£67,031.92 is a frightening number indeed....

tjp70

Hi TOPM.

I have just finished reading your diary over the last couple of weeks and I have thoroughly enjoyed it. You have such a lovely writing style. I am in awe of how much you get done in a day. It really puts me to shame.

On the last few pages you have received some harsh posts. I just wanted to remind everyone (and you) that every month you are paying off your debt, I think £700 was the monthly figure you quoted. You also have stated that you are going to pay back every last penny. Does it really matter how long it takes? Even if you only managed to repay £10 in a month, it's still less debt than the previous month. I think you are to be applauded for your acceptance that you are in it for the long haul. It would have been really easy for you to go for a DMP but you are doing it the hard way. And I find that very admirable.

tjp

Treadingonplaymobil

Work drama still occupying headspace today, if not actual work time. Hoping for some more information tomorrow or Thursday which will help me plan a way forwards.

Quiche was a hit today, which is always pleasing. Made mini meringues with the spare egg whites so will make buttercream to go with those tomorrow as a treat for my friend and her child coming for a playdate after school tomorrow.

To do today
1. start sourdough (to bake tomorrow morning). Realised I would have time to bake it tomorrow, so abandoned until Thursday.
2. make courgette cake. Done. Weird non-rising cake, but it tastes quite nice.
3. make quiche to freeze for lunches. Done.
4. continue to plan stockings. Not done.
5. spend some time knitting instead of working in the evening. Going to do some shortly.
6. rejig my week's working plans to allow for yesterday's write off day. Done, to an extent. Still not achieving as much as I'd like to.

To do this week
1. Continue to plan Christmas gifts.
2. Plant hyacinth bulbs.
3. Charity shop trawl for stocking fillers and hyacinth planters.
4. Library ebooks

To do this month
1. keep the total spend for the month below £3,500. Currently budgeted at £3,349.
2. work a sensible number of hours, even if it means slower progress on the work and debt front. September was rubbish. This is going well so far.
3. make any homemade Christmas gifts.

Treadingonplaymobil

Week 35: Day 4

Hmmm, still not really earning anything significant this month. I still have my contract work, which pays enough for me to cover my costs and most of my monthly salary, but my post-summer income has not picked up in the same way as it usually does. I need to focus some energy on my smaller business to try to make up the slack. Traffic is picking up on the website a teeny weeny bit each day (still incredibly low numbers, as expected - I'm viewing it as a three month project to build up the visitor numbers before I can even think of earning extra from it), but one of the work dramas this week has made me realise I need to make some slight tweaks to the focus of it, so there's going to be more work to do there too.

Being so conscious of my income this year has really shown me what huge fluctuations it has. The reality is that, averaged out, it doesn't earn enough for us to have extra in the good months - those months need to be used to pay for the lean months, of which there are many. Although I have obviously done my book keeping and tax returns every year for a decade, I've never really clocked how incredibly huge the fluctuations are, as I've always been looking at it in one year chunks (and, to be honest, not really averaging out what my tax return income is on a monthly basis and therefore not engaging with the reality at all). I do wish that now I've earned the wisdom of this, I could be rewarded with some good income to put by to cover the next lot of lean months! Sadly it doesn't work like that, but many valuable lessons have been learnt about self employment this year - things that I thought I knew, but actually I wasn't dealing with the reality of the situation.

Popping to the garden centre today for potting compost for my hyacinths, and meeting a friend in nearby town who I haven't seen for months. I should have cancelled really as Monday's work drama means I am still slightly behind this week, but I've been looking forward to it for ages. It will be a tiny bit spendy (probably a fiver on parking and another fiver on coffee and cake) but I'm taking a packed lunch with me as I'll be out for that part of the day, and I'm going to park in the cheaper car park and walk for a few mins rather than the closer expensive one. My £15 kitty for the month is being used for it though, so at least it's coming out of budgeted money!

Yesterday's courgette cake was a bit of a disaster - didn't rise, and the icing was runny. It tasted perfectly nice, but definitely wasn't a looker! Luckily DH and the DCs are sufficiently greedy that they didn't care.

To do today
1. make buttercream for mini meringues for playdate.
2. clear ironing (still only a small hill, not yet epic mountain).
3. email back client enquiry - need to make the most of these enquiries when they come!
4. keep an eye out for stocking fillers in charity shops in nearby town.
5. plan 2018 working time.
6. order hyacinth pots.
7. chase mortgage broker.

To do this week
1. Continue to plan Christmas gifts.
2. Plant hyacinth bulbs.
3. Charity shop trawl for stocking fillers and hyacinth planters.
4. Library ebooks.

To do this month
1. keep the total spend for the month below £3,500. Currently budgeted at £3,349.
2. work a sensible number of hours, even if it means slower progress on the work and debt front. September was rubbish. This is going well so far.
3. make any homemade Christmas gifts.

stoozie1

I'm part self employed too, and i wondered if you contribute to a pension?

Savertobe

Thanks for the sourdough advice I'll have another go sometime. Currently pretty horrified by the expense of xmas and rather hoping our friends don't bother this year. Would not mind if my daughter who has children also wanted to do children only! I'm spending as much as our summer holiday cost which seems out of kilter when we only have one child.

