Getting a mortgage and then becoming mortgage-free!

Kittenkirst

Managed to finally get the free 6 pack of baked walkers crisps this morning from Tesco's. I went earlier in the week but forgot my voucher and then couldn't find any of the mags for love nor money (the shop assistant said they'd taken them off the shop floor!!)

But today I had to nip in for some milk and some chicken for dinner so took my voucher. They only had the ready salted variety left but it's free and we'll eat it.

I obviously went at the right time as they had marked down so much meat stuffs it was unbelievable. Some of the reductions were pretty naff but I managed to get a whole chicken for £2.83 (will be frozen for a Sunday lunch), a pork loin for £1.97 (roast dinner again), chicken drumstick multipack for £1.25 which will be split up and frozen for casseroles etc and a 6 chicken breast pack for £4.03 which we needed for dinner tonight (will portion up and freeze rest).

Now it's autumn I love the Sunday roasts so is good to buy it when we spot it a bit cheaper than normal!

£12.23 spent on the groceries today- had planned it to be £5.75 on chicken, £2 on skimmed milk and then the free crisps, so spent an additional £5 but pleased we've got some extra freezer stuff although doesn't help with my freezer Tetris I have to play daily! :rotfl:

Cash back has cleared from the cat food and other buys earlier in the week which is great and has gone to the joint account and a little Tilly tidy of £2.75 to round down the joint account.

Hazelnutty

Strong work, KK! I need to work out when my local supermarket does its markdowns. 90% of our shopping is Aldi or Lidl but top up shops (bread, milk, kitty litter!) are often Sainsbury's or Tesco as they're near home or school. I do feel a little sorry for the people doing the markdowns though as often there's a whole hoard of bargain-hunters surrounding them, sometimes picking items from their box before they've even had a chance to price them up.

Kittenkirst

Hazelnutty our local Tesco is always like that on sundays or evenings when the mark down peoples come round, but this morning it was quiet as, it was just me and a little older lady perusing all the meats and having a chat about what to cook! She was buying lots of lamb mince for a suet pie and for meatballs for her hubbie! I was tempted by the lamb mince but it has quite a high fat content so we don't eat much of it!

We've taken to using Aldi and Lidl for weekly shop and Tesco's for any top ups, but now Lidl is next door to Aldi I should have gone there today but auto piloted to Tesco, but then I wanted to get the free crisps so it made sense. Will try a bit harder to get a good balance

Had free bacon today as gfs parents shop had some going out of date yesterday so we had some for dinner and I had some with toasted seeded loaf and the very wrinkly mushrooms. Had it alongside a packet of the free baked crisps. All Tasted delicious :T

Dinner tonight is chicken tacos using half pack of hard shell tacos from pantry, some of the ys chicken breast and those Mexican dips I got for 35p ys on Wednesday that still taste good

Kittenkirst

Finally set up a new regular saver with first direct- shifted the funds from the instant access account across for it and will do that for the first three months until I can save direct from my salary (was planning to start it in Feb but realised the instant access is earning a paltry interest so may as well start the regular saver sooner!)

A few more prolific surveys and one poll surveys this evening too- prolific has £9.12 cleared with another £2.90 pending. I'm quite hopeful I'll get to £15 by end of next week and overpay. £1 earned on one poll tonight. Slowly but surely!

Plans for the weekend are to go to yoga (not been since the holiday), the gym, and get 8 things onto eBay. Need to get the ball rolling and jump on the early Christmas gift buying train!

chumpy45

Sounds like everything is going well KK. Your posts always make me feel hungry. I am trying to get on top of food planning and reduce my weekly shop spend atm. It seems to be that fine balance between finding the time to allow you to save time and money lol. I am considering the FD reg saver too. Our last one finished about 3 months ago, and have been waiting for everything to settle down after the remortgage before I committed to it. Have a good weekend.

Kittenkirst

I'm probably going to make the hunger worse with today's post :rotfl:

We went to yoga this morning- first session since holiday. I did do a little yoga myself on the beach and in the gym on holiday but it's not the same as an intense hot class. Gf came too and enjoyed it, she hasn't been in 6 months but think she'll come again with me.

Anyways, after yoga gf decided she wanted a sausage and Stilton baguette but instead of eating out we could make it at home. As we were driving home we went to go past Morrison's so decided to try in there and we are glad we did.

We wandered past the ys fridge (although we didn't realise that was what it was!) and saw a lot of stuff so had a nose to see it was all 75% off...at 11.15am, the man doing the mark downs advised they were low on stickers so going straight for the 75% off rather than having to do further mark downs later in the day.

