Getting shot of the mortgage sooner than 2049!

KajiKita

Shame about the meal out. I’m finding that restaurant food really isn’t that special atm and it’s made worse by trying to always eat plant based. The worst was the posh hotel restaurant that work insist on using, where the only vegan main is a pre-prepared vegan burger that is identical to the one I have in my own freezer! I have told my boss I won’t be joining any more nights out with bigwigs if that is the venue again - it is just too miserable. 

The best food I have experienced recently was a Greek restaurant that my team went to in celebration of the apprentice finally getting his qualification. So much so that I am exploring Greek recipes. All the other food looked really good and people (omni) said they enjoyed theirs too 😊 Not cheap-cheap but worth every penny. 

You’ve done well on the rest of the holiday spending and it sounds like you learned a lot from the experience. I love how you reflect and review in a really conscious way on what works and what doesn’t. 😊

KK

Bluegreen143

I love Greek food too @KajiKita. 

Red got paid today. We had a good chat re budgeting priorities last night using my new paper budgeting planner (designed myself and printed rather than paying for one! 

We agreed that we don’t realistically have the budget to buy an inflatable tent before the end of the summer unless we use some of the emergency fund. As a new tent isn’t an emergency I’m not willing to do that 😂 and Red wasn’t willing to give up the couple of other big purchases he’d planned for June - a car roof rack/bag and painting supplies for the rest of the patio slabs. 

We’ve agreed we will continue to use our borrowed tent this summer, making sure to only go when the weather forecast is good, and we’ll save up to get a tent next year. I therefore drained what was left of the camping fund to add to our funds to budget. 

Here’s how we budgeted the income:

Red’s salary: £2,219
My expenses: £69.99 (came in today too)
Leftover from last month: £111.25

Budget

Emergency fund: £282.85
LISA: £50

Bills: £932
——Mortgage £529
——TV license £13
——Life insurance £29
——Netflix £6.99
——Car loan £160
——Internet £32
——Spotify £10
——HP printing £3
——Home ins ~£150 (annual)

Spending:
Red: £400

Groceries & household: £250
Petrol: £50
Two new chooks: £60
Roof rack/bag: £250

Pots:
Home & garden: £100
Holiday: £25

New pot balances:

Emergency fund: £4,675.69
Help to save: £3,000

Home/car repairs: £75
Kids: £601.59
Holidays: £151
Christmas: £0
Birthdays & celebrations: £30
Wood burning stove: £0
10th anniversary city break: £10

themadvix

I've lost track a bit, but is the issue that the borrowed tent leaks? You could always buy a waterproofing spray/seam sealant for it to improve its watertightness (assuming that's OK with the owner, but I can't see why it wouldn't be?). Just thinking that Scottish weather can't always be held to the forecast and it would be a cheap solution in the interim.

joedenise

Might be worth looking on Freecycle to see if anyone is offering a tent as they are no longer camping.  It's what we did with our tent we moved on to a caravan.

Bluegreen143

Yes, the tent leaked. Plus it’s not our tent, we can’t keep it forever - Red’s brother does want it back. Good idea on trying waterproofing it! Red is keen to invest in a new, decent tent that we will hopefully then use for years but just being sensible it’s not going to happen over the next few months. 

Just gotten anxious as I realised I’ve not received any response to my request for jury excusal (it’s in 3 weeks). I’m free on the day but the problem is that four days later the kids are off on school holidays and it’s my week I’ve taken off to watch them - I don’t have any alternative childcare. Then 10 days after I’ve been called I’m away on holiday. When Red did it last year he got picked and was there for 2.5 weeks so if I don’t get excused I’m really worried I won’t get to go on my holiday 😨 I’ve always had excusal requests granted before (they ALWAYS call me during school hols and I can never do it!) but when I look back, they usually respond very quickly and it’s been nearly two weeks… have sent an email to chase. 

