A new chapter, An empty nest, Drama school & Last year of Uni

Spendless

Honeysucklelou2 said:

Would your Ds and DiL have first refusal? Or perhaps an advantageous price if no estate agents are needed?

Yes to both. I'm just not sure if they're in a position to buy yet though. 

Spendless

Spends during DH recent trip overseas came to approx £200, that was paid for by £125 he received by opening another bank acc per a tip on here. He has now qualified for the further £80 to be paid in May which is the remaining amount he spent -making his spending money free. Hotel for him and relative night before flight was paid for by loyalty points and he'd also got some loyalty food vouchers for this chain and never found a participating restaurant before, but where he stayed accepted them, so also got food and drink for 2 without paying any real money. Only actual cost was for parking and his flights.

DD spoke to the last year's occupant of her room who confirmed it had flooded before. Upshot is DD has been able to change rooms. DH most  recent work  since returning took him back to near DD's digs so he popped in to see if she needed a hand moving her stuff, but the huge majority had already been done. I was able to send DD some items  from home that she needed for a costume for her play next week. This is the 3rd production she has done in as many weeks back. I have asked her to fetch up with the student rep about them being given more notice for any props/clothes needed. If DD had funded all 3 lots herself the amount would have come to more than she has to live on per week. Instead she funded the first lot, myself the 2nd and fortunately could find what she needed at home to send with DH for the 3rd. All are usually specific or specialist items so not found in charity shops etc in the limited time she has available to browse them. A number of students live just over an hour-ish away so can return home for the weekend and fetch anything needed back. We are 3.5 hours away so that isn't an option for DD.  More notice would mean being able to look through items left here (her room is far too small to send everything we have 'just in case') and just paying del costs on any parcels sent would be a far cheaper option.

Spendless

Yesterday I had a look at the projected outstanding debt balance in what should be the final DF month. Usually I give my figures on the penultimate working day of the month (day before DH gets paid). I do that though because that's when we've paid off any outstanding amount of the CB CC and  are aware that no 'nasties' have befallen us. With regards to solely the debt payments though this isn't accurate and we know where we are by the middle of the month.

Assuming all repayments remain the same, by mid  July CC debt will be at £105. There will be 1 outstanding SO into my bank for £80  and another for DH's clothing account, which was set up this month so I can't quite remember how much for till March payment comes out. Approx it comes to £250. Initially I had 31st July as the DFD but until yesterday hadn't thought about how much would be outstanding once the usual  July's payments had been made. It's not a large amount of money the question is can I find it on top of needing another £1K to pay DD's rent? 

 I certainly need  a new job, but that has had to be delayed due to Dad's op and DH overseas trip. Dad's op was yesterday, it went ok but he was in pain when I visited. He said last time it took about a week before he felt better. I am thinking of applying for jobs at the beg of next week once I know how he is.

The de-cluttering continues. We are doing it a different way to previously. Before I've gone room by room. This time we are doing it under 'categories' So far we've done bedding (surplus sent to recycling) and then DD's clothing (stacked ready to sell this summer with deadline dates to be gone by). This weekend was the turn of bags. Goodness knows why we'd kept some of them. One had clearly belonged to DD because it was a pink rucksack and she stopped using that style for school when she was around 11 and she's 21 next month!  We ended up with a huge sack of bags that weren't in a re-usable  state (mostly because they were worn too much and/or had stains we couldn't shift). We took them to our Household waste centre thinking there was going to be no option but to send them to landfill and discovered that one of the clothing banks located there would take them. DH also noticed there was a container labelled 'bedding' which would have been handy to know when I was searching the other week for somewhere. Next weekend is ear-marked for shoes de-cluttering. Before taking the bags we checked the insides and all pockets for any change found - not a single penny! The coin purse must be losing it's magic touch, either that or DH has cottoned on that if he leaves loose change anywhere for days on end or fails to pick any money up that he drops on the floor that I will snaffle it up - hahahaha. 

