Resourcefulness: The budgeter's friend

foxgloves

Hello Monday Money Savers,
Useful day - apart from cooking dinner tonight, the only task left today is to squidge down to the greenhouse between showers to cut a bunch of rocket. I had better do that sooner rather than later because the thing about this time of year, is that it is perfectly light at one moment, then an hour later darkness seems to descend all at once & then I am poking around the greenhouse bench with a torch.
Anyway, I have made good inroads into getting back into my routines today. Small budget-helping positives as follows:
*Free salad using home grown rocket (well, there will be when I've picked it)
*2 loads of laundry on heated airer with added drying ooomph from the dehumidifyer. 
*Baked a loaf.
*Divided up leftover ham from yesterday. Will be using some of it in a chunky frittata tonight & the rest on a home-made pizza tomorrow. Stock skimmed & frozen for soup making.
*Did Monday morning budget updates - grocery budget & personal spends mostly, didn't take long.
*Booked a haircut so I don't look like the Wild Woman-on-Trent for Christmas - £10 at my nice friendly little salon.
*Did a few surveys. Hoping to manage another Ips*s cash-out before Christmas. PA Nov earnings inching upwards.
*Asked Mr F to fetch Christmas crate down from the loft. I know there is stuff in there I need to check to make sure I don't re-buy & duplicate items. I know there is an advent calendar in there, a festive scented candle & some nice paper napkins, so I will have a proper look through in good time.
*Synchronised our diaries so we know what we're doing - it's even helpful to know how many packed lunches are needed, late shifts, etc. Can't bear not being organised.
*Planned our Christmas food (much easier now we know that we have a couple of days over the festive period when people are coming over for lunch), including what I need to bake. Then wrote our festive food shopping list. Felt it was well worth doing it now, as I shall be setting December's grocery budget on 27th Nov & we also needed to get a morning in the diary for driving out to a Sains*'s, as the £50 voucher I earned for doing a university food diary exercise earlier in the year was for there, & I put it away towards our Christmas shop. List now on front of freezer so I can cross off any oddments we pick up along the way. Mr F was quite restrained about how many pigs in blankets, sausage rolls, etc, he thought he might need, so it was quite a calm task doing the planning & writing the list & I feel quite organised now that it's done, & that I won't end up over-buying.
Well, it's only just gone 4pm, but the light is already going, so I am going to say 'bye', sign out & trot off to fetch that rocket in for tonight's salad.
Hope everyone's got off to at least a reasonably decent start to the week.
Take care,
F x

Blackcats

You are very organised for Christmas!  I'm inspired to start a food plan and associated shopping list.

foxgloves

@Blackcats - I think you will find it well-worth doing. It allows more time for having a proper look at what items are already in stock....for instance the 2 rolls of turkey foil I bought for 50p in Wilk*'s sale last January! Also, I think it is good to have a discussion about what is actually needed. We have plenty of treats, but certainly won't be spraying money around like we used to in the Spendy Era. As I know what I'm going to bake, I can also get on with that & freezing it as & when I have the time & inclination. List pinned to freezer & I feel organised every time I look at it!
F

foxgloves

Hello Money Savers,
Mr F back at work today so I have been doing all sorts of random tasks to get the place tidy & myself back into routines.
Just a few budget-helping positives today:
*Made packed lunch & breakfast for tomorrow.
*Baked a batch of rolls as I was already making some for pizza dough today.
*Picked another little bowl of rocket from greenhouse.
*Did regular laundry shuffle on heated airer to try & get the larger items fully dry before the end of this afternoon - almost done.
*Mr F confirmed no spiders in my spare music basket which lives on the bottom shelf of a hard-to-reach (except for spiders) unit. Sorted through it & decided not to buy a Christmas volume of piano music I have had my eye on. It's about £16 - not all of the pieces are to my taste - & I have been able to shop several new pieces plus plenty of festive choices from what I already own. Unless I change my mind, that's £16 (plus p&p) saved.
*More shopping from home. Crossed 'birthday card' off next town list as I found a not specifically birthday, but really nice one in my stationery basket. I know the recipient will like it so another little saving at an expensive time of year.
*Turned the heel on final pair of Christmas present socks. I need to crack on with these as they are for Mr F so I am not knitting them when he's around.
*Postie brought CC loyalty voucher so have popped it away in my voucher wallet.
That's it for today.....have been busy, but mostly with tidying & clearing various outstanding jobs.
Enjoy your evenings,
F x

foxgloves

Morning Campers,
Well there I was lying in bed first thing planning my gardening morning when I remembered it's mid-month budget check-in day. Not that it will take me all day by any means, but it makes sense to group admin-type jobs together, so front border clearing swapped to tomorrow morning. 
This time last month was when I found that mystery extra money. Even on my main Big Budget Day two weeks later, I wasn't able to find the anomaly anywhere in my accounting, so I'm hoping there isn't a belated unwelcome surprise waiting for me today. I shall soon find out!
Once more into the breach with my calculator.......
F x

