Half a house

Silence101

Flooring
I'm hoping that after this weekend I won't have any more updates about flooring . On the spur of the moment I've decided that we should just buy really cheap laminate for the hallway. That way Mr S can put it down quickly (he knows how to do it, unlike tiling) and we could afford to replace it when it gets badly scratched. Also, cold feet in the morning is no fun. Hopefully we can keep it until the youngest no longer needs a buggy, so the next flooring won't get such a heavy use.

Packing
Still plodding along with the packing. Mr S takes boxes up daily when he goes to do the flooring. I've not really done a very good job this time as I haven't been writing the contents of the boxes so it's going to be a bit of mayhem on the other side.

Storage
While packing I've realised there's going to be missing quite a bit of storage in the new house. We're going to have to be quite creative trying to sort that out. We still need to buy wardrobes and possibly bunk beds, as well as the fridge (it's getting a bit urgent now!)

Phone line
This needs to be sorted soon, we need the Internet once we've moved, and I don't know how long it'll take to set it up.

School
Still waiting for email confirming start date, so I'm planning on staying home until I get it. Once I do, I think I'm going to start going up to the new house regularly during the day to tend to the garden. Because we haven't moved the furniture yet, I can't start unpacking just yet.

October goals

Dry October
3/31
No Fizzy Drinks
3/31

Silence101

Just paid for the mail redirection.
We need to start informing all the companies of our change of address. It's all the fiddly time consuming stuff I don't want to do! I need to write a list and just spend a morning sorting it out so it's done.

Silence101

Flooring
Hopefully Mr S can finish the living room tonight, as the children and I have to spend tomorrow morning at the house (we're viewing the new school that day)

Change of address
I had to go into town as none of the banks recognised our new address as it's a new build. Mr S is in charge of the utilities, so I haven't had to deal with those.

I had to buy new light bulbs for the old house as 2 upstairs ones blew one after the other one.

School
We need to buy new uniforms next week, but I need to check if they definitely need the logo, as the logo cardigans are £11 each but I can buy 2 for £8 from the high street, without the logo. I'll see what the other children seem to be wearing.

Internet
Mr S phoned our current broadband provider who said we could only access fibre optic at the new address, meaning we'd have to pay £40 ish a month instead of the under £20 we pay now. We're going to have to try different providers to see if we can save some money, as well as see if this "fibre only" is true.

October goals
Dry October
4/31
No Fizzy Drinks
4/31
I also need to stop snacking. I'm eating a ridiculous amount of food and all unhealthy so that needs to desperately change.
Tilly tidies
I've done it but have forgotten the totals so I need to check them. I'll probably have to use the money towards the uniform bits.

wishingthemortgaheaway

Primary schools cannot insist on a uniform full stop. However I do think uniforms are good for the 'teamness' of a school, it makes a huge grin difference to behaviour (positively) and everyone does look smart. However (in my experience as a teacher) most children have 1 logo'd jumper for photographs, concerts, class assemblies etc, then plain ones for 'every use'

Silence101

I grew up in a country with no uniform, so for me, I don't see the benefit. I mean, it's not a problem to me, either way, apart from financially, as the logo stuff is more than twice as much as the plain ones, and it's the 3rd set of uniform in just over a year. At the current school, she's got one logo-ed cardigan and the others plain, but the new school seems a bit more insistent on having the logo-ed one in their leaflet, so it'll be interesting to see how it translates in real life.
We won't be buying the summer dresses until next spring /summer, but we do need to buy more PE kits as she needs a winter one.

Silence101

Morning! Up early as Mr S needs to drop us off at the new house before work.

School
We're visiting the school this morning, and should be back on time for eldest to go back to old school this afternoon.

Passport
As this month is not expensive enough we need to renew eldest's passport, and book the MOT for the car.

Cleaning
I need to deep clean the freezer before we plug it in. And maybe take the vacuum cleaner as Mr S said the flooring work got quite dusty.

Silence101

Wow, eldest starts school this Monday, and we've just signed up youngest to nursery one morning a week. Did I say this month was expensive? That's an understatement!

Silence101

A spendy day yesterday

Appliances
Fridge and dishwasher bought, to be delivered Monday

School uniform
Bought a few bits, need to find more this weekend.

Mortgage
Signed up for online banking so should get that sorted next week. At the moment they've set up the DD with the wrong account so I need to see if we can change that.

Old house
The estate agents have arranged a viewing next week, so we need to try to remove as many boxes this weekend, so people can actually walk around. It'll take a few trips as our car is rather small.



Flooring
Living room is almost finished, Mr S has been working on it all week after work. He's ordered some special flooring for the area near the front door, I'm not quite sure what it is, so we'll have that next week.

Silence101

I've just done our first OP of £50. We probably won't be able to do much more this month, but according to the OP calculator I've just saved £43 in interest! That is crazy really, I can see how addictive it can become!

wishingthemortgaheaway

Oh my goodness. You are really on this op malarkey.
Have you even paid your first
Proper
Mortgage payment yet?

What a way to start. I wish I'd kept track of all the interest I'd saved, it would be something to make e smile when the going gets tough.