NST April - SPRING INTO ACTION

dizzyblnd

My apple tree is budding too yay!

greent

Didn't make my 10K steps yesterday, but fitbit has registered active minutes, so my running around just doing stuff must've been at a faster pace than normal lol


Few spends yesterday - will update food spends in sig when I retrieve receipt from upstairs. Spent 2 x £2.99 on unnecessary purchases in a1di - 2 pretty sparkly garden stakes - 1 butterfly and 1 dragonfly - they are already installed in the garden, nodding away in the breeze, bringing much joy! OH also bought the teenagers sausage & chips from the chippy (was a promised, not impulse/ lazy purchase). He had a few of their chips with a pie from the freezer and I made pasta carbonara for me (SW style) The small ones don't like chipshop food, so they just had stuff from the cupboards


Two large items sold on ebay and were posted yesterday - net sales for month to date total £52.33 so far. Hopefully will get a few more £ to add to that this month. Children have also cleared a few items from their rooms - anything suitable has been priced and boxed up ready for the next NNS (not until July) I used to label it all up in the week or so before a sale - this way is much better - I price everything as it goes into the NNS pile and put a box into the garage loft when it's full. All the boxes are in a particular place, so when the sale comes around all I have to do is get the boxes down and we're all set - no last minute panic labelling (I have to say that I can be this organised as I always have the same seller's number every sale)


Today's plans include washing (yesterday's washing has been ironed this morning), getting bags ready for school on Monday - and a swimming party this afternoon. And vacuum everywhere downstairs and mop the kitchen and hall. I baked a large batch of rolls for the week last night, so just need to freeze them today. Will bake loaves tomorrow, along with maybe some cakes for lunchboxes. Am hoping for SFD today, but will probably need some food shopping tomorrow


Have a lovely Saturday


x

GSRcat

Hello,
Apologies for not checking in yesterday, I sometimes don't know where the day goes.
So yesterday we had friends over and took the kids to the park then in the afternoon I took the kids to the park with the gym and did a workout at there.
DH got a weekly rail pass yesterday and I got one of my work mates to take me to work and drop me off, we Haven't had the chance to do anything about the car yet due to being almost like ships in the night. And he has been called into work today because someone called in sick so that's ruined our Saturday as he rarely has them off, not that we can really go anywhere cos it's tipping it down and the car is broken! I did suggest going for a walk to the river but the kids said no so I did try.

On the upside I've gained another two NSDs making that a grand total of 7 which I am pleased with, I also managed 15k steps yesterday.

I've been feeling a bit depressed the last few days so I am struggling to motivate myself. Think I need to get back into the routine of school runs.

Bobarella

Haven't read the thread yet today as I wanted to write my message to JulieJim before I forget.
So Julie you were saying the other day about how your scout troop isn't getting many of the schools vouchers at the moment. I suggested putting a poster up next to the CS desk in your local Mr S asking for donations. But I went to the CS desk today to have some points added on and asked if it would be allowed and they said no. Just thought I'd feedback.

Bobarella

WelshKitty85 wrote: »

Hi everyone!

Yesterday turned into a spend day as DH needed fuel. Had to run an errand for FIL but he bought us a take away supper in return and it was delicious!

SFD 5 today.

Had some good news in work today and have been asked to work overtime over the next few weeks as they are so short staffed. Hoping this means they can't afford to let me go at the end of my contract and I will be made permanent. At the least it will be a few hundred pounds extra in next months pay packet.

Great news WK. Really pleased for you.

Bobarella

Have spent today dotting about. Not a NSD but not too bad. We went to our favourite shop of the moment, a Turkish supermarket that has an in store bakery and butcher. It sells lovely produce in industrial quantities and also normal sizes too so you can get vats of jalapeños for about £3. The bread is amazing. Huge round ones for 60p. We did some shopping, honey,lemons,coffee fruit etc and then went and had Golzme's & strong coffee in the bakery.

Whilst out I have also:
Paid into son/daughters building society accounts
Added on Mr T and Mr S wombles reciepts
Found 2p roadkill
Wombled 2 chocolate chip Belvita bars that they were handing out in Mr S. Quite nice. Like a cross between a tracker & a flapjack.
Used £2.50 in Costalots points to get a free coffee
Used a handful of low denomination coins from the change pot in the £ shop to buy DD a gel filled teething ring.
Nearly scared the life out of DH for almost putting Pamparse in our basket instead of Little Ones. Like I'm paying premium for something you poop on.
Took a bottle of water with us to save buying one out.
Also took snacks for DS and us.

