Feast or famine

CCW007

NSD so far and not going out so unless I spend online it's looking good for today.

I always take lunch to work but OH is not as organised and can only take lunch for his first day if he is working away due to storing / heating up etc. As I am working from home today I had a bit of time before he left so made him lunch for today - that will have saved £3 to £4 and used up some coleslaw left over from buffet lunch at weekend which was dated today.

Need to investigate lunches for him which he can store without needing a fridge - thinking of home made pot noodle type things. He can't always guarantee access to a microwave so microwave pasta isn't always suitable.

I made a big pot of soup using up some chicken sausages dated today so that was lunch for today and the rest of the week as well.

Opened up a new current account which I will transfer two direct debits over to then use that as a donor account to switch to HSBC for the bonus. Don't want to lose my main account as I've had it years and I know the details! Also my salary is paid into it and it would be too risky to change given how rubbish my HR payroll can be!

Also opened a FlexDirect account for OH to stick £2.5K into and for the regular saver. I will manage it though on his behalf.

CCW007

Managed my NSD day yesterday and trying for another today. It has made me very conscious of my spending habits - I need a couple of bits of shopping and ordinarily I would have been putting together an online order and padding it out to meet the minimum spend, instead I shall stop off at @ldi on my way home tomorrow and just get the bits I need.

Homegrown0

Hi CCW - just had a read of your diary and really impressed at the level of debt you've shifted already.

A note on your husband's lunch situation - my husband is a tradesman so never knows whether he'll have access to microwaves/ kettles/ fridges etc. I got him a thermal food flask from Dunelm (they sell them loads of places though) and it keeps his food piping hot up to 12 hours and keeps things cold for 8 hours (I think). I'm pretty sure it cost me £8 but he uses it most days for leftovers. Perhaps worth investing? Especially if, like my husband, he sometimes works outdoors in the cold!

CCW007

Thanks Homegrown, good idea for days when he leaves here and goes to the office; will have a look as I'm sure we had a food thermos.

The problem is when he is on a clients site for a few days and is away from home - I can make lunch for the first day but not the following days.

NSD today - two in a row, get me! Tomorrow will be small top up shop, no other spends planned. Hopefully less than £15.

Homegrown0

Ah, I see that the consecutive days would be an issue. Hope you can track a food flask down in your house to avoid paying out for one!

Well done on the NSD x2!

CCW007

CCW007 wrote: »

NSD today - two in a row, get me! Tomorrow will be small top up shop, no other spends planned. Hopefully less than £15.

£15.17. That is all.

CCW007

OH is definitely getting this mindful spending, I suggested we could go and get some bacon for breakfast but he decided to have an omelette so we didn't need to go out and spend anything!

He is currently fitting new brakes to my girl racer car which will need to be driven to see if the problem with gearbox has been fixed or whether it needs another part replacing (£335 ) then we can get it back up for sale. Hoping to get £6k for it but would take £5k to get it gone. Every month I have to tax and insure it (on a temporary cover) it costs almost £100 so it may pay to take less for it but not have it hanging around.

CCW007

NSD on Sunday, so that's three this month. Really loving keeping the spending diary, I've added in direct debits (except credit card minimum repayments) so I can really see where our money goes each month. Being an excel geek, I've been having fun playing around with the pivot table!

This is the first time ever I have recorded money as I've spent it rather than a month later when the credit card statement comes in. It's making me much more mindful of spending too.

OH's Nationwide account is all set up so need to arrange direct debits to pay in and get the regular saver set up too. We have a regular saver maturing this month so that will get transferred straight to the new account to get 5% interest.

One week to pay day so nothing very interesting happening with the debts. Hope to get down to £25K after all money shuffling done.

CCW007

Completely forgot to say, I've lost 6lb this month (year!) so down to 12st 11lb = 3% of my weight. That's 6 / 42 of my target so 14% of my target in 2 weeks! Obviously this will slow down but it's a great start.

Still need to up my exercise and don't think I will be able to start running just yet so doing a 10K at end of March may not happen but if not I'll aim to do the 5K race instead which should be manageable.

Am doing dry January and so far so good which will be helping with weight loss. Going out for lunch with a friend on Saturday then meeting friends the following Friday evening so a couple of challenges coming up but will be driving for both so could only have had one drink anyway which I'm not keen on as I then want another which I won't do if I'm driving.

CCW007

Money shuffling still to happen but debt will be down to £25,500 so only £700 reduction since last month but up to £10,500 overall.

Disappointing but understandable given the credit card bill last month.

Progress on the weight loss though - 9lb of 42lb target lost.