Finally Debt Free After 34 Years, But Still Need to Live Frugally

HairyHandofDartmoor

Sun_Addict said:

I think we’ve all felt like you do at some point during this pandemic. It’s almost a year now and it’s getting very wearing. The mornings and evenings are getting lighter though, the vaccine rollout is going well and we’re on the home stretch now. We just need to be patient and stay safe for a little bit longer.

Thanks SA . It's really easy to feel miserable at the moment, but I agree that we must try to be positive and hope for better days to come.

milann said:

It would be lovely to be able to do something different with a different person wouldn’t it Hairy. It’s like an eternal wheel going around....one day we can jump off the wheel and meet folk again. At least the nights are getting lighter in the evenings so we can poodle around the garden and have an evening stroll to mix things up a bit. Not long until the clocks change either. In a funny sort of way I felt lucky being in hospital as I saw a lot of different people and the nurses came out for weeks afterwards and although the building work got me down I did see the various tradesmen...it kept me going. I can think of better ways than being in hospital though to meet people 😂😂

Thanks Milann . I completely understand about enjoying talking to people in hospital and tradesmen. I enjoy brief friendly exchanges with shop assistants just because it's someone different to talk to 🤣. As I go to school I should be fine for company, but we were saying at school the other day that we don't have much to talk about except the virus or school related matters because we're not allowed to do anything or see anyone in our free time. I miss having more variety in my life though as to places I go and people I meet, and talking to work colleagues isn't the same as talking to family.

beanielou said:

I am slowly going doolally. 
Cant see anyone or do anything, as you say even go for a coffee.
Bah.

I'm not surprised Beanie. It must be awful to be stuck indoors for so long and not be able to see anyone. I think you're amazing to have coped up to now and not gone raving bonkers!

HairyHandofDartmoor

I felt really tired last night after my park walk as it involved walking up and down lots of hills and I'm not as fit as I was in the summer 😴, so DH and I put our light out at 10pm and slept well until 7am this morning.

I felt a bit flat when I woke up this morning as it's a grey rainy day again 🌧🌫 (it's lucky I went to the park yesterday!), but I have lots of jobs that need doing and I know that getting on with them will make me feel more positive. So far this morning I've put the dishwasher on, sorted through four rubbish bags that had piled up in the garden and divided them into recycling and garbage in our big wheelie bins, and put some towels on to wash. After that I treated DH and I to some Costalo coffee in the fancy machine DS1 gave me for my last birthday ☕☕. 

After this I need to fold up the clean washing and put it away, swop washing around on radiators for maximum drying, and handwash a few mugs that are too delicate for the dishwasher.

Today's most important job though is to make an appointment for DS1 for a consultation for some treatment he needs that isn't available on the NHS. DS1 has changed doctor's surgeries recently and his new GP seems very supportive and has recommended a private service that can help him. Stepdad has very kindly offered to pay for some of the medical bills out of some of the proceeds of selling mum's and his old house, and the NHS should take over at a certain stage. I'm keen to get this started so that DS1 can lead a nomal life, so I want to get the ball rolling today.

Other than that I may as well relax and enjoy some leisure time while I can. Reading other people's diaries always cheers me up so it's been lovely to have time to catch up on them while I'm on half term 🙂.

I'm going to try and be more positive today 😀. I have much to be thankful for. I have a lovely husband. I have three lovely children. I have a nice home. I live in a beautiful part of the country in a safe neighbourhood. I have a splendid park at the bottom of my road. I have a job that I enjoy. I am debt free and am building up some savings. Spring will come soon and that will make the virus spread less easily, whilst vaccinations will also make the virus spread less easily. By spring hopefully I'll be able to visit National Trust gardens again as these seem vital for my mental health. 

