Sunday 23rd November - What small DFW things will you do today?

determined_new_ms

When we start out on the DFW trail we do loads of "big stuff" that makes quite a difference to our situation. These include having our lightbulb moment, cutting up the credit cards and cancelling Sky and the gym .

But once we have done the bigger stuff, we often feel that we are not making the same amount of progress, when in fact the small steps are helping us form good financial habits and helping us get closer everyday to staying in control and becoming debt free, or staying debt free.

Examples could be hanging washing out instead of using the tumble dryer or leaving your purse/wallet at home to avoid the risk of spending.

So be proud of those small steps, they really are important :money:

Gosh came on here to do my sporadic posting & discovered there isn't a weekend thread :eek:

Hope everyone is doing well :A

Things for today:

* all meals from stores
* cook tomorrow's dinner while cooking today's so it's ready for when oh & dgd gets in
* make cake for packed lunches during week
* hang up washing & do another load
* Iron clothes for week
* vacuum polish & tidy upstairs
* work out spends for last night & let oh know how much he owes me (managed to get a lift rather than a taxi home so was a lot cheaper than expected :T)
* work out how we're going to go and get fireplace bought on ebay yesterday. It is £40 but will need a van & petrol. Had a builder come round and quoted us £140 to install. This is an a massive difference on the £1200 quote we got from a fireplace company for a new fireplace or £425 for the work if we provided the fireplace :eek::eek::eek:
* Will try to do some reading or sewing later - haven't sewn since dgd came to live with us 5 months ago!
* take dgd to visit ex-mil this afternoon

Ok think that's all I'll do today. Tomorrow am being taken to see Paloma Faith for my birthday :j

Have a lovely sunday everyone.

DawnW

Thanks for starting the thread DNMS - I was intending to yesterday but ended up helping DD2 blitz her house. She is finding it hard to make time to keep on top of it, with a busy job and a baby.

The only DFW thing I can think of yesterday was that I didn't spend anything as I was too busy scrubbing!

For me today:

Check banks

Food shopping - I have joined the December grocery challenge, so must not spend too much :eek:

Cook a chicken with a view to making it last a few days

Make some mince pies with a jar of bought mincemeat that I found in the larder. Not sure where it came from as I don't remember buying it, but I have it so will use it.

Text son and daughter in law to try to find out what GD1 would like for her birthday. She will be 12

Housework - didn't do mine yesterday as I was busy doing DD2's :rotfl:

Sort out some paperwork that is scattered all over the dresser :mad:

That will do for me today I think!

Ratison

Thank you for starting the thread - though I have very little in the way of money saving to report! I decided to order a lot of my Christmas presents yesterday, so that took away a chunk of cash! But I shopped around online to make sure I got the cheapest deals, and I haven't had to dip into my overdraft repayment fund. I used to always put money into my ISA then have to move it back to my current account because I just never had a budget.

Today should be a NSD though! Plenty of food in and off to OH's mum's for Sunday dinner. Mmm.

Did a couple of surveys yesterday. Some much more interesting than others. Still getting to grips with Swagbucks - very slowly.

Went to the cinema with free vouchers from sweet wrappers. And took our own snacks. Two bottles of coke in the cinema are £4! Ridiculous!

Hope everyone is having a lovely weekend.

