Keeping on the Straight and Narrow...

savingholmes

Just remind me what WWOTW stands for.

Glad your son has had a better day and you get a break and a nap. They definitely keep you on your toes.

DancingInTheRain

@savingholmes WWOTW = What We Owe The World or Wicked Witch Of The West, take your pick 

savingholmes

Thanks for explaining.

DancingInTheRain

Not achieved much the last couple of days as my back has been hurting so really impacted on what I can do, seems to be easing a bit today thank goodness. I think this was a result of sleeping on the sofa with DS1, it's L shaped so we were on opposite sides but as he's a wriggler I slept with my foot against him so I could stop him falling off so while he didn't hurt himself I haven't done quite so well!

I am managing to potter around and slowly keep on top of any light chores but anything on the floor has had to stay there until DH can assist or take over. The boys have been stars at loading/unloading the washing machine as I daren't go a day without that going on!

On the finance front I've sent the yellow slip from the car log book to the DVLA so hopefully that will trigger a Road Tax refund soon. Cancelled the insurance for the car but any refund due was taken up by admin costs! Have kept on top of surveys, just cashed out £6 with another £4 pending. Received the money from Music Magpie, still have Ziffit and We Buy Books pending. 

Hope everyone else is well x

savingholmes

Hope your back improves soon. Glad you've had some  of the extra £ actually arrive

DancingInTheRain

Thanks SH my back is much improved thank goodness.

Had a 3 hour governors meeting on Teams this morning which although productive, was a bit of a shock to the system after not working for a few months! Was good to collaborate (I'm definitely at my best as part of a team) and to contribute on a few things and have some ideas taken onboard.

DS2 and I went for a little walk around our nearby harbour this afternoon as the weather has been quite pleasant here, almost warm in sheltered areas. We even enjoyed an ice cream, perfect in this weather as it doesn't melt as quickly

Our Broadband contract is ending later this month so we have gone with a new provider which will see us saving £7 per month and also receive an £85 gift card 90 days after the contract starts.

Since my post yesterday the money from We Buy Books has arrived and have had an email confirming the Ziffit payout will be paid in the next few days, also had another small cash out from Vinted. Free money this month has just topped £900 thanks largely to the jewelry and car being scrapped, need to think about how this money will be allocated. Initially the goal this year was to top up savings but that was thinking we'd make around £100 per month, this month has definitely been an anomaly so I think we need to allocate it differently this month

I've just mentioned on SH's diary that I'm thinking of putting some of the money towards our energy account in order to try to prevent a large increase on the monthly DD later in the year. Also thinking of paying some of the gold money towards the mortgage as 1 of the pieces was my Gran's so it would be nice to put it towards something towards securing our future. Probably prudent to pay more off the CC too. An unexpected but good small dilemma to have and something to think about over the next few days...

savingholmes

Hi Dancing

I like the idea of a harbour walk... sounds beautiful.

£900 extra in a month is amazing. Well done. Any thought on an encore?

DancingInTheRain

SH - might need to sell a kidney to match this month's extra earnings!

February will be more about getting the house in order in terms of decorating I think. We will be getting the kitchen and utility room painted (delayed from autumn), we'll be paying decorator friend to do this so these rooms will need to be clutter free and deep cleaned.

Then I'm planning on starting work on our hallway, lots of original wood panelling to strip back as well as the staircase as the previous owners were fans of painting multiple layers of gloss on these and we'd like to try to bring it back to the original woodwork if possible so that will be a fiddly & time consuming project to keep me busy. Will also be stripping & redecorating the walls and will need to replace skirting boards and flooring but hoping to do as much of this as possible ourselves to keep costs down. 

Will also have half term to navigate which is slightly extended as the school has an inset day on the Monday after half term so I can see February disappearing in the blink of an eye.

Since my last post have cashed out £5 from VYPR, £6.70 from Prolific and moved £4.50 monthly account earnings to the free money pot.

We've decided to pay the gold money off the mortgage so have transferred £500 to the mortgage account. The remaining free money will go to savings as in addition to the decorating costs next month we also need to pay the balance on our holiday at the start of Feb. Not sure if I mentioned that we cancelled our holiday abroad we had planned for May? We just didn't feel like it was the right time with everything still being so uncertain with Covid so we took a hit on the deposit and booked a week away in the UK at the start of the Easter holidays instead. Despite the loss of the deposit the holiday cost overall us coming in much cheaper so had ended up being more budget friendly too.

sashybo

Hope you can find time to get the hallway done, it sounds like a lot of work. Good that you can get the kitchen & utility painted by decorator friend.

We need to re-paint most of the house! Will probably start in our front hall as it’s small, although will have 3 doorways to gloss. 😱 

I dread the thought of doing our stair banister, the gloss on it is awful and we bought our house as a new build!!

Good news on the holiday. 

Bubblesmum

Well done you ….. 

sea abs ice cream - joys x