Our £20,000 Life

Drawingaline

Well done!

We are similar to you, hubby gets paid around 24th, so fixed expenses come from that, cb/Tc/Dla is four weekly so this tends to pay for food, petrol and other items which does mean we never have a five week month for food. I get paid twice a month and atm using this for savings, and debt repayment.

Cinny91

DHs work changed the payment day a few years back to help with peoples cash flow around Christmas, or something along those lines! Glad to hear someone budgets the same, I see people giving every £ a job at the start of the month but I prefer the flexibility of having the monthly and regular income budgeted semi-seperately

DH heard back about his service and it looks like it'll be around £300 😬 trying to turn my negative dread for February into optimistic motivation. Lots of free events start happening again next month, it's like our town has come back to life after a very long Christmas snooze so we have free entertainment, snowdrops and their buddies are starting to sprout, this month has shown we can eat well on a small budget and if anything O has been doing so well. Hes been eating lots of different foods as well as eating a boiled egg for the first time in years last night. All good things, and we have a solid goal to focus on which might be a squeeze but it's not an impossibility.

Need to go into town this morning. Totally out of fruit but we arent fancy with it and stick to apples, oranges, grapes and bananas so a restock wont be much. Want to get £10 out the bank to and use this for O's activities over the next few days.

Have a trip to the giant bulk C warehouse this weekend so want to comb through their deals at some point and see what will actually save us money in the long run. Going with my Sister, BIL and Niece as they can use our membership and they've promised us dinner (as in, a slice of pizza) to say cheers. BIL is from California and was raised (big family!) on their products so hes very excited to go. Been asking us for a while otherwise I'd cancel with February looking tight. Just need to stick with our list and budget!

Cinny91

Spends today -

£2.67 - Aldi
£1.50 - Boyes
£5.00 - C ex

On the flip side I traded in some things at C ex for £73.47

I've left £4 in my purse for tomorrow, and put everything else in the change tin. I did take £10 from the bank too, so that change after shopping at Aldi also went in the pot! That money will cover us for the family meal next month so that's one less thing to worry about funding and we got rid of a few things from around the house too.

Cinny91

Today's spends -

£3.00 - Playgroup
£1.79 - milton tablets

The end!

Avoided the singing group as O has a cold from nursery, so we went to a play group with said germy nursery friends instead of our normal group. Did not care for it, sat glazed over thinking about our normal Thursday group with hot tea and biscuits.

Also returned the cable we got from C ex yesterday so now have a £5 voucher to spend in the future.

Payday tomorrow! Also food shopping day, might be keeping O off nursery so that trip could be interesting. We don't need a lot again this week so wont take long to do thankfully 😅

Cinny91

Payday!

Savings are now at £5735 and the aim is to be over 6k by O's birthday :j

Bill money is to one side along with £180 for insurance and we've paid off DH's CC.

Went to do the food shop this morning and I'm really enjoying the routine of it now! Hidden veg spaghetti bolognese for tea tonight. Spent £38.85 at Morrisons and £9.80 stocking up on dishwasher tablets and fabric softener. Have enough detergent for a couple weeks so that's a head ache of getting the best price prosponed for now!

Easy afternoon as both O and I are full of cold, no visits to the Grandparents either as my Grandad is unwell and we decied we'd rather not share the germs 😬

We currently have £195 in the bank, I need fuel for my car but other than that it should be semi easy sailing until next Friday.. in theory

Cinny91

Trip to the city for a bulk buying spree. £87.02 spent, but it does help keep weekly shops on the slim side. We tend to go every 5 months or so. We also picked up a premade tea, feels like a bit of a splurge at £7.99 😅

They also had some brilliant books for O, so I think we might go next month with any birthday money he has so he can pick a few as he reacted to long tables of books like I'd expect him to react to a sweet shop.

TT of £4.69, so we're off :j

lucielle

All sounding good, Cinny
L

Cinny91

Thanks Lucielle, just trying to stay motivated!

My niece has come up with slapped cheek so it might be another week of low spending if O has caught it. Thankfully our Thursday group is doing a free showcase on Sunday so we've got two chances to go this week :j

There's also a jumble sale in town in Saturday, as as my uber strict no spend January is over I'm going to go and see if there's anything decent I can spruce up as token birthday/mothers day gifts. Would like something I can repurpose as a vase or planter for bulbs/daffodils, so we'll see what they have.. if anything! Will have O take any silver from his piggy (dino??) bank so he can have a looksie too. Trying to teach him about money, work on his counting etc when we're in the shops so the sale will be a ~*teachable moment

Yesterday was a NSD. We had pork for our roast, no prizes for guessing what's on the menu tonight. DH went on a bike ride while O and I stayed at home with our colds. Had O rest all morning which just meant he went absolutely wild after dinner - DH felt bad for leaving us when we weren't well so told me to go have a nap while he kept an eye on O. By all accounts he thoroughly regretted that choice as O was acting like he'd been let at a bag of sugar :rotfl:

Updated signature as DH put £750 not £735 into savings. We have £85 in the bank, I need fuel this week but I'm okay topping up £10-15 at a time and I'll need to do a veggie shop on Wednesday. Aim for this month is to save £100 every payday, which cuts it a little close to the bone but I think we can do it as almost everything is budgeted for in February. Need £25 for O's birthday party, but thats the only thing I can think of that's out of budget atm. See how we do!

Cinny91

3rd NSD in a row. Sundays through Tuesdays seem to be the sweet spot!

Eeeeeeking out fuel as long as I can. See how far I get, quite literally

Wages are in cash this week, which makes me feel like it's 2006 and I'm about to go home and stash it in my piggy bank. Reality is I'll pop to the bank tomorrow and pay it in then move some money around. Extremely thrilling times.

In the theme of mixing it up this week, tonight we're breaking from our norm of beans on toast to gift ourselves with... an omelette :cool:

Bagging up O's piggy bank tonight to get changed from pretend copper money into real silver and gold coins. Found around £1 in coppers he can add to his loot ready for Saturday.

So we currently have £85 in the bank, £1 in my purse and £160 to be paid in. I think £100 is more than reasonable for saving. Do need to spend some money tomorrow, but only a few pounds and as I'm still on the look out for O getting a germ from his cousin we'll be avoiding our normal Wednesday hang out and plan to go for a walk instead.

clearmydebts

Cinny91 wrote: »

3rd NSD in a row. Sundays through Tuesdays seem to be the sweet spot!

Eeeeeeking out fuel as long as I can. See how far I get, quite literally

Wages are in cash this week, which makes me feel like it's 2006 and I'm about to go home and stash it in my piggy bank. Reality is I'll pop to the bank tomorrow and pay it in then move some money around. Extremely thrilling times.

In the theme of mixing it up this week, tonight we're breaking from our norm of beans on toast to gift ourselves with... an omelette :cool:

Bagging up O's piggy bank tonight to get changed from pretend copper money into real silver and gold coins. Found around £1 in coppers he can add to his loot ready for Saturday.

So we currently have £85 in the bank, £1 in my purse and £160 to be paid in. I think £100 is more than reasonable for saving. Do need to spend some money tomorrow, but only a few pounds and as I'm still on the look out for O getting a germ from his cousin we'll be avoiding our normal Wednesday hang out and plan to go for a walk instead.

You're doing brilliant Cinny. The omelette sounds so yummy