Getting a mortgage and then becoming mortgage-free!

Kittenkirst

It's Friday :j today has felt like a long old week getting back to work and the routine!

Sleeps still a bit of an issue- I was up north yesterday so up and out of the house at 6am and home for 7.30pm. Asleep on the sofa by 8.30pm :rotfl:

Popped into Pets at Home as we had a voucher for a free small bag of cat food (400g) and picked up some dreamies treats as it seems like our cat sitters were rather generous with them :rotfl:

Doing a volunteering day today but starts at 10.30am so a bit of a lie in this morning and now relaxing with a cuppa.

Gf had saved all her John Lewis vouchers from work until they stopped doing them so she said a few months back we'd get the new apple watches with the vouchers when they came out. Soooo we've ordered them for collection tomorrow and will take advantage of the free cuppa and cake whilst there it will cost me £100 which is the difference in her vouchers, and I think worthwhile as I managed to crack my Fitbit screen when snorkelling in Oz (:mad:) so that's coming out of my fun money spends for this quarter.

Shopmium money received and also referral money so those four fish fillets and primula were all free as the grocery budget is looking good (we don't need any shopping for this/next week still) so overpaid the £4.50.

The £3 old pinecone money cleared this morning so that's also been overpaid- small steps means we are now at £25.22 so far with our monthly OP planned for Monday- planned for half the usual amount due to the holiday so £175 budgeted

This week has slipped with silly spends at work canteen and not as good planning as usual- so the focus for next week is no silly coffee spends at work and packing full lunches. Time to get back to normality and routine fully and no frittering of silly monies!

chumpy45

Hi KK, just catching up after a bit of a long absence. Sounds like all going great guns with you. Holiday sounds fabulous. Well done on all your achievements x

Kittenkirst

Thanks Chumpy, holiday was a dream and so glad we did it next year will be a much cheaper holiday probably to see family who live abroad (Dubai or New York are being debated but we'll look in the New Year)

So much for not needing grocery shop- we did the volunteering day which was very wet but great fun- I love just getting stuck in but am a bit of a bossy pants so people kept asking me what to do etc...I happily obliged with getting us all organised and having different jobs

After volunteering we nipped to Asda to take advantage of the iams deal on Shopmium- should have spent £9.60 with £4.8 cashback which we were doing twice. I ended up spending £12 as picked up a few Halloween bits and then £23 on the joint card as we also picked up other bits and bobs- bread, fish for the Shopmium cashback (so £3 will come back) and some other stuff

We need to pop to Tesco/Aldi this morning for coffee whitener for gf and some pastry- planning to make chicken pie tonight with the leftover chicken breast, mushrooms and some nice cabbage in the freezer. We'll use filo and make a nice lighter sauce from lean in 15. Fingers crossed we manage to stick to the plan! £18 left in the joint account after fridays groceries so that should limit our spends somewhat!!

A really lovely thing happened on Friday, on the lunch break from volunteering we popped into my old student union as it's next door and they have a great canteen. I went to Starbucks as have some funds on the Starbucks card from before holiday. Ordered my pumpkin latte and then found that they don't accept the Starbucks card in there. I was a bit mortified as had left wallet with gf so said I'd have to leave the coffee. The manageress noticed, apologised that they don't accept the app and said 'have this one on us' :A

That free pumpkin latte was a godsend as I was pretty soaked through from the volunteering. Nice touch from Starbucks really!

Lots of cleaning yesterday and we've finished the holiday washing so that's now all folded and under the (ottoman bed) in tubs ready for next summer. We also both pulled out lots of clothes for charity/eBay.
Gf wasn't keen on eBaying but I've said if she gives me 8 weeks anything not sold can go to charity then before Christmas....so my next plan is to have a rummage and pull out the autumn winter stuff to get listed first, then move onto the rest...setting myself a challenge of £50 profit from the stuffs as a way to focus the mind. Will get cracking on it this week!!

Watching Killing Eve which is very addictive- we've got a nice cuppa each and a blanket and kitten on our respective sofas (heating off as it's raining but quite mild and we have the blankets out!) happy Sunday!

Hazelnutty

Great update KK and good to hear about free Starbucks!