On another note, I’ve just had Monkey’s parent’s night at school. The teacher said he’s well-behaved, helpful and gets on well with the other kids (and she wasn’t concerned re his socialising which I was worried about - says he has a good group of friends). She also said he’s clever and capable - she’s very happy with both his oral and written Gaelic and his maths in particular. Lovely feedback to get! 

Her main concern is that he’s quite slow and unfocused at working and she feels he’s not going to get the chance to meet his potential next year if he can’t get through the work faster. Because he’s capable he’s in the group which works more independently but he then gets distracted and doesn’t write/draw as much as she’d like. We discussed some things to try at home - using a timer to practise getting through tasks and homework faster and remaining focused for example. 

I have Bambi’s parent’s meeting at nursery tomorrow but I’m not too concerned about that 🤣 she has another year at nursery before she starts school, as we’re deferring her school entry. I’ll start to do some phonics with her (in English) and some maths activities this summer though as I did with Monkey about this age. I do try to speak little bits of Gaelic to her because she’s not in Gaelic medium for nursery but I need to do better with my own learning! Tbh though they learn the language soooooo fast once they start school anyway. 

Bluegreen143

Spending round up for May

INCOME: £4,362.85
TOTAL SPENDING: £4,205.24

Mortgage & council tax £693.15

Holiday (self catering): £537.21 Transport, food, eating & activities for five nights of awesomeness in Argyll 🙌🏼

Red’s spending £480 Erm, beer, woodwork stuff, general uncategorised man spending from Red’s account 

Groceries £439.46

Kids: clothes £192.43 Spring/summer clothing, wetsuits & wetsuit shoes etc

Energy £189

Garden supplies £187.96 Plants, compost etc 

Camping/outdoors supplies £170.22 Cooler, airbed, waterproof clothing, fishing gear 

Car loan £160

Petrol & parking £145.87

Holiday (camping): £119 Food, drink, logs for the fire

Home stuff £101.20 Storage boxes and baskets mainly 

Me: social £92.09 Drinks with friends 

Household supplies £87.69 Chicken feed, toiletries, various household bits 

Car repair £85 New tyre 

Me: weekend away £67 Deposit for weekend away with my mum and sister 

Taxis for friend’s wedding £56.04

Family outings £54 Day trip to a castle, plus fishery visit

Kids: misc £53.87 Workbook/sticker books and pocket money 

Me: bills/subscriptions £53.73

Me: hobbies £52.49 Kindle books 

Kids: activities £32.48 Karate and bike subscription 

Internet £32.24

Birthdays £30.25

Insurance £29.24

TV & music £29.23

Me: convenience £16.10 Erm, the roll van at work mainly…

Eating out £15.30 Greggs lunch for the family on day out 

HP printing £2.99

Thoughts and reflections 

1. Ooooft! Another spendy month. Almost spent what we earned, with a paltry 3.6% savings rate. Luckily some of the spending was from savings pots, so we still added a fair amount to the emergency fund. 

2. I’m seeing how much we are spending on house and garden stuff currently. It’s difficult as Red is always very proactive about wanting to get projects done ASAP as soon as he thinks of them and it’s wearing being the bad guy saying no all the time. I think we need to limit this in the coming months though.

3. Camping and our holiday raised the costs this month. Money well spent! 

4. Kids’ clothes seems very high. But then we do tend to buy most of the kids’ clothing twice a year, so we won’t buy much now til autumn except school trousers/shirts/shoes (Monkey has enough branded uniform already, bought second hand). I do think the wetsuits & shoes were worthwhile as they’ve already had a lot of use. 

5. I do think a lot of smaller spends have crept in… sticker books, convenience lunches, me buying books instead of using the library. 

KajiKita

I sympathise on the DIY spends - Mr KK is also someone who wants to do things ASAP as he’s thought of them and like you I always end up being the one either saying no or trying to plug the money gaps after the spend. It doesn’t help that he works in the trade, so he always wants to do the best possible job, wants to use the best quality and hence expensive materials. 