At home I have:
Made a £10 PAD
Shredded a basket of paperwork
Sent a thank you card to my family
Put a load of washing on the line to dry and it pretty much has. It's been several days now since we last used the tumble dryer which is brilliant with a 6 month old churning out washing for Mummy
Called Oyster and sorted an issue I was having
Put £10 on my husbands oyster using the credit card rebate that I was debating how to get.
OH'S office have moved site recently. They were throwing away a huge box of various flavoured t bags so he brought it home. Must be 1000 in there. So have used more of those today

Think that's it.

Calling in terms of the audit I know I need to sort out my mobile phone situation. In fact for both of husband and I. I am out of contract as of the 11th. Plan to go sim only. Should save a packet across the pair of us. Fingers crossed.
Fuel bill should naturally be less this month as we put the heating off April 1st.
I know we can't save on our mortgage it's already very low from last fix. Council tax, water rates are both low and fixed. £136/£26 per month respectively.
Insurances are all paid in full or cheapest possible. We just have home contents/building/pet. No car.
We don't have any gym memberships or Sky. We cut NT and Royal palaces last month for the year so that's saved us around £300 annually.
All debt is on 0%
Travel is by bus or on foot except for ad hoc train journies like last weekend
Food is kept an eye on.
My son's dance school offered to refund us any classes he had missed attending due to my surgery and recovery so that means we are getting around £30 off for the coming term.

That's it. Once the debt is gone I feel pretty confident about our budget and ability to save more. Think at last tally across pensions/kids/EF we were doing about 15% of house hold income into savings. Weighted towards OH'S pension primarily. Makes sense when work fund match.

Blah blah long brain dump post sorry! Zzzzz

Calling14

Mothernerd no way are you allowed on naughty step for your Scottish board. Could help you save money, shopping lists.

GSR. Hope feel cheer up I felt awfully fed up yesterday so today did the boring tasks early, made some lentil soup( according to BBC programme other night along with dancing will make me healthier and younger):)Dancing to ABC whilst a blackberry crumble made and went out for the day. Bit wet here so went to garden centre followed by a nice drive to Anglesey. Sun was out there so had nice walk around cheered me up.

Bad news I am putting myself on naughty step bought a gorgeous plant pot, I bought a smaller one for friend for xmas but mine is nicer colour and compost. Whilst I needed compost the pot was naughty moment. So lying flat out filling the naughty step. Going to work out a way to get of it.

Bob will watch with interest switching to sim only phone. My contract doesn't run out till end of the year.

Juliejim wish I had kept my sainsbobs schools vouchers refused them last few times as I Collected time before but didn't find anyone wanting them.

Yeh to budding apple trees I wish I had one.

Not sure if roofer found any leaks in my roof, wasn't in. Catch up with him over weekend.

Welshkitty great news on yr overtime.

mothernerd

43 more items have left the house (and garden). Some were only tiny though (and 3 took up 2 bin bags). Spent money but I now have 'joyful' buckets and they were only a £1 each (ones in city were £1.99) bright blue rather than turquoise but lovely.

Still having problems with mum's filing, makes me tired just looking at it. Want it finished and out of here. Think I will go to the doctor's this week as am definitely low on energy / low level depression. Trying to talk myself back from the edge - need more days out.

Today I am grateful for
lovely weather early on (was quite surprised to get caught in the rain)
lots of space in the bins (trying to do extra bits like cutting back bits in the garden)
shortcuts - thinking if I scoop up the life insurance policies and bungalow purchase documents it would take a chunk out of this filinf and I could look through it later (both things I will be keeping hold of - probably not needed until mum dies although have had ongoing but intermittent correspondence with one company since my dad died - policy on mum's life but dad was originally he beneficiary, will become final part of his estate to be sorted, but only come into effect after mum dies).
Things that made me happy
Spring flowers being brave in the cold and grey
My new buckets

WelshKitty85

Hi everyone!

Thanks for the kind comments. I'm feeling really thankful to finally be working in a job that I enjoy and it makes the 3 years of studying worthwhile.

SFD 6 today. We had planned to go to the slate museum (free entry) but weather has been a bit changeable so have put it off until tomorrow which, fingers crossed, should be brighter. So, today we have stayed home, played board games and used up food from stores.

crazy_cat_lady

Hi everyone :hello:
Still not great physically but better than I was yesterday. Bagged a nsd because I didn't feel like doing anything much. No real exercise either, but, I did get 4 hours of school work done. Just had a bit of inspiration and decided to go with it. Means I didn't get a lot else done though. Never mind, tomorrow is another day.
GSR - sorry you're feeling a bit down. Hope you've managed to ride through and feel better tomorrow.