Getting shot of the mortgage sooner than 2049!

joedenise

I so agree with you @Bluegreen143.  It's a marketeer's dream - creating panic buying now to boost profits.

Bluegreen143

I can sort of understand the rationale of panic buying essentials (though obviously that’s not good and ideally you should just keep some stores in and regularly replenish) but panic buying trendy toys really is beyond me!

Baileys_Babe

joedenise said:

I so agree with you @Bluegreen143.  It's a marketeer's dream - creating panic buying now to boost profits.

This is what I wanted to say, but my words wouldn't work

Bluegreen143 said:

I can sort of understand the rationale of panic buying essentials (though obviously that’s not good and ideally you should just keep some stores in and regularly replenish) but panic buying trendy toys really is beyond me!

This is what we do, keep a store cupboard of food and toiletries etc. Saves us a lot of time and money as we are not needing to nip out for top-up shops in normal times as well as being very handy when there are delivery problems.

Bluegreen143

Joined the fiscal fast thread and have copied in my post from there as a record of what I’m planning:

WHEN?
📆 Six weeks from today to 25th November

WHAT CAN I BUY? 

💰 Bills and committed subscriptions

🍎 Necessary everyday spending, like food, groceries, petrol, parking and kids’ pocket money 
🎄 Gifts and celebration expenses, because I’ll be doing my Christmas shopping, organising Hallowe’en etc. But will be creative and make gifts, buy second hand etc where I can
🚲 My bike seat needs to go back, so I’ll either need to order a new one or I may need to sell my bike and get a bigger one to make a seat for my 2yo work. Either way, any costs associated are OK by me as it’s a planned expense 

WHAT CAN’T I BUY?
🍹 Alcohol, takeaways, sweets
📚 Books, ebooks and online resources/courses
👗 Clothes (I think the kids have their autumn stuff and will be OK for a few weeks)
🪴 Homewares and garden stuff 
🚕 Taxis (I’ll be able to drive to events if I don’t drink…)
💄 TBH I don’t use salons etc (I cut my own hair and everyone else’s in the family) or buy makeup much but nothing like that either 
🏰 Expensive family outings or activities, will stick to parks and the free museums for taking the kids out which is our usual habit anyway.

OTHER GOOD HABITS
🍳 Obviously meal planning, batch cooking, creative use of leftovers
🚶 Walk or cycle where possible to reduce petrol/parking costs
🗑 Compost all appropriate food waste, turn stained/ripped clothing into cleaning rags, consider how we can reuse or refurbish or mend broken things 

Bluegreen143

Doing well on fiscal fast so far.

THU 14th 

- worked (from home)
- took the kids to the library after work, swapped all their books, renewed one of mine and swapped the other for something new. I now go every second Thu, restrict the kids to four books out at once each and myself to two and it’s much easier to keep track of what we have now!
- Dinner was bolognaise sauce from the freezer in wraps with cheese and salad 
- Had my zoom Gaelic class and a zoom mum’s meet up for a parenting group I’m in during the evening 
- No 💷 spent ✔️ 

YESTERDAY 

- Got the house tidied in the morning
- My dad came to visit (he doesn’t live nearby) with his dog 🐕 so he took us for lunch and then I showed him our favourite river walk. It was a gorgeous, very sunny autumn afternoon so absolutely perfect for a long walk. The children spent a long time paddling in the river and splashing in muddy puddles so good fun was had by all 😍
- The kids were pretty full from a giant restaurant lunch so I just made them peanut butter toast and fruit for dinner. Red and I had a Balinese curry while they were in bed. It’s a Simply Cook pack - we’d bought four of their spice kits when they were doing a four for £3 offer - it’s a nice way to try out new things but I’d never pay £10 for four or whatever it normally is - that only pays for the spices/flavours not all the other ingredients 😳 that said it was delicious so I’ll look online and find a recipe for making it from scratch next time.
- felt like I was coming down with something last night (headachy, slightly nauseous and slightly scratch throat) so just cozied up and read my book. Feel better this morning after a good night’s sleep and I’ve done a negative LF test.
- no 💷 spent ✔️ 

Room reshuffle 

Don’t know if I’ve mentioned but I’ve been putting the kids in the same bedroom all week (Monkey on a mattress on the floor) to see how they get on. They have been fine so I’m going to move his giant bed today and they will both sleep (and keep their clothes) in the small room.