What we have found helps (purely through accidental evolution) is to plan the whole arc of projects, look at how they intersect (e.g. we need to make space in the living room by moving things around and rearranging storage in the spare room), cost them out ahead of time, work out how much time off Mr KK would need to action etc etc. Project planning like this has helped Mr KK understand the impact on our cash flow, the time needed off work for him (as self employed he doesn’t get holiday pay) etc etc. This year for example we discussed the back end of last year when I realised that I had a credit card debt I needed to clear, so Mr KK agreed that we would ‘have a year off’ and ‘only’ turn the living room round, and he’s really focused on how to keep costs down, what materials to reuse etc. The next big spend for next year is to put stone paving as a path all around the house. The stone will be £2.5K and I think we will need a further £500 for sand, cement and hardcore base. I have started a YNAB pot for this but I suspect it will swallow up any bonus I get next year or my mum’s annual contribution, so that means we won’t start the job until we have the funds which will be May at the earliest. If we have a major event such as his van or my car needing replacing between now and then, I will pushing for us to reconsider that timescale ….

Looking at things like the butty wagon spend on a monthly basis is a bit of a shocker isn’t it. I suspect I shouldn’t look too closely at how much I spend in the work canteen - fortunately there are very few meal options in their 4 menu week cycle that I want to eat! 😉

For me the rest of the spends look okay for the time of year - I always find spring into summer expensive as I am setting my garden up for the season. I am hoping that this will fall back as the garden improves over the years. As you say as well, you normally do a biannual spend on clothes for your children (I remember my mum doing the same when I was young) which makes sense as the seasons change. 

Lovely to hear that Monkey is doing so well 😊

KK

Bluegreen143

Hello all!

I’ve had a lovely weekend - will do a spending round up shortly. 

Th - went round to a friend’s for a catch up in the evening (free except for the petrol to get there) 

F - casual day at home with Bambi then round to Monkey’s friend’s for an after-school water g u n fight playdate! Plus our new, slightly extravagant paddling pool arrived… Water g u n s were £16 and paddling pool was about £40 🙈

Sa - went to get two new chooks! Hilarious and glamorous looking bantams. Very sweet 😍 £30 each. 

Then my friend took the kids for a sleepover and Red & I went for a fairly frugal date to the local Chinese (considering we live near soooooo many expensive and award winning restaurants in the west end and city centre this really was a frugal choice!). Plus a drink in local pub after. Walked there and back. £75 all in (for three courses plus overall we had three alcoholic drinks each). 

Su - poor Monkey woke up at my friend’s sick! He was fine a couple of hours later so don’t think it was an actual tummy bug. Left him at home with Red just in case and Bambi & I went to my parents’ house for a barbecue. They live in the countryside and it was a glorious day to sit out looking at all the fields round them. Free day. 

As well as the above, I’m really pleased that over the weekend I got the living room totally organised and decluttered, it looks amazing now 🙌🏼 it wasn’t overly cluttered before but there is a kallax and bookshelf, both of which were messy, and I moved a wee side table we don’t use to the outhouse/man cave. 

Healthy eating 

Red and I weighed ourselves and we are both three stone above the NHS healthy weight for our heights 😨🙈 less obvious on Red as he is ridiculously tall but we definitely do both need to lose some weight and get healthier. 

I know I do better on higher protein and lower carb diets as well as avoiding ultra processed foods so it will push up the grocery bill. But we are not on the breadline, we are not choosing between heating and eating and we don’t have debt except the car loan from my mum. It’s silly trying to be too frugal with the grocery bill and just putting on weight when there’s a choice. Plus I know we can save some by buying fewer treats and wasting less, which will counteract the cost of more meat, salad stuff, nuts & seeds etc. 

