Second Time Lucky

debtfreeoneday

Hope all Ok with you A! x

amycool

Oh my, it's been ages since I came on here. A combination of constant illness, family emergency, and DD being on holiday then snow days.

Financially, things look okay on paper...but OH is on strike. It could last 4 weeks we've been told so that's going to be a big knock to the savings account.

In other news, the fridge broke, full of food, and we spent £400 on a good quality new one.

The pipes under the bath are leaking and the shower is leaking so we've decided to do a half bathroom refurb. The idea is to replace the bath/shower and retile around it, but leave the rest of the bathroom for a better time. Haven't got round to getting any quotes yet.

We've had 2 poorly rats needing surgery, which brings the vet bill since summer past £1000.

And OH has to go abroad for work but it doesn't look like they're covering meals or travel, so that's yet more money.

And of course the gas and electric meters have been whizzing around like crazy all winter as we've had snow on and off for months now.

So, just as the little line on my line graph was heading strongly upwards, it looks like it might take a rather large dip.

Still, I'm glad we have worked so hard to save as I know lots of his colleagues are really panicking about how they will cope.

In other news, OH being ill, a very long half term holiday (inset days either side) followed by snow days all week, means that I haven't had the house to myself for 3 weeks! I've been quite ill too so haven't been able to properly rest and recover. DD is not coping well with the change to the routine. I am really hoping that school is open on Monday!

in_need_of_direction

you sound completely beleaguered. take care

amycool

So...

We still haven't started the bathroom. Can't decide whether to wait and get the whole thing done. My worry is that I really wanted to properly design it and have a company come in and sort everything and this way we'd have half a bathroom that might not fit in with the final scheme. The leak isn't coming through the ceiling since we put an ice cream tub under and resealed it so we do have some time to think.

We lost one of our furry friends last week. She had cancer and the operation didn't fix it. Very upsetting but glad she is no longer in pain. So we have 4 rats left and (touch wood) they all seem fairly well at the moment. Fingers crossed!

OH survived his trip abroad. Ended up costing us about £200. :eek:

We're in debt by about £100 with the power company but they haven't increased the payments yet. Hoping the warmer weather will get us closer to £0 soon!

Got the new light fitted in the boxroom for £36. Tried to do it myself but our wiring is insane.

DD back in school on Monday. Have paid for dance lessons this half term and had to buy some uniform. She is growing so fast! It's been a cheap Easter holidays at least! We did a £1 charity shop challenge and mostly went to free parks and the library.

Wages down last month and will be down again this month and more strikes to come possibly.

To Do:

1. Renew car insurance. It has gone up so can hopefully find a better deal.

2. Fill in the holes and cracks in the plaster in the box room.

3. Buy gifts for DD's adoption day (already got some)

4. Get gutters cleared and conservatory washed (already booked in but have to pay for it!)

5. Get gift bag and wrapping for a few birthday gifts.

6. Hospital appointment (5 months late as it keeps getting cancelled!)

amycool

Got the car insurance for £60 less than the renewal quote with better cover, and ironically from a company owned by the original one!

Have started filling the holes in the plaster and trying to remove those last fiddly bits of wallpaper.

Bought a handmade card for DD. Think I have enough gifts now so just need wrapping paper.

Gutters cleared, conservatory roof cleaned and windows cleaned for £118.

I found a giftbag and wrapping for the other gifts so didn't have to spend there.

Appointment is next week so still to do.

In other news...
DD has broken yet another pair of shoes. These were really good quality and very lovely but for some reason she didn't like them so kept pulling the strap really hard until it snapped. Her back up shoes have also now been trashed by walking on the edges of her feet and jumping in muddy puddles (not waterproof) so she's in trainers until we can get to the shops at the weekend.

We had a nice trip in the sunshine to the countryside at the weekend so bought ice lollies and then we couldn't face cooking so as a very rare treat we spent £22 on takeaway curry. It did 2 nights meals so not bad value and they gave us a free bottle of pop!

amycool

5 months until the fixed deal is up and we can make a big overpayment so just trying to save as much as possible until then.

Incoming - OH earned a bit extra this month with some extra work

Outgoing - Ordered the wallpaper for the box room. Once it comes I'm hoping to get the same decorator as last time as he was really reasonable.
- Have had to buy lots of new clothes for DD as she keeps growing out of everything!

June plans

1. Holiday - will try to use Max card as much as possible to cut down on days out. We're self catering so shouldn't need to spend too much on food.
2. Finish the last bit of filling and sanding and sort out decorator
3. If that gets done, order new carpet and curtains, put up curtain rail and new light
4. Another hospital appointment (starting a new treatment that will fill much of the day)

I know I really need to sort through the home file as it's bursting at the seams but not sure I'll get the energy to do it!

