A treehouse for the twins

PrincessLou

Rainy day today with some breaks of sunshine. Went to a woodland park with DH and boys to catch some Pokemon I don't play myself but DH and DS2 are very into it at the moment. Although I did help collect Poke balls from every Poke stop we passed on the drive there. Team effort and all that! See, I do have my uses...

Made a curry for dinner - Jalfrezi sauce with mushrooms, value prawns, value rice, YS bahjis and YS naan bread. :j

Weather looks a bit better for tomorrow so may head out in the afternoon. Must get some Ebaying done though...at least the first five items on my list.

Hope everyone has had a super Saturday! :j

A_Frayed_Knot

Hi PL You were asking about offers from the bay. Just received one tonight, 25% off FVF on 100 listings between 24th and 28th Aug :j:j Check your bay messages

PrincessLou

Thanks AFK, I saw the message and listed a few items (although not as many as I was planning to do!!). Glad the offers are back - feel like they are a real incentive to list more. Ebay has been really quiet for me this month, however I did sell some jeans on Wednesday that were brand new with tags. :j

Made enchiladas tonight and having another shop delivered tomorrow morning. Received a £10 voucher from Mr M because there were 18 items sustituted in the previous shop! :eek:

Last weekend was our 5 year wedding anniversary (although we've been together for 13 years!). First night away from the boys too, as we left them creating havoc at their grandparent's house . Was absolutely wonderful to just think about myself for once and relax. 24 hours away seemed like a week's holiday

Mortgage currently stands at £113, 745.

Payday today and I have created a budget for September. Will OP £245 to round the outstanding balance down to the nearest 500. I did have another £500 spare but Christmas has started to creep into my mind....so may keep that aside for that.

Sat with my feet up watching First Dates on catch-up

PrincessLou

Gosh, what an awful day weather-wise! It seems so unfair that it can be lovely weather during the week and then as soon as the weekend comes and DH is home, it turns rainy and cold

Made the most of it nonetheless; lots of playing, puzzles, dvds and fun with the boys

I made subway-style sandwiches for lunch. We had previously fallen into the bad habit of treating ourselves to a shop-bought one each weekend, coming in at £10 I bought all the ingredients of my much-loved BMT sub-sandwich and worked out that doing it that way must have cost us around £1 per person. :j Got lots of ingredients left over to make more tomorrow! Happy days!

DH had a good tidy of the [STRIKE]junk room[/STRIKE] home office/computer room. We sorted two carrier bags out of things to take to the charity shop and tagged the bags to receive the nectar points from Oxfam.

Now catching up with MSE diaries and watching Netfix

PrincessLou

Another rainy day but a lovely day spent as a family regardless.

DH announced mid-morning that he would like to cook a meal this evening Although a very enthusiastic cook, DH has not cooked a meal since we have lived in this house (4 years now) :rotfl: We did end up going to Mr M for some extra ingredients but found a large pack of posh sausages for 83p which we will have for dinner tomorrow. :j

Had a fantastic offer from the bay of E this morning - 50% off final value fees! I promptly announced to DH that I would be listing 100 items over the next few days I've made an enthusiastic start but hmm....we'll see if I can find 100 things to list!

The boys start preschool in a week :eek: I think I am still in denial.... :(:(:(
Anyway, I need to order some iron-on name tags for their clothes. If anyone knows where the best place is for this, please let me know, because apparently the quality varies enormously.

PrincessLou

Been thinking lately of giving the house a bit of a cosmetic makeover. When we moved in nothing needed doing and the bathroom and kitchen had recently been replaced. We moved in four years ago and four years and two little boys later, the house is feeling tired to say the least. Considering we will most likely move in the next 2-3 years, I'm wondering how much to spend and how much work to do.

Projects I'm wanting to do include:

- New carpets for upstairs (3 beds, hall and stairs)
- Regrouting the bathroom to make it look like new again.
- Painting the living room
- Giving the boys' room a complete makeover (they still have their original nursery decoration)
- Turning the home office/computer room upstairs into a toy storage room/playroom
- New front door
- Taking 1970s fireplace and stone surround out
- New flooring in living room
- Buying a couple of new furniture pieces for the living room

....tell me honestly, does this sound too much? The budget would be £2-3000 maximum. :A

In other MFW news....just sold a cracked, non-working tablet on ebay for £40...crazy!

tattycath

Ive just been catching up with your diary. Thanks for the heads up re. The bay. I've just checked mine. I've been offered only pay fees this month if my listings sell. It seems to be for up to 100 listings. I really need to get on with this.
Well done on selling your tablet. :T

PrincessLou

Thanks Cath Nice to know somebody is reading...sometimes it feels like I'm just talking to myself.

Groceries being delivered tomorrow morning. Paid for it using Mr M's more points vouchers, so a completely free shop for this week. Should have enough meals now until the 20th when my budget starts again for the next month. The only thing left to pay for is around £15 worth of buffet food for Saturday when we're having some family over. Everyone is bringing something though, so that will help out alot.

In the general spends category, we have to buy new car seats for the boys :eek: but I have done some price comparison and cashback research and think I've found the best deal.

PrincessLou

What a wonderful week it has been. My twins started pre-school for five mornings a week and are loving it. A few posts ago, I wrote that i was dreading sending them but it has been doing them the world of good. They seem so grown up all of a sudden and I've been feeling very proud.

I set us the challenge of not spending any money on groceries until tomorrow and using up food from the cupboard and freezer. I think it must be psychological but I feel starving hungry and have been craving all sorts of things that I never usually buy Yet when my cupboards are crammed full after a grocery shop I barely eat anything...go figure that one out

Looking for a new mortgage rate at the moment and need to switch tomorrow when DH and I have time to sit down and discuss.

Decided that Sky is getting too expensive (currently paying £68 per month and it seems to be rising all the time :eek:), particularly as I realised that [STRIKE]all[/STRIKE] most of the shows we watch would be available on freeview.

PrincessLou

New rate applied for - 1.79% over 2 years - this will start on 31st October. There were slightly cheaper rates available but they had much higher fees. Compared it all on a calculator and this worked out the best deal for us. New payment will be £456 a month. Crazy to think when we bought our house four years ago we were paying nearly two hundred pounds more. :j My sister has just bought a new house and although we do want to upsize in a few years, I definitely do not envy her £1500 payment :eek: Makes me think that paying off alot more equity before we move will put us in a (hopefully) much better position.

Grocery shopping delivered yesterday evening. Cupboards and freezer crammed full.

E*bay offers a back - £1 maximum final fees. This is their best offer but it finishes today and I'm not sure what else I have to list. We have so much to sell but nothing accessible that wouldn't mean delving into the deepest darkest depths of the loft or garage. :eek: