Cherry takes the reins

Cherryfudge

I'm getting so tired! Just been asleep on the sofa having spent the afternoon cooking: the cakes were the only thing on my list that got done but I also made lentil and chorizo soup using store cupboard ingredients. I did a quick count-up and reckon I have finished 10 packages of ingredients today! There is one tidy shelf in the larder but all the oddments from it that haven't been used are in a box or another shelf! The freezer is full again as I can't eat all those cakes at once. So kitchen progress is two steps forwards and one back: we need to keep on eating freezer stuff so there's a spare drawer for A & H when they move in, in just over a week. I have half a shelf for their use in the food cupboard and have promised two.

A buyer came for one of my sales so I've added the proceeds (£1 ) to the 10th coin pot, to which I'm also adding 15p as 10th coins for yesterday and today.

17/6/18 Spends:
NSD
18/6/18 Spends
Housekeeping £1.00
Downloaded e-book £0.99 (paid for with gift voucher)
MS stuff:
Lots of baking and soup to use up ingredients
More soup for another day
Kept away from the shops

Cherryfudge

Not much to show for today: I spent some of it descaling various appliances, watered the garden and went to the shops for groceries, then once again was far too sleepy by mid-evening to do anything, so I went to bed. I've been up again for a little while but I'll head back soon.

I did manage to read up on additional pension contributions and of course nothing is as straightforward as I'd wish. Mine requires a medical stating that I'm in reasonable health and can be expected to continue to work till retirement age. While I hope to be back to full health in the reasonably near future, the nature of my work means there's a chance (hopefully slim) that I may not continue if the arm doesn't heal well. So no medical for me till I can show x-rays of good healing and improved flexion. So the idea of additional payments needs to be on hold and I'm wondering whether to pay the amount I'd set aside into the mortgage instead and at least I won't be paying interest on it. I'm paying roughly twice as much in mortgage interest as I'd be earning in savings interest so it's definitely got a strong argument in its favour. Of course on the amount I've got set aside it's not going to save me huge amounts but still... every little counts, as they say.

I did have a look at the pension calculator and I'm not sure I understand it. Now isn't the time of night to try, either. :rotfl:

Spends:
Housekeeping £7.85
MS stuff:
Dinner from the freezer/cupboards (sausages, mash and beans).
Used up more stores for lunch (stir fry) but had to buy veg to add to it.
Strawberries and apricots on reduced price
10th coin savings 10p (now £14.46)

Honeysucklelou2

The soup sounds delicious Cherryfudge. I guess it's a twist on the traditional lentil and bacon?

Hope your foot is feeling better as well as your arm.

Cherryfudge

It's my favourite, Honeysucklelou2. Will try to remember to put the recipe up soon but basically it's red lentils, chopped chorizo, stock and various veggies according to taste.

So: 20th was a day of changes! I had my physio appointment which was okay. Some new exercises and she's decided the shoulder won't need much work, though there's still swelling in my elbow and around the fracture. Then I spent the entire afternoon working on a food cupboard, cleaning and clearing. I've got rid of loads of out of date stuff. I feel rather guilty for throwing out several bags of green lentils but they were literally years out of date and the fact I hadn't used them in all that time indicates any use at all would have been protracted and hesitant. Lots of cake sprinkles went too, though I still have a lot. I only really decorate cakes at Christmas nowadays so pink sugar, hundreds and thousands, sugar strands and coloured stars that went out of date in 2015 (I wonder what happened in 2014 to make me buy so many?) have also gone. I have given myself permission to replace if wanted, but a part of me is saying that was another person and not who I am now.

DS1 turned up just before tea with some bits to put in the freezer: they've got a buyer for their fridge and freezer but are hanging on to the fridge till the last minute. I'd been posting progress to the family Whats@pp group during the day and he said he felt a bit bad that it was the freezer space he needed when I'd put in all the work on the cupboards! We just about found space though.


