New year plus new decade equals, new diary

charhen19

I put £10 petrol in the car this morning on my way into work which should more than see me through until payday.

Now with only 4 sleeps until payday this is the time of the month when things can get very sticky! Although I think I'm on top of things this month.

All meals are covered - even if they're not the healthiest! I'm trying to run the freezer down so I can hopefully defrost it on Sunday ready for my monthly food shop delivery on Monday evening. We only have a tiny makeshift freezer at the moment so it's really important to pack it efficiently and to stock rotate. Sunday afternoon snack may be a plate of chicken nuggets with nothing else!

Daily TT's done and I had a little more than I expected in my current account so another £1 gone to the furniture and £1 to my EF.

I shouldn't really need anything else before Monday morning so anything I have left in my account Sunday evening I will split between my EF and the furniture as usual.

charhen19

I've been reading a bit recently about "no spend January". (Sorry if this is not a new thing, I've only just discovered it) Apparently the average family takes 7 months to repay what they've spent at Christmas and some people are now cottoning onto the idea of not spending anything in January to speed up that recovery process. Direct debits are allowed of course and any travel to get to work (although if there is a cheaper way then it is encouraged). And a conservative food shop to be done/delivered 1st Jan is also allowed but apart from that (and barring any medical needs or emergencies) not a penny is to be spent.

I'm wondering how realistic this would be for me. The lady I was reading about managed 50% of what she hoped to save the first year, then 75% years 2 and 3 and then year 4 she achieved 100% of what she aimed to save in January (£1300).

Even 50% would be great as a first attempt so I'm giving this some serious thought for next year. I have a whole year to plan. Now I see stockpiling a few non perishables a month towards it as cheating, however if I get anything on a BOGOF (when I was only intending to buy one) that will keep then I'll use that towards it I think and store it somewhere separate where I can just forget about it.

I have a few birthdays in January so will have to plan ahead for these. Cards is not a problem as can buy them in advance. I'll ask for everyday (not fancy, premium brand) toiletries for Christmas if anyone asks if there's anything I'd like.

Finding free entertainment should be fun too - always up for a movie night (homemade popcorn of course) and might be fun to dig out some old board games. We always love a good drama series we can get stuck into. A brisk walk at the weekends (so long as it's dry) always blows the cobwebs away. And I have a stack of books waiting to be read that I never seem to be able to get around to.

Other potential Christmas presents could be a bottle of wine or pods for my coffee machine so we could feel like we're having a treat or a cinema voucher.

Any other ideas welcome!

charhen19

It's Friiiiiidaaaaaay - hooray!

Had a bit of a ys haul last night - 500g mince, 2 x salmon fillets, 8 premium sausages, curry ready meal, pasta ready meal, bubble and squeak (wouldn't normally buy this ready made but was literally pennies) and 2 savoury pies. All this for just £7 :eek: I've had to readjust meal plans to fit them in and put some tinned bits we were going to use on the back burner for now but they'll keep. Some has had to go in the freezer at work as I'm trying to run the one at home down but when I see these things on ys I have to get them there and then. It was an unexpected spend but I could accommodate it as there's nothing really to pay out for before Monday payday anyway.

So today it's ys hot cross bun from the freezer for breakfast, ys curry for lunch and OH said he will scrape together enough to treat us to fish and chips tonight :T Deffo need to up my exercise to counteract this :rotfl:

TT's done for the day - I had my annual mortgage statement through recently and calculated my over payments for last year at equivalent of over one month direct debit :j This means at some point I can have one month "payment holiday" if I want to but I'm going to try not to and try for overpaying even more this year.

A night in tonight and then we're at our sports club tomorrow so hopefully we'll be too busy to need to spend anything!

charhen19

OH had a voucher for one of the food delivery websites so fish and chips Friday night cost us £2.09!

I got ahead of my laundry and housework yesterday morning before sports club and have hit the ground running again today having already roast a chicken - ys of course! Just a bit of pottering around/tidying today - nothing too strenuous and then to do all the other roasty bits later.

Hoping to list some eBay items later too and need to finalise my monthly supermarket order which will be coming tomorrow night. Also need to sort packed lunches/snacks etc for tomorrow and make sure there’s enough bits for the week ahead.

MatyMoo

I was particularly broke after Christmas last year so I set myself a challenge of feeding myself for no more than £10 a week. I was allowed to use stuff from the freezers and cupboards to supplement this.

My favourite was a £1 stew pack from the supermarket, I used half in a stew or casserole and the other half to make soup - it fed me for a week!

charhen19

Brilliant work MatyMoo! I love a challenge like that. OH found the whole chicken on ys - he’s learning well. It will do us both for a big roast dinner tonight, a mini roast for packed lunches tomorrow and sandwiches for lunch on Tuesday. Plus OH is planning on making soup in the slow cooker with what’s left and the cats will have any scraps. It was only a small chicken but with some other bits will do us at least 8 individual portions of meals.

charhen19

Roast eaten, cleaned away, packed lunches packed. Chicken in slow cooker for soup ✅
Another cupboard cleaned out and put back more organised, 2 items into charity bag ✅
Laundry done and fresh bedding on our bed ✅

In my opinion there’s no better nights sleep than when you get into fresh covers ��

A friend and I were talking earlier. Her secondary school child was questioning why he had to learn trigonometry (he knows what he wants to do and he deffo won’t need trig). It got us to talking and wondering why kids aren’t taught about budgeting/what’s involved in getting a mortgage/basic diy/basic car maintenance.

Anyway enough of my ponderings - I’m off to binge watch our latest favourite and list some eBay items.

charhen19

I had £1.28 left in my current account (my salary is due to go in around 2am). Since I can only pay £1 or more off the furniture bill (and I like round numbers) I paid £1 to my EF and 28p to the mortgage. The next spare pound will go to the furniture to keep it fair.

charhen19

Payday today which means a day of admin/moving stuff around, hence my late check in here today. This is one of the days a month I TRY to get organized for the month ahead.

So far I have done my usual TT's for the day. DD has gone into EF (need to update sig.) I've double checked that all DD's that should have gone out, have - including DMP.

I have paid £30 into my £1 a day tin towards Christmas 2020 which takes me upto and including 1st March - I like to stay ahead where possible. Also paid in to my penny-a-day tin to take me up to the end of February.

Have bought the 2 birthday cards that were required and a valentines card - still to get a wedding anniversary card for OH as there wasn't one suitable where I was.

Just taken a pasta ready meal out of the freezer here at work for lunch tomorrow and OH will use up the copious amounts of chicken and stuffing that's left for his sarnies. My mini roast lunch was just as lovely as the main meal last night!

I'll fill up with petrol on the way home tonight and set the rest of the cash aside which I'll need for a fuel top up near the end of the payday month.

Our supermarket monthly shop will be delivered soon after I get home tonight so it's a case of finding homes for everything there and stock rotating things so they get used up in the right order.

I've paid into our lottery at work for the month and in to our social fund - we pay in £10 a month and have a summer day out and a winter day out each year which is effectively already paid for. Tomorrow I'll need to top up my travel card to cover the trip I have coming up this month.

Phew - after all of that we have a bit of a funny old dinner tonight using up bits and bobs. A burger and a half each (no buns) assorted fresh veg, a spare yorkshire pudding each, sauted left over roast potatoes and the end of a garlic baguette! Monday night dinners can often be like this in our house but there's zero waste!

charhen19

Does anybody else find the admin of being DFW quite time consuming?!

Sig. updated.