Treadingonplaymobil

stoozie1 wrote: »

I'm part self employed too, and i wondered if you contribute to a pension?

No, I can barely get my ducks in a row sufficiently to save an emergency fund (although my emergency fund does currently have a WHOPPING £30 in it :T ), never mind a pension. DH saves for one with work, although not a lot. We'd like to be able to increase his work contribution (since his work match it, so it's a sensible scheme for us to overpay) within 5 years.

Savertobe wrote: »

Thanks for the sourdough advice I'll have another go sometime. Currently pretty horrified by the expense of xmas and rather hoping our friends don't bother this year. Would not mind if my daughter who has children also wanted to do children only! I'm spending as much as our summer holiday cost which seems out of kilter when we only have one child.

I've found that actually more children haven't added as much to Christmas as I'd expected! (obviously mine are still smallish though). Things like the tree, Christmas meal, adult family members, decorating the house etc all add up too. Christmas is extortionate, but I'm such a sucker for it, I love it.

Cherryfudge

Well done on conquering the courgettes!

You now have 11 months to research a more effective recipe before the next courgette glut.

Wysiwyg49

Just wanted to echo what some others have said - keep up the positivity (if that is a word). I totally agree with your philosophy of paying down your debt in a way that doesn't make you and your family wear a hair shirt for the next X years...

My outlook is, spend on important things, which vary from person to person - and scrimp/skip the dross. So I don't buy many clothes or shoes, and don't spend a lot at Christmas, but I do spend on kids activities, family skiing holidays, school trips etc. because they give them life skills and memorable experiences.

Honeysucklelou2

Re the courgette cake, it freezes really well. I had a glut one year and baked several. They looked like bricks lined up in the freezer but lasted well and tasted good when defrosted.

Treadingonplaymobil

Week 35: Day 5

Yesterday was pretty much as planned, spend-wise - spent a little on coffee and cake and parking, and bought compost and bird seed from the garden centre for a whopping £4.

Having re-read the courgette cake recipe, I slightly suspect I may have failed to add baking powder. Whoops.

Had an email from the mortgage broker. She has found some miraculous mortgage deal, which seems far too good to be true. Obviously all credit checks to go through, so we'll see what happens. It's 2.19% fixed for two years, with the Tesco loan added to it, and payments will actually reduce by £10pm. So we'd have various options to do with the £377 that we currently spend on the Tesco loan each month (plus the whopping £10pm mortgage payment saving!). So instead of 10.3% interest on the Tesco loan (well over £1,000 interest over the next year alone), it would be carrying an interest rate of 2.19%, which gives us an awfully long time to worry about overpaying before the total we'd be paying back would actually be more than the original total+interest.

The plan would be to split the £387 saving per month between giving us £50pm flex in our budget to ease the pressure just a tiny bit, overpaying/saving to overpay at the end of the term (depending on overpayment fees) and saving for the extension.

I am aware of the horror of securing unsecured debt. For anyone who is wondering, our two priorities are absolutely clear at the moment:
1. Making inroads, however small, into the debt each month. We are achieving this.
2. Increasing our bedroom space within two years. We are currently making zero progress towards this.
Whatever else is ideal, those priorities have to be met first, and if securing unsecured debt helps us do that, I'm at peace with that.

As I said though, not getting my hopes up until the application goes through.

In other news, I had a work enquiry yesterday, which will be £75 if it comes through, and made a couple of sales in my smaller business, so another few quid profit in. I also have a booking next week which, assuming it doesn't get cancelled or anything, will be a minimum of £120 profit. Nothing huge, but it will all help add together towards November's expenses/salary, as my contracted work payment will only be about £350 this month (I need to make £540 each month to cover business expenses and 'salary' of £350). I am still longing for an amazing month which will ease the pressure, but at least I'm getting something in.

Gosh, this is an epically long post, sorry! Last thing...

I planned out my 2018 working time yesterday. I have been able to up my average working hours to 24hrs per week over the year. My average for this year will end up around 12 hours per week, with a heavy weighting towards this end of the year. It's important for me to keep track of this as it ensures I am actually earning a sensible salary for the hours I work, which I have this year (i.e., I need to be better off than I would be working the same number of hours in Sainsburys!). If I earn the same equivalent hourly rate next year I'll be bringing in £980 a month. I don't for a minute think I will in the first half of the year, but hopefully as things move on with the website etc I will in the second half.

To do today
1. Pop to town again for another charity shop trawl, and post office for smaller business posting.
2. pack return for DC3 clothes - I ordered slightly too much, and although it's only about £15-worth of excess clothes, seems mad to keep them just because they're here. Returns are free.
3. gather info for mortgage broker.
4. try to tick off some of the FORTY ONE things on my list. That's a new low. Many of them are tiny jobs though.

To do this week
1. Continue to plan Christmas gifts.
2. Plant hyacinth bulbs.
3. Charity shop trawl for stocking fillers and hyacinth planters.
4. Library ebooks.

To do this month
1. keep the total spend for the month below £3,500. Currently budgeted at £3,349.
2. work a sensible number of hours, even if it means slower progress on the work and debt front. September was rubbish. This is going well so far.
3. make any homemade Christmas gifts.