A new royal start

QueenJess

Oh dear.  So after I depleted the emergency fund for the heating fix and am only very slowly building it back up, my washing machine is officially gone and we need to buy a new one *sigh*.  So back to a negative emergency fund and we'll need to build it back up again .  I definitely need a larger than £500k emergency fund in place when these things all happen together.  Plus my house was bought new, so I suspect everything will break at the same time.

Good job I'm currently employed!  Will be online shopping for a new washing machine later..

I might increase the amount we are paying into the joint account each month until we get the emergency fund back in place.

themadvix

A £500k emergency fund would cover most things I think 😉😂

 What a pain though. Hope you manage to get a good deal. Working FT is definitely a saving grace with unexpected expenditures.

QueenJess

themadvix said:

A £500k emergency fund would cover most things I think 😉😂

 What a pain though. Hope you manage to get a good deal. Working FT is definitely a saving grace with unexpected expenditures.

   Whoops - was just reeling from the news and looking at work contracts.... definitely £500 and not £500k!  If I had £500k floating around I would be retiring right now...

QueenJess

Gosh, what a jam packed week. It culminated with me being put in charge of the work project at 5:30pm on a Friday… looking like a busy two weeks coming up! I got the washing machine delivered and installed and I’m about 2/3 through the washing mountain at the moment. At least I didn’t have to figure out how to work it as we basically bought the same machine again! I was very impressed with the efficiency of the installation as it’s a bit of a pain to get to and a very tight fit.

After that money bombshell, it didn’t get any better… we got notification from nursery that from May our bill is going up about 15%! That’s another £50 a week to find. Then of course water is going up, although they’ve failed to tell us how much by. And finally we paid this years garden waste bin collection fee.. £90!!! So overall, very ouch this week. We are going to use our personal savings for the washing machine, then increase the payments into the joint account by £100 a month to start building up the EF more. Then May-August it’ll be needed for the nursery bill and it only does half the increase. I’m hoping I will have too much in the childcare bucket by then as we don’t need any holiday club in the Easter hols as DH is taking a bit of time off. At least it’s only 4 months to find as then DD will be at school and it’ll all be cheaper.

So all in all, I am trying not to buy anything unnecessary and am saving any money for holidays/days out etc that I would much rather spend my money on. We currently have a very healthy balance in the entertainment/leisure/days out bucket of our budget as we’ve not spent that much recently. I’m not going to get complacent though as I know we spend much more in the summer than the winter - mostly fuelled by the long school holidays.

Fingers crossed that’s the end of the bad news money wise for a while! It’s DD’s birthday in a couple of weeks, but her presents are sorted and we will take her to the zoo as her birthday treat instead of a party. I can’t really see the point of a party for a 4 year old as she doesn’t have proper friends and isn’t bothered about that sort of thing. Probably the last year we can get away with it!

QueenJess

A quick post as parents and sister are here today (they’re at the park with the kids - I needed to get the dinner on…). Dinner tonight is a beef stew in the slow cooker with carrots, greens, celeriac and suet balls. Should be enough to freeze another portion for another week.

Dessert is a slow cooker jam steamed sponge with custard. That pudding bowl DH got me for Xmas is my favourite thing at the moment and especially since I can throw it on in my lunch hour and have a lovely steamed pudding for dinner I even used a recipe from a Mary Berry cookbook I picked up on Buy Nothing.

edinburgher

Sorry to hear about the increased nursery fees, that is quite a jump Our childminder hasn't put her fees up since we started using her, which is very much appreciated. I suspect that her expenses are relatively low as she runs the business from her home, and children need to bring their own nappies, food etc. Still, good value, we were very lucky to get off the nursery cost escalator.

Our childcare fees are relatively low at the moment as DD1 stopped going to afterschool care. I am readying myself for sticker shock when DD2 has to use it in a few year's time, they were hinting at 20%+ increases. Massive in relative terms, even if not in absolute terms.

