A new royal start

South_coast

Imagine how much the bill could have gone down by if they didn't send their comms out by letter....😬

QueenJess

South_coast said:

Imagine how much the bill could have gone down by if they didn't send their comms out by letter....😬

Well given they’re bankrupt, I doubt it’ll make that much difference!

South_coast

Ah, fair point 😅!

QueenJess

Yikes - so food shopping day today and basically everything seems to have run out so it cost an absolute fortune. Austerity measures for the rest of the month now 😂. I did buy a nice lamb meal for this evening as it’s been a long time since we’ve had anything resembling a dinner out/takeaway etc and as DD has a birthday party she won’t be hungry later (she’s a lot more picky so food has to be simple). Anyway, sm £107, £39 vitamins/medicines/ bathroom supplies, £25 zero waste shop, £33 Riverford. All coming to a massive £204! 😱 That’s almost 1/3 of my budget for the month in one go. Hoping for a couple of cheaper weeks before half term hits.

This afternoon DH is taking DD to a party (no cost to us as I found suitable gifts in the gift drawer, reused some wrapping paper and DD always makes her own cards. Whilst they’re out I’m planning on making some snacks for the week - ginger biscuits (half plain and half dipped in dark chocolate), flapjack and then for tonight a jam sponge pudding with custard.

Dinner tonight is the lamb with veg and potatoes. Lunch is separate due to DS’s gym time. He’ll probably opt for boiled egg, toast and beans, so I may have the same for simplicity. Tomorrow DD has another party, but otherwise a quiet day as we are all fighting off/recovering from colds. Not planned lunch tomorrow yet as DD is at a party. Dinner will be cooked chicken from the freezer with roast pots, veg, Yorkshire puddings and gravy, followed by jam sponge and custard. Pure comfort food

Needed to buy a padlock earlier for the lockers at swimming. The irony wasn’t lost on me that they were all “locked up” and you had to request someone to unlock the bit they were in and escort you to the till with the one you want. Is there a run on padlocks? Perhaps it’s the new cryptocurrency 😂

QueenJess

This week has been an incredibly stressful one at work, plus October seems to be the month of admin and remembering everything is starting to make my head ache.  Parents evenings, school homework, needing specific clothes for certain school days, MoT, car service, car insurance, half term arrangements, taking stuff into school for projects, kids party invites etc etc etc...  As a result I've made a couple of minor frivolous purchases, but hardly anything that will break the budget.

Money wins: Mortgage has been rounded down to £118,100 (I would love to take off the £100, but I need to mend my savings first after being out of work for a couple of months), rounding my accounts has netted me £45 so far this month into savings (to go into mortgage overpayments) and I've cancelled next Friday's after school club as DH is able to pick them up.  It all helps..

The plan is to continue putting money into savings to get to where I want to be, then from about April I'm going to start putting some real money against the mortgage and get that thing lower.  For the joint account I will continue concentrating on fixing the food budget and then I'll pick another category to concentrate on once that one is done.  In the meantime, I'm trying to be sensible with money of course and not make anything worse.  At the moment I am bracing for the cost of car insurance, car MoT and car service - I need 2 new tyres and I have a nasty creaking sound that needs investigating.  Cross your fingers for me!

Not even thought about food as I've been that busy.  Will need to scrabble something together later for dinner - I might do a chicken stir fry as I have cooked chicken in the freezer.  Lunch depends on time... if I have enough time I might make a butternut squash soup.  Right, better get back to work.

edinburgher

Best of luck with the car. We were £726 last week (MOT/service/2 new tyres/broken coil spring)

QueenJess

Oops - been a bit awol as work has gone completely nuts.  I spent Friday coming up with a plan to get work delegated out to other people as realistically it is too much to get done.  Thankfully everyone agreed to it, so I have meetings to hand over work tomorrow.  Hoping to be more under control after that, but as I have 3 days off for half term and am going away for a long weekend, plus I have 2 parents evenings and my car going in for service and MoT this week, I'm not particularly hopeful!

There seems to be continuous requests for money at the moment... kids birthday parties, family birthdays, school money requests, kids growing like weeds and needing more clothes etc etc.  I think I'll heave a sigh of relief once this month is over!  At least I get paid next week!

Trying to ignore the high credit card bill at the moment (it does include the holiday on there) and am concentrating still on getting the food bill under control, ensuring the rest is reasonable and then I'll pick a new category once food is done.  On the flip side, I've very slightly relaxed my spending given I have a full income and do have a bit more money generally.  I took DS to the cinema last week (although Sun morning, so only £4.98 for both of us to see How to Train your Dragon, which frankly was a bargain!), bought DS some brand new (not second hand!!) slippers, had the odd cheap lunch out and got DS 3 (2nd hand) books to complete the set of books he loves (the last one I got he stayed up late to finish the whole book reading, so I am jumping on anything I can to keep him reading).  Nothing ruinous and still frugal, but just trying to enjoy life slightly more as there is a bit of wriggle room.

Had a relatively quiet weekend, but got lots of stuff done and just about recovered from last week.  I finally got round to picking the apples from the tree outside and am thinking of using then to make mincemeat for pies.  I also caved and put the second duvet onto the bed (it's one of those ones you attach to another duvet) and the kids already have their blankets on their beds.  No heating on yet...

A bit of a first world problem, but my houseplants are doing a bit too well.  Every family member and friend has a baby aloe vera plant and so do many random people where I live (courtesy of Buy Nothing).  I hope my plant stops reproducing now as I am running out of people to give them to!  I also have a very small snake plant in a tiny pot and it has had two babies.  No idea what I'm going to do with those...  My spider plant also had a number of babies, but I shoved them in the pot with the main plant as there was a bit of a hole.  My string of hearts plant is mad - it was on a high windowsill in the kitchen, but I had to move it to the very high window over the stairs (can only just reach the corner of it on my tiptoes).  It was getting too long, so I raised it onto a plant stand, but it's almost to the stairs (must be 2m long).  I had a brainwave and trialled putting two of the longest ones into the pot to see if they root and then I'll have a shorter, but more full plant.  If that works, I will do it with the others.  The other option is to hang up hooks and drape round the otherwise dull wall.  I mean I could trim it I suppose, but this is more fun 

Lunch today was leek, cheese and pea orzotto.  Dinner is spicy (for the adults) chicken, hm chips and mixed veg.  Dessert is the end of the apple and blackberry crumble with ice cream, the end of the lemon cake or some of the chocolate chip cookies I made this afternoon.

QueenJess

Well there’s good news and bad news. The good news is that my car is fine and the noise is just some hardened rubber that I don’t need to replace any time soon. The bad news is I need 4 new tyres 😬. At least I got paid this week!

themadvix

Four new tyres won't have been cheap... but suspect the noise had the potential to be more expensive! (And then gives the headache of whether it's worth it - at least tyres are consumable that you expect to have to replace.)

South_coast

Yeah, but you can't hear bald tyres, so it's easier to ignore them 😅!