I really really want to be........mortgage free!

Ali-OK

Christmas Eve sounds wonderful at yours

I'm enjoying your blog and following. Great news on the free tablet too.

Heating on here though usually try and leave it til October, feels worse as such a drop in temperature in a short space.

ourcornercottage

Ali-OK wrote: »

Christmas Eve sounds wonderful at yours

I'm enjoying your blog and following. Great news on the free tablet too.

Heating on here though usually try and leave it til October, feels worse as such a drop in temperature in a short space.

The Christmas Eve party is so fantastic, I look forward to it more than Christmas Day!

Thanks for reading the blog, any suggestions let me know. I have a budget tablet to review and currently use an iPad. Could buy 20 of these tablets for the price if my iPad but so far I'm really impressed it is really very good value. I need to download a few apps etc to really put it through its paces. We get to keep it at the end so miniOCC is happy (although he already has a kindle fire) as its pink!

I've checked out the forecast and it's going to hit a maximum of 14 degrees tomorrow. Oh my days that's chilly. Due to lovely weather I haven't brought any coal yet although we have loads of wood. Will need to purchase fire lighters etc tomorrow. Also must check the oil. Filled our massive tank to about 3/4 back in March/April ish time. Can't have used a great deal but better check now I've started using for water heating again.

Edited : just checked the oil was last brought in May. I'm hoping this will be still pretty full when I look tomorrow

ourcornercottage

Just been on a credit report checking site (free 30 day trial, through Tcb of course! Will be cancelled in 21 days) checked back through the last 6 years and I've actually had very little credit and any possible ppi items must have been well before the 6 years. Anyhow worth a check and I'm getting a few quid cashback and know that despite opening a few accounts and switching cc's my credit score still very good. Will check again in a year or so using the other site that it's still looking good.

Have set reminder in my phone to cancel but will put in diary too for good measure!

newgirly

Your xmas eve sounds magical, I think its the best day too mine are are at the wrong age to want to.do anything now, so I'm debating an xmas eve family meal or drinks party this year.

ourcornercottage

newgirly wrote: »

Your xmas eve sounds magical, I think its the best day too mine are are at the wrong age to want to.do anything now, so I'm debating an xmas eve family meal or drinks party this year.

Go for it! Ask everyone to bring their own drinks and make a small easy buffet so hardly any costs.

Today has been a good day. Took miniOCC to football training, he's currently with the under 8's but one of his school friends dads went this week go the first time and it looks like he will coach the under 7's! Tbh he holds his own in the under 8's as do all the under 7's so they will do okay in matches I'd think.

Took miniOCC to supermarket to get some milk but also picked up some biscuits, Pringles and chocolates for a treat to watch strictly tonight (which he LOVES) so spends today about £8! I think that's the first money I've spent this week!

this afternoon I've caught up on the washing (3loads) and as the Suns been out I've used the tumble dryer. Last load in, dishwasher on, apple crumble made and house tidied a bit. Now sitting down to watch football and strictly with miniOCC then an early night.

Tomorrow I'm going to lie in and watch dads army, take miniOCC maritime festival £1 entry, get some proper shopping (must write a list) and get miniOCC to do some reading. I have to download some apps onto tablet I'm reviewing and think about advertising on my blog as I've had 2 requests in the last week and think I could actually justify a very small charge.

ourcornercottage

Not such a mse day in the end. downloaded an book at £16 for my course. I do have a paper copy from the library but am so used to reading on my tablet now I prefer it. Also means I can read anywhere which is handy. I have a few more books I need for course and will prob do the same, I know it's not very MSE but it works for me.

In addition I've splashed out a massive £8 on a domain for my blog for 2 years. Had to be done and Monday I'll do all the redirection bits.

So have ended up spending a whooping £32 today!!!

In other news I live in sticks but do have 3 sets of nearby neighbours and one set is having a party. It's actually getting quite noisy now and if they wake up miniOCC they will feel my wrath. It took me til 9.30 to get him to sleep with the noise (we wAtched a film in bed to drown it out) you'd think they'd go inside as its dithering inside let alone outside. Actually they've just turned music off, fingers crossed it stays off this time.

ourcornercottage

Another good day. Went into work to take our gogodragon back to break. MiniOCC came and helped me.

MiniOCC has been trying today, really really trying. It was hard to keep calm when he head butted me accidently but I've made it to the end of the day.

Took him to maritime festival cost £2, my mum brought us chips and a drink. Then went to Aldi for the weekly shop which came in on budget at £50 including an axe for chopping the wood. BF has been waiting for Aldi to get them back in as they got good reviews apparently! Officially only £30 spent on food and need to spend about a further £5 Next week

Have downloaded the on trees app and am going to try it out as a way of checking all my accounts at once. So far so good I've just hit a couple of passwords I need to rack my brain to remember. Looks good for those with multiple accounts like me

ourcornercottage

Well today has been a really hard day again. BF is still at Olympia so I'm holding the fort at home and at work.

Dropped miniOCC off at school then straight to work taking dogs with me so I can walk them to and from the car park to get a walk in. Arrived at work to 6 orders and a LOAD of paperwork. Worked til 2.15 got lost of the bits done

Walked dogs back to the carpark, straight home, parked car and walked to get miniOCC from he wanted to play on the playground so went there for half an hour walked home and I made a quick tea of. soup and garlic bread and here we are!

MSE news

£6 spent on after school clubs for the half term. MiniOCC wants to do 3, running, nature and gardening.

2 of my FC loans processed today so 1 just left processing now. I have recieved some payments back and will update my sig to reflect this.

Still awaiting my payment from £co to process, but my topcashback USA payment is in its way

Had an email from TSB to say that they are doing 5% cashback on first £100 of contactless spending. Need to try to remember to use that when I actually spend any money :rotfl:

Managed remember how to change the DNS settings so that my blog now has its shiny new domain name

ourcornercottage

Today I have......

Received FIT payment which was just short of £215 but I will not move that until the money shuffle starts tomorrow. After the money shuffle has started I will OP this amount and also add Co-op into the shuffle!

With the FIT payment amount confirmed my target OP with this included is £640 Taking into account my OPs already made and my regular OP it means that I have to find a further £125 (approx) which will be just fine. I might even be able to smash this and get closer to £700 this month as not a lot of expenses expected.

Have spent some time fiddling with my blog today and decluttering the side bar. I've also updated my about us section to be a bit fancier.

1 loan still processing in FC hopefully that will be in place soon. Im very pleased with how this is going currently.

need to make a payment to my 0% CC as Ive been neglecting that a bit in the last few weeks. I need to check to see if every penny is on 0% if it is I might open a regular saver and put the money (except min payment) in there as a kind of stoozing activity.

inspired by Jimlad and Misswillow I am going to try to think of some more sidelines. Currently I do the following but as you can see they done actually make any money

1. Blog - makes pennies, will take me months to pay back the cost of the domain name!
2. Preserves - make enough to cover the cost of the materials so we get free food. No actual money made
3. Counselling - this is a long term plan and I start my training in November. Will take years to be fully qualified (need to do post grad qualification) but will generate some £££ when completed and will make a difference I hope.

I am giving serious consideration to
1. Stoozing
2. ???????? this is where my problems lie, I cant think of anything!

shangaijimmy

The hardest thing is thinking about making extra bits of cash for minimal effort!!

Great progress and update by the way.