threepenny_bit

Spendless said:

Y
The de-cluttering continues. We are doing it a different way to previously. Before I've gone room by room. This time we are doing it under 'categories' So far we've done bedding (surplus sent to recycling) and then DD's clothing (stacked ready to sell this summer with deadline dates to be gone by). This weekend was the turn of bags. Goodness knows why we'd kept some of them. One had clearly belonged to DD because it was a pink rucksack and she stopped using that style for school when she was around 11 and she's 21 next month!  We ended up with a huge sack of bags that weren't in a re-usable  state (mostly because they were worn too much and/or had stains we couldn't shift). We took them to our Household waste centre thinking there was going to be no option but to send them to landfill and discovered that one of the clothing banks located there would take them. DH also noticed there was a container labelled 'bedding' which would have been handy to know when I was searching the other week for somewhere. Next weekend is ear-marked for shoes de-cluttering. Before taking the bags we checked the insides and all pockets for any change found - not a single penny! The coin purse must be losing it's magic touch, either that or DH has cottoned on that if he leaves loose change anywhere for days on end or fails to pick any money up that he drops on the floor that I will snaffle it up - hahahaha. 

Well done on the decluttering! I love the idea of a themed declutter rather than room by room. I am just starting a declutter so will have a try at the categories. Thanks 

enthusiasticsaver

Well done on the decluttering. I find it clears my mind sorting things out then getting rid of unused items. The only things I struggle to let go of are books.

Exciting news on your DFD. Good luck with job hunting. 

satchmo1

I had a huge declutter on bags, shoes, scarves and costume jewellery. Initially I thought I'd take it to a charity shop, but then realised I could raise money for our community food pantry by bagging a free stall in the church hall on 2nd March. 

badmemory

I would like to know how it is things multiply.  I mean if I clear a couple of drawers (I am not exactly speedy) then when I want to do the next clear I have to do those again before I do the next.  Where does that stuff come from, I certainly don't remember buying it & it isn't what was there before.  I'll have to blame DS but as he wouldn't put anything away unless under instruction I think I am on a loser there.

Spendless

Yeah I've no idea how it all accumulates either. I also can't work out how when you see it all bagged up and ready to leave the house how it all fitted in in the first place! 

Doing by categories has pros and cons. You aren't getting the instant 'lift' that doing a room gives you (suppose it depends on how messy it is in the 1st place though!) but long term I'm hoping for better results.

The area I am most dreading is paperwork. I think this will be such a mammoth task it's going to have to be split into sub sections! I'm not even prepared to think about it yet until we have seen the FA. There's a reason for this, at our last appt FA said I had to dig out all my personal pensions for her to give  accurate  advice as to what investments to make. It took ages to work it all out and I came across pensions I wasn't aware I had (ok with not a lot in them but that's not the point). Though time consuming to locate , I was aware we had everything at home and hadn't thrown anything out by accident not realising. I've asked DH to set up another meeting shortly with what we have. I want this done before I am back working because I had so little AL in my previous job and zero flexibility for finishing slightly earlier and making the time back I don't want to be back in that position again with a job that I've accepted purely because I want the money. I am still awaiting one of my pension providers to confirm they have changed my surname. When I  last rang I believe I was told upto 16 working days. If it goes past that I am going to raise a complaint because I initially asked for this change in January. 

Spendless

CB CC has been done and paid. Asking DH not to buy his small Amazon purchases throughout the month this way because the pennies he was receiving as CB wasn't worth the headspace it was taking up with me trying to keep track has worked. One of the few payments this way was for the socks/tweezers mess up and at a fiver I can live with that as a lesson learnt in querying odd arrivals.