In the meantime I'd like to improve our own small garden 🌳🌺 and make it more of a sanctuary. We did a lot of work to improve it last summer by putting up a fence on two sides to give us much needed privacy, by buying new colourful ceramic pots and buying new plants including two standard bay trees. However there's more that could be done. I'd like to attract more birds to the garden 🕊🦅 and so I'd like to buy a nesting box to attach to our fence. I want one that looks like a proper little house with a pitched roof and I'd like it to be in a lovely shade of blue or green with a contrasting roof, as I think that would look lovely on our fence and if birds nest in it then it would be a bonus 🙂. I'd also like to buy a bee house made out of wood  🐝 🐝 and painted in a nice shade of green or blue to attach to the fence. I also want to buy a good quality bird feeder to hang from our tree that we could put nuts and seeds in. We didn't buy all these things last year as we spent a lot of money on the fence, pots and bay trees, but my birthday is next month so I told DH that I'd like to buy these items with my birthday money. I think it would really cheer me up to attract birds and bees and to have lovely decorative items attached to our fence 🕊🦅🐝🐝.

Good news is that I don't have to do any covid tests over half term 👏👏👏, so my next one will be on Sunday evening. It's good to have a break from them! I've been moved down the vaccination queue as asthmatics have been told they don't qualify for special treatment unless they've been hospitialised with their asthma 🙄. So I'll have to get my vaccine based on my advanced years. I'm 56 (57 next month) so that will put me in group 8. I hope I get the vaccine in April or May. Until then I shall carry on being careful. I'm going to start wearing two fabric masks to the shops as I read that it gives you extra protection from breathing in virus droplets in the air 😷😷. I won't do this at school though as communicating with the children is hard enough with one mask on let alone two! I find the medical masks are the most comfortable to wear for long periods of time at school, as the fabric ones seem to put pressure on my nose after six hours of continual wear. I also believe that the medical masks give me greater protection and I think I owe this to myself as I risk my health at school every day that I spend there. A child sneezed in my face the other day 😱😱 and I thought thank goodness I'm wearing a mask!

Anyway I must stop wittering on and get on with some more jobs. I hope everyone in Forumland is having a spendid day 😀.

Parkyp

Sounds like some lovely garden ideas you have planned. Enjoy your week off. 

HairyHandofDartmoor

Parkyp said:

Sounds like some lovely garden ideas you have planned. Enjoy your week off. 

Thanks Parky 🙂

foxgloves

You are one month older than me, HHoD, so I expect we will both be getting vaccinated at around the sane time. I'm also feeling I need to make a conscious effort to be posirive each day..... I think we just all need a bit more variety in our lives now, also I can't help but feel sad for all the many people who have lost loved ones to Covid. It has truly been (& still is) a terrible time, & I'm not at all surprised it is now well & truly getting to us all.
F x

Onebrokelady

Sorry to hear that the pandemic is getting to you Hairy. I don't think it's helping that this is dragging on and now we are in winter too. None of us expected this to last over a year and I also think we need to acknowledge the hardship of the situation. Humans need other human contact almost as much as they need air so it has a massive impact to be stuck in this situation and while you are lucky that you have DH and your DSs its good for us to have lots of varied human contact as well. We also need to have the chance to be useful to society so being stuck at home and not being able to do anything ( as we see it ) is not helping either, try to reframe your contribution. You are helping by following the governments advice and doing this will have saved unknown amounts of lives, then you are looking after the children of key workers so your contribution is even bigger because without people like you looking after children at school most of my nursing colleagues wouldn't be able to go to work at the moment which means the NHS would have imploded under the strain. Please do not underestimate the impotence of of are doing because every little action adds up to massive benefits for other people 
I have also learned that we do need to acknowledge our feelings and try to work with them, so if you are feeling sad then take a bit of time to think about why and allow yourself to process the reasons, also it's quite ok to have a day where you recharge and just allow yourself some time to not do anything at all if that's what you feel like doing. I am calling this my hibernation and if I feel like staying in bed until lunch and then getting up and reading all day then that's what I will do. 

