The Ultimate Incentive muddles along

Dinah93

Dinah93 said:

1. Apply for last 3 boroughs grants  Only two in the end, I couldn't evidence we had been trading the week prior to shut down for one of them, as it was half term, and we don't operate in half term. The others wanted the month prior which was fine. 
2. Send extra info to M borough
3. Find the last totals so I can finish updating my signature 
4. Set up printful integration to Ebay 
5. Set up printful integration to Amazon
6. Make full spreadsheet of designs so far and check they are all uploaded to all my sites
7. Email workshop participants from pre-Christmas
8. Mailchimp all 
9. Tidy the games bookcase
10. Create my new year new organised me spreadsheets 
11. Record and edit 21 podcasts 

A start was made at least. Meeting a friend and her baby in the park tomorrow, but there is a weather warning overnight for ice and snow. Something broke on the car yesterday and the heating isn't working, everything else is fine, so could be a really fun drive over! 

Dinah93

So, new year, and for me that means a new spreadsheet. I've been pootling along happily, spending far too much on crap for years now, and our reasonably high salaries have allowed us to pay good chunks off and do that at the same time. But I'm surrounded by clutter that I spent money on, to make me miserable we have too much stuff, until I end up doing what I've been doing the last few weeks and chucking or giving away thousands of pounds worth of stuff we've not used. So this month I'm tracking every penny we spend on groceries, non essential spending, and travel. Tier 4, travel should be pretty low! 

Day one, £13.25 came out as a non essential spend. A glossy box subscription. I have worn make up four times this year, Christmas day and three times I was on camera. I have a LOT of it to use up, no need for more, so I've cancelled that now so it won't come out again next month. I'm trying to use the barometer of 'will I miss having this thing more than the thing itself' and that was a definite no. I keep toying with buying some kind of CD shelf for the kids rooms though, as the box of story cds on the floor drives me nuts, so that may come in as a non essential but wanted spend, as may a longer coat. All the puppy walking with a coat that skims my belt when it's consistently in the minus temperatures at the moment isn't fun at all! 

I have all my goals for the year in my spreadsheet, but in short I want to loose weight, cut down on my diet coke problem, I'm setting myself a target each month for number of new designs on the print on demand sites (this month I've set 150), a target for videos onto my yoga youtube channel (Jan - 10) , a target for videos onto my entrepreneur channel (Jan - 4), and two other channels I'm hoping to start also. While I would very much like to get some if not all of these channels monetized in time, both the entrepreneur one and the yoga one are about building a brand more than anything, using it as a form of marketing so me and also my company become more known and respected in the industry. My other goals are a monthly target of debt to clear (January - £2000), move more target (January - 80km), extra income goal (I'm very cautiously aiming for £300 in January, as there are a lot of bigger things I want to kick off that won't give immediate returns), and the amount I want to save each month in my stocks/shares/savings/non-traditional pension (January - £200). 

I also want to give the curly girl method a try this year, but that's not really a quantifiable goal so it hasn't made it to the spreadsheet, but if anyone has an idiot proof guide (I've tried to work it out but I'm so confused!) please let me know. 

Dinah93

I'm not being rude, but I can't bring myself to say 'happy new year' to people at the moment when I feel like 'I hope no one you love dies, you still have a job and aren't totally depressed/anxious or agoraphobic by now' seems the more honest greeting.

The private pool we hire cancelled our booking for the 9th, as they are in tier 4 by a mile or so, but we are as well so no exercise facilities may open even on private use.  So I guess I'm up on money for the day, even though I'd rather not be in this instance. 

Dinah93

Well, that was short lived. Another £60.04 spent getting a retractable lead for recall training and a snuffle mat for the pup, and some curly girl approved shampoo, a microfibre towel and hair gel. However if it means graduating out of my lack lustre ponytail I've had since I was at school it'll be the best money I've ever spent. 

