Getting shot of the mortgage sooner than 2049!

QueenJess

The book sounds interesting.  Was it based on statistical information?

Bluegreen143

Yeah basically it’s two women who have spent five years reviewing thousands of studies on aging and trying out different lifestyle changes (they are now in their early fifties I think). They have a blog, the book is called The Age-Well Project. They break the tips and advice into four pillars:

- eating & drinking;
- movement;
- staying engaged socially & intellectually (everything from attitude/mindfulness to learning, the role of faith and working, maintaining a wide network of social connections, marriage)
- and basically everything else - they call it setting up a good environment for sleep & health or something and it has tips on sleep, de-stressing, environmental toxins etc

A good few tips in each pillar and a bit of inspiration to look after my health now while I’m still young! 

Baileys_Babe

Link to the blog https://agewellproject.com/about/
I would like to read the book at some point but I have enjoyed many of the blog posts.

Bluegreen143

@Baileys_Babe thanks for the link! This caught my eye in my local library which I was pleased about as I was looking at it online only a few weeks ago and considering buying it on kindle.

Honeysucklelou2

That’s really interesting about the Age-Well project. Two of my grandparents lived until their late nineties and both were physically active - my grandfather was doing a daily bike ride until 93, until his sight wasn’t so good, so he swopped to an exercise bike!

The holiday plans to the Highlands sound fabulous.

Bluegreen143

Interesting re your grandfather Honeysuckle! That’s the kind of 80+yo I’d love to be 😅

Today was super busy at work, almost all Teams meetings so barely had a break to eat and run the dishwasher. Didn’t get a washing on - must do tomorrow. And didn’t touch a single one of my Tuesday Tasks 😭 will check my list tonight to see if any of them are things I can do outside office hours.

Took the kids to the children’s wood after school, it was windy but not too cold and it felt great to blow away the cobwebs after a day in virtual meetings. Monkey really enjoying some tree climbing this afternoon.

Then a quick stop by the Zero Waste shop. It would have been £20 but I had a loyalty card ready to take £5 off the bill. 

£4 was a cute little metal tea strainer as I have some loose leaf tea and have never had a strainer so end up trying to spoon floating leaves out 🤣 I prefer white/green/jasmine tea to black though I only drink tea very occasionally… never drink coffee though (can’t stand it).

53p was the kids buying a couple of bits from the vegan pick n mix and I said I’d recoup from their pocket money in their wallets (which were at home) 🤣

£7 was on pine nuts which were VERY expensive and, while they are organic and sold plastic-free, I’m not sure if I’ll buy them from there again 😆 they are expensive in Tesco too but not to that degree, I only bought 150g worth.

Everything else I was ok with the price (as in it wasn’t as cheap as Tesco but not outrageous) got plain flour, dry roasted peanuts (seriously bargainous at 35p for 100g), cashews, ground ginger, loose leaf green tea. Didn’t realise we are running low on pasta so may nip back in this week to get some. Oh also got a bag of millet they were giving away for free, because it’s best before Jan 2022. Never cooked millet but figured it’s worth trying for free! 

Having chicken pasta (sauce from the freezer) tonight. Chopped up all the leftover salad veg (as will get Tesco delivery tomorrow) into a big tub of carrot/pepper/cucumber sticks and a lovely big bowl of mixed green salad. Gave the kids the veg sticks thinking it would be a couple of days worth and they’ve eaten the whole thing while watching TV before dinner!! At least they got their 5 a day today 🤣

Bluegreen143

Yet another meeting-full day today. When, may I ask, am I meant to do any of the actual work which comes out of these meetings?! 

Rainy day today so had a friend and her two round for a post-school play date rather than the park. But we ended up outside in the garden for ages, and I also took a meeting on my phone so I could go for a walk this morning, and I walked to and from the pub today so it’s added up to nearly 2hr outdoors anyway which isn’t too shabby. 

I was a bit panicked before the playdate as I had not much fruit and nothing treaty in to offer as a snack so went to the mini Tesco and spent £7 on cream eggs, chocolate bunnies and blueberries… bit of an overspend but enjoyed by all. I usually bake cookies for play dates but had no time. Keep meaning to make up loads of cookie dough balls for the freezer.

Then we realised we didn’t have much in for dinner so foolishly I allowed Red to go to Tesco to get something and he spent £20?! We have negotiated and he is providing £5 from his budget. I think it was revenge as he forgot to add his rubbish to the Tesco order (which came today) before the cut off.

Will go through the Tesco receipt but haven’t got it to hand - was about £60 on groceries though and £40 on wine, nice soft drinks and crisps as I’m hosting drinks here for a few Primary 1 mums (this will come out of my own budget). When our friends come over they bring their own booze but I had a panic that these mums may be the sort of grown up sorts who have parties where the host provides, so I got plenty of wine and if they do bring stuff then it will keep til next time anyway 😆 we are not the sort of people who keep much of a booze cupboard, we just buy a bottle as we want it, but it would be handy to keep a few bottles in for this sort of thing. I do still have some homemade limoncello from Christmas and a couple of bottles of Prosecco though.

