Friday 27th November - What small DFW things will you do today?

crazy_cat_lady

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:

crazy_cat_lady

Morning all
Today will be mostly sponsored by ibuprofen - I've woken up with a very fuzzy head indeed. I know it's just tiredness and I feel ok overall, but I'm not getting into the whole feeling-like-rubbish thing today.
Another busy day on - I am hosting an 'at home' party tonight for a friend of mine. You would not believe how nervous I am - it's so far out of my comfort zone it's untrue. I have a really dry sense of humour and am self deprecating so I hardly come across as the picture of a perfect salesperson. :eek::rotfl:
Anyway - here's today's list
check banking (come on payday!)
minimise heating use
aim for nsd
all meals from stores
no getting involved in Black Friday (easy as I have less than a tenner to my name)
do not get stressed over things I have no control over
get ds to football training
get myself to party to be hostess with the mostess
mark at least 2 sets of exam papers (urgent)
use my free time at work productively
I will be really busy - not sure if I'll even have time to get on here to update tonight but I'm going to try my best.

foxgloves

Morning Early Bird,
Well today is my Big Budget Day, so I won't be posting anything else until I've dealt with All Matters Financial. Off to get breakfast & coffee & prepare to shut myself away in my HQ with my trusty calculator & overflowing inbox. May be back later.
F x

Bobarella

Morning

Good luck with your at home party CCL and hope you have a good big budget day Foxgloves.

Bit of a night of it with madam she seems to have got her day and night mixed up yesterday. Good job she's so cute.

Off for all the coffee!

Bob

La_escocesa

Hi ladies :hello: and big hellos to all who follow :hello:

I'm off work today but just realised I need to log in as I forgot to do my timesheet Needs to be done before the end of the week as they won't be able to bill the clients otherwise and the powers that be will not be happy about that...

Got an exciting weekend away at mum's this weekend - sister's bday and meeting up with some other friends. V excited for it. For sis's bday M&D are paying for us to go to a spa hotel overnight so that is my little bit of luxury this weekend. :cool:

CCL - Looking forward to hearing how the party goes! You might surprise yourself and just love it
Foxy - Please come here and do my big budgets - you are a budget superstar! :A
Bob - Ah, bless little madam - take it easy on yourself and see if you can have an extra snooze or two throughout the day.
CLF - from yesterday - I am so with you on the limiting negativity! There's just no need for it all. I'm a big fan of the Secret and really do believe that what you focus on expands.

Here's me:
Petrol fill up at cheap petrol station - although my car is telling me that it can do circa 100 miles less on this tank so thinking this is a false economy...
Cheapo porridge brekkie
Lunch - going somewhere with lunchtime £9.95 deal and driving so won't be drinking (not that I always drink on lunch but today is a special occasion )
Dinner at the parentals and night in with them

Dare I say I will call n p0wer... I keep putting it on my list but haven't been able to face it yet!

I've also not done any voluntary work that I was going to do yesterday... Tut tut.

Happy Friday! :beer:

La_escocesa

Random Q but can anyone see my avatar? It looks like it's set up but whenever I post it still shows me as the blue and white person image...

determined_new_ms

Thanks for the kick off CCL! Thank goodness we live in an age of pharmaceuticals! Good luck with the party.

You are so disciplined foxgloves!

Bob that's what I used to say about dgd for the first forever! She wasn't a good sleeper probably until about just before 2 (sorry if that bums you out!) She got up at 4 am for the longest time. But now at 2 1/2 she's a great sleeper. Goes down at 7.30 wakes 7-7.30, until she was ill recently she never woke up in the night and she only did it for 3 days while she was poorly.

CCL I just wanted to respond to your comment yesterday about behaviour management in school because it really is something close to my heart. My dd became ill at 12 with the onset of puberty, but this disorder if developed in teenage years presents as real teenage rebellion - absconding from school, running away from home, stealing, unsafe behaviour (alcohol, drugs, opposite sex) but in the extreme. I didn't know how to cope with it so turned to professionals for help - school and the SS. I was told it was rebellion and to put in firmer boundaries. This gave it a very different slant in my mind to someone who was ill. I thought she was destroying our family on purpose so how I dealt with it was very different to how I would have if someone had explored the possibility if her being ill. I feel so passionately about it I would like to develop a talk to give to schools/professionals about how this disorder presents in teenage years and what works and what doesn't.

Yes that very difficult child might just be going through teenage rebellion but it may actually be the beginning of something much more serious and the child and the family need a lot of support.

determined_new_ms

La_escocesa wrote: »

Random Q but can anyone see my avatar? It looks like it's set up but whenever I post it still shows me as the blue and white person image...

I don't really understand what you mean La E but I did notice you had a new avatar it's like a heart thing

La_escocesa

determined_new_ms wrote: »

I don't really understand what you mean La E but I did notice you had a new avatar it's like a heart thing

Ah - that's what I meant - I can't see the heart thing just the standard picture that they give you if you don't have an avatar... Hmmm. I think it's a bug in the new-look forum...

