£15,000 to 0

lonelyrat

I think that's a really solid idea. Being able to save for something and have a goal will be far more motivating. If worst comes to worst you can always take some deposit savings and pay off a chunk.

Haha! I had wondered what you had got your OH! Where are you jetting off to this time? The way I see it is an experience is better than a gift that may not have any longevity and just get discarded. Holidays for the win! :cool: If my OH can find a job sometime soon I want us to go away in September for my birthday. We will both be a few months debt free and it can serve as a nice reward (and to make up for the Copenhagen fiasco!)

Silver_Queen

We're going to Kiev in Ukraine - OH will love it as he'll be interested in the soviet history. I just booked it because it was cheap and will be cheap when we're there! It cost around £80 each for flights and accommodation and will only be a long weekend. I checked lonelyplanet and I reckon we will be fine with £100 spending money each. OH will be told to supply his own spending money! Will also need to book airport transfers as for some reason there doesn't seem to be a metro to the city centre from the airport. I checked and it'll be around £40 there and back. Also will book train tickets as it's at a slightly further away London airport and last time it cost us more to get to the airport and back than it did our whole holiday! I didn't quite realise how cold it gets there though and we're going in December so I might have to buy a snow jacket!

Very naughtily I have now also booked a holiday to Rome for us in February. My family wanted to go on a family holiday there for three days which I'm not paying for at all except maybe the odd meal when I'm there. My sister is using her Avios to book the flights so she offered to book a later flight back for me so I could spend some time with OH there as we have never been to Rome before, so I'm essentially tagging on two days of accommodation and spending money. It was £75 each for accommodation for both days (Rome is so expensive!) and I used some of my own avios to book a flight for OH so he could be on the same flight back with me. Probably shouldn't have but Rome is on our bucket list and we have never booked it because it's always been too expensive. This way, it's actually affordable!

All in all I've spent or will spend about £300 on holiday this month

EssexHebridean

That's a great budget way to visit somewhere that's so firmly on your list though - and you have the time to save up spending money etc as well so all good I'd say! :T

lonelyrat

Kiev is on my list to go to! I did Slavonic Studies for a while at Uni so I feel your OH and I share an interest haha :rotfl:

Rome will be lovely as well! 2 holidays for £300 isn't bad at all... And like EH said you have time to save up the spending money!

Silver_Queen

I have to confess to well and truly busting my budget this month

I just spent £160 on four tickets to a gig in October! My favourite band is doing a reunion of two shows only having not done a gig together for I don't even know how many years. I've never seen them live! It's even in my part of London so I think it's fate.

I will be getting £80 back for two of the tickets but I bought tickets for myself and OH before even asking him if he wanted to go, on the basis that they would probably sell out and I didn't want to miss out. Because of this I told him that I would pay for his ticket as it's not really fair for me to demand he attends and also demand that he pays. Missed a trick though because he then told me that he is a fan of the band too so I could probably have asked him to pay :cool:

Really not doing very well this month! At least my meagre savings pots are still intact...

onedaysomeday

Well done on keeping the savings intact though! I had to raid all of mine this month due to my own fault with buying car insurance on the day of buying the car which made it jump up an extortionate amount :cool:

The gig tickets sound like a good reason for busting the budget though :rotfl: I would have taken it being local to you as a sign I should go too!

Silver_Queen

Accidentally put my leather watch in the tumble dryer

Fortunately the watch part is fine but the straps are completely ruined. I'll have to buy new straps!

Going to have a look in the jewellers today and see if I can find anything unbranded which looks right. Otherwise it's £30(!) for new leather straps.

Next month I will be buying some new casual clothes as I've had a rash of clothes giving up the ghost on me, having been worn for 5 years or more. I now have only two dresses, two pairs of jeans, one pair of leggings and one jumper that I can wear casually - not really ideal! I have loads of office clothes so I should be OK in that respect although my recent weight gain has made my clothes quite unflattering....

Silver_Queen

I have now managed to get a romper from Primark for £6 and a winter waterproof jacket from Hollister for £25 - I'm pleased with that, it'll be handy for Kiev! Next aim is a couple of t-shirts that are decent quality (not Primark) for casual wear. I did have a top from Hollister which was really good quality but having worn it for 6 years, it finally gave up and ripped on me at the weekend, so I'm looking for something similar that will last me a while. Then I just need a pair of sandals (mine fell apart in Portugal in January) and then I should be good to go for a while.

I also bought a dress for my friend's wedding in July. I had a voucher so it came to a grand total of £19 for a formal dress, which I'm not displeased about.

Just checked and it looks like payday this month will be on Wednesday, woo! Next month will be a five week month.

Off to Brighton this weekend, the train tickets have already been paid for and were a total bargain as I booked the late night train, which cost me a grand total of £3! Going to have a lovely time, hopefully.

Been focusing more on my health these past few weeks as OH's cousin's wedding is in 4 weeks and I don't really want to buy a new dress for it. I have a dress that I could wear but it is the epitome of the phrase "just because it zips, doesn't mean it fits". If I manage to lose around 5kg I should be able to fit back into it comfortably. Alternatively, if I don't manage to fit back into this dress I will just wear the same dress twice to both my friend's wedding and OH's wedding but I'm a bit worried about getting tagged in photos on social media! My friend is the type who would possibly be offended. We'll see how weight loss goes because I think the new dress that cost £19 would still look fine if I lose 5kg.

Last week's step count didn't quite hit the 70k that I was hoping for. I made it to 65,600 which is not great. I'll be trying to increase my daily step count during the week this week by walking an extra stop before getting on the train. Fingers crossed that does the job.

lonelyrat

Yay to still having savings even after booking holidays and a gig! Perhaps with the gig you could ask OH to pay for drinks/ food on the day? That way by the time it comes round you probably won't miss the extra £40 you paid but you could end up feeling like you're getting a wee treat from him!

That's really crummy about the watch At least the actual watch bit is still functioning. I got OH a nice watch for Christmas 2 years ago and he did the same and went to Timpsons and got a new leather strap which I'm sure was under £15 and looks pretty similar. Might be worth having a look if you haven't already sorted it!

I'm the same with casual clothes... I have 1 pair of leggings and a few t shirts, but those are more around the house clothes than being seen in public clothes. Am going to hold off buying any for a few months at least and just hope what I do have lasts me! Some of my work dresses could be casual without tights /blazer so they may have to do :rotfl: I'm quite sneaky in that if I have any plans for socialising I organise it for after work that way I can wear my work clothes and not have to navigate trying to find something casual to wear!

Don't have much advice on the weddings/ dress situation really. July is still a wee while away so you could set yourself a mini target of aiming to fit into the smaller dress and if it doesn't work out it isn't the end of the world and just use the other one as a back up. If it's a nice dress than I don't think there's anything wrong with wearing it to two different weddings! Gotta get maximum value out of it :rotfl:

65,600 steps is really good! Any improvement is amazing really. I was actually reading a while ago that the whole 10,000 steps thing may not be the way to go with improving health/ weight etc. and that 10 minute bursts of quick walking is actually better for you. I'm still aiming for the 10,000 steps though as it gives me a reason to be out the house and doing something!

Walking an extra stop from the train is a good idea! I did that the other day and it added about 1,500 steps... I was a bit annoyed at myself because it was hot and I just wanted to get home but when I DID get home I felt like I'd accomplished something!

lonelyrat

"Just because it zips, doesn't mean it fits"

:rotfl: Never heard that before but I like it!