New year plus new decade equals, new diary

charhen19

Thanks Eyebright. Oh no to LO being poorly - hopefully on the mend now?

Another penny street cash at lunchtime today - I'm sure you can guess where it went! It's almost as if someone's heard my mission and is leaving one every day for me!

DMP totals have been updated today - will amend sig. asap.

missymoo81

Hey Charhen, I’ve just read your whole diary, you’re doing so well! I love the way you use up all your leftovers etc! And going to use your tips of rounding up or down to make over payments.

Sarahwithlove

Well done so far, I love your little challenges for yourself. I need to get on board with some

charhen19

Thanks missymoo81 and Sarahwithlove - I just hate throwing anything away nowadays and I really need the challenges to keep me focussed and on the straight and narrow!

charhen19

I had a planned day out yesterday (I had previously saved up the spending money) and I stuck to budget - after a few cocktails it could have easily gone wrong! So pat on the back for myself!

charhen19

Today we’ve had ys breakfast and ys lunch and now a ys joint is in the oven with lots of veggies to go with it. Will have a leftover roast for lunch tomorrow as usual and I’ve already prepped a curry (ys meat of course) to go into the slow cooker for tomorrow night - leftovers of that will be for lunch Tuesday so I’m already a few meals ahead of myself.

I’m up to date with everything else and we have fresh bedding on our bed for tonight!

charhen19

TT's done for the day and I've checked that all "start of month" DD's have come out, which they have. One has taken almost double what I was expecting (it's a set amount one for a subscription, not one that fluctuates) so I will be calling them to query that at lunchtime - you've really gotta keep your eye on these things!

I've taken a leap and this morning paid £5 off the furniture balance. I really hope I don't come to regret this - once it's paid to the account I can't "borrow" it back so this has taken quite a lot of contemplating! I have a quiet few days coming up, plenty of food in the house and petrol in the car so should be able to have low/no spend days and this should bring me back in line. Fingers crossed!

This does mean that to fulfill my February targets I now need £8 for EF and £8 for the furniture! 26 days to find it. It will be tough and will involve some serious amounts of squeezing of the budget. I'll just concentrate on getting back on track for now I think.

I've slacked a bit on the clearing out front - that head cold I had put me behind with everything but I'm back on track now so no excuses. One cupboard will be done tonight without fail.

missymoo81

You’re doing so well Charhen, super well done for sticking to your budget whilst out!!! I’ve no doubt you’ll be able to find the extra money. Love all your YS food. I used to find loads in my COOP on the evening, but I’d end up going in for something else and come out with £20 of unbudgeted spends!

charhen19

Thanks missymoo81 - yeah I have to be quite disciplined, as in there's rules I apply to ys shopping:

1) Is there a decent enough amount off it?
2) Can I fit it into my meal plan somewhere along the way?
3) If not can I freeze it to use later and is there enough space in the freezer to do that?

I try to always have a meal plan for the next few days at least - I found ys salmon fillets at lunchtime today (love salmon but can never justify paying full price for it) so that's slotted into tomorrow nights dinner and what we were going to have can be put back for another night.

It takes some juggling around sometimes but nothing gets thrown away and we try to eat in the order of fresh first, then from the freezer then non perishables tins etc. We use quite a bit of tinned potatoes and veg. so if something fresh comes along it can jump the queue and nothing gets wasted.

Sometimes we even end up trying something we wouldn't normally have picked up and 9/10 times it's a success.

charhen19

Today the furniture balance has been updated to reflect yesterdays DD - £8 to find and £8 for the EF in 25 days.

Hopefully I'll have another low/no spend day today and tomorrow and then I should be back on track.

Signature updated!

I cleared out the cupboard I wanted to last night - so tonight I'll start on the dreaded cupboard under the stairs. I know how to live eh?! Tuesdays are the nights OH is out for around an hour and a half at a sports club so I should manage to achieve a little more than usual.