Busy Mee's Last Leg

Suffolk_lass

Love your monthly updates. We are also due to go away in just over two weeks to sit in a field at a campsite where we will use our own facilities, (assuming we have some by then [eek]).

We also have an August to September trip possible but so far only ferries - out to NL, back from France, with our original plans including Germany, Austria, Italy, and possibly Switzerland too. Just wondering how welcome we would be.

try_harder

I am so pleased for you , you work so hard at everything . Great numbers as always

South_coast

Great round-up Busy_Mee, you must be delighted 😀

LadyGnome

Great progress. 

savingholmes

Great OP and savings. Glad that you are getting some nice treats to look forward to.

Busy_Mee

Good morning. I am up with the lark this morning as I am expecting a delivery of a new sideboard. The delivery is expected between 7 and 9 am ON A SUNDAY. Still it is a lovely morning to be up early and I am quite excited about the sideboard arriving.

We have definitely been focussed on titivating the house and garden during lockdown and spending the money that was saved for holidays on things for the house. We finished the house 11 years ago and we haven't done much with it since and it feels good to update things a bit, particularly as we are spending so much time at home.

There is nothing much to report financially, which is one of the reasons I have been missing on here. 

I don't feel like I have anything interesting to say  The £100 from Quidco And £18.03 from have TCB arrived and duly shuffled into the odds and sods account. We finally received a refund from Emirates on flights we should have taken on 1 April, but they only refunded the cost of the flights, not the seat booking. Apparently you had to apply for that separately so I have had to go around that loop again 

Our spending on food does appear to be returning to pre- Covid  levels as DD as resumed her social life and their are more opportunities for eating out. 

We actually went to the local pub for tea on Friday night and we really impressed with the measures in place....they had even erected screens between the tables. It was a nice evening out, quite buzzy but felt safe and just so good to feel like we are back to some sort of normality.

My annual pension statement arrived this week. Cue much spreadsheet fiddling. I am still targeting retirement some time after my 57th birthday in April next Year and I feel that I am just trying to get through this year. I will have the discussion with my boss in January (once I have had a full year temporary promotion) about whether there would be the opportunity for partial retirement, but to be honest I don't want to be doing what I am currently doing in part time hours because it is too stressful in full time hours.

Anyway I think that is all. The weather has finally improved and I am hoping to get in the garden today to catch up on the weeding after all the rain we had last week. Have a great Sunday x

South_coast

At least there are no disasters to report BM - "nothing interesting" is a good thing at the moment! I really look forward to your posts, especially about approaching retirement so I can live vicariously through you 😀!

Suffolk_lass

We are happy to read about non-financial things too! look at the discussion about your patio tiles. It's a sort of "over the garden fence" thing, in a virtual anonymous sort of way.

savingholmes

News of impending retirement sounds like a dream

Busy_Mee

Morning. It is a lovely sunny day again here. The weather has been so unpredictable here over the last few weeks. The weather has been switching from "November" to July on almost a daily basis. DD went to Alton Towers yesterday and was thankful that she wore jeans and a sweatshirt rather than her originally planned shorts and T-shirt combo. It was cold and rainy and queues for rides up to 2 hours. She had a good time but as with most things, just not the same as pre Covid.

I had a better week at work last week. I think the best I have had since Covid started. This gave me a bit more head space for financial stuff and I did a bit of shuffling around. I put a further £15k in my SIPP which then gained me an extra £3750 in tax relief. This still feels too good to be true and there will be even more to come when I claim back the 40% element at the end of the tax year. 

Surprisingly my pension has bounced back to pre Covid levels, as has my ISA. However I am fully expecting them to fall again if economic predictions are correct. I am just banking on the tax relief to cushion any losses. I only log the original investment in my savings so anything left of the tax relief or any increases on the investment will be a bonus when we draw down. 

I am trying to get to a position where all the money is working to earn interest and I have just spotted that the bills account is quite healthy (around £1k in there) but earning nothing. So I am going to shuffle that to the TSB to earn 1.5% on the basis that all these bits and pieces of interest add up. The bills account is so healthy because I have managed to reduce the outgoings considerably over the last year but still sent the same amount to the account. If in April there is surplus I will decide what to do with it (maybe mortgage op or new boiler). In the meantime Mr Mee tells me we need two new tyres on both cars, so that will strip a fair amount out of the account.

I feel that some areas of life are getting back to normal. Our food bills are back to pre Covid and DD and I are back on track with our eating. I have put 2lb on during lockdown but I figure it could have been worse.

 I am still not happy in the big outside world though. Hardly anyone is wearing face masks despite local spikes in infection. I cannot understand why people are waiting for a week on Monday to wear face masks. Why wait for the legislation when it is clearly safer to wear one.

We are going away next weekend to stay in a nice country house hotel. This was originally booked for March and I am actually looking forward to it. I will take my own disinfectant wipes to clean the door handles etc. 

I've also just rebooked our Greece trip for September. We have been undecided about what to do but decided to go for it as we have nothing to lose financially. We simply rescheduled the flights ( Sleasy jet and that was very easy) and booked a fully refundable no deposit hotel. There was no additional costs for the flights despite the new ones being more expensive than the originals ( bought the day they were released last September). We are going to France for a long weekend first in August, so we will see how we feel after that.

Mr Mee loves retirement, despite it not going quite according to plan and has no regrets leaving work. He has got into a good routine and is constantly muttering about how busy he is  . I definitely want to join him next year but I am glad I didn't do it this year and the extra year will give us a great financial cushion.

I think that is all. I am going to make the most of the weather today. A good walk with the pup and then gardening. Have a good week everyone x