Mealplan for M-Th 

Breakfasts

Me - porridge or smoothies

Kids - cereal, porridge, peanut butter toast 

Lunches

Me - leftovers or salad

Kids - eating at school/nursery 

Snacks

Me - try to avoid, but fruit if necessary 

Kids - fruit, yoghurt, toast if they are starving, there are HM flapjacks in the freezer for school snacks. We have a family agreement of no treats (sweets/crisps) for the kids M-Th, only at the weekend. So us adults ought to stick to that too!! 

Red has declined to change his usual ham sandwich with crisps or lunch out routine so I’m quietly confident of beating him this week 😂

Dinners

M - chicken soup, wholemeal sourdough

T - coriander lime salmon, rice, green veg 

W - Joe Wicks cheesy chorizo chicken, will serve pasta with it for the kids 

Th - beef stroganoff (bulked out with veg) with green veg, will add rice or chips for the kids 

Shopping - £67

Chicken thighs 1.2kg

Stewing beef 400g

Salmon fillets x4

Sandwich ham x2

Carrots

Cherry toms

Avocado 2pk

Peppers 3pk

Frozen mushrooms

Frozen berries 

Bananas

Tinned sweetcorn

Melon & pineapple pack

Living coriander (to repot into a bigger pot & keep alive)

Butter

Kids’ fromage frais

Whole milk x2

Cheddar

Feta

Soured cream

Mozzarella 

EV olive oil

Pine nuts 

Instant coffee

Crisps 6pk

Diet cola (own brand) x3

Spaghetti

Wholemeal sourdough

Sliced seeded bread

Porridge sachets (I know, not cheap! It’s so the kids can make their own though). 

Re fruit & veg, we have quite a bit left in the fridge/fruit bowl already (broccoli, celery, swede, courgette, green beans, apples, grapes etc), plus frozen veg, plus lots of lettuce and herbs in the garden. So there will be more fruit & veg in the meals than what you see here 😆

Bluegreen143

New little chickens! They aren’t fully grown yet. The two silkies are ok with them but we need to watch our one hybrid (her name is Penny) we still have, she is top chicken and can be a bit vicious with new chooks 🙈 so they are only together when supervised for now. 

Jasmine (the crested one) is quite brave and settling in very well - Sparkle (named by Bambi!! I wanted to call her Belle 😂) is shyer and more timid. 

Bluegreen143

Good frugal day today - no spends.

Meals:

B - banana & strawberry milkshake (kids had porridge or cereal)

L - chicken soup (leftover from last night), Red had this too when he got home from work early

S - fruit salad for the kids and I 

D - salmon in lime/soy/honey dressing with rice and steamed veg 

Went to the library with the kids so borrowed a Pinch of Nom cookbook. Will use for inspo as the meals actually look amazing but I don’t do artificial sweetener or oil cooking spray or low fat dairy, but easy to adapt. They are all fairly low calorie so will still be so even if I use a tiny bit of oil or sugar in the recipes. The salmon recipe we had tonight was from the cookbook and it was good 👍 

Then we spent some time in the garden. Got some baby lettuce plants planted out and spent ages watering everything, I love this weather but it’s hard on the plants 😂 we aren’t going crazy with home grown veg this year as we’re too busy. But we’ve been harvesting some herbs and lettuce already, the strawberries are starting to show now too. Even if we just get herbs, salad greens and soft fruit it’s still really fun to show the kids how food is grown. I think we will get peas as well, as they are coming on nicely. And some radishes and carrots hopefully, though my first sowing of carrots ALL got munched along with the beetroot! 

I did a tiny reorganisation yesterday - just moved the dining table about three feet from one wall to another 😂 and it’s made the space SO MUCH better, we all agree. One win is that it’s opened up the shelving we keep arts & crafts stuff and learning supplies on, which you could reach before but was a bit blocked. The kids have been doing lots of art the last two days as a consequence, and pulling out workbooks and other activities. Amazing what a different moving furniture makes, and it’s free!