The 'scenic route' to mortgage freedom...

savingholmes

Sounds like you have a lot going on. Will be good to sort out his POA. I still need to do mine - and put my will in the post!

Great news that you won't need to take any money out of savings this month and can still pay for loads to get done! Fantastic result

powerspowers

Brill progress shaker!! You’ve got loads done since I last checked in. I love the Europe plan as well. Have you ever played mapominos? It’s a geographic card game and until I played I had no idea there were so many countries in Europe! 

themadvix

Ooh, just looked that up Powers, it looks great!

PiggyBankShaker

Yes, it looks great, thanks powerspowers. We already have one of their games, Who Knows Where, which is fun.

Sorted my Dad's Power of Attorney with first bank, only four more to go. Also rang British Gas and negotiated cheaper boiler cover for him - personally I would have switched to get a better deal, but he was happy with 20% discount. Also, got his suitcase out of the attic and called the prescription line for him to order new medical supplies.

DH and I have both been paid and we made a £500 mortgage overpayment, although it won't credit until tomorrow or the next day. Most the bills will go out tomorrow, but its nice to not have to pay water rates or council tax this month. 

DH sanded the back of the front door some more and I order a couple of free wallpaper samples for the porch. 

Feeling quite tired today, the wind was quite loud last night and I didn't sleep well, I even had a dream about calling in sick to work.

That's all folks!

PiggyBankShaker

Bills have gone out (Mortgage, life insurance, TV licence, 1 mobile phone) £100 transfer to regular saver account. DS has drums tonight and DD has rugby practice. Need to put my thinking cap on about what to have for dinner.

A builder is coming around on Thursday to look at the house before giving a quote for the extension - it is someone the architect organised and he told him in advance our budget was £80,000 - so we'll see if he laughs. If so then I think it proves that the architect designed something unfeasible for the money. But we'll see, it'll be an interesting exercise if nothing else.

Feeling a bit blurgh today, not much energy or motivation. Everything feels a bit 'one step forwards, two steps back.' If you asked me to expand on that I'd probably be hard pressed to give you specifics, but just everything feels like hard work.

 I need to have a shower and then I think I'll go for a little walk and get some fresh air.

themadvix

I'm feeling rather like that PBS, so you're not alone. I'm hoping a walk will help me too.

PiggyBankShaker

themadvix said:

I'm feeling rather like that PBS, so you're not alone. I'm hoping a walk will help me too.

I think it might be the time of year...? Not enough sunlight etc I take Vit D when I remember, which isn't everyday.

A few more bills have gone out today (life insurance, app subscription) and £200 to a different regular saver. We did a bit of grocery shopping last night between ferrying the kids around but DH hasn't updated the spreadsheet yet so I'm not sure how much we spent.

DH checked the online account with Sh3ll Energy and it seems two of our payments to our previous supplier (which went bust) have not been transferred over. He's queried it with them and set a photo of our bank statement showing the payments. 

Appraisal in work this afternoon, I'll be glad when its over.

Wallpaper sample arrived for the porch, DH likes it so that's nice. I'll get him to measure up but hopefully we just need 1 roll. If there's any spare I might also use it in the downstairs loo. Hopefully we can make a finally start painting the back of the front door this weekend. Why is it the small jobs take the longest? 

That'll be it for house jobs before half term I think, then we can arrange the scaffolding for March when were back from Greece and start painting the front of the house. It needs to be done before May when the new path is laid.

Right, that's enough planning. Must prep for my appraisal! 

PiggyBankShaker

My appraisal went well, this is a huge relief.

Day off tomorrow, seeing the chiropractor for my back (self-care!)

DH has offered to find the cheapest best seats for the Harry Potter play in London that I have wanted to watch for about 3 years and which I am too intimidated/frustrated by the seat booking system to do myself. It was this or 'stop banging on about it' so I went for the former... 

I've been trying to book the car in for its service but the garage isn't answering the phone.

PiggyBankShaker

Day off today, still feeling positive from my review yesterday. My line manager said some lovely things about me so I'm concentrating on those, rather than the impostor syndrome I feel a lot of the time.

I booked the car in for a service next week, and I also booked DH and DS a chiropractor session too. I can't be bothered to go into long details, but suffice to say DH is long overdue some attention on his back and I didn't want to leave DS out as he thinks it sounds super exciting.

The builder has been and had a look at the house. Got a pretty good vibe off him, which was a pleasant surprise and he seemed to know what he was talking about and had a few good suggestions. He also seemed flexible and understood the need for a 'ceiling price' for the works. I'd certainly be open to working with him if the finances stack up. He said he's get a quote to us in a fortnight.

DH and I booked the Harry Potter play tickets together last night, we're going in the last weekend of August and staying two nights in a Travel Lodge a 40 min tube ride away from the centre of London. Whilst its certainly not cheap, it was the cheapest option to see the play with decent seats. And I'm super excited about it. Our wedding anniversary is in August so I said 'aw, its like an anniversary celebration,' to which he said, 'no, its bloody not!' which tells you how DH feels about Harry Potter. He's been on the Studio Tour with us twice, so it must be love.

A few more bills have gone out, including the first payment to Sh3ll and a small charity payment.

That's all for now. Stay safe, moneysavers.

PiggyBankShaker

Morning moneysavers!

CB hit the account this morning. 1 week to go until 2nd job payday.

Not a lot of financials to report, been a quiet start to the month. The car is having a service today. I have £300 set aside for it, any more and it will need come out of savings.

DD's orthodontics payment went out yesterday (£120), DH did some grocery shopping last night in Ad1i (£40) and then he and DS had their chiropractor appointment (£66)

I've had a very VERY tentative enquiry from a publisher about my book, so I spent most of the weekend (when I wasn't working) reading over it, editing and drawing up a revision plan. Its the first time in about 10 months that I've done anything with it, so it feels nice to pick it up again. The break has given me some perspective, which is allowing me to be objective about the changes necessary to whip it into shape.

Stay safe mortgage-slayers,