BK & Husbandface diary

Newlywed_Saving_Ninja

Damnit, the gift for my friend's daughter won't be posted to me until Monday, sigh!

Also, just realised I forgot to get Yorkshire Tea in the shopping, so I am now on the hunt for the cheapest deal for these!

Newlywed_Saving_Ninja

I keep thinking of things to say!

So today I remembered I had a little cashback in my topcashback account. £17.32. Which is great. EXCEPT. When I went to draw it out, topcashback have took £5 of it and paid me the remaining £12.32, sigh. Apparently they put me in some cashbackplus thing that costs £5 a year, I didn't ask for this, so I am annoyed. But at least I have £12.32 towards the debt.

Also, we have almost £30 in nectar points, which will pay for a lot of our Christmas shop (we don't go overboard, so it will cover some nice meat, cheese, desserts etc. We don't buy a lot of sweets, chocolate etc). We also have a £5 match and more voucher for Morrisons which we are saving for Christmas, so that will go towards the Christmas grocery shop too. I also save points with the Daily Mail (my friend gives me the code each day), and we will have enough by December to trade in for £20ish of Sainsbury's or Waitrose vouchers, which will again go towards some nice treats in our Christmas Grocery shop. We don't need any wine as we already have lots leftover from last Christmas.

Oh, and I have discovered the cheapest place for my beloved Yorkshire Teabags is Asda, £3 for a box of 240. I don't think that is an offer either, so looks like I will be getting them from Asda in future!

LittleMissDetermined

Good to see another Yorkshire Tea fan! Love a good brew...

I wanted to wish you all the best on your debt free journey, I'm sure that with the MSE support you will be debt free in no time, despite what your car may throw at you!

LMD x

Newlywed_Saving_Ninja

LittleMissDetermined wrote: »

Good to see another Yorkshire Tea fan! Love a good brew...

I wanted to wish you all the best on your debt free journey, I'm sure that with the MSE support you will be debt free in no time, despite what your car may throw at you!

LMD x

Ah, a fellow Yorkshire Tea lover, we are going to get along just fine LittleMiss!!!

Thanks for your good wishes, I really hope we have a little good luck thrown our way while working hard towards clearing our debt! Most of it will be hard work, but hopefully we will get a few little lucky things thrown our way too!!!

I now know what the roadkill challenge, and wombling is (we actually womble a bit already, just didn't know it had a name!!!), so we will be partaking a bit more in that!!

LittleMissDetermined

Maybe try the Payment A Day challenge and start PADding?

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5227381

So addictive!

Newlywed_Saving_Ninja

Thanks LittleMiss, I will take a look.

I also have between £20 and £30 towards the debt from some things I sold on fb selling pages over the last few weeks. So I will get that paid in the bank on Monday and then paid off the Nationwide CC.

Paige

I'm a Yorkshire Tea Bag fan also. Have tried cheaper options but they just don't hit the spot.
Sorry you've not had a good week Newlywed. Hopefully a better one next week. Its so annoying when you get repair bills and those family parties you cant get out of. I have to admit to hate spending money on people I don't hardly see as well as spending a fortune on drinks while I'm there. This is especially bad as I feel I would rather pay off the debts or go out with my husband if I could.
Onwards and upwards for next week x

ShouldaWouldaCoulda

Hi, just wanted to wish you luck! look forward to following your progress x

Newlywed_Saving_Ninja

Thanks Shouldawouldacoulda

Yorkshire Tea rocks Paige, you have excellent taste! We are looking in to cutting our grocery bills, but I am afraid Yorkshire Tea is something I won't compromise on!!

I know what you mean about preferring to spend the money on other things. We had a great time at the party though, lots of laughs, so the spends were worth it. HF got rather drunk, I was driving so totally sober!, it was amusing to see HF and his two brothers all drunk at the same time, it rarely happens as one of them is usually driving etc. The band were fab too, a bit like the commitments so right up my street (I am a bit of an old soul and love all the old music).

So that is the spends more or less done now in terms of nights out. We do have a lot of nights out ahead, but they are all paid for already as we bought the tickets for them ages ago. I think these nights out are going to be great for us, as we will be able to pull in the purse strings while still having some nice things to look forward to, it will keep us motivated. Full list below of future nights out, just putting it here for me to look at for any future moments where I am feeling a bit down/unmotivated.

31 Oct 15 - Warner Bros Studio Tour (Halloween thing with HF)
28 Nov 15 - Agatha Christie play "And then there were none"
27 Dec 15 - Warner Bros Studio Tour (Christmas trip with girls)
25 Mar 16 - Flavia and Vincent - The Last Tango
9 Apr 16 - An evening with Ian Waite and Camilla Dallerup

We also have our lovely friends coming to stay with us for New Year, so really looking forward to that.

I just want payday to arrive now (Wednesday), so I can pay off my Nationwide CC and Halifax CC, and get them closed. Once this is done, for the first time in my adult life I will be credit card debt free. It is frightening to think that for over half my life I have been in credit card debt!!! Never again!!!

I am also looking forward to finishing off my Christmas shopping. I am having a few things made for people, so need to get those orders in Wednesday, as a lot of crafters close their order books early in order to fulfil all Christmas orders. Some things I won't be able to buy for Christmas (as they haven't told us what they want yet), but I am going to draw out the money and put aside in an envelope so that at least the spends are set aside, and I don't need to find any money from November payday towards Christmas presents.

We have forgotten a few spends this month, £19 to clear Very (I only opened Very account last month to take advantage of the Groupon offer so we could get some curtains for our huge living room window). As soon as Very is cleared I am closing it, it was just a way of getting cheap curtains for our new home. I also need to pay £39 for our paperbill (I have stopped deliveries today), it is quite big as I haven't paid it for a while. But both Very and the paperbill are one offs, so though it is a bit annoying, once they are paid, they will be done and forgotten about.

We should be able to start to save money towards early settling the Co-Op loan this month. We are really glad about this, to see a start in tackling paying off the loans will be great. We are worried about getting demotivated with this mission we have set, as when we pay the credit cards we will instantly see the drop in the amount of debt we have, but with saving up for the loans we won't see any drop until we have enough saved to early settle. Don't get me wrong we will stick with it and get there, I think it just gives you a psychological boost to see the amount of debt dropping. I hope I am making sense!!!

thegreenone

You sound very organised and I like the list of things to look forward too. I took my Mum to see Flavia and Vincent. Not my thing but they were amazing. Have a good time. Also if you see Anton du Beke and his dancing partner advertised - go, he is absolutely hilarious and she is his comedy foil. It's not just dancing but a real show.


As for Christmas, 42 people - OMG with Christmas bells on. Is there anything you can do, this year, to cut that down? Can you explain to friends (mostly), then relatives that you are in desperate need of a new car, yours has been condemned and you really have to reign in this year. Go for it. You say that you are buying birthday presents for a friend and her daughter. Do you, really, really, really have to? I know you want do but..... If she is a good friend she will understand.


Or, if there is no getting out of it - visit the card factory, buy 99p savings tins asap and start putting £1 per week into each for the young ones, particularly little ones who will get loads of toys anyway. It might encourage saving especially if the recipients go around the room on Christmas Day asking rellies to contribute!!!! I've done this for my sons this year for birthdays and Christmas. It has made a huge difference to finding large sums quickly.


Now I've rambled..... sorry!