Cheery's country living adventure 11 March 2018 at 7:28AM edited 30 November -1 at 12:00AM in Mortgage-Free Wannabe 3K replies 211.2K views

lindez

Hi Cheery wow you have had a busy week and well done on sitting down and doing your writing it sounds like you really got a lot out of it.
Happy birthday to Mr Cheery.

Cheery_Daff

Thanks folks

Had a nice pottering day - breakfast in our favourite cafe (about £13 for bagel with smoked salmon, flapjack for me, tea and two lots of coffee, not too bad), then a trip to a local market town. Got a takeaway cuppa (£4) and supermarket lunch (probably about £8 including snacks) and ate it in the park. Pottered about the charity shops but didn't but anything, and have spent the rest of the afternoon at home lounging around (and repotting some dreadfully pot-bound plants in the greenhouse as a gardening friend will be here tomorrow :rotfl: )

I have an adventure planned for tomorrow :j I'm meeting said gardening friend in a cafe at 10.30 and have said I'll walk there :eek: which is fine, except it's about 6 miles, up hill and down dale so I'll have to set off at about 8am to be sure of getting there on time :eek: Will definitely be having a piece of cake at the end of it :rotfl:

Then she'll drive me to hers (which is just up the road) so we can nosey round her garden and play with her chickens, and then she'll drive me back to mine so we can nosey round my garden and play with my chickens

Very much looking forward to it :j

Had an email today from the building society reminding me to fill in the new mortgage acceptance letter. I need to ring them - in one place it says the fix will start when the old one ends (end of sept) but in another place it says the fix will start on 1st Sept.

Just need to check they won't start one while the other is still running and then charge me an early repayment charge for the first :eek: I mean, that would be ridiculous when they're both with the same bank... but stranger things have happened... so I'm not signing til the dates are right (I've got til 4th Sept so no rush)

Right, back is packed for tomorrow, house is reasonably presentable for having a fellow slightly slovenly visitor :rotfl: Just need to start drinking now

Cheery_Daff

Oh, and another builder emailed me this morning!! Most exciting. Rang him back but he wasn't there so will try to catch him in the morning.

themadvix

Belated Happy Birthday to Mr Cheery!

Great news about the builder - hope you managed to get hold of him this morning. And I hope the walk went ok (and not like my 6-miler!).

Cheery_Daff

Thanks

Had THE most lovely day :j Walk was cheery, felt SO good to stretch my legs and see some different views :j and I only got rained on a tiny bit at the beginning :rotfl:

Took me just under two and a half hours to walk 6 miles and I arrived at the cafe within 10 minutes of when I said I would - not too bad considering!

Had a very well deserved pot of tea and piece of cake, and a not very well deserved (but well enjoyed) ice cream :rotfl: total cost about £7 I think, not bad.

Then had a cuppa at friend's house and then she came back here and we had tea here too (SO MUCH TEA). Sat in the garden with chickens round our feet and Tiny Hare sat just the other side of the gate munching grass and washing its ears :j :j So lucky :j

Tired now and Mr Cheery has just run me a much needed bath :j

Tomorrow the weather isn't great so I think I'm going to take myself off to Calke Abbey, a National Trust place. I'm not generally much of a stately home wanderer but this one has been preserved in the state it was abandoned and looks quite interesting. Mr Cheery's not that keen (and I'd want him to be more than 'not that keen' as it's almost £20 to get in :eek: ) so I'm going on my own. Looking forward to it!

In builder news, I spoke to yesterday's one this morning - he seemed a bit scatty but I'm going to email him my address and when I'm free and we'll see. And another one rang this evening just back from holidays - sounded organized and cheerful and is speaking to the guy he works with and will ring me tomorrow.

So it looks like I might have three quotes by the end of next week - maybe we'll even have a fully fitted kitchen by Christmas! :rotfl:

Right, best get in this bath :j

Cheery_Daff

Another lovely day yesterday (well, the weather was vile but I had a nice time :rotfl: )

Took myself off to Calke Abbey - not cheap to get in but it was really interesting, and I pretty much had the gardens to myself as I flounced about with my brolly :rotfl: Had a nice time finishing my book in the cafe too :j

Not exactly a budget day out but as this fortnight is in lieu of an annual holiday... £16 entry fee, £10 for lunch and tea in the cafe, £20 on reduced Christmas presents in the gift shop :eek: and 100 miles of driving...

Cheery_Daff

So, just had the first builder round :j :j

Happy to just do the building work (without the decorating/finishing, which we'll do ourselves). Reckons it'll take 3-4 weeks (which is what we expected), and it might be after Christmas when they can get to us :eek:

Got two more coming to quote (hopefully) at unspecified times next week so we'll see. I'll be very happy to have a price and a date even if we do have to wait for a bit! We're going to create a very basic kitchen (microwave and a hotplate) in one of the other rooms so they'll have a clear run and hopefully can get on with it a bit quicker!

