Day Dreaming to Debt Freedom

Sarahwithlove

It's great when kids are at the age that you can do stuff for free or low cost with them

MrsDaydream

Really got to make the most of it while we can! Had the blummin McD's advert making me cry last night, thinking how Bug won't be little and full of wonder at Christmas forever. Not that it made me want to rush off and buy some hamburgers to comfort eat the emotion away  I am excited to get the decorations out in a few weeks and give this year a good old fashioned send off, Bug was a little worried that Santa couldn't come this year because of all the rules but I let him know BoJo isn't Santa's boss 

Didn't mean to go quite so long without an update but since I last posted we have paid £557.68 off of our debts. Our next smallest debt needs to be paid in one chunk, which feels a little demotivating but we'll get there. We have had a few set backs, such as an aerial replacing not long since as those strong winds broke our bracket clean off. But hey ho!

I've also had a 30% wage increase this last week, all of which will be going to debt repayments. My plan is to split my wages clean down the middle, half for groceries, Bug's classes and fuel while the rest will be saved. I currently use about £15pw in fuel and Bug only has one course left running at another £15pw (which is a full day of activities, around 6 hours, so absolutely brilliant!) so £70 for food for 3 people feels like a generous budget to me. 

I am spending £5 today, on some games from marketplace but the retail value new is £37 and will be the perfect fit for our home ed and the seemingly endless rainy days. We do head out no matter the weather (got caught at the park in near horizontal rain yesterday am, took shelter at my Grandmas to warm up as we're currently her bubble!) but we're never out for as long so our games cupboard is a must! Been after these games for so long but didn't want to part with the full cost of them. I did get a good stock of movies for £2.50 on the last day the charity shops were open, along with a good haul of books from the library so our entertainment is well and truly covered, especially as I can start easing in some Christmas movies.

MrsDaydream

Worked through our bill pot and I've managed to put £159.75 to one side this month towards debt overpayment so far. One more payday of mine before Hubby's so I think we'll have another £100 to add to that total for the month. 
Also have the good news that Hubby has been offered a new job, which we'll be £500pm better off at. It's still home based, which is a small relief as we've just painted his office and had to buy some furniture for in there with his current job (which added to our debt, ashamed to say!) and we can apply it all to our debt repayments, which is the really good part! 

Over the weekend I did spend £44.89 on Bug, he wrote his letter to the big man asking for one very specific toy. The letter was sealed and "posted" to Santa by the fireplace and Hubby wrote a letter back. The contract is unbreakable  He is really working at the couple things Santa asked of him (finishing his meals, sleeping in his own bed) so I'm pretty confident he'll be getting the toy at the end of it I'm also very relieved as he had been asking for something that didn't exist before this. 

£60 on the food shop this week, so under budget which was a surprise as with Hubby and Bug coming to "help" I expected a small fortune to be spent. I did spy a few things I hadn't noticed going into the trolley come to light during check out, but I know from past experience if I become too strict with the food shopping it leads to some grumpy family members, so I think a slightly larger food budget for now is worth pinning our sanity on.

We've been keeping a kitty in the house, as in a mug to put spare money in and not an actual kitten (although, that would be Bug's dream) which we've been adding to whenever I sell something or have a few £1 in my purse to spare. We have £35 in there now which will come in handy, have a few birthdays coming up when I'm planning to just put some money in a card so I don't need to fret on that coming out of the bank. 

MrsDaydream

Had to pop to the shops for milk at work, have Bug with me today but we've brought pack up and plenty of books/toys. It's going surprisingly smoothly! But while I was at the shop I saw a 3 pack of PJs reduced from £13 to £3 so snapped them up as new PJ's were high on our "to buy" list for next week. Was tempted to get the next size up too, but his current PJ's were reduced to £1 a pair at the start of this year so I know cheap PJ's are never far away.

