The journey to financial independence.

greent

Hope all goes well, CT xx

Watty1

good luck vibes being sent

Cream_Tea

Hi all, sorry for the radio silence, it all,got a little mad my end. We had our offer accepted then that weekend my waters started leaking not properly broke so I was kept in hospital for 24 hours while they waited on a labour suite to become available and then I was induced (straight to the injection to start the contractions, they didn't do the first few stages because my waters had been gone too long and it was starting to be an infection risk) and 26 hours later our beautiful baby boy was born at 8lbs 12oz and 3 days early so thankfully I wasn't two weeks overdue! He is now a crawling, pulling himself up furniture shuffling 7 and a half month old, who is keeping us very busy and constantly entertained.

DH, DS and I are currently living with my parents and have been for 5 months now while we are doing up the new house. We are hoping to be in before Christmas but after is probably more realistic.

So far we have:
Knocked through toilet and bathroom
Knocked through kitchen and dining room
Found we had original parquet flooring downstairs!!
New bathroom fitted
New kitchen and utility (still being fitted)
Added additional sockets to most rooms
Moved lights and and removed pull cords in the bedrooms
Plastered part or all of most rooms
Added a downstairs toilet and cloakroom (using up part of the garage)

DH has been so busy and has done it all himself on evening and weekends with help from friends who are trades people as he had needed it. If I didn't think he was amazing before I do now. He drives an HGV so it's not like home improvement is his day job.

I will work out in the next few weeks exactly where we are money wise and give you all an accurate update before the new year.

I hope everyone is well and I will spend some time in the coming weeks catching up.

CT

Cream_Tea

To keep costs down this Christmas I had decided on home made. In previous years I buy some and make mini hampers with chutney jam and some festive drink (mulling syrup and salted caramel vodka have been done in previous years) truffles, etc.

This year I've made truffles and decorated them like Christmas puddings and made word art using Tagul Word Cloud. I would highly recommend it. It's free to print it out and I bought two picture frames for £3 at a charity shop. All you need is a little time to play around with the word art on your PC to make it look right. They look so good as well.

http://pin.it/LkiI4dH

http://pin.it/E6pdtPD

I hope this helps people keep costs down. I've told a couple of friends who've loved the idea and are going to do the same.

CT

Watty1

Very impressive list of works

greent

CT - how lovely to see you back - and to hear of DS's arrival

Your DH sounds fab - that's a massive amount to have achieved by himself - and how wonderful to have discovered real parquet!

xx

jodles16

Hello CT! So pleased to see you back here, amazing news on your DS! The house sounds like it is progressing really well! Looking forward to seeing all your progress!

Jodles

Cream_Tea

Hi all, it's been another busy few months. We moved into our house in February, approximately 7 and a half months after we bought it. Big items left on the to do list are:
Plaster and paint our utility room
Fit a toilet and sink in our downstairs toilet.
Do the garden which is a jungle but we are slowly chipping away at that.
I feel like I'm coming out of a mist in the last few weeks. We've been so busy with the house and a new baby that money saving hasn't been at the forefront but has been in our thoughts obviously. This week I've started to take back control and have applied for a CC with 0%balance transfer so we can cut the costs there. I will spend some time this week getting all the information together to make a financial update here and really get things sorted. I think it will be a few years before we are debt free but every journey starts with a small step. I'm happy to be back. I hope everyone is well. Xx

greent

Welcome back, CT!
x

Cream_Tea

Now the big spending on the not so new now house has finished I feel I have the space to think about our money and make a plan. Since buying and renovating the house and buying a car we have £26,809 in debt. This is is between loans and CCs. I have graded the debt from highest interest to the 0% CC and will focus the overpaying to the most costly and pay the minimum on the others.

I'm going on Mat leave again in December and thought wouldn't it be lovely if one cc and father in law loan was paid off by then but it was not realistic. So the new plan is to have it cleared in the next 12 months which would leave us with only the 0% CC and the car loan which I'd like cleared in the following 12 months.

Plan going forward:
Look at possibility of moving other CC to 0% one.
Look at possibility of generating extra cash.

Hope everyone's well and now I feel I have time to get back to it I hope I'll be reading all about your successes and inspiration.

CT