Right, heading into the big city today with Mr Cheery - he's meeting up with someone to do some stuff but is quite dizzy so I'm going too to drive and have a bit of a mooch about, and maybe meet up with a chum myself. Probably should stay here and strip the wallpaper or something but his dizziness is a nice excuse not to :rotfl:

Cheery_Daff

Well, I had a most jolly afternoon in the city yesterday :j Met up with a pal in a cafe, then went for a bit of a walk round some fields, and then as I was driving to the DIY shop I spotted another friend in the street so went round to hers for a cuppa instead :j Very jolly :j

Picked up Mr Cheery, and we called in to see another friend for another cuppa :rotfl: Then started getting peckish, so went to our old favourite takeaway that we used to go to ALL the time but haven't been to since we moved house :eek: Shared a single takeaway (£6.20) and used our new melamine bowls we just picked up in a charity shop for £1.50 :money:

Today is WET WET WET. Chickens are NOT impressed :eek: I am not too impressed myself :rotfl: Still, I have plenty of indoor chores and activities to do, some of which I'm putting off so I'm going to do my new favourite trick that I do at work and write them all on bits of paper and draw them out of a hat, and spend 30 minutes on each one That way everything has an equal chance, and if I pick out the one I don't want to do, then it doesn't last long :rotfl:

So here's the list (I'll just put the bold headings in the hat - the things underneath are the things to do in that category)

Decorating the hall
* Finish scraping paper off
* PVA the bit that needs plastering
* Put filler in the holes
* Plaster the bit with PVA on
* Paint the rest
* Find the heat gun and start getting the gloss paint off the woodwork

Promotion application
* Finish CV
* Start tweaking other bit of the application
* Email people to ask for references

Diploma
* Finish writing up one design
* Sort out photos
* Start tracing maps for new design

Blog post
* Put photos onto the computer
* Blog post about National Trust visit the other day

Life admin
* Both of us to sign mortgage acceptance letter
* Package parcel I need to return
* Find letter for old occupant to stick in post box
* Email local life coach woman (she can't see me til nearly the end of September)
* Email scythe bloke to book him in for next year
* YNAB and banks (it's payday today!)
* Get my stuff ready for tomorrow

Matched betting
* Work through the rest of the day's offers
* Check bank

Quite clearly I'm not going to get ALL that done today :rotfl:

I'll do a quick poo pick of the hen house when it's time for them to go in, and once they're in bed I might get back out in the field and do another hour of scything. Did an hour and a half last night and made it across an entire strip of the field! :j :j NO idea what I'll be doing with the hay yet - in fact there may just be a giant soggy pile of grass at this rate But doing it with a scythe will take me forever so I don't have time to wait for the sunshine at this stage - just have to get it cut, then hope for a few dry days to dry it out (it's easier to scythe when the grass is wet anyway)

First of all though, a nice cup of tea

Cheery_Daff

Morning MSE chums :hello:

Well needless to say I still haven't done half the things on that list :rotfl: but I'm getting there!

This afternoon we have visitors though, and the sun is shining :j :j Mr Cheery spent much of yesterday doing tidying and garden sorting while I was out enjoying myself but there's still plenty to do.

However, this morning we both need to make some progress with functional/work-related tasks, so we've locked ourselves away for a couple of hours to get on with that first :j

Meeting at 12 to recommence tidying/wind-proofing the garden/making food :j Guests arriving from 2 (but probably a bit later...)

In financial news, well, not much is happening really :rotfl: MB dosh now up to £3400 in total :money: although obviously some of that has been paid off the mortgage. £420 made so far this month :money: All good :j

Tried to sort out YNAB last night but was trying to do it in a bit of a rush and got myself in a right old muddle with what I'd done when I transferred the MB dosh into the main bank account, and then transferred that, plus a bit more that I'd transferred in from elsewhere, to the mortgage. Can't figure out what I put in YNAB, and now all my numbers are out Think I may have sorted it last night but was getting a bit tired so need to go back for another go

Also need to check where we're at with savings. I've been drip feeding the P0$t )ffice money (main savings account, about 1.5%) over to the two regular savers (which are 3% and 5%, although the 5% one was also reduced to 3% recently), but I think we've *almost* got to the point where the regular savers are full now, so I need to check the direct debits and stop them if necessary.

Rejigged my spreadsheets this morning for the MB stuff - I had all my account withdrawals in with the spreadsheet I keep track of my free bets etc in, and realised I didn't have anywhere to keep track of how much money I had in each betting shop account etc. So I've done a bit of a rejig which will show free bets etc in one tab, and a list of ALL betting shops (gosh, there are plenty of them :eek: ) in another with current balances and withdrawals. Should make it easier to keep track (I hope).

Anyway, as usual I'm putting off filling in the promotions form :rotfl: Only got an hour and 15 mins left now til we need to down tools and start tidying so I'd best crack on!

Cheery_Daff

Oh, and I've finally filled in the mortgage re-fix form now I'm happy they're not going to start it before the previous one finishes - carried it round all day yesterday and forgot to put it in the post so need to do that tomorrow (and return a parcel, so a trip to the post office).

Also, I spotted a small mouse happily wandering along the floor in my study yesterday... I'm not that bothered, but we've got guests staying on the sofa bed in here tonight :eek: Got the trap set now, and hopefully we'll catch it this morning. Not sure how squeamish our guests are so I'm afraid before they get here I'll be removing the trap and feigning ignorance and just hoping it doesn't turn up when they're here

Country houses always have mice, right?! :rotfl: