Mortgage free in Forever Home :-)

SandyShores

KajiKita said:

Thanks @SandyShores - it does help. Is that late morning start and early afternoon start agreed with work, or do you just plan your meetings that way? 

Its an informal agreement, and if a meeting comes up I'll rearrange, but I could make it a formal arrangement if I wanted to.  It  helps me to have a morning to do a chore, or do some exercise - just takes the pressure off the weekend - but it also helps work as I'll stay late to meet deadlines mid-week or take shorter breaks.

Its good to hear what other people do, as there's not one fits all solution.  But I think you are right, getting out in the fresh air helps.  I love your garden btw, no wonder you love spending time out there. 

KajiKita

Thanks for all the feedback everyone, really appreciate it. I have a lot to think about before I discuss with my boss. 😊

@SandyShores - we intend this to be our ‘forever home’. The setting, with view out over the Chapel field (the chapel is the red roof you can just see on the bottom left of the garden as you are looking down towards the pond), is one of the things that sold it to us. The other thing that swung it for Mr KK was the double depth, double width garage…. unsurprisingly! 😂 It was a magical moment on our first viewing when I said to Mr KK, what do you think, and he said I don’t see any reason why not …. I was sooooo excited because we had been looking for so long! It was the strangest feeling on that first viewing - I walked in there and it was a completely instinctive reaction of ‘what’s this strange woman doing in my house’ …. you know …. the house we were only just viewing for the first time! 😳😂😉😊🤩 We offered to the woman selling (it was on sale via Purple Bricks so the owner was hosting the viewings) straight away, at the end of that first viewing and she pretty much burst into tears. It was a pretty intense afternoon. 

KK

Crazycatlady2

My husband was doing a 4 day week and hated it and is glad new job will be 5 days. Everyone different I guess but it made it easy for appointments and supporting his dad but he said 8.30-7 sat in front of computer with 3 screens running was too much on his eyes and gave him headaches 

SandyShores

Its beautiful @KajiKita, I can imagine how you felt/feel.

With changing working hours, its definitely worth thinking through before you raise.  I think it also depends on your work environment and their attitude to flexibility.  You could ask to trial for a few months, then if it doesn't work out you can revise.  I appreciate what Crazycatlady2 says - the long days just didn't suit me, so I prefer to take a couple of slightly shorter days e.g. start at 11 am -  I'll only have a short break that day and its easy for me to make that up over the course of the week.  9 day fortnight is popular though, and I know several people who do that.

Suffolk_lass

My pattern of work was based on 37 hours plus 5 for lunches and when in the office I dealt with email for my one hour mainline train commute in, from 6.40-7.40 then thought these through on the tube and walking parts. In the office at 8.00, I took a half-hour lunch and then tried to leave before 17.00, taking a different route home to start my journey from the London terminus, so I got a seat. I had basically exceeded 9 hours every day I was there.

I tried not to do email on the way home, either reading or just closing my eyes to switch off. If we were mad (and my last area was bonkers) I lost this me time. As I had normally completed 9 hours a day for the four days in, I dialled in to meetings from home on day five, but always in the morning, and had my thinking/writing/while doing time in the afternoon. I always did more than 37 hours, but no overtime at my grade.

The alternate Friday I did all the stuff like meet friends, get hair cut, dental and medical appointments, and maintain my veg garden so I was dedicated to work while there.

Garden looks fab. I dropped a few paving slabs as wet-weather stepping stones into the gravel paths here - often free on FBMP - maybe one or two on top of the bark to stop the worms pulling it all down. I would be getting one of those small weed flame guns for the border of doom, and storing up some carton packaging to suppress weeds in the winter, held down by bricks. We use that or carpet to reduce weeds (but often find mouse nests under the carpets!).

Are you planning an orchard area behind the arch? I would definitely have a Victoria Plum, a self-fertile Bramley apple, a dwarf crab-apple (universal pollinator for apples) and a conference pear, if nothing else

KajiKita

Suffolk_lass said:

Garden looks fab. I dropped a few paving slabs as wet-weather stepping stones into the gravel paths here - often free on FBMP - maybe one or two on top of the bark to stop the worms pulling it all down. I would be getting one of those small weed flame guns for the border of doom, and storing up some carton packaging to suppress weeds in the winter, held down by bricks. We use that or carpet to reduce weeds (but often find mouse nests under the carpets!).

Are you planning an orchard area behind the arch? I would definitely have a Victoria Plum, a self-fertile Bramley apple, a dwarf crab-apple (universal pollinator for apples) and a conference pear, if nothing else

Thanks for all the feedback on the hours and working patterns etc. I don’t commute by train unfortunately, so no chance of reclaiming that time for anything useful (I’ve tried having podcasts, language tapes etc on in the car, but I find them too distracting on the roads i am driving tbh). I think, over time, maybe heading into the autumn, i will aim for every other Friday working from home. My new team should be established enough by then to make that work - doing that would save me the commute on those days and I could get started on things like the washing etc. 

 There are a few small slabs surfacing in the BoD that I will repurpose as stepping stones 😊 I don’t think a flame gun would help much - it’s all gnarly roots / stems running 2 to 3 inches below the surface, topped off with moss 🙄 I don’t want to wait as long as next year before being able to plant it with nicer things - Mr KK has been making comments about my garden not having enough bright flowers - apparently my planting taste is too delicate-wiffly for him! 😂 (I wouldn’t mind, but I don’t get to comment on his vehicle colours!! 😳🙄😡😂) This bed is the only one in the garden that gets enough sun to be able to grow decent flowers (most of the delicate wiffly stuff is *because* there is not enough sun!) so I want to get it planted up this season and rename it from the ‘BoD’ to the Contorted Hazel bed …. 😉

KK

KajiKita

Been quite a positive day today 😊
- NSD
- Saw the fruition of a vision that I have been working on for 12 months today - really quite proud of this! 
- Took a walk outside at lunchtime today and my overall steps are just over 8K
- my 10 minute task this evening was to clear three of the drawers in my desk out and tidy them up - found a spare phone case (I always buy two when I get a new mobile) as the old one was getting ratty, so could swap that over 
- Threw my weights around and did my squats whilst preparing dinner - that’s two evenings back to back I have done that 

KK

KajiKita

I have been told today that I will be getting an 11.2% pay rise from April 😊

I am really chuffed as the standard pay settlement this year for indirect staff is 7%, so it feels like I am quite valued to be getting this uplift 😊

I will have a lovely play at the weekend with the MSE calculator to decide how much to up my pension contribution by (currently at 6% - can go as high as 10%) and how much to try to keep in my pocket for direct savings, OPs etc. 

Meant to be an NSD today, but needed fuel for the car, so had to stop and get that on the way home. I have also noticed that my makeup (concealer and lipstick) is getting very low, so it will need replacing - I have been meaning to do this for ages and keep forgetting so I think tonight is the night! 

KK

KajiKita

Trying to get the discipline going again of tracking my spends more proactively and TT’s etc.

8p TT’d from current account and 45p TT’d from house account to savings 😊

I have had a fiddle with the MSE calculator and although I can’t get it to work quite correctly (for some reason my take home pay seems to be higher than the calculator says it should be - my monthly car allowance might be throwing it out?) it looks like, if I increase my pension contribution to 8% I can still take home a further £300 net cash each month, which will be useful for savings, OPs etc. 

KK

SandyShores

Mine always seems slightly out too Kajikita, but its a good approximation.  Have you tried adding your tax code?  You've done really well on the book reading this year, I need to add this to my targets.  I've got 18 physical books purchased but not read and probably more on the kindle.  I managed to read one chapter last night so I've made a start.