Have started yoga this month to try to strengthen my muscles and reduce joint pain. So far I've pulled my back 3 times!

amycool

Holiday was great. Saved a lot with the Max Card on a few museums and spent lots of time in parks and on beaches. We only paid for food out a few times and mostly took packed lunches.

I have the number for a decorator but need to empty the room first.

Some good news! The Student Loans Company phoned to say they'd been trying to get hold of OH. It turns out he has paid off the loan and more so we should be getting a refund of over £1000!! I know technically it was our money anyway but it feels like a bonus!

Although the money hasn't actually appeared yet, I have ordered a tent and sleeping bags in the hope that we can sleep in the garden in the summer holidays. They were from Aldi so not expensive.

I also did a Book People shop and could easily have spent £100 but stuck to £40 and got £8 off and free delivery. 2 books for Father's Day, one with loads of ideas for outdoors activities. The rest were all for DD - some stuff for the summer holidays and some for birthday and Christmas.

Must sort life insurance for OH soon. We've decided it's well worth the monthly payment (especially now we have no student loan to pay off) for peace of mind.

amycool

Life insurance sorted. Only £6.37 a month and gives us peace of mind.

Vet bills of £325 this month. :eek::eek: Very lucky that we got the student loan money!

Oddly, OH's wages haven't gone up to reflect not paying the loan, which I'm hoping we'll notice next month, unless he already hasn't been paying it? It's tricky now statements are all online.

We gave £200 of the student loan money to charity and we spent £50 on 2 massive water butts. We have a 100L one to collect the conservatory rainwater (as the conservatory was built without a proper drain so otherwise it would flood the garden) but with the dry weather this is completely empty. Obviously the water butts won't help for this year but hopefully next year.

In the meantime we've been using the shower water to water the plants (just put the plug in). We use the watering can and it takes 5-6 trips but saves using all the drinking water. We have lost a few plants to the heat unfortunately and our poor Christmas Tree has lost loads of leaves but is hanging on.


Even with extra expenses we managed to save a fair bit in June.


July plans

1. Didn't get at all far with the decorating due to starting a new intensive treatment for my illness. It leaves me with little time or energy but hopefully we'll get somewhere this month
2. Make plans for summer holiday activities
3. Sort out home insurance (surely it hasn't been a year already?)
4. Sleep. Lots.

amycool

I'm back!

I got very ill last year and ended up on IVs. Last treatment finished in January and although I'm not out of the woods yet, I do feel much more human now with more energy.

So, what's been going on?

1. Mortgage fix ended and we haven't got a new deal. Reverted to a much higher 4.24% but we made a lump sum overpayment and we're overpaying £1000 a month if we can afford it.


2. Monthly interest, which started at £155 is now around £45.


3. Only £11500 left to pay, and it would be tempting to use savings to pay this off however...


4. We're getting a new bathroom. It is costing £8k and is going ahead over the summer. We're doing it the most expensive, most stress-free way. We will also be spending £1000 on a holiday for the first week of building work as it's our only toilet.

5. We don't have pet rats anymore. The older guys all died and we rehomed the younger ones. In theory this should save us money but we have started spending quite a lot on wild bird feed and we paid £13 to sign up to Borrow my Doggy (no matches yet).

Once we get the bathroom sorted the plan is to throw everything at the mortgage until it is gone! OH's pension contributions are going up but he's hopefully getting a pay rise later in the year so we might be up overall.

Once the mortgage is paid we'll start saving for new windows/front door and then that's all the main things paid for.

The kitchen is awful but it doesn't seem bad enough to completely change and the garden would massively benefit from a landscape but whilst DD is little it serves its purpose.


I'm really looking forward to having some spare cash just for nice things for once!

amycool

In non-money news (although sort of linked),

I've started Kondoing again. I did the whole house about 4 years ago but since DD came along, and then 2 years of illness, it has become a total mess.

So far I have:
Filled 3 bags of clothes for CS and 3 bags for scrap
Bought new drawers so all my clothes can be stored nicely and the open storage, which stressed me out, is in the built in wardrobes
Sorted through OH's clothes
Tidied underwear drawers
3 bags of books to the CS
Thrown out lots of damaged Tupperware and old tins and tidied some kitchen cupboards
Sorted the pantry
Got rid of the old rat cage on Freecycle
Gone through the medicines - mine (I have a lot) is all in a large underbed storage with a smaller Tupperware that holds a few days worth, and the family store is about a quarter of the size!

I'm not really doing it methodically but I do aim to continue until everything is gone through. It's exhausting though! After half term I need to start on the paperwork, which is really bad. I've already deleted about 1000 emails!