Put away your purse & become debt-averse

foxgloves

Hello Campers......glad I'm not camping atm, to be honest. As much as I enjoy it, the weather is very unstable here today, with sunshine one minute before black clouds, sharp showers & wind blowing up from seemingly nowhere. Thunderstorms forecast for later.
Useful day so far. I've done my big Friday house clean, which is very boring but I start it early & think of the massive coffee & a sit-down at the end of it. Mr F took the car for its service & we were both surprised that there was enough money in the service plan to cover the cost, also a replacement bulb, which we were sure we'd need to pay for. The service plan comes to an end soon & there was a bit of a strong sell to try & get him to sign up for another one. He didn't succumb, said we will be changing the car fairly soon & may go with a different dealership, we haven't decided. While he was there, he had a look at the prices of cars on the forecourt & confirmed that there are certainly decent models around within our price range. Service took less time than anticipated so he decided to be a hero & swing by A*di with the list for my pantry stock-up. Defo some stock gaps, also at Waitr*se. 
Other stuff.....just catching up really. Wrapped a gift for a friend to post while I'm in town tomorrow, did a couple of surveys. Printed out the JL vouchers I cashed out from another survey site this week - added to Christmas stash. £45's worth of vouchers now & am not far off another couple of pay-outs. Also number-crunched our Home Improvements Budget. We are intending to have a serious look at this over the weekend when it looks to be a bit too wet to go anywhere. We want to plan for the next stage of work which is imminent (builders followed by return of decorator, then carpet fitters), but importantly, we also need to begin work on the final stage.....making sure we know exactly what we want, getting quotes, etc, & I didn't feel we could do that properly unless I knew exactly where we are with the current figures. Being careful & sensible at this point could result in some money leftover for savings. Less care & an 'Oh let's just get it done whatever' attitude, could make a serious dent in our budget. So I think having said that, I will wish you all a nice weekend & just go over the numbers again.
It's not my cooking night tonight, so I can hopefully finish reading my book & knit some more of B-in-L's socks.
Love to all,
F x

Baileys_Babe

That is interesting about your Aldi, last week I went to a different Aldi in our area and there were quite a few gaps including no eggs. Yesterday I went to my usual Aldi and the only gap I saw was cranberry juice. So hopefully things will improve quickly.

foxgloves

@Baileys_Babe - I think the road hauliers have said that August will be difficult because of it being holiday time as well as the ongoing Brexit & Covid issues. No signs of any silly panic buying here though, so at least that's a positive.
F

foxgloves

Hello Sunbeams, Useful discussion with Mr F this morning about where exactly we are with the home improvements project both in terms of the work itself & the budget. We had both been feeling a bit in limbo as decorator can't re-start until the builders have been (expecting lots of brick/mortar dust) & other jobs need to be done after the decorator. It was really useful to sit down & talk about it because we found that there are jobs we can be getting on with at the back of the house. Painting the conservatory, sourcing new vinyl flooring & arranging to get it fitted won't get in the way of any other jobs/workmen, so we are going to crack on with that. Mr F trogged straight off to the shed to source some paint from stores. Double win! He is apparently starting the painting tomorrow.
Am intending to read this afternoon but have done today's garden pickings - chillies, courgettes, french beans, lots of tomatoes, an aubergine & an artichoke. I shall need to make some tomato soup for the freezer next week to make the most of them.
Yarn arrived today, which I bought with my birthday voucher. It is so scrummy, I could honestly carry it around wirh me so as to keep stroking it!
Wishing everyone a peaceful weekend,
F x

Baileys_Babe

Due to all the rain, we have been having, I had forgotten it was the holiday season 🤦‍♀️ but it makes sense this will add to the disruption.

It sounds as if your home improvement meeting was successful and you are able to shop from home for some of the materials.

foxgloves

Yes, @Baileys_Babe - He's just putting the 2nd coat on before starting the skirting boards. All paint & material shopped from our shed!
F 

foxgloves

Has it stopped raining today even for a moment? I don't think so.....oh, I tell a lie - I think there was a two-minute window when I squeezed in the mini-glamour outing of trotting out to the wheelie bins!
Hello diary readers, it feels like the sort of day where nobody will have done anything exciting, so I'm wondering if any of you have bucked the trend? Perhaps @Pixiehouse55 & her mister have pirated a fab narrowboat from an unassuming couple on their way up a peaceful canal, somewhere, maybe @CrazyCatLady has squeezed in another 3 moggies, who knows?! So here at chez Foxgloves, the lovely Mr F has cleaned the inside of the conservatory & has been painting in there most of today. I've cleared up the bombsite kitchen, got one of those bargainaceous gammons into the slow cooker, picked a bundle of chard, prepped tonight's veg & frozen surplus beans picked yesterday. I've also made tomorrow's packed lunch & managed to fit 2 use-it-ups into my lunch (Mr F only managed one, so I win the leftovers!) & have spent most of this afternoon researching new sofas plus the logistics of replacing ours at the optimum time to fit in with the decorator coming, etc. Bizarrely, this research may have turned out to be more money-saving than I thought. It is probably 18 years since I last bought a sofa, so I was interested to see what styles would be available, given that we both prefer the wipe-clean qualities of leather, & basically, I absolutely hated most of them! I decided to set a top budget of £2k for the sofa (while very much hoping it would be a lot less) as we also need an armchair. Liked a couple on JL, but they all have an 18 week delivery time, which doesn't work with getting shot of our old furniture pre-decorator, felt very ambivalent about everything else - some were horrid & really old-fogeyish & others stylish but too modern for our room. I could hardly believe it when the top one on my very short shortlist turned out to be the cheapest one I looked at, appears to be immediately available & has extremely good reviews. At the moment, I'm thinking we will go with that - if so, I'll have been money-saving by accident! I'm not placing any orders yet. Those days have gone. I will think about it some more, we'll discuss it, as we do all big purchases & also make sure we tie the order to a delivery date when decorator has defo finished that room. Price good though - both sofa & matching chair for significantly less than the amount I'd notionally budgeted for the sofa.
Well, I shall stop droning on about furniture - I think it is just that it feels positive to have started moving on the home improvements project again, after feeling in limbo all summer. I need to go & make up a pint of powdered milk as we are apparently running low. Milkman not due till Tuesday & I am not popping out for a pint in case it turns into a bit of a top-up shop as these things always do when we are hungry!
Take care m'dears,
F x

Tescodealqueen

Well I made three birthday cards if that counts as exciting. I had fun though 

Humdinger1

@foxgloves as a fellow ex-last-of-the-big-spenders, I often think that the quest for dubious excitement and spurious, unachievable and pointless Sunday supplement lifestyle lay behind many of my outbreaks! Give me peace and a quiet life any day, after the debt mountain I climbed...well over 100k when inc business and personal debt.  I did manage to do it and have often thought since last March how grateful I am that I wasn't in the thick of it while the world is on fire.  The grounded reality of your writing is marvellous and why I'm reading you daily.  Thanks again love Humdinger xx

BlueJ94

Hello! Been having a quick read through some of your earlier posts and you've just given me a good kick up my bum to start using the slow cooker/ pressure cooker more!  

Looking forward to cheering you along!