And I spent £7 on a couple of drinks at the pub tonight (a group of my closest friends and I, mainly uni friends, try to meet up every second Wednesday) so basically it’s been a VERY spendy day 😆 will sort out YNAB tomorrow. However it’s mainly nice spends on seeing people which I don’t mind.

Bluegreen143

Meant to do a budget update!

Red got paid and transferred £1,910 to the joint account (80% of his pay - he keeps the other 20% for his spends).

Budgeted as follows (though I do follow the YNAB rules of flexibility and transferred things about as needed).

This Month £1,409

Monthly bills £825

Groceries £400

Petrol £51

Fun £50

Pets £30

Misc £53

This Year £325

Annual bills £100

Christmas £75

Birthday/celebrations £75

Home & garden £75

Goals £170

Conservatory £70

Help to Save £100

(That’s £1,904 but the other £6 went to an oversight category from last month).

Current savings totals: 

Emergency fund: £1,000

Conservatory: £1,140.70

Help to Save: £1,400

Current mortgage balance is about £109k.

Doesn’t look a lot of saving in the budget, but we’ve still got child benefit and my salary (80% of going to the joint account) coming in. Thinking the rest of the budget will look something like: 

Child benefit £140 - Kids category 

My salary £1,150

Holidays £200

Petrol & any category top ups £100

Conservatory £850

Bluegreen143

Hello diary friends!

Have had a busy weekend with a few spends. 

Friday
- went swimming with the kids and my sister, but my sister paid as wanted to treat the kids, which was very kind!

- drinks with P1 mums here was so much fun on Friday night, and another mum has offered to host a repeat in the next few weeks. In the end, everyone brought me a bottle of wine so I’ve finished up with the same amount of wine in the end 😂 so much more MSE than I’d thought it would be given I’m now sorted for wine for a few weekends (it’s als good to have some on hand in case you get invited anywhere!).

- however, we did end up getting a takeaway for dinner 🙈 but, Red paid for it from his personal spends as had been paid that week.

Saturday
- Monkey had a school birthday party to attend. As it was at softplay, I took Bambi along and paid her in. It was £15 as I also paid for a friend and her daughter though she said she’ll pay me back or pay next time. Also spent £5ish on snacks and a cup of tea. Quite fun for a morning at soft play, as all the mums from the night before were there too, along with some other mums I know. 

- Red took his mum and the kids carpet shopping (for her new place, not us!) and I got a nap then did my jigsaw puzzle in peace 🤣 I should probably have done something more MSE like batch cooking, but I was a bit “delicate” from drinks the night before…

Sunday 
- mainly a pottering about at home day 

- I walked to Lidl with Monkey and spent £10 on various bits and bobs (chicken and orange juice to make mandarin chicken for dinner, plus some fruit and other bits) but I forgot Red had requested prawn crackers and spring rolls to accompany dinner so he went back out to Tesco and got them after (just under £2 spend). Not our finest frugal moment and an example of where we could do with being much more organised with groceries than we have been.

- Red has a really nice quality jacket he was provided by work (nice enough to wear outside work) which he was told to bin as the company has changed name. So I spent all evening unpicking the embroidery with the branding on it so he can keep it for himself 🤣 time well spent though as he could have been £50 on a new coat.

Bluegreen143

Today it looks like it will be dryish after school, so I’m keen to start making more headway on 1,000 hours outdoors, as I’ve barely added any hours this last week! Weather has been grim and we’ve had a lot on. So we will go to the playpark post-school.

Tuesday is admin day (Tuesday Tasks), and today’s top three tasks are:

1. Chase mortgage company, as I’ve been waiting on a callback re our conservatory extra borrowing for a week

2. Sort out new energy account online log in, and take meter reads

3. Do mealplan and online shopping 

My new approach to Tuesday Tasks is to pick a big three. If I have extra time I’ve got a list on my phone of extra tasks I could do, but I’ll be happy if I get the above done today and tonight!

Other general stuff needing done today:

4. Usual daily chores (dishes/kitchen, tidying and emphasis on laundry as I didn’t do a load yesterday). Also get the kids to tidy their bedroom and put away their clean clothes.

5. Help Monkey start to make an octopus costume, which is a big part of his homework this week (they need to dress up on Friday for Vocabulary Day and he’s chosen to go as an ochd-casach - octopus). I’ll let him do as much as I can but it’s unlikely a 6 year old can make an octopus costume by himself, so thanks school, for the extra task on my list 😆

Yesterday was Money Monday and I’m pleased to report that YNAB is now up to date.

Planned dinner - white bean & tomato pasta, sauce from freezer.