The alternative hive - making plan B work

KajiKita

I was wondering why you had hidden those updates behind 'Spoiler Alerts' …. ? External escape stairwell from BoM stores - needs structural engineering assessment every 5 years🤔 More like 'Random Button Alerts'!🤣🤣

Still, as I was reminding myself after rolling my eyes from reading some slightly overbearing moderator comments today, this place we get to use for free without adverts and there aren't many places you can say that of these days …. 😉😊

KK

Queen_of_the_Hive

Yes! We made it to Friday!

Work has been frankly poop and by Weds was ready to quit… (if only! I could afford to!). I know i'd quickly get bored and I do need the routine of work. Anyway yesterday was feeling a bit fragile but today back to my happy self.

So this morning OH and I went out for me - next C25K run and OH joined on his bike. We both appreciated the refreshing morning air. Also completed a couple of lessons on Duo. My kids were propping us up for the past 4 weeks and now have to stand on my own two feel lol! Think DS2 will be proud of my 7 day streak with no gaps 😂.

This week has been a really quiet, unspendy week as planned. We don't normally do too much when the kids are back with dad anyway so this is our norm. The meal planner has worked to a degree. Keep forgetting to take food to defrost and Wed night was in a funk so it was emergency fish and chips. But I can see some of the benefits of the effort put in and it will make this week's meals and food shop a lot slicker. It also I hope gives us a bit more inspiration what to have. We still have quite a bit in and I don't think we will need to buy much at all.

One really exciting thing has happend - i've won tickets to a local theatre show on over the bank holiday. Really chuffed. Tickets for two of us was £70 which I was contemplating buying but hadn't really got it in the budget but now we don't have to worry about that. We will make the most of it.

Queen_of_the_Hive

Good Morning, hump day!

Oooops haven't done a diary update for a few days. Life is good in the hive. Work is keeping me busy and actually being a blocker for spending money. Have had quite a few NSD's which was the plan! Tomorrow is payday, its an exciting one as its the first of 3 months FT salary plus an extra few days. This money is going to be ringfenced into savings for next year.

Loving being consistent on C25K and Duolin*o.

Monthly survey target is going well - currently upto £101.11 / £140.27 although the last few days I haven't been able to add anything to the pot.

Looking forward to the bank holiday weekend and being able to catch up with diaries amongst other things.

Queen_of_the_Hive

Happy Saturday lunchtime!

Its been a really chilled morning in the hive. Yesterday was payday and this morning a focus on bill paying and money juggle. Happy thats now done for another month. Big positive for the month was setting up a cash ISA and feeding it with extra pay. In fact we had an email this morning to say it had earned 11p in its first 24rs! Hurrah!

Nothing significant to report on the CC debt, the cards have been paid for the month, one is still a bit too high from summer extra spends so am embracing a more simpler existence at the moment to rein it before trips back to the city start again. I did however indulge a little bit on some camping towels for the four of us to use on our cabin and hostel stays. It was £36 for towels for the 4 of us which I did not think was bad at all.

We are going to be looking at a second hand table and chairs this afternoon - its been a bit of a saga. The dining table in the holiday rental has broken. We've removed broken table and taken our dining table at home to replace it with. The one we are viewing will be a new to us for our home. It looks in decent condition with 6 matching chairs for £80. Not too convinced this will fit into stepdads car but everyone is telling me they think it will. I'd prefer to get a man and a van. Lets see how we get on.

Tonight we have the free tickets to a local show. We won the tickets so this will be a real treat. Its not often we go out to the theatre so very looking forward to this.

Today I do need to finish meal planning for next week. We had a voucher for £5 of Li*l but didn't use in the end, tomorrow we'll go food shopping and Monday fancy getting on a bus and going somewhere new.

Surveys wise - we did it! We actually hit our target for August. It was £140.27! Cashed out £139.85 and now sitting with £3.53 pending. Pretty confident we'll get the remaining 42p before Monday evening!

Queen_of_the_Hive

Hello diary, Happy Tuesday!

Its been a pretty busy but steady time in the hive. The kids are now back at school and settling down in their respective classes. So far no hitches but then again its only been Friday and Monday lol! I've been pretty heads down with work too and have been really trying to be consistent with running, small savings, meal prep and other stuff. Being consistent I do feel a bit happier, in control of sorts and that aspects of life is improving.

But CC debt wise - no new updates really and I have felt the banks are winning and its easy for it to feel impossible. But some progress has been made. I'm trying to snowball the worst card. At its height it was costing £170p/m in interest and its now down to £113 p/m in a combination of paying down debt and shifting some of it on to a balance transfer card. The combined outstanding debt hasn't changed as much as I have liked. But I will not give up and will continue to turn up each day and chip away a penny at a time.

Last weekend we had a nice day in a bigger town closer to us. There was a weekend street festival going on. We saw a little of the festival, had a cheap pub lunch and OH bought us a dress in the sales. Its one of my friends 50th this coming weekend and as most of my pretty clothes are too small I needed something a bit smarter to wear.

Today its a normal working day, lots going on and need to pop to the shops at lunchtime to buy a bra. Mine are pretty dire, looking for one to fit the goods in and look good for the dress.