We had a meeting this evening: business but interesting so I didn't fall asleep, then at half past midnight I've just seen DS2 and his friend off on an adventure: five countries in two weeks! DS2 put several people in a tizzy including himself by letting us know at the last minute that his inhaler's run out but at least he found his European Health Card (with about an hour and a half to go!) and I've got him the details of the emergency chemists at the airport. He hasn't actually needed the inhaler for several months so I'm not in a flat panic but I do wish he'd sorted that as soon as he booked the holiday.

The upshot of it all is an NSD, and it's time I wound down and went to bed. Too hyped up to feel tired but I haven't had a proper rest all day so I'll need to take it easy tomorrow if I can. I'm not very good at that.

Cherryfudge

Nothing spent yesterday (21st). I spent the day working on the kitchen: nothing hugely dramatic to show for it but there is now freezer space for A&H to use, and today I hoovered upstairs (requires planning now as DH has to put the hoover up there for me before he goes to work!) and cleaned some shelves under the stairs. It desn't sound like much, does it! I can see the progress, though.

It was also beautiful weather: J came to lunch and we sat out in the garden while she helped me eat soups to create freezer space! (I also made veggie curry for tea so the stash of frozen veggies is getting smaller).

I had a bit of a light bulb moment about the money left over from last month's wages which I had been wondering about. There was an amount outstanding on my older CC from holiday spends last year. I always find it really difficult to keep score when we're away and this hadn't been paid off because it meant facing loads of old receipts and working out which budget each came from. Now it's occurred to me that it's just money and needed to be paid, and in fact the sum was close to the amount sitting in my account waiting for a home. So I've paid it off. Tomorrow that card should be clear. Just draw a line under it and move on, there will be no future day of reckoning for that one.

I then had all of £9.28 left over from last month's wages so that's gone to the mortgage, in addition to the agreed overpayment I made at the beginning of the month. As they've now sent their revised figures, I know the overpayment was £114.20, so total overpayment so far this month is £123.48. In other words, that's £123.48 they can't charge me 3.99% on.

Memo to self: holidays need a system of accounting that is easy to keep up to date. What that might be, I don't know. It's further confused because we tend to combine our spending on hols. Really it should all come from the holiday savings account apart from food money which should just be cash, but somehow it's not that simple.

Spends:
Mortgage £9.28
Housekeeping £6.95
MS stuff:
Still valiantly eating our way through the freezer!
10th coin savings £1.55
Voted online in Garden News magazine for my favourite garden and got a free download of a garden magazine which I didn't expect, as a reward.
Confession time:
Bought favourite cereal and coffee just because they were on offer, not because I was running out.
Decluttering:
Finished a packet of posh coffee
Did some deep cleaning in DS2's room ready for guests
Have laundered all DS2's bedding rather than replace, and it's come up nicely.
Rang the company to collec tthe bed guard I don't need any more.
Arranged for someone to collect an item I put up for sale.

Cherryfudge

Some car boot spending this morning - 2 balls of wool at 10p each, a book for 20p, a cake tin for £2 and an old piece of doll's house furniture for £2.

We went to the garden centre for coffee with FiL this afternoon, then back via the shops. I took advantage of having the car to stock up on bird food and toilet rolls - can't carry these heavy/bulky things too well at present though the arm and foot are doing well today. I did have a bit of a blip after walking round the car boot (lovely weather) and persuading the arm to relax and extend instead of protecting it. When I got back in the car it remembered it was supposed to be poorly and tensed up a fair amount, so much so that I've messaged my sister to warn her I may not be able to make the journey to meet her and help with the house in a couple of weeks. Apparently my arm hates car travel.

Then I spent quite a bit at the supermarket, but we are feeding the family tomorrow.

DS1 has been round getting the room ready for their use. With his usual DIY aplomb, he's already fixed a door handle and re-edged the laminate, as well as taking the extra bed to storage. I fed him tea as he's been too busy to have lunch. They have friends round helping them pack and tomorrow is likely to be more of the same.

