Coffee, Cake, Yarn - New Start

CoffeeCakeYarn

I've just realised we are 52 days into the year, pretty sure I should have named my diary...


52 days of Spaghetti Bolognese


:rotfl:

joeyjimbles

I'm sure there was some pulled pork in there as well....and some chips!

CoffeeCakeYarn

There was indeed some pork and some chips - just feel like I'm forever saying, 'Spag bol for dinner tonight!' :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Mumoffourkids

CoffeeCakeYarn wrote: »

I've just realised we are 52 days into the year, pretty sure I should have named my diary...


52 days of Spaghetti Bolognese


:rotfl:

Surely that should be 52 days of yellow sticker spaghetti Bolognese!! :rotfl:

Drawingaline

:rotfl::rotfl:

joeyjimbles

Hope you're ok, and just being busy and/or relaxing after your busy week. Just checking in.

joeyjimbles

Do we need to send a search party into the snow, or lure you out with a steaming plate of spaghetti and sauce? Hope you're ok?

MeenaM

Hope all is well !

CoffeeCakeYarn

So it's been more than a while, but here I am. It's been a long journey since my last post, but I'm so happy that I've come back here to report a lower debt than before, but honestly, I don't know where to start. Where I left off I suppose, 21st Feb 2018, 19 months ago.

If anyone is still here that was here before, I'm sorry I dropped off. I burnt out. Really quickly. I ditched the survey sites, hated money, hated trying to save, hated the insurmountable hill that I had to climb, and that month ended up sticking £546.79 on my credit card, on blowing out, having fun and craft supplies. I know that because it's still on my monthly debt tracker. But those first few months of my debt free journey taught me a lot of things, and I want to share them here.

The first time I cleared a large amount of debt, I was in a very different position. I was married, with two decent incomes, and had someone to hunker down and crack through it with. This time I find myself living alone, with a tight budget, no one as a team mate to do this with, and one income. I thought it would be like it was before, but it wasn't. It turned horrific, quickly.

I can't not live my life. I can't spend every single available penny on debt and not have any experiences, because when I do that I end up blowing out as above. I can't say no to seeing friends because I don't want to spend the money on petrol. I pulled my socks up after that blow out way back when, and revised my budget to allow for things that I had told myself I wasn't allowed until I was out of debt.

I learnt the importance of tracking everything, my spending, my budgets and my debt. I still have the excel documents for each of these that I set up way back when, and I still use them every month, without fail.

I spent that first 12 months building up some funds. I built an emergency fund, which is currently at £803. I built a car fund, which currently sits at £455. I built Christmas and Presents savings, which currently sit at £300. I learned that these expenses WILL come around, and whilst it would be lovely to have that money paid off of my debt, in doing that I would only end up spending on the credit card.

I tweaked my budgets. I had to change my diet significantly to improve my health, and the spend went up. I stopped trawling for YS food, and now just pick it up if I find it. I'm still mindful of what I spend on food, but I was obsessing about eating as cheaply as possible that my health suffered.

I accepted that big things were not going to happen overnight, and that for me this would be a slow journey. Once you've done all that big stuff, and you still have a huge number over you, it's a blinking long slog. My budget has always been a bit tight, and once I'd made the decision that I needed to be sensible about how I was going to tackle my debts, I understood that to avoid the blow outs i needed to factor life into my budget so I didn't rebel at myself.

So what have I managed financially? My finances now, whilst still being in a significant amount of debt, are MUCH brighter. I had a little pay rise at work. I'm not dreading Christmas. I have an emergency fund for Emergencies. My car tax and service and MOT and Insurance and any ad hoc repairs are covered. My Opticians and Dentists appointments are accounted for, regular, and saved for. I can get my hair cut and it's paid for. All of the regular expenses are now covered, and god is that a huge weight lifted, knowing that I can cover living (whilst still being frugal!) and still chip away at my debt. I'm going on holiday in November (skip the lecture, please!) and it's all been paid for and the spending money is ready and waiting.

But there's more, and that's what's bought me back here to document the next steps of my journey. Me and the boy ended up getting along much better than we first planned. Things went very slow for both of us, but, we have decided that now is the right time for us to move in together :j Which is crackers, because I never thought I'd want to live with a boy again! So in the next few months I'll be moving into his place, with a view to getting our own together in the next few years.

He knows I have debt, he doesn't know how much. I'll be paying him a teeny amount to cover half of the rent and service charges on his place, and splitting the bills 50/50. This is exciting for me, because it means that I will be freeing up a significant amount of dollar every month to throw at my future. But the future is a little scary now, a couple of years to clear all the debt and save a sizeable deposit, it's a tough one, but I'm up for the challenge!

I took a hard decision to open a LISA when we decided on our plan of action, and I'm currently trying to fill it up to get the max bonus before April. 25% return is too much to turn down when my debt is (very almost!) all at 0%. I've stuck some money aside to help with my end of tenancy costs, because even when you rent it's not a cheap exercise, especially not when you need to get things like wardrobes and storage for boy house . I'm looking to be out of my place by 9th November, so still a little while to go, but things are being moved over slowly, and we both have mega months at work this month so didn't want to add more stress on.

So if you took my debt payment figure in isolation, you might think what on earth have I been doing for the last year and a half? I've grown. I've paid some back. I've lived, I've moved forward, and I'm now in a position where I don't have to reach for the credit card when I need a new tyre, of the hairdryer breaks. I think I just wanted to share a little for the others out there like me who are doing this on their own, with only a little wiggle room, and don't see the debt figures dropping by £800 a month. I know my circumstances are set to change, but for a long time they didn't, and it was a VERY long road ahead, but I just kept going.

So that's it, i'm back. I picked up the survey sites again, but without as much gusto as before, because it's boring and I don't want another burn out. My immediate goals are to finance the move without credit (possible), fill up the LISA before April (doable) and then smash the debts. Lets see how we get on

joeyjimbles

Welcome back, exciting news. And you have so many things to look forward to - I'm sure you'll get there, at your own pace.