So we ended up picking up:
Thai green curry fresh chicken kit- 88p
Crispy Chinese beef- 62p
Moroccan chicken breasts (2)- 88p
Tandoori chicken breasts (2)- 88p
Healthy yogurt coleslaw- 25p
Panko Chicken katsu curry kit- 63p

We then continued with our shop and picked up a small baguette, pack of pork sausages, chillis and spuds.

We had to walk past the ys fridge to go get the spuds and the markdown man called over to us that he had high protein yogurts he was marking down (he had heard the conversation with the gf about whether I should get some high protein yogurt this week or start on porridge)....so I got a big tub of the honey area high protein Greek yogurt for 42p as well. Should be nice for dessert tonight and will last a few days for breakfasts I'm sure!

We spent £9.36 in the end taking us over the grocery budget but we have stashed loads in the freezer for the rest of the (payday) month

Now having a cuppa having played freezer Tetris with the new goodies and looking forward to dinner of the crispy beef and Thai chicken....much cheaper and probably bettter for us than the takeaway equivalent we keep tempting each other with!

Kittenkirst

2 items lited on eBay this afternoon to start at 8pm and one has a bid already

Plan is tomorrow to photo lots of stuff and get 6 more items at least listed- fingers crossed!!

Kittenkirst

Lots of items photo'd for eBay listing but no listings posted yet! However bids on both items posted on Saturday- one is at £22 already too which I'm surprised at!

Gf found out her quarterly bonus figure today which will be paid on the 15th, she told me she's planning to OP a nice little chunk of it so that's an unexpected OP. She's a good egg!!

Away with work tonight for an all day meeting up north so had a four hour drive here and then used the hotel Gym. Spent 1hour 20 in there maxing out the cardio equipment.

As I'm away with work I get £25 allowance for dinner. I didn't fancy anything off the room service menu so hopped in the car and went to Nando's. £18 later and I'm stuffed! Now in bed with sore legs and an overful tummy :rotfl:

Now time to read a few diaries then to crack on with my novel I got at Cairns airport- the newest Ian Rankin Rebus novel :heartpuls

Kittenkirst

Am back home and in the working week swing. Trip up north went well but was shattering- took 4.5 hours to drive home so am feeling pretty sluggish and tired still today.

I've managed to go to the gym though every day this week so far and feeling pretty good. Not sure whether to go tonight or to have a rest day.

Did a small shop yesterday- needed bread, milk, eggs, coffee but I made an error with the coffee. I bought it from Lidl but picked up what I thought was that fine instant espresso style but when I got home and made my cuppa I realised it's for an espresso machine....so I'm working from home today but without coffee! :eek: luckily I snaffled a few sachets from the hotel on Monday night so I've rationed these and going to have a cup this afternoon (I make it sound dramatic but I do have ground coffee for in the cafetière if I need to!)

Made a lovely veggie mince Bolognese with homemade potato wedges and some nice bread gf bought the day before (fancy pepper covered focaccia). I've just had one portion microwaved with spaghetti and the other half of the bread, with a little torn mozzarella and basil on top. Delicious. One more (lunch sized) portion has been bagged up in the freezer too

Planning to try the aubergine parmigiana recipe tonight ready for gf returning from her trip to Scotland (left yesterday morning)- https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/3091674/melanzane-parmigiana but we don't have Parmesan or pine nuts so will improvise a little

Little TT of 25p yesterday and just off to check balance to see if there's another we can do.

Yesterday I succumbed to work canteen again and had a skinny syrupy latte £1.50 wasted :mad: I even had my refillable cup with me but still, I went for a three hour meeting with a break midway but rather than go up the two flights of stairs to make a brew I was lazy and bought one. Working from home today and tomorrow so won't be tempted. Will do better next week.

I did manage to only eat my packed stuffs though so that's a little progress! :rotfl:

Need to pay for my car insurance today- quote has gone up £10 but it's still less than I saved for which is good. Don't think I'll get any cashback as it was an autogenerated quote which I've not been able to beat going direct or through other comparison sites. But still, it's under what I planned so I'm pleased.

Kittenkirst

21p Tilly Tidy made today, and an eBay sale of £4.40

I've managed to list three items of clothes on eBay tonight too - finally! I still have 3 more to list to hit my goal this week. I've photod two items ready and need to iron another to get it up and listed.

A no spend day today and the aubergine dish worked a treat. Gf loved it so when we spot aubergines cheap we have a new recipe for them!

A few surveys completed on prolific - am at £14.70 with £2.12 pending.