Finances-wise, I did some more reading which in turn made me realise I don't actually know off the top of my head what we spend on certain key categories, although I collect the figures. I went back into my online banking and did some number crunching. Even allowing for my lack of maths skills and not double-checking anything, it makes interesting reading. We are overspending on food, which I know is sometimes me, but it's often DH. He tends to get money back at the till, so for instance he might spend £1.50 on fruit then get 'his share' of the housekeeping out as cash back at the till - total spend £41.50 not £40. The exception has been May, when I had my accident and spending dropped a lot! I wasn't getting to the shops and as I got more mobile I was using stuff up from cupboards and freezer, which meant DH didn't have to buy meals much. His tastes are more expensive than mine!

I've also been number-crunching on the mortgage which I haven't finished yet but before I go to bed I want to put through another mortgage overpayment as I've realised the end of the month will soon be on us and the bank is quick to take it out of the account but slow to apply it to the mortgage. This means that if I'm to avoid unnecessary interest, I need to get the payment across soon.

Oh, and the bank seems to have missed two payments which they would normally have made to me for paying my salary through this account, so I need to visit the branch soon and have a chat with them as I hadn't missed any payments or gone OD.

Oh my - that is a loooong post! Sorry.

Spends:
Wool 20p (hobbies)
Book 20p
Dolls house furniture £2.00 (hobbies)
Household £2.00
Housekeeping £26.26
Pets £4.00

MS stuff:
Used up another soup from the freezer
The dolls' house furniture is cool but won't fit my dolls' house so I might end up selling it on.Confession time:
Could have coped without that cake tin, but it's a really nice one
Decluttering:
No actual things leaving the house but some deep cleaning in the bathroom.
Small amount of weeding in the garden.

Cherryfudge

This was supposed to be an NSD but we went to a food fair so that was some cereal bars because I had a small breakfast, some salad dressing because it sounded so good and a plant from the herbal stall. Also some freebies from Love Food Hate Waste which is always my favourite part of the food festival. They have bike-powered smoothie making and things like that.

A brought their luggage and several sets of drawers so the move seems very close.

I have to be up in good time as I have appointments tomorrow, so this is going to be short.

Spends:
Housekeeping £4.20
Garden £2.50
MS stuff:
Wombled 7p (which is going in the 10th coin savings)
10th coin savings 42p
Set up an order for the mortgage payment to go out at the beginning of next month rather than risk not being able to get online to make the payment. Learning from experience here.
Resisted some items at the food fair.

Cherryfudge

It's been busy today with a couple of appointments and remembering all my errands. That proves I have had a personality change .

I did fit in a trip to the bank to ask about the missing reward payments but she managed to track it back to a DD not being taken out, which put me outside the terms of the reward scheme. However the DD thing was deliberate and saved me more than the reward would have paid me so that's okay.

I remembered to put my contact lens order on hold too: no point continuing to accumulate lenses when I can't reach to put them in!

A buyer came for a sale item so that's another £4 in the little stash of savings that's waiting for a good pot to grow in.

Yet another meal from stores: chicken and mushroom pie. There are definite traces of space in the freezer outside A&H's drawer now but that lasts only till the next item I buy. Why is freezer space so hard to find? (Actually I know the answer to this: it's all the bits I stashed away in the past and didn't deliberately make a plan for. Sausage meat, anyone?)

Spends:
Housekeeping £3.09
Estate business - Electricity - £28.something which goes straight from the estate account.
MS stuff:
Sold item £4.00 (goes into 10th coin savings)
10th coin savings 60p
bubble & squeak from leftovers for lunch
chicken pie from leftovers for dinner
Decluttering:
Sold one small item - very small but it's been hanging around without a proper home for nearly a year!

redofromstart

Yum, sausage meat. Nice weather for hot sausage rolls with ready roll pastry for a quick and easy meal. Sausage plate pie - good for cold slicing. Sausage plait, maybe mix in some stuffing. Roll it into meat balls and have with a tomato sauce.

Cherryfudge

redofromstart wrote: »

Yum, sausage meat. Nice weather for hot sausage rolls with ready roll pastry for a quick and easy meal. Sausage plate pie - good for cold slicing. Sausage plait, maybe mix in some stuffing. Roll it into meat balls and have with a tomato sauce.

Top ideas thanks Redo

How did you know I also have half a pack of pastry waiting to be used up? And two boxes of stuffing though I usually make my own? Oh, and sundried tomatoes