foxgloves

Hi Weekend People,
Busy weekend so far & lots of money spent, but it was all planned spending & we took advantage of what offers we could find that suited us.
Yesterday:
*City centre trip to mop up most of the remaining present shopping. Remembered to take vouchers, Presents & Clothes Pig money & grocery shopping list to save petrol going out again later.
*mr f needed jeans. Found exactly what he wanted on sale rail at M&S for £7.99 plus he had £3 vouchers so got perfect pair of jeans for £4.99. (It was one of their more expensive ranges, too)
*More MSE success for mr f - he wanted a particular X-box game & took in a few DVDs & games to CEX to see if he could part-exchange. he said even £1 off a game would be ok with him, as part exchange stuff was old, but they gave him £3.20 so he got the game he wanted for the princely sum of 80p & it was in great condition.
*Remembered I'd still got an unspent Debenhams voucher from my birthday so treated myself to some purple tights & a pair of vampy black lace ones for a bit of Christmas glamour :-)
*Took a packed lunch. We did treat ourselves to a coffee & bun (from our 'Personal Spends' so no effect on bank account) but reckoned we'd save around £14 if we shoved a couple of filled rolls, crisps & satsumas in a lunch box, & we did.
*Grocery shopping came in on budget. Remembered to use a £4 off voucher & that meant we could include a Christmas mag & a small gift too.
*Sainsbury's 'Exchange your nectar points for double the value in vouchers' weekend. We were well up for doing this, but when we'd thought about it, there wasn't anything we needed in the categories included (toys, home, decs, etc) so we decided the points were of more value to us next month to use for a festive grocery shop.
*Did some surveys.
*Found 5p road kill. Big wow! On the theme of 'found' money, I was nearly responsible for making someone's roadkill day.....I took my purse out of my bag & mr f said 'You've dropped something'. I didn't spot anything falling out of my bag, but when I looked it was £30 in a little cash bag! Aaaagh! So glad he spotted it!
Today:
Had planned big gardening day but so disappointed to find it was pouring with rain.
*Decided to use 'gardening time' to turn a bucket of our windfall apples into another batch of brown sauce.
*Had to call at Waitrose for sultanas & root ginger for the above so decided to buy a few more gifts from the list so as to use a £6 off voucher. Used 'My Waitrose' card to get free cappucinos & a free 'Observer'. Very festive in store, as staff were doing iced Christmas biscuits with children & they were loving all the icing & silver balls, etc.
*Read meters & updated my energy spreadsheets. Using less than this time last year. It just hasn't been very cold yet.
*Loaded washer & set timer for overnight Economy 7 wash.
*mr f is roasting a chicken later so I'm hoping to get a few meals & some stock out of that over the next few days.
*Shall be making tomorrow's packed lunch later, carrying on with my current knitting project & reading my library book, so that's likely to be my sum total of money saving for this weekend.
DNMS - Nice to hear from you. How is your little grand-daughter getting on? Must be hard work suddenly having a tiny to look after, but she always sounds so cute, so I bet she's worth it!
OK, must crack on,
f x
P.S Waitrose butcher's counter - Stewing lamb - can't recall exact price per kilo but I got around 570g for £2.50. It's the pieces with bone in which are great in the slow cooker, as the bones help make such a good thick gravy. Stewing pork chunks also good price at the moment, £5-something a kilo x

Bobarella

Guys I could weep. Just spent ages writing a message to you all and lost it.

jodles16

Howdy all!

Yesterday was a stay at home NSD which was lovely, hubby was super energetic and did loads, I lagged behind a little trying to be helpful! Have had washing out on the line which should reduce the amount of time in the tumble which is good! Have completed a couple of surveys as well.

Today was a big spend day, got paint for the hallway and painting bits and pieces and Christmas stuff! Bloody love christmas and got a little bit overexcited but all well worth it and cheap items really!

Hope you have all had a great weekend!

Jodles

ziggy2407

Hi my lovelies

DNMS - Thanks for starting us off today

Apologies for going AWOL again but the last few days have been manic

Friday - quick trip to town to buy an outfit for Sat night - ended up
catching tram to major shopping centre
Sat - Spent the afternoon finishing wallpapering DS's room and it looks FAB. Sat evening went to a party for my mums 80th - she had it with all the oldies she lives with and my 2 brothers and half-sister and their families came. She had a singer who sang 1930's/40's/50's and was great for such a young girl (only 23ish). I spent the evening wandering the tables making sure everyone had enough to eat and drink and washing pots - and boy am I tired today
Sun - Picked mum up from church and took her out for lunch, spent the rest of the afternoon on the sofa. made a scrabble frame for a friend, chased up plumber re: heating problems (cost £30 last week for an electrician to come and look at thermostat only for him to say he didn't really know what the problem was and then for the problem to re-start 24 hours later )

Have made a list of jobs I would like to achieve this week, so fingers crossed there's no major interruptions (although mum has said she wants me to take her Christmas shopping - and now I probably sound awful but the others want to be there for the good times but not with the day-to-day )

Thanks for listening to my moans (again), normal service will be resumed tomorrow, when I shall be siezing the day

Night all. Love

C x