BTW - I'm so sorry to hear about your DD I just caught up with yesterday's thread. That's so awful. Foxgloves is right about the letter - it's so dangerous to send a girl on her own off a train and walking through the town alone!! It's really awful for anyone to be ridiculed in public but especially if MH problems mean you can't cope with the situation. MH problems just aren't understood at all.
It reminded me of something that happened to me years ago (although not even half as bad) - I got on the train (on the days when you bought a ticket from the train) and before the train set off I realised I didn't have my purse. I ran to get off the train but before I could the doors closed and it set off... Queue the ticket man... When I told him what happened he started with his 'likely story' etc and being really loud and embarrassing me - is this part of their training?!! I was mortified. The woman next to me saw what was happening and then asked everyone else sitting next to us to chip in 50p and buy me a ticket as she knew it was a genuine mistake!! I just cried the whole way to town. It's such an awful feeling.
:grouphug:
xxx

princess_pea

Morning all, thanks for starting CCL - I'm sure your party will be fabulous tonight!


DNMS - so sorry to hear of the awful experience your DD had yesterday - some people are absolute pigs and I would definitely complain to the train company.


Well today is pay day and I've already checked banking and moved some money around. I'm now only 4% away of paying off my debt and becoming debt free! I say debt free, I haven't included my student loan in any of my calculations so far. Does anyone else consider this as a debt I should be overpaying? I've read Martin's advice and that I'd be better off putting money into a high interest rate savings account but it is a bit unsettling to think I have this additional debt in my name. My goal for the short-term is to pay for the wedding without taking out credit to pay for it. My medium-term goal is to save £12k for a mortgage deposit. Should I also be overpaying the student loan or concentrating on these two goals?


Planning on a NSD today. Tomorrow I have to go into town to pick two Christmas presents on my list and we'll also need to do a food shop at Aldi. Will decide tonight what we're going to batch cook for this month!


All meals from stores, soup for lunch and chilli for tea


I might stay a bit later at work tonight and wrap OH Christmas presents which are being stored here to avoid snooping!


FPL and surveys to do (slipping behind with surveys again)


Another busy day at work today so I hope that means it'll go quickly!


Have a fab day everyone

DawnW

Morning all
Thanks for the start CCL - hope you enjoy the party (I think it is brave of you, it wouldn't be for me :eek:)
Hope you have a nice spa weekend La E
Good luck with the budgeting Foxgloves - you are very disciplined :eek:

DNMS, I know what you mean about teenage rebellion /MH problems. My elder DD was similar, running away, refusing to go to school, risky behaviours etc. I could see she was unhappy, but in my ignorance didn't think of getting advice etc. Though she is 40 next month and I am not sure what help would have been available (?) The school were very unhelpful, and I dealt with it (or not ) by simply trying to support her, and in doing so, probably let her get away with murder much of the time I know what you mean by it feeling as though it is destroying your family, and it was all the more difficult living in a very small and judgemental seeming community

She improved as she got older, and no longer has the ongoing problems that your DD has, but she does have an odd outlook and way of dealing with things. I worry about her little DDs a bit, although she is a very good mum, they live in quite an isolated situation, and she is very controlling and doesn't often let them mix with the other kids outside of school time. Their behaviour is already quite problematic, but I am hoping this is just a phase :eek: DD probably thinks I was too lax and she got into bad company, which is quite possibly the case, but you just do what you can at the time, don't you. I was so scared of her running away permanently, being taken into care or getting onto hard drugs that I did let lots of things go by the board just to keep some kind of rapport with her. I remember it as a truly horrible time, and you have my sympathy

Anyway, OH arrived home at 5 am with a bad cold (where is that roll eyes smilie we used to have when you need it?)

Today's list:
Dog walks x 2 Done
Meals from stores, absolutely no food shopping today! No food spends
I was thinking of perhaps doing a bit of Christmas / birthday present shopping in the little shops in town. We don't get Black Friday here though :rotfl: (is it today? I got very confused as I got emails about it on Monday and Tuesday....) Either way, I shan't be going to a shopping centre to fight for a big telly :rotfl: Well, I ran out of steam in town after going to the bank, the post office to queue to post postal survey items :mad: and several other errands so didn't do any Xmas shopping - but I did accidentally get a Black Friday reduction I ordered a hoodie online for GS1, and got 20% off :rotfl: Well, I wasn't going to say no!
Pay a cheque in at the bank Done
Sort out some bigger items for my sales unit, as a couple have sold and it looks a bit bare and bitty if that makes sense Done
Washing, as OH has brought a load back with him It is in the machine now
A few surveys and checked the FPL

Quite a lazy day today, as I didn't sleep particularly well last night. Won't tonight either, as I am heading for the spare room as I would be unlikely to get any sleep at all with OH's cold, grrr

I am sure there is more, so will pop back later to update. Better get on with that first dog walk!