we may need to move to a bigger house. This is an added incentive to get ourselves sorted.

However this is all way off into the future and probably well into next year before we even make a real decision about what we are going to do.

So short term plans for the long weekend...

We have no real money this weekend so we are staying at home and Hubby is going to be trying to get his final year project/dissertation finished.

I think the kids and I are going to have a mega spring clean and organising session, all the cupboards, wardrobes, everything...although I will have to see how enthusiastic Herbert and Sherbert (kids nicknames) are after they come home from being spoiled for the last two days.

Right must get up now and get on....or at least make another coffee and read some more diaries

OrangeFairy

Hi Squirrelly- great to see you back.

Lovely to hear you and hubby got some adult time. DH and I try to go for lunch together when we can as it is important to get that time together.

I too was in desperate need of bras. Hubby kept telling me to get some as mine were sad and embarrassing! So April found me spending £59 in M & S. this got me 4 bras with matching knickers and then another 4 bras in the sale.

I feel a lot better for it now

OF x