Queen_of_the_Hive

Hello, happy evening.

I've been having one of those hormone overload days and everything has been rubbish. Was meant to be at a dance class tonight but our stupid cat unbenowingly followed us (not something new) but he'd never come onto the main path and main road before. We live a couple of streets away from a pretty busy road. Myself and OH had already crossed and was on the other side when I heard a very familiar meow. I totally freeked, the cat ran across the road to us and dived straight into bushes. In a panic i'm trying to get the cat out. Thankfully only took a few mins before he was apprehended and we then had a stress about crossing the road back with cat in hand without him getting spooked and leaping out of my arms. Luckily all was good and we made it home in one peace. It honestly was a bit too much and I just gave up on the dance class. OH said my face said it all and he didn't even try to persuade me to join him. So sat at home feeling pretty sorry for myself. Today was pants, tomorrow will be better.

In a bit more positive news - last week finally sorted out moving over from expensive mobile phone contract costing £24 p/m to a sim only deal picked up through an MSE code with a new to us provider. Its now costing us less than £3 p/m and will move to under £7 p/m after the special offer price ends. This will make a big difference in the monthly budget. Unsure yet what the total outstanding balance will be for the last bill but happy so far with new provider and OH is considering moving across to new provider too.

As part of the weekly meal planning i've been getting back to making home made soup. I make a batch of it, portion it out and freeze the excess. So am quietly building up a little stock of soups in the freezer to choose from. This week's was courgette and blue cheese with peas and red onion. Very yummy!

debtfreewannabe321

Morning QofH just catching up. Naughty kitty!! I was reading thinking noooo don't run out in the road 🙈 glad he stayed in the bush and waited for you! Sorry you missed your dance class though 🙁.

Well done on getting cc down in interest I think that really makes a difference to how quickly it can be paid off. We have a cc debt all on 0% at the mo. We should be paying it down even if just TT at the end of the week or whatever. But I'll wait for a bit to see how our budget settles on new income…

I've got on my meal plan this coming week three different soups. I miss my soup maker so I'll have to make it by hand. Therefore I think I'd rather just do it all in one big cooking session. But I'm going to do the same as you, portion it off and freeze to build up a bit of an inventory in the freezer.

Queen_of_the_Hive

Hi @debtfreewannabe321 - aw thank you, yeah I agree it hasn't felt like much progress but doing the big balance transfer has really helped bring down the interest. It feels so slow at times, am not patient enough! 😄

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82130806#Comment_82130806

Queen_of_the_Hive

We made it to Friday! Hurrah!

The sun is shining and finally able to sit and write a quick diary update before work. This week has been a just ok, quite vanilla dull week (sorry!). Kids first full week in school. The battle to find out whats going on, how its going etc has commenced again. The young one is particulary difficult to talk to on the phone. Back in the city with them next weekend so hopefully find out more. The bit of info I did gleem out of him was its going good.

This week i've found we've been sticking to the meal planner a bit better and OH agrees that it is working well. We haven't popped to the shops at all except one time to buy bread and milk which I will say is a defo win. Tonight I need to spend a bit of time going through the freezer and writing next week's list. It'll be quite similar to this week in eating stuff from the freezer mainly. We go to the city the back end of next week anyway so its a bitty week. I do though want to try to have a plan for meals over the weekend we are in the city as this is our pressure point. I try to take some dried stuff from home and have at least a meal or two using our electric pan in the accomodation.

Last night we discovered all the series of X Files are now on C5 on demand platform and we loved watching the very first episode. I used to love this program and looking forward to showing it to the kids.

Money wise - its a sucker on the S&S ISA given the rising oil price etc. September going to be bumpy. I might need to re-think my plan to take out some money for bills from it this month. 'Free cash' is not that great tbh. But I may have had some promising news. Work have offered to extend my extra hours for a few more months. Its not signed and sealed but may take us up to Easter next year! The busy period normally starts from July so it is looking a bit more rosy. Current extra hours are only unitl end of Oct.

Great weekend ahead planned. There is a big festival type event happening in our town this weekend. Most is free and we also have a very quick trip to the city for a friends 50th. We've been very sensible and instead of booking a hotel we are taking an afternoon train there and the night bus home. Monday we will feel it though…! Right better go, time for a quick walk before starting work.

Queen_of_the_Hive

Happy Tuesday!

So party on the weekend was fabulous! It was awesome to see friends and have a well overdue catch up. We are catching up again in Nov for a pre-christmas get together slash another friends smaller 50th gathering. The venue was new to us, set in a micro brewery so we must go there again soon. Nightbus worked well but yesterday was tired. One benefit of WFH was that I could take an nap at lunchtime. Slept like a baby for an hour!!

On Sunday I spent on the CC to buy accomodation for Oct trips to the city. Used a discount code from one of the budget hotels which meant a £25 discount on the hotel stay. Also booked hostel accomodation too. Going to put extra into CC to bring the balance down. Still need to book train tickets but we are part way there.

Tomorrow evening is my next journey to the city so today is focused on work, packing and dance class. Very busy day in all.