Asked Hubby for total amounts on our accounts (all in his name, which is jolly good for me if I decide to walk out and start a new life in the woods one day) anyhow, I was wrong on my first post as our biggest loan was over £16k so while we have been making payments - our debt total is actually up. Which is fun!*

Loan 1: £15378.77
Loan 2: £2632.00
Loan 3: £1466.00
Loan 4: £1017.91
Total: £20494.68

*but it's also fine because obviously, we are tackling it.

As it stands its going to be a long slog to get this paid off, but with my payrise and Hubby's new job (and if we're focused on what we do with the spare money and not fritter it) we'll hopefully have it cleared off in a year or there about. By and by, it should all come good.

MrsDaydream

Small progress today, £6.54 into the side saver. Shuffled some odds and ends about yesterday so we now have £167.89 for overpayments.

Had been umming and ahhing over getting Bug a new stocking this year, the one he's had up until now was just an old jumper I'd sewn into the right shape and was not holding up well. But we finally removed an old sofa from our home this morning, and I can use materials from the cushion covers to make him one as well as some as gifts if his turns out okay. Which I think it might?! I have about 50% faith in my abilities but hey, it's not going to cost owt to try 

MrsDaydream

Went to Asda first thing to get their 2 for £6 tubs of chocolate. So that's gifts sorted for the neighbours for £12 🥳 have a box to put away for ourselves too. 

Stocking turned out brilliantly, made 4 in total for a friend and nieces. Upcycled a few of my younger nieces old tops into cushions and finished off Bug's main present. I've painted a few plaques left over to send in cards as little decoration gifts for friends we wont be able to visit, and posted off one gift to a friend its pretty likely we wont see before Christmas. The only thing left to buy for presents is a bottle of whiskey for a friend. And that's that! 

Good news from our overlords about bubbles, as it means my parents can come for Christmas dinner. My sister and her family are coming too and that's our set. My parents are paying for the meat, my sister bringing puddings, so it's only the sides for us to buy everyone being well (and everything to cook, serve and wash up 😄) 

My payday tomorrow, so today we'll be making our shopping list and meal plan, and going to do the food shop tomorrow with Bug. Which is always very interesting! Today we're just going to stay warm and go for a walk in the park, see if we can make some new friends. Already set a fire and looking forward to warming up by it at dinner time! 

MrsDaydream

Had a few sales on eBay totaling £110 after fees so put that to one side for our Christmas week  
Regular payments have come out so we've decreased our debt by £552.68, and we currently have £316.63 for paying off the next loan. This isn't as high as I'd hoped, mostly because Hubby is off down South for work which is £50 in fuel. Roll on this weeks wages, hey  

Loan 1: £15009.34
Loan 2: £2632.00
Loan 3: £1282.75
Loan 4: £1017.91
Total: £19942.00

Most importantly, we're under 20k! Life feels a little back to normal where we are, dance classes and drama group are back which is fun. It also means on Wednesdays I get to have a little pocket change rummage at the charity shops. Picked my niece up some lovely clothes last week (2 tops, 1 dress, 1 skirt) for all of 80p and some items brand new. I'm pretty controlled in not just buying things for the sake of it, but I kind of just like to see what's on offer  We've also bought a few things for Christmas day to prep and freeze. Hubby is a little anxious to get the beef joint bought so that's on the agenda for this weekend, although it is technically being paid for by my parents, if lights on homes are anything to go by people are going all out this year and I expect going all out on food is included in that. We are only buying what we need but don't want to be left running around last minute to find an item.

Went for a walk to see the big guy himself last night, which was all of a £1 donation but Bug loved it. Also have gingerbread making on the agenda soon, and our usual walks and of course the Winter solstice is coming up so lots of (free!) things to do to celebrate the shortest day.

MrsDaydream

Currently waiting to hear back from FB marketplace on something free to collect that I can upcycle for my nephew. Also sold £30 worth on books on the webuybooks app last week so just waiting to be paid for those, I was going to go old school and list on amazon but it doesn't seem like that's possible anymore? Feels like a waiting kind of day! Have £359.70 to one side for debt repayments as Bug has caught a cold and reminded me very quickly that we really need to be hitting hibernation season with his health issues, so I put £50 to one side to buy him some indoor climbing things. Which seems extravagant, but as works need to be kept short and cosy it'll benefit him hugely.