Dinah93

Right, starting to see the problem. Another £53.98 spent, this time on replacing the two smoke alarms in the house (one of them fell down over a year ago and smashed, the other developed a fault over Christmas that changing the batteries hasn't solved). I'm a little unsure about putting these in the 'unessential spends' total, as let's face it, smoke alarms are pretty high priority for most homes but I've added them in anyway. This takes my day one non essential spends total to £139.46... only 36 minutes to midnight and it may be best for my budget if I just go to sleep! 

wendz86

It's hard when things come up that you have no choice but to spend on. You have done well though cancelling the glossy box . The goals you have set look good, hope you manage to achieve them.

Dinah93

1. Find the last totals so I can finish updating my signature 
2. Set up printful integration to Ebay 
3. Set up printful integration to Amazon
4. Make full spreadsheet of designs so far and check they are all uploaded to all my sites

So in general what I need to be cracking on with are my goals in the new year spreadsheet, which is largely content generation. However I've hit something of a snag in that the kids haven't returned to school. Our head said all absences were authorised for the next two weeks while we see what is happening in the world, and given biggest mini moneysavers health issues and the fact she is on daily antibiotics always to try to support her it just wasn't a risk I was happy to take. We are tier 4, but tier 4B, where schools are open, rather than the tier 4 Boris can see from his bedroom window. 

I've cancelled all bookings that were due to begin this January, just waiting to see how many are happy to roll the booking until we can open, and how many want a refund. 

My plan for today is to try to record this week's podcasts, edit them and get them up if nothing else. I've written the first one in full as I found a new opportunity I want to explore in article writing (I'll report back once I've looked into it more!), I just need NIM, the kids, the dog, both cats, the street cleaning lorry and any cars, planes, random teenagers walking past to all shush at the same time! 

kavics177

I wanted to ask before, can we listen to your podcast? Happy to receive it in pm if you don't want to put it out here, just really interested in it.
Crazy what is in UK right now, thankfully the numbers here are decreasing. Looking forward to getting the vaccine, hopefully won't need to wait for long.

Dinah93

Not shy here  - I'm about to start putting them on youtube in the next couple of days which will be completely free and a longer format than I currently do (please give me a subscribe anyone reading this, really helps the channel be seen and it makes me do a happy dance)  but I also have a short form version which is about 3-5 minutes Monday-Friday mornings which is available on patreon  which is pay as you feel (happy dances also included with patreon subs). Patreon has a huge back index of podcasts as well as yoga classes too when you join. 

Having something of a meltdown in trying to get ANYTHING achieved while we're all home all the time, so this is by no mans a list of what I want to get done today, but just a reminder list if at any point the kids are both working independantly maybe I can get something partly crossed off. 

1. Find the last totals so I can finish updating my signature 
2. Set up printful integration to Ebay 
3. Set up printful integration to Amazon
4. Make full spreadsheet of designs so far and check they are all uploaded to all my sites
5. 10 short form podcasts 
6. 5 long form podcasts 
7. 2 new yoga videos 
8. Edit previous yoga videos not yet uploaded 1/2/3 
9. Investigate lockdown grants - Arts Fund/Lottery/NEBL/D/cD/N/H/R/M/RC/Sports England
10. POD designs 5 a day - Thur/Fri/Sat/Sun

Thought I'd found a grant we were eligible for this morning (at about 1am), got halfway through the forms before I realised the web address ended in .za and not being based in South Africa this would probably override all the other criteria we had hit. It was doubly gauling because 

Homeschooling is going okay (but we're only on day 3!) it's just very all consuming. I really wish just for one topic they'd say 'here's a good youtube video on the romans' rather than just 'what can you find on the romans?' or techy things with 85 stages to load up and needs a parent to do it - I just want an hour before the sun goes down to get a little work done each day, starting work at 8pm is exhausting (or maybe that's just because I have my head in a good book and have stayed awake until 2.30am the last two nights to get a little reading time when I finally finish work!).

Dinah93

First video on the new youtube channel is scheduled for tomorrow morning, so thanks for commenting Kavics as it gave me the kick up the bum to do it