EssexHebridean

Here's hoping a hole hasn't appeared the same size as the previous gain Mrs F! I also hope that your weather forecast for tomorrow is better than ours, otherwise you are going to wish you have instead swapped your admin day to then and retained your original plan to garden today! 

foxgloves

@EssexHebridean - Yes, I hope so too, re weather forecast as it has been bright & sunny for my indoor day. Hope this isn't heralding a p*ss-down for tomorrow. Am thinking positive.
No budget hole found. In fact I found the main anomaly which was staring me in the face. Talk about overthinking. And I DID say "Oh Foxgloves, you absolute PLUM"!
F

rtandon27

FG - you can't leave us hanging like that 🤣🤣🤣 - do share what happened!

EssexHebridean

Tsk - you do love a bit of suspense, don't you!   

foxgloves

Hello Wednesday Pence Wranglers,
No, I didn't at all mean to be suspenseful, it was always my intention to pop back later with today's full post, but fish pie making took a bit longer than I expected (for no good reason whatsoever!)
Anyway, I'll start with today's small budget-helping positives:
*Chose 7 meals from November's master plan for next week.
*Wrote grocery shopping list.
*Did my regular mid-month budget check-in. All present & correct.
*Did a few surveys. 
*Packed lunch & breakfast for tomorrow.
*Wrapped the gift beers - 4 pieces of recycled wrap from my stash turned out to be the perfect fit for beer!
*Did the ironing, which was an opportunity to test the steam function on new iron. All seems to work perfectly, so I'm glad I went for a cheaper one than some models that I looked at.
*Found a suitable box for the festive hamper I'm making up tomorrow. It didn't look very festive, but a green & red felt-tip later, it was adorned with wonky holly, so I'm sure it will look fine once I've arranged a selection of my preserves inside, some of which will have pretty lid-covers. Wanted to shop it from home & not buy a basket.
*Made fish pie for tonight's meal & prepped veg. Too much fish pie mixture for the dish, so I have frozen a portion as it will be a good jacket potato topping for me on Mr F's next very late shift. 
Right, now onto that budget anomaly. When I did October's mid-month check-in this time last month, I had about £50 more money than I should have had & couldn't see where it had come from. A week later, I did another check-in to see if the issue had resolved, but the surplus had actually increased by about a further £60. I still hadn't spotted the problem by the end of the month when I set November's budget. It's obvious from just the above, that it was 2 issues. I think the 2nd one was actually some sort of accounting error around fund transfers for Christmas presents I had bought & I am not so bothered about that as no money is missing after all. However, after I'd done November's mid-month check-in today.....guess what? I was about £50 up again. So that told me that the error was something structural. I went back to Spreadsheet 1 (Bills & regular DDs) & decided to have a really forensic look at September to November. I'd already done this, but had been looking for complicated errors or dodgy syntax causing Excel to malfunction. Yes, as ever, I had been massively overthinking all the possibilities. I suddenly saw it! Remember that drop in energy bill DD we had from September? Well, I had dutifully filled it in on my quick-reference bills card (which acts as a much-consulted bookmark in my Money Book) but had, very unusually for me, neglected to change it on my spreadsheet. I use both, but for slightly different tasks. The old figure (about £50 higher) had therefore continued to be included in the global figure for monthly bills, which I used to set October & November's budget, but when I sat down to do my mid-month check-ins, I used my bills information card, which cited the correct lower figure. Hence the extra money. Well, I was calling myself all the plonkers under the sun this morning. I couldn't believe I'd missed it, but I know why I did. I had been well used to paying that higher figure & that (like most of our bigger bills) was the one lodged in my head, so the first time I looked at the spreadsheet, I didn't register that I'd still got the old amount because it was one I was familiar with seeing. Ah well, at least it is sorted out. As for the other £60, I did so many funds transfers in October (& this isn't an error which has permeated through to November's budget), I think I have just made a one-off error in that process. So that was a lot of verbiage, m'dears, to say that the damn mystery has been solved. That'll teach me to overthink - a problem in all areas of my life, I can tell you!
Well, the only thing which has fallen off the list today is piano practice, so I can put that right by doing it while the fish pie is in the oven. Still hoping for a decent day for some front garden tidying tomorrow.
Love F x