The plans for your garden sound lovely. I do like feeding the birds and Squirrels. SA mentioned a page on FB called Mr Lumpy And Friends ,you should check it out because I think you would love it 😊

HairyHandofDartmoor

foxgloves said:

You are one month older than me, HHoD, so I expect we will both be getting vaccinated at around the sane time. I'm also feeling I need to make a conscious effort to be posirive each day..... I think we just all need a bit more variety in our lives now, also I can't help but feel sad for all the many people who have lost loved ones to Covid. It has truly been (& still is) a terrible time, & I'm not at all surprised it is now well & truly getting to us all.
F x

Thanks Foxgloves . It is hard to be positive although I know many are worse off and I'm lucky not to have lost anyone to Covid yet. I'm going to try to focus on the good things in my life and try to find something to look forward to. I think the worst thing for me is feeling like I have nothing to look forward to. Life seems all work and no play at the moment 😒.

Onebrokelady said:

Sorry to hear that the pandemic is getting to you Hairy. I don't think it's helping that this is dragging on and now we are in winter too. None of us expected this to last over a year and I also think we need to acknowledge the hardship of the situation. Humans need other human contact almost as much as they need air so it has a massive impact to be stuck in this situation and while you are lucky that you have DH and your DSs its good for us to have lots of varied human contact as well. We also need to have the chance to be useful to society so being stuck at home and not being able to do anything ( as we see it ) is not helping either, try to reframe your contribution. You are helping by following the governments advice and doing this will have saved unknown amounts of lives, then you are looking after the children of key workers so your contribution is even bigger because without people like you looking after children at school most of my nursing colleagues wouldn't be able to go to work at the moment which means the NHS would have imploded under the strain. Please do not underestimate the impotence of of are doing because every little action adds up to massive benefits for other people 
I have also learned that we do need to acknowledge our feelings and try to work with them, so if you are feeling sad then take a bit of time to think about why and allow yourself to process the reasons, also it's quite ok to have a day where you recharge and just allow yourself some time to not do anything at all if that's what you feel like doing. I am calling this my hibernation and if I feel like staying in bed until lunch and then getting up and reading all day then that's what I will do. 

The plans for your garden sound lovely. I do like feeding the birds and Squirrels. SA mentioned a page on FB called Mr Lumpy And Friends ,you should check it out because I think you would love it 😊

Thanks OBL . It certainly is dragging on and everyone at school is saying that they are finding this lockdown much harder than previous ones. Morale at school is very low at the moment 😔. I am glad that I'm able to contribute by looking after key worker's children and vulnerable children (we have about 30% of children attending school at the moment). But I feel like life is all work and no play at the moment and I have nothing to look forward to 😕.

This is why I've decided to get the bird and bee items for my birthday to give me something positive to look forward to 🙂. I'll check out the page you mention on FB.

HairyHandofDartmoor

I'm trying to be positive so I'm focusing on the fact that we only have six years and seven months left on our mortgage. With that in mind I've drawn up this chart to show how many months we have left. Each box represents one mortgage payment and each month when we pay the mortgage I can colour in one box. This way I'll have a visual guide to the progress we're making on paying it off 🙂. 79 payments to go I make it.

We're allowed to overpay without any penalties too, so I've suggested to DH that we tilly tidy any spare pennies or pounds in our accounts into the mortgage account to pay it off a bit quicker, as this will add up over time. So DH put in an extra £6 today. Every little helps 🙂. It's taken me ages to draw this chart 🤣 .

Today I've also logged into my Sk!pt0n account as they've discontinued grid cards to manage your money, so I've applied for a code through the post so I can sign up to have a unique code sent to my mobile if I want to draw money out. The things you have to do to access your own money 🙄. My Christmas savings of £146 are in this account and did a tilly tidy on my personal account and sent £7 to the Sk!pt0n, so I should have £153 in there now towards next Christmas.

It's good to get these financial things sorted out. This is what holidays are useful for 🙂.

elizabethhull

Love your mortgage chart !
Also think it's a great idea to get things for the garden inhabitants for your birthday - they should last years and hopefully are appreciated by the intended users.

HairyHandofDartmoor

elizabethhull said:

Love your mortgage chart !
Also think it's a great idea to get things for the garden inhabitants for your birthday - they should last years and hopefully are appreciated by the intended users.

Thanks Elizabeth 🙂. I hope the chart will be motivational for me.

 I'm looking forward to getting the nesting box and bee house as they'll enhance our garden and hopefully will attract birds and bees. I want to get good quality ones so that they last 🙂 .