The Last Leg; 6 years later, debt free in 2021

greensalad

Went to the shop to drop off my parcel and pick up a free newspaper for my pots. Couldn't find a freebie newspaper so figured I'd have to buy one (the local is 50p) but then realised I'd already paid for some drinks we bought on card and didn't want to be mean and buy a 50p paper on card (I know they aren't allowed to say no nowadays but it still feels bad because I know they won't make money on the sale from it). The owners are so nice though, she let me take the paper for an IOU, so I'll pop back in next week. 

Anyway 50p for the 16 pots I've made is great price, and they can be planted straight in the ground too which makes it easier! I'm keeping the precious newspaper in my gardening trug outside for future pots. 

Planted up all 16 seedlings and they wilted but have sprung right back and are looking great. The only one that's suffering is one I accidentally bent. It hasn't completely died but it's not growing as fast, so it might be the runt of the litter. 

Plan is to post some of them to my friends along with their much belated Christmas presents. I just need to wait for them to get large enough to survive the post.

greensalad

We got it! We got the mortgage in principle today! All passed through credit checks no issues. I'm so happy.

The document is hilarious. Apparently they maximum affordable payment they'll give us is £5000 per month?! Are you kidding me. Haha. Glad we're going for around £1,800.

greensalad

Oh and on non-money saving I managed to !!!!!! up our budget and we have way less for groceries than we actually thought. Cue panic in the supermarket and I ended up sticking it on credit card. Ugh. Just got to shuffle some bits around to make it work which is fine but it's screwed over some of my careful calculations! Oh well, we're only talking thirty quid or so. 

Edit: shuffled a few things around, pulled out our "movie rental" budget, skipped our coffee order, and threw some leftover pocket money and I've managed to both set aside today's grocery shop for the credit card payment and put together £32 for next week's grocery budget. Pretty pleased with that

lantanna

Really pleased for you. Congratulations ! I’m sure your over the moon. Let the hunt begin

greensalad

lantanna said:

Really pleased for you. Congratulations ! I’m sure your over the moon. Let the hunt begin

It's such a relief to know that we got the "yes", as my main fear was my "adverse credit", which it turned out I didn't really have at all! So that's the main win from today! Still seems such a long way off as we don't actually have the cash ready to go and start viewing but the next few months are just going to be stuffing as much in that savings pot as possible. Bring on July, that's when my spreadsheet says we'll have the cash!

lantanna

It really will fly in for you ! This time next year I should be speaking to an advisor and should be there or nearly there with savings. I feel it’s going to fly in. It does feel like you can never have too much £ saved for it or be totally ready but I think that’s just nerves, it’s happening, it’s exciting and we will enjoy it!

greensalad

Some nice news today, my boyfriend is getting a bonus. 

Albeit very small in comparison to mine! But it's in lieu of a payrise. There was a possibility he could get this one-off cash bonus instead of an annual payrise because he's a fairly new employee (10 months) and so we thought his pay grade might be a little higher than median (paying slightly higher in order to get new people in the company). It sort of works out for us though really, because instead of having it over the course of a year we get it all now when we need to put it into deposit!

I've worked out post-tax we'll get about £600 in his next paycheque. Annoyingly student loans skim off the bonus even though the debt is repaid because they won't calculate until the new financial year, but we should still get the rebate + interest back in the spring anyway. 

Makes the sting of possibly pulling out of LISAs (still waiting until the budget to decide in case anything new crops up IRT LISAs like in the new one). But the bonus money wasn't money we ever saved ourselves anyway so it isn't like we're losing our hard-earnt cash.

Kakiste

Fantastic news about the AIP! Really pleased for you.
Now back on the plants.... There were a few people on fb marketplace selling small veg plants last year; price range seems to be what you suggested £1 for bog standard varieties and £2 for anything bigger/more interesting. I reckon you would sell lots of chillis priced at £2 and that would then offset your lamp use etc. 
I got into a barter system with a local woman last spring- I traded her 3 cucumber and 10 purple carrot seedlings for some raspberry cuttings and 4 decent sized tomato plants. Plus I felt very homesteady..... Which always makes me feel happy.

greensalad

Ooh swapsies might be a good idea!

Chillies are now coming along so nicely. I'm considering buying a cheap coldframe (B&Q does one for £4) and planting all the chillies in the ground. But I think possibly it's not warm enough in there so I might re-use that idea for strawberries instead. I'll probably just buy strawberry plants though. I have tried growing strawbs every year and have failed because I've tried them in bags and Victorian planters and of course they just never really work out. Strawberries in the ground is probably the way to go.

I might sow some mint today in seedling trays and get it ready to go outside. I'm going to re-use last year's failed Victorian strawberry plant for the mint as I know it likes to spring up everywhere so I thought it would do nicely escaping out of all the holes in the side of the planter.

Now the weather is better I also really need to get my blackcurrant plant in a planter, it's been in a pot all winter! Raspberry canes are starting to bud as well!

1st March is when the mega-planting comes out, all the tomatoes will go in trays then. Dreaming of my new house and hopefully a greenhouse!

Kakiste

I'd love a greenhouse. It's on my 'one day' list. 
I'm going to start sowing first weekend in March and put the trays into the conservatory during the day to give them a bit of extra heat.