Are we nearly there yet?

Pauper1

Sarahwithlove said:

Do you and your partner keep finances separate? How does it work for food shopping etc for you? Just wondered if you had reviewed what you are both paying out for and whether they could help out at all to free more money towards the debt? 

He pays for all the house bills except TV license and netflix. So he's covering a lot already and doesn't tend to have much spare, but we will look into everything he's paying for at some point, just in case. 

Pauper1

£1 PAD and 9 & 10p penny savings done yesterday & today. Yesterday was a NSD, today wasn't as I had to pay the ULEZ and the tube for fun stuff so I will count that as spends. I took a brew with me to avoid coffee shops, and OH paid for dinner, snacks and the carpark. We did try to keep the costs down as much as possible. Usually we'd stay in London but we're driving back tonight to save on hotel costs.

I won £1 on paddy power spins today. Nothing else is fruiting. Did a YouGov survey this morning and uploaded some bits to Vinted yesterday, but no bites.

40 minute dog walk yesterday and 50 minute gym sesh today. Tonight's dinner and sweets were the only "bad" thing I've had all week, so hopefully I'll still be making a dent in my cholesterol 🙈 I'm planning on a walk tomorrow morning and a gym sesh in the afternoon to balance it slightly.

Pauper1

Yesterday
£1 PAD & 11p penny savings. Used my £25 voucher from Mistplay to get a few extras for this week, so I only used £22.71 of my "real" money. Nothing excessive but OH did add to my list quite significantly, which is a bit annoying.
Groceries at £145.93 so far, which I'm happy with at the moment.
Cashed out £5 on 5surveys, FINALLY! 
Hour long walk in the morning and a quick gym session in the afternoon. Normally Saturday afternoons are super quiet there but it was so busy 😭 hopefully it quietens down a bit after January... 🤣 

Today
£1 PAD & 12p penny savings. Not expecting any spends today, so should be NSD number 7. No proper exercise planned today either, as the house is an actual state so sorting that out should get my heart rate up and my steps in!

Pauper1

Tidied the boys' room this morning, done two loads of washing and a proper clean of the kitchen. Need to clean downstairs loo then hoover all downstairs. Hopefully will finish my room later too, and then will feel more on top of things.

Sold something for £2 on Vinted this afternoon, so I've packaged that up ready to go tomorrow after work. Maybe before work if I get my bvtt in gear.

My weight hasn't gone down since Wednesday but besides one meal at Chopstix and some sweets I've been soooo good, plus three gym sessions and a dog walk on my "rest" days, so I'm fully expecting that to show on the scales within the next few days. Our Gousto meals will finish on Monday so I need to plan my meals for the rest of the week. Will get that done tonight.

My mugs and cups are all washed up ready to take to work tomorrow, and I reckon I'll probably take the last of my breakfast muffins and a soup. 

Apparently yesterday was the day that most people give up their resolutions, but I still feel as motivated as I did before the New Year 🙏

Pauper1

£1 PAD & 13p penny savings. Expecting NSD number 8 today. 

Got a £30 Aldi voucher this morning so I'm up to £112.82 in the Make £2025 in 2025 challenge. That means I only need to make £55.93 by the end of January to be on track.

Weight is still holding 🙄😭 wonder if I'm due on...

Off to do my spins and surveys with a coffee before I need to get up for the day

Pauper1

£1 PAD and 14p & 15p penny savings for yesterday and today. Yesterday was NSD number 9, but will be spends today I believe.

45p Chase cashback yesterday from some Klarna payments that went out. Nothing really happening in spins and surveys, have a few things ticking along but really not a lot. Will definitely try to upload some things to sell after the school run. 

Weight finally dropped the last two days so my second week weigh in was 2.4lbs off 🙌 I'm so glad I believed in the process and carried on. Although the cholesterol thing is not letting my brain eat anything remotely "bad" anyway, so it's not like I had a choice. I'm actually really enjoying feeling like I'm fueling my body with what it needs as well.

Slacked on my walks the last few days, it's been really hard to fit it in around the kids and both our jobs. I think if it wasn't so dark I'd feel more comfortable doing it at this sort of time, so roll on the lighter mornings.

Pauper1

£1 PAD and 16p penny savings. Yesterday I only spent £10 on fuel and £5.32 in Aldi, cos I had a £30 voucher. Today should be NSD number 10.

I didn't manage to upload anything yesterday, it was a really busy day. Only 15p cashback from Chase yesterday as well. Fail.

Added up all my debts this morning, and I'm down £78.63 since 1st Jan. Although I usually end the month maxed out in my overdraft (£250), and I'm currently only at -£87.99 with 4 days til the end of the month. I really hope it stays like that cos that's £162 down then as well.

Pauper1

£1 PAD and 17p & 18p penny savings yesterday and today. It was a NSD yesterday and I'm planning for today and tomorrow to also be NSDs, which will bring me up to 12.

I've done a workout three times this week but only managed one walk, I've been so tired 😭 my diet has been really good as well, I've amazed myself. I'm coming up to my period now though, so it's going to take a lot of willpower to not eat ice-cream and chocolate!

It's the end of my month on Monday, when I get a couple of my incomes, with the main one coming on the 26th. I'm determined to keep my overdraft as low as possible until then, so I've been using up random things to make meals the last few days and have been so proud of myself, sticking to my diet and not going to the shop. We've had "carbonara" made with silken tofu, three bean chilli using up the last of the dried TVP, and a linguine dish where I used potato and carrot to make a cheese sauce. 

We've got Gousto coming again on Thursday, so I won't need to get too much dinner stuff in my shop on Monday, but will obviously need three days worth. I do think it's going to be quite a big shop as we have got really low on quite a lot of things. Will do some meal planning later. I'm thinking about pulling out the Jack Monroe books that I relied on a lot when I was in the really bad debt.

Sarahwithlove

Pulling out the books sounds good even if it's just one or two meals a week that are from there it all helps 

Pauper1

I just did a balance transfer of the 41% interest debt to a card with 29.9% interest. It was £192 and it charged me £7 to do so, however last month I paid that in interest and going forward the interest will be more like £4. Once it has gone through I'll cancel the original card.

I wish I could've moved the worse debt cos that's charging me £70 interest every month, but that's over £2k and the new card had a £200 limit. So, baby steps.