New tunnel - no light yet

girlatplay

Feels like ages since I was last here. Been on other diaries though


Today I have:


Got the loan balance down to £5950
Got the mortgage balance down to £89670
Had the worst part of the crown done and paid £212
"Broken" laptop fixed (was just the power cable) £15
Bought new washing machine (before the old one gives up completely)(including disposal of old one) £277.99
Booked car in for MOT on Monday (more money )
Balanced the spreadsheets


Expensive, but productive, day.


Wouldn't have been able to do from the crown down without the rainy day fund. It's so important to put some money aside for unexpected outlays, even if it's just a few pounds or pence at a time. It all adds up quicker than you think.


Hope everyone is well (and hope your face is healing Beanielou)

Hiddenidenity

Love an update when its all positive (Apart from the tooth, hope it isn't too painful x)

beanielou

All sounding good & positive

Feeling more like myself apart from the concussion.
Face healing nicely but nose still sore.

girlatplay

It feels like far longer than a month since I last popped in here. What a month it has been though.


I have paid out quite a lot - car insurance, MOT (£225 inc MOT), balance of the crown, etc. Feels like I've never had my hand out of my pocket this month.


The biggest payment of all though is something major that I have to report. I had been dabbling in stocks and shares, just small time stuff. I had been paying into a stocks and shares ISA a little bit at a time, telling myself that I wouldn't pay in more than I could afford to lose. I'm a bit risk-averse so even though the funds were building up, I knew that I wasn't leaving myself short every month. If everything crashed and burned then I'd be disappointed but I wouldn't have put every last penny in.


Anyway, in a moment of madness I decided to empty the ISA and pay it off the loan. I had made £500 on the funds in there so I wasn't losing anything in that respect. I scraped together as much as I could from various places (had £1.3k in a holiday fund account) and now the loan is down to £770!


On 1st November the loan will be gone.


I will have paid back just over £21k in 2.5 years.


We have £300 in the rainy day fund, £160 in the grocery budget and I have £70 to play with for the month (which usually ends up being spent on groceries). That is all the money we have in the world (which is massive compared to some people). If anything goes wrong in the next few months before I get a chance to build up the rainy day pot again then I'll be crying to the bank of mum and dad. At least I have that as a last resort if we were going under but obviously I want to do everything myself. I've not asked for help in 10 years so don't want to start again now.


I've joined a FB group for saving money on meals and it is excellent so I'm planning to keep my head down and make the money stretch as far as possible for the next couple of months.


The only big thing I have going on is LMG's birthday in mid October. She is going to be 17 and wants driving lessons (my biggest nightmare - teenagers driving). I have been putting money away over the year towards her birthday (as always) so I have enough to buy her a few lessons.


I've put away a little bit for Christmas too so that should be fine when it arrives (sorry, I know it's September but I have to be realistic about these things).


I think that's it for this month. That really is quite enough of me blethering on anyway.


Hope all is well with everyone else

beanielou

Blimey.
That is just awesome
Go you