1 or 2 items might have come from my wages if I'd been earning. Whilst it's highly unlikely I'm going to be hitting my target of being back in work in Feb, I will try my best to ensure I have employment soon. On that note I met up with some old school friends yesterday. We meet a few times a year for a catch up. I told them the story of my last job and both individually and collectively they all said the same thing. They believed in the firm's eyes, whatever I was officially told, they saw me as a temp. They'd keep me on if it worked out - which was highly unlikely since I'd been asked at interview if I'd ever done that type of work before and said No, plus I couldn't keep up with workload as prev people hadn't been replaced but there was still the same amount of work to do and another experienced staff member left within a month of me starting. This makes so much sense. When I'd flagged I was struggling to the manager, I got a response that I've never come across before during 40 years of working life  where I was blamed for not keeping up and an invite to just call it quits. Even looking back at the beginning, the AL was 20 days (plus BH) but you had to save 5 for Christmas which is a whacking amount considering AL wasn't generous. I queried it with the agency that placed me, their manager looked into it and secured 2 more days straight away. I was told to keep it quiet and careful questioning of the 2 office staff that followed me (one from the same agency) made me aware they hadn't been given it. At the time I thanked the agency manager but she even responded saying she hadn't done anything so why did they offer the extra days straight away - because they knew full well, they were continuing to look for someone else and in the long run it wasn't going to matter. At least I've realised and can put it behind me.

Onto brunch, we met at a local farmshop. Once this just sold veg but in recent years has diversified into selling produce plus being a café. Normally I can only eat typically breakfast items before lunch, but mindful that DH was going out not long after I got in so wouldn't be eating again till evening, went for steak (cooked as preferred), 2 eggs of choice (I had poached) cubed fried potatoes with mushrooms, vine tomatoes and red onion relish. It was beautiful. That plus 2 lattes meant my share came to £22, which I didn't think bad given the  amount and quality of the steak and how beautifully prepared it was. Just had to keep our coats on which was understandable given the place started life as a barn. 

Once home DH then went out to choose a suit for his Godson's wedding, along with Groom and Groom's Dad. DH asked the shop if they'd offer a discount due to several suits bought and 10% got knocked off the total  price. I love the pattern on the inside of DH's waistcoat and I'd love to see  if I can find a dress that is similar.

As I want the bank account to be as healthy as possible for what is left of Feb, I declined DH's suggestion that we went out to eat or drink last night and instead watched a drama catch up on TV. I fell asleep though for the last half hour, so had to finish off watching this morning. 

Spendless

Plans for this week. NSD/minimal spending until end of month. I have a little change in my pocket/purse in case I need to buy something like bread. DH went away last night and is back tomorrow  night so majority of his spends should be on company expenses. 

Wed - I've been asked to go to the cinema with my friend who has 2 freebie tickets. I've enough petrol in my car to get us there and back  (friend doesn't drive) so long as I don't use it much between now and then. 

Thursday , visit to see DD's Godmother so she can wrap DD's 21st birthday present (I picked it up on her behalf) which is at the end of next month. 

Friday - Is a visit at long last to the FA. Hopefully my name change documents will have turned up by then! 

Saturday - I am off to the theatre with same friend as above. I bought 2 tickets for DD as a Christmas present but she then got invited to a 21st she wishes to attend for the same date, so I'm using the tickets and I bought DD something else as a replacement.

Plan during my self imposed 'staying at home' is to continue with the de-cluttering. Yesterday was the turn of footwear and I re-discovered some of my fav boots. I had mistakenly thought they were broken - confusing them with another completely different pair(that I hadn't got rid of!)  Really happy to have them back, I'd missed having them and couldn't remember where I'd bought them to get another pair. Filled up a large sack of unwanted/damaged shoes of mine, DH and DD's. but left her a large container of ones we weren't sure about for her to deal with herself when she's home. They have same deadline date to be gone as her surplus clothes do.  On the agenda for next weekend's de-clutter is 'school supplies'. I can't get rid of every spare folder and notebook I have since DD is still a student, but we can certainly condense it.  Plan for next few hours is to ensure everywhere is clean and tidied so there's no additional jobs to do at the weekend.