Then I’m going to make the big room into a playroom (using what we have in for now of course, not buying new furniture!) 😍 I think it will be a much better use of space because currently most of their toys live in the living room but it will free up more space downstairs for my hobby room. The toys will all be in individual boxes in Kallax units as they are now so if they do want to play downstairs it’s just a case of taking a box downstairs and returning it when finished. Will take the opportunity to do a rather severe toy “pruning” anyway as with both their birthdays and Christmas approaching it’s the right time to declutter.

Bluegreen143

No “real” spends here yet - I got a £40 Amazon voucher from work, most of which I’m keeping but I did get an ebook out of it.

Also got the kids’ Halloween costumes and cute felt trick or treating bags today but my dad gave them pocket money when he saw them at the weekend which covered it. 

I told them they could have a homemade costume/something they already have in if they wanted to use the pocket money for something else but they both chose to use it for costumes. We have a Halloween party in the morning then trick or treating later and the costumes will go in the dress up box afterwards so they’ll get plenty of use and it saves me trying to work out how to make something 😅😅😅

Had such a productive day yesterday and we switched the bedrooms around as I described before 😍 which took us literally all day but they look fab, it cost £0 and the kids have been playing in their new playroom constantly. I took the opportunity to properly sort and declutter their toys and got rid of two bin bagfuls 😳.

This is their new, somewhat cosy, shared bedroom 😆

And this is the playroom - the drawers at the end hold all the lego, the big plastic tub is dress up and all the other toys are in the cubbies. It looks like far too much (and I do think they have too many toys tbh) but all the boxes aren’t full, it’s one type per box eg one for cars, one for dolls, one for Duplo etc. Really pleased we achieved this only using things we already have so fitting in with my pre Christmas fiscal fast ☺️

Bluegreen143

Oh meant to say I made a wonderful breakfast this morning - gently fried a very finely chopped onion and pancetta, added finely sliced mushrooms, garlic and rosemary from the garden and then butter beans at the end. The beans made it filling enough to not have on toast which I usually do with garlicky mushrooms - trying to ease off just a bit on all the carbs and eat a bit healthier. Anyway it was delicious, filling and I think I invented it 😅

joedenise

@Bluegreen143 - the bedroom and playroom look brilliant and well done on doing it without cost.

I do something similar for breakfast but like to add some chopped tomatoes and peppers as well, although I've never tried adding rosemary!  I sometime add a handful or two of free-flow beef mince instead of bacon which makes a nice change.  It works well with chopped sausages if you have any leftover!

Baileys_Babe

This arrangement of rooms looks very good to me.
The children's bedroom looks a good size to me, especially as they are only going to be using it for is sleeping and dressing, added to that they have a generous playroom.

Where are you keeping the jigsaws, crafting materials, games? In the playroom? Or is that just for toys?

Bluegreen143

@Baileys_Babe we have arts & craft & messy play materials in a unit next to the dining table because they’re only allowed those at the kitchen table. It’s carpet upstairs so not ideal for paint, glue, playdough etc. Also homework materials/learning activities in a cubby by the dining table (eg magnetic letters, stuff from school).

Jigsaws and games are currently still downstairs too, but wavering over moving jigsaws upstairs to the playroom. Because Bambi is only 2 games tend to be played with adults not the kids playing solo (she’s too little to always understand them so we often either help her or we play a lot of games with Monkey on his own) so I’ll keep them downstairs for now, we have an understairs cupboard in the living room where they live. We’ve gotten into a nice routine of playing a toddler friendly game as a family after dinner each day though we are looking forward to her graduating to more complex options 😆