Ding! Ding! All change, please... (now replaced with new diary on MFW)

Sallyforth

@EssexHebridean - a little hack re Airtime Rewards for you (and anyone else).  If you are spending say £10 in a qualifying shop - I'll use Boots as an example - split the items into two separate transactions of £5 each and then the monthly challenges add up.
SF x

themadvix

I struggle with Airtime Rewards EH. I've finally cashed out my first £10 after several years of membership. Problem is, you can't add Amex and I prefer Amex for my spending for the points... you win some, you lose some. If I remember when I'm in a qualifying shop, I'll use my Virgin card instead (different points, but not as good) and get the AR too.

Makingabobor2

Flyers sound like an excellent idea.  If you are on FB, could you also maybe put a post on the local page, saying you are selling? 

themadvix

Makingabobor2 said:

Flyers sound like an excellent idea.  If you are on FB, could you also maybe put a post on the local page, saying you are selling? 

This could go for Nextdoor too, if you use that?

EssexHebridean

Hey lovely visitors! Foxgloves I’ve managed to nudge PA up a bit over the past few days too - it’s still not brilliant but I’m now at a bit over £14 cleared with just under £4 pending. I’ll keep my eyes open over the rest of the weekend too. 

SSG here’s hoping with the flyers - the first batch have been shoved through doors this morning and I’ll do another batch next week to spread the net a bit wider. MAB aside from here I’m being pretty careful to keep it off social media for various reasons (bit wary of people having the ability to directly identify exactly where I live, for a start but my Mum has put it on Twitter as “family friends are selling…” and I’ve retweeted that. I don’t know anything about Nextdoor TMV - not sure whether it gets much use locally as I’ve never seen it mentioned. 

SF that’s a good tip about Airtime Rewards - thank you! I’m really not sure how much I’ve get from it but I’m firmly of the view that it all helps, so let’s see! 

Weekly shop done here earlier - ended up at £41 but that included washing liquid (£6 Cc price which is about as good as it gets) and some stocking up on frozen veg - I decided that not being sure how much the weather issues in various places might affect other crops as time goes on, I wanted to add to our stocks a bit, so frozen mushrooms peas and sweet corn all purchased. I also topped up on tinned sardines and soup to replace ones that have been used. Other than that the usual bits and pieces for the week, plus reduced cheese and houmous from the YS’d zone. 

DW had a run through today (on expensive time electric, I hope it knows how lucky it is!) on a hot programme as the pump has been clogging. I soaked it overnight with white vinegar, chased that down with a load of bicarb and some boiling water before I set it running this morning and it seems to be fine now - sparkly clean inside, too! It’ll probably decide to clog again at the most inconvenient point! 

Other than that MSE wise banking checked and all fine - and although the local council haven’t bothered to write to us to confirm the new CT rates they have put them on social media (!) and it looks like about an extra £10 a month for us. Now we just need to find out about the new service charge and garage rent too and we’ll know where we are at. If last year is anything to go by we’ll find out about a week before the first payments are due! 

milann

Hopefully you’ll hear something soon about a buyer 🤞

EssexHebridean

Two more days of the month to go, and still the dinky little surplus amount sits in the joint account...MrEH's money should land overnight so hopefully I'll be able to transfer the remaining balance across to the New House Fund tomorrow morning first thing! I'm also going to take some money out of the feeder account for the Sant-And-Er reg savers I think as we didn't use money from there to feed the accounts this month, it just came straight out of the joint account.

I'm of a mind that next week's shopping might be a "bare minimums" week - and that in itself should inspire me to get properly back on board with meal planning. In the spirit of this:
Tonight: Lamb Sausages, mash & beans
Tomorrow: Couscous with pan fried garlicky courgettes, mushrooms and probably some roasted fennel, plus lamb pieces leftover from the roast the other week. 
Wednesday: Creamy courgette pesto pasta with the remaining sausages sliced in
Thursday: Turkey satay stir fry (that will see off the last of the cabbage so hurrah!)
Friday: Up for debate, but maybe fish pie again...possible fish and potato wedges though. 
For the weekend we are out on Saturday, and I'll likely do a cheaty roast using previously frozen meat - probably the gammon from Christmas as I think there is still one lot of that. Tea on Sunday will be cheese and crackers.
Next week can feature a combination of stew in the slow cooker - I've got some stewing mutton in the freezer to get used so I'll do that heavy on the additions of pearl barley/oatmeal to bulk out and probably stretch to two days meals - I'll still have a tub of chilli just needing the beans added and some rice alongside, there are still sausages in the freezer and I'll still have plenty of tatties too. The Tuesday night couscous will involve halloumi most likely...

If I stick with the above then this week's shopping will need to include milk for MrEH, probably a few yogurts and the usual fruit. We might need onions by that stage, and I definitely need to remember to get butter. I'd probably ideally like to grab a couple of carrots for the stew...other than that though there really shouldn't be much we actually need. We've been on a real roll the last couple of weeks of using things up so I'd very much like that to continue, and of course it was a veg box week so I need to focus on using that stuff as well. 

It's turned chilly here again so the heating is back up - but on the plus side it as also beautifully sunny all day yesterday so the washing that went out to the airer outside yesterday morning is almost completely dry and has been swapped to the airer inside this morning. I'm hopeful we might be able to repeat the feat with the stuff that went out this morning too as certainly at work at the moment the sun is shining again. I'll throw a light coloured load through tonight and then that should see us right up to date which is excellent - I've been on catch-up for a few weeks!

Prolific is now at a whisker under £16 with £2.26 pending - I'll be cashing that out to the gym-neutral pot tomorrow. I'll go and take a look at OnePoll in a moment to see where that is at...and must turn my attention back to Ipsos this week too - there you go - £10 there by the end of the week, there's a challenge!  

beanielou

Have a good week 

EssexHebridean

You too Beanie! 

Morning all - it's flipping chilly again down here, the heating has been turned back up and electricity monitor tells us that we're back into silly season! Honestly, just when you think it's safe to assume that costs will be falling a bit! Oh well - we ARE still in credit on the energy account (MrEH needs to let me have a gas meter reading today now I come to think about it) With luck the office heating might actually deign to warm the place up today mind you - it ran all day yesterday and never quite reached the point set by the thermostat! 

MrEH has been paid so I have shifted a bit of money into the New House Fund - the surplus from the joint account from last month, plus £200 from the "feeder" account for the regular saver as I mentioned - there is another spare £200 there but I'm leaving that where it is at the moment. I've also shifted £90 from the old Mortgage OP account as well as that is earning a lower rate of interest now than the NHF.  I've also finally got the money we owe from the beer festival accommodation sent across so that's now dealt with and out of the way too - another thing ticked off the to-do list! 

Surveys: 
Prolific £15.92 payable/£3.01 pending
OnePoll 1898 points
Ipsos 250 points

Three forms of movement yesterday all in the shape of walks - but it tallied up to nearly 7 miles over the day so I'll let myself off the yoga practise I'd planned to do last night - that got put off in the end due to a mix of CBA'd ness and the fact that we decided to throw in some additional time on voluntary role stuff as that needs to step up now. I think I'll go back and do another of the 30 day yoga challenges again as that does focus my mind on doing it! 

On the subject of voluntary role stuff we have a meeting on Saturday - an actual "in person" one that will involve seeing people, talking face to face and enjoying a few beers afterwards no doubt, so woo for that! Costs for both of us on that will be from personal spends, apart from bus fares which will eventually be claimed back on expenses. There will be lunch, dinner and beers to pay for though. Thoroughly looking forward to it! We also have another meeting in connection with the voluntary role stuff at the end of March too in a pub in London - again this will be budgeted from personal spends, although there will be no expenses claimable for that one. We're also planning a trip down to Devon during March as well so it's going to be quite a hectic month - and we will absolutely not be taking any further social stuff on! 

Sausage and mash last night was lush, and I have remembered to get the lamb out for this evening. Annoyingly it seems that even with the banana-in-the-paper-bag trick the avocados aren't playing ball. Maybe they will have become more obliging by this evening but I suspect not - it's not a problem as we have plenty of other veg. MrEH was dispatched off to T's this morning on a hunt for cherry tomatoes and a pack of smoked mackerel as I found a link to a tasty sounding  radicchio, mackerel, beetroot and lentil salad yesterday which I think I will swap into the meal plan for Thursday evening. MrEH isn't a massive fan of lentils but I expect he'll get over it - and we have the last of a pack that I'd like to get used up. If I drizzle them in smoked oil once they're cooked through then he usually agrees they are OK anyway. 

Right - let's go and see what Ipsos has for me today, and I think I may have a YG one to do too! 

Makingabobor2

Cold here in the Midlands as well. Looks like rain also. Not a very cheery day at all. I'm just about to do some money shifting as well, with it being the end of the month. I do love moving money around...lol
Well done on 7 miles yesterday. 
Enjoy your day.