I've been wondering about how long to leave items for sale before charity shopping too. I really want to storage room clear and set up for people (and kittens) to use before Christmas, so I think I may go mid-November for the cut-off. Hope your fleabaying goes well

Kittenkirst

Today's little shop was certainly better- £7.25 spent on coffee mate (light), skimmed milk (for my coffee ), 30% reduced fat puff pastry (it was 98p less as on offer!) & Bramley apples (we have a few eating apples I will whack in the crumble too)

Made the pie using the chicken, mushrooms & onions bought last weekend and the pastry bought today. Stirred in a nice amount of frozen sage and a nice big spoon of English mustard. Pie was delicious and another two portions for the fridge/freezer. Had it with nice Savoy cabbage (also last weekends shop) :heartpuls

Think we're having scrambled eggs on toast for supper followed by the homemade crumble ...:rotfl: drrrrrooooool crumble!!

Hazelnutty

That pie sounds lush! Scrambled eggs followed by crumble sounds lovely. We had a late lunch here as no-one was hungry. Batch-cooked root veg soup for us and pasta and prawns for the sprog. Although it's shepherd's pie on the menu tonight I'm not sure any of us will want it so probably going for tea and cookies instead (currently being baked by OH) Quality parenting right there.

Kittenkirst

Hazelnutty wrote: »

That pie sounds lush! Scrambled eggs followed by crumble sounds lovely. We had a late lunch here as no-one was hungry. Batch-cooked root veg soup for us and pasta and prawns for the sprog. Although it's shepherd's pie on the menu tonight I'm not sure any of us will want it so probably going for tea and cookies instead (currently being baked by OH) Quality parenting right there.

You can adopt me!! (It's normal to adopt an adult, right?!)

Homemade cookies for Sunday supper sounds just heavenly especially in the lovely dark autumnal evenings :heartpuls

Kittenkirst

It's payday!!!!

Initial money shuffles conpleted- we've each sent our bills money to the joint account, the kittens saving fund has been paid (£40 every month) and the monthly overpayment sent.

We planned £175 this month but checking my number s it looked like if I upped it to £186.80 the balance would be a nice £154,800 after the monthly payment comes out on the 20th....so a nice £186.80 overpaid this morning.

We worked out the holiday spends on both cards last night- including all of the planned expenses (hotels we couldn't pay before, car hires etc) we spent in total £2400 on the credit cards. We took £2k in cash with us and spent £2000 before on flights and the things we we could pre pay for. Total holiday sat at £6400 all in for two of us for the 3.5 weeks in Singapore and Australia visiting the Grand Prix and doing the East Coast trail. I'm prettty pleased with that and we should have paid the credit cards back by next months payday (without using savings) :cool:

Totally worth it for a once in a lifetime holiday, back to normality.

Spent a lot of time cleaning this weekend and really enjoyed it- I quite love cleaning and tidying the house. I'm really proud that it's our house that we're paying for and own a nice portion already with plans underway to own it all soon (well sooner than the bank want!) :rotfl:

Kittenkirst

Forgot to note: usual payments went out as follows

£25 to lifetime ISA fund
£50 to company SIP
£50 to company share scheme 5 year plan
£150 to company share scheme 3 year plan
£100 onto my PURE voucher card (for high street shops- saving for Christmas gifts!)

£157.50 my pension contribution, £257.50 company contribution

I've seen Quidco are offering a nice cashback of £130 for a £10 a month ISA so going to check that out on my lunch break today. Working from home so just made breakfast- avocado with two poached eggs on seeded toast. Yum! Time for another cuppa and then back to the laptop!

Kittenkirst

Hola mfw's
This week has felt long at work but I've finally got back into the gym tonight and managed to cross train at home yesterday so baby steps back into the routine.

Been in the office the past two days and have managed to stick to my packed lunch but have succumbed to crisps, pop and a few coffees. An improvement on last week but still leaves room for improvement!

Surveys have been alright this week- prolific is at £8.67, one poll is £7.10 and yougov is £15.65. The last two will take a fair while to reach payout but prolific I'm aiming for £15 by month end to overpay on the mortgage.

Picked up some Shopmium offers- some hazelnut coffee milk with £1.50 cash back, the Harrington's cat food (4 bags and one that I put in the animal charity bin at Tesco), a Bol Thai curry pot which I had for lunch today (delicious) with £1.50 cash back.

Now snuggled with Oscar watching the apprentice with the blankets out to save on the heating! Dinner is leftovers from gfs mum and some bacon that's today for its best before- yum!!