Extending our house without extending ourselves beyond our means

PurpleFairy26

Bobarella wrote: »

Hugs PF. I hope that now you have made your choice things get easier.

Thanks bob I hope so too. It's been a difficult journey and one that has been very personal and DH and I aren't really ones for sharing, which, whilst our decision is sometimes as hard as we internalise things. Hopefully we can move on and not have any regrets down the line.

PurpleFairy26

The smalls have carpet in there room :T it looks fab and makes our hall carpet look like Lino!!

DH started building the beds, but they're sleeping on mattresses tonight - they just think it's some adventure

Hopefully we'll get the, up bier the weekend and can get some other furniture back in too so at least I'll be able to get back in spare room. Must pay for carpet. Add to to do list.

Our area are trialling 39 hours free childcare from after Easter. Well on,y get it until July but might as well. You'd think. However, you have to call a number for eligibility. Which is constantly engaged. Joy!

Want to start get the wallpaper off our room next. May have already started

Cleaned a big patch of black off the kitchen ceiling with some mould spray I already had in. I also managed to get washing outside to dry this week. It's brilliant not having washing hanging round the house.

Over £35 on 1poll and another £3 p1necone done today. £10 voucher arrived in post this week as have hot drink and cake vouchers x 2

Bobarella

Hugs again. Doesn't sound easy.

39 hours free childcare? From what age?

PurpleFairy26

Bobarella wrote: »

Hugs again. Doesn't sound easy.

39 hours free childcare? From what age?

Did I say 39 Sorry fat fingers (as my DH was so lovingly say :rotfl:) it was meant to say 30. They're just bringing the 30 hours free for over 3s forward by a term in our County as a trial.

Crazy busy none stop weekend, however, progress:

Put bunk beds up for smalls yesterday and new bedding they had for Christmas on rest of room still empty, Due to final bit of painting beds not in final resting place yet, so don't want to have to keep moving stuff
Friends for dinner last night. Did buy some booze, but cooked Balti from scratch (already had homemade paste in fridge) and naans from freezer. Treated us to ys chocolate pud.
Left over rice from ^^ for tea as egg friend rice for DH and my tea
Bought ys sausages and we had sausage sandwich this morning so we weren't tempted to go out wth friends for breakfast
Made DD lunch for tomorrow
Managed 3 @loads of washing almost dry in line yesterday. Dried on airer since.
No heating on since Friday.
Managed a walk yesterday with a friend whilst smalls were at an activity

Early night all round.

Bobarella

I didn't know 3 year olds get 30 hours now. I thought it was still 15. I'm not really in the loop with such a gap between mine.

Sounds a good day

PurpleFairy26

Where has the week gone .... oh, yes I remember, lots of work :eek: I have 30 minutes or so in the house on my own, which just about never happens and it feels a bit odd.

This work I have done some surveys - need to cash out £3. Got a sample to test for 4 weeks of something I would buy anyway and potentially 2 more surveys from that so another £6.

Picked up some curtain hooks today that have been on my annoying thing list since start of January used local town discount card for 5% off and my cash back debit card for another 5% - happy days. Just need to think about hanging them now and whether I do need a new curtain pole or not. Will try and make do.

Need to order DDs curtain pole, so if I do lounge curtains first - if i do need one I can just get it from same place, they have decent c/b through £co so not the end of the world as they are reasonably priced to start with

Managed to get some items I needed and a potential couple of gifts in the n£xt sale. Will come from gift/clothes piggy

DH car booked in for MOT on Monday :eek: might be time to scrap it - we'll see. Project use up continues on food, so spends are lower than they could be - must continue, despite us getting to some random concoctions at some point! Must remember to do menu plan for next week. Spent £3 in market today on strawberries and cherries.

Utility bill came in, noticeable drop from last month, hopefully next month will be more to eat in to the small debit we are in and hopefully build some credit for next winter.

Bobarella

That's good that your utility bill is down. I'm hoping for similar next month. We switched our heating off for the year last week so it should halve the gas element at least.

I just pay my bill each month in full rather than just a standard amount. It works out ok really. It's £59 a month for the 8 months we don't use the heating and then goes up to £95 for the remaining 4. Something to look forward to

brizzledfw

Good to see all the progress, well done x

PurpleFairy26

Still no call back from council on nursery funding. Will likely have to move from to do list to annoying things list at this rate!

Updated all banking and spreadsheets. As ever last week of paycheck will be tight but we have all bills accounted for and a freezer full of food so can't complain. Must continue in my use up mission for that. 2 ys mackerel fillets out tonight (and and almond croissant . I'm also considering turning my bag of dry sour dough into bread pudding. Just in the desire for space of course

I'm less than a pound away from cash out on 1poll and cashed out £15 something on another site and £3 c/b from £co

Bought some gifts today, used money from present piggy.

Trying to get 2 free 'things' on my new phone contract. They seem to be struggling to recognise my new number. May need to call them. Boo!

Downloaded an old episode of the original miss marple from tv for free

PurpleFairy26

Realised that I probably couldn't do the two free things as I was being impatient and my phone number hadn't transferred so it wasn't being recognised. All sorted now. All good. Being booging around to some music I've not heard for ages all for free.

Managed a run today, first one for about 7 weeks :eek: must to better. Have the bug again. And a plan

Have meal planned tonight and we need hardly anything for this week. DH will shop tomorrow from market and supermarket (with his discount) to get best deals. Also synced bank accounts. DH received his switching bonus of £125 that went straight to CC. Pay day Friday which is good news.

DH has applied for a new job. Fingers crossed. Would be perfect for him! It would fit in perfectly with our bigger plans.

Money from various surveys received and paid to card. 25p away from payout on 1poll. DH got to payout this week and has cashed out. He's also looking on singeing up to a couple of others which all helps the cause.

I relisted 19 items on fleabay. But if a cheat really as they're not new and re listing is easy but they won't sell if not listed. Will try and list 5 more this week. But busiest week of year at work so may just need to lower my expectations at least until next weekend

Lovely day today spent with family. Sister cooked and we came away with some leftovers :T no spend so all good.

Going to try a different approach and make a couple of cakes or a batch of fairy cakes or something for tea/after school snack. My two are very good and eat a decent amount of fruit and veg but do like 'pudding' and yogurt both doesn't always hit the spot and isn't cheap. Will make one tomorrow night.

I also cut the crusts off my dd sandwiches for 2 days at nursery (I know ) but she eats them all if I do this rather than 1 bite of each quarter if I don't. I've never liked throwing them away but before today couldn't work out what to do with them. Well today I had my light bulb after making bread pudding this week, they've gone in the freezer for the next one. The bit of jam won't matter :rotfl:

Bought dds a pair of blackout curtains thy were less than £20 in the sale instead of £65 :eek: do need to get a rail but I can sell their current curtains and that will go towards covering the cost as they are really good quality and very well made. Must take photos whilst still up. Will add that to my annoying thing list.

All in all, life is very good. Sunshine definitely helps with all of that :A