Drip feeding...

wildesavings

Tillytidy of 20p.

SAVED a fortune by dodging the local fete today which with 3 children would be 2 hours entertainment for around £40 and they'd all feel like I was being mean and not allowing them enough rides/goes on things. Instead I've dragged the giant paddling pool out and we'll fill that up (water meter a spinning but still less i'm sure lol).

Looking at recipes to start a large round of batch cooking to combat those tired evenings when we inevitably end up at the chip shop or ordering in... Family portion of chilli from yesterday went in the freezer and it's fed us for 2 days too. Last night with rice - tonight with jacket potatoes/wedges. Laid the freezer bags flat out, a tip i got online, so they're about A4 and thin so will defrost in record time should I not be quite organised enough to take it out in the morning

Poorlittletightgirl

Hi Wildesavings,

I think you probably did the right thing - my friend spent £100 at our local fete, with only 2 kids :eek: Also love the flat freezing, you can get more in the freezer too!

wildesavings

Poorlittletightgirl wrote: »

Hi Wildesavings,

I think you probably did the right thing - my friend spent £100 at our local fete, with only 2 kids :eek: Also love the flat freezing, you can get more in the freezer too!

You're probably right! Someone on the FB page has had a moan that everything is vastly expensive. Bouncy castles £5 for 10 minutes, trampolines £5 each etc throw in an icecream and my £40 would've lasted about 20 mins between us all :eek:

Cut up the last of the apples from the tree and eldest daughter made spiced apple muffins, whilst I made a final few jars of nectarine chutney so Christmas cold cuts and cheese board condiments all now totally covered and homemade to boot :cool: Neighbour's children hopped over the fence and there's been whooping, laughter and cheering in the garden pool all morning and borrowed children complained when their mother collected them to take them to the fete and mine made no mention of it. :T:T:T:T

Downshifterella

Never heard of flat freezing before but great plan must get into that one!!

Well done avoiding the fete with littles , fun sometimes but can end up so so expensive!! :eek:
Bet they had just as much fun in the pool!

Love the Christmas prep going on! Chutney making next in my list here once I have the bits sorted out! X

wildesavings

Thanks Downshifter, Love a bit of long term Christmas Prep plus it makes it look like I've gone to tonnes of effort on the day when the effort was all months ago

Big old week shop today, £68, which has left me with a £5 to my name for 2 days. BUT it included large beef joint for cutting up and making Stifado, 3 days food and a litre of Gin as I'm about to get a bowl of sloe berries from a neighbour's garden. I cannot stress just how under my normal spending this is. I tend to spend £130 a week for food plus top ups so I'm utterly polishing my halo with this. I'm hoping that it becomes my new norm and this in turn frees up some money to throw at the mortgage.

Hubby still isn't happy about moving money from savings to over pay mortgage yet so and it has to be a joint decision. So I'll just continue chipping away doing my thing and I'm excited to see if I'll make any difference.

I sat down and worked out that IF we want this mortgage gone in 8 years that gives us 100 payments to do it in.... Those payments would need to average £1050 a month.. We already pay £800 by direct debit which includes a healthy £300 overpayment each month.

So just £250 per month for me to squeeze out of our already tight finances... I may need to get creative

Downshifterella

Well done on reducing food spends, I honestly think that's been the biggest saver attitude.es for us (as well as the one where money creeps up as soon as I take my eye off the ball! )

Do you have Ald*/L*DL near you? Can get some great bargains there. Lots of value products too are just as good as more expensive, is just hit and miss I find, finding the right ones!

Absolutely with you re Xmas, I'm starting g to think of some of the homemade gifts we can get going with..... Thinking jams, chutneys and perhaps some elderberry gin or wine (* goes off to Google recipies)

Good luck with your goals I'm sure you will smash them!! Xx

wildesavings

Told OH. again, that we need to attempt to claim PPI which he's been very very skeptical about but my dad had £6500 land in his account a few days ago from a claim and that got his attention. We've only ever had one CC so not expecting much from that BUT I know we've had it on our mortgage for 12 years so I'm hoping there might be a chunk coming our way. So I've done that this morning as we're having a quiet day here today.

Mr WS is on nights sleeping, it's wet and raining and we're going to town this afternoon for coffee with a friend. So girls are having an at home cinema experience. Beauty and the beast, popcorn buckets filled with homemade popcorn etc. They'll all be cranky once it's done but at this phase of the holidays I'm willing to gamble it to just get some peace for an hour or 2

Had an email from the nursery DD#3 has just left and we'd overpayed in vouchers so they're repaying us by BAC in the next few days. I think it's under £20 as I very rarely overpay anything so I gave them the Overpayment AC number We hadn't missed it so off the mortgage it can go.

NSD yesterday so no tilly tidying to do

wildesavings

Thanks to the people who've noted their A sd a price guarantee vouchers I googled and did the same today. So vouchers for 92p and £2.69 to come off my next shop ! Excellent!
:beer:

Cashed in our copper jar whilst up town yesterday and £16 to add into the OP A/C - which now stands at 17.21.

Also applied for the M + S credit card - only want it for the £55 vouchers that'll be 2 Christmas presents covered.
:money:

All in all a very MSE morning

Busy_Mee1

Hi Wildsavings spotted you had a diary and thought I would have a nosy. You are doing really well and making terrific progress. I spotted the M&S CC deal and thought it would be worth doing for the £55 vouchers for Christmas too. I will have to persuade Mr Mee to do it though because I already have one !

wildesavings

Ah thanks for popping in Busy Mee1 - Today's the last day for the offer so get in quick.

It's hard to feel the progress when you're living it but I'm hoping the extra effort I'm putting in will begin to gather pace over the next few months. With our mortgage on a tracker rate of BBR+1% I don't want to waste the opportunity to make a massive dent in it even whilst money is really quite tight for us. I'm hoping that it'll pay dividends for the future too.

September Target

Starting balance £92459
Monthly interest £92.46
Monthly payment £501
Target £91440
Paid off capital this year to date : £4382
Target amount to pay this month £1111
:eek::eek::eek::eek::eek:

That really doesn't look or sound achievable to me at all :(:( But even if I don't hit it every month I'm hopeful that the long game of averages will even it out. There may be scope to pay the odd lump sum off in the future which will be great.. I just need to be patient.