Bought our joint of beef for Christmas day in this weeks food shop so that's in the freezer as well as a few bottles of wine, some dry goods, goose fat etc. Spent over £100 but around £30 of that was for this weeks meals and the rest we had to one side and of course my parents are paying me back for the beef at some stage. When we get that and the webuybooks money, that'll be going into the overpayment pot. 

Not a lot else to report! I called up the library today to renew our books so we have those until the 4th of January now, and no late charges as they were due back today but I don't want to be a germ spreader. Cheap tea tonight of pasta bake, hidden veggies to bolster Bug along with this cold. Did mean we had a quiet, no spend weekend and I got the time to wrap all our gifts.

MrsDaydream

Hi!
Having a mad few days. My new nephew has been born, one of our nieces is in for stitches tomorrow which means going under with her being 2, and Bug had minor ailment to boot. Phew!

But Christmas is as ready to rumble as it can be this year. Bugs presents are wrapped, things for his stocking ready to go 😊 added a couple more treats in books and a game from the charity shop too.

Hubby managed to turn some free spins on a betting app to £200 withdrawable funds, we've also got £100 in Christmas bonuses as well as whatever Christmas money we receive to pay off debt. Unfortunately my savings pot was near wiped by 1) leaving council tax out of our budget (yes, really!) 2) a cancelled work trip being uncancelled which needed fuel and 3) paying for some boiler repairs. Honestly I'm treading water right now but I've rewritten to budget to include the council tax (🤦‍♀️), one tank of fuel p/w for Hubbys work trips and Bugs regular classes so I feel like we cant go wrong in January?? We also do a no spend January as a financial reset following the madness of December. So will update with a payoff in January 😊 move us to the right track!

Merry Christmas to anyone reading this! 🎅

MrsDaydream

Happy New Year!!
Hunkering down properly now. The new budget is in play, everything accounted for. Our area was, like pretty much everyone else, moved into Tier 4 so I've moved £35 budgeted for Bug's dance lessons to our debt repayment. I spent £5 of it on a reduced reading subscription box, that should have been £19.99. If lockdown continues it's £40 more towards repayments.

Also budgeted £200 fuel for Hubby, but again as we're tier 4 and his office is in London I don't see this being used but we've agreed to wait the month out before we over pay it - because with how quickly rules change who knows what could happen. Boris might just chuck his arms up in defeat and cancel it all in a paddy. 

MIL always gets us a scratchcard for Christmas, I won £2 on mine and used it to buy us a mini Atlas as I've been borrowing one repeatedly from the library. Speaking of, I've also signed up to some audiobook apps via our library so I've got plenty to keep my ears busy for nothing. 

Inventory of the cupboards, fridge and freezer took place yesterday and I don't think we'll need to do a proper shop for a few weeks yet. Our family NYR was to no longer shop at Supermarkets, this will mean some things cost a little more (2 litres of jersey milk and 250g of butter was £4.80 this morning) but it also means our local economy gets a boost while our local farmers are getting paid a fair price. We'll also not be able to buy the junk - chocolate, crisps, pop, etc so I think it will even out. Seeing the profits large companies made while so many small businesses closed their doors really got to me last year, so we've decided it's worth doing what we can. 

Have some returns to make when we can get to the town over to do so, our local branch isn't accepting returns at the moment, which will be £63.00 to pay off debts once it's sorted. As it stands we have £596.19 to over pay and debts are:

Loan 1: £14639.91
Loan 2: £2553.04
Loan 3: £1099.50
Loan 4: £1017.91
Total: £19310.36

I'm confident we'll be in the 17k bracket by the start of February, if we could stick to 1k payoff per month a DFD of next Summer would be lovely. Hubby works with a bit of quarterly commission too which we've agreed will go 100% towards our debts. We do have annual costs coming up in April/May which may slow progress but only by a little (car insurances) but nothing we can't handle. And I know what you're all thinking - should be saving for that monthly!