QueenJess

Not posted for a bit because I’ve just been feeling unwell and just been getting through the days really. It’s all getting really boring to be honest. Had my hospital appointment yesterday (was a bit surprised I there were three people on my appointment - mix of doctors and nurses), but fingers crossed I start to feel some sort of difference soon, although I’m sure I will need more than just this. Just have to wait now to see.

Going to be a jam packed week next week as it’s busy at work and is the run up to DD’s birthday on the Monday of the week after. I have bought lots of colouring so I can make a rainbow cake as requested. I’ve still not decided whether to buttercream the outside or fondant it… if I was feeling ambitious I could colour the outside as well. I have free decorations for the top (courtesy of Buy Nothing), which are rainbows and unicorns. I am hoping she’ll be delighted however it turns out given she’ll only be 4 and is pleased with anything really. 

Did my fortnightly shop today, although it was a bit busier this morning than usual. Not sure what that was about. I prefer to shop when it’s very quiet - just me and the polite old people 😄. The zero waste shop was quiet, which was just as well as I had two massive canisters of flour to fill up. Spent £162 in the sm and £27 in the zero waste shop. I’m probably behind money wise this month for groceries, but trying to give myself a break given I feel so terrible and am working full time. Will see how it works out as I have one more big shop to do this month. I’m also getting low on yeast again, so will have to order some in.

Dinner tonight is freezer beef stew (still running down the freezer for a defrost) followed by blackberry and almond cake and hm ice cream. I shall also be making more ice cream later as I found some reduced cream. I might make mint chocolate chip although it disappears very quickly as I can’t stop eating it 😂. DD has a party today and tomorrow for nursery friends, so no big plans outside of that. At least they’ll feed her up!

LadyWithAPlan

Your food as always sounds lovely 
ouch to the nursery fees increase 

QueenJess

It's a really busy week at work this week and I am taking a well needed lunch break post finishing a big bit of work.  Feeling rubbish this week as both myself and DS have some sort of cold/cough type thing where we are ok for school/work, but then go straight to bed in the evening as we are both knackered!  Trying really hard to recover for DD's birthday weekend this weekend.  At least all presents are sorted and wrapped.

Payday for me tomorrow and will not be saving out of it as we have to pay off the washing machine that's currently on the credit card.  We will both put more money into the joint account to cover it.  I think I've spent around £150 a week this month on food (£10 a week over budget), but depending on what happens for my shop next week.  I'm worried that now I've found the bottom of the freezer we need to up the food budget as I will be buying more meat/fish, which is expensive.  We've had a notification that after school club is going up again (not sure by how much as they prefer to build the suspense until tomorrow).  So with all that and nursery (plus water and council tax), it looks like my budget is going to have to soak up more and more.  I think my choices are now coming down to spend less on a holiday, save less money for an early retirement and work for longer, or simply work more of the year (or possibly see if I can negotiate a higher fee for myself on my next contract if possible).  The constant squeezing of the finances are getting very old I have to say.  I will continue to monitor it all and try to figure out what is best to do.  At least I only have nursery until the end of August, but I am a bit worried that it will make little difference by the time I factor in all the other increases to pay for..Oh - I nearly forgot we did also have a plumbing issue which cost us £52 today (coming from the non-existent emergency fund).  It's never ending at the moment!

Any upside from nursery finishing I am tempted to split 50:50 between saving for solar panels and paying down the mortgage (both of which will alleviate monthly expenses in time).

Anyway - sorry that all sounded very negative!  I think it's because I budget for the year in December and do include reasonable increases, but come March I am always surprised by extra increases I've forgotten or things are just more expensive than I thought.

I'm not feeling great today, so DH is making pesto pasta for dinner later and we are scrabbling around for desserts as I am trying to only take things out of the freezer and not add to them (hoping to defrost it on Monday).  We have seed cake, hm biscuits that the kids iced, two types of hm ice cream and lots of fruit and yogurt so no one will go hungry.

Better get back to the craziness that is work...

Jessy103

Hope you feel better soon, Jess x