Time to clear the remnants of my old life

leftatthetrafficlights

Oh dear - none of that went to plan!! 🤦‍♀️😂

We ended up sorting out the pond (it's been a hole in the ground for about 18 months 😳) and ended up spending a fortune!! I decided that as we were doing the pond, I may as well get everything else that I wanted for the garden so that we can really utilise it as an additional room in our house - upshot is, lots of spending on wants not needs but I admit I have no regrets! 😉 I paid for everything from our savings so no debt incurred and we both love the purchases so worth every penny 😁 

Anyway, I'm done now - there genuinely isn't anything else that we want for the garden so I can concentrate now on rebuilding the savings and getting back on the frugal bandwagon 🙌 

I'm still doing well with the alcohol but the food and self-care are still in the starting blocks....tomorrow is a new day though so I'll be getting on with it.

I've got all the food that I need for next week- I'm basically doing buddha bowls every day - alternating the grains between quinoa, buckwheat and short grain brown rice; a variety of veg, salad leaves and different dressings daily so all healthy stuff! 😁 

I know exactly where I stand with the finances, have my meals and self-care routine planned and feel like I'm back in control so all is good! 🙌

leftatthetrafficlights

NSD today - first one in a while so I'm happy with that! 😁 

I've managed to pull a muscle across my torso and back so currently not good for much as far as yoga is concerned (or doing much in the house/garden other than laundry/cooking/plant watering) so poor dh has been left to his own devices to do the garden work - thankfully I have a cleaner as I'd be pulling my hair out otherwise! I'm starting to believe my dd when she tells me I'm a clean freak!! 🤦‍♀️ (thankfully she's my cleaner so can't complain too much as it pays her bills! 😂) 

Financially, I'm completely organised again after my spending blow out - there's nothing on the credit cards, my leccie bill is in and its slightly down on last month despite an increase in charges from the middle of April (my provider put prices up last year so less of an increase this time round) and one of my purchases was a load of logs for the fire so I'm hoping that will ease the pain of the winter ahead if prices rise again in the autumn 😉 I need to check out broadband prices as my contract is up this month - hopefully that will reduce by a few quid! 

I'm actually relieved to have done my spending blow out - now that I have everything I want and my home and garden actually feel like the sanctuary that I envisaged them being, I feel that I can spend the rest of this year really pushing the debt neutral fund as hard as I can.

I'm going to redo my budgets again this week so that I can check we're still on track with everything - I think we are but I've taken my eye off the ball recently so need the reassurance! 😂

savingholmes

I do miss my pond - so sympathise with that spend. If your garden is a tranquil space it can make a huge difference.

leftatthetrafficlights

@savingholmes - it certainly does 😍 got to say that I've spent a lot more time in the garden recently as I love the reflections and sound of the pond 🥰 

I've done well in the past couple of days, had the talk with dh, renegotiated my sky/broadband package, cancelled one of my charity donations (chief executive on ridiculous salary! 😡), opened a new bank account that has saving 'pots', rejigged the budget and finally got my washing line back in use which is now full of washing drying in the sunshine!! 🙌 

Although none of this contributes directly to the debt reduction fund, it means that we're spending less in the long run so will have more to contribute as we go along 😁 

I've also done a meal plan for the week ahead which is totally based on what we have in so hopefully absolute minimum spends on groceries this week - all in all, I'm happy with what I've achieved 😁

savingholmes

Sounds like you are putting all the right steps in place to support your freedom journey

leftatthetrafficlights

I've been busy this week sorting budgets and finances - I've swapped bank accounts for ones with a better rate of interest and a cashback on spending facility,  I've moved money over to the relevant savings pots and generally got a lot more organised! 😁 

I've managed to do several laundry loads and dried outside - had to use the td yesterday as needed some particular clothing and it was raining cats and dogs! However, as long as I use the line whenever possible, I'm okay with the occasional td use 😉 

We've done really well with food - only used what we have in and have just started the new month's grocery budget which I am hoping to keep as low as possible. We have cupboards and freezers full so I'm going to be utilising those as much as possible this month and then will hopefully be able to defrost them at the beginning of July ready to start harvesting stuff from the garden 😀 

So, so far on groceries we have spent: 

£4.40 on 'emergency noodles' for dh lunches
£2.20 on ice creams for my grandbaby 
£1 on soya milk
£0.90 on longlife milk for the cupboard 
£1 on loo bloo things

Total of £9.50/£300

I'm keeping a record so that I can start to analyse where our shopping money goes! 

savingholmes

Love that you can keep a list. My items seem so many I would struggle to keep track!

leftatthetrafficlights

savingholmes said:

Love that you can keep a list. My items seem so many I would struggle to keep track!

We tend to buy little and often @savingholmes! In all honesty, that's one of the problems- dh goes and buys stuff we really don't need 🤦‍♀️ Thankfully I've just wrestled the budget from him (as of tomorrow) so hopefully that will reduce spends going forward! 😉 

So, today, another £19.97 spent 🙈 breakdown as follows: 

£1 - apple juice for the grandbaby 
£1.20 - sparkling water 
£1.25 - vimto
£2.25 - strawberries (for breakfasts) 
£1.78 - blueberries (breakfasts)
£3.10 - watermelon (breakfasts) 
£1.39 - salad leaves (lunches/dinners) 
£8.00 - suntan spray lotion for the grandbaby 

We are currently growing salad leaves and they are about a week-10 days away from being ready to harvest and we'll be sowing more this week - we eat a lot of salad leaves and normally have some on the go but managed to miss a few sowing earlier this year and have been behind...it's an expense that will no longer be relevant once ours are ready for cutting 😉 The fruit for breakfast will always be an expense- we grow strawberries but just don't have enough to keep us going all year and never will - we would have to stop growing veg with the amount we go through!! 😂 We also started growing blueberries last year and they are currently covered in flowers so fingers crossed that we end up with a good harvest 🤞 Watermelon is bought every week but lasts us for the entire week so is good value for us. 

Sparkling water is an unfortunate necessity- I'd love to get a machine to make it but our tap water is hideous to drink so that's not an option- I buy bottled still water too which is really annoying but I just can't cope with the tap stuff 😔 Vimto will last for months - dh likes it and we bought the last bottle around December time so no issues with that! 

Sun lotion a total necessity for my grandbaby- I'm not taking risks with him regardless of the cost! Again this is an irregular spend so I'm not bothered about it coming out of the budget this month. 

£29.47/£300

2 loads of laundry line dried again today 🙌 I've even started putting towels out to dry a little before I finish them off in the td - progress indeed!! 😂

leftatthetrafficlights

No more spend days since Sunday so happy with that 🙌 

Grandbaby went back home yesterday and I'm missing him already 😔 he's so funny and full of wonder it's such a privilege spending time with him even though he tires me out!! 😍🤣 

I'm making enchilada pie today - only a little one though as I keep making too much stuff and my freezer is full - in fact I may just see if I can work out what's in there and defrost something for dinner as I think the butternut squash will be fine for a while longer 🤔 If I go down that route, I may just be really brave and try to do a freezer inventory! 

I should be able to add a bit to the debt reduction fund this month - only about £200 though. Now that I've changed bank accounts I have made sure that all the 'pots' are where they should be despite the fact that I've used money from those categories this year already - hopefully it will give me a bit of a cushion against price increases. 

savingholmes

It all helps